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yanderefairyangel · 8 months

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*sight*

Alright so basically was again talking about Engage story and how I thought it did a better job then 3H with someone and at first it was very cordial, but when I said that in Engage, animals, clothing and dishes are linked to the area unlike in 3H where everything is linked to the monastery, I wake up to a condescending reply where I am told I have no reading skills and as much media literacy as a 3 year old and that I was straight up lying, before getting blocked with no chance to reply to this person... who managed to misunderstood something I said in less then 2 lines. So I decided that instead of just ranting I would actually use this to show how the Somniel is better then the monastery while explaining further this idea because I actually think it's a clever idea and shows why you should never rely only on conveying your worldbuiling through telling.

So what do I mean by linked ? In both Engage and 3H you have many things originating from all the continents, but in 3H everything is linked to the monastery whereas in Engage it's not, the only thing that is linked to the Somniel is what originates from Lythos in terms of dishes or clothing, and only because the Somniel is part of Lythos.

If you want something originating from Firene, you need to unlock said region from Firene first while keeping in mind that the animals or materials avalaible in let's say , the map of chapter 4 is not avaliable in chapter 5's map and slightly different then in map 6. Same can be said about Brodia, Elusia and Solm and even once you unlocked those areas, you still need to make donations to be able to unlocked some dishes in the Somniel, some outfits or to adopt some animals. Therefore, we understand that those are all linked to the different areas of the world it originates from, all the more so when Engage having no NG+ if you replay another file, you have to do this again giving a real meaning to the exploration phase. It's also giving you the sense that Alear is actually gaining knowledge on the world they live in and are getting used to it, fitting with their own character developpement of slowly stepping more and more into their role as the Divine dragon. Additionally it helps making the Somniel much more tolerable because it gives you a sense of progression, it doesn't feel monotone nor routine like. You get to visit different landscapes that are moreover beautifully designed with colorful graphics meaning you are less likely to feel bored and feel like you are repeting over and over again the same thing. The fact that the more you progress into the story, the more you unlock stuff even activites linked to one specific character (work out => Alfred, Wyrvern riding =>Ivy etc) so it makes the Somniel feel actually meanigful and gives the feeling that Alear is getting used to their world, as well as varying in the Somniel during the playthrough so that at no points it feels boring while still leaving the possiblity to skip the Somniel when you don't want to go back to it. The only cons of this strategy is that it's up to the player to actually seek for the world and do the exploration and donations but depending on what you want to see on your first playthrought, it actually leaves you the choice.

Now in 3H. The monastery is the place where you end up spending most of the game and oh boy does it hurts the story. So while 3H has this gigantic worldbuilding, the main problem is that it's conveyed through dialogue. And unlike Engage where you had only 2 chapters of Lumera and Alfred explaining the whole world to Alear and then lefting the rest to explore so that the story could focus on it's events and left the support dwell more into it as well, the characters will very, very , very often repeat the same wordlbuilding elements. So now, while 3H also let you cook specialty from Adestria, Faerghus or Leicester or let you pet animals from diverses regions... you never work for them. They aren't linked to the area of the world they originate from, they are all linked to the monastery as they are already there. All you need to do is to fufill the request that unlocked the cooking activity. It's not "Oh I went to Faerghus and now that I visited the place I can cook any dishes originating from there", no it's already there. And while I get it since Garrech March is the center of the world and that with these many students from all over the continent, they need to have a lot of recipes from all around the world, it kills the creativity because everything is handed to you, you just need to do some secondary quest rather then actually explore the world so as a result, the only thing you have to do is do monastery activities rather then visit the world to get them. Same thing for the animals, they aren't linked to their world, but to the monastery and thus everything is avalaible regardless of which route you choose. Even in Leicester you can have stuff from Faerghus in the monastery because it is linked to it rather then to the place it originates from, so it creates a very monotone thing in the monastery that contributes to its repetitveness and gives little variety to the route you choose. And when the game asks you to replay everytime the first 12 chapter, let's say that it's not good. And with NG+ it's worse because the necessity to gain activity point that gave the impression Byleth was becoming a better teacher is ruined by the sole fact that all the points you had can be re-acquired right at the begining despite you doing nothing to deserves it on this playthrough.

Moreover, it never feels like Byleth is learning about the world they live in because the characters will constantly acts as if they didn't knew about... everything. It doesn't matter how much time you can spend at the library reading about the family and the world, for reasons the character will always treat you as if you didn't read those. And this is because of being a route game. Since 3H can't know which routes you'll play first, it constantly treats every 12 chapters as if you never played the others while also taking into account that you might have played the others and trying to rely on that for a lot of things. It creates a paradox, but paradoxes never works and it actually hurts the story because one of the reasons why 3H feels so easy to burn out from is the repetiteveness and the monastery being that one place where all the worldbuiling is stocked into when it's not conveyed through dialogue or supports or the main story, it only makes the monastery more and more tedious. Compare that to the Somniel where you have the possiblity to skip those phase, where when you go to the donations maps, you can notice the difference between the different areas, to the world exploration phases after battle where the title screen will appear to tell you "that you don't know enough about said animal to adopt it", where you have to make donations to unlock all these regions linked items. There is more variety here.

If Engage was a route game where you can side with any of the 4 kingdoms, no doubt it would have a real advantage over 3H by the fact that these exploration phases and unlockable items linked to the regions they originate from with what's more, the possiblity to observes the landscape gives much more variety and diversity making the whole Somniel and fighting phases less monotone. In 3H, the only variety offered by choosing your path is your students, whom you can recruit anyway no matter what houses you choose, so it ends up that 3H's has little variety. Imagine if depending on whether you choose Black Eagles or Blue Lions, you end up with different stuff for each route : different pets to pet, different plants to plant, different dishes to cook and if you could unlock outfits linked to these regions rather then having only the outfits that are Garrech March made since you can only choose to dress your units between differents uniforms or a maid/butler outfit. Say whatever you want about Engage's design, but at least, it lets you dress your units as how people in the kingdoms traditionally dress up. But since the only NPC you can intereact with in 3H are people of the monastery, it once again kills that diversity. In Engage, you can talk to NPC living there in their environement. In 3H you can't. The only way you know how people of Faerghus dress is by looking at Dima and the other with their outfit that seems to fit more for a country where there is a cold climate but that's about it.

And worse : since 3H recylcles a lot of maps and place present in the support for the dialogue even in main story, it's even less varieted. It gives even more the impression that you don't move, that everything is static. And it's not even that all maps are the same, but the fact you have so little opportunity to appreciate going outside of the monastery makes it hard to project yourself. You can literaly go click on map yet it feels like you don't move at all and mainly due to the calendar system. Outside of battle and side mission, can you really say that 3H lets you explore the world ? And is it really that different between the routes ?

You wanna know a game that does exactly like Engage ? Fates. Freaking Fates.

Fates has its flaw, but diversity and variety was not one of them. When you choose Hoshido, you get special item originating from Hoshido in my Castle and since those aren't available if you choosed Nohr, so that means those ressources are linked to Hoshido and that gives more variety to the playthrough.You have to choose an entire route to get to have both ressources. It gives actual variety to the landscape and life to the world. 3H in comparision hands you everything it has no matter which route you choose : dishes ? all there in the monastery. Animals that can be found in variying regions of Fodlan ? They are all already in the monsatery, no need to visit any country to adopt them. Clothing ? All comming from the monastery, no way you can cosplay as some villager from Remire or any palce you are curious about.

What I am trying to say, it's that by showing its worldbuiling and letting you explore the world and do all these little stuff, Engage is able to make it's world more lively and creates an actual dynamic between Alear and Elyos rather then having them staying passive. In 3H, the worldbuilding is always presented to us but the fact that it is linked to the monastery and not avalaible in any other context ruins it and fails to give it life, if anything it gives everything to the player no matter the route making the experience feels shallow which is what I am sure player that feels like 3H has this enormous worldbuilding and does nothing with it comes from. It's great to have a big worldbuilding, but because everything is tied to the monastery rather then the region it is originating from, it ends up feeling like there is no substance in this worldbuilding and in 3H's case it hurts even more due to how it makes the replay experience so repetitive. You can play a different route, but the monastery phase will remain pretty much the same since it's the same story for 12 chapters, only some dialogue changes and different scene... doesn't help a lot does it ?

And you are pretty much forced to play the monastery phase just because you need to boost your teacher points to unlock every monastery feature but with NG+ it's only once you'd have to do that since you won't have to do it for the next playthrough making the whole thing even more tedious.

The Somniel in comparison is not only very easily skippable, but the fact that it gets more and more feature because of your progression in the story and the world rather then your Somniel activity does convey a progression rythm making the exploration phase worth it. Unlike for Garrech March were the feature depended only on how much you invested into monastery actvity, for the Somniel the feature rely on your progression into the world. And the lack of NG+ in Engage actually respect that every of these feature is linked to the world and that's up to the player to search for them, unlike the monastery where everything is handed to you, linked to the monastery and therefore making it that the world of Fodlan fails to come to life.

This tell don't show way of exposing the worldbuilding that 3H has is really a big flaw, especially for the gigantic world it created for itself. Engage has a simpler and smaller world, but the fact it lets you explore it and most importantly, interact with the world rather then being locked into the Somniel like Rapunzel in her tower helps it give it life, it breaks the possible monotony of the Somniel by giving variety to your moves.

If 3H had a world hub phase like Engage, you have no idea how this would improve it's wordbuilding by giving it actual substance. At first Engage's activity might seems like silly little fun, but it actually gives you a dynamic and active relationship to said world rather then staying at home and having everything handed to you over

Now that's not saying Engage has a perfect worldbuilding but I can say that if the devs had a library like for 3h, it's likely that to fill it you'd have to again unlock the kingdoms first to have them in the Somniel and it's possible they might have you have a mini games like a quizz with Vander since it's how it worked for all the Royals having a special activity to train Alear. And in the case of 3H, if the reading could actually pay off. That would be an improvement.

#fe engage #fire emblem engage #fire emblem #as someone who plays a lot of world hub #like Animal crossing of Magical World #and games of the sorts #Let me tell you #staying static kills the funs

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