Photo: totallygn.com

Olivia Judd

Staff Writer

The Fire Emblem game series has been around since 1990. Fire Emblem Awakening is the thirteenth game in the franchise for the 3DS that was recently released. However, there is no need to have played any of the previous ones. The style is still the same, a strategy turn based RPG with a fantasy storyline.

The story begins right after an individual creates their own character, a new feature in the Fire Emblem series. One can choose gender, as well as hair, eye, facial, and voice styles, but sadly there are no options for a different outfit from the one that is given. After character creation is done, the player wakes up in a field with amnesia around a couple of the main characters, one of which the player will happen to know the name of even with the awkward memory loss. As the story goes on, the player finds oneself allied with the Prince of the land, and become his military tactician as the player defends the kingdom, which is a good story explanation of why one can control the characters on the battle field as one pleases.

The battle system is very simple and easy to pick up after a short while. The player gets to have the choice to prepare a bit before hand, viewing the battle field map, choosing the characters the player already has to fight, and more. The first turn is always the player and ends when all the player’s characters have moved. However, the player can also end one’s turn at any time before that, cuing the enemy’s turn to do the same. The series has always had the concept of “permanent death” in the games, meaning if one of the characters dies in battle they will not come back again. However in this one, there is an option to turn it off before the player begins the game, which can be very nice for easy/casual gamers. However if the main character is defeated in battle, it’s still game over, and the player still has to deal with the fact that weapons and spells “break” after a certain number of uses in battle. If this happens in the middle of one and that character has nothing else equipped, the player is, for lack of better terms, screwed.

Another interesting part of the game that effects a bit of the story is the relationships that the can build between the characters. They form and grow when one of them fights beside another, backing them up in battle. Because of this, some of the characters can vary because they may have different parents depending on the character relationships that are formed. This probably greatly pleases many fangirls.

Story- 10/10

Game play- 9/10

Graphics- 9/10

Sound- 10/10

Overall- 9.5/10