Fire Emblem Three Houses

Metadata

  • Media: #videogames #games #Games 2021
    • Platform: [[!Nintendo Switch Games]]
    • Status: completed
    • Play time: 80+ hours
    • Tags: #tbs #rpg #nintendoswitch
    • Rating: ★★★★☆
    • Idea richness: ★★★☆☆

Summary

Classic turn based strategy with a twist. Fire Emblem, at least in my limited experience, is a winning combination of medieval fantasy, turn-based strategy featuring at least one blue haired person with a sword, semi-divine dragon lady, and a crew of JRPG stereotypes taking on whatever latest threat is about to wipe out their kingdom and the world.

Three Houses adds a new twist by putting all that in a blender with a Persona-style school-exploration, time management, and dating-sim. Bit weird? Sure. Does it work surprisingly well? Also yes.

You play as a mercenary with a mysterious past who is press ganged into teaching a group from one of the three major powers of Fodlan: the Empire, the Kingdom, or the Alliance. Of course, not all is as it seems. The church running the academy harbours secrets and war is brewing. Which class you side with will alter the future of all of Fodlan.

Thoughts

This is based on my first playthrough. I chose the Golden Deer route because fun cast, supposedly the most 'complete', amazing boss music, and actually mentally stable leader.

Things I loved...

  • Multiple paths akin to a Multi Access Narrative. It is essentially 'choose your side of the war' but feels like different perspectives which, alter the overall story, what you learn, and how you see the same content depending on the order in which you play the 4 routes.
  • Enjoyable character dynamics.
  • Customise EVERYTHING: the ability to use any weapon with any class blows Fire Emblem's class system wide open. It's fun to play with different builds and also means when you inevitably end up with a team of OP wyvern riders, they can still feel and play differently.
  • The expanded systems (Persona-like time management, mini-games and quest, skill upgrades) are a fresh addition... at first.
  • Characters going head to head has the potential to be more heartfelt/gut wrenching than generic FE villains I’ve seen in the past. That said, on my first playthrough I only ended facing 2-3 past students, neither of whom I had seen much interaction with, so it didn't resonate as much. I think this probably comes out more as you play the other routes and face characters from your previous playthroughs.

Things I didn't...

  • The story walks the line between classic JRPG style empire at war and nuanced tradegy full of trauma and no totally right path. So far I've only played the Golden Deers route (which is more story driven then character driven) and I feel like they'd have been better off going all in one way or another. I hear the other two routes skew more towards the tragic character side.
  • It's a lengthy game to replay 4 times to see everything. One route is enough, sure, but I'm not sure if I would have got as much if I hadn't read up on some of the context online. It's a balancing act of rewarding replays while keeping a single playthrough satisfying and I think the balance is shifted in favour of replays.
  • The main character/avatar. I get what they were going for but to me it landed on the bland and weird side rather than mysterious.
  • The whole school setting. The game takes great lengths to explain your character is the same age as your students... before you plot to romance one of them later. Ew.
  • Speaking of which, that tea party mini-game...
  • The persona style school exploration and mini game system became an absolute chore about halfway through once you had all the upgrades but still had to run around just to upgrade combat skills.
  • Still with the gender-locked classes? Falcon knight and war master are both great and I wish they weren't restricted.
  • A few of the scenario setups (Gronder Field 2.0) feel forced story-wise.
  • The difficulty level is weird and skews heavily towards the easy.

Routes

  • Golden Deer - An enjoyable middleground with plenty of JRPG cliches but a few standouts. Could have been an incredibly nuanced route but most of the deeper issues are glossed over. Still enjoyable but felt like a missed opportunity to go all in either as silly fun or complex politicking and savvy characters.

Overall

I'd give it a very solid 7.5/10. Fun as long as you approach it as a JRPG and don't expect the story to be as nuanced as it's themes promise. Well worth your time and you get a lot of game for your buck. It's not going to dethrone Fire Emblem Awakening (Nintendo 3DS) for me and I'd still recommend starting there if you're looking for a perfect entry to the series. However, it's a worthy successor and I'm glad to see them continuing to evolve with each game in the series.