E3 Gameplay

[Etrurian emperor]

1 minute ago, Jedi said:

Its funny in terms of Jugdral because us Westerners generally have more regard for them than the Japanese. Which is probably part of why. 

FE focuses more on its Japanese audience usually.

I think focusing more on the Japanese audience was somewhat more justified when the west was a mere fringe demographic but those days have been over for a long time now. I think Japanese series should start taking that into account more. 

[a bear]

9 minutes ago, Etrurian emperor said:

I get the logic of ignoring Tellius which sold badly, Jugdral which most fans haven't played and Magvel for being a side story but I do wonder what Elibe has done to deserve getting ignored. It successfully brought a Japanese only series to the west and a lot of the older fans started with Blazing sword. 

It's funny since Elibe got tons of love in Heroes alongside the same three other games represented in Warriors.

[Jedi]

Just now, Etrurian emperor said:

I think focusing more on the Japanese audience was somewhat more justified when the west was a mere fringe demographic but those days have been over for a long time now. I think Japanese series should start taking that into account more. 

And it is with Awakening & Fates, the fact of the matter is, FE in the West was very small time even with its decent enough success with Blazing Sword. 

I mean I love every FE and all, but their choices in terms of what games to focus makes sense in terms to appeal to the broadest demographics.

[Arthur97]

1 minute ago, Etrurian emperor said:

I think focusing more on the Japanese audience was somewhat more justified when the west was a mere fringe demographic but those days have been over for a long time now. I think Japanese series should start taking that into account more. 

Hopefully they'll learn eventually, but Nintendo can be kind of slow to learn.

[Etrurian emperor]

3 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

Um, so what?

Its a singular story in a game that has (largely) the same graphics and engine as Blazing sword, it appeared barely more then a year after that game and it sits between Elibe and Tellius. 

To me that comes off as a side project.

Edited June 14, 2017 by Etrurian emperor

[Anacybele]

3 minutes ago, Jedi said:

I mean I love every FE and all, but their choices in terms of what games to focus makes sense in terms to appeal to the broadest demographics.

Except it would appeal to even MORE fans if it also catered to those who like the other games? Really, I can't fathom why IS doesn't want to take advantage of the popularity of characters not from those games in addition to catering to the Archanea, Awakening, and Fates crowds. Even if they're DLC, a lot of people would throw money at the game to get Ike, Lyn, Ephraim, etc.

Edited June 14, 2017 by Anacybele

[Etrurian emperor]

6 minutes ago, Jedi said:

And it is with Awakening & Fates, the fact of the matter is, FE in the West was very small time even with its decent enough success with Blazing Sword. 

I mean I love every FE and all, but their choices in terms of what games to focus makes sense in terms to appeal to the broadest demographics.

Help! I'm getting quoted more times then I can keep up with!

I'm not quite sure.  To me it comes off like Archenea is so strongly represented every time purely because of the high opinion the Japanese have of it. To the west its mostly known for either Smash which doesn't entirely count or Shadow dragon which is generally considered underwhelming. Archenea getting so much representation compared to the other games seems like undue favoritism to the Japanese fans. 

I also don't think its the broadest demographic because a huge chunk gets entirely underrepresented. If you're a fan of the more nuanced characters of the GBA and Tellius games you're pretty much out of luck. Fates and Awakening cater to the same demographic of the fandom so only one of those would have done it for that crowd. 

Edited June 14, 2017 by Etrurian emperor

[Arthur97]

Well, Archanea comes with Marth so there's that.

[Etrurian emperor]

5 minutes ago, Arthur97 said:

Well, Archanea comes with Marth so there's that.

They do but they have come with Marth multiple times now and still lag behind every other cast in the franchise. So its a little bit of a double frustration. On one hand they get special treatment while at the same time they largely refuse to improve themselves. There's some additions. They had some supports in the Japanese only new Mystery and a couple of lines in Heroes but its still to little to overcome their NES handicap. The gaiden cast overcame it so why not they?

That's generally where my kneejerk reaction to those characters come from. They get undue favoritism over better characters and tend to make very poor use of it so I not only miss out but get something inferior in return.

[HK Motendra]

19 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

No, SD failed. That was why New Mystery didn't get localized.

The world may never know why New Mystery wasn't localized. However, blaming it on SD is nothing but a baseless claim that you're only ground is the fact that it happened. If it really failed, then there wouldnt even be ANY remakes afterwards. There is literally no room for debate on this.

[Arthur97]

4 minutes ago, Etrurian emperor said:

They do but they have come with Marth multiple times now and still lag behind every other cast in the franchise. So its a little bit of a double frustration. On one hand they get special treatment while at the same time they largely refuse to improve themselves. There's some additions. They had some supports in the Japanese only new Mystery and a couple of lines in Heroes but its still to little to overcome their NES handicap. The gaiden cast overcame it so why not they?

That's generally where my kneejerk reaction to those characters come from. They get undue favoritism over better characters and tend to make very poor use of it so I not only miss out but get something inferior in return.

The lack of supports in SD certainly doesn't do them any favors. It becomes hard to remember the grunts.

[Jedi]

1 hour ago, Etrurian emperor said:

I'm not quite sure.  To me it comes off like Archenea is so strongly represented every time purely because of the high opinion the Japanese have of it. To the west its mostly known for either Smash which doesn't entirely count or Shadow dragon which is generally considered underwhelming. Archenea getting so much representation compared to the other games seems like undue favoritism to the Japanese fans. 

I also don't think its the broadest demographic because a huge chunk gets entirely underrepresented. If you're a fan of the more nuanced characters of the GBA and Tellius games you're pretty much out of luck. Fates and Awakening cater to the same demographic of the fandom so only one of those would have done it for that crowd. 

The first part of a franchise usually is the one that gets regarded the highest by its original userbase, a series going forward always has to keep their roots in mind or else they might alienate them. Thats what I think anyways. But I see Awakening & Fates getting more than Archenea even in what we have.

I agree that they do give Archenea quite a bit, but sales numbers for FE3, 13 and 14 speak volumes in terms of money. They want to keep making money, I'm aware of Elibe & Tellius's spectacular characters (and Jugdrals), among other things, but Fire Emblem outside of Archenea, Ylisse & Fateslandia are niche. There is a a chunk of fans getting snubbed here, i'm not going to defend that. But the fact of the matter is, Nintendo & Koei-Tecmo are trying to get the biggest fan appealing project they can, and they decided the way to do that would be to appeal to the 3 biggest successes in their franchise. 

Hyrule Warriors focused on only 3D Zeldas, but expanded out with DLC (even then most of the top downs didn't get much), I'm going to guess the same thing will happen here. With the key fan favorites from around the franchise.

Edited June 14, 2017 by Jedi

[The DanMan]

8 hours ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

It's dumb gameplay wise, especially if it stuns named people too. On higher difficulties where even grunts do noticeable damage, this is top level cheese, especially since Xander can't be knocked off his horse.

We finally get to make the mooks experience what it's like fighting people glued to horses... *maniacal laughter*.

[Etrurian emperor]

17 minutes ago, Jedi said:

The first part of a franchise usually is the one that gets regarded the highest by its original userbase, a series going forward always has to keep their roots in mind or else they might alienate them. Thats what I think anyways. But I see Awakening & Fates getting more than Archenea even in what we have.

I agree that they do give Archenea quite a bit, but sales numbers for FE3, 13 and 14 speak volumes in terms of money. They want to keep making money, I'm aware of Elibe & Tellius's spectacular characters (and Jugdrals), among other things, but Fire Emblem outside of Archenea, Ylisse & Fateslandia are niche. There is a a chunk of fans getting snubbed here, i'm not going to defend that. But the fact of the matter is, Nintendo & Koei-Tecmo are trying to get the biggest fan appealing project they can, and they decided the way to do that would be to appeal to the 3 biggest successes in their franchise. 

Hyrule Warriors focused on only 3D Zeldas, but expanded out with DLC (even then most of the top downs didn't get much), I'm going to guess the same thing will happen here. With the key fan favorites from around the franchise.

I do get the reasons for why those games were chosen and from a marketing standpoint I even say I agree. But games consist of both a marketing and an artistic side and artistically I think it is the wrong decision because not a lot can be done with Archeneans compared to the others and Awakening and Fates have the same feel to them. It leads to a balance that's very off.

I understand the logic but I feel its a logic that leads to a flawed outcome regardless of how sound it is. I also think its possible that the logic ends up backfiring on the game. Snubbing any part of the fanbase enforces negative word of mouth and I feel the part that's been snubbed is the most vocal one. I generally see a lot of negativity regarding this game.

I think DLC ala Hyrule warriors brings a problem of its own. A lot of HW dlc characters weren't involved in the story so we could see a scenario where the black knight and Alvis appear, are amazing but are very minor compared to more sub par villains like Gharnef and Gooron who will get the story prominence they can't really make good use of. It will be a cute little extra, fun for gameplay but still wasted potential that costs money. 

Edited June 14, 2017 by Etrurian emperor

[YotsuMaboroshi]

Let's be honest, the moment the developers decided to limit the cast is when they 'snubbed' part of the fanbase.  No matter what restrictions they decided on, some part of the fanbase was going to be butthurt that X character didn't get in (see Smash).  The only real difference is that people would have been hopeful up until release, then get disappointed.

Would a game focusing strictly on the 'popular characters' appeal to more fans?  Probably.  Would that roster be balanced enough to allow the weapon triangle to be a major factor for gameplay?  No, because generally speaking the more popular characters tend to be swordsmen or mages (which is natural given FE's general weapon bias).

They (probably) made a gameplay decision first (balance out the weapon triangle) and then chose the focus they thought would appeal the most.  I personally think SD, Awakening and Blazing Sword would have been overall better, but obviously the developers didn't agree.

[Interdimensional Observer]

A couple words of mine own:

Chrom can have Aether no problem, because there is nothing stopping Ike from having it too. All three Links have spin attacks after all. Ike, being the original lord to get the awesome marriage of the Heavens above- of the healing Sun and the penetrating Moon, linked by the numerous Stars- can have the Aether of Aethers- the most over-the-top and powerful rendition of it.

I profess general agreement with Etrurian Emperor. And add that sadly, depth isn't necessarily something the masses are looking for. Otherwise we'd have in a heartbeat. Based on popular tastes, we'd be more likely to get .

Making decisions based solely on popularity can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Excluding characters in one game due to supposed unpopularity, gives an excuse to leave them out from another, because if these characters were popular, you'd think they'd have showed up in the prior game. This creates a cycle unbroken until all the more popular characters at included (this likely won't happen, I'm just giving it as a hypothetical), but. Isn't a point of marketing and advertising that of making things popular when they aren't already? Sure it doesn't always work- Azura flopped despite attempts to sell her as Lucina 2.0, but they could try to popularize Siggy and Eli and Ikey-poo and their retinues too. KT and IS should gamble a little . (Can we have more FEmojis?)

[Tsak]

Alright so who likes any of the gameplay seen so far or we just gonna keep comparing chrom to ike as if it really matters what moves each of them do? Chrom can do aether all he wants? He learns in it awakening so I don't see why it's a big deal? Anyways who else noticed ryoma doing the crit animation from fates? That was pretty dope lol

[Anacybele]

We were talking about Aether animations though, not specifically the skill.

And yeah, I did notice Ryoma kicking people in the gut like he does in Fates when he crits. XD I love it!

[Jedi]

1 hour ago, Etrurian emperor said:

I do get the reasons for why those games were chosen and from a marketing standpoint I even say I agree. But games consist of both a marketing and an artistic side and artistically I think it is the wrong decision because not a lot can be done with Archeneans compared to the others and Awakening and Fates have the same feel to them. It leads to a balance that's very off.

The Archeneans mostly having minor backstory and small bits of character allows for the most creativity however from a design standpoint. There isn't as much of a baseline that "has to be fulfilled if you put x in" and can lead to some more unpredictability. 

You seem to really hate Archanea despite it having quite a few beloved characters of the fanbase. 

Edited June 14, 2017 by Jedi

[Etrurian emperor]

17 minutes ago, Jedi said:

The Archeneans mostly having minor backstory and small bits of character allows for the most creativity however from a design standpoint. There isn't as much of a baseline that "has to be fulfilled if you put x in" and can lead to some more unpredictability. 

You seem to really hate Archanea despite it having quite a few beloved characters of the fanbase. 

Its more like a very aggressive indifference coupled with annoyance about them being favored again and again. I suppose that's easy to morph into dislike if it keeps going and going.
Where most people see beloved characters I merely see worse versions of characters that came after them. Gharnef has less going for him then Nergal and Manfroy, Cain isn't as interesting as the other red knights and the successors of Ogma tend to have more elaborate designs and a bigger number of supports. Because of how reliant Fire emblem is about archtypes very few Archeneans manage to escape this trap. Hardin is a good example of an Archenean that does manage to stand out as his own character.

I feel the same reliance of archtypes would decrease the chances of those better successors if the Akeneans are already in. Why use Nergal in a crossover when Gharnef already fills the same role. What can Gerik add if Ogma is already doing the big blond mercenary stuff.

 

 

Edited June 14, 2017 by Etrurian emperor

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

I think the key difference between this game and Hyrule Warriors is that the Zelda series is supposed to be one giant timeline instead of separate games with separate universes (supposedly). As a result, the fandom is much less divided than ours, because every game there's always a Link, Zelda and Ganon, and the key things that separate each Zelda game don't lie as heavily on story and characters, but rather gameplay mechanics and gimmicks.

Hyrule Warriors gave Link, Zelda and Ganon new designs, justified by the structure and lore of Zelda games, then sprinkled in some originals and a few fan favourites. It worked really well because the core cast of the Triforce trio was the most important, and what they had to get right the most, and they certainly did. The originals were cool, and the other characters were well-received by the fandom overall. There was salt about missing people, but nowhere near as what it is (and will be) for FE Warriors, because it's all one big cohesive thing.

Edited June 14, 2017 by SatsumaFSoysoy

[Arthur97]

32 minutes ago, Tsak said:

Alright so who likes any of the gameplay seen so far or we just gonna keep comparing chrom to ike as if it really matters what moves each of them do? Chrom can do aether all he wants? He learns in it awakening so I don't see why it's a big deal? Anyways who else noticed ryoma doing the crit animation from fates? That was pretty dope lol

I haven't been able to watch much, but it looks fine and similar to HW which I am fine with.

[Raguna]

While I understand the points being made, this is just a pill that we have to swallow. I think we can all agree that we wanted characters from all over and not just the ones with the most presence right now. I spoke to some friends of mine who play FE but not enough to be called fans and they weren't aware that only the dudes from Awakening/Fates and Marth's games would be the primary ones. They aren't that invested but want to play it, and I think this allows for things like what Nintendo's pulling slide under the banner of  indifference. 

The inclusion of  FE 1 and 3 is something that feels necessary outside of complementing Marth. Them being included gives a chance to actually develop what little character they were afforded anywhere else they've appeared. I don't believe they'll do anything incredibly astounding due to my low expectations.but the Archanea dudes have room to grow in places where the Awakening/Fates can't and those dudes had a whole slew of opportunities to develop their characters in supports.

Honestly Nintendo missed a big opportunity, to try to expand the lesser known of the series into a more public consciousness but I may be speaking out of line since we've only got six members on the roster. In this age of remakes, ports and remasters, don't you want to hype up past characters in some way for when they're introduced? It gives something to look forward to and avoiding the same drivel of always. 

 

[Book Bro]

I've already commented on what I think about the roster limitations, but regarding the gameplay, I just was not as impressed as I was when Hyrule Warriors was shown. FE has so much stuff that may be in this game that wasn't shown but really should've been. Where is the enemy variety? I'm sure Wyverns and Pegasi are in (maybe even some monsters) so why not show some of that? It seemed so dull to only see a bunch of generic soldiers. Where are the bosses? Why not show more stages taken from the main games? Why are the special moves basically just "bigger slashes"? The only cool one was Corrin's. Why is the interface so bland? Why were no features explained or really shown off? And I still say it was dumb to show only sword users, especially after their previous comment. Also, Xander's horse moves very oddly. 

Edited June 14, 2017 by Book Bro

[Interdimensional Observer]

1 hour ago, Jedi said:

The Archeneans mostly having minor backstory and small bits of character allows for the most creativity however from a design standpoint. There isn't as much of a baseline that "has to be fulfilled if you put x in" and can lead to some more unpredictability. 

 

Contrariwise, the better developed characters of Tellius and such means less effort to try to come up with ideas for. Gatrie's in-battle quotes and overall styling have easy answers between his pickup artistry and gullibility. What does Draug/Macellan/Dolph/Roger/Lorenz have in comparison? And Merric, though certainly among the better Archaneans (and I like him), still has less, at best only as much, to go on compared to his archetypal successor Soren. And don't get me started on Lewyn.