Everything Fire Emblem Engage Did WRONG!

[@kayeka4123]

Another thing I'd like to add is that it tried to appeal to both newcomers and veterans in the worst way possible. They gave the game a shiny new artstyle that made the characters look like a bunch of V-tubers and touted the accessibility for new fans, but they also made a lot of the story revolve around "Emblems", who are essentially fanservice that only have meaning to the kind of people that could write the game's wiki articles.

[@TheMaestroMizerous]

And it only appealed to gameplay and long time FE fans no one else.

[@chrislyngar9081]

The name Brodia still cracks me up, because it's Bro country.

[@fojisan2398]

DudeBrodia

[@brandonwilliams6119]

Fun Fact, Jin from Cyberbots and Marvel vs Capcom has a Mech called Blodia

[@GodlikeJCMS]

I absolutely hate when my character is worshipped as a god the minute you start which is why I despise both Corrin and Alear. And holy shit, the whole overlaying all the female characters to show they are just variations of each other is something i never noticed

[@catinapan4956]

Didn't Byleth got the same treatment too? Everyone was glazing Byleth azz just cuz his dad.

[@Ender41948]

@@catinapan4956 I'm pretty sure I remember there being a good bit of friction from certain characters to his inauguration as a professor, though it might've been mainly Seteth. Still, he's not treated as the LITERAL god, just a damn good mercenary who can handle himself very well. At least, most of the time. And no, I'm not calling Byleth a good character.

[@Gondengun06]

Get to work on the engage Ironman

[@TheNuts1225]

You mean the Eggage Ironman.

[@owen-tv9dt]

I guess I should try bringing up the game's world building. Friene: They are self sufficient and this makes them more aloof and closed off from other nations as they don't have to rely on others. Their culture is a light hearted one celebrating fables while also having a high level of refined living given all the tea farms and fashionable clothes. The king died of a terminal illness that his son now suffers from, and it is the expectation that the princess would have to take the throne from his cold dead body. Brodia: A mining based economy that expands territory by launching wars. Cruel retaliations have been launched by Elusia in return, slaughtering innocent fishing villages. The nobles are in support of these wars and many exotic balls are held celebrating their opulence. Military strength and riches are the theme here, signifying their power. The queen of brodia still lives, she was moved to a remote location for her own safety. Elusia: the most prominent feature is the main academy that everyone is obligated to attend at some point in their life, as this is the kingdom of knowledge. As such they have the most skilled expertise in goods and craftsmanship in all the land. King hyacinth fought with his brother for the throne and ended up winning, banishing his brother in the process, and then hiring his brother's supporter Lindon. Hyacinth had many wives, having children- the half sisters hortensia and ivy. It is a den of intrigue with many bureaucrats squabbling, plotting and backstabbing each other to rise high in court. Also it is the country that worships the fell dragon. Solm: a queendom run by calm rational thinkers with the aim of maintaining their own freedom. They appear carefree on the surface but they're cunningly studying other nations and managing their relations for either warfare or peace- whatever works for them, given the interactions fogado and timerra have with the other characters. During the war with the fell dragon they were the best equipped and prepared to fight on their own, and pointedly refused to help any other nation. They are a wild bunch, and wolf racing is a popular sport. And yeah nothing is going on in Lythos.

[@justcritlmao5730]

While I agree that mangs came at the point in a pretty reductive manner, I feel like a lot of the world building for the game comes from supports instead of the main story. Now is that a good or bad way of doing it? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Idk

[@owen-tv9dt]

@ That's true. The supports are better written than the story as the supports actually take the time to flesh out characters, while the main story is just the usual war with an added touch of silliness. Would be better if it was both. I think the best world building is when you can infer it out of the characters and the land, and it just naturally being brought up rather than being handed the exposition dumps from a lore book somewhere. I like what they did with solm- they have a facade of goofing off- like when the queen forgets where the ring is- but theyre actually extremely pragmatic- the queen herself is proud of her daughter for choosing to sacrifice her. Stuff like that which tells you more about the people and their ideals and methods.

[@superape013]

Lythos had more divi e dragons but they all died at some point the land of the divine dragons was a dead kingdom of an old people which is why its so empty even though it has large structures

[@Noelfriday]

Ah alcryst. As soon as he did that jumping in the air and landing on his knees made me bench him immediately. Didn't care that he had better stats than my Etie

[@justinmoreno390]

11:33 If I remember correctly, in Veyle and Corrin's bond, Veyle says that she buried her dragon stone so as not to hurt people and that she doesn't even remember where she buried it.

[@ghost245353]

Also, the game tells us that Alear is considered a defect by Sombron because they cannot transform.

[@hheecckk526]

​@@ghost245353 They could have easily made it so alear could transform after becoming the divine dragon and got a new stone made by lumera along with the pact ring. Since lumera knew about alears heritage it would have made sense that she could have figured something out.

[@redfoxoffire]

Ah yes, Shulk is a photoshopped Little Mac. I like Engage, but I do agree with a lot of these points. However, I do have a few criticisms: - Mauvier was clearly with the Hounds to protect Veyle. Like with Marni, the reason he cares so much is never really explained, but it's there. - Etie's personal 40% Str growth is actually on the high end for the cast. It's only beaten by Amber, Panette, and Rosado at 45%, and Madeline alone at 50%. The Bld criticism is legit, though.

[@brandonwilliams6119]

Fun fact, if you overlay Shulk and Little Mac’s Ultimate Renders they still look photoshopped lmao

[@evanb4189]

People complained about perma-death not being viable in 3H. They made it viable in Engage and people complain about the characters not plating a big enough role, having too many, etc.

[@fakesmile172]

It's games like Engage that push people away from anime and make them assume that all anime is poorly written

[@ChillstoneBlakeBlast]

22:10 Now that I watched the video, Etie was localized differently. Etie was suppose to have Maribelle's Gimmick, but for some reason, they made her a Strong Women archetype, which was also part of her gimmick and not her main one

[@SerRompalot]

Fwiw, historically archers had some jacked arms because drawing bows repeatedly and quickly takes a lot of strength.

[@zer0name720]

@@SerRompalot If you look at the skeletal remains of archers, their right arms are longer than their left by ≈20%

[@SN1PERx64]

On the note of personal skills, I will always remember Owain from awakening as my favorite. It gave a bonus if the main weapon had 13 or more custom characters in the name. It not only gave a nice bonus, but heavily encouraged the player to make custom wepons in order to utilize it. And when you would see players online you could see all the crazy names people came up with! Lore, creativity, and useful in one package!

[@nessdbest8708]

Thats Fates.

[@SN1PERx64]

@nessdbest8708 hmm, so it is

[@nessdbest8708]

@@SN1PERx64 not awakening

[@SN1PERx64]

@@nessdbest8708 hmm, so it is

[@nessdbest8708]

@@SN1PERx64 literally just copy & pasted

[@InternetMonster1]

I am 100% certain, the Engage team decided, " This is classic FE units are expendable in the game, so they must have no plot relevance" to avoid writing 200 alternative dialogues in the case of a main character dying.

[@TheMaestroMizerous]

Imagine if Three Houses did this. Dorthea was just a girl who sung. Mercedes had no relationship with her brother and was only obsessed with the church. No one would care about these characters because they would only be units to throw away.

[@DisplayThisOkay]

FE need to give up the actual "death" part of permadeath and just make the characters permanently crippled when their HP hits zero so they can still do story stuff and be done with it. They only ever tried to make it make sense in one game and that was one of the ones that had a direct sequel making their efforts useless.

[@MidwestArtMan]

@@TheMaestroMizerous Me, who played Golden Deer: Mercedes has a brother?

[@CarbonMalite]

I'm so glad someone brought up Etie. Why is her personality a gym bro and yet she's dressed like a Mario princess and has stats befitting of one.

[@hanzou1238]

I mean she does at least have the third highest strength in the game after Amber and Panette so her strength training does show, and she does have a smaller body even with her training so the low build fits too. It would have been much better to just start her in Fighter and Boucheron in Archer since their growths match those better. Archer has horrible bases which tank her starting stats (She only has 3 less base strength than Fogato 9 maps earlier) and Boucheron has incredible high skill and speed like Snipers normally do and horrible strength even in Warrior. Etie probably also should of had Strength Taker as a personal skill to match her personality except they didn't like personal skills in this game.

[@brutalnobody5240]

It tells you something when Unicorn overlord made it to game of the year awards but Engage wasn't mentioned.

[@funtik3000gt]

I still think, that Robin was the best avatar

[@ZytenEspada]

Shez is definitely no. 2

[@paranoia1896]

Shez mogs the other avatars hard

[@Bierbuxe]

Weird opinion maybe, but my favourite avatar was Mark, literally being the strategist in the background.

[@brandonwilliams6119]

Kris and Robin were alright Avatars but nobody will ever compare to Mark in FE7

[@TrueTrickster2016]

Robin Number 1

[@fromeggman]

One thing that will always strike me as utterly hilarious as to how bad the world building is, but also the choices surrounding Pepsi-man, is the reveal about them. Pepsi-man is dragon Jesus as far as the world building goes, and most everyone worships them as such. Then comes along the revelation that they are actually a bad dragon and not Jesus dragon. And no one in the cast has any issues, 3/4s of the planet worship Pepsi-man, and there is no crisis of faith or questioning of reality with what should be an earth shattering revelation. One that shows their worldview was a LIE. Everyone just kinda shrugs and ignores it mostly. Hell Pepsi-man doesn't prior to this feel all that special or divine for that matter. At least Byleth had a built in god mechanic with the times pulse, Pepsi-man needs a shinny rock to do that...which reminds me, why is that rock just glossed over with little to elaboration? A rock the manipulates time is something anyone would kill for, never mind nations.

[@A_normal_Tsukasa_fan]

If I remember correctly, that type of rock can only be made by mage dragons, aka zephia, and most other people probably have no idea that it exists. It's something that was supposed to be a secret emergency button for veyle, but for some reason she accidentally dropped it after killing lumera. Basically, the reason why people don't fight over it is because no one really knows it exists, or that it could only be made by zephia, who is not on their side and certainly wouldn't just hand one over to them.

[@Edagui97]

Most of the cast didn't really worship Alear that seriously, since they had been worshipping Lumera for the last 1000 years and Alear kinda came out of nowhere, so there was not that much emotional attachment towards worshipping him, barring Ivy and the party dude whose religious practices were already quite different from the main stream. Most importantly, everyone who learned the truth had already been through thick and thin with Alear and even a blind man could see how different he was compared to Sombron.

[@paulman34340]

@@Edagui97 Actually they kind of did! Firene being HEAVILY Devotee to the Divine Dragon's Royal Family visited Alear when they were resting, Note that Celine when she calms down recognizes Alear immediatly as she and Alfred HAVE visited! Diamant even mentions seeing them as well! Alcyst likely was too stressed from watching the border, or was left behind to watch the Castle when Morion and Diamant went to Lythos and the Sominel which is why he didn't recognize Alear. (Though PEPSI LOOK should have made that obvious, I'm still remembering Jean and Jade's recruitment where it took Alear having to SAY they were the Divine Dragon for them to realize "WHAT, this WEIRD LOOKING PEPISI PERSON IS DIVINE! I WOULDN'T HAVE GUESSED WITH THEIR WEIRD LOOK) In alot of the supports, Alear despite being "Divine" is sort of the "Only Sane Man" out of the cast who each have their "quirks" (They went the angle of the "Mystical Character" being normal minded and the "Mortals" being the "weirdos") and as you said. They've been with Alear LONG enough and KNOWN them long enough for the "Fell Dragon" thing to be relevant (and ANY of Alear's "Crimes" working under his/her father was 1000 years ago.....they were ALSO the reason he was sealed in the first place! Had they finished the job, they wouldn't be DEALING with Sombron in the current day! Actually I still wonder why Lumera didn't do it and just sealed Sombron now that I'm thinking on it, I just assumed she didn't want to waste too much time and power that could go to seeing if she could save Alear) all the revelation did was confirm to everyone the FULL truth of Alear's Origins (The game always felt like a RETREAD of Awakening and Fates story Threads, FATES ESPECIALLY while doing the stuff that people note ALOT on their "Fix it" to Fate's story. Like Corrin KNOWING their origins instead of keeping a secret! Veyle being what Lilith should have been in that she is both your sister AND an Antagonist! And Lumera coming back from the Death, I liked HERS more then Mikoto's!) which the Antagonist never hesitate for one moment (well Zephia and Veyle which makes sense) to bring it up! I like to PRESUME Sombron figured it out the moment Zephia confirmed she found no body where he was sealed. But as he ESTABLISHED, he really doesn't give a shit, he only had ISSUE with Alear because they DARED "bite the hand that fed" even when he was a crappy father who saw them as a tool he'd KILL the moment he was "disappointed" and was mad his own "behavior" was used against him! As for the Rock. I will give A_normal this. It only was relevant ONCE in Chapter 10/11 then never comes up again. So maybe it's better not to make it a "Story/Gameplay Integration" if it's not going to be brought up much! But then Three Houses did the same thing! Thales is shown to No-Sell Divine Pulse....yet he NEVER uses it in the gameplay. And Byleth gives up like ONCE after Thales blocks their attempt to kill Kronya before she shanks Jeralt! They never really explained too well how many PULSES. I do feel next game the OPTION to turn it off or not should be made (Maybe a Reward after Non-skirmish Battles if you win without using it once or had it turned off) I think that would shut up some of the whining (or just increase as the "challenge" bros/gals complain they can't CONFIRM if a Let's Play has it off or on! Who the fuck cares, stop punishing NON-CHALLENGE Players by enforcing! Already tired of hearing the WHINING about the fucking Emblem Rings/Bracelets) and Weakening it so the "why don't they just go back in time THIS or THAT" (I always presumed the Rock was the only reason Veyle as in EVIL Veyle SURVIVED her fight with Lumera. Only getting Lucky the JUST WOKE UP SO WEAK Alear showing up and Lumera shielding was the reason she WON by surviving, she only found out Lumera was dead AFTER Zephia learned of it from Alear after all! Note the stone did NOTHING till the next chapter, meaning it was likely out of juice when Veyle dropped it when she retreated! She could have attacked AGAIN after attacking, but it's clear that was a Desperation attack! But without the story CONFIRMING it, all I just stated is Assumptions! But then sad part is people will STILL get mad they were TOLD this because they hate being treated like their stupid! "Can't fucking WIN")

[@CoyoteMao]

Frankly, Engage feels like a self-parody of the Fire Emblem series.

[@Aeivious]

Tbh, I think that was the point, they wanted a story that felt like they took every fire emblem trope into a blender and made a game. It was, in a sense, a celebration of fire emblem, brining back all the lords, tons of maps and music from those games, while having a story that feels like asking an AI to generate a fire emblem script after only reading every fire emblem game. Did it work well, not really, but it felt like thats what they were going for.

[@JasonGodwin69]

Nothing about Engage would change if the Emblem Rings were Smash Bros characters like KIRBY.

[@FireEmbros]

The alcryst scene is 100% an absolutely horrible portrayal and the absolute dumbest writing and is a prime example of how out of touch, especially coming from three houses, IS was with their playerbase in terms of story quality.

[@bm4604]

oof that template argument was pretty damming

[@Wingman1024]

Just a little advice before I watch this video: don't do red borders at the bottom of the thumbnail. On the main page, It makes it look like you have already watched the video and might scroll past it, since KZbin promotes already watched videos from time to time.

[@henryreturns1397]

Two main reasons : - Marketing was not good. They just slap Fire emblem and thought it would sell. 3 Houses Marketing was insane , there was literally updates about it and trailers about the game and what "SOLD" the game to everyone was the "TIME SKIP TRAILER" where all the lords were at each other throats and it was so hype - Secondly is because is really hard to follow up the "best selling Fire Emblem game" which was 3 Houses. Like sure gameplay wise Engage might feel like an upgrade but story wise and how it was portrayed it felt like a big downgrade. From having 3 and (one hidden story) and played with a big cast of characters that were set up for each house , to being lock in to a main character who is like a Corrin 2.0 lol. - Engage might have sold better had they focus more on their marketing on having a lot more throwbacks to previous FE games , show a lot more of the game , and like show a really "engaging moment" like 3 Houses did on their time skip trailer.

[@anthonypreston7261]

This might be because they were literally making both engage and 3 houses at the same time

[@TwilightWolf032]

And it would have helped a lot if the story wasn't garbage!

[@rdrouynriv]

There's a reason why it didn't get the marketing that 3 Houses did. Nintendo knew they had a dud with those MC designs.

[@bearerofbadnews1375]

@@henryreturns1397 it also doesn’t help that engage’s story tried to be a best of fire emblem Awakening and Fates plot points, but somehow did them even worse.

[@therealjaystone2344]

@@bearerofbadnews1375 Engage surpassed Fates as the worst FE game ever

[@ratman5225]

I think Aliers hair would have worked if the player had dialoque options of good/evil choices and it would have unclocked more endings or smt

[@Edagui97]

"Greetings, oh Divine Dragon. Would you like some of the pickles I made especially for you?" A) " Thank you Clanne, I truly appreciate all the things you do for me". B) "Bother me again and I'll fill that jar with your innards". Best part is that the options were labeled as "thanks" and "no thanks".

[@Rodri34451]

I remember an early fake leak from Engage saying that Alear's hair color would change throughout the story depending on your choices. Imagine if that were true.

[@revolver6452]

I'll always be pissed that Chloe had a god tier design with a terrible personality, I felt baited, they wasted such a good seiyuu as Hayamin on her.

[@TwilightWolf032]

While I agree that the localization for Fire Emblem games are atrocious and Engage is no different, I played the entire game in Japanese (voice and text) and let me tell you, the Japanese script is only marginally better than the localized version. The scene you described with the running dogeza is a really BAD scene no matter the version you play, it just doesn't fit what Fire Emblem spent decades establishing about itself, nor does it make any sense within the context of the game (the second prince is introduced as a badass sovereign not willing to take any risks and endangering his people by trusting possible spies, only to undo it all with a gag and spend the rest of the game portraying him as a weak-minded wimp who never shows his resolve again in the story and gets immediately sidelined by his older brother)! I am petitioning to get Japanese companies to create and enforce guidelines against localizers to prevent their stupid censorship and Woolseysm in the future, but we have to give credit where it's due and should do the same with criticism - the localization of Engage, as terrible as it is, is not the one responsible for the flaws in the writing; that blame falls on the Japanese writers! To keep it short, the humor in this game is bad in Japanese as well.

[@MidwestArtMan]

I think that initial Alcryst scene was done really early in development, and they just never bothered to change it. Being a Lapis fan, I noticed that she's wildly different in just that scene. She looks mad the whole time, and says, "If you can't dodge one arrow, you aren't worthy to enter. Here, the weak serve the strong." It's the complete opposite of her actual personality, and that tough-guy attitude never shows up for even one line of dialogue anywhere else. I like dorky, easily-flustered Lapis much more.

[@hillnor6812]

@@MidwestArtMan I really hated her for that first dialog and didn't realise what an awesome character she is until I played her and watched her supports. She's a completely different person.

[@Rodri34451]

@@MidwestArtMan True. It's so strange how vastly differently her personality changes from that cutscene to the actual game.

[@TheZedFactory]

You raised the cost being a major reason for both similar character design and the inability of crafting different scene in case a main character die (so you can't really have them be important in the plot) First of all, crafting different scene in case of character death isn't that hard nor expensive. The main cost would be the voice acting but seeing how heavy the voice acting already is, I suspect the cost wouldn't be so high. The other thing you need to prepare is the dialogue, and for that you need a narrative designer. Safe to say, any Fire Emblem should have at least one, but seeing the resultat of Engage story, I'd be curious about how many they were and their experience. As for similar character design, I can accept that a bit more, seeing how long and costly character 3D models, rigs and animation could cost. Making a different model would imply A LOT MORE works, to make it usable. HOWEVER, there is tools and smart ideas that can be useful to reduce that cost. Some were used, like the fact they kept a similar face for each character, so you won't need to make a whole set of facial expression. But my problem is that, despite the budget friendly choices to reduce the cost of making these characters, I don't feel like this budget was used smartly elsewhere, especially about the talking animation and emotes, which could have make theses characters less robotics. The rest of your analysis on the accessories characters are wearing is highly probable. I wish they would have created at least more bodies to convey multiple character types at least My main question would be : what is the budget of this game? I feel like the minimum was spent to make it marketable and to raise as much profit as they could. And even if that was the case, I'd wish they settle on a good artistic direction and start keeping assets for the next game. One thing that is under appreciated in the GBA games is that cool animation made in Binding blade were reused in Blazing Sword, allowing for unique animation to be created for this game AND for Sacred Stones. Just like you, I feel distant from this game and really wish they could pull out something great again for the next game Sorry for the wall of text, and thank for anyone brave enough to read it xD

[@TortoiseNotTurtle]

20:02 I think the big thing id that stylistically, each character is trying to be "attractive" in the most broadly appealing/lowest common denominator sense. Like take Etie for example. She talks a lot about her muscles and working out, etc. Yet outside of her abs (which kinda look out of place on her bodytype and in art because none of her other flesh is rendered that way) she prrtty much just matches every other character proportionally. Her shoulders are just as skinny, her thighs are just as thin, her arms are just as noodly (and you can have a lean built character, but no part of her aside from her stomach suggests any kind of toning). Not to mention nothing about her design really screams "i like working out" which is a huge part of her personality. Theyre trying to on one hand appeal to the whole "muscle mommy"/"tomboy" fetish, but dont go more in because their focus is more on the clothing aspect. So much of their designs are based more around bright colors than other features because said features are so samey.

[@paladinslash4721]

There’s another glaring problem with Engage. It’s a really bad crossover game. All the previous lords do it show up as the McGuffin of the day. There’s no going into their worlds, battling enemies from their, see some of their allies. Just a paralogue and the “dark emblems” which couldn’t even bother to model their villians. You could swap out the lords for generic legendary heroes and nothing would change. Also Engage’s nostalgia concept would be novel ,with it wasn’t for the fact that every Fire Emblem after Awakening that isn’t Three Houses and Hopes had one.

[@dierare]

To be fair, they probably had nowhere near the budget to make the game long enough to explore all the Emblem's worlds. FE games usually feature about 24-30 chapters, for featuring 13 different worlds, you'd easily need at least another 26-39 chapters, which could potentially more than double the length of the game. And at that point, it would feel like heavy bloat.

[@Artemas_16]

Easy, just throw away all nobles and retainers. Make MC and his guards/stuards as a starting party and all other units in the game will be lords from another games. You go into worlds, like two chapters on lord each, and beat big bad in the last one. Simple and pretty.

[@magicalcapi9148]

I feel the biggest offender is how childish Engage is, comparing to Three Houses (and the rest of the whole series). It wouldn't surprise me if this was by design by pressure after Three Houses, the timeline matches. It would be "perfect" timing for the company to make FE more "accessible", Smash Bros popularity, Switch audience, so on, but that's just a theory.

[@Edagui97]

That wouldn't make sense either, since the whole Emblem gimmick is based on nostalgia pandering.

[@binxthebinx6575]

Ok, I'm going to try to keep this breif (famous last words), but I want to go over the points you made Mangs because...it's fun. *The World Building* I agree on mostly everything. Honestly, what they could have done to fix this is to cut the roaster/countries in half. Fierne and Solm are the most irrelevent out of all the characters/places Alear goes during the story. If you cut them, you could heavily focus on the war and character development between Brodia and Elusia. The only counties to have "arcs" in the game while Fierene and Solm have...nothing. If the story cut out Alear and Diamant and Ivy were the main characters, instead? Even better, that's all you need. Give them an enemies to lovers story line with a Romeo and Juliet twist in the end and I guarantee Engage would have been a better game story wise. I don't even think you need the emblems as along as we, the fans, care about the characters we are playing as. I do want to correct you on two things though mangs. The first is the game does explain that Mavier stays with the hounds to protect Veyle because he is her retainer. It is mention in chapter 18 (I think), the one where they are on the boat, but the game did explain why, it's just they didn't push that idea enough I think because we barley see him protect her at all. The last thing is from my experience, while there is literally almost no lore to this world at all. Diamant in one of his supports with Framme actually says that a thousand years ago. Lumeria blessed Brodia to help protect them during the war. This is, as far as I'm aware of, the only time Lumera's protection is brought up and, again, makes Diamant look like the more complex character and possible MAIN character because he knows this...and Alear, for some reason, doesn't. Ivy also ,um, tries to get closure later when she takes back Elusia...but Griss just laughs at her and she is never aloud to give a big speech about how she will change her country for the better. Even Xander, and to another extend Dimitri were aloud to do that in the end game...but not Ivy? Huh... Also, super glad you brought up how the elements of each country does not make any sense. Brodia should NOT be next to Elusia, the snow county. Thats...not how weather works from a basic level. If IS created this world where you worked your way up (Like having Solm and Firene be closer to the equater while Elusia is the closest to the polls, for example, that would make more sense. *The Villain's* I present to you a line that incapsulates the villain's motives in the game (Chapter 23) Veyle: Why are you helping us now?" Zephia: I'm not sure of that myself. Me: Why is she giving them a crystal to help them succeed and not take them down with her? That one Power Ranger Mega Force meme: It's far too complex for you to understand. Nuff said... *Alear* Everything you said about Alear are my complaints with them and I agree they are the worst avatar in the series. If you watch interviews on Alear's concept. They were suppose to be even MORE cowardly, and nintendo had to stop them from doing it. Also, the fact that the director of the game believes fans don't like selfless hero's when fricken DIAMANT EXSITS is absurd to me. He literally contradicted his own statement by creating Diamant, a complex, selfless hero who is, last I checked, *THE MOST POPULAR ENGAGE CHARACTER.* It depends who you ask, but if your looking at the polls from Hero's, he's the most popular male character in the game, but there was a twitter post a while back that said Diamant was the most universally loved character in Engage world wide. To add salt to the wound as well. If you look up the most popular characters in Japan, Diamant is the second most popular character in that country under Alear. I get why Japan specifically would like Alear, but elsewhere? Their really hit or miss, or hated,. Alear is just a controversial character that has completely divided the fanbase, period. I hate always going back to Diamant but...Alear's and Diamant's C support. Literally Alear could not take out a SINGLE corrupted on her own and Diamant had to protect them. Alear pretty much makes Diamant look good in this game every chance they get...and it also shows within the dialog. Personally, I feel the avatar has to go. They had their time and I want a new FE game where the main character has his/her own identity. Robin was debatably the only good avatar...and they made them worse ever since, it's time to move on. *Dialog* If you forget about the cliche father death for a moment. The only part of the game that was written well AND had potential was the Brodia arc. Before and after that, it's absolute, cringy trash that takes me out of the experience. Hell, I would even argue that if Diamant's relationship was development more with his father, it COULD have been something complelling we have never seen before. A crown prince going out of his way to protect his father out of fear of not being good enough? That's sounds fricken awesome and you could have made a whole game centered around just that concept alone! Yes, the father death is super, overdone at this point, but I am in the belief that you can STILL make a father death super compelling if you do something new. That's how writing stories have worked for thousands of years, maybe longer! Put your own new ideas into it and you can have your cake and eat it too and I don't see anything wrong with that. The "Was I a good son" line was and still is the most impactful line in the whole entire game. I think part of that was because the VA for Diamant did such a good job with him. It didn't feel cringy like Alear. You felt the emotion and the turmoil of Diamant realizing that he has to kill his father. Chapter 10, to me, is the best chapter in the game because of these conversations. I...just wish the motion capture was better because, damn, those cutscenes just completely suck ass in this game and chapter 10 is the worst example of it. *Retainer Trope* I agree. The crown princes/princesses were all you needed in this game with some commoners thrown in. That's it, that's all Engage needed to do. *Character designs* Again, Brodia. They have the overall best designs because every design in the country is themed consistently. Everyones colors match, they have almost the same aesthetic or type of clothing if that makes any sense, and while I love Kegetsu's design. The problem is he does not fit in with the county of Elusia. His backstory explains he was a prince somewhere close to Solm, so to me after hearing that, his design would be better suited as a solm retainer...but the Japanese style still doesn't fit in the world of Engage and that's my biggest problem with Kegetsu's design. What sucks is, as a woman, the only really attractive males in this game (to me) are Diamant...I'll throw Kegetsu in there...that's it. Like, where are my attractive men at? I feel like FE always have several, but because a lot of the males in this game have same face syndrome, IS can't make a beefy character or a differently built character with muscles because they might have used the same template for every character. That's why the muscles on Ike in this game look so hideous. It's like they got an artist who knew who to draw women with breasts and curves...but not men with attractive proportions and muscles. How do I know this? Do not look at any of the male characters in this game with their shirt off. It's ugly and super cursed and I have seen better artwork of the male characters with their shirts off on tumbler. *Personally skils.* I agree. I have nothing really to say other than I wish many of the old mechanics where in this game. I also feel that having characters next to each other for a bonus is worthless in Engage. It's barley noticable and the two characters are never on screen together. This is a rant in itself, but having supports made sense for Awakening and Fates because you could get married and have kids. So seeing a character protect their husband, wife or child made getting those supports worth it, and it added stakes if you really cared about a particular couple or child. Engage is just not built that way and I think if marriage was completely out of the question... *in the American version anyway* Then they shouldn't of had supports at all, but that's just my take on the issue anyway. I will end this by saying I wished you talked about the music because I think Engage has the worst tracks in the whole entire series. I hate that I have to be "don't mention Brodia, don't mention Brodia"...but fricken Brodia's chapter 10 track was the only track aloud to have a choir. Not even the final battle had a choir, a literally staple to the series at this point! Like, WHAT? Ok, I'm done. Good think Nintendo only gave Engage a year of shelf life. I hate Nintendo as much as the next guy...but they knew this shit was bad, which is why Engage had one of the shortest physical copy runs before canceling them out right. Nintendo sent this game out to die on purpose. I'm pretty confident in saying that.

[@ShatoraDragondore]

Learning and then being unable to unsee that the MC (and I believe) the Lords and Retainers her designed by a VTuber artist. Really killed it for me, in non animated cutscenes they moved like VTuber model, a janky cheap one at that. And Hortensia and Ettie are just Iron Mouse and Buff Pup with just enough changed to not get a copyright claim from their agencies

[@catinapan4956]

To make it even worse, when people ask the vtuber artist why? She said the director didn't give any direction (really I hardly believe that) so she just draw things randomly she didn't even know the thing about the country or background story.

[@Rodri34451]

​@@catinapan4956 Kinda makes sense seeing how some characters don't fit that well on their region.

[@milanoxiel7853]

“Ivy’s barbecue lit” had me 😂

[@nessdbest8708]

Wasn't Mangs' last point that engage felt like classic FE in the previous video?!

[@KamelGuru]

What did you get wrong: The plural form of ducal realms is "duchies" not "dukedoms" 🤓

[@novacorponline]

To be fair on the subject of some dragons not transforming, I recall it being a thing in previous Fire Emblem games that dragons need a dragon stone to transform. So, it might be the case that the dragon characters who don't transform don't have a dragon stone.

[@isakts8576]

shouldve given them dragon stones then

[@Cayden.1]

@@novacorponline Also Zephia and Veyle are mage dragons and they are stated to lack dragon forms in exchange for much higher magic potential

[@darcy7257]

The writing in this game has some of the worst prose I have ever read

[@redhiney6666]

I had a thought how to fix avatars, give them a set of questions in the beginning for boons and banes, sex, class, that sort of thing. Then have them pick a background like one of four like orphan noble clergy or soldier something like that, and just make their supports have dialogue options. You have agency, customization, the story is intact, and you can insert in a way that feeds your head cannon without pole jocking the whole time like you’re a celebrity

[@Dragonite43]

It sounds like how the Ultimate General series handles it.

[@ultimateluigi9878]

The first half is actually how you picked Kris' boons and banes in FE12 (past, present, future), improving on that and having it tie more into the avatar themselves would be a huge step forward

[@Ender41948]

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon the avatars.

[@KrimsonKattYT]

Lapis has an amazing design. I won't stand Lapis slander!

[@Supahvegetah]

He had us in the first half

[@jaimereupert4247]

How?

[@Amferam]

Another thing to say about the writing feeling A.I generated how they handled Chapters 10 and 11. At the end of 10, the party is trapped, but at the beginning of 11, we are miraculously outside. Somehow, the time crystal is in Veyels possession. We defeated a ring-bearing enemy let's get the ring, oh wait, no, Veyel can somehow pause time and take the ring, which isn't how the time stop works for us. Oh, look, it's Ivy, and she somehow stole the time crystal from Veyle, but we can't take the rings from fallen enemies now because...

[@SteelandSouls]

I wonder how much different Engage would feel if it wasn't actually an FE game but a spinoff into a different genre like a fighter or a beat-em-up or another Warriors title.

[@creativename2281]

I'm just saying, Engage sold more copies than Floparon saga

[@lacaserne9924]

Holy based

[@Zyaire286]

True!

[@ShadowWolfRising]

What's Floparon Saga?

[@maxspecs]

Crazy it sold more than a free game

[@Cenriquezm]

@@ShadowWolfRising The dude's trolling Mangs. It refers to Andaron Saga, a full fledged romhack that was made by made by a group lead by Mangs. He has a few videos about it.

[@Speedwinghere]

A lot of this is opinion based which is fair enough but allow me to make a few corrections to claims which aren't. Bear in mind I don't give two hoots about story or lore but even my glancing over it seems to be a little more informed than some of the takes made here. In regards to the four hounds Mauviers motivations with Marni are actually brought up in his supports with Veyle, infact practically all his support chains are about his motivations and regrets about the four hounds. Zephia and Griss wasn't meant to be a love story, it was meant to be about how her one driving force was her desire to have a family and the irony that she didn't realize that Griss and the hounds were basically the children/family she wanted the whole time, although I agree the death scene goes on too long. They explain the lack of Dragonstone situation with Alear and Veyle. Veyle talks about how as long as your Dragonstone is intact you are still alive, and buried hers a long time ago. This is further brought up in the xenologue where if Nel dies her Dragonstone breaks. In the case of alear she gives her stone to Veyle before her 1000 year sleep, this stone then breaks the first time that alear dies in game. This is why neither of them turn into dragons, whether or not this is a good idea or not is leaning into opinion territory. Same face while bordering on opinion I will say, what would happen if you layered the faces of practically any of the casts of fire emblem games A minor point but you say Etie ONLY has a 40% strength growth, this is the second highest personal strength growth in the entire game so I'm not too sure what you mean by this. The build point works though however it was kind of done as a joke between retainers that she tries really hard while boucheron does nothing and is stacked, their supports are all about this. Etie was ripped pretty hard by the localization team and if you take a look at some of her japanese supports is one of the characters with the most changes outside of goldmary and rosado. I don't really understand why your last point was it doesn't feel like fire emblem when in your video yesterday you said it feels like a more classic fire emblem, which one is it? All in all this video was much of what I expected, complaints about visuals and writing as opposed to actual gameplay. Which is probably one of the main dividing parts of engage on how much the individual values those two things over each other. As a side note if I engage defender numero uno had to say what I think engage did wrong it would be 1. severe lack of marketing, 2. Suspect UI issues (surprised there was no mention of this) 3. Relying on a core fan base of long term fans of the series as opposed to the vastly larger new fanbase brought in by three houses. 4. Putting the DLC on the world map as opposed to in a menu, fooling people into thinking its part of the main game itself and destroying their playthroughs

[@ChillstoneBlakeBlast]

The UI issues were horrendous. They literally have to let you inherit skills in the arena in an update because no one wanted to go to the ring chamber just to inherit skills

[@Mangs1337]

1: "See a characters supports to view their motivation" is bad game design. Supports are optional. A characters motivations should be explained in the main story, especially with a major antagonist like Mauvier. 2: That's fair. I still think they just didn't want to spend budget animating a dragon-form, but maybe that's just me. 3: For the GBA games they would look similar due to how sprites are confined to a certain row of pixels, but for some of the later games, they would look very different. 4: Fair enough. 5: Engage feels more like Classic FE than most modern FE games in terms of pure gameplay, however, it's aesthetic presentation and feel is more akin to Tokyo Mirage Sessions than Classic FE. I could have worded this better though. 6: Wow can't believe Speedwings is negative about Engage. It's truly joever ヅ JK ty for the comment. We'll probably always disagree on Engage, but that's fine. We can at least take some joy in knowing there are at least 2 fans out there who like the game ;D

[@aphato2770]

Oh yeah that UI can be super ass. The class selection in particular is something I actively despise. An incredible class system that is squished into a corner of the screen despite needing much more space.

[@Speedwinghere]

@@Mangs1337 I actually agree with the majority of your negative points on things like story and presentation etc. The difference is these barely effect my enjoyment of the game compared to the parts I do value.

[@deanmcmullin1263]

i have played through most of the fire emblem games a few times, 3 houses i have 30+ playthroughs cause i very much enjoy the games faults and all, but when it comes to engage, just 1 playthrough bore me to hell, the characters were very bleh at best, the fact that alfred's story is the same no matter what you do feels so bad to me, outside of using tiki to buff everyones stat growth i either feel extremely overpowered or massively underpowered. The support dialogues even more so with the emblems themselves are frankly wasted, characters says 1 line emblem says 1 line then character says they are greatful they are here as an A rank support like why even have it there, i honestly stopped doing supports cause they had very little to even talk about and felt like it took away from the whole game, which sucks cause 3 houses i still listen to all support dialogues even after the 30th playthrough. sure the game looks cool, but I dont play fire emblem for the looks 3 houses wasnt great looking compared to other games on the switch but the characters and story were some of the best parts of gaming for me in the last few years, this game felt like a Saturday morning cartoon dubbed and edited by funimation, frankly i wouldnt be surprised if the swords were turned into finger guns ala early yugioh, i was so hyped of this game and it had a lot of potential even more so with alear being "evil" in the past, almost felt like we could have been given a choice to turn evil again, but no power of friendship and all. there are fun fun parts of the game, yes the battles are some of the more fun i have had and the engage system is a lot of fun, but when i can play fates more than once and enjoy my time and i cant even fathom playing through this game a second time, really hurts and disappoints me. sorry for the rambling.

[@DoggyP00]

If you ever ask anime fans to list their top saddest moments in all of anime, you'll soon realize that making a half assed sad backstory the second before they die is a VERY effective strategy for most people.

[@KrimsonKattYT]

Only crappy shonen anime like Naruto and MHA do that. The ACTUAL saddest scenes in anime are in actual well written stuff like FMA and dramas.

[@DoggyP00]

@@KrimsonKattYT I was specifically thinking about FMAB when I said this lol. Also, come on, Naruto is a master of sad anime moments before it started getting repetitive and a crutch for bad writing. That said, there's definitely plenty of well handled and well set up sad moments in anime, but unfortunately many of the ones you'd find on a top list have none of that.

[@DisplayThisOkay]

Literally every villain in Bleach. I never even watch the entire show just few episodes and every fight was a cliffhanger followed by flash back episode of the villain's entire motivation/backstory before cutting back to him getting killed. It works pretty well until it happens the 4th or 5th time. Then it just becomes silly.

[@fakesmile172]

The Demon Slayer strategy. It works on more than just anime fans.

[@great_icosahedron]

sadly, this only really works if the characters have any actually redeemable qualities and somewhat understandable motivations. Also, the writing is pretty important to get right as well. FEE has none of that.

[@kylebennett789]

Engage as a whole is this enigma that teeters between what makes an FE Game good and bad. Yeah it's the most interesting and engaging (haha funny joke) gameplay in the series alongside a few breakout stars from the cast, but they somehow did everything else wrong. I believe we can get a good story and good gameplay sometime soon, whether it be whatever the next FE remake is or just a new title on the switch 2. Talks of this game died a year ago, and this game has way overstayed it's welcome. Hoping for some good news at The Game Awards.

[@DeusExDraconian]

One glance from me and it looked as if it had completely abandoned the "low fantasy" vibe which Fire Emblem had. It looked as if it had shed its soul.

[@thomasquesada7248]

Lmao Fire emblem « low fantasy » was always just being generic and I’m glad titles like fate and engage decided to shook itup

[@Ender41948]

​@@thomasquesada7248 You ever think what you view as generic is actually just the series' identity?

[@thomasquesada7248]

@ it’s not identity when it never bothered to have one Low fantasy is supposed to make magic special but fire emblem always treated magic as just a normal thing

[@paulman34340]

@@thomasquesada7248 I think the OC was referring to well te Sominel and the fact the protagonist is a Manakate! Now I think Three houses went TOO far in the Low Fantasy angle with the loss of the shapeshifters AND Manakate (Seteth and Flayn don't shapeshift, so don't REALLY count as "Manakate" traditionally despite the fact they kind of are!) while Engage went TOO far on the High Fantasy angle! Ironically they're is ALOT of Cake Eating with both entries (everything to do with Rhea, Byleth and Sothis as an example for 3H and well Much of the NONE fantasy stuff with Engage! I swear my issue with the Sominel is it creates the SAME fucking problem Fates did with the MyCastle! Why don't the character's retreat within there or something?! The Sominel makes it WORSE as My Castle is mentioned only like ONCE in it's introduction to the plot! The Sominel is APART of the plot to an extent! I don't hate the place as I like exploring, but I feel Fire Emblem going forward should use the BASE CAMP from Three Hopes as THAT made more sense then BOTH Garrag Mach and the Somine as a stop between for your Army before the next battle! I didn't mind LOSING customization of My Castle as I BARELY Customized mine! Only added the ESSENTIAL and the Statues of character's I'm using and that was it each playthrough, Garrag Mach was fun first playthrough, but a part of me REALLY wanted a menu, same feeling STILL with the Sominel that lets me ACCESS the functions without needing to be there! Sort of like Base camp back in Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn for those of us who DON'T want to stop moving forward with the plot! This could ALSO help in situations where it's STUPID, ironically Three Houses had the right idea with the Shops being available on the Map menu, Engage did the same but only for Weapon and Item shop AND NOT THE BLACKSMITH which I found foolish! Will say simplifying the Forging Material was good, but they could STILL work it better! I disliked so many DIFFERENT materials in Three Houses, but I think their going in the right direction with the Ingots.....just hope they find a DIFFERENT way to get them then the DOGGOS) But anyone complaining about the HIGH FANTASY that is Pepsi-Kun/Chan! I feel their an INCREASE of what they were trying with Byleth and Corrin. Frankly speaking BYLETH was at their best (especially IF YOUR CAN HAVE THEM FUCKING SPEAK, 3H showed this with SHEZ and Byleth ironically in that spin-off) when they were an ADVISOR/AIDE like Robin to the chosen Lord! I'd like that to come back! Avatars in Fire Emblem should NOT be the main protagonist. Yeah Byleth and Shez were "main charactes" but in the overall plot and everything, your chosen LORD of the Three is the main character, you are THEIR partner! And that works better then Corrin and Alear (though I dont OUTRIGHT hate Corrin and I actually LOVE Pepsi-Kun/Chan! They were EVERYTHING I wanted Corrin to be...sans the Dragonstone, I feel SLIGHTED that never came into play even if Emblem Alear is a nice replacement) I would like the Emblem Rings to STAY in the series, but not be as you see them in this entry. Make them a sort of mix of the Crusader Scrolls/Bond rings/Starspheres of the series! Buffers that give a Stat Bonus AND Growth Modifier and maybe a unique skill or so, but you don't get skills off them and by DEPOWER I mean about as strong as the S RANK Bond Ring Bonuses! DON'T make them a major story element either. Frankly some people, ESPECIALLY Three House newcomers likely got caught off guard about how far they went in the OPPOSITE direction tone wise because Three Houses was pretty fucking Dark (I laughed abit when this was said cause I didn't feel it was THAT Dark compared to FE4-5 now THOSE were fucking dark, I will say it does come CLOSE though) so this was an attempt to lighten it up. But it went pretty far in that direction (while still havng it's dark moments!) But lets be real! Metaphor from Atlus pretty much was the more SUCCESSFUL answer to the OVERPOPULATION of "Low Fantasy Game of Thrones wannabes" that makes Engage LOOK abit better (same with Three Houses abit) because I think folk are TIRED of all the GOT wannabes! FE did it LONG before it was COOOL (FE4 and 5) as they did it when the BOOKS were out at that, before anyone even KNEW what game of thrones (which was SUPER Low Fantasy as magic was RARE to see and the fantasy to the people in that world was coming back in a "I thought it was all LEGEND" manner! Low Fantasy means magic is RARE to that "It was LEGEND" manner! I mean the people in alot of the FIRE EMBLEMS sans the Shapeshifter absent ones like FE4-5 have easy access to magic. It's the SUPER RARE stuff, the "Avada Kedavra" that aren't EASY ACCESS) So I feel if the next FE tones it down abit from Engage! It will be better for it! At least make the "3H" Stans calm the fuck down

[@professorlemon4386]

In defense of Etie through her support with Bucheron she comes off as very self conscious of the fact that she isn’t as big as him and keeps asking about his secret to working out. those two retainers have a dynamic where one doesn’t work hard and has build come to them naturally the other works hard and never advances. And lastly at least her constant working out is reflected by her high strength growth

[@lucg4005]

40% strength growth and 5% build growth in the archer class. To me, pannette executes the stupidly strong woman archetype better, but that's me.

[@Scrap_and_build_ourselves]

Here's one thing Bwangs did wrong: Not finishing Golden Sun 2.

[@n00bplayer72]

Things I disliked: > No Paralogues. These go hand in hand with worldbuilding. The Emblem Paralogues don't count. Like, imagine a paralogue that unlocks if Ivy and Diamant are alive, and it involves getting two Elusian and Brodian armies to stand down, with rewards depending on how many enemy soldiers are still alive at the end. > The skirmish difficulty scaling. If you had one or two units that got all the experience, it over-inflates the difficulty of the skirmishes so that you can't train weaker units. If you beat the DLC too early, it's even worse because the extra characters always join prepromoted Level 1, even if you're at the end of the game. > The game doesn't properly explain SP: you still gain some SP if you use bond rings. It's always better than nothing. But the fact the game doesn't tell you this meant I got halfway through the game with a good portion of my party having no SP because I just kept Emblems on my favourite characters only. > I would also say some of the class skills are the worst in the series so far. For once, Berserker is worse than Warrior in all regards. No innate crit, the devs seriously thought Smashing weapons would be a huge deal, so they gave berserker a class skill that revolves around it. > The Lord/retainer schtick is worse here than Fates. At least in Birthright and Conquest, some retainers joined separate from their liege. In Engage, we get 10 units in the space of 4 chapters during the Solm arc for example, that you now have to integrate into your party.

[@TIDbitRETRO]

The gameplay feels like it was crafted by masters of the genre, but the writing was done by a 12 year old girl.

[@sorinvonotomo]

All of your points are solid. The one I feel the most is the one with most of the cast being either a royal or one of their two retainers. That and your point on world building. Honestly, it feels like Engage just took everything Fates did either bad or mediocre and cranked it up to 11. At least Fates had a fun my castle system that took about a minute to do all of your activities in and it didn't have fishing. Only thing I liked was the gameplay, which was fun... until I feel tempted to keep a spreadsheet handy of all of my characters internal levels so I can do the side battles without getting curb stomped by the over-leveled enemies that zerg rush you. What were they thinking with that?

[@MP-tw4fc]

I never understood the emphasis on Engage’s gameplay. It’s fun at first, but the rings and the silly over the top transformations totally tank the enjoyment in the later chapters.

[@tobiz1922]

THE DIVINE DRAGON LOOKED AT ME

[@yashinebrown9179]

Dang who would have guessed all the criticism is story.

[@LuckyTheReviewer]

One of the biggest grievance i have with Engage is the fact it introduces the idea behind the Zero Emblem during the final chapter of the game and we get no real explanation about it only to be given a story dlc and then have it not come up whatsoever during said story DLC. Logically, the dlc should have focused on that lingering question from the main story: The Zero Emblem. What is the Zero Emblem, who even is it, what does it do, etc. Instead of getting that, we get a DLC story that introduces two new characters who didn't exist in any shape or form outside of being children of Sombron and as well as good versions of the hounds, all to simply be playable characters once you finish the DLC story as well as be a sort of explanation for where the Emblem Bracelets came from but that's it. Where was with Fates' story dlc effectively being the aftermath of the Birthright and Conquests routes and focusing on the children units, Three Houses' story dlc focusing on the Ashen Wolves, Sitri and Jeralt's past at the Monestary, and SoV's story DLC being focused on the events prior to the start of the game regarding the Deliverance's beginning and the backstory regarding those characters, nearly everything regarding Engage's Story DLC was created for the purpose of having a story DLC because they likely felt obligated since it's been a thing for the past FE games since Awakening and not because they wanted to answer any of the lingering questions the story of Engage would have left the player with like, again, the Zero Emblem.

[@MaxCheng95]

The single biggest failure Engage has done is simply the skirmishes. Everything else are just addons to the bill

[@ubercow6611]

In the case of Mauvier, he was with the hounds because they were serving Veyle under Sombron and he already knew her before that. I'm thinking he was close with Marni since Marni and Veyle were kind of similar

[@ZytenEspada]

Didn't he or Veyle also want him to become her knight? That would be plenty motivation and he also had no where else to turn to.

[@owen-tv9dt]

...and I guess I'll bring up the four hounds too. Marni and Griss were broken people who were indoctrinated into this. Marni was abandoned by her mom as a kid at a fell dragon church, Griss was a wretched disciple who hurt himself to please the dragon god. Mauvier is the only one who defects as he's a full grown adult who swore allegiance to Veyle, not the fell dragon himself. Zephia is allied with Sombron because she respects power, and because she wants a child- living for thousands of years means seeing and forgetting countless faces and none of them mattering in the end. A child to give her company and who could stand the test of time. The villains aren't to be sympathized with, they're a bunch of wackos who are crazy and enjoy burning down orphanages but they still have character and goals. Zephia was not "redeemed", she just found closure in getting to know what love felt like after a life of closing herself off from it. They're goofy cartoonish villains who are really just messed up people. And that's a step above shallow.

[@TheMaestroMizerous]

That's fine but why did they need to show up and lose every chapter damn near. Why not have other villains than these guys?

[@hillnor6812]

@@TheMaestroMizerous If you want a gameplay/story reason, you're out of luck, since the most likely reason is because voicing more characters is more expensive. I'm no expert here, but considering how much better than 3H the graphics are, I would assume the budget is there.

[@fakesmile172]

18:22 I kinda love FE5's cast for that, it's full of commoners, con men, generic knights, etc.

[@TheGreatLords]

About the number 4 showing a lot on japanese media, it is a buddhist ifluence of the 4 heavenly generals, the "shitenno", also 4 can sound like death and be a unlucky number, 4 generals + evil conotations = evil generals, any story with a maoh (demon king), will have this trope in some shape, final fantasy does this a lot with the 4 fiends, anime about demon kings, and so on, when you realize what it is you will start to see this everywhere

[@Austin_Schulz]

The nations are basically the political compass

[@goatslayer3160]

I can ignore most of Engage's issues. But the two things I hate the most about it, that keep me from replaying it, are the lack of deployment slots, and the ludicrous amount of reinforcements they spam you with in the late game.

[@thomasquesada7248]

Skill issue straight up Never had any problem with reinforcements and lack of deployment slots is a fake issue

[@Dew8Dew]

I think there are definitely some games that do both of these things way worse than Engage, but I have the same exact issues with Fates and Hector Hard Mode, so I totally see your point tbh.

[@AlexLee-je5jg]

My biggest issue with FE Engage characters is that anyone can tell me that they are V-Tubers and i will believe them instead of being FE characters.

[@Rodri34451]

No surprise considering the character designer is Mika Pikazo who has done vTuber stuff like Hakos Baelz's main design.

[@demi-fiendoftime3825]

I have a discord friend who keeps insisting Engage is better than 3 houses saying 3H sucks because it's all built around and focused on a silent protagonist and that the rest of the cast's progression tied to them when no that's no what hapens at all. Was it mistake to make Byleth a silent protagonist because they were leaning hard into persona as inspiration yes and 3Houses has many flaws and that's one of its bigger ones but the universe is not solely focused on Byleth and the characters go through plenty of growth without them. I can't say the same for engage which seems to solely exist to worship Dragon Jesus

[@skynet0912]

My own main issue with Alear is how the game keeps hammering at the point that they are a divine dragon, then you are a fel dragon, then a mix of both due to Lumera giving you her divine power... But even with ALL THAT, Alear never does anything related to being a typical dragon, not even as a cool ending cinematic or just as a one time transformation for the final fight! They keep calling you a dragon, but never let you do anything that FEELS dragon-like. Hell, they make you into an Emblem, but you still get no actual dragon gameplay. And how cool would it have been if Alear ended up as a new form of dragon, made up of a combination of fel and divine energy, focussing more on your dragon aspects, instead of just making you an Emblem, the "fire emblem"! Not giving Alear a dragon form in any way with how often the dragon thing is brought up, is like saying that someone in a movie is the best sniper on the planet, but outside of carrying their rifle on their back the entire movie, and people talking about how good they are, we never actually see them shoot. Alear just feels like a dragon in name only, and as a way to make them plot essential...

[@makohidari4723]

one of the more annoying things in the last few games are dragons that don't transform and might as well be human. And when they do transform like Corrin. it's usually not the best class they can have. They give Corrin a special sword afterall.

[@crasusakechi]

I am definitely guilty of judging this game by its "cover" when I saw the protagonist design and the "collect heroes of past games" I thought it was 100% another gacha mobile game and didn't even look at it. Still after learning it is not a gacha game nothing really pulls me to give it a chance.

[@Edagui97]

You could just do like I did and watch Excelblem's playtrough compilation and play the game purely for the gameplay.

[@Rodri34451]

The game does have a gacha system tho

[@Edagui97]

@@Rodri34451 Thankfully it's far from mandatory, but I just couldn't bear the thought of living without Dire Thunder after I witnessed its might. Thankfully, the gacha can be cheesed with relative ease, so it doesn't bankrupt you.

[@bobowon5450]

Alear isnt a blank slate avatar. Theyre just kind of a mary sue

[@thomasquesada7248]

Mary Sue that start cowardly and lose everything after getting overconfident In your dreams that may fit the Mary Sue definition maybe

[@liberator-san4700]

As an Elibe fan im required to poont out that Nabata is the Desert. Arcadia is the village. On the other things though... Yeah thats true. Didnt even notice the design thing until you pointed it out. But i thinj the biggest thing that killed this was that not only were the characters redesigned but even the story was! You're basically playing through both Awakening and Fates all over again. Not only that you were playing through a version of Fates and Awakening that had nothing of why it was good. Awakening had you retreating after a massive battle against the Plegians in an effort to rescue Emmeryn only to realize it failed. Engage had... You somehow getting away after having all of your Emblems taken away like... How, how did you all get away? Fates, oh look its the "My parent got used by the bad guy just like Mikoto, Sumeragi and Arete" Also the hero worship got to the point that it was already very annoying. I liked it better when it was Mark, youre just a bystander who happened to be here. Which i personally think is jow ot should have been done. For the characters i also feel that the problem was just as you said, they're one and done. Not like Elibe where Legault gave the group suggestions. As for the DLC though, yeah, just, what were they thinking? In Hard mode the final DLC level takes forever to make with no room for error while playing it on normal allows you to 2 turn the level. I just hope that the next game learns from this to not repeat it.

[@anthonynguyen1289]

Unless I’m misremembering, wasn’t Mauvier in the group because of his affection for good Veyle? Now why doesn’t he take her and run? He either doesn’t think it will work or knows Veyle is dumb and cares for Sombron too much.

[@musiikkimies9241]

Huh, that character overlap image is an interesting point

[@finaldusk1821]

I'll give Etie this much: Archery is a deceptively strength-dependant fighting style. A bow's full power and range requires an archer strong enough to properly draw it, and war bows are monstrously hefty. The thin, speedy archer archetype (while perfectly valid for good old rule-of-cool) feels overplayed and is not true to what those weapons require from their wielder. If anything, I'm surprised that FE doesn't have more strength-based archers, especially as that in-game stat largely dictates their damage output.

[@hillnor6812]

I feel that there's a lot of criticism about the story, but when he gets into what he doesn't like about it, he says that there's missing things where there aren't. As if he skipped parts of the story and complains about them not existing. I don't blame him, if you dislike the story, it's understandable to skip it, but criticising the parts that you skipped because you didn't like the story instead of the parts of the story that made you start skipping it is weird. I find it kind of funny how in Fates Corrin transforms into a dragon and everyone stops caring about it just after it happens. In Conquest, the characters have never seen you turn into one and don't say a thing twhen they see it. Then, we get to Engage, where everyone reminds you Alear is a dragon, but, in the end, Alear never transforms.

[@justinmoreno390]

21:59 The point of Etie as a character is that she wants to get muscle but no matter how much she trains she can't achieve it so I think it makes sense that she doesn't have much build from a gameplay perspective.

[@Lexyvil]

Interesting. The map looks like that of Breath of Fire 2, except the latter's more square shape than ring shape.

[@JakeJonRoberts]

I’ll admit to bias because I wifed up Etie in my initial playthrough, but her insecurity about not being that tough and muscular is shown through her supports with Boucheron. Etie shows she is someone who is fitness-minded despite not having clear physical advantages, and that’s what makes her endearing and dare-I-say relatable. At American Universities, people can major in Sports Science, and I feel like Etie would have a doctorate in that.

[@nightmare1455]

To me one of the biggest bad, it's the localization team took too much liberties changing the original material, the fact that certain characters have entirely different personalities between the japanese dialog and the localized one. It doesn't excuses some other bads (the world building and the story arc that is generic at best and allready used (Hello awakenings)) but that point alone make me feel like japan and the rest of the world didn't play the same game

[@DSeditor22]

Ok so I’m at around chapter 18 (I think?) currently, and I already spoiled myself the whole story including DLC to finally decide to get the game, so here’s what I have to say despite others making awesome comments :) Yeah plot isn’t good, but what I’m observing/focusing is its ties to awakening + fates (at first I was gonna do a checklist but I think players of both 2 games know instantly). Some days ago I was reading its manga in English translation and so far I actually like it more than the game’s story, but plot-concept still isn’t great, but who knows what I decide when it’s done. I really loved 3Houses’ story, and engage’s trashy story was a painful letdown. Another thing I loved about 3Houses was its characters, and again I was let down by engage’s characters. I understand Diamant’s popularity, but I feel weird for only liking most Zelkov and Amber and Seadall (and can understand why they’re hated). What do I think of Alear? Uh.. not professional at character design, but I don’t find Alear SUPER trashy.. just not too great and I also hate the worship-gimmick. Also agree that the characters didn’t feel too important to the story; maybe others would disagree, but I think 3houses’ characters contributed great, mainly the BlueLions class. Againnn what I loved about 3Houses that engage sucked at was the supports. I occasionally review 3houses’ supports off game since they were most entertaining, but perhaps part of that was the voice acting, but even the support-topics were great and creative and funny too. There were only few engage supports I liked, with one being Zelkov & Jean being WHOLESOME, so I feel bad for missing any good supports (I’d like any replies inform me best supports!). Also I think my heart just disintegrated when I discovered that any Alear gender can s rank any character and all characters except Alear get a paired ending (yes you can guess i also loved 3houses' paired endings and especially how theyre modified based on your route). perhaps im super 3Houses-biased but i enjoyed Awakening and Fates too. ONLY thing that engage surpasses all 3 mentioned is its gameplay obviously, and thats why im thankfully having some fun with it (id also admit the somniel is better than the monestary). ONLY issues/struggles i have with the gameplay is grinding money and SP is PAINFUL and why do the sidequests have to be harder than the main quest or can someone tell me how to grind my weak/low-level units to prepare future levels? ok think im done now so thank you if theres any chance you finished reading this :)

[@BigmanDogs]

I think the main issue is that it primarily felt like a sequel to the mobile game from an optics standpoint

[@DoggyP00]

Yes, because it had one half assed mechanic that a tiny part of the game.

[@BigmanDogs]

@DoggyP00 I'm just saying that the first thing I thought when I first saw the game was that I thought it was some weird spinoff and not a normal sequel.

[@DoggyP00]

@@BigmanDogs yup, the random thought you had based on your imaginary version of a game you didn't bother to look at for more than 2 seconds is the sole reason for why it failed

[@definitelynotanarcissist.3135]

@@DoggyP00He’s not talking about the gacha mechanic, calm down.

[@DoggyP00]

@@definitelynotanarcissist.3135 Yeah, he's not talking about anything. That's the point.

[@Blizz3112]

I would've rather have people blame you for things you had no control over then worship you over things you had no control over... at least then you have a goal to be proven worthy by others around you over time... conflict in teams is the bread and butter of RPGs, as them getting along from the start is so bloody boring...

[@zackrin4007]

NOT HAVING S RANK SUPPORTS PROPERLY AND PAIRED ENDINGS AS A PLAYER OF FE WHO ALWAYS DOES WHATEVER PAIRS I CAN I HATED THIS GAME

[@LuminousArc92]

designed to have ng+ but didn't have ng+ could have allowed for early access to seals to change out builds use of skills inherited from later emblems to allow someone like Bunnet actual relevance in his niche from Celica's Favourite Food skill because why would you inherit that on him late game when you get her back (putting aside why you'd use him at all) the emblem rings gatcha system the starvation of seals early game. Its unhinged how long you have to wait before you have a chance to promote

[@JustCrazyDK]

6:58 He's doing the Dr.Wily.

[@happygol-lucky5938]

20:48 It's not a potted plant on a stain. It's the entire concept of Barbie as a product, only they're saying it's all different characters instead of "X Barbie". 🤔

[@isaiahandersen6224]

I am admittedly an Engage fan. Every point in this video, aside from the last one, I agree with. Whenever I play this game, I ignore the story and focus on gameplay and customization. With this alone, I can sink my teeth into hours of this game and have fun. Yes, I get extremely annoyed whenever I click on Framme and she says “the divine dragon looked at me!!!” There is overwhelming cringe, a terrible story, some terrible designs, and I can admit to that. It does piss me off like any other Engage hater or most people who view this game. Whenever I play this game in a room full of friends, they do label the game as “cringe” because of the story and designs without knowing anything about Fire Emblem, which I think should say a lot. However, this game does feel like Fire Emblem to me because the strategy is still there, it feels important when you lose certain units (showing that some units are important to you than others, despite their writing and bad design), and there is a lot of planning that goes into this game. I get a genuine kick out of successfully creating a build while also feeling heartbroken to lose said build in an Ironman context. I get this same kick from Fates and the GBA games. While the GBA games have less planning, you’ll usually at least plan who you will use and who your units will support with. The game is a lot of fun for me and this is genuinely how I feel. I am completely aware that not everyone thinks like me. I know that a terrible story and bad design can be more the sufficient to hate this game. I know not everyone plays this game in an Ironman context like me. And I know this game isn’t for everyone. But, as mentioned, I do get genuine enjoyment from the customization and gameplay. It’s a guilty pleasure and I’m willing to overlook the bad design and story to say the game is good for me. I really enjoyed the video, you made really good points. I’m glad you were able to be honest. While I may like the game and you don’t, I still feel civil in saying that is completely fine and valid. The only thing I will request, however, is to give the game a try from an ironman standpoint on random growths mode. Trust me, it aggravates me too that you have to beat fixed mode in order to get it. Definitely design flaw. But, this is the mode that did change my mind to liking Engage. If you don’t want to, completely fine.

[@ExcieXC]

ENGAGE BROS 💀

[@lacaserne9924]

... we can't stop winning

[@ItamarO93]

The greatest strength of 3H was its writing. Tough act to follow. Engage was not qualified in the least to attempt it...

[@Eternalwarpuppy]

I'm pretty sure the reason Mavier stuck around was that he felt sorry for Veyle and the best way he had to protect her was to sever alongside Sombron.

[@lucg4005]

For the design of characters being over the top and resembling vtubers, it's cause they literally were designed by an artist who has made vtuber designs. Don't know about budget cuts or limited time at all, but perhaps hiring the artist to only make the art for character designs heavily limited how they created the world. Maybe the artists was only in charge of making the unique characters, and another team was in charge of making the world and it's culture and stuff. Having two separate teams for that instead of one cohesive vision of the world design probably caused weird problems, though that's just my random guess. If the character designer also played a role in the creation of the different nations and their designs, then I got no idea. But that's just my guess.

[@Dew8Dew]

Damn I think my comments are getting hidden, unless I sort by newest, even on incognito, they just won't show up, what gives?

[@Mangs1337]

I can see them.

[@Dew8Dew]

@Mangs1337 I just responded to you, and the comment isn't appearing anywhere.

[@nohrianguy]

I can see it as well if that helps

[@justinmoreno390]

FE engage is my third favorite game in the franchise. but in terms of story it's just shadow dragon 4 (or in other words the most basic of the basics when it comes to fire emblem stories)

[@fakesmile172]

At least Shadow Dragon had a few good characters and decent world building (though having a sequel definitely helps)

[@vic77krack52]

25:55 but in the previous video you said that It feels like clasic fire emblem

[@RedSnd028]

This threw me off as well. In the positive video, he was definitely referring to the gameplay mechanics felt like FE. In this, one, I think he's talking about the overall presentation of the world, story, characters.

[@insertmemehere0]

I agreed with you, Fire Emblem Engage is just not that good!

[@SG-xn2rb]

We still farming engage hate lol

[@fojisan2398]

Yeah cuz its funny

[@dimitripatronas2409]

FUCKING YES!!!

[@rances4418]

This isn’t really farming as he also released a video about what he liked about this game. Honestly all talks about engage have died down even hate.

[@TheMaestroMizerous]

​@@rances4418Kinda shows how unremarkable the game is when Three Houses still gets more discussion

[@SARGON439]

Notice how 90% of the video was about the story and characters and not the actual gameplay? Mangs, you once said in regards to Conquest that you can skip a bad story, but you can't skip bad gameplay. Hold the same standard for Engage, it's a good game with an extremely bad story

[@マリー-v4p]

Yeah I mean nice video and all but we all know engage has a bad story.

[@Enidx10]

The gameplay was top notch. Dare I say the best in the series. But the story and characters are hot garbage (I literally skipped every single cutscene on my first play through because I couldn’t stand the story anymore). I loved my first play through, but I will never touch the game again because the characters are so boring and generic looking.

[@benedict6962]

Japanese comedy is still viable, the problem with those is that plenty of other titles do it much better. You can call it anime, but actual anime has much better dogeza memes, and then there's the Yakuza series. I think a bland final boss is very different from a simple one. Plenty of very good, entertaining villains are very simple, and they work because they don't pretend to be anything more complicated than they are, leveraging charisma from hammy delivery and style. A bland final boss fulfils the assignment of having a coherent motivation, but.....that's all. And they can still fail to achieve even that.

[@battlecarrier]

IDK that I would ever call it a flop, it still outsold any pre-Awakening Fire Emblem by a longshot. It's also the best candidate for a randomizer because of all the vectors that can be randomized, class, proficiencies, emblem/character recruit order, etc.

[@ZephyrK_]

In terms of modern FE though it definitely did flop. Being the least best selling entry in over decade is NOT a good thing for a franchise that was consistently trending upwards

[@Dew8Dew]

Most people that call it flop just do so without any proper research, all of the other modern FE games got extensive marketing and a lot of trailers, while Engage had one big trailer when it was revealed and then released 4 months later, obviously comparing it to 3H and Fates is extremely silly.

[@lsrrr3857]

@@Dew8Dew Maybe flop is a stretch, but having higher pre-sale numbers but selling half the amount of three houses is hardly an "okay" performance no matter which way you slice it. Any outside factor that would be used to explain the lower sales cannot explain the higher pre-order number.

[@Dew8Dew]

@@lsrrr3857 Personally I don't find the low sales such a big problem, especially in comparison to 3H, which is where they really mattered, being the first FE home console game since RD in 2007, I really don't think selling over half a million in the first 3 months can be considered bad, for an extremely, and I repeat, *extremely* niche genre like tactics RPG, sure, it's nowhere close to 3H or Fates, but as I said earlier, comparing it to those games is unfair to it. It should be stated that Engage was done as early as 2021 (something we know of thanks to the german rating system, unfourtunately I don't think I can post links on YT without getting my comment deleted, but either search for the USK website or a video by Good Vibes Gaming about it, and it should be clear enough), so it's not like IS has been working on it for super long, and now they're expecting big returns after all this time, the game was supposed to come out in 2020 for the 30th anniversary after all, it would not shock me if they're already working on a new title in the slighest. I sure hope this kind of info is in the video too.

[@Dew8Dew]

@@lsrrr3857 (The comment I wrote got deleted on my end, so I'll rewrite it again, sorry in advance if you get two of the same comment) Personally I don't find the low sales such a big problem, especially in comparison to 3H, which is where they really mattered, being the first FE home console game since RD in 2007, I really don't think selling over half a million in the first 3 months can be considered bad, for an extremely, and I repeat, extremely niche genre like tactics RPG, sure, it's nowhere close to 3H or Fates, but as I said earlier, comparing it to those games is unfair to it. It should be stated that Engage was done as early as 2021 (something we know of thanks to the german rating system, unfourtunately I don't think I can post links on YT without getting my comment deleted, but either search for the USK website or a video by Good Vibes Gaming about it, and it should be clear enough), so it's not like IS has been working on it for super long, and now they're expecting big returns after all this time, the game was supposed to come out in 2020 for the 30th anniversary after all, it would not shock me if they're already working on a new title in the slighest. I sure hope this kind of info is in the video too.

[@noctris1396]

A thing I hate about Enage, is that it doesn't include a support library, not that I could find anyways. I always loved after beating a FE game a few times and looking to see I have seen all supports available in that game and thus seeing that characters full, well character. It doesn't really affect gameplay but it was a QoL feature since I'm pretty sure supports were introduced.

[@BumpBobLooly]

Unintentionally Unsympathetic: The Four Hounds, save Mauvier, can come off as this. Even though they're responsible for pretty much everything bad that happens in the game or actively assisted in doing it, actively gloat to some degree about how much they enjoy what they do, perform many Kick the Dog moments with blatant cruelty which always top the last thing they've done, and treat Veyle very much horribly, they're given very sympathetic send-offs in their last moments, which don't quite land with everyone. While Marni sacrificing herself to save Veyle is meant to be heartbreaking, most of the player's interactions before that moment had her threatening to kill the party and mocking them for trying to stop her. She's given a brief backstory revealing abandonment issues and obsessive need for approval, but many players find it as a weak explanation for her actions. The narrative presents her as a tragic person whom ended up working for bad people, but many have noted that this not only fails to excuse her kill-happy attitude, but also that her decision to try to save Veyle at the last minute stems less from a genuine change of heart, and more from her no longer supporting Zephia's treatment of her after getting to know Veyle's Dark and Troubled Past. Griss spends the entire game acting as a Ax-Crazy psychopath, even threatening, in his own words, to rip somebody's guts out in what is definitely not a bluff. His main interactions with the player have him trying to kill or mock them and even before the final battle with him, he openly states how he'll never switch sides. And while it's revealed he never knew his mother, was indoctrinated by Fell Dragon cultists, and was more or less raised by Zephia (and loyal to her over everything else), this is not only mentioned exactly once, but also during a surprisingly prolonged scene where him and Zephia have a heart-to-heart in their last moments, which incidentally rubs many the wrong way for reasons described below. It also doesn't help that he not only did nothing to stop Zephia from killing Marni, but mocked Marni after her death, resulting in Mauvier considering him as culpable in Marni's death as Zephia was. Zephia claims many times that the Hounds are like a family to her, which comes across as extremely hollow when it's shown how severely she's willing to punish them for defying her, even killing Marni and almost doing the same to Mauvier, all while claiming these to be acts of love. This is made even worse by a flashback sequence where her past self speaks to Sombron expanding on her motivations behind wanting a family. For one, it's easy to interpret her wish for family to be not so much about love, but rather, because she's interested in having loyal and obedient subordinates (being, as Sombron explains, why he had children at all to begin with), given this appears to raise her interest. And second, her comments of hating Sombron for not allowing her to bear a child of his can come off as a case of Insane Troll Logic when the flashback shows Sombron did consider giving her one after winning the war, refusing only to act as a father. And then, there's her heart-to-heart with Griss where Zephia's thinking of the Hounds as her true family despite everything, which can be laughable given how she mistreated them. Muddying the waters however, is that she eventually admits to Alear she doesn't really understand what they regard as love, and that she may have never truly experienced due to killing her parents young for lacking control of her powers, and her battle conversations with Mauvier in Chapter 23, as well her final scene with Griss, supports more the interpretation she truly desired to have a family, but never realized she had already formed one up until her last moments where it's already way too late to salvage it. Goldmary can easily fall into this. With her narcissism and condescending attitude, she can already be difficult to put up with. It's not helped by her recruitment being mandatory, so players who didn't want her have to take her along. While she has some friendly moments, a lot of her better moments are only implied. Her Jerkass moments are more frequent and has very few supports where she apologizes, if at all. The culmination comes with Alear's support chain where she reveals her backstory. That she was always popular, until she was sent to the Academy and discovered other people were more popular than her which upset her. While it's intended to reveal her being insecure, her narcissism is shown to be completely genuine, even in private. This all comes with the fact she has no character growth from this and Alear even encourages it as a good thing.

[@ZytenEspada]

The last scene was really good with Griss and Zephia but it definitely was OOC, Griss is basically spitting facts and asking the same question as us. "Why wait until now to do something? I was actually baffled and it kinda made me dislike Zephia even more. Great scene but horribly executed. Idk who's worse them or TWSID.

[@r12365]

I hated Engage because it does not respect the player's intelligence in the least, you really brought across several of the ways in which it did so.