My thoughts on Shadows of Valentia

[Yula]

Hello everyone, you have known me under many names(Neko, Yula, Latias, Xelon, Thran) and while I do have a reputation for being quite negative around here. I am here to give my honest thoughts on Fire Emblem Echoes. I have beaten the main story and am reserving the Act 6 stuff for when I actually get some of the DLC. That being said, let us get into the meat of this topic.

 

I love Echoes. Just... completely. While yes, it is a flawed game(So is literally every other game in existence as perfection is an ideal that is impossible to truly achieve), it is my favorite in the entire series and proves what I said to be true. If I could automatically end the turns in Gaiden, I'd have loved it completely.

 

For many many years, I've asked for a more realistic Fire Emblem, never had I known that it was sitting under my nose this entire time. Every map was refreshing for me. Instead of most fire emblem games where I wondered who messed with the paint terrain tool, I saw large flat plains, fortresses that made sense, which had choke points that were designed to funnel the attackers into an easily engaged group, while the archers pelted them with arrows. The fortresses were designed to take any advantage away from you and put it into the defenders, just like in reality. I loved every minute of that. The deserts, being some of my most hated maps in the series for being a slow slog through an expansive area turned into some of my favorites. The desert fortress with Wolff being one of my favorite maps in the entire game.

 

The fact that every class in the game had a use for me, I loved that. In most fire emblem games I drop certain classes, but Forsyth and Catria, representatives of the Baron and Falcon Knight classes respectively were at the fight with Duma, I almost never bring armors or fliers outside of the Wyvern knight family into the final bosses. I used the archers with impunity in this game because something that has always bugged me was fixed. I've long asked, "Why are archers limited to 10 feet." To explain that, each square in your average grid based game is a 5 foot by 5 foot square. Archers are generally locked to a 2 space range, meaning that their range is 6-14 feet. But oddly enough, archers could always turn around and smack someone 5 feet away with their arrow, only if they attacked from a diagonal. So the fact that archers just can shoot into melee(Something that was historically done mind you) is an amazing thing and giving them 1-5 range with a bow(0-29 feet) is very refreshing as very rarely did archers stand close to the front line in actual combat.

 

Locking each class to a single weapon type was also somewhat refreshing, as swords were generally a sidearm and if you used them, you had tossed your main weapon away(which was usually a spear or some other polearm). It made it so that each class felt like it had a niche to fill instead of, "Who do I throw this up against."

 

The removal of the weapon triangle, my goodness, that was a very welcome change to the formula for me, as all the weapon triangle does is boil combat for me down to, "Rock-Paper-Scissors." which is boring and not at all tactical. With the removal of it, I didn't have to think about, "Well, I got a sword, so I screw over those brigands over there just because of that." Later in the game, this combined with other things had me pull off strategies that I would never try in another Fire Emblem title, like warping Mathilda into fight Rudolf with the Gradivus and have Forsyth sit there to block his escape to the supplies.

 

The Magic system was an amazingly refreshing change to the series. Having magic be tied to the HP makes sense as you're not just reading these spells from a book, you are casting the spell using your own innate energies. Heck tomes didn't appear in the actual games in the animation til the Tellius games and then the next time was Awakening. Plus it gives a cost to using magic, making you, once again think about your decisions.

 

Now as for the voice acting and fleshing out of the story, as well as the new additions to the game. Love it all, honestly, I ain't got any complaints, but since I'm courteous, I'll place my favorite part of the storyline in a spoiler tag just below. This is end of Act 4 spoilers and Endgame spoilers.

Spoiler

Rudolf on Alm's side is being built up to be this big bad, while the same is being done on Celica's side. However, Duma is quickly revealed to be the big bad in Celica's route and it goes as far as to explain why. Then when Alm kills Rudolf, you realize that Rudolf only played the part of the bad guy in order to bring out Alm and Celica, so that they would one day become powerful enough to defeat Duma who was going mad. And even then, Duma, who had been going mad once defeated is all like, "It's cool bro. I give the future to you humans, just don't disturb my sister or I as we slumber." It shows that neither of the villains were actually evil to begin with, one just played the part of it because he had a Xanatos Gambit(Alm fails, Rudolf takes over Valentia and kills Duma. Alm succeeds, Rudolf is proud of his son, Duma is killed, Rigel is defeated and Valentia is unified) and the other had just gone insane. The way this is presented is glorious and even though I knew that this is what was going on because I browse the wiki a lot, it was very well presented and kept me engaged.

 

Before the release of Fire Emblem Echoes I said that I would enjoy it, no matter how it was received. I do absolutely enjoy it for the story, the character interactions, the realistic feel of the whole maps, and the fact that the conflict seems reasonable instead of, "Lol, I'm an asshole for no reason so I'm just going to attack my neighboring nation." If I had to give this game a score, it's an easy 9/10, with my own seal of approval. This is the best Fire Emblem game I've played yet and and I can see myself returning to it again and again. It was honestly a refreshing change of pace for the series and I hope more games in the vein of Gaiden come about.

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

2 minutes ago, Thran Starcrod said:

For many many years, I've asked for a more realistic Fire Emblem, never had I known that it was sitting under my nose this entire time. Every map was refreshing for me. Instead of most fire emblem games where I wondered who messed with the paint terrain tool, I saw large flat plains, fortresses that made sense, which had choke points that were designed to funnel the attackers into an easily engaged group, while the archers pelted them with arrows. The fortresses were designed to take any advantage away from you and put it into the defenders, just like in reality. I loved every minute of that. The deserts, being some of my most hated maps in the series for being a slow slog through an expansive area turned into some of my favorites. The desert fortress with Wolff being one of my favorite maps in the entire game.

I'll agree that they're realistic, and that's what I thought too when I saw those maps. It makes sense in real life to design forts that way, and to defend them with a billion archers.

But holy fuck it's not fun.

[Nobody]

15 minutes ago, Thran Starcrod said:

Before the release of Fire Emblem Echoes I said that I would enjoy it, no matter how it was received.

This is so weird to me, deciding to enjoy a game before you even touched it. And I say this as someone who likes Echoes better than he expected to. I do disagree with most of your thoughts on gameplay, but to each their own. The game is really fun either way, and it's interesting how different it is from the other fire emblem games.

Edited May 25, 2017 by Nobody

[Yula]

1 minute ago, Nobody said:

This is so weird to me, deciding to enjoy a game before you even touch it. And I say this as someone who like Echoes better than he expected to. I do disagree with most of your thoughts on gameplay, but to each their own. The game is really fun either way, and it's interesting how different it is from the other fire emblem games.

To be fair, it is a remake of Gaiden, which I already enjoyed what little I played of it.

Edited May 25, 2017 by Thran Starcrod

[SuperIb]

30 minutes ago, Thran Starcrod said:

For many many years, I've asked for a more realistic Fire Emblem, never had I known that it was sitting under my nose this entire time. Every map was refreshing for me. Instead of most fire emblem games where I wondered who messed with the paint terrain tool, I saw large flat plains, fortresses that made sense, which had choke points that were designed to funnel the attackers into an easily engaged group, while the archers pelted them with arrows. The fortresses were designed to take any advantage away from you and put it into the defenders, just like in reality. I loved every minute of that. The deserts, being some of my most hated maps in the series for being a slow slog through an expansive area turned into some of my favorites. The desert fortress with Wolff being one of my favorite maps in the entire game.

This is pretty much how I felt on the maps. That and they all looked like very nice maps to me. The terrain, the textures, etc. etc. were all quite lovely and helped me to enjoy them even more. I really liked how natural they felt.

[poptdp]

I agree with a lot of this. I like the removal of weapon triangle. I like how archers have 1-5 range and realistic accuracy. I like how magic takes from your health. All very realistic and same with map design. Every class has its place and I feel like I'm really needing to strategise more. I also like the removal of the pair up system  I hated that and tried to never use it in previous games.

As for my gripes with the game, they include:

- Needs more map variety. Most maps are just plains. In Conquest every single map was different and varied greatly. 

- Unit balancing and need for grinding. I feel like I am primarily using only 3-4 units that are carrying the team. A few bad level up growths and most of my team have been left behind and barely used (I got really unlucky with Forsyth, Python and Clive)

[Doof]

Just want to point out that you can turn on Smart End for your turns in the Options section, so that turns end automatically.

But I agree with most of your points. I think I'm ruining the game's challenge for me because I'm weak for grinding lol gay joke      but overall.... I do love the game a lot! 

[Yula]

6 minutes ago, Doof said:

Just want to point out that you can turn on Smart End for your turns in the Options section, so that turns end automatically.

I did. That's why the comment of, "If Gaiden had auto ending turns, I'd love it." instead of, "Why didn't they have auto ending turns."

[Doof]

Just now, Thran Starcrod said:

I did. That's why the comment of, "If Gaiden had auto ending turns, I'd love it." instead of, "Why didn't they have auto ending turns."

Is it too late to say I can't read

thats embarrasing oops

[MediocreLee]

I also enjoyed that big story reveal at the end of Act 4, I thought it was pretty refreshing to see.