Full Review for Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance by nintendo_dude

Introduction

So, the Gamecube finally gets a slice of the Fire Emblem pizza. Although this is the only Fire Emblem game I have played and I have no knowledge on any of the other games whatsoever.

Anyway, Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance's story revolves around the character Ike, the son of Commander Greil of the Greil Mercanaries. The two races on the continent of Tellius, the Beorc (human) and the Laguz (cross between humans and animals) view each other with mistrust. Shortley after Ike is accepted as a full-fledged mercanary, the neighbouring kingdom of Daein launches a surprise attack on Ike's homeland of Crimea. Upon a scouting mission they come across an unconscious young woman, who later lays claim as Princess Elincia, the last surviving member of Crimea's royal family. After agreeing to become Elincia's excorts, Ike and the mercanary group become involved in the nationwide conflict, which eventually turns into a continental war.

Graphics

Most of the graphics are pretty simple. The conversation scenes consist of no more than four of the characters at once, and when a fifth character speaks, he replaces one of the character's positions. The characters are in 2D, but both them and the backgrounds are well detailed and colourful. There are also a few cutscenes throughout the game that feature great graphical effects and backgrounds, although they don't appear very often. The battle scenes are pretty good, with some nice special effects, such as the critcal hits. When viewing the actual battle map, it looks okay, could have been a bit better though.

8/10

Sound

A lot of the music is actually very catchy, and does sound like the type of music you would find in a strategy game based in a fantasy world. The sound effects are nice (I especially like the critical hit clashes coupled with the death clashes).

The voice overs in the cutscenes were done badly though. Ike's, Mists's and Elincia's voices were spoilt by cheesy American accents. People in fantasy worlds do not have American accents. I didn't see any in Lord of the Rings or any other fantasy games and movies. Although I thought Commander Greil's voice was quite good. And I liked the way the Black Knight's voice was combined with the echo of his helmet as he spoke.

7/10

Gameplay

The controls are simple. You will mostly be moving characters around and watch them fight each other. But the game itself features some great strategy levels. Even on the Easy difficulty, a few of the later levels can prove to be tricky. But that is what a strategy game is about right? Normal difficulty is pretty challenging and Difficult difficulty is an absolute beast. If you can beat the Difficult difficulty without losing any characters then you are a strategy master.

There are plenty of weapons and characters to choose from throughout the game too. It will take some time to get used to who's good (my vote goes to Ike, the three Laguz nobles, Boyd and Jill) and what weapons are the best to use (my vote goes to the Brave weapons, Killer weapons and Ike's special sword Ragnell).

The only downside is that sometimes levels can be a little frustrating, especially if you wish to avoid any of your characters dying, and believe me, losing a character hurts. Watch out on Chapter 26 and Chapter 29. Those chapters are the hardest in the game.

9/10

Lastability

The game itself is quite a long game. On the average playthrough it will take at least twenty five hours to complete if you include all the conversations and preparations. It is also recommended (by me) that you start on the Easy difficulty on your very first playthrough. After you have gone through once you will crave more. Also, once you have finished the game, you will unlock extras, including the Bonus Trial Maps (how many you unlock depends on what difficulty you completed and whether or not you have linked with the Game Boy Advance Fire Emblem titles) which enable you to experience even more strategic levels as you are rated on several fronts (such as Survival, meaning how many characters survived). You will want an A rank in everything, of course,

After your first playthrough, you will want to play the game again, most likely moving on to higher difficulty setting. This game is very addictive. You will be playing this for months on end.

10/10

Overall

Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance gets the silver medal as best game on Gamecube (Resident Evil 4 takes the gold) in my opinion. It is a fantastic game with only some minor flaws. It actually hurts to lose a character, and you will want to make sure everyone is there at the end, trust me, but I am not the type of person who spoils things for other people so I will reveal no more. It will test your stretegic knowledge to the limits, especially on the Diificult difficulty settting.

So even though Gamecube was a dead console the very second the Wii was released, I advise you hunt this game down if you have not got it already. I guarentee you will love this game.

9/10

Final Score: 86%