Fire Emblem Engage review: turn-based tactics in their purest form

Through all of its iterations, the Fire Emblem series has always been about finding your people: the ones you trust, the ones you worry about, and the ones you just can’t seem to help, though that doesn’t stop you from trying. This is Feuer Emblem EngagementIntelligent Systems, a developer of software solutions has made this process central. Nearly everything that is ancillary can be found in piles on the cutting-room floor.

Structurally,Engage Fire Emblem It plays like an adventure story. You play the role of Alear the protagonist. Along the route, you will encounter demons, bandits, evildoers, and fight them in turn-based combat. After each encounter, you will return to the Somniel (a floating castle that serves as your base of operations), to purchase supplies and train your troops. You also have the opportunity to upgrade your weapons and build up their interpersonal connections, all in the interest of your cause.

Said cause? Collecting 12 powerful “Emblem” rings to power up a Good dragon, so as to take down a Bad dragon. That’s the plot in a nutshell, and honestly, a nutshell is all this plot is worth. It’s laced with tropes that range from harmless (the protagonist has been asleep for 1,000 years but wakes up to combat a great evil) to exhausting (the camera introduces many female characters by panning slowly from their feet up to their cleavage). The dialogue is a mix of camp and cheese and never commits with confidence. Your army venerates the protagonist. This manifests itself in an ethereal, condescending dialogue at each turn. A scripting perspective, Get involved’s story is nothing short of terrible.

Image: Intelligent Systems/Nintendo

However, I can’t help but adore Get involved’s commitment to brevity. Almost half of the total cutscenes — I am not exaggerating — go something like this:

1. Alear, his teammates and others approach a place to find an Emblem rings
2. One character comments how safe it seems.
3. Another character shouts, “Oh no, are those Bandits?”
4. This is the end of the cutscene. A battle commences.

2019’s Three Houses, one of the series’ best outings (my top spot goes to Awakening 3DS) used social simulation brilliantly in an academic setting. This allowed you to instruct, console, analyze, criticize and then shape a very small number of students through two periods. I’ve written at length about the ways in which Get involved departs from its predecessor, so I won’t dwell on those comparisons here. Let me just say that Get involved is not pulling from the relationship-simulation school of RPGs, with its complex interpersonal story arcs and calendar-focused loop. It’s as laser-focused of a tactics game as I’ve played in years, one in which characterization and drama emerge chiefly from the turn-based battles themselves.

Some of these battles play out on prairies veined with rivers and bridges, which become crucial chokepoints for your heavily armored units — forcing you to make tough choices, in severe cases, about who lives or dies. Others unfurl on the coast, where high tide can hinder units’ Movement and Evasion stats every few turns until the water recedes. Get involvedAdditional battles are also rewarded. If you partake in many “skirmishes” — rotating battles that pop up on previously completed nodes that grant you gold, items, and useful experience for your greenhorn units — these landscapes can get repetitive.

Image: Intelligent Systems/Nintendo

There are many other factors that make grind-oriented fighting compelling. The series’ “rock-paper-scissors” weapon triangle is back after Three Houses It was omitted. The list of character classes that could be created, such as support monks and poison-wielding agents, is endless. wolf ridersThe list is sufficient for many playthroughs.

Get involved’s ring system adds another layer of strategy. By equipping one of the 12 Emblem rings Alear is seeking, a character can borrow the abilities of the ring’s corresponding hero. These heroes comprise a who’s who of Fire Emblem mainstays: “engaging” Marth’s ring amplifies a character’s sword skills and temporarily unlocks a seven-step strike; activating Ike’s ring grants an area-of-effect earthquake attack that bails out surrounded fighters. Many a tough fight can be won by activating Emblem rings.

Bond rings are another option that can boost the stats for their owner. You can spend a designated currency, but you cannot use real money. Get involvedYou will receive Bond rings at the Somniel with random grades and stats. Combining multiple rings of the same type and grade can boost their rank.

Image: Intelligent Systems/Nintendo

The result is an elegant, if initially overwhelming, system in which you can alter your army’s strengths and weaknesses in a matter of minutes. Because the majority of a character’s abilities are “inherited” from Emblem rings, you can teach any unit any ability, so long as they’ve developed the necessary bond with the corresponding Emblem hero. A Somniel can show a mage how the ax works, how to cast fireballs, how to summon a blockive pillar, or how to ride a wolf. All this in one trip. It’s one of the most flexible progression systems the series has ever implemented. This system changes the composition of my army enough to surprise me even in repetitive skirmishes.

I was caught off guard by a retread about 10 hours into my 40 hour playthrough. The encounter took place in a village on the coast, where market stalls were set up and trash was piled up between the thatched houses. The first encounter I had on the map consisted of a series incremental movements. My frontline strategically destroyed all the debris in order to channel enemies through the makeshift chokepoints. In the end it was a meticulous battle. To hold my line, I relied heavily upon Jade, Louis and Bunet who were horsemen with axes.

Hubris followed me when I returned. My team consisted of soldiers with low levels, who were confident that they would use the same strategy as I used to take down the village. However, this time the enemy had nearly 12 units operating over the ocean. They moved quickly to our side, riding wyverns. By activating Lyn’s Emblem ring, Fogado rained down magical arrows on the flock before they could wreak havoc on my back line. The site that was once the scene for offensive maneuvers had been transformed into an amphibious defense. It was quite thrilling and made me feel more connected to both the soldiers who guarded them and those who helped them weather the storm.

Image: Intelligent Systems/Nintendo

This is exactly why I love tactics games. They’re uniquely suited for a sort of self-told, emergent story. Louis didn’t become my favorite character because Intelligent Systems expounded, ad nauseam, about his backstory in a 10-minute cutscene. I made him my favorite character by marching in front of my swordmasters and mages, breaking many breaches. I didn’t grow protective of Framme because the script told me to be — I kept her safe because, fragile as she was in the early hours, she grew into an adept medic who could just as easily heal Louis as she could roundhouse kick an enemy into the afterlife.

There are many other games that dilute the effectiveness of turn-based strategies, such as those with complex scripts or a lot of unnecessary exposition. While I appreciate great dialogue, plotting and an expert hand to guide the narrative along with the action,Chaos Gate – Daemonhunters did this in spades), it’s always disappointing when a game strikes gold, only to bury it again with so much dirt. It was one of the most exciting games I anticipated for 2022.

Get involved, even when it’s fixated on stats and weapons and training, is always rushing toward the next battle, because that’s where the story lies. It’s not a reinvention of the genre, but a distillation. It can’t quite reach the crescendos that Three Houses did, and it certainly doesn’t achieve the longevity of Awakening. Yet, it’s always fantastic. And it’s confident enough to let me take the reins.

Feuer Emblem Engagement Nintendo Switch releases the game Jan. 20, 2019. Nintendo sent a prerelease download code to review the game. Vox Media also has affiliate relationships. Although these partnerships do not impact editorial content, Vox Media could earn commissions for products bought via affiliate links. Find out more. additional information about Polygon’s ethics policy here.