#archanea meta

[iturbide]

I'm not saying there's anything wrong with fans filling in the mistakes left by IS, just that I feel Awakening's writers treated the game as a stand-alone story.

In a lot of ways I'm pretty sure they did! From a Doylist standpoint, Awakening was intended to be the swan song of Fire Emblem as a series: they dropped in a lot of references, callbacks, and homages to earlier games as a send-off and goodbye to the fans of the series in what was intended to be its curtain call. I can't possibly say how much of it was intentionally placed and how much was included just as a nice treat for those who were familiar with older games.

But also I think that there's something beautiful about the effort fans have put into making sense of Awakening in the context of a larger timeline. It's a level of dedication and care that speaks volumes for how much they love the series as a whole, and it feels...dismissive, to me, to say "there's nothing wrong" with doing it, like it discounts just how much work fans have done, on their own time, to do all of this, and often enough make it available for other fans who share the same interest.

[knowmypower]

What are your headcanons on marth with metaknight? If it's okay to ask! 🙏

of course!! i freakign love these two. marth is meta knight's closest friend in my smashverse. they inspire each other a lot, meta knight with marth's noble and compassionate values, and marth with meta knight's resilient and fearless qualities. they're in perfect sync when they battle together or against each other, but surprisingly, you won't actually find them sparring much anymore. meta knight recognizes that marth doesn't fight necessarily because he enjoys it (unlike him), marth fights with purpose. and when there isn't really anything at stake, he prefers to live a slightly less…eventful existence in the smash mansion lol. meta knight is fine with this, because despite what it might seem to people who don't know him as well as marth, he also enjoys his quiet time.

incidentally, marth loves visiting dreamland. that kind of peace and tranquility is exactly what he strives for in his own kingdom. he stops and says hello to every. single. waddle dee. which gets tiring even for meta knight lol, but it's also one of the biggest reasons he respects marth. meta knight, in turn, loves altea. it's comparable to dreamland in a way, being a smaller, more rural kingdom in the grand scheme of popstar and archanea, but it is still equipped with more armories and training grounds than a knight could ever want, and a rich history to boot. meta knight felt like a kid in a candy shop when he first visited, and that's before he saw the library.

BASICALLY they are epic asf friends/comrades with a lot of common ground. they both value justice and go to great lengths to attain it. marth is humble and never overbearing, which keeps meta knight calm. meta knight is confident and grounded, which raises marth's spirits. marth takes his role as a prince very seriously, and meta knight likes that it gives him the opportunity to sorta ham up his own knightliness a bit (though he also does this with peach and zelda) lol.

[gascon-en-exil]

What do you consider the best FE games in terms of gameplay?

Bearing in mind that my parameters for what constitutes good FE gameplay are very different from those of pretty much anyone else who talks about this online:

Replayability and completionist goals like support logs are very much a part of gameplay even if most people disregard them.

Fun unintentional metas

Notably, these are the only games that I can fully enjoy even without cheating (not that they wouldn't be even more fun with cheating).

FE16: 100% completion, I have a playlist all about it, and alongside my favorite ships it's the best thing to have come out of this game in my opinion.

FE10: The game forcing stat points on level ups (at least +1 in combat, +3 with BEXP) as well as the battle save feature makes it feasible for units to cap all stats without grinding or using a bunch of stats boosters...which is good since they're finite here. It's also a lot of fun for draft runs with all the army switching.

Better with cheating, good replay value

FE4 rises above the other Kaga games by virtue of its eugenics babies, which really add to the replay value as you try out different combinations. There's also, unexpectedly, a charming smallness to its overall limited inventory and fewer chapters.

Not a ton of replay, but more interesting gameplay than below (esp. with cheating)

Basically what it says. None of them have universal support logs so that concern isn't there, but they can be fun to replay with different characters. FE5 especially though needs cheating, because I'm not a masochist.

Whoever designed the GBA support system should be ashamed

...Yeah. Good games, but the grind is miserable especially in FE7. Also, FE7's ranking system is awful and annoying although I can't fault it for that as it originated back in the Jugdral games.

Postgame is just a grindfest, but at least it's fun getting there

To this day I still haven't finished all the supports and bond conversations, mostly because I lost interest. There's just too much to collect or achieve postgame and almost no incentive to do so. As many have said though, the gameplay is fun and dynamic - yes, even on Normal.

Play it once (or play the remake) and that'll do it

FE6 would be up with the other GBA games if it had a support log, but since it doesn't there's no reason to get supports aside from the stat boosts. The Archanea games and Gaiden all feel small and outdated now, and there's not much point to going back to them. I ranked the DS remakes below the originals because while they're more up to date they also have more annoying features, like unlocking paralogues in FE11 or Kris in FE12.

Oh my God how did the support log get *worse*!? (Apotheosis meta is alright at least)

Grinding out every variable parent-child support line is a nightmare, and there's no sense of accomplishment because they're so repetitive. The gameplay is dull as anything, and while this is a game for min-maxing that will require lots of grinding. At least Apotheosis exists as a goal for that.

See Awakening, but somehow even worse except for the maps

(Note that this is FE14 in its entirety, not just Revelation - no idea why so many of these tier list makers break up the routes of Fates as if they were separate games)

Much less completionist-friendly than FE13; the support log is even bigger with even more variable parent-child lines, growths are lower and it's harder to level infinitely, and there's no serious postgame content to work toward. The maps are fun and I appreciate what they were going for with Phoenix mode even if no one else does, but there's a reason I haven't come back to this game in years and it has nothing whatsoever to do with moral outrage or nitpicking over plot holes.

[aurheatum]

@iyusiia

Headcanon prompt / open

Despite clearly drawing inspiration from FE4 and its divinities, godliness in 3h is explicitly linked to motherhood in Fodlan (differing from Naga's depictions in both Archanea and Jugdral).

Sothis is above all the land's progenitor goddess - the emphasis on her femininity and maternal side explicit in the text that shows up in the Fodlan magic circle.

Image: the localized text (right) and a new translation (left) using the exact romanization and wording that shows up in-game whenever white or black magic is cast. Source.

Rhea wants her mother, the Goddess, back; this is the reasoning behind much of what happens in Three Houses, including Byleth's own origin. But does Rhea want to be a god, herself? Much less a mother?

I don't think so. She states at the end of SS "I wished desperately to be held in my mother's arms once more", very clearly placing herself in the role of child when it comes to Sothis (funny, she can only admit to this when she knows it is no longer possible).

Here's a much harder, question, then, is Rhea a mother despite her own wants? Let's dig in!

As her new FEH unit aptly puts (in both her Japanese and English title for it) Rhea is quite literally the matriarch of the entire Seiros religion. Even if it is, as hinted, based on what the Sothis religion looked like while the goddess was still alive it was created by Seiros, named after her, and has been strictly guided by the same archbishop for a millennia now.

She is also the creator of twelve living beings or vessels - ending with Sitri (and this is not to mention her altered golems, all named after people dear to her). Textually, there is no doubt that as a creator to one who "loved as a human" and someone who, to use an alternate translation of Sothis' magical circle, was indeed "a creature who possessed a heart", Rhea is a mother, even going so far as to say that is exactly how Sitri viewed her.

It is telling though, isn't it, the way she phrases it? While she acknowledges she was a mother figure to Sitri, and even admits to affection toward her* -- nowhere does she ever say she considers Sitri her daughter.

She would never truly be able to admit that, after all; to be a mother is simply not something Rhea can ever comphrehend because it would put her as equal to her mother ("I have only ever been acting as your proxy" she tells Byleth when still convinced they will awaken as Sothis).

And yet, despite it all, she has indeed become one in her single-minded pursuit to bring the dead back to life.

Post canon would she ever be able to come to terms with all this? That's a little bit out of the range of my portrayal I have to say, but probably only in her endings where she goes to live with Catherine in Zanado and actually has time time to unpack all of the lies she's told both the world and herself.

*I want to add that, in her own weird, winding Nabatean way, I do think Rhea at least considered Sitri to be family or special. I went into this more in another meta but never added what really sets it apart to me: the reason she gave Sitri a private open casket burial and preserved her body, in my opinion, is because this is something she never could do for the rest of her family (tfw ur either a pebble or sword). It is one of the highest forms of love an eternally grieving woman like Rhea can give.

[markoftheasphodel]

This is FE12 Michalis, though. The one who got to shove his middle finger in Marth’s face and get Macedon all to himself, threw both his sisters in a convent despite their reason for angst being alive, and then ran off to conquer another continent because he learned nothing.

Only if you let Minerva save his sorry ass. I wouldn’t.

[burr-ell]

God I'll never not be salty about how WASTED the lore/worldbuilding is in 3H.

Sothis is literally an interdimensional draco-god of unknown origins who can bend time to her will and create (the Nabateans) and restore life, which is what made her comatose after the war with the Agarthans

The setting of Fodlan is a vaguely "medieval" country built upon the bones of an advanced magi-tech civilization (Shambahla and the Holy Tomb being nuclear bunkers with the Holy Tomb also maybe having missile EMP???), this is a Fantasy Post-Apocalypse.

Said previous civilization (Agartha) literally nuked the world back to the Dark Ages and had a nuclear winter (the Flood aptly named Despair) because they were a bunch of teched out super-racists

The Heroes Relics twitch implying some form of horrific sentience

The Slitherers being revealed to just be ancient humans and how humanity's hatred & greed is the root of Fodlan's problems, both old and new

And that's just the tip of the iceberg! 3H really went and said "hey NEVERMIND all that you should only care about [checks notes] Edelgard's War" The absolute. Buffoonery...

gods i knooOOOOWWWWWWWW

I've actually yelled before about how interested I am in Agarthan and Nabatean lore. Like, "Romance of the World's Perdition" was a good start, but I need MORE from you Intsys:

In the land of Thinis, where the old gods are said to live, the False God has awakened. Its looming, heteromorphic vessel was resurrected to sink the world to the depths of the ocean. It will bring extinction to all children of men, and salvation to all beasts of the land, sky, and sea. For the children of men who spilled too much of the blood of life, it promises only cruel retribution.

The False God must be defeated before the world sinks into a watery grave. To this end, the children of men have erected pillars of light upon the land. Thinis, Malum, Septen, and Llium were utterly destroyed. Those lands have vanished from this world. Yet even still, the False God stands. And soon, a flood aptly named Despair will drown this world.

The children of men fled to the depths of the earth, beyond the sight of the False God, beyond the embrace of the sacred sun, and beyond the reach of the waters of Despair. They swore a fervent oath of revenge against the surface world, ruled by beasts, and against their tormentor, the False God.

Like. What's the deal with Thinis? Was that the original name of Zanado/Garreg Mach? What are Malum, Septen, and Llium? I did once do some research and find these name origins on a forum somewhere:

Septen: Septentrional means "of the north", also used for stars of the Big Dipper Thinis: Capital of the first Egyptian Dynasties Malum: Latin for "bad" Llium: Could be Illium/Ilion, the old name for the City of Troy i.e. the Trojans

All the Greek/Egyptian names, plus "Sothis" being the Hellenization of "Sopdet", which we know they know is Sirius because the theme that plays during conversations about Sothis is called "Gazing at Sirius". Is Sirius the Blue Sea Star? WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN.

Like you said, they really took all that and went "we will not elaborate but here have gap moe crab waifu war instead". Claude is too hot to avoid this lore, Intsys. And he hungers.

[notcatherinemorland]

i had like an Idea in class today but the only thing running thru my mind is how i can shove that idea directly up the arse of my fire emblem Thoughts to create this frankenstein of legitimate literature analysis and anime chess which i have decided is my new brand. all my interests now have to pick a side. literature analysis or anime chess, and then will be sent through a sausage grinder to create... something

[arcstral]

Soooo... I have a meta question, if that's alright: what is your view on Archanea's perception of the afterlife? Or rather, what happens to souls after death. Do they believe in heaven, or an underworld? That there isn't anything at all, perhaps? :0

               Of course, Nat, as always thanks so much for the interest! This is an interesting and somewhat difficult topic to explore for Archanea because of how so little evidence exists in the actual Archanean games. I believe there are more direct references to heaven or heaven within the Valentia sister games but for Archanea, there aren’t many. The closest we get to an image or perception of the afterlife is rooted in the sequel FE13: Awakening, and more specifically, in the words of Tiki during the Future Past xenologue.

Tiki 1:   Don't worry, Lucina. I'll always be watching over you. Just as the Hero-King and your father continue to do so. I may be out of reach, but I will always be close.

Tiki 2:   And I know you will. May we one day meet again, Lucina. There will always be a place for the Twelve Heroes at Naga's side.

              Here, Tiki clearly infers the existence of an afterlife through two different lines, not only in the poetic sense but also in a spiritual one. She reassures Lucina that her deceased ancestor Marth and father Chrom will both oversee her safety, and upon their finals words to one another, remarks that they too will one day ‘meet again’ presumably in the same afterlife. Tiki also brings to attention that Lucina and the future children would become a communion of welcomed heroes if they should ever pass on, securing their places at the deceased goddess’ side.

               In essence, just and heroic souls like Marth, Chrom, and the future children are granted a place in ‘heaven’. There isn’t, however, any information on what presumably happens to the souls of the damned or if there is even an underworld at all. One point of interest is that Archanea itself is a very Greco-Roman inspired continent particularly with names like Marth/Mars, Cornelius, Marcelus, Altea, Macedon, etc. I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that there is a hell, like in real-life mythos, to accompany the more clarified existence of heaven.

               Over all, seeing as the Archanean religion of Nagaism is still dominant in Ylisse approximately 1,000+ years after the civilization fell to obscurity, and Tiki herself is one of the longest living relics of Archanea herself, I think it’s safe to assume that her words are an accurate reflection of what the Archaneans believed during their time. Relevantly, we can also refer to the uncanny resemblance that Marth’s situation bears to the divine warrior of mythos who ascended to heaven after his deeds. 

               ‘Hero-King’ is an epithet that survived through Marth’s admirers for two vast millennia, as the moniker of the man who twice slew Medeus, reformed the Fire Emblem, and unified the continent in a prosperous age of peace. It’s obvious that Marth is honored as a deific hero long after his passing, but it’s also more than that.

“I prayed to the Hero-King for a small part of the strength he used to save the world.”

               The fact that Lucina prays for strength to Marth but not the First Exalt for me is rather telling. If anything, there’s reason for her to pray to the more recent forefather, but she chooses Marth specifically. Prayers, in any case, are something that most would reserve to the omnipotent manner of gods, or those perceived with the ability to lend their aid from the heavens. There is an actual goddess and a prophet in her image that could serve this purpose far better, after all. But Marth, having lived as the epitome of heroism during his time, likely forewent the need to be divine and became a subject of prayer by his virtues alone.

               Shortly, he’s the true example of the nameless divine warrior in Archanean legend. A man who wielded the shield and blade of light, then was essentially elevated to sainthood after he passed on to the next life.

[crystalelemental]

While I can understand that, honestly hearing that it used to be common options that could dominate the meta, I kinda get why they stopped it cold. In a gacha, that is absolutely terrible for business, and it amazes me how long they’ve been trying to compensate for Reinhardt’s domination. Honestly, it’s probably better than the 5* options are the overpowered ones, and commons don’t quite keep up but can still be good. The bigger problem is, as you say, the units that feel virtually impossible to counter without highly specific options. Like oh good, NFU and Windsweep is a thing now, even color advantage and DC doesn’t do shit, unless you also use Null C-Disrupt, which is super niche. Oh good, built in damage reduction, all stats +5, Omni smoke and seal and pulse smoke, and 25% of attack as true damage because balance. Oh, 80% dual phase damage reduction and gravity effect and NFU on a flying archer, sounds fair. The top threats being rare is appropriate, we’ve just gone way too far into unstoppable territory.

But I still maintain the only reason to play this game at any point is the characters rather than the gameplay, and the limited options and heavy Fates/Awakening/Archanea focus would’ve made it intolerable to me early on. The roster needed to expand to be interesting.

[sireneia]

♕ ♕ ♕ ♕ ♕!!

( get to know the rper )

Send me a ♕ for me to describe favorite rp character of someone else’s.

ah, True Positivity Hours!! while i can just ramble about like. characters in general i’ll go for specific portrayals tho i’ll try not to clog up notifs by trying to avoid @-ing them 

@/cavaliant’s diarmuid is a joy unto this earth. i can’t sing this muse enough praises honestly. the amount of thought dusk has put into him. diarmuid is often a character people say has no personality whatsoever but dusk really does go into the lines we get, reads between them, and looks at things from a scope beyond just “what does this character say” and thinks about what his relationships say about him, his actions, etc. i live for looking at character development beyond the words explicitly shared, and i now stan diarmuid so thanks dusk LMAO. i just think it’s interesting to see this charming boy and his tendency to be nice to people, what it means to him and the self-sacrifice he goes by burying his feelings, etc. really gives me a newfound appreciation for his scenes.

@/hamartio’s hector takes you through the evolution of a character throughout time. you feel the boisterousness that means well in hector’s teenage years to the way he mellows out and how that’s a direct consequence of fatherhood and him rising up to the plate as the new marquess. it’s always cool to see, and equinox has fantastic metas on hector’s growth and what taking armads means for the lord and his motivations for doing so. this is a man who so deeply cares for others, even if it means accepting a curse, and i love every time equinox talks about it and explores it! also equinox really does take a great look at fatal flaws and tragic heroes which is [chef’s kiss]

@/drakslay’s marth is extremely fun to read! as someone who doesn’t know much about the archanea games, ( i promise everyone i’ve got fe11 and will pick it up again at some point LIKE I REALLY WANT TO... ) it’s super compelling to read their posts despite my lack of knowledge! soji’s got a way to take even looking at a hypothetical beach marth alt as interesting by tying it back to the archanea games’ worldbuilding and plot! that’s so cool!! i also think marth’s dialogue in soji’s posts is so charming?? from what i know about how marth speaks, it really captures his voice. i already do enjoy marth from what little i saw of him in fe11, and i look forward to liking him more and more!

@/sacredseals’s narcian is something to truly commend. how tf did nora get me to feel things about this man I DON’T KNOW HOW THIS HAPPENED !!! except sike i in fact know exactly how it happened. nora’s narration and metas ( whether they’re posted publicly or not ) really dive deep into the nitty-gritty of little details in fe6 we’re given and expand them in such cool ways, and it really makes me surprisingly soft for this villain that you’re intended to despise and find pathetic. also, nora’s voice for narcian’s dialogue is so fun and colorful to read! nora u may not have english as ur first language but you are KILLING it!!!

and then i give a shout out to YOUR lucina! i think you capture her voice really well in the threads and dash commentary posts i’ve gotten to see, but i also adore how you weave in the tempest trials plot line in as well. as someone who is still following heroes content and also someone who thinks the verse itself has plenty of potential, it’s great to see someone else also explore that direction and keep it as a consistent part of her character! i know some people might think the plots of the tt+ are kinda contrived, but legit masked marth is interesting to watch: there’s real stakes, she interacts with so many characters canonically, and she has to weigh what should and shouldn’t be said as a time-traveler. she knows all these people, and what a character does with that knowledge is always intriguing to see.

[fellspirited-blog]

ooc; Gaiden meta! Talk to me about the HP-cost of magic. ;O

↪ 「 gaiden meta topics | always accepting tbh 」

oυт oғ cнαrαcтer // valentia is unique in the fact that its magic-users don’t rely on any physical weapon but rather do a rather risky trade -- health for a spell, whether offensive or supportive (sans nosferatu, of course)

no one’s quite sure how it came into popular use, but it’s the standard. cliff’s own grandmother had been a rather powerful mage herself before she sealed away her magic, most likely when she started raising a family.

the idea behind it is based around the sibling gods’ belief that you must experience both sides of something: strength with bravery, plenty with kindness -- sacrifices. you must give up something ( security in order to properly wield strength, selfishness in order to be blessed with plenty ) in order to be given a product, and it embedded itself into mages and clerics across the continent. 

additionally, there’s a property of conservation here: you cannot make something out of nothing. the magic, thus, is created out of the health you pay for it. the stronger the spell, the more you must degenerate.

cliff, at first, is surprised to find out the precise pain he suffers by trying to fight in battle. he’s afraid to learn new spells, caught between whether he wants to be stronger and more useful to his team or whether to play it safe. it’s not surprising to look his way after a battle and to see how exhausted and frail he looks.

it’s because of his exposure to his trade that he finds himself being extra courteous and kind to healers in particular. at first he took them for granted as kind souls, but when he realized that they have to suffer in order to provide aid and how easy it is for a non-magic user to not notice, he became extremely grateful.

[sireneia-a]

💕 if you are not overwhelmed, i’ve played every game but i’m least familiar with marth’s (it’s been Awhile for archanea lol...)

+*. muse recs from games you haven’t played.

I SUGGEST TO YOU: CAEDA ( FE1/3/11/12 ) !

based on your two muses and a lil bit on the fact you were considering miranda ( your tastes would widen my horizons… but i feel like loving a character doesn’t always mean being able to / wanting to write them, so i didn’t want to base off too much ) i ended up thinking i should strive for a female character who is a bit tomboyish and lends herself well to interactions. she’s probably someone that you might need to fight a lil to defend in the fandom unfortunately… but she’s lovely nevertheless and has a fun, interesting personality to think about in a light-hearted or serious way! a gal for the fun times and the pondering metas alike.

caeda is the princess of talys and the childhood friend of marth. she has a big heart but she is not guileless. if anything, it is a mixture of her sweetness and her intelligence that makes her so good at convincing others to join her side of a conflict, and she is an invaluable asset to marth’s goals as a result. she is strong and protective of those she cares about, and she’s not above using her cunning to help get her ahead in life.

[gascon-en-exil]

I know you don't ship m/f but if you had to choose the most interesting/entertaining one for each FE installment, what would you pick?

Archanea: Are there even options here? The whole Camus/Nyna/Hardin disaster is easily the most developed overall and also the most narratively impactful.

Valentia: Alm/Celica carries the emotional core of the game, and there's still not much competition. Faye -> Alm and Conrad/Celica incest subtext are good for a few laughs though. They only added two playable characters to the remake, and those were who we got?

Jugdral: Poor Lachesis. I don't ship her with Finn and am fine with Beowolf being Diarmuid's father and possibly Nanna's as well, but no matter how you slice it FE's original brother-loving teenage girl has it rough. Her/Eldigan then, since even after his death his shadow still looms large over all her subsequent romantic entanglements - and then in Gen 2 they get eulogized as star-crossed lovers.

Elibe: Similar to the Archanea example, Hellene/Desmond/his mistress eventually sets up the plot of an entire game and leads to some entertainingly awful family dynamics all around (to say nothing of one of FE7's most difficult chapters).

Magvel: Bi, twincestuous OT3 of Eirika/Ephraim/Lyon. But seriously, L'Arachel/anyone is funny enough to count. Let's go with her/Innes, even though her Ephraim and Joshua supports are even funnier (because they've both got more gay stuff going on than Innes does).

Tellius: Micaiah/Sothe, which is both a solid relationship and a source of frustration for antis because "I married my surrogate son/brother" isn't a good look for a duology that they otherwise seem to love (likely without having played - these games' final word on race and racial politics aren't exactly the most progressive ever).

Ylisse: Ugh, I have no idea. 90% of this game bores me to tears, and the remaining 10% is pretty much just Apotheosis meta. Let's go with m!Robin/Lucina for being gutsy enough to go as hard in canon as other Avatar/lord pairings despite the obvious generation gap.

Nohrshido: Subaki/Selena, solely for the entertainment value of Severa giving birth to a clone of her own mother.

Fódlan: I appreciate Claude and Hilda in CF as nods to Quan and Ethlyn's deaths in FE4, but there's nothing indicating they're actually together there. Claudeleth, I suppose, because of how blatantly he uses the self-insert and how this is followed through on by making this Claude's best ending, politically speaking.

[markoftheasphodel]

The Blue Lions and the Burden of Tradition

Note: spoilers related to multiple Fire Emblem games including FE1/11, FE2/15, FE3/12, FE5, and FE8 follow.

The classic Fire Emblem plot line is the one sketched out by its first installment, Dark Dragons and the Sword of Light, all the way back in ’90. Young Prince Marth loses homeland in surprise betrayal, mopes in exile, gathers allies, retakes homeland, unites continent, defeats dragon, settles down to become virtuous ruler with love interest at his side. Then Fire Emblem Gaiden offered a counterpoint narrative in which a scrappier hero, village boy Alm, unites half a continent through military prowess before he even finds out he’s the prince, whereupon he too can defeat a big bad monster and settle down with his childhood companion/love interest as his consort. Marth restores order to The Way Things Were, But Better. Alm sweeps away a corrupt order entirely and puts something else in its place. One can be viewed as fundamentally conservative, looking back to an idealized past and trying to recreate it without the old mistakes. The other is revolutionary, but the way the revolution plays out the New Boss has an awful lot in common with the Old Boss (kings, nobles, churches). Any way you slice it the best outcome is a Just Ruler with the blessings of heaven and democracy ain’t in the cards. These two basic narratives have shaped every single installment of Fire Emblem to date. Some lean more heavily on the Marth narrative (Binding Blade), some on the Alm narrative (Path of Radiance), and others combine elements of both— Thracia 776, Sacred Stones, and Awakening all take some of Column A and some of Column B and and achieve strikingly difference outcomes.

The Blue Lions route of Three Houses offers the latest iteration of that classic Marth narrative, and it proves the deepest, richest, most nuanced look at that storyline to date even if it’s ultimately constrained by its own tropes.

 Its protagonist, Prince Dimitri, is introduced as a polite and courtly young man, the image of a Fire Emblem princeling, and as Part I of Three Houses unfolds the viewer is let into just how much of a Fire Emblem Prince Dimitri is. He’s the last hope of his house and kingdom, an orphan who lost his family under traumatic circumstances, and he’s struggling to maintain his peaceful ideals in the face of his lingering trauma and suppressed rage. As Dimitri receives both character revelation and character development through Part I, he echoes not just Marth but Thracia 776’s Leif and Ephraim from Sacred Stones, and those echoes carry over strongly to Part II of this route.

Likewise, Dimitri’s fellow Blue Lions, initially just another lot of fresh-faced schoolchildren, reveal themselves to be the Three Houses iterations of some classic “archetypes” of Fire Emblem. We have the “steady” traditionalist knight in Ingrid, the more unruly “rowdy” knight in Sylvain, the sullen swordmaster in Felix, the bright-eyed archer in Ashe, the bright-eyed mage in Annette, the demure healer with the convoluted backstory in Mercedes, and the battered old retainer in Gilbert. If you expect your “Christmas Knights” and “Navarre” and “Lena” and whatnot out of a Fire Emblem game, Blue Lions offers the entire set; they’re just a little harder to detect thanks to the open class system and lack of convenient color-coding.

Where the Blue Lions breaks with three-decades-old expectations is in its handling of the resident heavy; Dedue fills a slot on the starting team usually given short shrift (see: Draug, Bors), but in terms of plot and character and— critically— personal value to Dimitri he transcends both the stale Armor Knight niche that his character design nudges him to be and the Devoted Retainer trope that’s gotten a bit weird in recent years. Some recent games presented “devotion” in ways that were kind of twisted yet the games didn’t seem to really acknowledge how off-key it all was; Three Houses takes a full dive into what Dedue’s devotion to Dimitri (and vice-versa!) can encompass, how it’s a double-edged blade that can uplift or utterly destroy. That Dedue manages this while also being saddled with the role of being The Stigmatized Other to the Blue Lions cast is nothing short of remarkable.

Your core Blue Lions party is essentially the conservative wing of the Officers’ Academy. Ingrid may be the most orthodox knight of your house, but ultimately the entire core party is royalist and traditionalist, even when the system they’re holding up has hurt them personally. Annette, Sylvain, and most especially Felix offer some degree of dissent, but ultimately all of them fall in line behind King Dimitri and his unified continent— and in supporting Dimitri, by default they support the Church of Seiros under its new archbishop. This unswerving support of the Church structure on the Blue Lions route is hardly happenstance, as the game is basically waving a flag at the audience to let them know yes, this is indeed the conservative Restorationist faction— un roi une loi une foi. Still, the inner tensions of these loyalists as they play out through supports and in-game chatter— Felix against Ingrid and Dedue and Dimitri, Annette against Gilbert, Sylvain in his asides to Byleth— provide a multifaceted critique of the very concepts of Knighthood and Faith that the franchise has been trying to pull off since at least Thracia 776, whose beats the Lions’ plot structure samples more than once.

The game takes some risks; New Mystery of the Emblem supplied Avatar Kris as a mechanism to keep Marth’s fingerless gloves from getting dirtied by the grunt work of conquering an continent; Three Houses lets Dimitri’s hands get so filthy that his knights and vassals are appalled by it. He regains his moral compass and everyone’s respect after a tragedy that is one of the clearest call-backs to Thracia 776, but in Leif’s case the shock he received was a spur for a naive youth to grow up and look at the larger picture instead of his narrow goals. In Dimitri’s case, he’s got about five years of atrocities to atone for. That said, Thracia 776 arguably had a more realistic resolution to the Lord’s character development, as endgame Leif STILL has some growing-up to do, whereas Dimitri gets markedly better after a couple of conversations despite spending five years in the abyss.

And then we get to the Childhood Friend, one of the moments of the Blue Lions route that strongly evokes Sacred Stones. On this route we learn that Dimitri and antagonist Edelgard shared a fleeting but precious bond in childhood— but whereas antagonist Lyon uses a similar bond to his repeated advantage against the Sacred Stones Lords Eirika and Ephraim, Edelgard doesn’t even make the connection between Dimitri and her own lost childhood friend until he confronts her with the memory. It’s a one-sided bond that fuels Dimitri’s rage and regrets but is essentially irrelevant to Edelgard’s ambitions. The final wordless confrontation between them finally has Edelgard use Dimitri’s nostalgia as a literal weapon against him… and he silently runs her through with his lance for it— far cry from Lyon whispering “C’mon Ephraim, smile like you used to” as he dies in Ephraim’s arms. For a series that has leaned heavily on the trope of “Friendship is Magic” in recent years, it’s interesting to have the idea of the sepia-tinted childhood memory rendered impotent— but then again, the developers were supposedly inspired by Genealogy of the Holy War and the way that events pitted sworn friends and allies against one another.

The grand scope of Genealogy may be more apparent on other routes of Three Houses, but the Blue Lions route is fundamentally more narrow in scope, with this Thracia-like focus on Dimitri’s traumas, Dimitri’s loves and losses, Dimitri’s redemption, Dimitri’s ability to spare enemies and kill former friends. This in turn hobbles the ending of the route, much as Thracia 776 was hobbled by its status as a midquel, a singular if vivid chapter in the overall saga of Jugdral. Alliance and Empire totter, everything falls into Dimitri’s lap, the church is bolstered without any significant onscreen reforms or even onscreen questions on what the hell was going on under Rhea, and everything becomes as it was, but better— one king, one law, one faith (or one major faith with ecumenical tolerance for the rest, per Seteth’s ending), and apparently some reforms for the sake of The People. Dimitri’s going to be fine, and we all just have to have faith in the rest of it.

All in all, it brings to mind that Marth’s most successful game (Mystery of the Emblem), and the GBA game that hewed most strongly to the Marth Narrative (Binding Blade) both had Bad Endings in which the real answers, the true resolution, was never achieved. The Blue Lions route feels at once like a beautiful love letter to the Marth plot-line in all its iterations, in which the elements of its predecessors are revisited to grand effect— and a Bad Ending, a dead-end, an eternity of the curtain abruptly coming down once Marth defeats Hardin or even the hollow “is that all there is” moment of Leif besting Veld. It almost feels like a rebuke to the player for choosing to spend eighty, ninety, one-hundred hours in the company of Dimitri and his traditionalists, for choosing to glory in the multi-layered nostalgia offered by the Blue Lions. Perhaps it’s simply a cue that this is the route to play first, that it’s best to be guided into Fodlan by a familiar set of faces before choosing to open the doors of perception that the Golden Deer or Black Eagles offer. Given how heavily the pre-game marketing hyped the Black Eagles, that seems a bit weird.

I suppose the only way to get answers is to play another 200+ hours of Three Houses….

[doktorpeace]

Top 5 Games Of The Year Runner Up And Honorable Mentions

Runner Up: Doki Doki Literature Club (THIS SECTION CONTAINS BIG SPOILERS, IF YOU HAVEN’T PLAYED DDLC AND ARE INTERESTED IN MAYBE TRYING IT HERE’S THE TL;DR It’s good, it plays with your expectations in a very good way and in a multitude of ways, it’s a great little piece of media that brings to life an extremely good character. Also it’s free, go download it on steam.)

Look, maybe it’s because I don’t consume a lot of horror media but this game really stood out to me. Not only for it’s genre though, also for the high quality of its writing and with how great the game is at accomplishing the one and only thing it truly sets out to do: Convey Monika as a character. The horror elements themselves can be a bit hit and miss and some of them are quite predictable, but I feel the game is excellent at building a continuous sense of dread as the player continues through it. It rapidly ratchets up the intensity of its content after taking just enough time for the player to settle in and get comfortable and mixes in JUST A COUPLE of jumpscares (which honestly it probably shouldn’t) in order to keep the player unsteady enough in terms of expectations to keep that dread building. Regardless, throughout the game Doki Doki Literature Club does a great job taking advantage of player expectations both of dating sim visual novels AND of horror writing to ultimately become something just a little bit more. It becomes an excellent character exercise and exploration. Thanks to some smart programming in service of the game’s ultimate intent, to make Monika into a ‘real’ character actually ended up giving me one of the deepest scares any piece of media, video game or otherwise, has ever given me. And it did it without any secondary stimuli like sound or a jumpscare or horrifying visuals. No, in a completely calm moment all that was said was this:

And I REELED back in my chair because the suspense and the dread the game had been building all impacted me at once. You can’t deliver that kind of scare in someone without some smart writing backed up by some VERY smart programming and understanding of player expectations. Honestly Monika is such an excellent and fully realized character despite the game being so short it’s astounding. By taking care to give her a lot of special conditional dialogue, pages upon PAGES of missable content, and even meta-content such as her having unique dialogue that only appears while looking through the game’s files it really just all coalesces into making Monika feel almost real, real enough to give me the willies and to feel a bit sad for her by the end. DDLC is a divisive game and I understand if the game’s handling of certain themes or content doesn’t sit well with other people but for me, and I say this as someone who is no stranger to suicide attempts, the game never went to far. For me it all worked in service of the game’s narrative and Monika’s character growth. Honestly even just little details like how the piano in the soundtrack only starts playing for the first time once Monika is introduced and only ever stops when she’s not watching you or how there’s a lot of different horror elements that only occur randomly so not everyone has the same experience or how some can only happen in fullscreen or in windowed mode, it’s really amazing attention to detail and consideration of her character while also making the game more unique as a product. DDLC was really good. It gave me some good scares but it also gave me a good story and a GREAT character to appreciate. Even if, like me, you’re a bit of a weenie when it comes to horror content I’d wholeheartedly recommend DDLC as a read, assuming you both can handle a jumpscare or two and can handle game content that involves suicide and self harm. I know I didn’t get too in depth here but I wanted to avoid spoiling TOO much and honestly I already said too much as is! Please excuse me! Honorable Mention #1: Yo! Noid 2 - Enter the Void

It’s not often you get a game that’s developed explicitly as a joke that’s so good. Yo Noid 2 is a solid, fun, and funny platformer. It’s all pretty clearly built just to tell one joke right at the very end but the ends ABSOLUTELY justify the means. I can’t talk too in detail about this game without ruining why it’s special, but Yo Noid 2 is a legitimately fun 3D platformer, with good level design, a relatively expressive moveset, a very special Special Action Button, and honestly a great soundtrack to boot! Its difficulty ramps up in a good way across its very short 90-150 minute length culminating in a very fun final boss fight. PLEASE go download Yo Noid 2, if you like 3D platformers and want to have a good laugh it’s 300% worth your time. It’s even free, you have no excuses!!

Honorable Mention #2: Mega Man 11 Mega Man is back, again, and they really did a good job expanding the franchise. While I still like entries such as 9, 10, and 4 better personally there’s no denying MM11 expands the franchise in a positive way more than any other before it. MM11 takes the time tested side scrolling design of the classic Mega Man series and adds just enough of a new wrinkle with the Double Gear system to really expand the player’s horizons and to push their level design concepts. While Double Gear and in fact all of the secondary weapons are entirely unnecessary as is tradition for Mega Man games MM11 does a great job incentives smart use of these mechanics, keeping them balanced with a shared cooldown system between both gears (power and speed) and making every single one of the Robot Master powers actually useful! Also all of the robot master designs are really charming this time, I was initially worried about the addition of voice acting but the voice cast does a great job! The level design is also a treat, while the length of the levels varies DRASTICALLY and Wily Castle 1 is dramatically longer and harder than another other stage in the game overall it’s very easy to just jump into any level and challenge yourself. There is no obvious first boss, they’re all pretty tough, and I started with Acid Man myself. The only thing about MM11 that let me down was the soundtrack; it wasn’t bad it just wasn’t bombastic either, merely present during play but not sticking in my memory at all. MM11 is a great entry in the series and I hope it signals a true return of one of my childhood favorites with more games to come soon.  Honorable Mention #3: Fire Emblem - Mystery of the Emblem (FE12) Taking the great concept of remaking FE’s earliest titles that Shadow Dragon started and actually putting in the elbow grease to make the game really good, FE12 is a stand out entry in the Fire Emblem franchise. While some aspects of its map design are somewhat held back by the original iteration, FE3′s age, the developers at IntSys really did a great job modernizing Archanea and paying good tribute to the characters and story that made this game an absolutely beloved classic in the first place. With overall good map design, modernized mechanics, the best use of an Avatar Character in the franchise, and massively improved unit, class, and weapon balance over the original FE12 polishes its source material to a razor shine. Top it all off with a decent story and great new content that adds a bunch of new dialogue to the characters and this is the definitive way to experience Archenea and its inhabitants. Except for Marth, he was better in Shadow Dragon. Besides Marth’s characterization taking a step back and the gaiden content being rather slapdash and forgettable, this game is everything a remastering should be; Taking what worked and polishing it, improving what didn’t, and adding all new content that fits in with the original game in a productive and fun way for fans. The addition of a wide variety of gameplay difficulties and including the until this game INCREDIBLY rare BS: Fire Emblem expansion chapters previously exclusive to the Super Famicom Satellaview this game cartridge is bursting with good content. It’s a fun, fun game with a lot to offer and great replayability thanks to its BULGING roster of characters and deeply customizable avatar character. If you like Fire Emblem as a franchise I’d heavily recommending finding a patched FE12 rom out there, harder though it is to do now. You owe it to yourself to experience this game. Oh, just play with the battle animations off, they’re REALLY ugly. Still, this game puts Shadow Dragon’s lazy near-direct port of an NES game to DS to shame. Honorable Mention #4: A Hat in Time - Seal the Deal This DLC has been getting some backlash and frankly I don’t get why. While I was a bit disappointed the new chapter was shorter than the base game ones the Death Wish side of things offered a TON of great new content and new ways to experience past challenges. For its modest price point this DLC really does everything I could possibly hope for out of a 3D Platformer expansion. New, tougher challenges to really push my skills, fun new content that fits right in with the base game in terms of quality and polish, and in A Hat in Time’s case GREAT new boss fight experiences. Taking every existing boss and turning them into a downright Superboss level difficulty fight, remixing all of their attacks, speed, patterns, and adding all new stuff to them is such a great idea and I really loved it. Seal the Deal is a ton of fun as long as you aren’t averse to an easy base game getting a VERY challenging DLC expansion. I can understand why the difficulty whiplash might turn some people off but for me it was just right and really hit the spot. A Hat in Time is just so good, I love it.

[eldritchlittleblackdragon]

A Sort-Of Meta-y Post on Possession and Manakete Degeneration in Fire Emblem

Cross-posted from Pillowfort

My roommate @curiousobsession101 and I have been talking about Manaketes/Dragons in Fire Emblem and while there are a lot of inconsistencies, there are some threads that show up again throughout the various games. (Even if they don't take place in the same world/continent setting.)

And I've found certain threads make more sense if you're familiar with elements of earlier games. There is one in particular though that's been on my mind and that's manakete degeneration in the setting that Archanea/Ylisse, Valentia/Valm, and Jugdral all take place in (and my understanding is that they're all in the same world, just on different continents, as opposed to Elibe, Magvel, Tellius, and the Fates Setting).

In Awakening, you're told about how Grima basically selectively bred a line of human to create the perfect human vessel to posses (Robin/the MU for Awakening). Now, for the longest time my roommate didn't understand why this was even necessary. Once he gets resurrected and has a physical form, why does he need a human vessel?

It didn't occur to me to mention until recently, but there is a reason for that, and the reason is given by older games. Specially, Echoes/Gaiden and Geneology of the Holy War. I think the latter has the example that's easier to explain though. In Geneology of the Holy War, one of the main antagonists is Julius, half-brother to the second gen protagonist, Seliph. Like Robin in Awakening, he possesses a brand likely as a result of a dragon pact made by his ancestors, and it's through this mark that the ultimate big bad, Loptyr, is able to possess him. The reason for needing a human vessel in Geneology is to stave off degeneration, a problem that has plagued dragonkind since the series inception and has been a common thread through the games (I think save the Elibe and Tellius games). The main problem with degeneration is insanity and an affected dragon losing access to their mental faculties. Most manaketes choose to seal their power away in dragonstones and take on humanoid forms for most (or all) of the remainder of their lives in order to prevent or at least slow degeneration. However, possessing a human with a dragon's brand who is best attuned to them is another method of retaining one's mind for longer as well. Given this information about why Loptyr needed a vessel such as Julius, I think it's safe to extrapolate that we have a similar situation with Robin in Awakening. As much as Grima hates humanity, he saw a method to stave off degeneration that didn't require sealing his power away and assuming a weaker physical form. While the human vessel is an anchor of sorts, from what I can tell through stats and such in their respective games, Loptyr and Grima are forces to be reckoned with (the latter more so on higher difficulties). He can stave off this terrible fate, and retain the power he wants to destroy humanity (and everything else. Good job Grima, you racist old fart). Unfortunately, as my roommate pointed out, because of the thread in Geneology of the Holy War, there could be some unsavory implications as to Robin's family history. In Geneology, in order to create Julius (Loptyr's perfect vessel), Seliph's mother Dierdre was kidnapped and her memory erased before she was placed in the path of Arvis by one of the other bads. The intent was for Arvis and Dierdre to wed (which they did) and have kids, as those two would be the necessary parents for this to happen. That being being because they descended from the same bloodline (in fact, the two are half-siblings, if memory serves). It's possible that a similar situation could be the case with Robin's parentage, but little to no information is given about Robin's mother save for the fact she tried to run away and keep her child out of Validar's (Robin's father's) reach. So it's completely possible she might not have been a genetic relative of Validar but still had the requirements that Grima desired in order to create his perfect vessel. The fact it's a completely reasonable conclusion to come to though is... a bit unsettling to say the least. Considering real-world examples of inbreeding among plants and animals in order to foster certain results though (and the fact this is something that's come up in Fire Emblem), it does seem like something that, again, seems like a real possibility. Now, I mentioned Echoes+Gaiden being a potential example. While I haven't finished the game, I am aware of certain spoilery things. So, hear me out. At one point in the game, it's mentioned that the Zofian Royal family is descended from Mila herself (and this is the same family Celica and her brother Conrad descend from via their biological father, King Lima). It's a bit of a throwaway line but, from the outset of the game it's mentioned that Alm and Celica both bear special brands marking them as being 'chosen'. Given that information and the fact Jedah tries to convince Celica to offer herself to Duma (as many witches and cantors of the Duma faithful have), my mind keeps tugging at a certain idea: The idea is that the brands in question are in fact pact marks the likes of which Julius and Robin had (or at least potentially so). Due to this and their royal bloodlines, they are probably better candidates for Duma (or potentially Mila) to possess and escape or at least slow down his degeneration. Now you would think Alm would be the ideal candidate because if the Zofian royal family is descended from Mila, it's reasonable to conclude the Rigelian royal family is descended from Duma. So it would make sense to go with the bearer of the mark are directly related to him, no? But it still is probably possible for him to possess Celica because Mila is his sister, and while the connection might not be as direct, it would still make her a good candidate, and Jedah probably thought her an easier/more important mark to go after. The whole possession to stave off degeneration could be part of the reason why Cantors and Witches exist as well, although instead of Duma trying to posses one person, he's in some way trying to make use of multiple people. Whatever issues I have with the story and characters in Echoes, I appreciate that there is enough evidence here to support this train of thought. It's possible by the time I reach the end of Echoes both me and my roommate could be proven wrong about this, but for now, this is what I strongly believe about what's happening. Now Fates has a similar situation but the way it's addressed is a little different in that most dragons gave up physical forms entirely, save for a small number. We do see a character get possessed by a dragon (Takumi), but it's for an entirely different purpose, and What all of this does leave me with are questions concerning the nature of manakete degeneration. Is it a disease? A genetic defect? A curse or some other malicious magical malady? I suppose for now this is something to be thought of and worked on in the domain of theory and fanfiction.