Awakening or Conquest?

[바보kim]

Hi all! I'm new to this forum, and I'm trying to figure out which 3ds Fire Emblem I'd like to buy between Awakening and Conquest. I'm leaning to Awakening but I have played Birthright and enjoyed it. Personally, I value story and interesting characters, but still want a challenge. Could you help recommend one of the 2 to me? Thank you all in advance! (And sorry if I wasted your time!)

[Mandokarla]

So, Awakening's story is far and away better than Conquest's. You will not find very many, if any, people who will think the opposite. As for gameplay, Conquest's gameplay is difficult in a very rewarding way for 75% of the game. There's a cluster of three maps in the mid-late game that are gimmicky at best and dumb as hell at worst. The rest ranges from decent to excellent, Chapter 10 Conquest is my favorite chapter in all of Fire Emblem.

If you buy Awakening, start on Hard. That's the only way to get a challenge. Awakening is, in my opinion, balanced poorly. Normal can be done while sleeping, Hard is decent, Lunatic is bullshit, and Lunatic+ is...worse. Awakening's difficulty also comes in the form of a design choice many people hate -- ambush spawns, when enemies show up and move on the same turn. It's pretty shitty, though the game usually warns you that they're coming a few turns before. You just don't know exactly when, or where, they'll appear. 

If it's your first 3DS Fire Emblem game, I think Awakening is the better option overall. From there, I'd get Birthright and Conquest in that order (I say that because I played BR after CQ and Revelations, and that kinda made it lackluster to me in terms of gameplay). I would recommend never getting Revelations, but that's entirely my bias, as I feel the game shouldn't exist at all, for a multitude of reasons. 

[CatManThree]

11 minutes ago, Mandokarla said:

I would recommend never getting Revelations.

I'd recommend that as well. Revelations overall is incredibly rushed and its pretty obvious. The story is pretty poor and the balancing of all the different units is hilariously bad. The only reason I would personally see for buying the game is if you really want to at least play it for yourself, want to get all the available stuff for the my castle mechanic, or simply want to read the supports between characters from the two games (which are actually rather fun to read I might add). 

[Mandokarla]

Just now, CatManThree said:

I'd recommend that as well. Revelations overall is incredibly rushed and its pretty obvious. The story is pretty poor and the balancing of all the different units is hilariously bad. The only reason I would personally see for buying the game is if you really want to at least play it for yourself, want to get all the available stuff for the my castle mechanic, or simply want to read the supports between characters from the two games (which are actually rather fun to read I might add). 

All of the supports are on Youtube anyway. The game also further demonstrates the hilariously obvious lack of moral grey area in Fates, with the "clearly good" Birthright units being forced on you early, and all the Conquest units worth mentioning come later. Like, Odin, the unit that makes Conquest Lunatic borderline easy for the midgame, comes in chapter 18 or some shit. No. Don't keep Odin and Laslow away from me that long. 

[CatManThree]

14 minutes ago, Mandokarla said:

All of the supports are on Youtube anyway. The game also further demonstrates the hilariously obvious lack of moral grey area in Fates, with the "clearly good" Birthright units being forced on you early, and all the Conquest units worth mentioning come later. Like, Odin, the unit that makes Conquest Lunatic borderline easy for the midgame, comes in chapter 18 or some shit. No. Don't keep Odin and Laslow away from me that long. 

Not to divert the conversation, but there's also the fact that every unit in the entire game keeps the same bases they had in the original counterpart. Making any unit who appeared in conquest who isn't a prepromote or a royal completely useless unless you spend time grinding them up. Which is rather time consuming.

Edited March 8, 2018 by CatManThree

[Ertrick36]

Some of these people ought to actually read the OP before spouting opinions out of thin air...

If you believe the official descriptions of Conquest - the ones that tell you that you're working to fix a bad country from the inside - you are gonna be as sorely disappointed in its story as I was.  It is, undoubtedly, one of the worst stories in the series, and I'm confident that the only reason some people forgive the story's faults is because of how challenging and fun it is for them.  It starts out good, but about mid-way through plummets into oblivion.

Awakening, being my first game, offered... a reasonable amount of challenge.  I think if you played Birthright on anything besides Lunatic Classic (or Phoenix Mode, since that doesn't exist in Awakening), you'll get a reasonable challenge if you match that difficulty in your Awakening playthrough.  I actually enjoyed the story for what it is; there were moments when I first played through the game that stirred emotions in me.  And I liked the characters as well, but pretty much every FE cast has at least okay characters, in spite of what some bitter people might suggest.

Revelation...  Is very much geared more towards the player that wants to be able to use pretty much all the units from both Birthright and Conquest.  It's not worth it for the story, and there isn't much natural or fair challenge in it.  It's good for stuff such as PMU's (Pick-My-Unit, where you let other people pick units and their classes for you to play as through the whole game) and maybe some self-imposed challenges, but has frustrating map design and a half-baked story.

Basically...  Both Conquest and Awakening offer good characters, Revelation offers most Fates characters, Conquest has the most challenging gameplay, Awakening has around the same level of difficulty as Birthright but with less balance, Conquest had a terrible story, and Awakening has a better story than Birthright.  I'll also warn that Conquest is not very beginner friendly; you cannot grind at all without DLC, so if your units turn out bad, they're just gonna be bad and you're not gonna get very many resources.  And Revelation is only good for being able to use a bunch of characters and mess around with their possible builds and new potential Hoshidan-Nohrian relationships.

[GoldPaladin]

 

As far as story goes, Awakening's story is light years ahead of Conquest. That's not to say Awakening's story is one of the better in the series, as it clearly is not, but much better than Conquest. 

 

In terms of gameplay, Conquest easily wins out. Awakening has some of the worst map design in the whole series, contrary to where Conquest is the opposite in this department with brilliant map design. Awakening is a flawed, yet still very fun game. What a lot of people don't like is the endless grinding and poorly designed maps. 

 

For a beginner, you're probably better off starting with Awakening or Birthright. Awakening itself despite it's flaws, is quite beginner friendly and is where a lot of us began with the series. 

[anniec8711]

Conquest cuz  you can capture Rallyman, a Master Ninja who does guaranteed 40% Damage, and other cool enemies with unique skills.

But seriously, if you're looking for a challenge get Conquest.

[Xander]

The stories are similar, and not the strong point in either game, though Awakening's is a bit more solid. If you're newer to the series I would definitely recommend Awakening, as it's easier, cheaper (you don't have to buy three different routes, the only DLC that you want is for farming gold and exp), and the supports are fantastic and make you fall in love with the characters. It's one of the few fire emblems where getting 100% for the support conversations is fun. I feel like overall, it's a better representation of fire emblem and you'll be able to get a feel for whether or not you like the series with it, rather than jumping headfirst into a game like conquest, either getting frustrated at the difficulty or spending $80 for all three routes and possibly finding out you don't like one or more of them as they all focus on different aspects of the game, and individually don't feel like a complete fire emblem.

[SavageVolug]

Ok here's the thing. I go back and forth between Awakening and Fates as to which is better. Both games have characters that are very gimicky and one dimensional but Awakening has at the very least a more consistant story, Fates' story is a mess as multiple players of Fates have pointed out in various other forums. Both games have some characters that I like however in terms of % of the roster I would say that the % of characters I like for Awakening is higher than that of Fates even though Fates has more characters. The reason is for the most part I only really like and enjoy one half of Fates' roster whereas while there are characters I like more for the most part I like all of the characters with just a few exceptions.

Awakening's story while basic is more consistent, also there is more variety in the types of tomes each elemental tome has a few variants. Fates by contrast just has magic you can just barely say that they have differant elements. The only element lacking in Awakening was light but each element had at least 3 differant tomes per element. The world map also is A LOT easier to understand than Fates'

In conclussion both games are fun to play but most of the appeal for Fates comes I think from how characters can be customized in both their skill set and class. I know the biggest reason I play Fates is because I can have more of X unit than I can in Awakening. Awakening while having customization has a better thought out and therefore more consistent story, it also has aspects that I miss in Fates.

[Shadow Mir]

On 3/15/2018 at 8:43 PM, GoldPaladin said:

Awakening has some of the worst map design in the whole series

>Favorite Fire Emblem Game: Genealogy of the Holy War

...What. I find this hilarious coming from someone who likes one of the few FEs that do worse - and I do mean much worse - in the map design department. Also, I generally find the map design complaints blown out of proportion. It's not like every map takes forever to get through.

On 3/7/2018 at 8:06 PM, CatManThree said:

Not to divert the conversation, but there's also the fact that every unit in the entire game keeps the same bases they had in the original counterpart. Making any unit who appeared in conquest who isn't a prepromote or a royal completely useless unless you spend time grinding them up. Which is rather time consuming.

Not entirely true - the retainers of the Nohrian princes are leveled up. Also, Sakura and Hayato get a few level ups (more than a few, in the case of the latter).

[GoldPaladin]

20 hours ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

>Favorite Fire Emblem Game: Genealogy of the Holy War

...What. I find this hilarious coming from someone who likes one of the few FEs that do worse - and I do mean much worse - in the map design department. Also, I generally find the map design complaints blown out of proportion. It's not like every map takes forever to get through.

 

What does my favorite FE game have to do with this discussion? I said Awakening has poor map design because it does. It has nothing to do with Holy War's map design. Even the biggest fans of Holy War often admit that the maps are flawed. The giant maps are something you either love or hate but that's not the point of this discussion. This topic is about Awakening and Conquest, not Holy War. I'm sure you'd be angry if I quoted you in a random topic and told you that your opinion is irrelevant because of how disappointing Fates was to a lot of us. 

 

 

 

Edited March 18, 2018 by GoldPaladin

[anniec8711]

9 hours ago, GoldPaladin said:

This topic is about Awakening and Conquest, not Holy War. I'm sure you'd be angry if I quoted you in a random topic and told you that your opinion is irrelevant because of how disappointing Fates was to a lot of us. 

Don't take it personal.  This is what he does.  If you browse around the threads I'm sure you'd find many examples of his trademark comments.

And as for you@Levant Mir Celestia, where the hell have you been?  I can't welcome all these new members alone.  I need your help dawg!

[Shadow Mir]

10 hours ago, GoldPaladin said:

 

What does my favorite FE game have to do with this discussion? I said Awakening has poor map design because it does. It has nothing to do with Holy War's map design. Even the biggest fans of Holy War often admit that the maps are flawed. The giant maps are something you either love or hate but that's not the point of this discussion. This topic is about Awakening and Conquest, not Holy War. I'm sure you'd be angry if I quoted you in a random topic and told you that your opinion is irrelevant because of how disappointing Fates was to a lot of us. 

 

 

 

You have a point. But most of the complaints I see about Fates are based on its story, whereas my complaints about Genealogy revolve around its gameplay. I just find the game rather hard to play, in no small part thanks to the maps. Not to say that the maps are my only complaint - but they either enable or amplify the other problems the game has.

Edited March 18, 2018 by Levant Mir Celestia

[GoldPaladin]

12 hours ago, anniec8711 said:

Don't take it personal.  This is what he does.  If you browse around the threads I'm sure you'd find many examples of his trademark comments.

And as for you@Levant Mir Celestia, where the hell have you been?  I can't welcome all these new members alone.  I need your help dawg!

Noted after a bit of browsing. Seems to have a fetish for bashing Holy War despite admitting he's never played it. That's like if I came on here just to tell everyone how bad Revelations is, even though I've never played it but have been told by a number of people how much they despised it. I'd rather actually play something before deciding if I hate it or not. People used to tell me how 'bad' Thracia 776 was, and I completely forgot that after playing it and finding the game to be enjoyable. 

[Tsak]

Hmm that's a tough one. I haven't played either in a bit of time, but i'd still recommend awakening over conquest.

Awakening has a semi decent story and fairly fun gameplay (I'd say it's worst aspect is maybe map decision and difficulty is a bit wonky on lunatic)
You already have birthright so you've got your share of fates, so i'd just broaden the spectrum. Conquest is very challenging and pretty solid overall as an experience (the story itself is goofy so you just focus on the gameplay and you'll be fine)

[Shadow Mir]

On 3/19/2018 at 4:14 AM, GoldPaladin said:

Noted after a bit of browsing. Seems to have a fetish for bashing Holy War despite admitting he's never played it. That's like if I came on here just to tell everyone how bad Revelations is, even though I've never played it but have been told by a number of people how much they despised it. I'd rather actually play something before deciding if I hate it or not. People used to tell me how 'bad' Thracia 776 was, and I completely forgot that after playing it and finding the game to be enjoyable. 

I dunno about you, but I can ignore a bad story. I cannot - and will not - turn a blind eye to bad gameplay. And Genealogy's gameplay looks terrible from where I'm standing, what with the lack of trading, the unit bound money, and unit balance that makes frigging Revelation look good (unit balance in Genealogy in a nutshell: if you don't have a horse, a holy weapon, or Pursuit, you're automatically bad, or at least inferior. If you have all three, welcome to the best units club. And that's not even getting into the laughable balance between the weapon types. The maps don't help because they just make horses even better, knowing you need them to save villages from being ransacked, while foot units practically get invalidated. Speaking of which, the fact that bandits almost always start near or on top of villages is yet another questionable design choice.) Aside from the negative impact on balance, the gameplay also suffers because the maps make the game a giant slog to play. I don't have the time to play a game that's nothing but a massive trial of monotony. As for Thracia, all I need to know to determine whether or not it's worth playing is the fact that healing staves can miss (need a hint? It makes it not worth playing). And that's hardly the only gripe I have with it.

Edited March 21, 2018 by Levant Mir Celestia

[ashlyn]

Awakening is better. I found it to be more challenging and had a better story than Conquest did. I also liked the characters in Awakening better than the ones in Conquest. It was easier for me to like them and become attached to them than the characters from Conquest, who were just really...odd, I guess is the best way to put it. It also offers more gameplay than Conquest, which is pretty important if you really value the gameplay you're getting from it. 

[Dainank [Archive]]

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