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| Fire Emblem DS: Shadow Dragon | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: May 4 2009, 10:44 AM (470 Views) | |
| Kamille | May 4 2009, 10:44 AM Post #1 |
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Really? Fayt is the only person with reviews? Okay, I'm breaking that trend. This is basically a copypasta of my review from February 18th. Title: Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon Genre: Strategy, RPG Publisher: Nintendo Developer: Intelligent Systems Platform: Nintendo DS Players: Single Player, 1 VS 1 Online & Wireless Play Release Dates: JP August 7, 2008 NA February 17, 2009 EU December 5, 2008 AUS February 26, 2009 Site: US Official Site JP Official Site Unofficial Fan Data Site For those of you who have seen the more recent Fire Emblem games, or Smash Bros, you may know of a few characters. Marth, and Roy have been the ones given the privelege of being in Smash Bros Melee and because of their popularity, they brought Marth back for Smash Bros. Brawl and There's a reason for that, and while I won't go into too much detail, Roy was there to promote the (at the time) newest game in the series. Marth was there because he was the classic hero from the first game, and because of that, Marth returned to join Brawl. Roy however, with his game being around 5 years old when Brawl was released, decided to promote Ike as the new heavy-hitter because Radiant Dawn was the newest game, thus hopefully promoting sales for the Wii title. Now, I mentioned Marth being the main character of the first game. That was back in 1990, on the NES. The game was a hit, and was warranted a remake in 1994 for the SNES, with improved graphics, gameplay options, and included a sequel to the game not in the original, which is essentially making the game twice as long as before. Now, in 2009 (2008 for those lucky Japanese) English fans are finally given the privelege of playing Marth's story with the second remake of the original game, for the Nintendo DS. This review on the game shall be attempting to do so from a point of view friendly to people unfamiliar with the series. Those who already do know the series, just bare with me, for I'll be explaining the essentials to the game if necessary in whatever subtopic. Feel free to skip ahead if you already know some things. Story 9.5/10 Be prepared for your typical (but back in 1990, original) RPG-ish story. Keep in mind the EU English translation is different from the NA translation, so the names might have slight differences.
To summarize everything, A dragon seeking revenge for his humiliating defeat at the hands of a youth with a divine blade (Falchion), has been ressurrected and is attacking his descendants, allying with other power-hungry nations. Marth is the only descendant not captured or killed. It's up to him to escape to the only allied kingdom left, and train until he is old and strong enough to reclaim everything, including the stolen Falchion from the "Holy Order" of Sorcerors, allying with the Dark Dragon. How Ironic. Gameplay 8/10 Similar to the other Fire Emblem games, they take place on a turn-based map where certain types of characters exist. Swordsmen, Sorcerors, Healers, Cavalry, Archers, Pirates, and many other interesting and diverse "classes" are present. They all have certain statistical caps (or a maximum amount) for each stat. The stats are as follows: Strength, Magic, Skill, Speed, Defense, Resistance, and Luck. Making it more like an RPG, every time a unit wins a fight, you gain Experience Points, or EXP for short. You gain small EXP for participating in a fight, and when your EXP hits 100, you'll level up. This is how it's similar to an RPG, because certain classes have different growth rates in the various stats. For example, a heavily armored knight will have a higher defence rating (and maximum cap) as opposed to a lightly armored Sorceror, who will in turn easily outclass a Knight in Magical Power, and most likely Speed (as well as the maximum stat value for those stats). Movment is also an issue, because someone like a Cavalier will easily be able to move more than an extremely armored Knight. For example, a cavalier can move 7 spaces per turn while a knight can only move 5. Another new thing to the series is the "Class Swap" ability. Basically, there are technique type characters and brute type characters. For example, Myrmidons are more of a technique type whereas the brutes would be Mercenaries. Another example, Fighters for technique and Pirates for brutes. You can change your class into any class in the list where the character belongs (for example, Navarre is a technique type, and he can change into a fighter, cavalier, archer, etc) The main way the game works: 1: Chapter Information. Basically, you'll get a lot of story development, and usually it explains what's going on (ie, in the first chapter, you're trying to reclaim your castle from a few intruders.) So this is like your typical pre-boss scene in an RPG, where many characters appear on screen and start talking to each other. 2. Preparation. What you do here is select who to bring to battle, because as the levels get tougher and the more units you have, you're only allowed to bring say 10 people, when you have maybe 25 on your team. This isn't an issue early on, but it becomes very important as the game continues. You can also setup weapons and items (more info later), as well as buying them from the Armory. 3. Map/Chapter Battle. The units on your allied force show up on the map, and you have an objective. It depends on the chapter, but it can be one of the following: -Defeat All Enemies -Capture a Target (Throne, Gate, Castle, etc) -Defend an Area (don't let enemy capture the target) -Escape (reach a certain location with Marth, the leader) -Defeat Boss (defeat the boss to finish the chapter) The battle will start off with you moving your units. Allied units are Blue, and enemy units are Red. Once you've used a unit, they can't move, and once you've used all your units your turn is over. Once the enemy is done with theirs, it's your turn again. If an enemy is within your unit's attack range, you can deal a blow to the enemy. Stats are a big factor here, as someone with high strength against an enemy with low defence will probably win very easily. Keep in mind ranged units like Archers can attack units 2 spaces away, but at the cost of not being able to counterattack up close. Sorcerors (but not healers) can attack 1 or 2 squares away, meaning they can counterattack a melee or ranged unit. What I mean by counterattack is when Unit A attacks, if A's attack doesn't kill Unit B, Unit B counterattacks on the same turn (provided he isn't disadvantaged by range, such as a melee unit trying to counter an archer, it won't happen). Once you achieve your objective, the map is over. Also, a very unique thing to the series, once a unit is dead..they're dead. Forever. You'll have to restart the chapter to get them back, meaning you have to do that chapter they died on all over again. So deploy your units with caution. Also, if you see a village, send Marth to visit it. By visiting the village and warning them of the danger (either bandits, the enemy army, or your retarded allies that don't listen to you..wait, ignore that last part) they'll give you a reward. That reward will be either Gold, an Item, or even a Weapon. Along with this, they'll give you info, sometimes necessary for visiting secret chapters. There are more advanced armories on the map itself compared to the basic one you have at the preparation screen, with more powerful and rare (also more expensive) as the game progresses, eventually selling the rare yet deadly Killer Sword and Silver Lance. 4. After the Battle. Similar to the talking before the battle, it will usually notify you of what happened (similar to how when you defeat a boss in an RPG, you'll get a lot of text/dialogue discussing what just happened and what might be happening next. Another unique concept is your way of recruiting allies. Sometimes they'll just join you before a battle begins (in the dialogue part), sometimes after a battle, and rather often you'll have to recruit them in the middle of a battle. Recruiting characters isn'tas simple as visiting building X and spending 2300 gold, they are unique and limited characters. They all have their own reason for wanting to join you (revenge, money, boredom, etc) and provided you talk to them with the right character on your team, you can get a new ally. These potential allies can be Neutral (Green) and sometimes even as Enemies (Red). Provided they don't get killed before you can talk to them, as long as you talk to them with the right character, you can get them to join your army, keeping any weapons or items they were holding. Now to talk about weapons and items. The weapons vary from common, standard issue Iron Swords to rare, expensive Rapiers. Your common Iron Sword will have a durability of 46, and the rare Rapier will have 30. What is durability? Well, everytime your weapon makes contact with an enemy, your weapon will lose a durability point. Note: Magic users' spell tomes (books) will lose durability from being cast. If the attack misses, it still was used, and will lose durability. If it hits, it only loses 1 durability anyways. You can restore a damaged weapon by taking it to the Armory before a battle for a small fee of Gold. You can also buy new weapons here, but the weapons are usually only Iron quality. Items aren't necessary for victory, but they're still very important. You can find stat boosters (will raise a given stat by 2 points, depending on the item. If the item boosts HP, it will increase by 7 points.) and other useful items, such as Vulneraries (restore 10 HP) an antidote (cures poison) Elixir (completely heals HP and status effects) and staves. Staves are considered by some to be a weapon, but I consider them to be an item, since they can't be used to actually damage opponents. There are different types of staves, but the most common kinds simply heal you. As you go on, you'll find staves that can cause status effects such as sleeping, paralysis, silence magic, berserk (causes the unit to attack whatever is closest, regardless of it being ally or enemy. If the unit is yours, you lose control of the unit for 5 turns or until cured) and obviously in order to counteract these effects, a staff that can remove any status effect. Sound 9/10 Featuring music from the NES and SNES version (although redone with better technology, meaning DS quality Orchestra and Techno songs instead of 8-but madness) along with great sound effects for stabs, slices, magic, healing, movement, environmental effects, with the only thing left soundless is the speech. If it were voiced, it'd either be 10/10 for that, or 9.5 for trying but getting bad voice actors. Graphics 8/10 Besides the GC and Wii games, the FE series has never been big on graphics. While the battle scenes are very nice (they almost look 3d, but not 2d, so it's somewhere in between) there are unfortunately black lines on the character sprite outlines, leaving an amateurish look to it. Besides that, the environmental effects, landscape and structures look VERY nice. The close-up character portraits look very good too, in that RPG-ish style (since almost nobody has normal hair in this game) Multiplayer 9.5/10 This is one of the game's strong points. Using any of the save files from your game, you can load any character's data and create a team of five people, retaining everything about them (stats, items, class, etc) and once your team is made, you can test them against any other team you've made against a CPU on one of 7 maps. That's not the true multiplayer though, is it? It's simply a test so you can find out what the mode is like and who would be most useful. You can use any of your teams against any of your friends' teams (unfortunately, they need to have the game, but hopefully they can afford this great game and enjoy the multiplayer with you!) on any of the maps. You can adjust weather (make things foggier so the only visible locations are within 4 spaces of your units, except for thieves, who get 6) change the map (from an interior castle with pillars for avoidance to an open plain or even a harbor where flying units are key) along with time limits per turn, this is truly a fun mode. The only negative about this is the fact that it's only 1 VS 1 (but it's technically 5 vs 5) because having your team of 5 characters and your friend A's team of five characters against 2 more friends' combined 10 characters could have been that much more fun. To solve the possible issue of having overpowered characters, there is an option to level up, level down, or bring both teams closer by making the weaker ones stronger, and vice versa...making things a little more even. Online play is also available, with the same options. Replay Value 9/10 With the possibility of changing actions such as keeping certain units alive, or recruiting different characters on a different path, and with the ability to make teams with many different types of characters, this game will probably have you replaying it 5 or so times, maybe 2 or 3 if you're just casually into it. It's seriously really fun, and I think I'll probably have it done 10 or so times just to find out the best combinations of characters. Final Score 53/60 (88/100) It's very in-depth at the gameplay part, I know, but if you enjoy a good read about a game with easy learning curve and complex extras, it's worth the research. At 40$ Canadian (compare that to your prices, probably the same as your average DS game) this is going to keep me probably 100x more occupied than Soul Calibur IV, which I spent almost what, 70$ on? Played that game for maybe 4 hours since I've owned it. I'm not here to rip on SC4, just as a comparison for how long you'll be playing this game. |
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| Fayt | May 4 2009, 05:26 PM Post #2 |
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Easy wins have never been my style
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Nice review mate, and well done explaining some fundamental Fire Emblem aspects in it as well. It's easy to overlook things like that when you've played many games in the one series. It's great to see some others post some in here for a change as well! This is something that is on my radar, but I haven't seen many of them around, I even tried eBay and I'm not satisfied with any of the Australian sellers at the moment, just auctions with low feedback. I've been burnt on those before and will only guy from high reputation ebay stores these days. Anyway, I'm rambling, thanks for the review addition! |
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