Together RPG: Fire Emblem
This time we're going to take a look at one of the oldest SRPG franchises out there: Fire Emblem. Originally released in Japan on the Famicom it was relatively unknown in the US. There was a preview of Genealogy of the Holy War in an issue of Nintendo Power, but otherwise it was only known to those who sought out the various untranslated Japanese RPGs for emulation and translation patches. Then when Super Smash Brothers Melee came out there were two characters who were unlockable: Marth and Roy. Marth was the star of the first Fire Emblem game, and Roy was the star of the upcoming GBA Fire Emblem game. While Roy's game never came to the US, interest in the thanks to these cameos meant that the prequel did see a release in the US, and barring one exception we have gotten every release. So this time we'll be playing that very game which got the West involved in Fire Emblem. Additionally, the latest game, Fire Emblem Fates, comes out in the middle of this month, which is what I'll be playing.
The Fire Emblem gaes are strategy games with very heavy RPG elements. Your units gain levels which affect their combat stats; indeed, without staying on top of your levels your units will quickly become little more than cannon fodder. The story is always centered around the leader of your army, and should that leader fall it is a game over. Each unit in your army is unique; though they might share their class with another their stats and growth rates will serve to differentiate them, not to mention each one having a distinct characterization that shows up more and more as the series got past the 8-bit era. Probably the most notorious feature is the permanent death; just like in real life, should a unit fall that unit is killed and gone forever.
Fortunately, the player has some tools available to tip the odds in their favor. The biggest is the weapon triangle; a rock-paper-scissors system that determines whether a weapon is effective or disadvantaged against another. In the image above you can see an axe wielder attacking a sword wielder. Swords have the advantage over axes, which increases the sword user's chance to hit and chance to evade, and similarly the axe user has penalties to both. You can see that the axe user has a bare 32% chance to hit, while the sword user is guaranteed to hit. Careful positioning of your army to take advantage of these effects is crucial to making it through the game. Additionally, learning which units are best to attack physically and which are best to use your magic using troops on can make or break your game, not to mention properly using decoys who can survive to draw enemies out of a defensive formation.
The first US release, titled Fire Emblem in the West and Blazing Sword in Japan, was specifically created to be approachable for someone new to the series. The first ten missions serve as an extended tutorial to introduce game mechanics and they even turn off the perma death; any unit that falls retreats from the battlefield and is no longer available during those missions. Once they are finished you move into the main story and will later link up with the units from the prologue, so it's helpful to still treat them as if they were lost forever so as to not miss out on experience on account of having retreated.
Another option is to wait a few weeks and play Fire Emblem Fates, as here at Together RPG we seek to celebrate awesome RPGs and RPG serieses. It'll be fun to see how the two games compare and contrast.
