Fire Emblem Love

Today I'm posting about my love of the Fire Emblem series. If you don't know what Fire Emblem is, its a series of games developed by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo. It was one of the first turn based strategy games ever made and unlike others of its kind, a large portion of the storyline revolves around very charismatic and memorable characters.


Basically, the game mechanic is this: There is a battle map divided into squares, most of which are traverse-able. There are your forces and enemy forces (and in some battles, ally forces). You begin by moving each of your numerous units around the map and bringing them adjacent to enemy units. Then a battle takes place depending on weapons you chose to attack with, and damage is given and taken. Stats and levels are gained and thus its a strategy RPG game.

Unlike other games of this genre, when a unit dies, it dies for good. This vastly increases the difficulty of the game(s) and keeping your favorite characters alive becomes imperative.

Most of the games are just so darn addictive I've played through most in the series. There are a total of 12 FE games, on consoles from the humble NES to the Wii. Recently, the latest in the series, Fire Emblem: Shin Ankoku Ryū to Hikari no Ken was released for the DS in Japan. It is a remake of the original Fire Emblem game on the NES, with enhanced graphics and both local and online Wifi. A localization has not yet been released but its likely that there will be, as the protagonist of the game appears in Super Smash Brothers: Brawl (Marth..) so English speaking players will have an incentive to buy the game.


I guess the FE series could be considered a niche genre, but I like that fact. Most people find the game pace to be too slow and the difficulty too punishing, but that's what i love about it. There's that feeling of critical decision making that makes the game very cut-throat. You've been playing for an hour and a half, trying to beat that one map, and BAM! your favorite character dies. Do you restart or abandon your favorite character? It was always the former for me, so I sunk much more time than is normal into the games. But hey, that's what I like, and if you haven't tried it yet, so might you.

Now, I'll pop up a few of my favorites from the entire series (they're all great games, mind you, but these are my personal favorites):

1. Fire Emblem Seisen no Keifu
   
   Wow, this is the one that started it all for me. Great charismatic protagonist Sigurd, and my personal favorite, Holyn (swordmaster, gotta love this guy). Some very unique things happened in this one compared to the rest of the games in the series like 2 generations of characters (the second generation consisting of characters from the offspring of the previous generation (who you pair up by making them fall in love)).
   
   

   download: here. This is the english patched rom, just boot it up in zsnes or any emulator of your choice.
   get zsnes (super nintendo emulator): here.

   
   
2. Fire Emblem (GBA)
   
   The first FE on the GBA, this has a different art style. I prefer Seisen no keifu's style, but this game is a great portable FE experience. Highly recommended. The story is watered down compared to the SNES titles, but this is to be expected since the GBA was a very child oriented console (in western countries, anyway).
   
   

   download: here.

   
   
   
3. Fire Emblem : Path Of Radiance
   
   This game was an awesome experience from start to finish. Its a GC (Gamecube) title that was admittedly hard to find, but was well worth the hunt. If you guys drop a few comments, I'll dig up the links for it and hey, you can enjoy the game for yourselves. You play as Ike, a mercenary's son, who finds himself in a complicated war in which he is helplessly entwined. Highly recommended.
   
   comment if you want me to dig up the links for this one, guys!

Well, I know its been a long post, if you've survived this far, good for you and happy Fire Embleming. If you want to take the new DS FE game for a spin, try out this link: HERE. If you want me to sum up what i think is good and bad about it, comment away!

Happy Gaming Guys!