Confession #7: I left work early to pre-order my Wii, but when I picked it up I left it in the package for a whole day so I could rearrange my room to maximize the playing experience.
For my second unconquered game I decided to play another of my favorite franchises, Fire Emblem. I believe my first exposure to F.E. was in Smash Bros. Melee's 26 character roster. (14 more than the original Smash Bros.) The Fire Emblem series was represented by Marth and Roy (I preferred Marth). I read about their backgrounds in the Trophy room and eventually bought Fire Emblem for my GBA. three years later when it was first released in the US. In which the story revolved around neither Marth or Roy, but nevertheless I was hooked. It was probably the game that started my interest in turn-based Strategy games and eventually Advance Wars cemented that passion into my gaming soul.
This game is pretty different from others in the Fire Emblem franchise. You can award bonus Exp in between chapters, fight as beasts, only one Light Magic user, several classes have been removed, and several have been added. I'm not even sure if you can switch classes, the characters may be stuck as they are (which makes sense for the beasts). If a unit dies its still gone forever, an aspect I'm glad they didn't remove. I played the first couple of chapters to get through the basics and tutorials and made it to the turning point in the story introduction.
Ike has saved Princess Elincia from the invading Daein army and has just made it to the beast country ruled by Caineghis. A black knight appeared and challenged Ike's father Greil to a fight. From the conversation the player learns that he was Griel's apprentice. The Black Knight slays Griel and Ike has a last minute heart to heart with his father. (Great another kid losing his father story. He handles it better that Tidus though.) Progress: 4 hours. Chapter 8 or so.I must say, that for the Gamecube, this game looks pretty great. The cinematics are kind off half-cell shaded, like the upcoming Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. In-game graphics are pretty smooth and make the repetitious battle sequences more enjoyable to watch. The sound is okay, the sound effect the game makes when you gain experience grates on your nerves very quickly, but you can recognize the F.E. music in the background. I chose the normal difficulty setting because I am not masochistic. Anyone who has played a Fire Emblem game will tell you that losing a unit is extremely frustrating and results in frequent resets.
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