Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia Standard Edition - Nintendo 3DS

I only recently experience playing Fire Emblem in the GBA and fell in love. I got this on sale last month and have fallen in love with it. As this was my starting point, I would most likely hold this higher above others because it has a full well voice acted cast, beautiful music, and gorgeous visuals. I have not finished the game because it is a thinking game, for me at least. One part had me play for 2 hours (from trial and error, in fear of losing anyone in battle). If you're looking for something that'll keep you busy, and don't mind thinking strategies to win, I highly recommend this. I wish someone did but I guess it leaves lots of more hours to look forward to for the next games. I'm excited to play the old games and the latest one on the Switch. But first, to finish this one!

There's a lot to like about the previous two Fire Emblem games on the 3DS (Awakening and Fates) but the stories are pretty melodramatic and some of the characters are pretty one note. That's not the case in Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia. The story is heartfelt and engaging, and every teammate matters. They all have their own personality which makes them more real. The game being fully voiced goes a long way to enforce that. As for mechanics, this is typical Fire Emblem fare and it's exciting and challenging (playing on normal seems about right, with some difficulty spikes) without being a slog. If you like Fire Emblem at all, you owe it to yourself pick this up.

So Fire Emblem Echoes is an expanded reimagining of Fire Emblem Gaiden, which originally released in Japan. So forget about the weapon advantage system and marriage mechanics and promotions you might expect as things are different here. First off though, the presentation is fantastic with full voice acting, rousing soundtrack and battle animations that draw you into the action. The gameplay has its strengths and downsides. Ultimately, you control Alm and Celica in two separate campaigns around the map for the main story. With Alm, one gets a party heavy on physical units and light on magic units though class promotion flexibility for your initial villager units can make up for this. His story is ultimately more relatable as the hero's journey of wanting to prove himself, his uncle and finding Celica along the way. Celica's campaign has more magic units if that is your style but with mobility options bogged down by swamp and desert maps later in her campaign, which can lead to a tedious experience. In addition, her journey is less about herself than seeking out the Goddess Mila as very nearly an impersonal matter. She is an earnest young lady as presented so one roots for her but she makes mistakes that could present as poor writing. Gone are class abilities except for passive class-bound ones and customization more comes from unique spell lists (for mages) and weapon arts which are special attacks bound to an equipped weapon unlocked over time using the weapon. This was an interesting change but can be unbalanced given the need to fight for weapon experience to unlock new abilities as you find or make new weapons. So, the story is great and the localization really highlight the loving effort put into selling it. However, there is no multiplayer, no endgame difficulty optional content as dlc like Awakening had while the final dungeon that exists is high enough that it might make one want to resort to the DLC paid classes to beat it for bragging rights. To make a long story short, though there are things to enjoy about the gameplay (5-range archers), the story is the highlight while replayability is low and the DLC practice is abominable and costs more than the base game. So, savor this tale like a fine wine and hopefully Three Houses can combine this level of presentation with gameplay.

I've been a fan of Fire Emblem games since the series moved stateside back in 2003 with the GBA release entiled "Fire Emblem". All games prior to that were Japan-only releases, so I'm thrilled that Fire Emblem Echoes (a remake of FE2) was released. Better yet, the gameplay and graphics have been updated to keep pace with the excellent recent FE games. Love the strategy, the challenge, and the storyline.

This game does just about everything well. The story, presentation, artwork, and strategic gameplay are all top-notch. While it is quite different from the other Fire Emblem games for 3DS, I still found it to be just as enjoyable. If you have even a slight interest in a good tactical game, you should definitely give this one a shot.

Great graphics and interesting characters. This game adds an exciting new story to the Fire Emblem series.

More interesting story and characters, better presentation, same solid gameplay, and adds new mechanics for something fresh. Overall great.

For new people, this game is a strategy tactics game... its like chess but with unique pieces that have there own strengths and weakness... For the ones are familiar, this is not like the newer versions of Fire Emblem where you get to marry and learn a billion skills and create a starting character... This is a remake of very old fire emblem... its a classic RPG... meaning you need to play that role and continue that story... But even so... the game is still very good to play... the game is easy at first and then gets harder as you progress... you get very little stats at level up but it wont matter anyways bc when you promote, you gain the base stats if not met... the game gets very easy if you buy the inner sanctum dlc pack... bc it provides some gold, some xp, but most importantly it provides weapons and items!... This game actually has a good story... enjoy!