Released in Japan on August 7, the DS remake of the original Famicom strategy title, Fire Emblem, is coming stateside in 2009. A largely localized version was on-hand at Nintendo's Fall Media Summit – and turned out to be one of the most-played games of the event.
What Joystiq found was expected: pure and simple strategy-RPG combat. They were most intrigued by things that they couldn't try out, namely the Wi-Fi play – a first for the series – and the online shop. Nevertheless, they ventured through the game's prologue and found an appreciation for the characterization and development of individual units.
BLG writes: "The Fire Emblem games are a storied part of Nintendo’s history. Debuting only in Japan in 1990, it gave the first Nintendo consoles an enjoyable fantasy RPG-strategy experience. With 2003’s Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade, the series made its debut in North America (Europe and Australia got a 2004 release). Since then, the franchise has been a mainstay on every Nintendo system."
I still own Fire Emblem POF and RD. Those entries are uber pricey now. I wish they would bring back the transforming units from those games. Radiant Dawn was pretty hard too but at least you could save before each turn. Saved me the trouble of having to redo many a map due to unlucky enemy crits. lol
Thracia 776, Heroes and Warriors are all awful. I ignore them when discussing Fire Emblem altogether
Top 5:
1. Awakening
2. Three Houses
3. Blazing Blade
4. Sacred Stones
5. Path of Radiance.
I've played most of the others, but they didn't really hook me.
Stay away from Shadows of Valencia and the DS remakes.
Alex S. from Link-Cable writes: "...as we get ready to embark on the next journey with Fire Emblem: Three Houses we thought it would be a good idea to look back at the games that helped shape the series into what it is today, at least as far as the west is concerned."
There are a lot of animal-people in the Fire Emblem series! These are different races who transform into actual animals in battle, while occasionally maintaining some of these features while in their humanoid forms. Hearing about laguz or taguel can be confusing, especially since these races are not universal and may only be present in a few select entries.
