Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance

[Duddyroar]

Boxart


Release Dates
US - 17th October 2005
Japan - April 20th 2005
Europe - 11th November 2005

Synopsis
All of Tellius is torn in a bloody war, and only you have the means to put it to an end. Take command of a band of mercenaries loyal only to you, and guide them to victory against the forces of the Daein kingdom. Test your tactical prowess against mages, monsters and madmen as you command your knights, winged soldiers, pikemen, and skinshifters in man-to-man, turn-based combat. Three-dimensional battlefields present all-new tactical challenges, and graphically stunning battle sequences put you right on the battlefield.

Screenshots




Buy It Links

[MrKirov]

Fire Emblem: Path of Radience (GC)

Got this today, havent heard much about Fire Emblem before, apart from the fact its supposed to be great, so I picked it up.

Its good, so far very good strategic opportunities, and im ony about 2 hours in!

The anime cutscenes are GORGEOUS, but the actual in game scenes are quite poor, which is generally down tot he fact its just endless reams of writitng- and since its not very good it can become annoying

First impressions are good though, and the game seems much more open, and easier to get into than say, Disgaea, Phantom Brave et al.

Anyone else picked this up?

[dragz]

I must say, I am really suprised there hasn't been a thread posted about this game yet.

[Kaladron]

Where did you order from mate? I'm still waiting for my copy from DVDboxoffice.

[vertigo]

Does it have the same godawful cheating Nintendo trademark 'AI' that the GBA one does?

[gossi the dog]

I've had the US version for a good few weeks now and i'm gradually approaching the end. This is the first Fire Emblem game I've played so I can't compare it to any of it's prequels, however I must say that it's very Shining Force and that it is great if a little easy once you ditch all your useless characters.

Vertigo

What do you mean by cheating AI? So far the game has seemed pretty fair to me.

[fatbatch]

I haven't started this yet (still in the grip of Advance Wars DS), but having played through the two Fire Emblem GBA games I'm puzzled by the 'cheating AI' remark - both seemed fair to me, though tricky if you try to keep everyone alive ...

[vertigo]

Pasted from a previous conversation.

Typical example of something that happens over and over:
Stage boss had something like 4HP left, only one other enemy left on the map who approaches my Sage who is in a forest and attacks with a 3% critical hit percentage and his displayed damage rate was something like 7 or 8 so my Sage could easily have taken a normal hit.
He connects with a critical.
My Sage dies.
I need my Sage so I have to start the stage again.
My guy was hidden in a forest, so had the advantage of an enhanced defence stat, he's also a Sage, so a higher class than a normal Mage and you would think swords would have a bit less of an effect on upgraded magic users, yet an unenhanced soldier scores a 3% chance critical hit on him one turn from me beating the stage.

3% is a chance, but when it happened to me over and over again, to important characters that I'd purposely guarded by putting them in forests and surrounding them with more obvious targets, always in situations where I was one turn away from achieving something important that would either win the stage or turn it all in my favour, critical hits received without fail, I gave up playing it and recently sold it.

It just wasn't worth the amount of time I needed to invest in it to go about each level analysing the minutiae of every single turn as if I was trying to S-Rank an Advance Campaign level on Advance Wars.

It's not even that I misunderstood how the system worked, I understood the weapon trinity and how different classes are affected by different attacks, but the balance of Fire Emblem was all over the place to the point of unfairness.

There were points when I took one of my characters with a critical hit ratio of 95% and missed three turns in a row. Odds of 6859:1 if my calculations are correct (19x19x19).

I think Critical Hits in Fire Emblem, at 300% strength of a normal hit, are massively overpowered.

I hope Nintendo's coders learn how to do competitive AI properly in future, although going by what I know about Mario Kart DS they obviously still haven't.

[gossi the dog]

Critical hits used to annoy me in Shining Force and could see it properly annoying me in this where characters die permanently. However I don't think I've had a character hit with a critical. That maybe because the only weak character I've used much is the one healer and I've made sure that he's surrounded by other characters to act as guards at all times.

[harlowlad]

This is an stunning GC title. If you like the GBA versions then you are gonna love this ! Buy !

[gossi the dog]

Well I've just completed it. I ended up losing just two characters and it took me just over 30 hours to beat. It's really good and IMO a must buy Gamecube game. The only fault that I can think of is the story which has the potential to be great but ends rather abruptly and anticlamatically. I just wish Sega were to make an all new Shining Force.

[Kaladron]

My copy arrived yesterday and I've put about 4 hours in so far. While I don't think that it's a patch on Shining Force III, as a Fire Emblem game it's a triumph. The move to 3D has made the battles a lot more believable and tense, all the best elements of the series have been retained and some exciting new bits have been added. The half human creatures are cool and, while I haven't tried it yet, the shove command is a good idea.

The only thing that lets this version down is the battle animations. They're not as fluid as the GBA ones and don't seem to have the stylistic flair that went into the SF3 battle anims.

Apart from that though it's good stuff and a welcome Gamecube release in what has otherwise been a bit of a dry spot.

[Kaladron]

I'm up to the battle with the three ships joined together. WOW. This has got tobe one of the most epic battles I've ever seen in a tactical RPG, three squads fighting at once, loads of bases to cover, chests to plunder and princesses to protect. Its pretty intense.

I can't believe no-one else is posting in here. Are you all waiting for the PAL version or something?

[gossi the dog]

The PAL version is out and I've already finished it. Everyone seems to be ignoring this game, which is a shame as it is excellent.

[Kaladron]

Couldn't agree more mate. There hasn't been a tactical console RPG of this quality for many years. I'm a fan of the Nippon Ichi games but they tend to overcomplicate the genre a little too much for my liking. Fire Emblem has the perfect balance and should not be ignored if you're a fan of the genre.

All I need now is a decent new Shining Force and I'll be a happy man.