I say meh.

But I have only played Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones for the GBA thus far.

Part of the reason it is meh for me is I came into the series with a bit more expectations. First I figured it would be at least slightly 'difficult' on difficult mode. And I am far let down on that. The only thing that could really qualify as difficult is the tediousness of having to restart/reload if you make even a single mistake[ok, some mistakes won't warrant a restart, but generally if I make a mistake it is a doozie] or get REALLY unlucky.

Secondly since it was a tactics game I was hoping for something with the tactical value of FFT. Tactically speaking I would take Final Fantasy Tactics over it any day[but I have yet to find a tactics game that I like tactically more than FFT, which is sad since FFT has several glaring flaws that need fixed and several things that would make it better]. And possibly Tactics Ogre as well. Other than those two Fire Emblem is a definite top notch Tactics game.

Oh yes, and about plot..... FE lacks that so hard I think it fell in on itself and made a black hole[no not quite that bad, but the story isn't exactly its strong point]. This hurts it as an RPG but generally speaking pure tactical games don't really need a story, hence I am not putting it in the tactical paragraph.

And before I forget there is a TBS game that has nearly as good tactics as any tactics game that I didn't mention because I don't usually think of it as a tactics game(seeing as how you can go the entire game without using 'tactical combat'). But Age of Wonders and its sequels have some really sweet elements in the tactical combat that I would love to see occur elsewhere(attacks of opportunity for the win).


Anyways in the end it is a top notch game that falls short only because I grew into tactical games with FFT which sets a fairly high standard for that genre and while FE:TSS shines over FFT in some areas when it comes down to me deciding which is overall the better FFT comes out on top. However, I'll be giving the FE series a likely 10/10 if only because it is the best Tactics game I have played on any portable system(though if I ever get to play the FFT remake....).



Just as a note, the FFT system of chars dieing made the most sense to me due to one reason. It is obvious that even a red hp unit isn't in critical health yet. I have seen some fights and wrestled quite a bit and when someone is hurt badly(and if you are hurt badly enough you are about to die it is likely even worse) your capabilities to fight are reduced. This doesn't happen so I am left to assume that your are in critical(will die very soon without medical attention) health when your HP hits zero and phoenix downs just happen to be a super medicine that miraculously heals any critical injury(but yet doesn't heal regular injuries!). This is of course even further supported by the fact that phoenix downs don't revive people who are actually shown to be dead(Aeris is an easy example). And just to be fair to FE it is just possible they have no way of saving someone on the battlefield who has been critically wounded due to the lack of said miracle drug or of the medical knowledge needed for such an event. But by allowing it you give someone some room for mistakes so that they don't need to restart an hour long battle because they got unlucky and an enemy hit with a 19% hit rate and went critical at the same time with a 1% crit rate(yes I had that happen to me ).

And just one more kudos to FE. Weapon durability and needed certian weapon skill levels to equip high level weapons = love. I just wish there was more equipment than weapons in the game.