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mark_asphodelI haven't been meta-ing sufficiently because I've been enjoying new canon. Let's just say UPS brought something yesterday that helped ease the sting of a morning that kicked off with a blown-out rear tire.
Let's start with the first point: anyone who avoided spoilers, fan-translations, and all the pre-release fanwank hoopla was smart. I should try that next time. Maybe I'll go into a bunker for SMT X FE.
Now, the spoiler thing almost doesn't matter, because you have two big honking Reveals and one Really Big Clue before you even get to the first proper battle map in this game. It's as though IS was mindful of the concept that an audience anticipates a plot twist more when primed for it.
The fan-translation thing does matter, because it's really obvious that what I have in-hand is a full-scale adaptation of the source material, one that's consistently engaging and both delivers good (IMO) things that are not in the NoJ original and excludes many objectionable things from the NoJ script. I'm not going to accuse the fan-translators of being inaccurate (though some scripts were translated from Japanese to Chinese and then English, so nuances may've been lost), as it seems evident plenty of things I deem Objectionable were what IS intended. Well, they're gone now and I'm glad. Let the butthurt complain about what was done to their precious Tiamo and Nono, I'm having fun here.
A lot of fun. Gameplay? Good. Graphics? Good. Voice acting? Surprisingly good and I'm enjoying a lot of it. The entire presentation? Beautiful. I'm still not down with the overall character design and aesthetic of Ylisse and Plegia but I can deal. Ferox is kind of weirdly appealing, though.
[Flavia = hot]
The Characters!
Chrom-- I really like this guy, though I'm not in the "love" range yet. He's just an admirable mix-- a balance-- of obligatory Naive Lord traits and more aggro qualities, and his naive moments seem understandable. It's like he's making a conscious choice, a deliberate leap of faith, to believe the best in people, the same way Ylisse has made a concious choice to embrace peace under Emmeryn's rule after what seems to have been a disastrous reign by their father. It feels genuine, and when people play dirty Chrom doesn't hesitate to push back. He's all right.
Robin-- I went with default Male 1 Robin, but gave him longish lilac hair for a Deirdre/Julia/Lyon creeper vibe for lulz. The hairstyle is surprisingly effective at evoking said vibe all on its own. Robin's actually pretty likable-- too derpy for Stuhood, but not actually stupid or annoying. I've been surprised by my positive feeling toward him.
Everyone else-- mostly pretty likable. The gimmicks are obvious-- Stahl's a sleepyhead! Vaike refers to himself in the third person! Sumia keeps falling over her own feet!-- but it's all tolerable thus far. The main one that gets on my nerves is Miriel, with her "I'm smart because I sound like my sentences were put together by a high school sophomore boning up for the SATs" act. If I want an in-your-face prodigy I'll stick with Lute, thanks. Maribell is also pretty over-the-top but it's clearly the point of the character. Basically, I'm warm to tepid to all the playable characters I've encountered through the beginning of Chapter Five. Then there's Donny... er, Donnel... er, the kid. I don't think I like him but he got me Orsin's Hatchet so I have to be grateful for something.
That said, there have been some really nice moments of dialogue, both in the actual text and the use of voice clips (Chrom gives a voiced "no" response to one of Robin's sillier questions in a way that never fails to make me giggle). Overall the best word I have for this is "engaging." I want to keep playing this game and see what happens next. By Chapter Five of FE8, I wanted to throw it into a wall, my main takeaway from Lyn's Tale was not that I liked playing the game but that I didn't hate the characters the way I hated the fanon versions thereof.
The Pairing System:
Pair Up is all kinds of awesome and if they ever do make an FE4 remake I hope to hell they incorporate this instead of the adjacent-square crap. The mechanical supports in general are really well-done, given the way you can form entire support chains. I can stick my little non-combantant healer with a front-line mounted unit and it benefits them both? Wowsers. I also like the way support conversations are implemented thus far.
[Honestly? From a mechanical perspective I think the GBA games have some of the absolute worst things the series ever coughed up, and the support implementation there is near the top of my list.]
My Pairings:
From the moment that "Soiree" was unveiled as the female red cav, I threatened to pair her Chrom. When she was revealed to be one of his limited marriage options, I figured I was going to do it even if the Chrom/Olivia supports seemed oddly pleasing. When I played the fully-voiced "Sully" in the demo I decided to hell with Olivia and I've got Chrom and Sully to B-support already. Take-no-crap childhood friend romance FTW.
[Chrom/Olivia turns out to be about as gimmicky as Finn/Tiltyu in terms of what you have to do to obtain it, anyway. If I decide I really, really, really want a Chrom-sired Olivia!Kid, I'll do it, but lemme try something else first.]
I really like Frederick in this, even if he does have this bizarre obsession with cleaning away gravel from the battlefield (-_-). Not feeling the total <3 <3 <3 I feel for Rody, but Fred's got his stellar moments... and in his Chrom supports he pretty much has the knight-boner to end all knight-boners. By comparison, Kyle demonstrates a restrained and discreet appreciation for Ephraim. Since I can't pair Frederick with Chrom I figured I'd pair him with Lissa; I initially swore I'd never do that but Lissa has good moments to balance out her annoying ones and, on the whole, I'm OK with it. Fred's not quite as awesome as I wanted him to be and Lissa's not nearly as awful as I feared she would be, so it works. Not dead-set on any other pairings yet except the Avatar and Nowi match-ups, though I'm liking what I've seen of Ricken and Maribell so far.
The DLC:
Man, did I get a kick out of seeing Alm and Celica in action. Could've done without the dialogue between Alm and Lissa, though-- since when is he unfamiliar with female melee warriors? Um... Claire? Matilda? Yeah. As for Old Hubba, the resident pervert... he claims the Einherjar aren't actual ghosts, but their behavior contradicts him in places and he's a demonstrably unreliable person. We'll see. But it was really fun playing on the Talys map in 3D. :)
Overall: Definitely the most promising beginning to an FE game I've experienced in the modern era. And it's on a handheld, so I can play it while making dinner and conducting conference calls.
PS: I think that "Phila" peg knight chick is gonna come to a bad end. You want archetypes? She feels like The Mahnya.
Let's start with the first point: anyone who avoided spoilers, fan-translations, and all the pre-release fanwank hoopla was smart. I should try that next time. Maybe I'll go into a bunker for SMT X FE.
Now, the spoiler thing almost doesn't matter, because you have two big honking Reveals and one Really Big Clue before you even get to the first proper battle map in this game. It's as though IS was mindful of the concept that an audience anticipates a plot twist more when primed for it.
The fan-translation thing does matter, because it's really obvious that what I have in-hand is a full-scale adaptation of the source material, one that's consistently engaging and both delivers good (IMO) things that are not in the NoJ original and excludes many objectionable things from the NoJ script. I'm not going to accuse the fan-translators of being inaccurate (though some scripts were translated from Japanese to Chinese and then English, so nuances may've been lost), as it seems evident plenty of things I deem Objectionable were what IS intended. Well, they're gone now and I'm glad. Let the butthurt complain about what was done to their precious Tiamo and Nono, I'm having fun here.
A lot of fun. Gameplay? Good. Graphics? Good. Voice acting? Surprisingly good and I'm enjoying a lot of it. The entire presentation? Beautiful. I'm still not down with the overall character design and aesthetic of Ylisse and Plegia but I can deal. Ferox is kind of weirdly appealing, though.
[Flavia = hot]
The Characters!
Chrom-- I really like this guy, though I'm not in the "love" range yet. He's just an admirable mix-- a balance-- of obligatory Naive Lord traits and more aggro qualities, and his naive moments seem understandable. It's like he's making a conscious choice, a deliberate leap of faith, to believe the best in people, the same way Ylisse has made a concious choice to embrace peace under Emmeryn's rule after what seems to have been a disastrous reign by their father. It feels genuine, and when people play dirty Chrom doesn't hesitate to push back. He's all right.
Robin-- I went with default Male 1 Robin, but gave him longish lilac hair for a Deirdre/Julia/Lyon creeper vibe for lulz. The hairstyle is surprisingly effective at evoking said vibe all on its own. Robin's actually pretty likable-- too derpy for Stuhood, but not actually stupid or annoying. I've been surprised by my positive feeling toward him.
Everyone else-- mostly pretty likable. The gimmicks are obvious-- Stahl's a sleepyhead! Vaike refers to himself in the third person! Sumia keeps falling over her own feet!-- but it's all tolerable thus far. The main one that gets on my nerves is Miriel, with her "I'm smart because I sound like my sentences were put together by a high school sophomore boning up for the SATs" act. If I want an in-your-face prodigy I'll stick with Lute, thanks. Maribell is also pretty over-the-top but it's clearly the point of the character. Basically, I'm warm to tepid to all the playable characters I've encountered through the beginning of Chapter Five. Then there's Donny... er, Donnel... er, the kid. I don't think I like him but he got me Orsin's Hatchet so I have to be grateful for something.
That said, there have been some really nice moments of dialogue, both in the actual text and the use of voice clips (Chrom gives a voiced "no" response to one of Robin's sillier questions in a way that never fails to make me giggle). Overall the best word I have for this is "engaging." I want to keep playing this game and see what happens next. By Chapter Five of FE8, I wanted to throw it into a wall, my main takeaway from Lyn's Tale was not that I liked playing the game but that I didn't hate the characters the way I hated the fanon versions thereof.
The Pairing System:
Pair Up is all kinds of awesome and if they ever do make an FE4 remake I hope to hell they incorporate this instead of the adjacent-square crap. The mechanical supports in general are really well-done, given the way you can form entire support chains. I can stick my little non-combantant healer with a front-line mounted unit and it benefits them both? Wowsers. I also like the way support conversations are implemented thus far.
[Honestly? From a mechanical perspective I think the GBA games have some of the absolute worst things the series ever coughed up, and the support implementation there is near the top of my list.]
My Pairings:
From the moment that "Soiree" was unveiled as the female red cav, I threatened to pair her Chrom. When she was revealed to be one of his limited marriage options, I figured I was going to do it even if the Chrom/Olivia supports seemed oddly pleasing. When I played the fully-voiced "Sully" in the demo I decided to hell with Olivia and I've got Chrom and Sully to B-support already. Take-no-crap childhood friend romance FTW.
[Chrom/Olivia turns out to be about as gimmicky as Finn/Tiltyu in terms of what you have to do to obtain it, anyway. If I decide I really, really, really want a Chrom-sired Olivia!Kid, I'll do it, but lemme try something else first.]
I really like Frederick in this, even if he does have this bizarre obsession with cleaning away gravel from the battlefield (-_-). Not feeling the total <3 <3 <3 I feel for Rody, but Fred's got his stellar moments... and in his Chrom supports he pretty much has the knight-boner to end all knight-boners. By comparison, Kyle demonstrates a restrained and discreet appreciation for Ephraim. Since I can't pair Frederick with Chrom I figured I'd pair him with Lissa; I initially swore I'd never do that but Lissa has good moments to balance out her annoying ones and, on the whole, I'm OK with it. Fred's not quite as awesome as I wanted him to be and Lissa's not nearly as awful as I feared she would be, so it works. Not dead-set on any other pairings yet except the Avatar and Nowi match-ups, though I'm liking what I've seen of Ricken and Maribell so far.
The DLC:
Man, did I get a kick out of seeing Alm and Celica in action. Could've done without the dialogue between Alm and Lissa, though-- since when is he unfamiliar with female melee warriors? Um... Claire? Matilda? Yeah. As for Old Hubba, the resident pervert... he claims the Einherjar aren't actual ghosts, but their behavior contradicts him in places and he's a demonstrably unreliable person. We'll see. But it was really fun playing on the Talys map in 3D. :)
Overall: Definitely the most promising beginning to an FE game I've experienced in the modern era. And it's on a handheld, so I can play it while making dinner and conducting conference calls.
PS: I think that "Phila" peg knight chick is gonna come to a bad end. You want archetypes? She feels like The Mahnya.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-07 11:07 pm (UTC)The Pair Up mechanic is interesting. I'm still getting the hang of how some of this works but it's not frustrating. One thing about the GBA support system-- even though waiting around was annoying, I do miss the 3-square range of support bonuses.
Engaged is definitely how I feel. I'm in a bit of a blithe state playing the game; every bit as excited as I assumed I was not going to be, and it's a really nice feeling. Unfortunately I picked Hard mode (the game insulted my pride!) so I won't be able to blaze through as fast as I want to.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-08 11:40 am (UTC)The different support systems have their pluses and minuses, but with this you can form those interesting support chains or support lattices quickly enough that I'm not missing the 3-range boost.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-07 11:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-02-08 12:25 am (UTC)I'm not sure if you've tried Sully and Stahl's support yet, but the C rank, at least, included a very fun reference to Cain and Abel that I think you might enjoy.
I'm still scratching my head a bit at the nations we see in the game, but I look forward to seeing what you pull out of it. Ylisse's recent history is interesting, as you noted, and I like the way it influences Emmeryn's decisions, and how she in turn influences Chrom. Awakening has one of my favorite royal families in the series.
The way supports work in this game--and particularly, the Pair Up feature--is nothing short of fabulous, as you said. As Kyusil mentions above, the 3-square-range is gone, but that only took me a chapter or two to get used to, so that's all good. I paired Chrom with Sumia, simply because of the intro and their little cutscene in Chapter 3. I'm probably going to throw him and Robin together for my Hard run; that should make several scenes in the mid-to-late game very interesting.
The DLC and Spotpass seem interesting so far; you hit the nail on the head with regards to Xenologue 1. The Spotpass battles have little to offer, apart from an early-game grinding opportunity, and I suppose new units if you've played incompetently enough to need them. Ah, and Tyrfing, I suppose.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-08 12:12 pm (UTC)I got that last night and it was very sweet-- "Wait, you're the Bull in this scenario?" I'm liking Stahl; I felt warm fuzzies toward him after reading the first fan-translated supports (the ones with Cordelia IIRC) but then I got bored because everything seemed so samey and meh. But I like what I've seen of him now.
Awakening has one of my favorite royal families in the series.
Yeah, I played Chapter 6 last night and that did a LOT for all of them. I like Em's role in this game in particular.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-08 12:36 am (UTC)Out of curiosity, what are you planning on doing with Avatar and Nowi?
Though I actually read Alm as less "whoa woman warriors?" and more as "Oh, this random backwater also allows women to fight?" since his battle quote "You're not the strongest woman I know. But I'd sooner not take any chances." seems to imply that women warriors aren't a foreign concept to him
no subject
Date: 2013-02-08 11:42 am (UTC)I actually think the voice acting helps in this regard. Except maybe with Donny. He's annoying.
Out of curiosity, what are you planning on doing with Avatar and Nowi?
Avatar's gonna marry Anna. As for Nowi... I'll talk about that when we get there.
Though I actually read Alm as less "whoa woman warriors?" and more as "Oh, this random backwater also allows women to fight?"
It was just weird and seemed very unnecessary, especially with Lissa's return jab to him.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-08 02:34 am (UTC)Never thought I'd see the day Fire Emblem took a page from Ikkitôsen. o_O
the knight-boner to end all knight-boners
Or from Sengoku Basara, for that matter.
"MY LOOOOOORRRD!"As for Old Hubba, the resident pervert...
That would be My Unit, I suppose.Meanwhile, still waiting on motherf@#$ing Game Stop. -_-
no subject
Date: 2013-02-08 04:43 pm (UTC)(Azure/Inigo really does look like he could be Krom's kid in the face, IMO.)
no subject
Date: 2013-02-12 10:09 pm (UTC)A number of people seem to have taken that and the fact that his name WAS "Azure" and decided that since only Chrom can pass down the dark blue hair, Azure must be Chrom's son per canon.
Though "Inigo" rather busts that one up.