(This chart is a silly over-simplification, but I think it helps sum up what Engage is.)
This post contains no plot spoilers, but does discuss gameplay mechanics from Chapter 1 to Chapter 8.
I'm enjoying Fire Emblem: Engage!
When the first few images of the game leaked a year or two ago, I didn't know what to think of it. Even the first trailer left me a little on the fence about how much I would enjoy it, but I was ready for Fire Emblem to take a jump back into the pool of "colorful, dumb, silly nonsense."
The game has definitely been putting a smile on my face.
Gameplay: A Hundred Options For Tweaking Your Party
FE: Engage's central mechanic is the idea of wearing Rings. There are 12 "Emblem Rings", rings that contain the spirits of 12 former Fire Emblem main characters. From the very first trailer, it was obvious that this served to be a powerful buff for your ring-wearing unit and a powerful blast of obvious nostalgia fanservice.
What I was surprised to learn from Nintendo's Ask The Developer interview was that the inspiration for the Emblem Rings came from a desire to streamline past FE mechanics. Fire Emblem 4, Fire Emblem Awakening, and Fire Emblem Fates all include the ability to have your units fall in love, boost each other, and have a child who is a mix of their strengths. Awakening and Fates also had the "pair-up" system that let two units travel together in one tile, fighting as a pair. These mechanics are probably my favorite addition to Fire Emblem. I loooove the idea of mix-and-matching different units who can form a bond with each other, protect each other, and make a whole "new unit" that reflects them both.
The developers said that the downside of falling in love and having a kid is that it took, like, half the game for the player to get to that point. They wanted a mechanic that they could introduce at the very start and was much quicker to use, and thus the Emblem Ring idea was born. It helps players "get to the fun part" faster. The Rings can also be unequipped and swapped at any time! You unfortunately can't have your Awakening characters re-marry and have new kids whenever you change your mind.
Wearing an Emblem Ring gives you boosted stats, new skills, and the opportunity to "Engage" in battle, where your character actually fuses with the spirit. When you strengthen the character's bond enough with the spirit over the course of the game, they can even permanently inherent some of the spirit's stats and skills, allowing them to keep them even when they take the Ring off.
I really like the Ring mechanic. I think it makes it really streamlined and makes it really beginner-friendly in the sense of letting you swap the Rings among your characters between every battle. It gets a little more detailed and overwhelming over time (it turns out there's 120-ish other Rings in the game, that give very minor buffs, but they don't get fancy character models of voice acting) but at its core I think it captures that "pair-up" idea in a new way.
Writing and World: Brimming With Colorful, Trope-y Energy
Fire Emblem games have always, always, always been corny, cheesy, cliche, whatever you want to call it. They deal with broad, recognizable fantasy archetypes and tropes from anime and JRPGs. The plots are somewhat cheesy or somewhat affecting, depending on the game. Each individual character, in each game, is going to either resonate with you or they're not. In most cases, they're not going to be "complex, three-dimensional people" unless you invest in seeing all of their Support conversations.
Engage is very much still in line with this. However, I think FE: Three Houses put a different type of effort and emphasis into the overall writing. That's not to say that Engage has objectively worse writing, but I think it can easily come off that way. The plot does a good job of "getting to the point" really fast, but I don't think it starts off on the right foot in terms of sounding original. The characters are charming so far, but most of them have been bad first impressions for me. For some of them, I couldn't even tell you what their one personality trait is yet? Others have me hooting and hollering.
Overall, I think Three Houses was a big step forward in terms of "how much effort the team put into fleshing out the Support conversations" and Engage feels more similar to the games from the previous eras. I'm hoping it proves me wrong when I get further!
In general, the world and characters are part of a fun, trope-y, fantasy adventure. But I'm hoping there's something a little more original and interesting to chew into later.
Hub World and Progression: Throwing Everything In The Pot
From Fates onward, the Fire Emblem teams have been experimenting with what sort of "hub world" and "long-term progression" systems should be featured in between battles. They've tried several different approaches, and Engage feels like "throw all the spaghetti at the wall and see what sticks."
Engage's hub is less grounded and realistic than FE: Three Houses and FE: Three Hopes' hub worlds.
Engage's hub lets you...buy casual clothes for your characters to wear in their off-time.
Engage's hub has activities that are...frankly, pretty buckwild.
I think I might love Engage so far.
