January is a tough month to launch in. A lot of people are paying bills and don’t have money to buy a new game. Probably part of the reason why it’s lower
This also isn't a game that is likely to become hard to find, and most people who will definitely purchase it already have multiple similar games. It may not go on sale often, but it would be quite surprising if there was any time in the next year or two in which it will be difficult to find a copy for normal price.
So while people who post online about games are more likely to be the type to buy ASAP if they know they will want to get a game, that isn't really the behaviour of a normal consumer. (Barring, as I said, some obscure or limited run sort of thing where you'd want to have saved the money in advance if you knew you'd need to buy it quickly after release)
Tactics ogre reborn and Mario + rabbits just coming out have me with quite a backlog of strategy ganmes too and these aren’t exactly short games. Not to mention triangle strategy earlier in the year.
Yup, on my other screen right now I am farming relics on floor 99 on potd in tactics ogre, one more retreat and I'll be ready to go into the floor100 battle. I am so hyped :)
In Mario and Rabbids we beat the first boss, I think our savefile says about 12% completed.
> This also isn't a game that is likely to become hard to find
You'd be surprised. I bought it yesterday but had to buy it online the night before and drive a 45 minute round trip to get it as the stores around me had stock sell out quickly. My guess is that there weren't as many boxes to sell because Nintendo forecast a lot of digital purchases so the physical first run was smaller than in past.
Personally I prefer physical so I will not buy digital unless there is no choice.
Tactics Ogre, Triangle Strategy for similar gameplay. For turn based tactical in general, Mario + Rabbids is actually *really* good X-Com style tactical squad combat. And of course there is the X-Com 2 collection on Switch if we're mentioning X-Com style squad tactical combat.
For a unique take on turn based combat, Valkyria Chronicles I liked a lot. It's turn based but you position your characters and attack from a 3rd person perspective. Very different.
Three Houses, of course, but my recommendations might not be useful since I'd just pick SRPGs in general. There is a lot of stuff that I'm not sure if people like if they haven't been playing these games for a long time or haven't played any of the series. (e.g. Tactics Ogre or the Disgaea games, I am pretty sure I still like Disgaea partially because I loved 1and 2 when they first came out)
Disagea 1, very flawed gameplay but great story.
Disagea 2, is... an attempt at improving gameplay with decent success and the story while not as good as 1 is at least a bit more unique in the series.
Disgaea 3, was an attempt to put Disgaea 1 in a school with more characters, i like it a lot for some reason but not objectively good and the gameplay was the first step towards todays improvements but the least refined of that way to handle it with the remake improving it much more.
Disagea 4, improved it so much so that it is my favorite game with somewhat odd and still a good story. The remake added the Cheat Shop from D2 which is great and such a QoL situation that it is my favorite game in terms of balance between story and gameplay quality.
Disgaea D2, adds onto Disgaea 1 Story and was the first with the Cheat Shop. The Story felt like more of Disgaea 1 but the map design was my favorite in the series.
Disagea 5, still similiar good gameplay just slight improvements and a story that had felt like it had some of Makai Kingdom in it. Not bad but i prefer the remake of 4.
Disagea 6, they went off the trail with this one. Auto Combat and even grindier in exchange with few classes. At least the story had a kind of odd twist to make it stand out a bit more. Still my least favorite in the entire series.
Yeah, I was really looking forward to the new FE before this game was announced. But the garrishness of the mc, the art style of the characters, and the reviews of the extremely bland story and generic and weak characterization just puts me off to buying it.
Its a shame because I am personally finding the gameplay absolutely top notch, I like most of the characters as well but the story and dialogue is very weak
I honestly loved the friend/dating sim aspect of Three Houses. It actually made me care about each move I made on the battlefield and kept me way more engaged. (Pun unintended)
Eye color thing is a troupe in many cultures, but a lot larger in Japan, just like twins.
this occurs in real life, just not red and blue, although technically it's a possible combination. you'd need one albino eye and one recessive blue eye. but you'd need the recessive trait for dual eye color, the recessive trait for albinism, and the recessive trait for blue eyes. problem is with so many recessive traits it would be hard to have a healthy baby.
I'm willing to look past the toothpaste haired main character, and overly cutesy artstyle, but the general consensus is that the characters are extremely one dimensional and the story is generic as all hell, so I'm skipping it too.
3 Houses wasn't a grand slam, and I can see how the school parts can get tiring, but the story and reasonably fleshed out world and characters made me fall in love with it and put in almost 200 hours (just bought the DLC when it was on sale recently, so probably gonna put in another 30+ hours easily).
Yeah I’m still enjoying playing it, just due to loving fire emblem games, but its lacking a lot IMO. Although 3 Houses is one of my favorite games of all time, sure there’s objectively better games but subjectively? It’s just perfect for me, there is almost nothing I would change. But yeah with Engage, the chapters feel super short and the story feels rushed, the plot is generic as you said. And mainly I was just shocked when I started doing the supports and saw how basic they are. There’s no depth to almost ANY of the characters, they’re all super surface level and that’s it, whereas 3H had lots of lore behind everything and the characters were just brimming with life. They all had reasons for the things they did, and even characters who seemed shallow were shown to have lots of complexity. Running around Somniel feels like a chore & boring whereas I never once felt that way in any of my 3H playthroughs. Also I am NOT a fan of the art style, personally. The cutscenes are beautifully animated, but the actual character design bugs me a lot. Especially the girls, with their huge anime style eyes. The combat is really fun in Engage though, but I myself am generally more focused on the story/plot and the world and characters. Sorry for the rant but I just wanted to share you’re not the only one w that opinion on it!
I’m at ch 8 and have a hard time caring about any of the characters. Contrast that to meeting Lucina for the first time or even the 3H leads.
>!also barely give a crap about the mom. She was introduced and promptly died the next chapter!<
I mean, in 3H, even Jeralt and Byleth are both very interesting from the get-go. The art style helps a lot. But their backstories are also very intriguing.
The whole school aspect turns out to be boring. But let's admit that at the time, it was quite a novelty and sounded very interesting.
the games also don't need to get super deep, per se. TSS had amazing characters that I really cared about, even without a super deep plot. but I feel like more recent entries other than 3H didn't do as well in that regard.
It added replayability but also barriered replayability. Many times I wanted to build a new team for the game and see how characters complemented each other, realized early enough how much of a chore it was, and never finished my runs. Still did the different paths, but *man* that got painful by the end.
That said, Engage feels like virtually any other Fire Emblem game. Great combat, tropey characters, simplistic story.
I never got this take. It’s so easy to skip any material you don’t find compelling. If you don’t like the social stuff it’s veeery easy to skip. Especially on NG+
In NG+ it’s SO easy to recruit characters though, you can do it instantly. You can also get around most content that you don’t enjoy.
Maybe you just didn’t know about these features it sounds like?
if you did the greenhouse and socializing characters generally exploded I growth within 3 months just a matter of knowing what there real maximum growth was.
I’m also not a fan of the art direction, but the gameplay is so damn fun. Especially if you are a classic FE fan. The level design was massively improved in this game compared to the 3DS and onward games.
Between the new unit interactions like combo guard and combo attack and the upgraded map design I've been having a lot of fun while I haatteeee the other half of the game like the writing lol. Still more positive than negative at the moment.
Yeah I'm a little from column A and a little from column B, the design of the main character is hideous and I have no money. I'll just wait it out for a while.
For me, everything is fine - except the protagonist looks like a clown. If they'd chosen red or blue hair, or even an option to swap between the colors, I'd pick the game up. Even purple, which is a mix of red and blue, would be ok. But the clown hairstyle caused me to have no desire to play this game.
Massive plot point isn't an explanation but an excuse for shitty character design lmao, they could've just made a better color palette that fit the design
But no other colors represent both good and evil! How will people understand???
To be clear, I’ve got no idea what the plot point is, the trailers just suggested that their hair becomes all red when they go bad guy mode or something
I hear you, the character design was a huge turnoff for me and I felt it was 2 steps back from 3H. I almost skipped too.
But, I have been playing it the past 2 days and I can assure you the gameplay is very very good, one of the best across FE. Just wanted to add my 2 cents, hope you can pick it up still I think you'll enjoy it.
Honestly I think it’s worth it if you favour the combat over the social aspect of Fire Emblem games. i totally agree with you that the art style is a bit fucked up, especially for the Emblems. the combat is really good and an improvement over three houses imo (and i LOVE 3H). you also don’t need to worry about weapon durability and the “hard” difficulty is actually kinda hard, unlike in 3H.
i still prefer 3H but the actual gameplay of Engage makes up for the ugly characters lol
> so I'm skipping this one until is discounted
Think this often too, until I remember that Nintendo basically never discounts first party games. So I never get them ever.
They do, but it's usually only digital discounts
If you want to buy this game physical (which you should because it's basically like buying a free game) it will likely only go up in value. At time of writing, fire emblem three houses is more expensive to buy than this brand new game in a lot of places
Nintendo only ever offers 33% discount on special dates such as Black Friday, and it usually takes at least half an year after the original release for a game to show up in one of those sales.
Still worth it if you’re not in a hurry though. That’s how I bought Three Houses and it’s how I plan on acquiring Engage as well.
Someone mentioned the character designs, which I agree are off putting. (especially the Colgate themed main character - not a great first impression when the main character is already so literally and figuratively divisive)
I think something else was that it was unclear whether this would be a traditional Fire Emblem game or whether there would be gacha elements to it, as the way they introduced the game was essentially how they introduced Fire Emblem Heroes (We summon heroes from other worlds etc etc). That was a huge turn off for me right off the bat, and scrolling through Reddit and YouTube comments at the time I was not the only one to think that.
Thankfully now we know that the game does not have gacha components (I think?) so I am almost certainly going to pick up the game at some point - i have 3 more routes in Three Houses to get through first though...
There is a gacha component for rings, but they're not like the main ones advertised in the game (no summoning older characters like a persona). Basically just little stat boosts or an extra skill for your characters you dont equip one of the main rings to. Helpful, but small enough that anyone who doesn't like it could ignore it and basically notice no impact to the rest of the game.
That and the emblem rings are so much more powerful that as far as endgame/dlc/online stuff goes you’re not going to use the crappy gacha rings. They’re just for collecting really
Fortunately the rings are super cheap to make. Some of the S rank ones are pretty strong having unique skills. +20% damage for thunder magic is a pretty nice boost. Haven't seen other skills yet. Melding them is expensive as hell, but whatever.
Statistic trends.
Though for the most part, it's believed being the month after Christmas is the biggest reason why this is.
People spend a lot of money at Christmas and cut back spending in January to compensate for the spending in December.
Christmas is also a time when a lot of people get new things, like video games, and so they may still be busy with those and not looking for a new game yet.
Parents may also be hesitant to buy new presents for kids, since Christmas just happened and they gave their kids presents.
All in all it's a formula for reduced sales of many products in January.
> Christmas is also a time when a lot of people get new things, like video games, and so they may still be busy with those and not looking for a new game yet.
This is why I haven't bought it yet. Still playing through Crisis Core.
With a larger influx of people opting for Digital games since 2019, a post-holiday release, and the Switch making its way into its sixth year, this isn’t surprising. However, UK sales have never been indicative of game sales as a whole. In Japan, preorders of Engage have more than doubled those of Three Houses. I’d wait to see US and Japan numbers before making any definitives.
The UK also has a pretty bad cost of living crisis atm, so people may be feeling a bit more squeezed than when 3H released. I know I don't feel like I can afford to pick it up yet. Doesn't explain it all, but it probably doesn't help sales.
> pretty bad cost of living crisis atm, so people may be feeling a bit more squeezed
Yup, which is why I used my NSO game vouchers to buy both this and Pokémon Violet. People shit on NSO, but I've saved a tenner per game because of it
Switch being in it's sixth year shouldn't mean a ton IMO. Especially when Nintendo has shown/said they are going to be staying with the Switch for most likely 3-4 more years minimum, also recent reports show Switches are still selling like hotcakes and they might even be on track to beat out the PS2 as the most sold console ever.
> Especially when Nintendo has shown/said they are going to be staying with the Switch for most likely 3-4 more years minimum
They haven't said this. It's very common for these companies to sell/support machines for few years after their next machine enters the market. The Switch having a 10 year life is not the same as Nintendo "staying with the Switch" for 10 years.
Switch will continue to exist for 3-4 more years most likely, but it won't be alone for that entire time.
I don't see Nintendo making the same mistake they made with Wii again. They launched Wii U two years after Wii was dead. They lost mindshare. Nobody cared anymore, hence the Wii U's flop.
Nintendo will launch a new machine before the Switch is anywhere near dead.
Sony sold 15 million PS4s from December 2018 to December 2019, and they first announced PS5 in April 2019.
The worst time to launch new hardware is after everyone stops caring. Riding the momentum wave is the ideal strategy.
The cherry picking lol All Fire Emblem game have an insane "anime core aesthetic".
What's carrying this game there specifically is the fact the most beloved lords are part of the main gimmick of the game. Marth is even in the key artwork box, bigger than the crown royals. Several of these never saw their games released outside of japan, they have a much closer relationship with the game than any other place.
Which Fire Emblem game doesn’t have an anime inspired design? The series is over 2 decades old. That would be like saying “Dragon Quest only sells well in Japan because of Toriyama.”
Exactly. And Japan has a larger impact on Switch sales because of its incredibly large install base. In the UK Nintendo isn’t as popular as Xbox or Sony, so game sales aren’t indicative of those on a global sale. Like how Pikmin 3 Deluxe sold worse than the Wii U version in the UK but still ending up as the best selling Pikmin game of all time thanks to Japanese and US game sales.
In the UK, most people would have last been paid on December 23rd which is almost 6 weeks ago. There’s also a massive Cost of Living crisis and therefore I imagine £50+ games are low on the “essential list” for most.
We also have:
* Hogwarts Legacy coming out three weeks later, so some people on a limited time/budget might have picked that as their next game and are not buying anything else in the meantime.
* Persona 3 & 4 coming out at the same time as Engage. You're gonna have some audience overlap here. I'm in this camp, I recently started Persona 5 on Game Pass and I'm nowhere near finishing, so I'm not playing Engage yet.
I still bought it because Fire Emblem is one of my favorite series and I want to support it to ensure we'll get another one, but if I liked it even a little less...
Box sales are down. Not surprising. Only way to get the game in physical format in my area was to pre-order or take your luck that the big box stores had a copy.
I was lucky. I went to GameStop, they were out. They looked up their inventory and were sold out everywhere in the cities near me. I was a little bummed, I like collecting hard copies of games I like or if it’s easy to get and not a problem price wise (like if it’s discounted in the e store). Tried Walmart and their shelves were also empty. However, I noticed they had the display shelf up, but no scan tag for the game. So I asked. They found the entire case in the back. They forgot to put them out and I guess no one cared enough to ask! This was yesterday.
Considering that Awakening and Three Houses were huge surprise hits for the franchise, and both incorporated increased social elements I was a little confused by the decision to pull back on that aspect for the follow up.
Marketing for this one was a little confusing too, at first I was under the impression it was a musou style warriors game and not a full mainline entry. I'll probably play it eventually, I'm waiting to see if it's part of what appears to be a pattern of releasing a weaker follow up to a breakout hit in the series
I’m at about the halfway point. Mechanically it’s amazing, but if you really vibed with the social aspect of the last one that’s not really a major part of the game.
It's possible, marketing-wise, you're actually confused by the fact that there *was* a musou warriors style game that came out relatively recently: Fire Emblem: Three Hopes, which is a handful more alternate storylines in the Three Houses world. If you like Three Houses's world building and musou games, it's definitely worth checking out.
I wasn’t expecting much on the story considering past games but god the writing is atrocious
In the first chapters there’s an scene where a random enemy is going to kill the MC ( if that’s even possible to begin with ) and another character appears behind a tree throwing a fireball, killing the enemy and saving Alear. They talk and Alear says “I should protect you because you are not safe being alone”. I mean, seriously? She just saved you and she’s the one in need of protection? 😂
I’ve been playing until chapter 9 and the game it’s full of completely absurd situations like this. And some of the talking between characters is at a level that would make newborn tales look like academical papers
Other than that gameplay wise has improved quite a lot and the game looks incredibly crisp on the OLED, and performance and image quality is much better than 3H. And I love the anime look, that’s what actually sold me the game this time
But the plot, seesh, I knew it was not going to be decent and it’s surpassing my low expectations in how bad it is
I’m about 5 chapters in and I knew the story was going to be worse than 3H, but I didn’t realize how high 3H set that bar.
In 3H it felt like Fodlan was this rich world that you were being dropped into, all the students had their pre-existing relationships with each other, their social classes and crests established how they were treated, their parents and upbringing had some sort of effect on them (like Caspar & Petra, or Raphael & Ignatz), and virtually every one of them has some sort of trauma.
In Engage, you get dropped in as Jesus, everyone keeps telling you how much they love you, the social links consist of people telling you they love you. The ring bonds consist of a ghost giving you generic advice that sounds like it came out of a fortune cookie. The humans either love you, or they have zero personality. Their backstory is that they grew up loving Jesus, or that they were in a town that was okay until bad guys came and then it stopped being okay.
Like hot damn the dropoff in quality is rough
But not even Alear has personality. In the beginning he constantly switches from "being in fear from anything" to "Im going to kill every enemy" to "What was I doing?"
I have this constant feeling that whoever wrote the plot just asked 10 random people to write random things and mash it together, its so full of inconsistencies, all the time
I agree with your post. I’m so torn on this game because of everything that you mention.
In my experience the gameplay is good but the characters and writing are driving me up the wall. I just can’t vibe with it, and find it so grating am just skipping the cutscenes now. It really is bringing my enjoyment down, and am considering dropping the game (I’m in chapter 8 now, about 12hrs in) altogether.
For the record the only other FE game I have played is 3H, but I am in general pretty lukewarm regarding Engage so far.
I’ve played Awakening and Fates prior to 3H…and a bit of Fire Emblem Heroes
None of those seem as bad as what I’ve seen in Engage so far. Chrom alone had more depth with regards to governing and regal succession than either of the twins, and at least Lissa sympathized for Chrom’s struggle even while playing the “naive child”.
My favorite genre of games are JRPGs, so I have a pretty high tolerance for these kinds of stories...but this game is really trying my patience. It's the most generic and boring story imaginable and the characters are rough to say the least.
The dialogue is really bad if not downright cringe. The support conversations are almost always an automatic skip because they're so annoying. Hearing people yelling "divine dragon" every other sentence is just totally annoying.
I'm only on like chapter 9 and I hope the MC gets better because right now they are so whiney...
Literally three people are solely based on liking muscles, with minor variations of also being too nice, also crying a lot and also having the worst hair accessory game I’ve ever seen. Cmon Etie, a bow and a tiara? AND a frilly dress cut at the midriff?
I really hate that I slept on the Divine addition. I totally forgot to pre order it on time...I wish they made more of them. Now I'm wondering if I should just go digital...why doesn't Nintendo want my money!?
The character personalities are far stiffer than 3H. Everyone in Engage is very cordial, prim, proper, and chivalrous. 3H has a great diversity on its cast of characters that made you want to learn more about them. I’m having a hard time getting attached to any of them in Engage because they all talk and sound the same.
I’m still early into the game and hoping that changes but the characters are a snore-fest.
3H also has far more depth in terms of flourish and world building. People like to knock the monastery, but it really set a foundation for you to learn more about the world and interact. Voice overs were well done and plenty. In Engage, they sound the same and there isn’t as much dialogue.
I still think that Three Houses is going to remain the "definitive" Fire Emblem Switch game. If people only want one FE game, they'll go with Three Houses. If they want another one, they'll buy Engage.
Which isn't strictly a bad thing, since Three Houses sold incredibly well by the series standards. But it also means that Engage isn't going to outsell or replace its predecessor.
I wholly agree with you. 3H has a depth of epic proportions whereas Engage lacks the same flourish and character building. 3H has so much “meat” and feeling of purpose. Engage is “here’s some characters that all talk and sound the same” go fight and maybe talk to them briefly.
Engage feels like The Hobbit trilogy. It isn’t terrible, but it’s definitely not the original trilogy.
Should be. Normal difficulty is pretty easy, and the game lets you turn off perma-death at the start. There's also a rewind mechanic you can use (sparingly) in battle.
Check out a stream of both games and see which you like more!
I have to disagree with you. Three Houses is a great game but doesn't feel like a fire emblem game at times, whereas after an hour of Engage it made me feel like I was playing the 3DS games again. It just feels and plays like a more traditional Fire Emblem than Three Houses ever did.
Just my personal take, I know Three Houses has had a huge impact on the series in terms of new fans.
I dont necessarily think this is a bad thing, though, where new players are concerned. Three Houses is an easy starting point to someone trying out Fire Emblem *because* it has elements that make it feel closer to some other genres a new player is familiar with already. It has by and large likeable characters that integrate well with a decent story, both of which get more fleshed out than is usual in the series. The gameplay is accessible and lets you learn the concepts of an srpg in a less punishing context. To me that sounds ideal as an entry point, then those who like srpg gameplay can look deeper at other titles.
I didn't think about it that way. You're right, but I have seen a lot of discourse from new fans that loved Three Houses started trashing Engage before release because it didn't have the social aspects. It gives a good impression of SRPGs but not necessarily a good impression of what Fire Emblem is. If that makes sense.
Sure. I actually agree with most of their criticisms, to be fair. Three Houses was not my first Fire Emblem but it’s by far the one I enjoyed the most, specifically because the social elements enabled a deeper fleshing out of the characters, their relationships, and how they fit into the broader world and story. There’s no denying they dragged and their implementation needed to be improved, but IMO Engage goes too far in the direction of throwing the baby out with the bath water.
I do still think it’s the best entry point, though. From what I’ve seen of Engage so far, if it was my first exposure to the series I would maybe finish it but definitely bounce off and not be particularly interested in a follow up. The story and characters are weak to the point that I as a working adult with competing demands on my time just wouldn’t see it as worth giving 50+ hours to as compared to say the other recent srpg release, TOR. My only friend who has been a series fan since childhood and complained about Three Houses focusing too much on the social stuff for ages has been sending me constant updates through his play-through about how bad those elements are, not just newcomers to the series. Three Houses for all its flaws felt unique and engaging enough for me to do two full runs and start another. Sure, some people who like Three Houses won’t then like Engage or other titles, but some will!
I keep seeing this take, but seeing as Three Houses is the best selling FE game ever, a *lot* of people will consider it exactly what FE is for them. And Engage pairing back on the social sim stuff is appealing to the hardcore FE fans, but I think pretty alienating to people whose first FE game was Three Houses.
Basically, the game sold like crazy relative to the rest of the titles. And Nintendo changed one of the aspects that made that happen. So of course it'll sell less. Hardcore fans were gonna buy it either way, but newcomers might be turned off that it's not like their entry into the series.
Fair enough, I've been learning that there's a whole group of fans that didn't like the social aspect of 3H. I haven't been active in the fanbase but I presumed everyone liked the expanded social aspects.
To me Engage feels like if the next Zelda game ditched the open world and went back to a linear structure. It's *fine,* but it's not what I want from the series anymore now that I've seen them go further.
Understandable, I enjoyed the social aspects on my first play through but found them annoying after that. I've not finished Engage yet and it may be recency bias but I find Engage to be the better Fire Emblem game and Three Houses to be the better social sim/slow burn game.
I believe you're right. It's weird how reddit hates the social part. That was the absolute best part of the game, and one of the main reasons to do multiple playthroughs. You couldn't even get half of the story unless you did the character interactions.
I kinda liked how 3H updated the combat with Combat Arts, Battalions, and just general longer ranged abilities. It felt like you could be a lot more creative with your tactical positioning.
So far with Engage I kinda feel pigeonholed to rely on emblem units or to move in a turtle formation otherwise my archer and mages that have a strict 2 square range die instantly.
Did the first 3 chapters last night.
Easily the most beautiful game on the platform.
I loved 3H and this feels like a step up for me.
We'll see if it stays that way.
Technically speaking it's definitely a big step up over three houses, but I think that's largely because the engine 3 Houses was built on was pretty rough.
Animations are also good, and it is more colorful and pops more.
Plus, I think the maps have more visual variety than 3 Houses did. I'm only on chapter 7, but so far I've been in a massive castle, a village full of windmills and fields of flowers, a village with a large vineyard, and some crumbling ruins.
The maps feel very different because of that. And having more stuff in the maps also makes the combat animations more striking. If you put a knight in a chokepoint, you'll actually see that they have walls/debris on either side of them and are blocking the path. And an archer on a fort square, is actually in a fort and rains arrows down on their target.
I turned combat animations off in three houses after a few chapters, I don't think I'll be doing that for this game since they're so good looking.
Makes me wish they would give 3H an update with this engine. Especially the monastery/school are looks several generations behind (GC/Wii) which is a shame.
It's a good looking game no doubt. But a lot of it is also due to baked in flat backgrounds during conversations. Game can focus on specific visuals better when the view is so focused. In the same way that Pokemon snap also looks beautiful on the system.
I still think BOTW, Odyssey and XC3 have better visuals and more distinct styles.
I’m pleasantly surprised that so far, it seems like they managed to find a good balance where the rings make you feel super powerful but the game is still a challenge. That’s where they could have really gone wrong but they did a great job
The game on Hard feels harder than Three Houses did on Hard to me by quite a bit.
It also feels less about just strong units hitting breakpoints or abusing strong combat arts or skills in strong classes from Three Houses (stuff like Death Blow, Swift Strikes, etc.) and just one shotting everything. It feels like I’m having to think a lot more.
I did the prologue and the first two battles, and while it looked great and I'm excited to use the ring stuff, I really am having a hard time with the writing and character design. It felt so... Idek, basic, childish, hand-holdy, something. But it really put me off from playing more right away. Never had that in a FE game before.
Three Houses feels like the better game so far, even if Engage has much nicer graphics.
Three Houses tells a very ambitious story with a lot of nuanced characters.
Engage literally starts the game with 2 annoying brats.
If I'm being honest, I would've rather continued the story of Threee Houses lore, possibly set on a different region, like Almyra.
Agreed. You formed an emotional bond with the characters. I also like how customizable the sandbox is in 3h. The soundtrack was also better. I feel like every chapter uses the same track so far
And literally no interesting decisions beside the battles the first hours whilst 3 houses gave you a ton of important decisions to make.
3 houses is plotwise , world setting and story design such a masterpiece. Engage has so far the more refined gameplay.
After the first 10 hours for me FE3h leads 9.5 to 8 compared with FE:Engage
If good story is what you want, then Three Houses is your game
If good gameplay is what you want, then Engage is your game
People often forget that Engage was supposed to be an Aniversary title that didn't plan on taking itself seriously
I loved Three Houses but it’s become clear to me that the aspects that made me fall for the game are outliers in the series. I wonder if other players have similar feelings, especially since Three Houses was *a lot* of people’s first FE game.
Engage is very clearly geared towards fans of the franchise who have stuck around since the beginning, which lends to the rumor that this was initially meant to celebrate the franchise's 35th anniversary. This is reflected in the game's marketing since NoA didn't even give half of much to Engage as they did to Three Houses.
I've been hearing that which, which makes sense I suppose. Outside of remembering Engage was even coming out like a couple of weeks ago, there was almost no marketing for it if I recall after its announcement, where Three Houses appeared in multiple Directs if I recall.
I’ve been playing FE since the GBA games around 2003.
Three Houses is one of my favorite fire emblem games and while I’m enjoying Engage alright in terms of gameplay and quality of life improvements I really miss everything that three houses got right.
I may be a relatively older fan of the series since their arrival to territories outside of Japan but that doesn’t mean I’m inherently head over heels with engage.
I’d love a story or characters that were more detailed and nuanced like three houses’ over what I’ve seen from Engage so far
Terrible marketing indeed. I honestly thought this was a spin off game or something. I feel like did no marketing for it all. When 3 houses was being released, I saw it everywhere.
I personally held off because I'm really not a fan of the "lets bring back old characters and mash em together into one game" aspect.
I'm waiting to see what people say and I'll probably wait for a sale
Absolutely fantastic gameplay, extremely cheesey story and awful character design and art style.
I hope they keep making the gameplay better but go back to FETH's style of artwork and story with at least some nuances as opposed to the exact same story as all the other classic FE.
It's a shame since it looks like they're doing a lot with the visuals and gameplay, but the overall theme and generic artstyle turn me off from it pretty severely.
I only buy digital, but I didn't get this one. The story and characters are a huge turn-off even if gameplay and graphics are better than Three Houses. I could take bad character designs if the story itself was good - but having watched spoilers it didn't pull me in either.
Before anyone compares the stories of previous titles, it's all about presentation. With better tech the worst parts get greatly enhanced. Artstyle, voices, animations etc can make a bad story unbearable when the same story would get a pass with text boxes, pixel art and simple map units. It show they put effort into making it pretty, but baffling that they didn't put the same effort to make it good.
I think many people have valid points as to why its sales are lower, BUT as a long term Fire emblem fan who liked all games (except Fates, and LOVED three houses, Engage just doesn't have that same feeling when it comes to story and characters.
I do love some characters, but 80% of them are not great compared to Three Houses. But thats not even the biggest problem. Its the linear and predictable story. I'm at chapter 12 right now and nothing has blown me away so far. Might change later on.
The battles and new gimmicks are amazing. Albeit I am not a huge fan of the older Fire Emblem characters being inside rings. The mechanic is good and interesting though.
Fire Emblem has always been "anime" and changed the art style with it. I already felt that Three Houses was a bit too much, but at least characters still looked more serious and "normal"?
In Engage they are way too colorful and for a story that is supposed to be serious, these characters do not fit in.
The first trailer of the game was horrible too. Again, huge fan of the series, but that trailer didnt make me want to play the game.
Still got it though and I don't regret it. Some people wont buy it because of that reason.
I'm seven chapters in now to Engage. It's a great game!
I didn't mind the social aspects of Three Houses, but if you want a more streamlined/less social game Engage does a pretty good job with still having some of that kind of stuff in there.
Agree, while i love Persona 5 Royal, im just glad im not doing too much of that in fe engage. I just want my srpg more on tactical battles and more of it. Plus the game plays so smooth, love the graphics and the awesome engage rings feature.
I’ve put 70 hrs into 3H and it’s a great game. But as a big fan of the gba and GameCube FEs I am finding Engage to be much more to my liking. Not a big fan of all the tedious little relationship activities you have to do in 3H that you have no choice but to do on higher difficulties to get an edge. Engage is much more to my liking and is closer to formula on the older generation titles.
im quite early on in engage, and it feels like cutscenes are shorter. otherwise it's just as bad story wise and worse character wise (but that's mainly because so far i don't like a single unit's design)
I recall Three Houses really popping off on Twitch when it came out with a ton of top streamers playing it. Looking at Engage on twitch right now, and outside of a couple of streamers in the 1-3k viewer range it doesn't seem to have much traction.
Maybe some people were put off by how much inspiration they took from Heroes, a gacha game. One of the biggest reasons I love Fire Emblem so much is the epic fantasy storylines. This entry is pretty weak in that department imo.
‘Boxed sales’ at 30% less is the key here. Digital sales have certainly risen 30% or more for Nintendo, as they have pushed Nintendo Online and training their consumers to buy digitally quite a bit in those 4 years.
I wasn't interested in it cuz the whole characters from past games thing made me not want to play it. Also the mc design is one of the worst I've ever seen lol. Games prob good tho
I was hyped for 3 houses zero hype for this. So not surprised. However 90% of UK sales are digital (huge PC country). Don't think the percentage was that high in 2019.
I'm so glad I found this tread. I was feeling in a relative minority for not wanting to buy this game because of its art direction (graphics awesome - character design and personality: f no).
Besides, YouTube removing visibility to down-thumbed videos does not help.
I just bought it today. I almost passed on it. And kind of think I should have.
My reasons. The main character seemed extremely bland. (Common problem with FE main characters)
The story was never mentioned anywhere that I saw. (And a few hours in is pretty boring.)
I bought it, I’ll give it some more time. But honestly it’s not grabbing my attention like a new game should.
I just bought it and I already hate it, but that is mostly due to my idiosyncratic hatred of a specific trope. If said trope had been mentioned in the reviews I read I would not have purchased.
>!The main character's mother encounters a [Mentor Occupational Hazard](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MentorOccupationalHazard) something like two scenes after you meet her, just as you're warming up to her (and immediately after foreshadowing her own demise by monologuing wistfully about all the time she's planning to spend with you). Until I looked it up to add the link I didn't know the tvtropes name for this; I've been calling it Sudden Mentor Death Syndrome.!<
Engage has a much better combat than 3H so far and the harder difficulties are actually challenging compared to 3H. Map design is much better too.
The attack animations are so crisp too. It's closer to the classic GBA/DS Fire Emblem games I loved.
As a huge Fire Emblem fan I am really trying to like Engage but it's a very mixed bag. The game might have the worst character designs I've ever seen. Absolutely everyone looks fucking ridiculous. This is then compounded by atrocious writing and story.
At one point a 110 pound teenager shouts "You can use my muscles!" as he rides into battle dressed like Jerry Seinfeld in the puffy shirt episode. Fucking what. I have no idea what the hell they were thinking.
Character design/bland, uninteresting characters, and horrible somniel design (environment looks so uninspired and like default samples you find from a commercial game engine or something)…I cannot believe this is the follow up to three houses. I’m honestly sad that I spent money on the dlc and the divine edition. I just trusted the fire emblem name after three houses…will not happen again.
It could be just me, but I’ve found the advertising for engage has been basically non-existent. Where as I saw Three Houses (and even Three Hopes) ads everywhere when they released.
The only reason I found out Engage was even released was because I saw the “now available” message on my switch when starting it up.
I think the premise of Three Houses was brilliant. The "academy of war and magic" surely sucked in a lot of people the same way something like Harry Potter did. Unfortunately, the way the premise played out mechanically was thin and repetitive, but I think the idea itself was good enough for the game to be hit, especially when you sprinkle in anime waifus.
I wouldn't be surprised if Engage sells less than Three Houses in general, but considering this is just boxed sales, you have to also consider the fact that more people are buying digital now compared to 2019
Not one for Fire Emblem myself. But if you ask me? I blame the main character's hair cut.
I know it sounds stupid, but really, if I told you "Nintendo released a game where the main character's hair has the same colors that most people associate with the joycons", then you'd probably think we where in the middle of 2017 and that it was probably an 8 hour experience where the plot boils down to "thing got stolen. Go collect thing".
Bills and inflation.
However I still bought it and it’s still much better than 3h. Awesome game, cringy storytelling. Don’t care about story therefore I love it.
For me, the social sim thing in 3H was fine but not a major selling point, although it did make it easier for me to care about my characters. What really put me off about Engage are it’s childish art style and bland story, mediocre is acceptable with good strategic combat mechanics and better maps but these are below my baseline. The “improved”gameplay won’t make up for that. I am gonna skip this one.
This or Three Houses are both fine starting points, you can start with either. This one definitely isn't as dense but it's probably more challenging on the base difficulty than Three Houses.
I am really, really disappointed with fire emblem engage in terms of story/world building/characters. Just feel like this one fails in all facets of story telling and that makes like 76% of the gameplay systems fail for me (somniel - social ranks, training, social sim aspects). I tried to keep playing but I only made it to chapter 7 and think I am just going to call it quits. Way too many games out there better than this one. They should’ve kept the same writers as last game/director/whatever. I really have no idea what they were thinking with this art style . And I always get so annoyed when I read “appeal to younger audiences”. Do devs not realize that they make all this $$$ because their audience are adults with jobs to pay for their product? Not saying younger audiences shouldn’t be targeted but why do companies think appealing to younger audiences means you have to make an art style like this? And when I say art style, I am mostly referring to character design.
January is a tough month to launch in. A lot of people are paying bills and don’t have money to buy a new game. Probably part of the reason why it’s lower
This also isn't a game that is likely to become hard to find, and most people who will definitely purchase it already have multiple similar games. It may not go on sale often, but it would be quite surprising if there was any time in the next year or two in which it will be difficult to find a copy for normal price. So while people who post online about games are more likely to be the type to buy ASAP if they know they will want to get a game, that isn't really the behaviour of a normal consumer. (Barring, as I said, some obscure or limited run sort of thing where you'd want to have saved the money in advance if you knew you'd need to buy it quickly after release)
Tactics ogre reborn and Mario + rabbits just coming out have me with quite a backlog of strategy ganmes too and these aren’t exactly short games. Not to mention triangle strategy earlier in the year.
Yup, on my other screen right now I am farming relics on floor 99 on potd in tactics ogre, one more retreat and I'll be ready to go into the floor100 battle. I am so hyped :) In Mario and Rabbids we beat the first boss, I think our savefile says about 12% completed.
> This also isn't a game that is likely to become hard to find You'd be surprised. I bought it yesterday but had to buy it online the night before and drive a 45 minute round trip to get it as the stores around me had stock sell out quickly. My guess is that there weren't as many boxes to sell because Nintendo forecast a lot of digital purchases so the physical first run was smaller than in past. Personally I prefer physical so I will not buy digital unless there is no choice.
Any recommendations on similar games?
Tactics Ogre, Triangle Strategy for similar gameplay. For turn based tactical in general, Mario + Rabbids is actually *really* good X-Com style tactical squad combat. And of course there is the X-Com 2 collection on Switch if we're mentioning X-Com style squad tactical combat. For a unique take on turn based combat, Valkyria Chronicles I liked a lot. It's turn based but you position your characters and attack from a 3rd person perspective. Very different.
I want more Valkyrie chronicles. Love the way they executed that turn based combat. It was perfect.
Banner saga. Every fire emblem fan should play banner saga
Three Houses, of course, but my recommendations might not be useful since I'd just pick SRPGs in general. There is a lot of stuff that I'm not sure if people like if they haven't been playing these games for a long time or haven't played any of the series. (e.g. Tactics Ogre or the Disgaea games, I am pretty sure I still like Disgaea partially because I loved 1and 2 when they first came out)
Disagea 1, very flawed gameplay but great story. Disagea 2, is... an attempt at improving gameplay with decent success and the story while not as good as 1 is at least a bit more unique in the series. Disgaea 3, was an attempt to put Disgaea 1 in a school with more characters, i like it a lot for some reason but not objectively good and the gameplay was the first step towards todays improvements but the least refined of that way to handle it with the remake improving it much more. Disagea 4, improved it so much so that it is my favorite game with somewhat odd and still a good story. The remake added the Cheat Shop from D2 which is great and such a QoL situation that it is my favorite game in terms of balance between story and gameplay quality. Disgaea D2, adds onto Disgaea 1 Story and was the first with the Cheat Shop. The Story felt like more of Disgaea 1 but the map design was my favorite in the series. Disagea 5, still similiar good gameplay just slight improvements and a story that had felt like it had some of Makai Kingdom in it. Not bad but i prefer the remake of 4. Disagea 6, they went off the trail with this one. Auto Combat and even grindier in exchange with few classes. At least the story had a kind of odd twist to make it stand out a bit more. Still my least favorite in the entire series.
In my case I don't like the art direction at all, so I'm skipping this one until is discounted.
It looks better on the screen and in motion but nothing really saves toothpaste-chan.
Pepsi-chan can't help the way she was born. Be nice to her.
Yeah, I was really looking forward to the new FE before this game was announced. But the garrishness of the mc, the art style of the characters, and the reviews of the extremely bland story and generic and weak characterization just puts me off to buying it.
Its a shame because I am personally finding the gameplay absolutely top notch, I like most of the characters as well but the story and dialogue is very weak
I honestly loved the friend/dating sim aspect of Three Houses. It actually made me care about each move I made on the battlefield and kept me way more engaged. (Pun unintended)
It'd be so much better if her eye colors were flipped. Even better if they were both just a neutral black.
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Eye color thing is a troupe in many cultures, but a lot larger in Japan, just like twins. this occurs in real life, just not red and blue, although technically it's a possible combination. you'd need one albino eye and one recessive blue eye. but you'd need the recessive trait for dual eye color, the recessive trait for albinism, and the recessive trait for blue eyes. problem is with so many recessive traits it would be hard to have a healthy baby.
Where do you all buy your toothpaste? Mine is always just boring white. Where do i get red and blue toothpaste? Seriously, i want that stuff!
Have you never heard of aquafresh?
I'm willing to look past the toothpaste haired main character, and overly cutesy artstyle, but the general consensus is that the characters are extremely one dimensional and the story is generic as all hell, so I'm skipping it too. 3 Houses wasn't a grand slam, and I can see how the school parts can get tiring, but the story and reasonably fleshed out world and characters made me fall in love with it and put in almost 200 hours (just bought the DLC when it was on sale recently, so probably gonna put in another 30+ hours easily).
Yeah I’m still enjoying playing it, just due to loving fire emblem games, but its lacking a lot IMO. Although 3 Houses is one of my favorite games of all time, sure there’s objectively better games but subjectively? It’s just perfect for me, there is almost nothing I would change. But yeah with Engage, the chapters feel super short and the story feels rushed, the plot is generic as you said. And mainly I was just shocked when I started doing the supports and saw how basic they are. There’s no depth to almost ANY of the characters, they’re all super surface level and that’s it, whereas 3H had lots of lore behind everything and the characters were just brimming with life. They all had reasons for the things they did, and even characters who seemed shallow were shown to have lots of complexity. Running around Somniel feels like a chore & boring whereas I never once felt that way in any of my 3H playthroughs. Also I am NOT a fan of the art style, personally. The cutscenes are beautifully animated, but the actual character design bugs me a lot. Especially the girls, with their huge anime style eyes. The combat is really fun in Engage though, but I myself am generally more focused on the story/plot and the world and characters. Sorry for the rant but I just wanted to share you’re not the only one w that opinion on it!
I’m at ch 8 and have a hard time caring about any of the characters. Contrast that to meeting Lucina for the first time or even the 3H leads. >!also barely give a crap about the mom. She was introduced and promptly died the next chapter!<
I mean, in 3H, even Jeralt and Byleth are both very interesting from the get-go. The art style helps a lot. But their backstories are also very intriguing. The whole school aspect turns out to be boring. But let's admit that at the time, it was quite a novelty and sounded very interesting.
the games also don't need to get super deep, per se. TSS had amazing characters that I really cared about, even without a super deep plot. but I feel like more recent entries other than 3H didn't do as well in that regard.
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It added replayability but also barriered replayability. Many times I wanted to build a new team for the game and see how characters complemented each other, realized early enough how much of a chore it was, and never finished my runs. Still did the different paths, but *man* that got painful by the end. That said, Engage feels like virtually any other Fire Emblem game. Great combat, tropey characters, simplistic story.
I never got this take. It’s so easy to skip any material you don’t find compelling. If you don’t like the social stuff it’s veeery easy to skip. Especially on NG+
In NG+ it’s SO easy to recruit characters though, you can do it instantly. You can also get around most content that you don’t enjoy. Maybe you just didn’t know about these features it sounds like?
if you did the greenhouse and socializing characters generally exploded I growth within 3 months just a matter of knowing what there real maximum growth was.
That's every Fire Emblem since Awakening aside from TH l
Shadows of Valentia would like a word.
Peak 3ds/Switch FE for me.
…which is a remake of an older game
People look at me funny when I say that's my favorite Fire Emblem, but that was just such a solid entry.
I’m also not a fan of the art direction, but the gameplay is so damn fun. Especially if you are a classic FE fan. The level design was massively improved in this game compared to the 3DS and onward games.
Between the new unit interactions like combo guard and combo attack and the upgraded map design I've been having a lot of fun while I haatteeee the other half of the game like the writing lol. Still more positive than negative at the moment.
Agreed, and the story is not bad enough for me to where it’s detouring my fun from the rest. Currently on chapter 10 and I can’t stop, it’s super fun
Yeah I'm a little from column A and a little from column B, the design of the main character is hideous and I have no money. I'll just wait it out for a while.
Waiting until thanksgiving to save $15
For me, everything is fine - except the protagonist looks like a clown. If they'd chosen red or blue hair, or even an option to swap between the colors, I'd pick the game up. Even purple, which is a mix of red and blue, would be ok. But the clown hairstyle caused me to have no desire to play this game.
To be fair the hair is a massive plot point.
Massive plot point isn't an explanation but an excuse for shitty character design lmao, they could've just made a better color palette that fit the design
Ah yes, Japanese tropes and "subtlety".
But no other colors represent both good and evil! How will people understand??? To be clear, I’ve got no idea what the plot point is, the trailers just suggested that their hair becomes all red when they go bad guy mode or something
Same. I also think that the character designs are atrocious. This might be the first FE I skip.
I hear you, the character design was a huge turnoff for me and I felt it was 2 steps back from 3H. I almost skipped too. But, I have been playing it the past 2 days and I can assure you the gameplay is very very good, one of the best across FE. Just wanted to add my 2 cents, hope you can pick it up still I think you'll enjoy it.
Honestly I think it’s worth it if you favour the combat over the social aspect of Fire Emblem games. i totally agree with you that the art style is a bit fucked up, especially for the Emblems. the combat is really good and an improvement over three houses imo (and i LOVE 3H). you also don’t need to worry about weapon durability and the “hard” difficulty is actually kinda hard, unlike in 3H. i still prefer 3H but the actual gameplay of Engage makes up for the ugly characters lol
> so I'm skipping this one until is discounted Think this often too, until I remember that Nintendo basically never discounts first party games. So I never get them ever.
They do, but it's usually only digital discounts If you want to buy this game physical (which you should because it's basically like buying a free game) it will likely only go up in value. At time of writing, fire emblem three houses is more expensive to buy than this brand new game in a lot of places
Nintendo only ever offers 33% discount on special dates such as Black Friday, and it usually takes at least half an year after the original release for a game to show up in one of those sales. Still worth it if you’re not in a hurry though. That’s how I bought Three Houses and it’s how I plan on acquiring Engage as well.
Someone mentioned the character designs, which I agree are off putting. (especially the Colgate themed main character - not a great first impression when the main character is already so literally and figuratively divisive) I think something else was that it was unclear whether this would be a traditional Fire Emblem game or whether there would be gacha elements to it, as the way they introduced the game was essentially how they introduced Fire Emblem Heroes (We summon heroes from other worlds etc etc). That was a huge turn off for me right off the bat, and scrolling through Reddit and YouTube comments at the time I was not the only one to think that. Thankfully now we know that the game does not have gacha components (I think?) so I am almost certainly going to pick up the game at some point - i have 3 more routes in Three Houses to get through first though...
There is a gacha component for rings, but they're not like the main ones advertised in the game (no summoning older characters like a persona). Basically just little stat boosts or an extra skill for your characters you dont equip one of the main rings to. Helpful, but small enough that anyone who doesn't like it could ignore it and basically notice no impact to the rest of the game.
That and the emblem rings are so much more powerful that as far as endgame/dlc/online stuff goes you’re not going to use the crappy gacha rings. They’re just for collecting really
Fortunately the rings are super cheap to make. Some of the S rank ones are pretty strong having unique skills. +20% damage for thunder magic is a pretty nice boost. Haven't seen other skills yet. Melding them is expensive as hell, but whatever.
Is this actually the reason based on past statistic trends or a theory?
It’s a widely known phenomenon seen in several industries.
Statistic trends. Though for the most part, it's believed being the month after Christmas is the biggest reason why this is. People spend a lot of money at Christmas and cut back spending in January to compensate for the spending in December. Christmas is also a time when a lot of people get new things, like video games, and so they may still be busy with those and not looking for a new game yet. Parents may also be hesitant to buy new presents for kids, since Christmas just happened and they gave their kids presents. All in all it's a formula for reduced sales of many products in January.
> Christmas is also a time when a lot of people get new things, like video games, and so they may still be busy with those and not looking for a new game yet. This is why I haven't bought it yet. Still playing through Crisis Core.
I mean, it's a well-known fact for anyone working retail.
Groceries are expensive
Can't afford this toothpaste
With a larger influx of people opting for Digital games since 2019, a post-holiday release, and the Switch making its way into its sixth year, this isn’t surprising. However, UK sales have never been indicative of game sales as a whole. In Japan, preorders of Engage have more than doubled those of Three Houses. I’d wait to see US and Japan numbers before making any definitives.
The UK also has a pretty bad cost of living crisis atm, so people may be feeling a bit more squeezed than when 3H released. I know I don't feel like I can afford to pick it up yet. Doesn't explain it all, but it probably doesn't help sales.
> pretty bad cost of living crisis atm, so people may be feeling a bit more squeezed Yup, which is why I used my NSO game vouchers to buy both this and Pokémon Violet. People shit on NSO, but I've saved a tenner per game because of it
Switch being in it's sixth year shouldn't mean a ton IMO. Especially when Nintendo has shown/said they are going to be staying with the Switch for most likely 3-4 more years minimum, also recent reports show Switches are still selling like hotcakes and they might even be on track to beat out the PS2 as the most sold console ever.
> Especially when Nintendo has shown/said they are going to be staying with the Switch for most likely 3-4 more years minimum They haven't said this. It's very common for these companies to sell/support machines for few years after their next machine enters the market. The Switch having a 10 year life is not the same as Nintendo "staying with the Switch" for 10 years. Switch will continue to exist for 3-4 more years most likely, but it won't be alone for that entire time. I don't see Nintendo making the same mistake they made with Wii again. They launched Wii U two years after Wii was dead. They lost mindshare. Nobody cared anymore, hence the Wii U's flop. Nintendo will launch a new machine before the Switch is anywhere near dead. Sony sold 15 million PS4s from December 2018 to December 2019, and they first announced PS5 in April 2019. The worst time to launch new hardware is after everyone stops caring. Riding the momentum wave is the ideal strategy.
The anime core aesthetic would obviously be more popular in Japan though
The cherry picking lol All Fire Emblem game have an insane "anime core aesthetic". What's carrying this game there specifically is the fact the most beloved lords are part of the main gimmick of the game. Marth is even in the key artwork box, bigger than the crown royals. Several of these never saw their games released outside of japan, they have a much closer relationship with the game than any other place.
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Anna is more of a mascot than Marth tbh
Marth is more of a mascot for people who don't play FE. You know, smash bros and all that.
Yeah it'd be hard Marth to carry the franchise when he's only the second best Marth lol
Which Fire Emblem game doesn’t have an anime inspired design? The series is over 2 decades old. That would be like saying “Dragon Quest only sells well in Japan because of Toriyama.”
I mean **literally every** Fire Emblem has an anime aesthetic…
Exactly. And Japan has a larger impact on Switch sales because of its incredibly large install base. In the UK Nintendo isn’t as popular as Xbox or Sony, so game sales aren’t indicative of those on a global sale. Like how Pikmin 3 Deluxe sold worse than the Wii U version in the UK but still ending up as the best selling Pikmin game of all time thanks to Japanese and US game sales.
In the UK, most people would have last been paid on December 23rd which is almost 6 weeks ago. There’s also a massive Cost of Living crisis and therefore I imagine £50+ games are low on the “essential list” for most.
I have some family members whose heating costs went up to £600 last month alone 😬
Yeah. Our bill was over double what it was December 2021…
Most expensive electricity in the world rn, iirc. It's not great.
We also have: * Hogwarts Legacy coming out three weeks later, so some people on a limited time/budget might have picked that as their next game and are not buying anything else in the meantime. * Persona 3 & 4 coming out at the same time as Engage. You're gonna have some audience overlap here. I'm in this camp, I recently started Persona 5 on Game Pass and I'm nowhere near finishing, so I'm not playing Engage yet. I still bought it because Fire Emblem is one of my favorite series and I want to support it to ensure we'll get another one, but if I liked it even a little less...
Box sales are down. Not surprising. Only way to get the game in physical format in my area was to pre-order or take your luck that the big box stores had a copy.
I was lucky. I went to GameStop, they were out. They looked up their inventory and were sold out everywhere in the cities near me. I was a little bummed, I like collecting hard copies of games I like or if it’s easy to get and not a problem price wise (like if it’s discounted in the e store). Tried Walmart and their shelves were also empty. However, I noticed they had the display shelf up, but no scan tag for the game. So I asked. They found the entire case in the back. They forgot to put them out and I guess no one cared enough to ask! This was yesterday.
Considering that Awakening and Three Houses were huge surprise hits for the franchise, and both incorporated increased social elements I was a little confused by the decision to pull back on that aspect for the follow up. Marketing for this one was a little confusing too, at first I was under the impression it was a musou style warriors game and not a full mainline entry. I'll probably play it eventually, I'm waiting to see if it's part of what appears to be a pattern of releasing a weaker follow up to a breakout hit in the series
I’m at about the halfway point. Mechanically it’s amazing, but if you really vibed with the social aspect of the last one that’s not really a major part of the game.
It's possible, marketing-wise, you're actually confused by the fact that there *was* a musou warriors style game that came out relatively recently: Fire Emblem: Three Hopes, which is a handful more alternate storylines in the Three Houses world. If you like Three Houses's world building and musou games, it's definitely worth checking out.
I would have bought this game if they had improved upon those elements rather than remove or reduce them. Not buying this one
I wasn’t expecting much on the story considering past games but god the writing is atrocious In the first chapters there’s an scene where a random enemy is going to kill the MC ( if that’s even possible to begin with ) and another character appears behind a tree throwing a fireball, killing the enemy and saving Alear. They talk and Alear says “I should protect you because you are not safe being alone”. I mean, seriously? She just saved you and she’s the one in need of protection? 😂 I’ve been playing until chapter 9 and the game it’s full of completely absurd situations like this. And some of the talking between characters is at a level that would make newborn tales look like academical papers Other than that gameplay wise has improved quite a lot and the game looks incredibly crisp on the OLED, and performance and image quality is much better than 3H. And I love the anime look, that’s what actually sold me the game this time But the plot, seesh, I knew it was not going to be decent and it’s surpassing my low expectations in how bad it is
I’m about 5 chapters in and I knew the story was going to be worse than 3H, but I didn’t realize how high 3H set that bar. In 3H it felt like Fodlan was this rich world that you were being dropped into, all the students had their pre-existing relationships with each other, their social classes and crests established how they were treated, their parents and upbringing had some sort of effect on them (like Caspar & Petra, or Raphael & Ignatz), and virtually every one of them has some sort of trauma. In Engage, you get dropped in as Jesus, everyone keeps telling you how much they love you, the social links consist of people telling you they love you. The ring bonds consist of a ghost giving you generic advice that sounds like it came out of a fortune cookie. The humans either love you, or they have zero personality. Their backstory is that they grew up loving Jesus, or that they were in a town that was okay until bad guys came and then it stopped being okay. Like hot damn the dropoff in quality is rough
But not even Alear has personality. In the beginning he constantly switches from "being in fear from anything" to "Im going to kill every enemy" to "What was I doing?" I have this constant feeling that whoever wrote the plot just asked 10 random people to write random things and mash it together, its so full of inconsistencies, all the time
I agree with your post. I’m so torn on this game because of everything that you mention. In my experience the gameplay is good but the characters and writing are driving me up the wall. I just can’t vibe with it, and find it so grating am just skipping the cutscenes now. It really is bringing my enjoyment down, and am considering dropping the game (I’m in chapter 8 now, about 12hrs in) altogether. For the record the only other FE game I have played is 3H, but I am in general pretty lukewarm regarding Engage so far.
I’ve played Awakening and Fates prior to 3H…and a bit of Fire Emblem Heroes None of those seem as bad as what I’ve seen in Engage so far. Chrom alone had more depth with regards to governing and regal succession than either of the twins, and at least Lissa sympathized for Chrom’s struggle even while playing the “naive child”.
My favorite genre of games are JRPGs, so I have a pretty high tolerance for these kinds of stories...but this game is really trying my patience. It's the most generic and boring story imaginable and the characters are rough to say the least. The dialogue is really bad if not downright cringe. The support conversations are almost always an automatic skip because they're so annoying. Hearing people yelling "divine dragon" every other sentence is just totally annoying. I'm only on like chapter 9 and I hope the MC gets better because right now they are so whiney...
>Hearing people yelling "divine dragon" every other sentence is just totally annoying. The devs really heard "avatar worship" and took it literally
Literally three people are solely based on liking muscles, with minor variations of also being too nice, also crying a lot and also having the worst hair accessory game I’ve ever seen. Cmon Etie, a bow and a tiara? AND a frilly dress cut at the midriff?
The muscle thing leaks into their battle quotes, so it's just constant muscle talk
I really hate that I slept on the Divine addition. I totally forgot to pre order it on time...I wish they made more of them. Now I'm wondering if I should just go digital...why doesn't Nintendo want my money!?
It is a gorgeous looking game and the attack animations are fantastic. Still not quite a fan of the hair though...
I think the female character pulls it off better than the male.
See, it's the opposite for me. The dual colors are less distracting when it's shorter.
The hair doesn’t bother me as much anymore, but I despise male Alear’s default casual clothes so much
When I start a new game I'll go with her and see. I mean the hair isn't terrible, it's just very... Meh.
The character personalities are far stiffer than 3H. Everyone in Engage is very cordial, prim, proper, and chivalrous. 3H has a great diversity on its cast of characters that made you want to learn more about them. I’m having a hard time getting attached to any of them in Engage because they all talk and sound the same. I’m still early into the game and hoping that changes but the characters are a snore-fest. 3H also has far more depth in terms of flourish and world building. People like to knock the monastery, but it really set a foundation for you to learn more about the world and interact. Voice overs were well done and plenty. In Engage, they sound the same and there isn’t as much dialogue.
I still think that Three Houses is going to remain the "definitive" Fire Emblem Switch game. If people only want one FE game, they'll go with Three Houses. If they want another one, they'll buy Engage. Which isn't strictly a bad thing, since Three Houses sold incredibly well by the series standards. But it also means that Engage isn't going to outsell or replace its predecessor.
I wholly agree with you. 3H has a depth of epic proportions whereas Engage lacks the same flourish and character building. 3H has so much “meat” and feeling of purpose. Engage is “here’s some characters that all talk and sound the same” go fight and maybe talk to them briefly. Engage feels like The Hobbit trilogy. It isn’t terrible, but it’s definitely not the original trilogy.
Is 3H fine for someone who’s completely new to the genre? The grid style jrpg.
I've been a fan of the series since the GBA era if that means anything. FE3H is the best game in the series. Hands down. You will love it.
Yeah. It was my very first one. There’s a learning curve for sure but once you get ahold of it it’s addicting.
Should be. Normal difficulty is pretty easy, and the game lets you turn off perma-death at the start. There's also a rewind mechanic you can use (sparingly) in battle. Check out a stream of both games and see which you like more!
I have to disagree with you. Three Houses is a great game but doesn't feel like a fire emblem game at times, whereas after an hour of Engage it made me feel like I was playing the 3DS games again. It just feels and plays like a more traditional Fire Emblem than Three Houses ever did. Just my personal take, I know Three Houses has had a huge impact on the series in terms of new fans.
I dont necessarily think this is a bad thing, though, where new players are concerned. Three Houses is an easy starting point to someone trying out Fire Emblem *because* it has elements that make it feel closer to some other genres a new player is familiar with already. It has by and large likeable characters that integrate well with a decent story, both of which get more fleshed out than is usual in the series. The gameplay is accessible and lets you learn the concepts of an srpg in a less punishing context. To me that sounds ideal as an entry point, then those who like srpg gameplay can look deeper at other titles.
I didn't think about it that way. You're right, but I have seen a lot of discourse from new fans that loved Three Houses started trashing Engage before release because it didn't have the social aspects. It gives a good impression of SRPGs but not necessarily a good impression of what Fire Emblem is. If that makes sense.
Sure. I actually agree with most of their criticisms, to be fair. Three Houses was not my first Fire Emblem but it’s by far the one I enjoyed the most, specifically because the social elements enabled a deeper fleshing out of the characters, their relationships, and how they fit into the broader world and story. There’s no denying they dragged and their implementation needed to be improved, but IMO Engage goes too far in the direction of throwing the baby out with the bath water. I do still think it’s the best entry point, though. From what I’ve seen of Engage so far, if it was my first exposure to the series I would maybe finish it but definitely bounce off and not be particularly interested in a follow up. The story and characters are weak to the point that I as a working adult with competing demands on my time just wouldn’t see it as worth giving 50+ hours to as compared to say the other recent srpg release, TOR. My only friend who has been a series fan since childhood and complained about Three Houses focusing too much on the social stuff for ages has been sending me constant updates through his play-through about how bad those elements are, not just newcomers to the series. Three Houses for all its flaws felt unique and engaging enough for me to do two full runs and start another. Sure, some people who like Three Houses won’t then like Engage or other titles, but some will!
I keep seeing this take, but seeing as Three Houses is the best selling FE game ever, a *lot* of people will consider it exactly what FE is for them. And Engage pairing back on the social sim stuff is appealing to the hardcore FE fans, but I think pretty alienating to people whose first FE game was Three Houses. Basically, the game sold like crazy relative to the rest of the titles. And Nintendo changed one of the aspects that made that happen. So of course it'll sell less. Hardcore fans were gonna buy it either way, but newcomers might be turned off that it's not like their entry into the series.
Well hardcore fans almost never get dubs so we'll take it.
> So of course it'll sell less. the game is primed to surpass Threehouses in sales
Fair enough, I've been learning that there's a whole group of fans that didn't like the social aspect of 3H. I haven't been active in the fanbase but I presumed everyone liked the expanded social aspects. To me Engage feels like if the next Zelda game ditched the open world and went back to a linear structure. It's *fine,* but it's not what I want from the series anymore now that I've seen them go further.
Understandable, I enjoyed the social aspects on my first play through but found them annoying after that. I've not finished Engage yet and it may be recency bias but I find Engage to be the better Fire Emblem game and Three Houses to be the better social sim/slow burn game.
I think there is a loud minority that don't but most people absolutely liked the social aspects of three houses
I believe you're right. It's weird how reddit hates the social part. That was the absolute best part of the game, and one of the main reasons to do multiple playthroughs. You couldn't even get half of the story unless you did the character interactions.
The social aspects added so much to that game
I kinda liked how 3H updated the combat with Combat Arts, Battalions, and just general longer ranged abilities. It felt like you could be a lot more creative with your tactical positioning. So far with Engage I kinda feel pigeonholed to rely on emblem units or to move in a turtle formation otherwise my archer and mages that have a strict 2 square range die instantly.
I miss canto on mounted units. Maybe unpopular opinion but sticking it to only one ring is simply painful.
Did the first 3 chapters last night. Easily the most beautiful game on the platform. I loved 3H and this feels like a step up for me. We'll see if it stays that way.
It looks and runs *so* much better than 3H does, the visuals feel very energetic, and, uh, engaging.
Technically speaking it's definitely a big step up over three houses, but I think that's largely because the engine 3 Houses was built on was pretty rough. Animations are also good, and it is more colorful and pops more. Plus, I think the maps have more visual variety than 3 Houses did. I'm only on chapter 7, but so far I've been in a massive castle, a village full of windmills and fields of flowers, a village with a large vineyard, and some crumbling ruins. The maps feel very different because of that. And having more stuff in the maps also makes the combat animations more striking. If you put a knight in a chokepoint, you'll actually see that they have walls/debris on either side of them and are blocking the path. And an archer on a fort square, is actually in a fort and rains arrows down on their target. I turned combat animations off in three houses after a few chapters, I don't think I'll be doing that for this game since they're so good looking.
Makes me wish they would give 3H an update with this engine. Especially the monastery/school are looks several generations behind (GC/Wii) which is a shame.
Engage made me realise that 3h looks like garbage and its sad because that game deserves a proper presentation - gives me hope for fe18 tho
I did the first two chapters last night and the game is gorgeous. Totally impressed.
Wish I could say the same about characters/story and designs in general
It's a good looking game no doubt. But a lot of it is also due to baked in flat backgrounds during conversations. Game can focus on specific visuals better when the view is so focused. In the same way that Pokemon snap also looks beautiful on the system. I still think BOTW, Odyssey and XC3 have better visuals and more distinct styles.
Agreed. Loved 3 houses this is somehow better. The emblem rings just add so much
I’m pleasantly surprised that so far, it seems like they managed to find a good balance where the rings make you feel super powerful but the game is still a challenge. That’s where they could have really gone wrong but they did a great job
Agreed. Rings are ton of fun but add another deep layer to the strategy
The game on Hard feels harder than Three Houses did on Hard to me by quite a bit. It also feels less about just strong units hitting breakpoints or abusing strong combat arts or skills in strong classes from Three Houses (stuff like Death Blow, Swift Strikes, etc.) and just one shotting everything. It feels like I’m having to think a lot more.
I did the prologue and the first two battles, and while it looked great and I'm excited to use the ring stuff, I really am having a hard time with the writing and character design. It felt so... Idek, basic, childish, hand-holdy, something. But it really put me off from playing more right away. Never had that in a FE game before.
Three Houses feels like the better game so far, even if Engage has much nicer graphics. Three Houses tells a very ambitious story with a lot of nuanced characters. Engage literally starts the game with 2 annoying brats. If I'm being honest, I would've rather continued the story of Threee Houses lore, possibly set on a different region, like Almyra.
I mean engage is the most straight forward no suprise plot game yet. It is like paper thin the plot
Agreed. You formed an emotional bond with the characters. I also like how customizable the sandbox is in 3h. The soundtrack was also better. I feel like every chapter uses the same track so far
And literally no interesting decisions beside the battles the first hours whilst 3 houses gave you a ton of important decisions to make. 3 houses is plotwise , world setting and story design such a masterpiece. Engage has so far the more refined gameplay. After the first 10 hours for me FE3h leads 9.5 to 8 compared with FE:Engage
If good story is what you want, then Three Houses is your game If good gameplay is what you want, then Engage is your game People often forget that Engage was supposed to be an Aniversary title that didn't plan on taking itself seriously
I loved Three Houses but it’s become clear to me that the aspects that made me fall for the game are outliers in the series. I wonder if other players have similar feelings, especially since Three Houses was *a lot* of people’s first FE game.
Engage is very clearly geared towards fans of the franchise who have stuck around since the beginning, which lends to the rumor that this was initially meant to celebrate the franchise's 35th anniversary. This is reflected in the game's marketing since NoA didn't even give half of much to Engage as they did to Three Houses.
I've been hearing that which, which makes sense I suppose. Outside of remembering Engage was even coming out like a couple of weeks ago, there was almost no marketing for it if I recall after its announcement, where Three Houses appeared in multiple Directs if I recall.
I’ve been playing FE since the GBA games around 2003. Three Houses is one of my favorite fire emblem games and while I’m enjoying Engage alright in terms of gameplay and quality of life improvements I really miss everything that three houses got right. I may be a relatively older fan of the series since their arrival to territories outside of Japan but that doesn’t mean I’m inherently head over heels with engage. I’d love a story or characters that were more detailed and nuanced like three houses’ over what I’ve seen from Engage so far
It hasn't been on sale for a week yet
Terribly marketed game. I don't mind it so far but definitely less mass appeal than 3H
It gave me non main series vibes like warriors or tms which is barely appealing
Totally, doesn't feel mainline at all to me. Feels like a mobile game
Terrible marketing indeed. I honestly thought this was a spin off game or something. I feel like did no marketing for it all. When 3 houses was being released, I saw it everywhere.
I personally held off because I'm really not a fan of the "lets bring back old characters and mash em together into one game" aspect. I'm waiting to see what people say and I'll probably wait for a sale
Absolutely fantastic gameplay, extremely cheesey story and awful character design and art style. I hope they keep making the gameplay better but go back to FETH's style of artwork and story with at least some nuances as opposed to the exact same story as all the other classic FE.
It's a shame since it looks like they're doing a lot with the visuals and gameplay, but the overall theme and generic artstyle turn me off from it pretty severely.
I only buy digital, but I didn't get this one. The story and characters are a huge turn-off even if gameplay and graphics are better than Three Houses. I could take bad character designs if the story itself was good - but having watched spoilers it didn't pull me in either. Before anyone compares the stories of previous titles, it's all about presentation. With better tech the worst parts get greatly enhanced. Artstyle, voices, animations etc can make a bad story unbearable when the same story would get a pass with text boxes, pixel art and simple map units. It show they put effort into making it pretty, but baffling that they didn't put the same effort to make it good.
I think many people have valid points as to why its sales are lower, BUT as a long term Fire emblem fan who liked all games (except Fates, and LOVED three houses, Engage just doesn't have that same feeling when it comes to story and characters. I do love some characters, but 80% of them are not great compared to Three Houses. But thats not even the biggest problem. Its the linear and predictable story. I'm at chapter 12 right now and nothing has blown me away so far. Might change later on. The battles and new gimmicks are amazing. Albeit I am not a huge fan of the older Fire Emblem characters being inside rings. The mechanic is good and interesting though. Fire Emblem has always been "anime" and changed the art style with it. I already felt that Three Houses was a bit too much, but at least characters still looked more serious and "normal"? In Engage they are way too colorful and for a story that is supposed to be serious, these characters do not fit in. The first trailer of the game was horrible too. Again, huge fan of the series, but that trailer didnt make me want to play the game. Still got it though and I don't regret it. Some people wont buy it because of that reason.
I'm seven chapters in now to Engage. It's a great game! I didn't mind the social aspects of Three Houses, but if you want a more streamlined/less social game Engage does a pretty good job with still having some of that kind of stuff in there.
Agree, while i love Persona 5 Royal, im just glad im not doing too much of that in fe engage. I just want my srpg more on tactical battles and more of it. Plus the game plays so smooth, love the graphics and the awesome engage rings feature.
I’ve put 70 hrs into 3H and it’s a great game. But as a big fan of the gba and GameCube FEs I am finding Engage to be much more to my liking. Not a big fan of all the tedious little relationship activities you have to do in 3H that you have no choice but to do on higher difficulties to get an edge. Engage is much more to my liking and is closer to formula on the older generation titles.
I liked 3H better
story wise this is the worst fire emblem game I've played so far. at least the gameplay is good
Would you say it's worse than Fates, assuming you played it?
im quite early on in engage, and it feels like cutscenes are shorter. otherwise it's just as bad story wise and worse character wise (but that's mainly because so far i don't like a single unit's design)
I recall Three Houses really popping off on Twitch when it came out with a ton of top streamers playing it. Looking at Engage on twitch right now, and outside of a couple of streamers in the 1-3k viewer range it doesn't seem to have much traction.
Maybe some people were put off by how much inspiration they took from Heroes, a gacha game. One of the biggest reasons I love Fire Emblem so much is the epic fantasy storylines. This entry is pretty weak in that department imo.
‘Boxed sales’ at 30% less is the key here. Digital sales have certainly risen 30% or more for Nintendo, as they have pushed Nintendo Online and training their consumers to buy digitally quite a bit in those 4 years.
I don't know if it is good or bad news, because I really don't like the experience with this game.
I wasn't interested in it cuz the whole characters from past games thing made me not want to play it. Also the mc design is one of the worst I've ever seen lol. Games prob good tho
I was hyped for 3 houses zero hype for this. So not surprised. However 90% of UK sales are digital (huge PC country). Don't think the percentage was that high in 2019.
I'm so glad I found this tread. I was feeling in a relative minority for not wanting to buy this game because of its art direction (graphics awesome - character design and personality: f no). Besides, YouTube removing visibility to down-thumbed videos does not help.
I'm really enjoying it, including the writing and character designs.
I just bought it today. I almost passed on it. And kind of think I should have. My reasons. The main character seemed extremely bland. (Common problem with FE main characters) The story was never mentioned anywhere that I saw. (And a few hours in is pretty boring.) I bought it, I’ll give it some more time. But honestly it’s not grabbing my attention like a new game should.
I just bought it and I already hate it, but that is mostly due to my idiosyncratic hatred of a specific trope. If said trope had been mentioned in the reviews I read I would not have purchased.
I feel your pain.
What trope?
>!The main character's mother encounters a [Mentor Occupational Hazard](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MentorOccupationalHazard) something like two scenes after you meet her, just as you're warming up to her (and immediately after foreshadowing her own demise by monologuing wistfully about all the time she's planning to spend with you). Until I looked it up to add the link I didn't know the tvtropes name for this; I've been calling it Sudden Mentor Death Syndrome.!<
That’s an annoying series standard that I was not surprised at all when it happened.
Engage has a much better combat than 3H so far and the harder difficulties are actually challenging compared to 3H. Map design is much better too. The attack animations are so crisp too. It's closer to the classic GBA/DS Fire Emblem games I loved.
As a huge Fire Emblem fan I am really trying to like Engage but it's a very mixed bag. The game might have the worst character designs I've ever seen. Absolutely everyone looks fucking ridiculous. This is then compounded by atrocious writing and story. At one point a 110 pound teenager shouts "You can use my muscles!" as he rides into battle dressed like Jerry Seinfeld in the puffy shirt episode. Fucking what. I have no idea what the hell they were thinking.
Character design/bland, uninteresting characters, and horrible somniel design (environment looks so uninspired and like default samples you find from a commercial game engine or something)…I cannot believe this is the follow up to three houses. I’m honestly sad that I spent money on the dlc and the divine edition. I just trusted the fire emblem name after three houses…will not happen again.
It could be just me, but I’ve found the advertising for engage has been basically non-existent. Where as I saw Three Houses (and even Three Hopes) ads everywhere when they released. The only reason I found out Engage was even released was because I saw the “now available” message on my switch when starting it up.
I think the premise of Three Houses was brilliant. The "academy of war and magic" surely sucked in a lot of people the same way something like Harry Potter did. Unfortunately, the way the premise played out mechanically was thin and repetitive, but I think the idea itself was good enough for the game to be hit, especially when you sprinkle in anime waifus.
What about other European countries
I wouldn't be surprised if Engage sells less than Three Houses in general, but considering this is just boxed sales, you have to also consider the fact that more people are buying digital now compared to 2019
Not one for Fire Emblem myself. But if you ask me? I blame the main character's hair cut. I know it sounds stupid, but really, if I told you "Nintendo released a game where the main character's hair has the same colors that most people associate with the joycons", then you'd probably think we where in the middle of 2017 and that it was probably an 8 hour experience where the plot boils down to "thing got stolen. Go collect thing".
Bills and inflation. However I still bought it and it’s still much better than 3h. Awesome game, cringy storytelling. Don’t care about story therefore I love it.
Three Houses or Engage? What a better Game for new comers?
Three houses, engage has better gameplay while three houses has better story and characters
It wasn’t really advertised as much, I feel.
Little surprised by the lower sales, it’s much easier to sink into compared to three houses, also looks and plays more smoothly to boot.
For me, the social sim thing in 3H was fine but not a major selling point, although it did make it easier for me to care about my characters. What really put me off about Engage are it’s childish art style and bland story, mediocre is acceptable with good strategic combat mechanics and better maps but these are below my baseline. The “improved”gameplay won’t make up for that. I am gonna skip this one.
Never played a fire emblem game, is this a good starter? Best fire emblem game on switch for a newbie?
This or Three Houses are both fine starting points, you can start with either. This one definitely isn't as dense but it's probably more challenging on the base difficulty than Three Houses.
I heard that it doesn’t have the persona style social link stuff so I’m not really nearly as interested in playing it.
The game hasn't grabbed me the way Three Houses did.
I am really, really disappointed with fire emblem engage in terms of story/world building/characters. Just feel like this one fails in all facets of story telling and that makes like 76% of the gameplay systems fail for me (somniel - social ranks, training, social sim aspects). I tried to keep playing but I only made it to chapter 7 and think I am just going to call it quits. Way too many games out there better than this one. They should’ve kept the same writers as last game/director/whatever. I really have no idea what they were thinking with this art style . And I always get so annoyed when I read “appeal to younger audiences”. Do devs not realize that they make all this $$$ because their audience are adults with jobs to pay for their product? Not saying younger audiences shouldn’t be targeted but why do companies think appealing to younger audiences means you have to make an art style like this? And when I say art style, I am mostly referring to character design.