fire emblem: the sacred stones

One of the stranger things about Fire Emblem (GBA) was that your character was outside of the game. Specifically, you were identified as the "tactician", and instead of fielding each battle with an avatar you would be commanding the characters in your party. It was a bit odd during the cutscenes when the characters started talking to you, because it's not like you had a choice as to how the story was directed - a feature that may have made the whole tactician aspect a little more valuable. You didn't even get to pick and choose who got to join the group as the outcome of those scenes was predetermined.

Intelligent Systems has returned this year with another Fire Emblem, entitled The Sacred Stones. Dropping the tactician approach, the game follows the main characters, Prince Ephraim and Princess Eirika, who have been ousted from their homeland by a treacherous neighboring kingdom and must gather an army to take it back. It's your typical adventure story where a ragtag bunch must come together and fight the forces of evil, and there's nothing wrong with that. What I don't like, however, is the lack of any new features. Everything is exactly the same.

You could accuse this of the Golden Sun series as well: after all, The Lost Age was just the same game following the adventures of a different set of characters. Though as an RPG/Adventure, Golden Sun allowed the player to participate in the story as it happened, whereas Fire Emblem is unfortunately limited to telling you the story through cutscenes with talking heads. While the art may be very appealing, the dialogue is as campy as ever and rarely was I surprised about what transpired. This is nothing against the gameplay itself, however, as it remains a highly competent turn based strategy game (and vastly different from the previously mentioned Golden Sun). You're just looking at the same tilesets, character avatars, and battle animations. Since the battles are the core of the game, they should at least appear fresh and interesting. What would have made this outing of Fire Emblem a little more palatable is the inclusion of a map editor, something that Intelligent Systems put into Advance Wars 2.

The storyline, then, should be the one aspect of this game that makes you want to continue playing. For me, though, it wasn't. The enormous cast of characters lends itself well to some interesting situations, and a wide spectrum of personalities that eventually make up your army. You may even grow to love certain characters, playing the game to see what happens to them and ensuring they survive. The permanent death of your characters was one of the best features of the Fire Emblem series, because it made you value each character's contribution to the campaign. Pegasus Knights may be weak, but they are usually the only ones able to rescue another character from immediate danger - an ability that allows you to save your most powerful troops. Despite all this, the big picture is lost amidst the story arcs and flashbacks in some kind of fantasy soap opera, and I began to get agitated waiting for each cutscene to be able to play through the next map.

Fire Emblem is certainly one of the best turn based strategy games I've played, coming close to Final Fantasy Tactics Advance in terms of its addictive qualities. However The Sacred Stones feels more like an expansion, not a sequel. This should be great news for fans of its predecessor, but it doesn't really offer much except more of the same. It makes me wonder why this game was even made, given the DS will be seeing Advance Wars DS this August. Why not just make a version of Fire Emblem for the DS, introducing the use of the touch screen that we've heard so much about? I find it hard to accept that Nintendo is trying to extend the life of the GBA when their latest handheld is capable of so much more. The Sacred Stones may have a different ending, but if getting there requires viewing all-too familiar scenery it hardly makes the voyage worth travelling.

I believe I can see the future