FE4: King Blume's Idee Fixe

[mark_asphodel]

I think there's a reason I haven't played in several days.

Finished Chapter 7 last week, currently on the opening phase of Chapter 8.
 

 

Blume is obsessed with trashing Lenster no matter what it costs him. He's on his third attempt to (re)take it, and apparently didn't learn his lesson after the two (TWO) failures in the previous chapter. I'm not sure if Leaf's rebellion is just a personal/professional sore point with Blume or if the developers had already developed their own headcanon on that little assassination-plot debacle and that's what is driving Blume over the edge. In terms of storyline, the latter certainly works as a reason; Blume just keeps throwing resources at Lenster Trio 2.0 no matter how many times he gets his ass handed to him on that count. In terms of gameplay it's just annoying.

 

Chapter Seven in general is the most annoying to date. It starts off in a rush, with Shanan and Patty escaping from the Yied Shrine at the same moment that Blume sends his first wave of goons up toward Lenster. Then it bogs down in a disjointed series of tableaux marked by no-fly zones, immovable sentries, and a total inability to warp anyone into Lenster (and no ability to get back there fast if you do use Return to send anyone out). And since Lenster is a neutral castle, there's no weapon shop or arena to use while killing time. This was the first chapter I'd honestly consider boring; the Yied Shrine was kind of fun, and having Fee help Lenster Trio 2.0 beat back the first wave of Blume's goons was good fun (anything involving Fee is fun), but then things just bogged down. Taking Melgen was OK but the uneven nature of the Gen2 cast is starting to show. Taking Darna was honestly dull. Recruiting Tinny was tedious. And the second assault on Lenster was basically identical to the first!

 

Characterwise:

 

Look. Aless "betraying" his mentor figure is a cheap piece of theatre. It is a transparent reworking of Beowulf selling out Voltz in Ch2, only Beo gladly does it for the money and Aless allegedly acts on principle. We don't know Jabarro. We don't care about Jabarro. It's not like watching Celice turn against one of his mentors; it's inevitable and dull and it doesn't make Aless very sympathetic. He is inferior to his father in every way except for being recruitable.

 

Patty is a darling and I wish she were a better fighter, but she is Jamka's daughter so I wasn't expecting her to be a good swordfighter. And she's not.

 

Shanan is an amazing unit except when he's getting electrocuted by Tinny's squad. "Whoa," indeed.

 

Delmud is horrible. He can't get far in the arena, he can't dodge, and I mostly use him for magical chip damage. The fortuneteller says he's Dew's son but I still suspect he's Azel's kid somehow. If I'd known magic swords was all Del could do anything with, I'd have gone with Azel/Lachy in the first place.

 

Nanna thus far is better than Del because she can also do magical chip damage with the Wind Sword, can heal herself with the Earth Sword, and can gain exp by heal-spamming. She leveled up nicely in Ch7. He did not, so they're almost equivalent now!

 

Speaking of leveling Nanna, in some ways it's good that Finn had nothing but an iron lance to use against Blume's goons. At Level 23, with an iron lance, Finn can reduce most of said goons to 3 HP per round, which make them easy pickings for Leaf and Nanna. With his proper equipment, he'd have stolen all the Exp for himself, and the kidlets sorely need Exp. So, nerfing Finn leads to 1) Exp for Leaf&Nanna and 2) an incentive to bring in Fee and let her go to town (using Finn's old gear). Win/win. Yeah, it makes the chapter more challenging, but guess what? This chapter was boring. Letting Finn destroy everything on that part of the map would've been even more boring, not to mention counterproductive in the long run. [I will say that the combination of the Elthunder Mage and the axe-wielding Captain actually posed a threat, but once they're out of the way, the other goons are not a real problem for Finn. Or Fee, for that matter.]

 

Other thoughts: Arthur is amazing in the arena. Hopefully I can promote him during this current chapter (8). Lakche is outshining her twin. Lester is not impressing me as being an improvement on Midayle. Julia and Lana are racking up the Exp. Celice is generally very good. Oifey can hit hard but has genuine problems absorbing damage. Johalva is proving more useful than I expected.

 

Other other thoughts: Chapter 8 looks like more boring. Oh, look, another assault on Lenster... and the chapter force-deploys the Trio there, locking the player into the same strategy used twice in Seven! Meanwhile another wave of tedious Blume-goons creeps through the forest toward Alster and the rest of Celice's army! And Vampa-Fetra-Eliu are back, and in the middle of it all I have to use frail little Patty to recruit her brother! At a certain point, the player begins to long for an indoor-only chapter for variety's sake.

Maybe I should switch back to FE5.

Comments

[amielleon]

The map design is not particularly inspired in FE4. With a handful of exceptions it seems the approach is, "Make a different map and throw a zillion hard units at the player, and the player will innovate, design problem solved!"

... Until "throw Holsety at it" proves to be a valid solution to all problems.

The only time "throw Holsety at it" doesn't work is when you need to manage more than one mob, and Sety is busy.

[mark_asphodel]

The map design is not particularly inspired in FE4.

It says something that two of my five fondest gameplay memories thus far involve choke-points. The Efficiency Playthrough battle for Madino in Ch3 was just beautiful, and there have been some lovely coordinated tag-team assaults, but overall... yeah. But it seriously feels like the gameplay peaked when the Gen1 team coalesced in Ch3, and everything after that has been a series of gimmicks. And I did get a taste of "throw Holsety at it" as the panacea in Ch5. :/

[scarletmorning]

Goddamnit, I still can't get over the fact that he's called Blume. They couldn't have chosen any more intimidating-sounding name, could they? Like "Precious" or "Daisy". Those are fitting names for a villain.

[samuraiter]

This strikes me as lazy design. Feels a bit more like a series of maps in one of the weaker SRW games, rather than FE.

[mark_asphodel]

I don't know what the "best" FE game is yet, because all the ones I've played have their flaws, but this one certainly isn't it, IMO. In between the piss-poor characterization of a good chunk of the cast and the problematic map designs...

Good world-building. Fantastic plot twist. But man, there are ISSUES with this game, and I don't just mean certain characters' psychological problems.

[mark_asphodel]

Would it help if we called him "Bloom"? Though that makes me think of James Joyce...

[scarletmorning]

Heh, I don't think so. The fact that he's called Flower will forever be ingrained in my brain XD The same with Trabant, though for slightly other reasons.