Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance is so overrated
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- Опубликовано: 13 авг 2024
- Finally got Dolphin running, so uh. Time to play Tellius, those beloved games by the fandom, at last. Unfortunately, as you will be able to tell from the thumbnail and title, I didn't enjoy the first game in the duology. And I wasn't able to find a review video of this game by an FETuber saying this game is bad, so... have a very negative review of Path of Radiance!
Check out my Agree to Disagree with @JonoabboFE here: • Fire Emblem: Agree To ... , and that I... need to watch to actually remember what exactly I said on many of the talking points lmao. Thanks again to @actuallizard for proofreading this script for me (note that this does not mean that they agree with me, he likes Path of Radiance lol)
Timestamps
00:00 - Introduction
01:36 - The outright positives
03:43 - Mechanics I find interesting
08:01 - Downsides
11:07 - Specific map spoilers start
12:37 - The verdict
Music from Lo-Fire Emblem 1 and 2
Greil Mercs by Comphy
Pretty Girl Elincia by Comphy
The Relaxed Knight... also by Comphy
Kurthnaga by P&K
Sad Boi Pelleas once again by Comphy
Greil Mercs (again) by Comphy 
Игры
![Megan Thee Stallion - Mamushi (feat. Yuki Chiba) [Official Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/OdxSbc0ap-s/mqdefault.jpg)
Multiple people have understandably said that the music mixing volume is too loud, so if you want to read my thoughts instead, here is a link to the script: docs.google.com/document/d/1pd5w_U9vO6qDCXPTiUmlWK8xTEIjX7a_Xf1Gl4cJES4/edit?usp=sharing. Thank you to everyone who's reached out sharing this with me, and I hope that the music volume hasn't seriously impacted your enjoyment of the video
If you want specific advice on audio mixing, I can give you a bit of targeted feedback. There are a few very quick/easy things that I typically do to improve the audio in my videos. The most basic mixing takes around 10 minutes and can be done with free audio editing software.
@@oEllery if you're willing to, then that would be helpful, yes!
LONG WALL incoming.
TLDR: I get why you don't like the game and it's weird to me that so many content creators DO like the game, and just because I love it doesn't mean I didn't expect more people to dislike it because I get that my tastes are unique and, frankly, very different from the average FE player.
Your points are understandable all in all. Even though I really enjoy the game, I totally get why you dislike the pacing of the game and the lack of resource management for 90% of it. It's an easy, cozy game for me, one part nostalgia but another part bad unit playground. It's a game that can both be made ridiculously easy, and ridiculously unfun, by mass-dumping all your resources into 1 or 2 units.
The pacing of PoR's gameplay is slow. I hate that people ask for a "skip enemy phase" button but that's going to be coming in any remake. I like the map animations but I get that even they are very slow. What goes beyond the slowness of animations is the fact that enemies tend to have much higher defense, resistance and speed than in other games, especially compared to their strength, making it very difficult to 1-round enemies without a very strong unit with the best forge you can get, further exacerbating the "resource management doesn't exist b/c dumping everything into one unit is the Most Effective Tactic Available (META)" issue the game has.
Path of Radiance was a VERY experimental game for the series. Not as wild as Thracia, not by a long shot, but wild in its own ways. Level 21 classing and BEXP are hugely warping in their own way, and while BEXP gets toned down a *bit* in Radiant Dawn it's still incredibly powerful. I personally love the *potential* of what it could become, but it oozes "first implementation" energy all over the place, and I honestly think I love PoR as much as I do only because these things were never really attempted in other games. Even Radiant Dawn backed off on some of these things.
That said, I do feel it's unfair to knock the *entire* game down due to a few bad map gimmicks, as a lot of the side objectives and optional things in PoR maps are solid, and would definitely matter more in a harder, but specifically more lethal, game. If your units were more at risk when doing side things, but those rewards were more valuable to you, then it would create some very interesting dynamics, rather than the whole "Yeah just send steroids Marcia out to do everything while everyone else slowly pushes down mid."
There are some BAD maps, I'll say it, and they're ALL back-loaded so that the final impression of PoR is just bad. There are also some of my favorite maps in the series. It's a mixed bag. And much like Conquest lovers will go to bat to defend their game on the basis of its 5 good maps while shoving the 10 horrible ones under the rug, doing the opposite with PoR feels disingenuine. Not wrong, just bad faith.
I don't think the Ike vs BK fight is one of the worst maps though - if you use Mist (who won't get attacked by the black knight) then a capped-STR Ike mathematically wins that fight without any RNG. That said, if you didn't train Mist (or got her killed) then you're in for a rough time, and nothing in the game requires you to use her or even implies that training her is going to be necessary. You can always run away from the fight, but saying that winning vs the BK isn't required is like saying keeping all your units alive isn't desirable - you can make that argument but it's not a very good one.
Also this is totally just a *me* thing and nothing to do about PoR but I'm really not a fan of the "Pretty Girl Elincia" remix, it is incredibly distracting because it was deliberately designed to be out of tune and dissatisfying so I had to skip that entire section of the video because it was giving me a migraine.
Hi Zenith, finally got a bit of time to read through and properly respond to your comment. Just wanted to start by saying thanks for sharing your thoughts, especially since I know that you have a lot of love for this game
I'm glad that you agree that there are some problems with the game, and can see where I'm coming from. It is definitely true that Path of Radiance introduced a bunch of new experimental mechanics, such as the forge (which I forgot to mention in my review), so it does definitely deserve some credit for that
That's fair to think that I dunked on the maps too much. I'm not going to lie, even now I still don't really see how a lot of the maps could be good, since I dislike to have no feelings on most of them. It's not the case like FE8 where I can see the idea either, though that's definitely due to familiarity with the game, helped by how I find FE8 much less tedious to replay for the game speed reasons that I talked about in the video. Though I'm not personally a Conquest defender, it is true now that you've pointed it out that I remember thinking that the worst maps were concentrated towards the end of the game, so I can definitely understand how it comes across as a bad faith judgement
And yeah, definitely won't be using that track again. Thanks for telling me about it both here and in the DiSOUcord, and I hope that the migraine wasn't too debilitating. And once more, thanks for sharing your thoughts on the video content!
I recently installed Dolphin as well, so I just finished PoR for the fourth time in three weeks because I like it so much. However, my love for this game is probably half from nostalgia.
Whoa, that's really impressive, I salute you dang. And it's super valid to like something for nostalgia reasons! I only started playing Fire Emblem around 18 months or so ago as an adult, so it's not something that I personally feel towards the series, but there are definitely games that I'm nostalgic for that I know I wouldn't rate as highly if I played them for the first time today, so I get it
The music from 3:30 on is really loud compared to your speech, im having trouble hearing what you are saying over it.
Its funny, I think I agree with you on most of your points, its just the things we agree are bad I don't care as much about, and I like the positives more. So I get a much more positive overall picture on the game as a package.
The gameplay is very slow which is very bad, and the map gimmicks can be more annoying than good.
The 2 "I hope you trained Ike and didn't get stat screwed" fights are my biggest problems with the game, even though Ike has a pretty good chance of meeting benchmarks. Yes, they are either optional or you get another unit to deal with it, but RNG elements that the game strips away all your other options to deal with are my biggest pet peeve (though usually this is green units in fe7 that have chances (however small) of death before it is mathematically possible to reach them.)
The lower difficulty and over-abundance of resources is why I like this game for a newcomer for the series, it is very un-punishing if you waste money and gives you a lot more freedom to make mistakes, as well as letting you level up your favorite units with bonus exp and without needing to find the proper promotion items. These things go from benefits to downsides the more experience you have with the series though. I like resource management, but the only real management you get is the fact the convoy is inaccessible mid-battle.
Thanks for pointing that out, it's something that a couple of other people have said, so definitely a sign that I need to have lower music volume in the future!
And that's completely fair, I think a lot of game ratings ultimately come down to that balance of priorities. Which, while this is an aside, is part of why I find it interesting when people do tierlists of an entire game series because it really lays out where their priorities lie, and thus means that you can mentally visualise a framework on how this compares to your own priorities so that you have an idea on what they'll say about future games or fan hacks, for instance. I will get around to it probably, eventually, sometime... need to finish all of the games first for that though lol
Yeah... The Black Knight fight, and then Ashnard are real bad points
I would agree that if you're going to play Path of Radiance at any point, it should be while you're still relatively new to the series. Owing to Dolphin being... well, Dolphin, I left Path of Radiance specifically for far too long... I wonder what my thoughts on it would be had I played it within my first five or so games. Mind, I think they would have ended up this way if ever I decided to replay it for some reason
Very interested to hear your full thoughts on FE10 whenever you finish that. I love Tellius, and I do agree FE10 has much better gameplay than FE9 because it expands and refines a lot of existing mechanics (like the skill system and bexp) while also keeping systems that work really well like the base.
I do find it interesting that FE8 is one of your favorites while FE9 severely underperformed, whereas for me FE9 is one of my favorites and FE8 for me has always been meh (I dont dislike it but it has never excited me much).
I am definitely a gameplay first person as well, so really what it comes down to when considering an easy game is what “flaws” can you live with. The speed of fe9 has never really bothered me much, I memorized the pitfall bridge, the BK fight is mathematically solved with a trained Mist and is optional anyway, and bexp dumping although may take away the journey of training a bad unit, it saves me time when I dont feel like doing a long grind for something silly. These are not excuses for the game, but this is just how I react to these sorts of things which probably adds a lot to our difference in viewpoint.
Enjoyed hearing your honest thoughts about a game I love to death. As my man Ike says: “We will try to understand one another, even when we disagree”
Yo Elut, thanks for watching and commenting! An FE10 review is eventually in the works, but well... yeah, I enjoyed it a lot more. Basically some parts of the game where enemies just don't feel like trivial experience sacks blocking my path in addition to more refined mechanics means I prefer it greatly
Re FE8 and FE9, that's something that some other folks have pointed out as well. What I realised is that I don't inherently mind a strategy game being easy - I mind a game being slow, and a game being both easy AND slow is a near-death knell to me. Hence why FE9 is low (easy and slow in terms of gameplay speed) and FE7 is also low (easy and slow in terms of there are so many maps, especially if you add in Lyn mode). Whereas FE8 is a fast game (I can complete it in around 5 hours without RNG manipulation if I try) and while it's easy, there are a lot of restrictions that I can place on it that augment the difficulty, though that's more me putting in the effort than the game itself. Hopefully that makes sense?
Like you said, I think you're right that it depends on what flaws you can forgive, and also what your stance on different gameplay mechanics are. While probably my thoughts on these were already semi-evident if not outright stated in the video, regarding the examples you gave specifically:
1. I already said my piece on gameplay speed
2. I'm not a fan of online search/memorisation emblem, like with desert items etc, so I was never going to search up the pitfall locations
3. I don't find things I dislike like the BK fight acceptable because I can skip them (mind, if it weren't skippable, I would have an even lower opinion of it...); and
4. While I don't find the process of training "bad" units hard per se, I do think that people should have to work to use the units they want to and think that getting to skip that process defeats the point, at least from my perspective
Hearing your point of view has been very interesting, so I appreciate it a lot, and hope to see your thoughts as well on the eventual FE10 review vid! Thanks for sharing your thoughts, and as you said, we can very much amicably agree to disagree :>
I put this vid on during a PoR enemy phase to alleviate boredom.
And you're so real for that
Overall, a good video!
I played through FE9/10 blind for the first time only a few months back, and though it wasn't on the hardest difficulty, it was a pretty positive experience for me! The characters, the setting, the general gameplay, I really enjoyed it all! Looking back though, some of your points are for sure valid.
The difficulty of the game is definitely nothing crazy, so for people looking for some really complex strategy stuff, it may not be the best game. They give you a ton of resources and characters throughout, so much to the point that you can probably never have to buy anything from the shop, leading to that part being trivialized and not really a worry.
The speed of the game (animation-wise) wasn't a super big problem for me, but I've heard complaints about Tellius and it's several minute-long enemy phases, and I definitely took notice in RD, so I totally get that.
When it comes to overall gameplay mechanics and gimmicks, however, I found nearly all of it to be really interesting and fun to work with (even with some chapters being a lot longer than expected *cough* Ch. 17 *cough*). The variety of map objectives and battlefield obstacles kept my attention and never left me bored or wanting to quit immediately. Heck, even the infamous bridge kept me on my feet with everything going on there. I do tend to have more patience with a lot of stuff others might find annoying, though I could understand that sorta stuff getting on some people's nerves, and I do not blame you for what you seem to think of some of it.
All-in-all, I found your thoughts interesting! People tend to show Tellius a bit of love from what I can tell, so having someone highlight things they did not have a ton of fun with in their experience is nice to see!
I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed your time with Tellius! It does seem like a recurring point in terms of the positives that the character interactions are a big part of what endears Path of Radiance specifically to its fans (lmao Radiant Dawn supports, though the base conversations are still there obvs), which... I'm someone who doesn't personally value them highly, and also didn't really care for the main character and focus all that much lol. Definitely though even the gameplay side of things I can vaguely(?) understand why people might like it, since it's true that the game does provide some variety in goals in terms of the gameplay, even if I do dislike the implementation of bonus experience a lot as the game's way of rewarding you for pursuing said goals
And yeah, that was most of the idea behind the video, to have a less complimentary take out there. Radiant Dawn's script I'm still writing, so I'm not sure if it's going to be similarly unloving relative to general public opinion, not least because I did prefer it vastly to Path of Radiance. But hope to see you there, and thanks for sharing your thoughts!
I’ve never considered myself to be patient but maybe I should give myself more credit. I think you’re overlooking the earlygame of PoR a bit which does have quite a bit of strategy if you’re not just doing a Titania stomp. And then later in the game, even if enemies are bulky I find there are plenty of ways to one round most of them,so setting up the perfect enemy phase is pretty fun imo.
Haha if you didn't find Path of Radiance's gameplay pace to be really slow, then yeah, I would call you a patient person!
The earlygame... yeah, I won't lie, I did huck Titania at a lot of things, since I'm a believer in using your Jagen. I also used Gatrie and Shinon a fair bit while they were there. Oscar and Ike I did train during the earlygame, but I still found it simple and uninteresting to do. Part of that is that I did know coming into the game that bonus experience is a mechanic (it's hard to not, especially when you exist in the RUclips content creation space), and I think that if anything, it incentivises the Titania earlygame sweep because you can just BExp up Oscar, Ike, Marcia, etc later
And yeah, I can see that. So thanks for sharing your thoughts!
@@akirasou The thing I don’t understand is how you got through FE3 but found PoR to be an issue. I just beat FE3 Book 1 and I very much was not having a good time.
@@aggressivelymediocre350 interesting... I think it's probably a mix of actually liking the visuals from FE3, having played Books 1 and 2 back to back and therefore thinking primarily about Book 2 with the Star Shard management and similar, and also FE3 being so obviously old that I subconsciously give it a bit of slack compared to a game that I may have actually been alive for when it released. But obviously that's just my point of view, and I do think that Book 1 is worse than Book 2, so I can understand where you're coming from
7:00 - Hey that's me!
Really good video, enjoyed hearing your thoughts on the game a lot!
Absolutely agree with the slowness issues and in general the sloggyness of the game. Long animations with bulky enemies on mass that aren't threatening at all really do drag down the pace of the game.
What I didn't enjoy was the way you say BExp... Do... do you say Exp as 1 word O.O
That being said I still think the game is worth playing. Whilst some maps do have some poor gimmicks, I think it also boast some very fun, solid maps too. Chapter 10 springs to mind as one of the better gimmicks in the series, and I think a lot of the "Non gimmicky" maps can also be quite well designed, such as Chapter 11. I also don't think reading the plot is quite the same as playing through it yourself, which I feel grants a much better experience.
I strongly agree with you on that last point. Something about the way the music compliments the story in the Tellius games just feels special in a way that I can't really describe. I've played Path of Radiance 6 times and Radiant Dawn 5 times all within the last 3 years, and yet I still feel compelled to read most of the dialogue in every playthrough, whereas for most FE games I don't even feel compelled to read the dialogue after the first playthrough aside from route splits and supports that I haven't seen before.
It you!! Thanks for watching, glad you enjoyed and lol now that I've played Tellius and thus actually have experience with the mechanics we talked over, wanna do an updated Agree to Disagree sometime? (I say this half-jokingly)
And lmaoooooooooooooooo true, that should be the real video criticism here. Look, I've heard people pronounce it that way before and it just kinda stuck ;^;
That's fair, and I agree on Chapter 11 being neat at least, the stealth of Chapter 10 I didn't care for personally. Like I said in the video, I think if you are to play it, it's best to do so if you're still early on in the series where the abundant resources are a boon rather than a potential hindrance, and I myself don't regret playing it, since I do want to complete my self-imposed "required reading" as an FETuber. I also agree on playing through the plot being different from reading through it, though I maintain that I think rather than experiencing the gameplay and the plot, folks are better off just reading the plot lol
im sure this video will definitely not contain scathing comments at the sanity lost whilst playing this game
Then there's Vileplume who said that he was expecting me to be more scathing towards the game lmfao
After much time , the infamous video has dropped
Alright I have officially finished the video and yeah completely see and understand your point.
Personally I love fe9 because , A characters are all great, the base is great, I find a lot of the maps just generally quite fun to play such as the stealth map or the map where you get jumpscared by a unit wayyyyy higher level than you. Also while bexp is a rich get richer mechanic, it also allows for you to do very silly combination of units such as making brom your best unit for the sake of it.
Great video as always Akira and I'm excited for the fe10 review :)
(Personally I think fe8 is the real overrated game)
Thanks for watching, and I'm glad that even though we disagree, you enjoyed the video and that you think I made alr points! I completely agree that the base is great, I really like something that minimises the amount of time that you have to spend on not the game but... well, as you may have gathered, I didn't enjoy the gameplay, so there's really only so much that the base could do for me
And yeah, I do appreciate meme, so it makes sense that some folks are going to like BExp for that reason. It's interesting, because I appreciate meme and in theory appreciate an easy way to catch units back up for, say, an ironman context, but I don't like that they don't have to work for it at all. Not to say that I enjoy the process of raising a bad unit either. Still, it feels off to me in a way that I may well have to actually make a dedicated BExp/side objectives video on at some point
(And if you make it, I look forward to the FE8 roast)
This game was me and my bro's jam! We got super hyped for finding a secret green haired sword master in the desert on our 3rd playthrough. We even jokingly let Boyd die in his 1st mission just to see the unique dialogue you get when it happens. 😅
Though I clearly didn't like it, I'm glad that you and your brother enjoyed it! Somehow finding Stefan without the usage of a guide sounds super hype, and that unique dialogue sounds hilarious
As a fan of this game and even thing certain things like level 21 promotion which feels like a nice QoL in some ways. I will admit that this the game I likely play the least for things like a slow start and it being slow in general. I feel the review is a bit harsh, at least I wouldn’t call it full on bad. But I respect your opinions and can even agree that I need more time in between playthroughs of this game than others. Over all a review I can respect.
That makes sense, I can definitely understand the point of view that Level 21 promotion is a quality of life feature. In some games I could probably like it, since I'm not typically someone who gets people to 20 before promotion anyway. But I think Path of Radiance already gives you such abundant experience and bonus experience that it just further minimises the resource management aspects of the game, at least personally
Also fair to think that the review is harsh. Despite our disagreements though, I also respect your point of view as someone who is a fan of PoR. Thank you for watching and sharing your thoughts :>
I like the idea of being rewarded by playing decently fast or completing other side objectives and I wish other games did something with it other than the privilege of opening a chest on the map, since once I killed the thief I can go back and relax once again. Like if you win in 12 turns you get either a rare candy item, a weapon that is really strong for that point of the game or a growth boosting item. FE6 kinda did this with the legendary weapons which was pretty cool. Maybe a game will do this idea and inspire FE...
Oh wait, Tactics Ogre Reborn did! And even mitigated the overlevelling problem by using a level cap! I wouldn't be against a BEXP system but units that are too strong (like Titania who is promoted, therefore under a hypotetical lv7 cap) can't use it until the hidden cap raises. Imagine being FE and pushing the player to use everyone rather than just your few select chosen ones :))
As for the hubs... I honestly think Fates did it best. It's very quick, you can customize the hub with various baselines (giant rock moment) and reading the little conversation when certain characters are working at the shops was very funny. Expecially if you do something stupid like buying a weapon from Xander, for Xander himself, he is like "Uhm, is it ok? Cool I guess..."
I... Don't have anything else to say since I haven't played the game enough. I played the prologue and ch1 but this game is slower than Benny and I have a huge list of games I wanna try both as a honest citizen and as an eyepatch boy. Maybe in 2026. Maybe.
Yeah, I definitely like the way of offering rewards for completing maps quickly or achieving side objectives but I just think that bonus experience is far too centralising and strong for it to really work in practice. You've mentioned TOR before, and the more you say about it, the more I think I should give it a shot... Maybe someday I'll get it with channel donations/earnings on Steam once the channel hopefully gets larger
Fates hubs are weird. Like I don't care for the customisation, and I would prefer just a menu rather than the small hub you can run around moment. Then while I do find the various conversations and interactions funny, I would also rather not have them, not least because they introduce an RNG element to the part of the game that isn't the gameplay proper. That being said, I do actually understand why people like em though, and I do also like them, albeit not as much as the Tellius base system, so more power to you
And understandable! So many games, and uh. If I weren't now doing FE content creation and thus feel some sort of obligation to do my "required reading" and play through all the mainline games eventually, I would not have stuck Path of Radiance out to the end lol
@@akirasou Fates was the best modern hub they ever did imo. Mostly because everything is easily reachable and only takes a few seconds to load at worst. I dont understand why IntSys keeps making working things worse like - with Engage everything must have been a Fully Willing choice by the Devs. Otherwise I cant explain it since it lacks every good point of Fates and takes soo much time that its an objective downgrade in every point except the looks - which isnt as great either. 3 houses had problems too but used the hub in a more lively way (that still began to bother me in the first playthrough). If not practical, a menu like in POR and RD would be great. It might not look as good - but you mostly spend time on managing stuff rather than teleporting around, etc. Which I prefer. Tho Engage also has other things that make you spend a lot of time in the hub. It just feels too me as if they think about everything they could add no matter if it makes sense or not which results in something half baked. Which is strange because at the same time engage is sooooo good with many strategic layers... Were 2 different teams responsible for sidestuff and main game?
Bonus Exp are a funny thing but I do prefer the system of Radiant Dawn. I hope the rest is below the cut off.
There they introduced the rule that only 3 Stats will rise punishes those who only use BEXP to level up units (tho exceptions to units desperately needing them could've been made) - but it also serves as a strategic component. Using it at the right moment (for example when everything that grows good is already/almost capped you can increase the bad stats) feels very rewarding.
@@bladerdj3503 yeah that's fair, I see a lot of people who like the Fates hub world! While as I said, I think that the PoR/RD method is best because I don't particularly care for running around anywhere, Fates does definitely at least not waste your time as egregiously as Three Houses' monastery does (for the story reasoning) and Engage does (for... some reasoning, presumably)
Bonus Experience is weird. I do prefer the way it's been done in Radiant Dawn, but I do also have some gripes with it still. So maybe I'll have to make a video proper on the concept of bonus experience at some point lol
@@akirasou I'm all in for a damn menu to do my preparation stuff. But realistically speaking... they really want to make hubworlds a stample if they were alright with how they did it in Engage. Hubworlds can 100% work in FE but they havent found out how in 3D yet. Like do it like Valentia, let me explore DIFFERENT places, listen to npcs via lore and so on. Gimme sidequests, NPCs that return, shops with unique offers - a reason to run around other than... micro management but like chew gum.
Or to make it easy to picture -> build the game around the world, not the other way around as in one gigantic building. To avoid this issue Somniel is floating and MyCastle is in a different dimension... Works as a gameplay element, but does immersion dirty, just use a camp, something plain normal non godly stuff for once after years. Implement actions like Hunting, fishing, woodcutting, idk a character who is in origami or making ormants who are all traveling with you and make all these things that play out as short skippable cutscenes like group projects in 3Houses. Bonfires for random conversations or as a new "Eat lunch" option but with more than 2 people. Maybe crafting accessoires with fur of animals your units hunted for you. And it could all be in a small camp with no big loading times or anything etc. At least imo, the best way for FE to implement Hub worlds is making them compact and fit into the world, preferebly without "Because you are god."
very nice video. i consider myself a big fan of path of radiance but i do agree with most of your complaints. i find that, for me, the story is good enough for me to enjoy the game (exactly like you said), even though i 1000% agree that the game is far too slow, resources don't matter, and that bexp is broken in this game.
i will however disagree with the map gimmicks section. ike vs the black knight is one of my favourite fights in the series, and i think is the only time they've managed to pull off a real villain duel in that way.
aside from talking about the game, i do have a critique of the video as a whole. in my opinion the music was mixed too loud, and while i didn't find it difficult to make out your voice, the droning parts of the music really grated on my ears at the volume i had to play the video at to hear you. not sure if this is just a me thing (i have sensory processing issues) but it was a very unpleasant experience.
overall though, love your channel and looking forward to seeing what you think of radiant dawn, which is my favourite game in the series.
Thanks for watching and commenting! Definitely makes sense to like the game on a story and character front. The Black Knight point is interesting, because I think the only remotely redeemable thing about it is that you can choose to run away from it. I can understand the appeal from a story perspective since I do feel it completes Ike's arc, but I don't understand how it's enjoyable from a gameplay one. So while obvs you don't have to explain yourself or anything, I would be intrigued as to why you enjoy it so much
It's definitely not just you, some other folks have also mentioned the music, so that's my bad. I'm sorry it was unpleasant for you, and I'll work to make sure that future videos are less uncomfortable
Thanks! Radiant Dawn review will materalise in probably around a month
I feel like Bexp gets a lot more hate than it probably should. Yes its incredibly powerful and can make units insanely strong but it also rewards you for playing the maps well instead of turtling and shooting a boss 100 times with Rolf to make him strong. And when you realize what Bexp replaces in the fire emblem mechanic pool, The Arena, I think Bexp lands on the much healthier side of the gameplay loop. Arena is an infinite money and experience pool that lets you completely ruin all semblance of balance. The arenas also usually happen to exist on maps that let you buy infinite amounts of healing staves just to make it even more broken. I also refuse to believe there is any amount of risk when it comes to the arena. It doesn't take long to realize that in most of the games the lower gold value just means the units are significantly easier to kill and on top of all of that you can just back out if you think your unit might die. Idk frankly if path of radiance gets to be heavily criticized for "free exp" (even though its a limited resource) I think FE1,3,5,6,7,8,11,12 should all also be criticized for letting you ruin the game with arena abuse.
Without the fast enemy phase glitch I probably would have a lot less fun with this game but its such a life saver. Game is so slow near the end but I just like the game so much I can ignore the slower game speed. I also personally just enjoy the way shove and canto works into the mechanics rewarding me for clever use of strategy of movement.
Yo, thanks for watching and for sharing your thoughts! The arena point is interesting, because you're completely right that BExp is a better part of the gameplay loop than is the arena. Usage of the arena is just socialised against within the community as a form of what Excelblem would call 'unethical experience,' and there are definitely some games where I would say that arena abuse is unlikely to work out for you (I remember the FE3 arena being... very unfriendly, shall we say), but you're right. I was already thinking of making a video on the bonus experience mechanic, so if/when I do, would you be cool with me mentioning your arena point? Very happy to credit this comment if you want
Fair to be able to see past the game speed! Shove I like a lot for sure, the Shove train gaming is real and it feels great to pull off. Super Canto is... I have thoughts on Super Canto
@@akirasou Yeah you can use my coment if you like and the credit woud be appreciated. Yeah I cant say ive grinded fe3 arena so frankly I dont know about I know the gba arenas are very easy and so is fe5.
Bonus exp is cool and it has a much better application in radiant dawn. But I think it would be a good mechanic in por if the game was more difficult.
First playthrough of this game for me.
I started Fire Emblem itself 1 month ago, Finished 7 (I liked it), 8 (I loved it), dropped 6 (too much torture for me) and yeah, midway through 9 now (I have no social life, in case you're wondering). I do want to play nearly all FE games, I think I'd just skip FE1 and FE2 in favor of the remake.
Regarding PoR, I was very hyped about it, I usually do love stories and I like easy games (see: dropped FE6) but OH MY GOD THE SPEED. It is indeed so excrutiantingly slow. And although the story is alright I'm not actually that into it. I do prefer the support system in PoR though, and the skills are also an interesting mechanic. Overall I'm disappointed, I expected more from the hype, but maybe there's still time for me to like it more.
An interesting take...
While I find much of the criticism fair, I'm a bit surprised at the fact FE8 isn't right alongside FE7 and FE9.
Aren't all these games with a heavy enemy phase focus that "play themselves" once you've figured them out?
That's fair. I do consider FE8 to also be easy, but I think the difference is that I don't find FE8 to be both easy and slow in the same way that I find FEs 7 and 9 to be, if that makes sense? FE8 is a much shorter game than FE7, and well, PoR game speed lmao. And then I often find the map gimmicks in both FE7 and FE9 incredibly grating as well
I will also admit though that FE8 is the Fire Emblem game that I have the most knowledge about, having done an LTC of a mod of it (Oops All Archers). And while it may not be entirely fair of me to attribute this towards FE8 itself, I do think that it makes a really good base for things like challenge or meme runs, such as the 0 Spd base and growth FE8 run that I'm streaming right now. So given that it's snappy enough and also has meme potential, I like it for that
Hopefully that vaguely makes sense? At the end of the day, it is a subjective personal ranking moment though, so it may not be entirely logically consistent lol
@@akirasou it does make sense!
I would say FE8 lends itself more to repeat playthroughs in my experience than FE7 or FE9. Feels less tedious.
Though from my point of view it's more a gut-feeling thing than a well constructed analysis of these games :D
@@jierdareisa4313 I'm glad to hear that I was able to communicate my point well! And also that you agree with me lol, though disagreeing is obviously also a-okay
And yeah fair enough! There's definitely value in gut feeling etc since this isn't a science or anything, so you are. Extremely valid
@@akirasou I started FE on GBA and I found FE7 to be fun, but FE8 was really the one that hooked me!
I liked the split promotions, clearly differentiated two routes, smaller cast, more contained story, creature campaign and minmaxing after endgame...
I found my way here from Dani Doyle's channel and all the collabs you do with her. I'm not going to beat around the bush -- I think this is well argued and well made. I also love Path of Radiance. Most of your criticisms are not things that are actual problems for me, but I can absolutely understand how they would be for someone else. Some of them are noticeable problems for me, as well, but aren't particularly severe. I kinda want to comment on all of it, so here goes. This is long, but I hope it's clear that I'm trying to actually engage with your points because I think there's room for a reasonable discussion, and reasonable disagreement, here.
On map gimmicks -- I actually like gimmick maps, quite a bit, even. I'm one of the very rare supporters of FE6 Gaiden map design, for example. I also support the existence of the bridge maps -- mostly. I won't lie, I've been screwed over by the pitfalls before, and I wasn't very happy with them at the time. I think, though, that a map which forces you to move carefully, and have backup plans, is a good idea. I also like how you can see where the pitfalls _aren't_ by watching the enemies move -- because, naturally, having placed them, they know where they are and avoid them.
The Black Knight fight could be fixed to most people's satisfaction by giving it a few extra turns to complete, honestly. Seven or eight instead of five. That, or increase Ike's skill proc rate for that battle, if they want to retain the core of it. As is, if you didn't train Mist -- and I can see why you wouldn't think to in your first run -- you'll probably lose. That said, one of the things I like about older FE games is that they're relatively replayable because they're relatively short, and yes, I do think this applies to PoR. Losing against the Black Knight the first time around -- like I did, actually, back when the game first came out -- just makes it that much more rewarding to win the second. The real issue is the complete lack of checkpoint between the fight and the rest of the chapter prior, _combined_ with the fact that, even with perfect stats, it is _just barely_ possible to get screwed out of victory by RNG. If RNG only forced you to redo the 5 very short and easy turns, that would be fine, and, I think, the best answer of all.
I also want to comment on Ashnard, because the problem of being limited in how you can hurt him is _significantly_ exaggerated on Hard mode. On Normal, you can call one of the three Laguz generals on turn 2 of the map, and they do a _lot_ of damage. (Also, no second form and he doesn't move.) On Hard, you have to beat his first form, the normal mode version (well, normal mode plus movement) before you get any backup. A first playthrough on Hard means you might not be entirely ready for that. I think this is important context to consider. Locking you out of Hard mode on a first playthrough has its own problems, mind, but this is a case where an attempt at playing blind could actually cause you to have _less_ context than a person playing the game on release.
On speed -- I am the sort of person that, 99% of the time, would prefer to leave animations on, finds map animations a good compromise between style and speed, and is almost never inclined to turn them off completely. Still, it wouldn't be that hard to accommodate everyone with options -- Radiant Dawn managed it (though only after a first playthrough, which is itself a rather silly design decision).
Forging costs are really dumb in this game. You would think more powerful weapons would be more expensive to forge, but no. The most expensive things to forge are low-mt tomes, because forging costs are relative to the existing stats of the weapon. Adding a 9% crit bonus to most weapons costs vastly more than adding 5 points of mt. And forging a Wind tome with +5 mt, bringing it from 2 to 7? That'll run you 14 grand, easy. Not as bad as a 7-mt Light tome, though. That'll be 22 grand, thanks. Meanwhile, oh, you want a silver lance with 20 mt? Not even 5k. That is unimaginably silly. A similar thing goes for Master Seals, actually. I only ever use them to promote at 20 in the base as a way of hoarding exp from other sources. The most insignificant optimization ever, really. They don't matter at all, and I completely agree with your criticism here.
Trying to be at all optimal with unit selection can easily wreck the strategy in PoR. If, on the other hand, you use units just because you like them, and the units you like are, for example, Rolf, Mist, every mage you come across, Mia, and Nephenee, it can be quite a lot of fun training them all the way up from scrubs to god-killers, especially if you're going for transfer bonuses. Still not crazy difficult, but it poses enough challenges to be entertaining. Similarly, going for difficult bonus exp conditions can be a rather enjoyable challenge to my mind, like the stealth mission, where I also challenge myself to escape with every unit including the green unit that has to be rescued, or the desert map, where I challenge myself to get every hidden item and defeat no enemies other than the boss. It's actually an interesting puzzle. At least, I think it is.
So that's my take on PoR's mechanics. The story isn't perfect, but it's got genuine depth, actually gets you interested in that depth, and is well told. The worldbuilders thought about the implications of what they were doing, and built a cohesive world, that competent story writers then placed a good linear narrative within. It's no Disco Elysium, but for Fire Emblem, it's quite impressive. And while the mechanics have many flaws, they also do some really cool and unique things, like shoving as a core mechanic, and laguz, and the particular approach to skills. I can't help but want to praise the artistic vision of it, even if sometimes it doesn't completely stick the landing. I'd take a game with ideas of its own that it implements imperfectly over one that perfectly implements regurgitated least-common-denominator design any day, and I find PoR to be the former. It may not be for everyone, but that's just a consequence of it trying to be itself, rather than an amalgamation of other things. You don't have to enjoy it, though, and some of what you pointed out are significant flaws.
I found the music starting from 3:33 to be incredibly distracting. I don't know if it's a me thing or not, but the volume paired with sharper sounds sort of mask your much softer voice, at least to me.
Thanks for saying! This is a comment that's been made a few times, so it's not just you. Will make sure that future videos have less loud music relative to my voice, and I hope that it didn't make this video unwatchable for you
Hey Akira! I do not have much to say, because I have not yet played the Tellius games and do not have much of a comprehensive opinion on them, but good video 👍
Thanks for checking the video out regardless! I hope that you enjoyed it still, and also that it hasn't spoiled anything for you if/when you get around to playing it if not being spoiled is important to you :>
PoR is my favorite FE game (narrowly ahead of the GBA games and SoV) and I clicked on this video expecting it to say the game was too easy and too slow.
I'm an extremely patient person, so the speed of the game never even crossed my mind as something to be upset over until I heard other people complaining about it as a complete dealbreaker for the game, but I do understand it. I do kind of find it funny that so many people treat it as a dealbreaker when you can completely solve the issue by playing on an emulator though.
As far as the gimmicks, I can see why the map gimmicks in this game can be frustrating for people (particularly on their first playthrough), but I personally still prefer the gimmicks in this game over the gimmicks in many of the more recent games. I was particularly not a fan of Fates's map design as it felt like EVERY map was a gimmick first and a map to play FE on second. With a few notable exceptions, the gimmicks stopped being novel and became more of a chore standing between me and the traditional FE mechanics. I can see why the gimmicks in PoR can be frustrating, but for me, they were few and far enough between that they added much needed difficulty in a memorable way. I unironically like Petrine's (Mekkah's) bridge for that reason, and I think it's very fitting that defeating the Black Knight is so satisfying because it's too difficult to be required.
Ultimately, due to the nature of Fire Emblem being a series that always makes drastic changes rather than refining its core systems, every Fire Emblem has flaws in one way or another. I mostly agree with your criticisms of the game, but those issues with the game just bother me far far less than the criticisms I have for other games in the series.
That's completely fair on all fronts. I guess re the various specific points:
1. Emulation: my system can't support Dolphin speedup and also recording my gameplay with OBS, so that at least was a non-starter lol
2. Gimmicks: that's fair to think about Fates, for me the problem point is mostly that I find checking each individual enemy for skills somewhat annoying so I have to be in a specific mood for it, but I can understand what you mean for sure. I definitely think that it's good that the Black Knight fight isn't required. If it were, then I would be harsher on it than I already was lol
3. Changes: I would disagree, I think for the most part the combat system of Fire Emblem has remained remarkably similar. I do agree though that every FE has its flaws, so as you said, it depends on what people are able to personally tolerate and/or forgive. So it makes sense that the difficulty and speed wouldn't necessarily be dealbreaking for you
But yeah, thanks for sharing some of your thoughts on an FE game you clearly have a lot of love for! I have softened on PoR a tiny bit since releasing this video in that I would now recommend it (with speedup) as a first or maybe second FE game. Given how impatient I am and how much of a dealbreaker slow and easy is to me, I left it farrrr too late lol
So full disclosure in all honesty. Fe9 and 10 are my favorite in the franchise specifically for their unique game play mechanics. The effective damage on all magic, the three separate weapon triangles, are something that when they are missing from a game immediately drops my enjoyment of said game. Also I do think you explained you points fairly well, and were decently clear these or subjective opinions, which is fair you are allowed to hate what I love, and vice versa. Life is too short to let others determine your interest.
To acknowledge your positive points. I can see how the slow gameplay can get to people, and in comparison to modern games especially, it feels exceedingly slow. However, when you consider it for it's time while slow it was expected. That is more to taste. Difficulty in any fire emblem is almost entirely decided how a player approaches it, and I disagree that any one game is harder then another outside of 4 and 5 solely because crits can miss in that game. In general almost every game can be beaten if you just focus a couple units and support that; however, you are intentionally comparing a game in it's mid difficulty and calling it easy, compared to other games hardest difficulties. That's kind of a bad faith argument, as a result discussion of difficulty should be placed on hold, until it can be properly compared to other games highest difficulty.
For the interesting section, I actually prefer fe 9 and 10 skill system to any other skill system, and actively dislike how much skills effect the game from awakening onwards. Yes 100% there are some over tuned skills (Looking specifically at Astra fe 9 that is utterly broken, and Aether) But most are surprisingly fair, and outside of I think it is either Nihil, or cancel being essentially for a couple units for bosses, you can't ever really get too op with just skills alone. Whereas awakening Galeforce exists. Fates Warp exists. With 3 houses it feels to much like Heroes for me, which I just don't like and there are so many busted combinations that are readily available with the reclassing system, And I have no opinions on engage as it looks like a game I just won't enjoy so I haven't picked it up.
For the Downsides Resource management is an interesting one, as from my personal experience there isn't a single game that really requires in depth resource management. And I'm someone that typically trains a full party of units that is subjective to drop in and drop out if a unit gets rng screwed. So for me the supposed resource management just doesn't exist in any fire emblem, you can micromanage sure, but at that point you typically micromanage it to intentionally have excessive money, or items. In fe9 Don't get me wrong I forged max might weapons every chapter as well, But I also made minimum weight weapons with increased crit, or weapons with intentionally more weight to quickly level up weapon levels. This aspect of forging was important to me, and as a result I was constantly bankrupt my entire playthrough. Sure I never truly struggled to have what I needed either, but I also never had excess. My money to chapter ratio ended to where I had no excess in weapons and no money left at end game. However in the context of an Ironman, with an imposed challenge of never being over leveled, Resource management is a very different thing.
That last point I think is an important difference between how I play and how most of the community plays. I consider the boss character of each map being the level cap my party is allowed to be at for that chapter. This creates an entirely different approach to my strategy as I am now forced to not use my jagens until the enemy is promoted, I'm forced to not only level one or two good units, This gives me a completely differently feeling of each game and it's difficulty.
On the subject of differences. I mentally don't allow myself to use bexp for anyone other then priest to get them to combat unit status, to finish a level up for units within 25 exp points of leveling up, or to promote any unit. I naturally play that way so Bexp ends up largely not really affecting my playthroughs, and I realize this, so while I hear the counter argument and half understand it just doesn't apply to me. That being said if you consider something tedious, completing shouldn't feel rewarding it should feel relieving, where as a challenge should feel rewarding. So in that regard I completely disagree that's a QoL change that is more appreciated, and works even better when you don't play how the community at large plays (Resetting for unit deaths. We really should play it more of an iron man, and in that context the bexp is a lot more fair. That's a dev. vs community issue.)
This goes to another point. To me the idea of not checking every units stats at least once, then marking problem stat units, and the ones with problem items or drop every chapter feels foreign to me. And like it's fundamentally wrong. that's part of the strategy in a strategy game. But I can see where this difference would be between the games. On that note map gimmicks are a part of the strategy, and I greatly Prefer 9's to almost any thing else in the series. A lot of it feels surprisingly grounded which is weird to say, That bridge chapter specifically is my favorite map in the game, especially if you don't use fliers. I find it to be one of the best strategic maps in the entire franchise, that requires good planning then execution, as there's nothing about it that is inherently unfair. The enemies show you that path the take. Yes it's a map that is slow, and the bane of any player that has gotten used to LTC. But for players that like looking at it as nothing more then a puzzles that's all that map is, a puzzle. I didn't use any guides my first playthough After the first two pitfalls I understood that maps gimmick, was punished for rushing it, altered my strategy and the only slow down was getting in enemy range to see where was and wasn't safe. I also didn't read through that base conversation I clicked through that without reading as it didn't seem important and later playthroughs I felt dumb because it did warn me.
As for Ashnard and the BK. I'm actually more annoyed that you can even mathematically beat the BK in FE9 especially after 10 reveals some things about that fight for you. As the BK already taught me what to expect from a boss I fully went into the final chapter ready for the effective weapon thing with Ashnard, and find myself wishing more games did that. (This is actually a point knocked of for Fe10 for me actually) Forcing you to need to make sure you have enough weapon uses of your legendary weapons to even beat the final Boss.
I think a big difference between us and how we view it is I view it as the potentially and the ideas it brings are higher rated, Where you seem to rate it as the presented package and what you specifically engage in from that package. As well as the differences in our approach to play. Case in point you like most of the community Favor Cavs and fliers primarily as they are king when it comes to LTC runs. (The community jointly views this as an expression of skill in the game) In my case I favor being forced to need to train and alter my strategies to ensure I'm always at level parity with the chapter, and If I succeed that a unit becomes unusable until they are at level parity again. That singular difference makes it to where I don't find any unit more valuable then another. It's more does this chapter have a chokehold trio, a side objective clear, a skirmisher, one form of healing just in case, then finally if the map has an enemy type is my counter unit for that available? This leads us to valuing different things and seeing things in a different light, and that's okay. Thanks to those differences we can learn to appreciate other aspects of the game we may not have normally considered.
Uh I played this game when I was 8. Idgaf about your takes on the difficulty it was made in a time where people played games to actually experience them.
I weirdly don't disagree with a lot of your points, but I still love the game. I think the big differences in how people view PoR come from how people prioritize different aspects of a FE game. For instance resource management just isn't something I care all that much about. Like I enjoy the challenge tightly designed resource management might provide, but I don't exactly miss it when it doesn't exist. I agree the maps can be gimmicky but I largely don't mind the gimmicks. I think the priest shove puzzle is a genuinely fun change of pace.
It's not a perfect game. Laguz are very much used in a way that hurts narrative cohesion and rarely justify a deployment slot. Enemies could use a bump in offensive stats while maybe reducing their HP and the animations need to move at a minimum three times faster. But I still think it's just a nice, straightforward Fire Emblem with one of the better overall narrative experiences. It actually is a game I'd recommend someone if they just wanted to get initial FE exposure because of it's overall simplicity and fairly forgiving nature, while simultaneously including most of FE's key elements.
Though I didn't, I'm glad that you love it! And also that you think my points don't sound too unreasonable lol
Yeah, a lot of it definitely comes down to differences in priorities for sure. A big part of why I wanted to make a video with such a harsh negative opinion on it is because the game seems to be very beloved in the western FE fanbase from my point of view. Well, and also because I genuinely didn't enjoy it personally lol
That's fair re the recommendation. My opinion has softened slightly, to the point where I would say that I could ostensibly recommend it (with extreme speedup) for someone early on in their journey with FE. I don't think I could recommend it to someone with more experience playing Fire Emblem, since at that point I think it ends up becoming both simple in a bad way and also long (and boring)
But y'know, I am ultimately glad that I played it because that means that I actually get to have a properly formed opinion on it. And there are some things that can be appreciated about it for sure and downsides that can be overlooked too depending on priorities. So you're completely valid for loving it, and thanks for watching and commenting on the video, especially given our differences in opinion!
I might be biased as a person who adores the tellius games. But damn saying "I wouldn't recommend playing it" seems kind of harsh to me. Fire Emblem is a really special series to me, though, so I can't really picture myself saying that about any of them. I don't know if I'd recommend it as somebody's first FE game, but I'd definitely encourage people to play it
I’m a little late for the party. I recently finished my first semi-blind, ironman playthrough in hard for PoR. I did have some fun with the game. The story was fun (what the fuck have they done to Devdan and Nadved), the interactions between characters were nice… But I have to admit that the game has flaws. It was really slow. I played with animations off and during combat I was still watching videos and chatting during enemy phase despite having a x2 speed up on my Nintendo PC. The sheer amount of bulk these enemies have impressed me, but um… Nephenee with vantage wrath did cut through them quite easily after a bit of investment. She was my favourite unit to use as a result. The only mildly threatening units I faced were the final boss (but haha Mist and Elincia have physic) and the feral ones dragons in the very last chapter. The rest of the game was fairly easy, and the only troops I lost were due to my fucking up their position. (The only time I almost had a death outside of my control was to a berserker with a killer ace critting Jill in chapter 14)
Overall, yeah, not the most fun game due to how s l o w it is, but the story was quite nice. If the money was tighter (Begnion’s chapter could easily only give half that money) and Bexp wasn’t that plentiful, as well as the enemy phase being sped up dramatically and the enemies made to be more deadly, the gameplay would actually be pretty solid.
(Still though, my very first run of the game, I did get hit by the chapter 11 jumpscare, with Ike being exactly 7 tiles away from the big boy. That felt a bit unfair)
Tl:Dr, good vid, I agree on some points you bring up, but I feel like it’s not worse than FE7 personally.
I'm glad I watched this video all the way to the end. I am familiar with all of these criticisms, but for me, the thing I liked the least about the game was how bare-bones the battle sequences are. The animations aren't terrible, but it's the only game where you can't see the battle forecast. Furthermore, the animations kind of lack emotion, if that makes sense. I usually love having animations on, but in Path of Radiance, I think the map animations are more enjoyable.
In my opinion, I think the pros of this game vastly outweigh the cons. While I would consider myself someone who values gameplay more than story, unless the gameplay is awful (which you seem to think, unfortunately), a good story can really elevate my experience. Of all the Fire Emblem games, Path of Radiance had me the most immersed in its world. From the game's themes, to all the world-building, to the OST, Path of Radiance goes to way more effort in this department than any of the recent games (which I doubt IntSys thinks is even worth doing anymore).
Overall, I respect your opinion. I do think in terms of difficulty, Path of Radiance is closest to FE7, so your ratings make sense.
I am most excited to see you finish FE5. I really like FE5 because, despite the fact that I really hated some chapters, I see that it had the potential to be a near perfect game with changes to a couple of mechanics and maps. In this way, I would say FE5 is very similar to FE3 and FE6.
Thanks for watching it all through to the end! That's completely fair that since you like the world, you think the pros outweigh the cons of the game, which I respect as well. Makes sense as well about the battle sequences, I played with animations off for the vast majority of the game, but a friend did tell me at one point to turn them on and say if I noticed anything, and the lack of battle forecast is direeeeeeeeee
Ahaha eventually I'll get around to finishing FE5, I don't think I've touched it for nearly two months by now lol. The RD review will probably come out far sooner than I actually finish (or maybe even continue) playing Thracia. I was much more positive/less negative on that game than this one, so I'd be curious what your thoughts on it are when it surfaces!
Path of Radiance is a weird one, because I largely agree with everything you said, but it’s still one of my favorite FE games.
Granted, I don’t replay it a ton, it’s simply too long and slow for that, but every time I do I have a great time (outside of the stress over Ike potentially being stat screwed, among other things).
Strange as it is to admit, I think the aesthetics are a huge part of it. The graphics hit the perfect sweet spot of being charmingly primitive with a great artistic style, without being too outdated or unpleasant to look at (mostly holds true for Radiant Dawn as well). The music is also excellent and the story is mostly well done, though repeat play throughs have soured my opinion on some of it.
That's fair. Different people prioritise different things when it comes to evaluating games, so even if you agree on a lot of my points, it's perfectly understandable and aight to still come to a different conclusion about how much you like the game
I have to say that I don't really get the graphics part because I personally found them unpleasant to look at outside of the 2D art for the characters. However, I can understand the music and story points for sure. I'm curious, what has your opinion soured on in the story on repeat playthroughs? Regardless, thanks for watching and for sharing your thoughts :>
@@akirasou (potential spoilers ahead) my biggest issues with the story are:
1: Everything we learn about Greil after his death. I just don’t like how much they hype him up and would of preferred it if he was just a Daien General who defected to become a mercenary. But no, he was also the best swordsman ever, he was friends with Laguz royalty, he helped protect the medallion that could potentially cause the apocalypse, and most of the prominent fighters in the world are all well aware of his legacy and what it potentially means for Ike. It’s just too much.
2. Having an entire arc for Reyson about not being devoured by vengeance, only to then glorify Ike’s personal revenge obsession against the black knight with no acknowledgment of how contradictory this is. They go so far as to have Titania justify Ike’s decision to fight the black knight alone and effectively state that beating him is required for Ike to move on with his life.
3. There are several times where the story seeks to criticize the concept of knighthood and for whatever reason it is really bad at it. Ike throws shade at them in a conversation with Jill stating that “at least mercenaries fight for something that’s real” as supposed to concepts like justice, loyalty, and honor. Which is not only contradictory (Ike literally condemns Naesala’s lack of loyalty to those who hired him), but it also implies that knights only fight for concepts and never for physical compensation. The game seems to think that knights are ideological Simps with no will or thoughts of their own, which could potentially apply to some characters, but certainly not to knights as a whole.
4. Last but not least, at the end of the game Elincia accepts her role as queen of Crimea despite not wanting anything to do with the crown. She doesn’t want it, but she understands that this is the best way for her to help her people in their time of need. Then our protagonist Ike… plans to ditch Elincia and his new role as general as soon as he possibly can because he’d rather be a mercenary. And maybe this was just me, but I get the impression that the game genuinely sees this as a positive thing, like Ike is resisting a potentially corrupting power by rejecting nobility, but he’s just doing exactly what Elincia was pressured into not doing (ditching current responsibilities and going back to their old life).
And that’s about it. Took way too long to write that down. Maybe I’m crazy and most people don’t consider any of these to be problems, but these are the things that upset me most when I replay PoR.
@@tjroybaker7964 nah I don't think you're crazy at all. Now that you say that... I think those are now additional gripes that I have with PoR's story LMFAO
The first one I already vaguely felt since I feel that it really, really downplays any notion of Ike as the everyman if Greil is as... himself as he is, but you're completely right on the vengeance and knighthood stuff as well. In my playthrough, I ended up failing to get BK, so I actually thought the having to give up thing worked pretty well, but since you said, I went back and read what's said if you win and... yeah with the Reyson moment, it really doesn't work for me lmfao
Re the last part... I would agree that it seems like on all fronts, the most responsible thing that Ike could have done is not gone and ditched Crimea. Especially since when the GM stuff picks up in RD, Mist is literally like "oh we're basically scraping by to be able to eat" so there is the whole aspect of what's best for his literal only other family member as well. It's weird
But yeah, thanks for sharing your thoughts! Though I guess it means that I now have additional issues with PoR lmfaooooooooooooo as if I needed any more of them
Tellius games are my faves to this day, although Radiant Dawn with all the army switching certainly has become a headache to me and I really dislike that mechanic of it.
PoR's biggest issue 100% is the slow animations. Holy fuck. Emulator is a godsend for that, though. I can play at 200-300% speed and it is SO much better. The difficulty, especially of the English version, too easy.
I'm about to start a stream of a "blind" iron man playthrough (only because I'm not familiar with it directly) of JP maniac mode, but even that definitely looks like enemies might be quite numerous. I'm not expecting that to bother me much, since I typically love to totally rout maps, but yeah I can understand how the crybaby LTCers (with the patience and attention span of a first grader) would hate to actually have to fight a map instead of turn 1 warp skip 😂.
Altogether, I still believe PoR is the best FE game if you can speed it up via emulator. The base management is perfect (FUCK the new FEs for how they do it,) the music is excellent most of the way through, the game's setting and world building seems on point. Ike will likely always be my fav FE lord ❤
That all makes sense, thanks for watching the video despite obviously having a lot of love for PoR, which I do not lol
Completely agreed on the base management, the monastery and the Somniel are both. Awful in their own ways, and I don’t personally like even how Fates did it since I have no interest in running around and talking to people rather than just menuing for it
What I will say as a sometimes LTCer is that I don’t inherently mind rout maps. Some of them are really interesting in that context, like Phantom Ship’s 5 turn or the precise movements for Scorching Sands’ 2 turn. That’s because I find the question of how to rout them quickly interesting though, which isn’t the same case for me as PoR’s maps
But yeah, thanks for sharing your thoughts! Best of luck with the JP Maniac ironman, I hope you enjoy yourself and that it goes well :>
Breaking my heart with that title. :V
That said, before I get to my thoughts on FE9 (and really only FE9, I am only mildly familiar with FE10 on paper), I do have one critique of the video itself. Some of the music is a tad too matched with your voice volume, in that it competes with your own voice sometimes that is. I found it hardest to listen to what you were stating during the segment having the Elincia arrangement for example, though some later bits still had me having to replay some small parts to make sure I heard correctly.
As for what I like about Path of Radiance that you didn't elaborate on? Well, it actually _introduced_ the Forge mechanic to the series, as in actually made it into something that was even added retroactively to some remakes, aside from some newer games. Being able to give custom weapons to units of your liking, or just weaker units needing the oomph to catch up by hitting hard and accurately, is a simple yet fantastic concept; Whether it made the game easy or not I feel is kinda the point, cause why would you purposely bring a lousy weapon to war when you can bring what suits you best if you could afford it from your earnings? It also somewhat gets around the annoyance of enemies that just exist as HP sponges against the standard fare.
Though it was disappointing how narrow it was for the Tomes (and much more expensive). That said, some of the parameters were oddly balanced in terms of cost to gains ratio; Crit is WAY too expensive for how little you get out of it. It might be worth the cost if it gave increments in 10s, rather than 3s for example. Still, you'll be hard-pressed to deal more damage than with a max might Silver Forged weapon, but Steel is just much more affordable. You do get a lot of gold, but not THAT much that you can just make a weapon as OP as possible every time from the moment that the Forge becomes available; That is a legit pitfall of the game if you get drawn in by all the best numbers. :V
Shove/Smite is amazing, but I feel you didn't really stress enough that it presents an actual alternative that gets around the idea that ONLY cavalry and dancers are good for unit mobility and placement, when you can choose to give extensions with your other units towards or away from circumstances without having to rely on Canto so much. Even just giving smaller Con units the ability to Shove larger Con units (up to a point) would give the whole Con/Aid thing a bit of a much needed fresh twist in the series; I don't think I should have to explain why it should not be impossible for someone weighing 170 pounds to flinch back when someone weighing 160 punts them hard enough, and how it could have an effect on gameplay.
The animations... I do enjoy the animations as they are, plenty of attacks seem to have _enough_ weight to them. I feel they laid the groundwork for what is to be expected moving forward in 3D FE; Also, helps I am plenty patient... o3o .But I'll meet you halfway in that this is the same console that gave us Mario Sunshine, Soul Calibur II (Link), and Tales of Symphonia, it should have the engine to make set animations happen quickly and more engaging, if it were optimized better.
By the way, while unlikely, the cap for Skills in PoR is 6 skills, even if characters normally can only have up to 5 displayed. Just a pinch of trivia on that one in terms of how ambitious it could have been with it. Point is, I do enjoy that Skills can be granted at will, rather than having to go through hoops mid-battle to get them through Supports or something and risk do overs because someone croaked. The menu/base management truly was a class act.
Lv.21 promotions. Yes. Thank you. This, a million times over. I never understood the point of gatekeeping prowess to some arbitrary rare item that usually designates a mark/rank/title and limits your options. I get some games have such items be of significant lore value (looking at you and your lords, FE6 and FE7), but I cannot stress enough how jarring it is having to wait so much for you to have a choice to help your units reach that next tier, be it finding an item or reaching a promotion event point. At least FE8 has the decency to give the twins the Braces as a half-measure, so that you can use them on the spot or hold onto them if you want more levels first before committing, same as you could use Seals, Bexp to rank up, or just take to battle and earn it there.
Nephenee is my favorite country bumpkin... Just saying. :V
As for 5 very definitive negatives I have over this game:
1. How underwhelming all Laguz that aren't Dragons, or Giffca and Tibarn, end up being due to how forced and limiting the transformations are (many of my issues with them would be fixed in Radiant Dawn at least).
2. The Knights and Generals are TOO SLOW in combat!! They're as if made of stone, and swing swords like dorks!!
3. Weapon ranks take SO long to naturally enhance.
4. Ashnard and Black Knight being invincible to most of your army by literal plot armor. The fact I can't even scratch Ashnard with Jill nor Elincia, who arguably have the MOST reasons to strike him down out of the whole army, just aggravates me.
5. Too much swamp and too much pitfall bridge.
Hello! Thanks for being patient, I've finally got a bit of time during which I can respond to this comment with the appropriate level of care I think it deserves
Yeahhhh the music moment is real and has been noted by some other folks as well. My apologies, I hope that it didn't impact your viewing experience too badly
You're completely right that I forgot about mentioning forges lol, thanks for bringing that up! Forges are weird because especially towards the end of the game, I didn't really find that forged weapons would help me secure a ORKO and that both forged and unforged weapons would 2RKO, so I think(?) that's probably why it didn't occur to me? Still though, forges in and of themselves are definitely cool, though as you said, Tome forges especially and also crit forges are extortionate. Lemme just add this to the list of things I should mention in the eventual Radiant Dawn review lol, which is a game that I enjoyed much more
Also good point about Shove and Smite, me when LTC brain goes like "well, everyone knows how good these things are" lmao. There is going to be an eventual video on Rescue, Pair Up and associated mechanics, where I've actually expanded on the role that they play, and it's... possible that I may have forgotten to copy and paste it over here as well :V
Level 21 promotions are weird. On one hand, I like them because it does make sense to not necessarily have a designated item for moving up a rank. But on the other hand.... I don't know. Path of Radiance being as easy as it is makes me less charitable towards it, because it just means the removal of yet another source of strategic decision-making
And yeah, I don't think you'll be surprised to hear that I agree with all of your cons lmao
Hopefully you feel like your comment has been adequately responded to! I really appreciate your continued interest and even in isolation, the effort put into your comment. So thank you :>
@@akirasou Just about everything that could have needed addressing was, so yes. Though I did forget to bring up how much I liked Reyson and the proximity Skills he and others could have for curing status effects.
Often I say that Dancers would benefit from having staves, and that sentiment holds still, but a short range area heal/recovery is pretty neat if you just need a moment to back off and take a breather. I really liked that about him, frail a target he was as a flier. And do I think its broken to have up to 4 units being able to act again, or be set up to bum rush a target or two? Yes... and I would have it all over again in every FE game if I could. :V
@@MrMarket1987 I have to admit, the status effect curing thing I don't especially care for. I also don't think that Stave usage would really matter, since I would rather just have my Dancer dance in nearly every single circumstance I imagine
And yeah, four-way dance is funny. I do like Goddess Dance for that reason
I'd like to play PoR someday (as with all FE games eventually), but it looks a little slow.
And this is coming from someone who finds Gaiden interesting.
Yes, I would call Path of Radiance a bit more than a little slow lol, definitely if/when you do get around to it and your system can handle it, I would recommend speedup
Also Gaiden fun game, if sometimes a bit painful lol
@@akirasou Thanks! I'll take that into consideration!
I just hope Dolphin won't let me down...
@@luthierisbestboy8177 I hope it doesn't let you down eventually as well!!
I love PoR, but it may be strong nostalgia, I had a lot of free time when I was younger playing it and am patient. I think my being bad (especially when I was younger) added to the challenge, also I hoarded all the good weapons and BEXP (and then turbo dumped it all on Elencia late game 😂).
That's completely valid, it's very understandable to love a game for nostalgia reasons, especially if you're more patient than I am lol. I do also respect the Bexp hoard and favouritism dump, acknowledged favouritism is based
played the tellius games 2 years ago and i loved Por world and characters and the gameplay was pretty fun but i do have to agree with it being slow if i ever made a mistake and had to redo a chapter it that i was almost done with very annoying thankfully emulator speed up is a thing i will have to check out your thoughts on FE10 since it seems like you liked that game more and FE10 is probably the fire one of my least liked Fe games tho i will admit its mostly since the dawn brigade are bad and all of mine where getting RNG screwed
Completely valid of you to have had those thoughts on PoR, thanks for sharing your experience! And yeah, I did like RD much more lol. Funnily enough, the Dawn Brigade parts of the game I liked the most, and I wouldn't say that my units were getting particularly blessed or screwed either way. So if you do eventually get around to watching it (which there's no pressure to, btw) I'd be curious what your thoughts on them are in more detail!
Interesting video i can see why someone wouldn't really like it because of the animation speed (which wasn't such a big problem) funnily enough that's something that people would critique Pokemon Platinum too (which i also don't mind). For gameplay i don't mind that its easy would be my answer. I personally prefer a game with an engaging story with well rounded characters and serviceable gameplay. Than a game with basically little to no story or even a bad story but great or even outstanding gameplay (if i had to make a decision). For recommendation well i disagree too. It is a pretty good game for beginner's to get into the series it teaches you well enough the fundamentals of the series and it gives you a a lot of great story moments, and boss battle quotes. As for looking up a plot summary why? Video games are an interactive media why would i look up a damn text devoid of music cutscene and art given to those narrative scenes? A RUclips video isn't a replacement for expiriencing such a game too and if speed is such a problem emulators have a speed up botton. Anyways thank you for your perspective on the matter. (You should also probably adjust the volume of yours background music)
My first playthrough of Path of Radiance is among my favorite moments playing Fire Emblem. The story and cast is one of my favorites. I did a second playthrough on hard mode later, and the game already felt like it had lost its magic at that point. Once I had experienced the story twice, the flaws in became more apparent to me. FE9 is not only the slowest game to play, the unit balance is also systemically bad. The only games I think are more poorly balanced are FE4 and maybe Revelations.
Later, I've tried maniac mode, and found out that it is likely the worst ultimate difficulty in the franchise. Not because it is hard, but because it is extremely tedious. FE12 lunatic is much more difficult, but once you figure out the strategy, it is very quick to execute. FE12 enemies can kill you in 1-3 hits, but also die in 1-3 hits, while FE9 maniac enemies don't deal a lot of damage, but are almost impossible to efficiently defeat.
The above issues make it very unlikely for me to replay FE9, but it still remains a very fond memory.
That makes sense for sure, I think that getting sucked into a world and characters can help smooth over a lot of a game's flaws if they catch you, and I can very much see how Tellius can have that effect on some folks. Radiant Dawn I think might have a worse balanced cast (though well, the structure of that game with the multiple armies kind of necessitates that to some extent), and... yeah, FE4's unit balance is wonky for sure. Rev I couldn't comment on since I'm currently playing it for the first time, but the unit balancing sure does look like it exists
FE12 Luna I also couldn't comment on since I haven't played it yet either, though my understanding of it is that it usually abides by "high Atk, low bulk" on everyone, which would support what you've said. And I do find it obnoxious when it takes several rounds of combat to remove someone from the field. Maybe someday I'll try Maniac FE9 (probably I'll have to be heavily bribed in order to do so) and I'll get back to you on how awful I find it lmao
And I'm glad it remains a fond memory for you! Like I think it's perfectly fine for a game to be fun to play just once, so pop off :>
That tier list looks like an AI just allocated the games at random
The difficulty might not be the hardest one but it is nowhere near as irritating than the intermediate difficulty of Engage.
I guess I have patience as I don't mind at all the enemy phase. In fact I prefer it as it gives more time to think about my next actions or take a break. What I dislike is not seeing the combat forecast.
While I agree that the monks chapter can be tedious like the snow map in Fates this one can be skipped and enemies are more dangerous if you don't. BK is always optional, and if RD was not a thing more people would pass on that. Is there other annoying map besides the Ashnard thing?
That I had to redo the whole map in some challenges because I missed a 90+ hit will stay in my head forever.
Bexp is your choice to bump it into only one unit, this could have been fixed if the level up system from warriors was implemented here, but it can be abuse to make units get specific stats in random growths and superboring if you optimize the amount of exp given per time.
I've beaten an ironman of this game by pure chance of doing one due to no memory card and I can say enemies are somehow weak. They're bulky enough to not get 1 rounded by most of your units if you don't forge weapons nor crit, though.
And, yeah the music was quite loud to hear you and that bit music was uncomfortable.
I will take your word for it on Hard Mode Engage because uh. The only non-Maddening experience I have with that game is like. Draft runs
Yeah, I remember Dani telling me on voice call to turn on the battle animations one time... And that was... real, real dire to realise that the combat forecast isn't there
Pitfall bridge is a pain. The one where Naesala shows up can be a pain. Clash is really annoying... Without A King I used to think was annoying and I do still think it's way bigger than it has to be, but Dani's swayed me on that one after laying out the actual chest items, though that does require well. Knowing the contents of the chests, which is... not something I would expect of someone else
Thanks for watching despite the music issue, and for your comment! I appreciate it a lot :>
@@akirasou
I can see the bridge and Naesala being hard. The bridge you slowed down and that's fine, whatch out for RD's. Naesala I think my issue now is baiting him for the item and BEXP but back when I was doing my first playthrough not being able to proper see the raven's range was a big deal as some of them transform and killed a unit, or get killed at the start costing me a reset for that item. I also remember something like on an Ike solo giving him the boots and walk around Naesala's range. That's for a fun story.
Clash is more a maniac thing. It's pretty empty on hard. It's probably harder than other ones because no one has trained as many units as deployments slots available.
@@ghable23 That's fair. I didn't get the Knight Band and honestly don't care about missing out on things, it really was not being able to see the raven ranges that annoyed me deeply. Also makes sense on Clash, though I still don't like it on Hard because there are a ton of non-threatening enemies. Don't know what I would think about it in Maniac since then there's tons several of more threatening, more bulky enemies, but... I'd be very happy if I never have to play Path of Radiance again I'm ngl
Great video, very well articulated points. I disagree with a lot of what you said (not the slow pace, I totally agree on that), but that’s okay! Hope you like fe10 more, I think that game does some really unique and interesting things that the rest of the franchise has lacked
Thanks for watching, glad you thought I articulated myself well! And yeah, it's totally cool for us to disagree, I'm happy that you feel the same way on that point! Can confirm that I enjoyed FE10 more, there will be an FE10 review out in... probably slightly over a month lol
This reminds me i need to beat yhis game on Japanese lunatic mode of this game if theres an English patch for it.😅
Google says there is: forums.serenesforest.net/index.php?/topic/34809-fe9-maniac-mode-english-patch/
When streaming eventually, I do need to do a sabotage run where one of the sabotage options is me having to play an Ironman of this difficulty setting lol
@@akirasou you will fail, assuming Magnus knows what he's talking about this time
I'm gonna start by saying that PoR is my favourite game out of the whole FRANCHISE (yes you heard me right), yet when i watched your video i didn't feel like disagreeing too much with your complaints and the reason is probably because it's a difference of perspective. Like you said you're a gameplay>story person so all the flaws you pointed out in the gameplay have BIG value on your judgment while they might have much less value for other people (and for me). Personally, like many other people, i love PoR because of the story and character interaction and i kid you not, Path of Radiance is the FE story i got invested in THE MOST out of any FE game and i basically love the whole Tellius cast, the base conversations are an awesome way to give everyone their time to shine, as opposed to most games where all the side characters you recruit appear just for their joining chapter never to be seen again, it made me feel like the cast was actually alive and not some pawns i control for the sake of gameplay, if i would do a Top5 FE characters basically 3 of the slots would be from Tellius lol. As a first timer playing the game all of this left a BIG impact on me and made me fall in love with it, the fact that it is on the easier side i don't mind at all, personally i don't like the idea of getting stuck on maps because of bullshit enemy stats being so high, i'm generally not a fan of the FE "harder" modes and only ever played Engage Maddening because that game gives you so many easy to access resources to deal with stuff. Most of the map gimmicks, aside from the dreaded bridge map i didn't find to be so bad really.
Now... i am recently replaying the game on difficult for the first time and i DO have some complaints to make which is most of the stuff you already said in your video.
The enemy spam is real and it's annoying, especially in the early chapters where you have a fairly limited amount of units to use, more specfically i am talking about chapter 4 and 7, those maps are a SLOG and i will not lie here... i didn't enjoy them, early game might just be the worst part of PoR gameplay in my opinion actually. Second of all the game is of course very slow, without animations off and speed up you take SOOOOO MUUUCH for the enemy phase to end, and the combat animations themselves are pretty awful, however it WAS their first 3D Fe game so i won't judge too harshly on that. I haven't gotten very far into my run so there isn't that much to complain about yet, but after experiencing the game again i can definetly understand and even agree on some of your complaints. Seeing the final ranking still hurt.... a LOT... but it is what it is. I'll be waiting to see your thoughts on FE10, as a side note i'm gonna add that a game i find personally much overrated is FE6, but that's for a whole nother story.
Yo, getting around to responding to this as I said I was like. Five to fifteen minutes ago by the end of me writing this comment response, prolly
That makes perfect sense given your priorities, and thanks also to you for acknowledging mine! I'm glad that the complaints sounded fair enough. For what it's worth, I do really think that the base conversation method of characterisation is a huge boon, and it's supported heavily by the support system meaning that the support conversations can account for certain plot events having definitely happened. Also makes sense re difficulty - I think something that I perhaps didn't make clear enough is that I don't personally mind games being easy, my problem is more games being both easy and slow (hence why FE8, which is easy but not slow, does much better in my view). And of course, that doesn't mean that difficulty has to be a priority for anyone else, yourself included! I do think that the community can get weirdly hung up on the highest difficulty, but like. The only 'right' way to play a game is one that you ultimately enjoy or get something from
It's cool that you're playing it now on Difficult and are having new thoughts on the game! Even if some of that is complaints lol. If your takeaway from it is that you prefer playing on Normal Mode, then that's plenty gleaned. Since you like PoR a lot, can definitely understand how it could hurt someone to see the final ranking, but as you've said, it is what it is, and it doesn't invalidate anyone else's opinion on the game. Hope to see you for the eventual RD review! (Which, spoilers I guess: I did enjoy a lot more)
I love FE9, but mainly for the world, story, and characters. The base and support systems are among the best in the series, but I've got to agree- slogging through maps full of low quality enemies isn't particularly fun.
I've got to say though, 0% growths + emulator speed up brings the gameplay up quite a lot, as the core engine with shoving, rescue, skills, FUNCTIONING WALLS, etc is really nice. You just have to mod the game against its design to bring your own units much more in-line with the enemies (and speed it up) to unlock fun gameplay mode. This isn't really a defense of the game as it is an unintended modification, just pointing out a way to make it more playable and enjoyable for gameplay enthusiasts that might otherwise brush over it. (Final boss gimmick sucks extra hard in 0% though :(
I can definitely see the 0% growths and speedup helping a lot with the gameplay, yeah. So thanks for the recommendation - maybe if I ever find that my laptop can magically now do Dolphin speedup without becoming extremely unhappy and feel like I can face playing PoR again, then I'll give it a go! (But yeah... Ashnard sounds real bad because now you can't even do the standard thing of ignore Ike, then BExp him up at the end... I'm guessing that Ena has to like. Actually do things in 0% lol)
PoR is my favorite Fire Emblem game and one of my favorite games period.
Honestly, I was expecting you to be way harsher on the game given your misery while playing it lol.
My thoughts on FE9 on my recent replay are pretty much the same. It's a game that, even on hard mode, you kinda have to try to lose, and it is so damn slow that it feels glitched. Slow and Easy are a very bad combination, just ask Pokemon Scarlet and Violet. It doesn't help that this game is far longer than that one.
The story is pretty good though. Due to the limited cast of characters and very small support list, they really were able to make sure that every character feels unique and has moments to shine (if they aren't Makalov). The main story also feels like an elevated version of the typical FE plot, Ike is a very interesting main character, the politics of Tellius that continue into Radiant Dawn are strangely nuanced for FE and go deeper than "who is allies with who", which I really enjoyed. It also has the coolest legendary weapon in the series, Ragnell, simply because you still have to earn it, but you actually get to use it for more than one map.
But yeah, neat review. Can't wait for the FE9 LTC.
Lol and here I thought that I was already being harsh: I wrote the vast majority of the script on the night I completed the game
And yeah, slow and easy is the killer for me, which after reading some of the comments here, I think is the duo that makes me dislike FE7 and FE9 as much as I do, whereas FE8 gets a pass since it's easy, but isn't slow like FE9 or as long as FE7 is
The story is... my thoughts have shifted. Yeah, I agree that Path of Radiance's plot is more elevated than the standard FE plot for sure. And I do vaguely find the politics of Tellius interesting. Still, I don't really find the plot as a whole interesting, which may be because I never particularly cared for Ike especially. I say shifted because I think now my playthrough of Radiant Dawn, where the plot really goes in on the Ike love towards the end, has probably biased me against him since now he's taken up screentime that characters I find more interesting could have had instead. But that's a whole other topic
Glad that you enjoyed the review! And lmfao you couldn't make me LTC this game at gunpoint. Already I do the more degenerate form of superrig for an engine that you can actually easily edit things on and it's feasibly to RN burn on, do you really think that I'm going to LTC the largely unhacked game?
FE7-10 are my favorites, with FE8 being the lowest of those 4. We must like Fire Emblem games for different reasons lol.
A lot of your points don't matter to a casual first play through. There are a lot of aspects of the game that are much more engaging than Sacred Stones and Shadow Dragon. I completely disagree with you that someone new to FE shouldn't play this game. On the contrary, with it's tutorial too it's good for someone who wants to play however they want without any experience playing FE.
I will agree with you that the game is too slow. On the point of the duel later in the game, I imagine most players would use Ike enough that he would not have much trouble.
I couldn't comment on Shadow Dragon due to not even started playing it, but that's fair. I definitely think I left it too late on the list of mainline games to play, what with having played all of Gaiden, FE3 and FE4 first. And though I personally consider this playthrough of PoR to have been 'casual' as I wasn't trying to optimise any particular metric, it's probably true that I approach FE games I'm playing for the first time differently from a 'more casual' player, whatever that means
I agree that if you were to play it at any point, it would be ideal to play it early on rather than later. So like, fine to good (maybe even great) as one of the first few FE games someone plays, but probably worse the longer you leave it, if we combine both of our thought processes?
Re the duel point, my Ike was max Str and Spd at that point and we got Nasir called in on us due to exceeding the alloted turncount. Admittedly this was due to Ike not getting several Wrath crits (if he'd gotten one more, BK woulda fallen), which is overall unlucky, but I maintain that it's still bad game design
Still, thanks for sharing your thoughts! I appreciate it a lot :>
@@akirasou I actually think it's cool that the fight can go differently in different playthroughs. I get that maybe you were just being contrary when you said you don't recommend the game to anyone. Personally, I enjoyed the new classes in the game including the Laguz when I first played the game. The new weapons were interesting not in FE7 or 8. I also liked the effectiveness of magic against different units, beasts, flying and dragons. I understand those aspects of the game can be missed because admittedly using Titania and Oscar is probably the most effective strategy to beat the game. I didn't use the forge system either.
I played the game around the time New Mystery and Awakening came out. It was one of the first FE games I completed.
@@anus693 Yeah, I think the Laguz are cool, though that's mostly because I like dancing, and because I really like Smite. Mordy legit came to every single map after his join just so he could Smite people places lel
The effectiveness of magic against different unit types is something that I could find interesting... in another game. Double effectiveness I personally find to be deeply unthreatening, and even in Radiant Dawn, I didn't find magical enemies to be threatening. Beyond the Tellius context and speaking from an optimisation perspective, mainline Mages are typically the easiest enemy type to reach ORKO thresholds on, though it is true that hacks have done interesting things to make magical enemies actually a concern. But that's an entirely different topic that I may eventually make a video on
I agree with everything, but I think that the gameplay is not the best I played it a lot of times but I never felt it that boring, maybe because I use to get into the game playing with animations, and all my mind into the game. And you did not mentioned the story and music, which I think, is the best of the game
That makes sense. The story I did mention, albeit not much because it's not a high priority to me and though it's old, I do have reservations about the baby's first racism moment, and well... every Fire Emblem game has good music, so I'm not going to praise Path of Radiance for having good music. It is true though that the music is probably the best part of the game
*Lebowski voice* Well that's just, like, your opinion man.
Seriously though, I've never understood some peoples' need for Fire Emblem to be fast. I could see it for subsequent playthroughs where you're trying to experiment with things, but the first one? It's like demanding that the devs strip everything down to spreadsheet interactions--the animations are where the impact and the drama live!
I can see being annoyed at Bexp being too plentiful, but that never bothered me; it's certainly no worse than allowing unlimited grinding. Bexp is just a Tower of Valni that respects your time.
For what it's worth, I am a very easily bored person. Typically I turn off animations even on a new Fire Emblem game or hack that I've not played before at around four chapters in maximum. And that's for FE games where I like the animations, like Engage or the GBAFEs. I don't like the Path of Radiance animations, combat/utility ones or map ones, and even having played Radiant Dawn without any animations at all, the Enemy Phases still are incredibly long sometimes. Don't get me wrong, I can enjoy FE games that aren't fast, like Engage or the Fates games where the playthroughs can get L O N G, but the combination of easy and slow is a death knell for me
The Tower of Valni is a weird one. It's a feature that I don't typically use, but that I do have some thoughts on, so maybe I'll have to make a video on it sometime. Eventually. After many other things lol
You know what game is even more overrated than this one? Three Houses!
Well, joking a bit aside, and no offense to the people that like these too, I think this a pretty decent video. While I may disagree a bit at some of the things you said, like some of the mechanics of some chapters, or the Black Knight battle, since while it's luck based if you even get to beat him, at the very least it's not mandatory, overall I agree with some of the other points you said (or at least at first, since I haven't played this game yet), like the game being pretty easy but slow (normally I am a patient person, so the game being slow may not bother me too much, since I can also do other thing meanwhile, but I feel as if I've become less patient this year, but not a lot, so there's that), or some of the mechanics being not well refined or a bit broken, so there's that. At least the good points of this game would be the music, and the way the story and its characters unfold. So while this was a more caustic criticism of FE9, I don't think this was a very harsh review, much less a bad one (maybe it helps that I didn't get to play this when I was younger, so I don't feel too much love towards it), so I did like it at least.
Thanks for watching, and I'm glad that you enjoyed and thought it was a fair enough review!
Yeah, I definitely think that the fact you can run away from the Burger King fight is the sole redeeming thing about it. I also agree that the character moments in Path of Radiance are cool, and I do also like some of the music, though uh. Neither are particularly high priorities for me, with me not even mentioning the music lol
I mean..
@@noble8696 was meinst du? (Idk why I suddenly decided to use German, I don’t speak it)
Pretty reasonable takes for the most part but watching a plot video or playthrough is definitely nowhere close to a good replacement for playing PoR for the plot, especially considering how seriously the game takes itself when it comes to gameplay plot coherence.
That's fair, definitely it's going to be different from experiencing it yourself. While I don't always agree with the gameplay/plot coherence thing (the Laguz by and large are not good combat units, for instance), it's true that the gameplay does generally try to take the plot seriously
I dunno, it's not that I regret playing Path of Radiance since now I can have an actual opinion on it. Still, as someone who didn't like the gameplay or feel any attachment to the characters for the most part, I would have preferred to have not played the game and just have gotten a plot summary or read the entire script in far less time. Would have even helped with the characterisation part probably since that would include reading all supports and base conversations, including for the units I killed/let die
Though I enjoyed the story a lot, I have to agree with all the gameplay gripes. Enemy phases are already infamously long - for good reason. And many map gimmicks are just annoying, not interesting, but nobody rags on the damn rock level or the bridge potholes like they do with revelations cuz they love the story. I've enjoyed radiant dawn's maps much more for certain, even if it has new and different issues. And too many yellow units. Way too many yellow units. No turn of combat should have *four* phases.
I had a decent time with Path of Radiance, but I'm certainly not coming back to it anytime soon.
The eat rock map... so bad, why is it rout?! But yeah I completely agree, four phases per turn is one too many for sure... and in Tellius, honestly sometimes even just two feels like a colossal pain I'm ngl
And yeah, completely understandable! Glad to hear that my gameplay gripes sounded reasonable to you, and I hope that you enjoyed the review :>
At least we can all agree that "Fire Emblem Echoes: Legacy of the Crusaders" will be amazing!!!
Yeah, and it most definitely won't take 10 billion years to come out either!!!
bro that background music ITS TO F LOUD
Fe 10 is still peak fire emblem for me with fe 9 bring the prototype for it. The only fe games I haven't played are the original gaiden, genealogy, and thracia. I understand they're deeply flawed games, but they're still my favorite fire emblem experience so far
That's completely valid! Having now played Radiant Dawn and having enjoyed it much more overall than I did Path of Radiance, it's definitely true that Radiant Dawn couldn't exist without the prequel
And neat! Do you think that you'll ever get around to them? Of those games, I've completed playthroughs of Gaiden and Genealogy, and it sounds like you've played a few games that I haven't in the forms of FEs 1, 11 and 12 (a lot of Archanea...) and then Rev as well
Being someone who absolutely adores Path of Radiance, a lot of your complaints are pretty valid admittedly. Although, looking at your FE game tier list, I highly disagree with a lot of it.
For reference, my favorite Fire Emblem games not counting PoR consists of FE4, Radiant Dawn, Awakening, Shadows of Valentina and Three Houses if that tells you anything.
Fair enough! I'm... not entirely sure what that says, but my first guess would be story/story presentation valued highly?
@@akirasouYeah pretty much. That's not to say that I don't enjoy the gameplay loop of Fire Emblem or anything but a big part of my enjoyment with Fire Emblem (as well as a ton of other games) stems from raising the characters that I like (both from the story and the in-between map interactions) and working my way around that.
@@hylianfelldragon1308 gotcha, gotcha, if that's what you value, that makes sense!
PoR was my first FE game and still is one of my favourites, but I have to agree that the gameplay is a slog. It's hard to go back to when Radiant Dawn exists.
On the topic of cringe map gimmicks, the game shoves siege tomes and ballista down your throat from chapter 18 and onwards and it sucks. It doesn't make the game fun, it's tedious, and I dread it every time I replay. Great video, the audio mixing didn't bother me much :D
Thanks for watching, and for sharing your thoughts! It's cool that a bunch of folks who do like PoR think that my points are fair, and I do agree that Radiant Dawn is a substantial improvement in gameplay personally
Siege tomes and ballistae are interesting, because I think I just... kind of got to ignore their existence a lot of the time thanks to having the Full Guard on a flier (usually super Marcia, who I did later give Saviour to so that she could ferry Ike where needed) for the majority of the game. Still, definitely would have been much more annoying if I didn't take that approach, so I feel you. From my understanding, there are a metric ton of siege tomes in Japanese Maniac Mode, and that they're. Insufferable lmaoooooooo
Yeah you're right they're not that big of an issue on Hard and you have plenty of ways to deal with them. But Maniac mode scarred me man, there's just too many and they hit too hard 😂
@@BaselardFE gahhhhhhhhhh I'm not looking forward to when someone somehow manages to convince me to play Maniac PoR and I get to experience it for myself...
I went into this video with a lot of skepticism given the ostensibly clickbaity title, that being said I found your video largely fair, even if I don't really don't agree with you.
For starters, I understand that you admitted to being a gameplay first type of person, which is fine, but even with this in mind I think you severely undersell the story and writing. I'm not going to get into a thesis about what makes the story and characters good because I don't think you need an essay long supposition clogging up your comments, but I think just describing it as "pretty alright", again, sells it very short and gets to the heart of why people like the game so much and more than likely why you find it "overrated" in contrast. For me, a good story creates a stronger emotional connection than good gameplay does and I'm willing to bet a lot of people that rank this game highly feel the same. With that in mind, I think it's fair to say that those types of players are going to be more willing to put up with either middling or sub-par gameplay given that emotional connection. Tales of Berseria for example I think has one of the weaker battle systems in that series, but has some of the best writing, so even though I *should* from a more unbias perspective rank the game lower, I would still consider it one of my favorite Tales games. Conversely, Tales of Arise has far better combat than Berseria, yet I found myself not nearly as invested in the game due to the comparatively far weaker writing. I can't speak for anyone but myself, but I think it's fair to say that a lot of this game's fans likely feel similarly. Also to be clear, this isn't to say that I don't care about gameplay, some of my favorite games are ones I enjoy purely from a mechanical perspective, it's just that I don't need a game to be fun to play for me to consider it a favorite.
I think it's also important to note that this was for many, myself included, their first game in the series. That might not mean much to some, but for a lot of people, that can carry a lot of weight, sometimes too much I feel. Using Tales as an example again, many people started the series with Tales of Symphonia and even though, I personally feel there are better games in the series, it still gets cited as the best and it largely has to do with their nostalgia and it being their first entry, I think many FE fans who started with PoR are in a similar boat. I think it's also important to mention that while this wasn't an issue for me since I grew up with all three consoles at the time, there are many people who only had a GameCube, a console with extremely slim pickings when it came to RPGs. The only ones I can think of at the top of my head outside of PoR would be Paper Mario 2, Tales of Symphonia, Baten Kaitos and Skies of Arcadia. With this in mind, players who grew up as RPG fans that only owned a GameCube, more than likely forged a stronger connection with the very few titles at their disposal, which again increased their reverence for PoR, especially since as far as I know at least, it's the only grid based strategy game on the console.
Sorry for the long read but I think I'll end the comment here, I hope this gave you a different perspective on the strong feelings people have towards this game. I'm not a hardcore FE fan,, in fact I've only beaten PoR and Awakening(which I didn't like as much because of the weak story) but coming at this game as a fan of RPGs in general, I think it's a great game and I can't say any of your complaints resonated with me during my playthroughs, but then again I think we just have different approaches.
Hello! Thanks for sharing your thoughts, and my apologies for taking a second to respond to your comment. But I will do so now
Yeah, definitely the title and thumbnail were a bit clickbaity lol. I did want for it to be clear that I don't like the game, not least because it does seem like a lot of hardcore FE fans and FE specific content creators really love it, but I can completely understand coming into the video with skepticism
That makes sense, and a couple of other commenters have also said that they think I undersell the story and characters. To be honest, even if I do think about the plot proper, I don't really get why people like the story as I have several gripes with Path of Radiance's plot and also that of the sequel, Radiant Dawn, and I also didn't feel anything for any of the Path of Radiance characters. Leading onto your next point, it's also true that I don't have any nostalgia both for Path of Radiance (or any Fire Emblem game, really) or for the Gamecube. Even for the games that I am nostalgic for (some DS and 3DS games), my personal stance on them defaults to "I liked it as a kid, but..." Regardless, it's totally fair for people to like games for story/characterisation and nostalgia reasons, though I don't understand it myself in the specific or general case
And no need to apologise for the long comment, I did ask people for their thoughts after all, so I appreciate it! It does definitely seem like we have different approaches because I still can't do anything more than intellectually understand your points, but that's totally cool! We can agree to disagree :>
@@akirasou The main point of my comment was to try and help give you a better understanding of where people that enjoy this game are coming from. This game has a lot of fans for reasons I think are different than most other FE games and I think that manifests itself in it getting what is arguably a disproportionate amount of praise. I just tried the best I can to provide multiple different perspectives to help you understand where the praise is coming from.
Much of the criticism seems to come from the fact that the game has several mechanics that make it much easier than other FE games. It's fine if you don't enjoy that, but to say a game is overrated or to say you wouldn't recommend it to anyone because of that doesn't really make sense. I know it's difficult for some people to understand, but a lot of people actually like it when games aren't as difficult or don't pose as much of a challenge. A game being easier or giving you more ways to do better at it with less work isn't inherently a bad thing.
As for the "slow" animations... it's always fascinated me that people who play turn based games, which by their nature present a slower game play experience, seem to be the most impatient when it comes to the gameplay. I'm not saying you have to like it, but it just confuses me given the fact that I like turn based games specifically because they provides a slower, more methodical experience.
I did say I would respond to non-trolly comments, so while it's taken me a while to get around to it for various reasons, here I am
That's true, and I was being a bit hyperbolic on the recommendation point. Part of that is that in terms of publicly expressed opinions, I couldn't find any made that were largely negative, so I wanted any review I made to be markedly down on it. Probably overcorrected a bit. If I were pressed to recommend it to someone, it would be as someone's first or second FE game probably, since then the difficulty point doesn't matter and you don't have a reference point for how snappy other games in the series can be
Re the difficulty thing, I don't especially mind games just being easy, otherwise I wouldn't rate FE8 as highly as I do. It's when it's the combination of easy and slow that I can't stand it, because then despite it being a game such that coming up with various challenge runs would be easy because they're probably doable, it's just a pain to sit out
Which brings me onto the speed point. I like turn-based games for approaching them in a methodical way... but that doesn't mean that I want everything that happens after I make my decisions to take forever to happen. I dunno, if something's going to take me forever anyway, I'd like it to at least present some element of challenge, or I'm just there watching the thing happen for much longer than it took me to make my moves
TL;DR: I agree I was overly harsh and don't think PoR being easy on its own is a problem, but find the slowness inexcusable and don't see the contradiction between speed and turn-based gameplay
i think smt nocturne and digital devil saga were literally the only jarpigs at that time with combat that wasn't slow as black tar. this and dragon quest 8 were the worst offenders.
also it's dishonest that you neglected to mention that por has one of the best osts in the series, which makes the slow speed tolerable
Interesting... I haven't played any of those other games, but I've heard good things about the gameplay of both Nocturne and DDS, so I may eventually get around to giving them a shot. Maybe. Turns out that if you run a FETuber channel, then Fire Emblem eats up a lot of your time lol
Definitely some of the Path of Radiance tracks are good, but... Fire Emblem is a series that has good music. As a result, I don't personally think that it's worth pointing out that it has good music, because all of the games do, so it doesn't make the slow gameplay any more tolerable for me. Can include a music mention in the eventual Radiant Dawn review though lol
As much as I love PoR, I can recognize that the gameplay is objectively bad. When I’m playing PoR, I typically spend most of my time watching a podcast/fire emblem play-through on the side, since the game rarely requires thought. Despite, or perhaps because of that, I have played through PoR around 5 times and mostly enjoyed my time with it.
That makes perfect sense! I mostly played through Path of Radiance on voice call with friends, and it definitely made it a lot... "less painful" is probably the best way of putting it, and I still found it pretty painful lol
I played fe9 3 years ago and the story was not impressed me at all. In fact i already forgotten the story in PoR. On the other hand i can remember conquest story despite i played it like 4 years ago because it was so dumb but hillarious 😂. From what i remembered the gameplay of PoR was kinda easy like fe8 but it was so slow. It was different with fe8 while easy but it was so quick and comfy to play. Being able to play it with my potato phone also plus point for fe8 since i am more a portable gamer. Fe9 does have very good character design. I think this is the only fe where many male character designs looks hot and more mature (for example tibran, naesala, haar). I tried radiant dawn but could not bring myself to finish it. I got bored for the couple first chapters.
Yeah, I think that's what makes the difference for me between FE8 and FE9: both are easy, but only one of them is both easy AND slow. And yeah, I feel that, what with Dolphin being so unhappy on my laptop and all... I also wasn't that big of a fan of FE9's plot, I do find that out and out bad plots like Conquest generally stick with me more, so I'm glad I'm not the only one!
Interesting that you feel that way about Radiant Dawn, because I vastly preferred it to Path of Radiance. And in fact, I found the early parts of Radiant Dawn to be my favourite part of it lol
@@akirasou i do still want to give a chance for radiant dawn but i think i want to replay PoR once again before playing RD since i forgot most of the PoR story.
Anyway please play FE 11 and 12 they are ugly looking FE but have nice simple gameplay. The take on reclassing system also interesting as you may often to change classes depend on the map. The infamous lunatic reverse fe12 is game changer. It sounds like unfair mode but in fact it is more fair than awakening lunatic+.
@@renren5660 that makes sense, yep. Though uh... I do think that it's not worth replaying for the story if you don't like the gameplay still lol
And cool, thanks for sharing your thoughts on the DSFEs! I do need to get around to playing them, and it will happen eventually :D
Path of Radiance is definitely one of the easiest games in the series. I just did my second plsythrough recently, going from Easy to Hard AND doing a limited unit Draft run at the same time, and it was very doable. Honestly this game is way more fun when you impose challenges than playing it straight, I cant imagine playing this game and using all the best units 24/7. Id get so bored
Thanks for watching! Yeah, I can see this game being more enjoyable when you self-impose challenges, I think similarly to how FE8 really opens itself up to challenge runs. Mind... I'm much more prone to doing FE8 challenge runs, since while it's easy, it's not the lethal combination of easy AND slow
music at 3:33 is perhaps the worst thing i’ve ever heard
Everything in the vid is valid, POR is pretty good for newcomers due to the low difficulty - personally its a great game to try out playing with permadeath too. Rather than a Skip button I would prefer a Speed Up option like they do nowadays.
I gotta say tho that the music you include is often louder than your voice (and sometimes a bit hard to listen too, personally - like the one at the interesting mechanic section). Which was a bit irritating while watching.
I do wish you a great time with RD, it is definitly a unique experience compared to POR and the rest of the series.
Thanks for watching and for sharing your thoughts! PoR does seem like a pretty aight first Ironman, since BExp means that if someone important does happen to die, you can always just take someone off the bench and bring em back up to speed. After having played Radiant Dawn, I definitely think that the No Map animations thing is great, so if you could have that and also probably a speedup button for PoR, it does at least help my issue with it being slow. Which, given that I don't like games being the combination of slow and easy, would probably bring it up in my estimation
(And you're completely right about the music, I hope it didn't impact your viewing experience too badly)
And thanks! As mentioned previously, I have finished playing it, and I did enjoy it a lot more than I did PoR. So if you're interested, hope to see your thoughts on the eventual RD review vid!!
i am extremely fond of The Tellius Duology, but almost everything i like about it is due to the character writing and story, and FE9's writing is only good because FE10 subverts the happy ending and tells the player "No, you don't get an easy happy ending, you don't solve sweeping systemic issues by killing one bad guy and calling it a day"
Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
I definitely agree that FE9's story is made retroactively more interesting due to FE10 actually exploring the impacts of the game's events. Not to say that I like everything about the plot and details of either game (I don't), but it's undeniably a more deep worldbuilding and storytelling moment compared to like. What FE7 is to FE6, which is, in my opinion, a game that actively hurts Elibe's lore. By comparison, I would say that FE10 does actually build upon FE9's storytelling concepts, even if I don't love everything it's building off of, if that makes sense?
@@akirasou fe10 is a story that gets better with repeat playthrus. it's a bit of a mess and that is most apparent on the first playthru, and it was only when i replayed it as an adult with a more holistic understanding of political theory that i saw how often FE10 stuck it's landing thematically.
@@DarkSoulsSauron makes sense, I can definitely buy that there are additional things that folks tend to only realise on repeat playthroughs. And I do know that RD has a few things locked behind repeat playthroughs and clear data save files... I'll have to search it all up sometime, thanks for reminding me of its existence!
The background music is quite loud! Good video, though!
Thanks for pointing this out! Will lower the background music volume in future videos
Great review, and I agree with pretty much everything. The gameplay is just soooo bland and going through most maps is a slog
I'm glad that you enjoyed the review, and also to hear that I'm not alone lol. I've now had some folks in my own community Discord and such say that they agree with me, but right when I started writing this script, there really didn't seem to be that many negative modern opinions on the game, so it's reassuring to hear
I think I said enough about PoR on your server so commenting for engagement
Thank you for your algorithm boosting comment!!
Path of Radiance is the Mega Man 5 of Fire Emblem. Did good things for the series, but is just way too easy
On one hand, I would be curious if my opinion on this game would improve if I were to play Japanese Maniac. But on the other hand, I don't think I can sit through all of those Enemy Phases again
For me personally, it's not as good as FE12, 7 and especially 5, but still a fantastic game.
I can't comment on 12, having not played it at all. 5 I'm playing on stream currently, and I'm starting to understand why people like it. And then 7 I don't personally like
That being said, if you like this game, fair enough and more power to you. I may not understand, but that's fine, we can have conflicting opinions :>
I think my only point of disagreement is the weight you put on storytelling for recommending the game; I do absolutely think the story is the game’s primary selling point, with imo the most interesting cast, a protagonist that feels genuine and reacts like a human would in the face of insane exposition dumps (vs watching seth talk at Eirika for half of FE8, as an example), and a world that is genuinely interesting.
All your notes about the gameplay are 100% valid tho, the black knight fight is so badly designed its almost insulting
All that is to say; I think PoR appeals to a cohort pf people that dont necessarily enjoy standard fe gameplay but who appreciate it’s world, storytelling, and protagonist.
That makes sense. As I said, I'm very much not a story person for a game I play for gameplay, not least because I do have some gripes with the plots of both the Tellius games overall. I will admit though that having only played both games once apiece, there are definitely going to be blind spots that I don't know about the cast due to the support limit etc, whereas I know more about Three Houses and even Engage characters due to how those support systems work
And that's completely fair, yeah. I think you're right that I undersold it slightly for people who play games primarily for plot, setting etc, since I personally would rather just watch or even read the full story script rather than be the one actually pressing the A button. So thanks for sharing your thoughts, I appreciate it!
@@akirasou I think you have every right to take some issues with the plot, even us tellius fans can't defend the blood contract, but going from the tellius games to Revelation and Engage is just, depressing in terms of story quality.
@@relloz6 I'm not gonna lie, I don't actually have any issues with the Blood Contract, but that's something to mention in the FE10 review, which I clearly should say something about the plot in. Rev... I haven't actually played Rev yet and don't know the plot, but it seems like people are voting for me to play it on stream next, so we'll find out whether I agree with you on that front shortly lmao
@@akirasou I'mma try to catch those streams so I can see the insanity that is rev's attempt at storytelling, we'll see if timezones allow me.
try maniac fe9 first, fe9 is one of the best games in the series, good story, good gameplay and good cast
I have been told conflicting things about FE9 Maniac. Some folks have said that it's fun, other folks have called it insufferable... Probably at some point, I'll end up playing it on stream for some self-flagellating purpose or another, so I guess we'll eventually have to see
@@akirasou its fun, only the clash chapter is hard. Playing fe9 maniac ironman is rly amazing tbh
@@matiastorres2553 huh... well, I may end up trying that at some point (time unknown, probably a ways off), so we'll see
Yeah, PoR isn't that great. Hard Mode is a joke. Maniac Mode is terrible, and I mean like real terrible, it's just watching a swarm of 50 hand axe/javelins enemies try to hit you over and over again. Lategame is truly awful. It's just boring to play. Nothing more fun than watching enemy phase go over 10 minutes of enemies trying to hit you with hand axes and canto.
RD is a lot better in this aspect
Oh... yeah, that doesn't sound fun. I do feel like as an FEtuber, I should eventually give Maniac PoR a go, but I think that me playing it will have to be a stream incentive or something because I don't think I could play it unless forced to...
I agree on RD being a lot better, so I'm a lot more positive in my review thereof. Cool game that I should replay at some point for various run ideas
I recently played this game. Like you, I was rather disappointed after the praise I’ve heard for the game. I also played on “Hard” and found it way too easy. I like the idea of bexp but in practice it just made the difference between my units and the enemy’s worse. And then after some really trivial maps I struggled (and not in a fun way) with the final boss because I was playing semi-blind and didn’t give Ike Wrath and Resolve. It was basically just praying for Aether to proc while my other units were standing by. The story was alright but not worth the hype. I loved the base though. It would be amazing if we could return to that, but sadly I don’t think that’ll happen. Thanks for making this video. I’m glad I’m not the only one who has this sort of an experience.
Yeah, I agree with everything you've said, and I do wonder if both of us would have been less negative on the game if it weren't as beloved by the western Fire Emblem fanbase as it is. If it makes you feel any better, despite the fact that I did give Ike both Wrath and Resolve, since I boxed the final boss in not realising that there was a second phase, I inadvertently made the map way harder for myself since I couldn't get Ike to below half HP and also have him not die to Ashnard on Enemy Phase... so... that happened
And yeah, that was the idea behind making it, so I'm glad to have reaffirmed your own experience! You're definitely not alone :>
Por is good because Ike is pwnage incarnate
Real! After all, as we all know:
"Better stats + Regal Sword + Ragnell + only unit able to seize + only unit that can't die = pwnage incarnate"
You want me to spoil radiant dawn :) i know it fully 😂
As you now know, there is nothing for me to be spoiled on!
@@akirasou correct 😆
Poor sun but pog video
Glad that you enjoyed the video!!
This is an FE take I was not expecting.
Im open.
We stan being open to FE takes! For real though, hopefully you enjoyed the vid :>
thats so interesting how people have such different taste, because I see engage is rankest as your highest. For me engage would be at the bottom, but for me characters and story are really important, so it comes to a matter of flavor more.
That makes sense, yeah. It's all about what people can forgive in a video game, really
😢😢😢😢
I've softened a tiny bit on Path of Radiance since then, but regardless... your approval of Path of Radiance is valid