Fire Emblem: Echoes: Shadows of Valentia

This is a really great Fire Emblem game. Beautiful art, amazing soundtrack and a solid battle system. The story is one of the best so far (not counting the games that are Japan exclusive) and has a colorful cast of characters. Definitely a must buy for every 3DS owner.

This is an OUTSTANDING Fire Emblem (FE) game. The game follows the story of two protagonists Alm and Celica, who get entangled into a war between the gods Duma who rules Rigel and Mila who lords over Zofia. The story is decent and the characters are memorable (please play the Phoenix mode where you do not lose characters forever).For people who are new to this series, all FE games are turn based strategy RPGs where there is a board partitioned into cells. One character can occupy one cell. The player and the enemy alternate in turns and in your turn, you get to move all your characters or you can attack enemies.The gameplay is fantastic and is the sole reason why this game outshines many other FE games. For one, there is no rock-paper-scissor weapon triangle. The game is very strategic in terms of terrain advantages and you will think a lot about unit formations, weapon distribution, grinding in dungeons and using support bonuses. One sad thing is the lack of options for promotion. Also your units can get weaker if they get hungry (interesting mechanic). The game makes up for its lack of customisability by giving us a variety of classes and multiple levels of promotions.The music is beautiful, and the game looks fabulous. I think this game is a must buy!

Not much to say. Plays similar to the other Fire Emblem 3DS titles. All the more reason to add it to a fan's library.

For FE veterans: get this game.For FE newcomers & on-the-fence: this game will be more challenging than Awakening and Fates, but it's worth a try.I did not know FE Gaiden was even a thing back in Famicon days. Had no idea this was a remake. Initially, I was put off by the idea that magic mechanic will not be fueled by tomes but by mage's HP (gasp, but they are so squishy). But I was itching to play more FE after Fates and patiently waiting for Three Houses. I am really glad I gave this a try because this is a fantastic remake and what Gaidan needed to bring that second title back to the modern gaming age.What SoV does not have compared to recent FE titles:- no S-supports = no waifus/husbandos- no child units- no My Unit- no My Castle- no armory- not much room for grinding even with dungeon feature- no weapon triangle- do not expect support conversations for every characters interacting with every characters- no casual/phoenix mode; Permadeath. Permadeath everywhere. Muhahaha.What to expect:+ Fantastic soundtrack as always+ Great, well-translated, well-paced story+ Interesting class change system+ Interesting dungeon feature akin to Final Fantasy than previous FE titles+ Interesting skill system+ Beautiful character art+ Well developed characters+++++ Mila's Turnwheel+ Voice acting. Oh, yeah... Every dialogue (that isn't fetch quest) is voice acted. That was a welcome change.The game's 5 acts took me about good 45 hours to finish; standard RPG time. (Remember to take breaks for your thumbs). For this remake, they added the new battle animations from Fates to give it more cinematic oomph. It took me a couple of maps to get used to the change in UI (how stats are shown for % of Crits and Dodge), but the new UI does the job of conveying the necessary information.Even on normal difficulty, some of the maps were challenging. But there's the Mila's Turnwheel that lets me avoid doing soft resets (L trigger + R trigger + START) every time I realized I made a tactical mistake. So scour for Cogs to increase the Turnwheel ammo. It's super useful!Another thing that made Sov difficult were the dated map design. While I read Gaidan was notorious for its difficulty back in the day, I did not expect how dated the maps would feel. There's a lot of empty space to traverse on many units that start with just 4 movements (those 5 movements were taken for granted). And the enemies are all the way across the map. At least the bosses can move instead of being stuck on the seize tile.Few things that did bothered me were the choppy animation in cutscenes and repetitive grinding. Turns out the choppy animations is the style for the studio who were in charge of SoV. So, I guess I can't really complain, but I did prefer Fates' fluidity (no pun intended).All in all, SoV is different than Awakening and Fates. Even Path of Radiance. But I see that as a good thing as it gives the fans to try something relatively new with FE.Now Intelligent Systems has a few remakes under their belt, I am hoping they remake Genealogy of Holy War and Thracia 776 for us relatively and brand new fans to FE :D 'cuz that would be awesome. Cheers.

Elegí darle 5 estrellas porque no hay opción para darle 4.7Lo que me gusto: El juego es excelente, tiene una de las mejores tramas de los últimos juegos, posee diálogos con voces 100% lo cual aumenta muchísimo la inmersión del jugador y facilita el desarrollo de personajes, la música es para mi gusto la mejor de los últimos años en la serie y el poder explorar calabozos le da un toque de acción que otros títulos no tienen. En general me parece que este juego debe ser la piedra angular para el siguiente (ya sea nueva historia u otro remake) titulo de la saga.Lo que no me gusto: Al ser un juego un poco mas viejo, algunos diseños de mapas son demasiado grandes para mi gusto, existen ocasiones en las que por las condiciones de terreno solo puedes moverte 1 o 2 espacios por turno así que para poder llegar al rango del enemigo e implementar tu estrategia tienes que moverte demasiado, algo que no decrementa la gran experiencia pero si da momentos de tedio al iniciar un mapa muy grande o tener que re iniciarlo.Se lo recomiendo a cualquier fanático de RPGs tácticos, fans de la serie e incluso a cualquier persona que quiera intentar entrar a la serie pero se siente intimidada por el nivel de dificultad, ya que es muy accesible y existen muchas opciones que harán de tu experiencia mas ligera (muchos mapas para incrementar tu experiencia y nivel, muchos personajes, una opción para rebobinar a turnos anteriores)

Bought for my son's collection. Loves the Fire Emblem games.

I got hooked on the Fire Emblem series after it debuted stateside with Fire Emblem (GBA) - Blazing Blade (Rekka no Ken). It was a fantastic game with beautiful sprites, good pacing and difficulty. I've played every game released since then, including a few of the Japan only with translation guides. That said I find the remake of FE: Gaiden - Shadows of Valencia to be objectively the best Fire Emblem game I've played.The game streamlined more than a few things, instead of having a STR and MAG Power stat they are instead combined into one, likewise the double-attack speed formula is very simplified (which isn't necessarily a good thing). Class changes are available with your starting crew of Villagers and pitchforks from free DLC which was a lot more fun than Shadow Dragon. Additionally each character can hold a single item, which adds a lot of gameplay depth and very little complexity. No more weapon durability either, and the spell system is quite nice where you pay HP for your spells which means your mages have their limits, and are absolutely vulnerable on the front lines.Difficulty is excellent, it's a good entry point if its your first Fire Emblem game, there is also a built in rewind feature with a limited number of uses. Most character have decent stat bonuses and unlike other games there isn't any one particular character who is completely unusuable. The parallel story paths is interesting, and I got a kick out of sending items between stories via travelling merchants.The story is simple high fantasy and the characters are likeable. Compared to FE: Three Houses I would recommend Shadows of Valenica any day of the week. Three Houses suffers from a lot of mechanic bloat, Fire Emblem games are known for having almost minimal need to customize your party, but Three Houses takes this to the extreme, and is not nearly as satisfying as FE: Awakenings. Additionally, even on Hard Mode there aren't any challenging battles in Three Houses and nearly every opponent will be one-shotted by your team. It doesn't make for very rewarding game play. Valencia while one of the easier FEs, offers a up a decent challenge for newcomers and returning fans alike. You cannot go wrong with this game.