We finally got a fully voiced Byleth but at what cost?

I've read fanfiction better than this. Not like I had much hope about the story in the first place since it's a warriors spin-off game with a completely new protagonist. It has some good scenes and fights of course. Especially SB. I actually kinda liked the route and more Edelgard content is always a win, but man ...all in all this game is really kind of a mess.

Some characters behave strangely in order to fulfil nothing more than pure fanservice and awful tropes (looking at you AG). And some of them are just irrelevant in general.

The secret chapters are a joke and just prove that the original characters are unnecessary and only exist because it's a warriors game. I guess that was to be expected but it's still disappointing to see. Welp, I'm glad this isn't canon.

The gameplay is fun for the first few hours then it's getting too grindy and tedious for me.

Overall Three Hopes is an alright game if you like the cast because the new supports and character interactions are fun to watch, but this game only made me appreciate Three Houses even more to be honest.

I know this is a fanservice spin-off "nobody dies" AU, but the circumstances surrounding the lords this time around are too convenient imo. There was simply no tension. Even the endings felt too abrupt and all routes lacked the emotional impact Three Houses offered. The routes were lacking in emotional investment, mostly due to odd pacing and lack of exposition in certain things and character interactions.

(The game leaked a few days ago, so I had the chance to play it early.)

I never thought I would return to 3 Hopes after completing 1 route. Since I was so burned out after finishing one path. But here I am after completing the other two and I have to say, 3 Hopes is a welcome return to the continent of Fodlan, seeing familiar and new faces among the Three Houses crowd.

Battling enemies in the usual turn-based engagements? Nope! 3 Hopes operates as a hack-and-slash RPG. More specifically, the musuo-like kind. You also control a new protagonist. Shez. A run-of-the-mill mercenary with strange abilities. It will be up to you to choose which house to ally with. Like in the previous game, 3 Hopes also features 3 main routes to play through. This review was only possible after I finished all three routes. Since I felt making a review when I had only beaten one path, didn't sit well with me.

Anyway, let's begin.

Gameplay is a major shift from the turn-based nature of Fire Emblem. Here, you'll be fighting in a musuo-like gameplay of hack and slash. Elements from the franchise are integrated relatively well. Using terminology from the series and implementing different unit classes having a variety of different professions from lancer, ax, sword, bow, brawler, and mage. Each main weapon class leads to different classes and different abilities. There is even an element of base-building for your base camp. Which provides a nice way to upgrade your equipment. The game is pretty much what if Fire Emblem is a hack-and-slash? A weird thought, but strangely enough it works here, to some extent.

For the most part, I love the change in gameplay to an action hack-and-slash compared to a turn-based game. You get right into the thick of things by decimating countless mobs and eliminating your enemies up close and personally. Didn’t feel bored utilizing different abilities and units to keep the battles fresh. There is impact and it never gets old commanding your allied units for an all-out offensive. The feeling is euphoric and it is awesome watching your army mow down the baddies right alongside you.

However, the same objectives and S-rank requirements got old real quick since you cannot innovate much to keep the battles fresh constantly. Sidequests & paralogues, in particular, do try to reinvent the wheel in some way. Yet, they still conform back to the old formula of killing ‘x’ units within a time limit, Defeat ‘x’ unit, oh wait extra reinforcements, oh here complete this side-mission while you go into battle. Artillery firing at your units? Please eliminate. Enemy forces calling for reinforcements? Stop them from executing an action. Here are some new reinforcements to add to the battle for you to tackle and defend your bases. Oh, you thought the main story quest ends? No way! Here’s another enemy you have to defeat. This formula becomes tiresome to complete again and again. And when you thought you killed an enemy. Psyche. I'm going to retreat until the plot forces me to die. Sure there are several approaches in store for you like escorts, special-type monsters, conquering key strongholds to move closer to your map, etc. But it is not enough.

I feel the game could’ve been more innovative to keep the combat formula from being dull. It's fine in the beginning and middle acts, but once you do a lot of missions, the combat gets stale. And trust me, I’ve finished all paralogues in one route, every single thing I could fight on the map, extra sidequests, extra limited-time quests to completion. Skipped several in the end, due to realizing they offer no real benefit to me. But for the most part, I'd say 95-98% of all missions I completed for the Black Eagle route.

I skipped the filler battles in the other routes using a vanguard whistle which is an absolute godsend. You don’t need to fight every battle. Using the whistle allows the player to auto-complete the battle on the world map. Thereby, skipping the process instantly. Why the heck wasn’t this item available in your first route? Honestly would’ve helped lessen the tedium and rinse-and-repeat battles.

Granted I get it is a Musou Fire Emblem. So I can’t expect great expectations. But it would’ve been nice to have a stellar musou-like game that knocks all areas out of the ballpark. And for me, I feel the element of reusing the same objectives, some maps, and enemies being the same could have been done better. Two specific enemies, in particular, are reused more than several times. This becomes especially egregious when reinforcements are the same enemy types with no real distinct features to differentiate them. Same enemy combat class again and again.

Artificial intelligence, for comrades at least, is decent but could be better. Many times during a battle, I had to micromanage units to attack an enemy then once they were done. My ally will sit in that same spot. Even when I have them set to attack. Orders would’ve been nice for them to follow through. For example, after defeating an enemy, move to a nearby enemy commander. If a player-controlled unit falls below 50% health, tell the healer to heal them. Prioritize map objectives over killing a single enemy.

Continuing on with S rank requirements I feel there is a missed opportunity to do extra. Like erasing the whole concept of s-rank. And only set different requirements such as: Manage 500 hits. Use ‘x’ warrior specials. Cannot use a single healing item during battle. No dodging. No switching to a different unit. Female/Male characters only. Use a single unit only. Use certain classes only. Fight with only disadvantaged units. And so much more I could list. Heck, the handicap battles you fight in each chapter, the developers could’ve taken handicap battles and implemented some of those handicaps for S-rank requirements. Instead, we are left with killing “xxx’ units by ‘x’ time while taking “xx%” damage.

One thing that I immensely enjoyed was strategies. At the end of a chapter, you will have to face the final chapter battle and it is here and only in this battle can you implement strategies. Various parameters can weaken the enemy, from giving your army reinforcements, allies to heal, units to protect, or special units to advance on the enemy, magic bombardment, special formations, and unique types I won’t get into because that's spoiler territory. But suffice it to say, I was very satisfied with how the developers implemented strategies to work in favor to spice up every final story battle in a chapter. These parameters you can activate greatly turn the tide of battle and can lead to one of Fire Emblem’s aspects of making a unit join you. Some strategies can even be unlocked by completing filler battles on the world map. So it pays to finish everything on a map to unlock more strategies.

Support conversations are such a relief, and a delight to see the Three Houses cast again. Which expands and greatly answers some lingering questions I had in the past game. And while this entry is contained in an alternate timeline. Pretty much all support conversations I’ve seen are an extension of what occurred in Three Houses or some cases provide much-needed context into a character’s background or relationship with other characters. It's one of the biggest backbones the game has to offer. And I laughed so hard in one conversation. Amused in some, puzzled in others, gained much-needed insight into the relationships and backgrounds of characters I rarely use, and broke a smile during moments of wholesome and endearing moments. The game also had plenty of quality-of-life enhancements like fast traveling to any unit, location, and building making it easy to get to the unit you need. Along with seeing current support levels with any unit during any activity requiring the two of them. This feature is a godsend in particular due to not needing to go back and check which unit is currently at a certain rank and then back to the food hall in FE3H.

My playthrough lasted over 93 hours and to be frank without the support conversations, I feel that number could’ve been cut by more than half if I didn’t pay attention to grinding for these conversations between my units as much as I possibly can. A buddy of mine took over 130 hours to complete all paths in the game. So your times may vary depending on how much or little you do in your base.

Storywise. Each route felt distinct enough with cool cutscenes, sweet character development with each house leader, and more. And each path had enough content to interest you further. However, each route did use a bit of copy-paste formula. Leaving me a sense of samey vibes a bit. But this occurred mainly in the middle ground of each path. The game makes up for this by displaying scenes you wouldn't otherwise see in each route. So if a major event is glossed over in one route, you will see the full extent in another route. Which makes comparisons between each path easier to conjure the bigger picture. While I do have some reservations about each route, the final act is a pay-off, I looked forward to. Could it have been better? Certainly, but the game accomplishes this in a manner I find good enough.

Overall, I feel 3 Hopes is a decent FE spin-off game. Could be better regarding objectives, AI, map design and a bit on the plot of each route. Nonetheless, the excellent support conversations, adequate base-building, and character conversations hold the game up strong. The soundtrack is fantastic and I love the new arrangements and new tracks. Especially the leitmotif dropping here and there. I feel the game does justice in some ways to three houses in that if you’re looking for more of the world of Fodlan you’ll find that here. Some plot points which were left unanswered there are answered here. So. If you’re looking for more Fire Emblem Three Houses content. And don’t mind the shift to action rpg hack and slash. Look no further than Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes. I hope you’ll like it just as I did. And if not, well that’s fine too.

8/10

Clickbait title: Fire Emblem Warriors if it wasn't terrible.

Revisiting FEW1 and finding it lacking in some- most- every aspect actually put a downer on my desire to play Three Hopes again, because I'm frankly not sure I have it in me to find out the game I once called the best Musou was bad.

Fortunately, I don't have to! Three Hopes is mostly great.

On the gameplay front, Thropes has traded out FEW's snappiness and relative speed for more deliberate and weighty combat. There's a greater spectrum of unit speed in terms of both movement and attacking here, which keeps the classes from feeling homogenous.
Instant skills from Pirate Warriors 4/Warriors Orochi 4/Samurai Warriors 5 have made their appearance in this game too, adding a little extra flavour and maybe some extra weakness exploits to keep things fresh. You only get two, though; no stacking 4 separate elements to instakill enemies.
What really makes the game feel phenomenal, though, is that every character has a unique ability that implicitly encourages the player to experiment, to find out the best class/weapon combo that'd augment their skill.
Take Sylvain, for instance. He's 'supposed' to be a mounted lancer unit, but... Gordian Stroke, his unique ability, boosts range and damage significantly as his combo count increases. Two buffs that apply to projectiles, meaning he's actually better off as an archer thanks to his ability to attack from several postcodes away.
Or you could take Caspar, a musclehead who's meant to be a high damage axe unit, but due to how his charge attacks work is actually much better suited to be a mage with some investment.
I could go on forever. The core here is one of those days.

Compared to FEW the strategy elements feel much less bolted-on, in part because every character has an oft-ignored Tactical Skill that gives them distinct roles and bonuses when commanded. While this can seem like a lot of numbers, the end result is less babysitting. Unlike its predecessor, maps actually feel designed to accommodate strategizing and those S Ranks come much easier if you split up like the Mystery Gang.

Really, though, the star of the show here is the blend of musou gameplay and Fire Emblem character building. Class changing is back after a grotesque absence in FEW and it requires markedly less investment than in mainline games. You are free to dick around and feel out certain class/skill/weapon combos, which will be necessary on higher difficulties because unlike FEW simply stacking more attack bonuses won't help. Hope you memorized the weapon triangle!

You'll note that I keep referencing FEW more than Three Houses despite this game fusing both, and we'll get to that later. First though, I keep referencing FEW because a lot of this game reads like Omega Force learned all the right lessons from the first game. Class changes are a thing, the weapon triangle isn't horribly unbalanced against you, Lords don't dominate entire missions, missions have way more variety, swords aren't omnipresent, weapons actually mean something... It is a total fixup of the last game's issues.

"So what's the downside?"

In my last review, I said that FE Warriors failed because the FE half of the game was lacking. Thropes has thirds; Warriors, Fire Emblem, Three Houses.

The Warriors third is fantastic. The Fire Emblem third is phenomenal. The Three Houses third is... perfect.

Hold your horses, because that's not blind praise.

Three Houses is a game of many, many issues. It is absolutely my favourite FE game and one of the most influential titles I've ever played, but it is a messy and incomplete game oftentimes characterized not by what it has but what it doesn't. It is a game where exceptional character writing and worldbuilding manage to solve stories that are at best boring and at worst terrible. It is a game where songs from the greatest Nintendo Game OST ever released are scores for some of the most narratively unsatisfying scenes you as a human will ever see.

Three Hopes, then, is a perfect adaptation of Three Houses.

On the character front, the supports are interpersonal interactions are better than ever. Annoying traits and poor-taste jokes are thrown to the curb, meaning people like me can listen to Bernadetta's supports without craving a cyanide milkshake, and characters like Raphael are now possessed of an actual character. In general, the sole word needed here is 'refined'. The supports were already 3H's best part and here they're better, although I do miss some of the darker ones like Sylvain's.

And Claude! Claude is a real character now! Not just a ghost from a rocky developmen! And he is an asshole, oh my god. It's great! Pre-release materials for 3H were very insistent that he was a sleekit scheming wee bastard, but this never manifested in the actual game.
It's on full display in this game though and arguably makes him the most detestable of the lords? He makes Edelgard seem like a moderate sometimes and I'm all for it. It's frankly kind of nice to have an asshole protagonist, and though the term "morally grey" is fast becoming a pointless buzzword alongside "media literacy", his route in this game is really murky.

But this is a tale of higher highs for lower lows, and the actual storylines are reprehensible. You know it's bad when I, notorious Golden Deer disliker, think their route is the best.

I hate using "fanfic" as a derogatory term, but as a fanfic writer who's been at it since 2011 I think I have a right to say: The storywriting in this game is on par with every other ~Alternate Universe~ fanfic. Like AU fanfics, Thropes is a story for people who just do not want to engage with any darker parts of 3H's story, and in picking a faction you are essentially choosing which one will be aggrandized so hard as to be infallible.

Do you pick the Black Eagles? Cool, Edelgard is now free from Those Who Slither In The Dark, and her crusade against the other factions is now entirely clean because TWSITD have been meddling elsewhere. You can even end one sub-war if you make a certain choice.

Do you pick Golden Deer? Cool, you're just playing Three Houses' Golden Deer route again, except this time Claude arbitrarily dislikes Rhea despite being privy to nearabouts the same amount of information as his 3H counterpart. At least the final boss isn't as badly justified.

Do you pick Blue Lions? Cool, the narrative sands off every bad thing about Faerghus, corrals all the remaining bad eggs into a basket for Dimitri to smash, and just... Look, the real reason I used 'fanfic' as a perjorative up above is because this route reminds me of particularly bad fanfiction. In an attempt to make the story work within its confines, characters are hammered into holes they aren't necessarily meant to fill, and while 'character assassination' is a really intense term, I feel it applies here.
This segment is longer than the other two, and that's because while those routes are bad but inoffensive, this route displays a peculiar attitude towards the Blue Lions that simultaneously feels like contempt and veneration. If you bring this route up online you'll likely see people call it out of character, and this is the one time where popular opinion and mine are harmonious.

And the original elements running through the story, centered on newly arriving protagonist Shez and their psychic barefoot service toy Arval, are... Odd. They feel decidedly thrown in, and the resolution to their arc actually leaves more questions than answers. Part of this is due to the fact that everything regarding them is spoken in that particularly annoying Vagueity Vagueness cadence that makes so much amateur mystery fiction fucking unbearable yet is sadly omnipresent here.

All of this, ultimately, does make Thropes a true successor. I love Three Houses, but I'm not going to pretend the overarching story of any arc is any good. This game is just the natural conclusion to it; ostensible fanservice muddying the waters of a game that was already an hour out from being a Snowrunner map.

...

But it's still Fodlan, man, and I love it. The worldbuilding is as tight as ever and it capitalizes on some branches left behind in Three Houses to do some exceptionally fun stuff within the setting's confines. Many maps offer a newer look at some locations only glossed over or alluded to in the original. The inspired architecture, outfits, weapon design, it's all here.

And the music. My god, the music. I recently booted up Three Houses to test how it emulates via dumping my copy directly, and the menu music made me tear up. That's what happens when you play a game for 80~ consecutive NG+ cycles!
Three Hopes carries on its legacy with some truly inspired remixes and fantastic original tracks, including one for Byleth and an amazing medley of leitmotifs that occur in the secret chapter. Particular shoutout to Wrath Strike's remix, which includes a fucking guitar solo, or the jawdropping Apex Of The World remix which actually made me tear up the first time I heard it? Legendary stuff.

Despite the thrashing I gave the story up above, I really don't hold it against this game because bad stories are just Fodlan's legacy. It is everything else that gave it a permanent place in my heart, and through the good parts Three Hopes elevates itself to the peak of the musou pile.

Also you get Rhea as a postgame unit and it's confirmed she wears toenail polish, so no matter what I was always coming out of this game as a winner.

Edelgard was right btw.

Pretty good game.

Went WAAAAY beyond my initial expectations for it. Really broke that "it's just a silly musou spin-off" barrier at its best moments. The 3H cast is still excelent with some characters I'd argue being utilized even better in this game while others go into fresh and exciting new directions.

It's a bit too lenghty for my taste since I'd prefer a game with this kind of simple gameplay to aim for a shorter runtime but it was not obnoxious or anything and New Game + will def make the next routes shorter and more chill

Played Azure Gleam, honestly backfired to go with the Lions this time since from what I think about this route and what I hear of the others it seems to be the weakest one lmao. Wasn't bad at all tho just had a good amount of narrative gripes here and there so I ended up thinking the main plotline was far less interesting than the smaller character conflicts that stuff like the paralogues and supports explored. So yeah just like Three Houses the characters elevate a faulty script, some things don't change.

Some rapidfire things I liked: Shez and Arval are fucking awesome holy I cannot go back to a version of Fodlán without Shez bro they actually elevate this shit so hard, one of the most fun MCs in the series. Byleth being voiced is such music to my ears, all the characters that weren't playable in Houses like Rodrigue and Jeralt were also fun as hell to see, I barely even scratched the Eagles route but I love Monica, music was fire, the elements of base management from Three Houses returning was nice and well done

Plan to do Edelgard and Claude routes in due time (ain't trynna do a whole other 40h musou campaign rn lmao), pretty sure the score is going up once I add those to the full picture

A lot better than I was expecting honestly, I love Three Houses, mostly, and despite the fanfic-y nature of this title I find myself strangely compelled to it. For reference, I've only done the Golden Wildfire route where it functions as a better Crimson Flower honestly, the deviations from the original story are well illustrated and easy to infer why Claude deviates so much compared to his Verdant Wind actions, and better yet, people are actually willing to call Claude out on his actions when he does some pretty terrible things, something no-one ever did with Edelgard in Crimson Flower. I will say that the new protagonist, Shez, is pretty flat and their storyline ultimately ends up as an optional footnote in the overall story at large which is pretty jarring, and very strange how barely anyone acknowledges it happened.

Gameplay wise, this is the only Musou to date I haven't bounced off of, it's really fun to be strategic while slapping buttons with some really satisfying movesets, shout-out to Shez's Asura and Byleth's Enlightened One movesets for being the most fun. The territories between missions can get pretty repetitive, but they take like less than 5 minutes once you know what you're doing so I didn't feel all too fatigued by the game until the last chapter, and character and class progression manages to be really satisfying with movesets that change as you advance down your desired true.

Three Hopes functions actually pretty well as a lite version of Three Houses in this regard, the main story isn't as good as most Three Houses routes but it's not bad in it's own right either, the gameplay and class progression is also a small version of Three Houses class progression but manages to capture the same feeling of satisfaction and character growth. The supports exist, and they're pretty good too, although not as good as Three Houses, again. All the redesigns and music is pretty good too. The one thing I'd say is straight up better are Shez and Byleth, with Byleth getting a pretty good set of supports, fun gameplay, and a personality a million times more entertaining than when they were silent. Shez might be pretty cardboard, but at least they're still more interesting than 3 Houses Byleth too. In the end, a game worth your time if you like Three Houses.

To start off, I am not a musou guy, I played maybe a few dynasty warriors over 10 years ago. That's about my only experience with the genre. I intended to play the first Fire Emblem Warriors before this game came out, but that didn't work out like that. So I went into this pretty fresh in a couple of fronts, my incredibly mixed opinion on Three Houses was also lingering as I played. But man, what I got was incredibly surprising and satisfying.

STORY
Now I've only played Scarlet Blaze, so my opinions may change with additional playthroughs of other routes, but what I saw I really loved story wise. In a shocking turn of events, this story felt like a dramatic improvement over Three Houses, I say this even as someone who loved Crimson Flower as much as I could. It felt like it was delivered so much better, having more maps and more chapters led to more cutscenes which led to more time with characters I liked. World building and politics felt improved, getting to actually see the Lords of Adrestia that were just lore in Three Houses and parents the students would occasionally mention, added a lot of depth that Fodlan needed. Claude and The Leicester Alliance are actually big parts of the whole story, instead of two speed bump chapters in Crimson Flower Edelgard blitzes through. I liked the whole alliance arc a lot in this game, Claude actually felt like an actual character and lived up to his "scheming" reputation he didn't earn in Three Houses. I like how this game speedruns through White Clouds events that Three Houses spent an entire part on. The absence of Byleth at the academy makes a huge difference plot wise, which is great to see. It utilizes those White Clouds elements in interesting ways too, namely in Lonato, in Three Houses, he was a lord that each of the Lord trio dealt with in the same way. But in Scarlet Blaze, he rebels against the kingdom after they take in Rhea, which gives Edelgard an opportunity to save Lonato to take him into her side. I won't list every improvement over Three Houses plot points, as much as I'd like to, that would take a while. New stuff, Shez was a great addition to the game, I had reservations at first and they're pretty similar to Byleth conceptually (mercenary with a mysterious power and spirit inside them), but Shez is just such a fun character, great dynamics with the cast. I enjoy watching their relationship with characters like Edelgard, Hubert and Byleth, seeing elements of their characters from Three Houses stay consistent when presented with a new story. I won't go on too much longer, as I'd enter into spoiler territory, but I loved Edelgard's story, it felt properly chaotic as a war against basically four factions should. Edelgard is seemingly desperately bouncing around trying to clean up various messes, and you think she isn't making progress. But she's very composed and always feels in control and prepared even when it seems she's been blindsided. It was really fun to watch this army manage this big conflict, helps with the scale and world building too. I do have some complaints, a few questions are annoyingly unanswered, nothing game ruining but stuff that should've been there. One line in the ending monologue, that references the future of the story after the ending, kinda ruins what could be a great ending place. And there's a "big game changing decision" moment that isn't delivered to the player in a way they would really understand what they need to do. Two little fixes and that problem wouldn't exist, but it does so that's unfortunate. But these are minor complaints and compared to Three Houses? A few minor complaints is something I'll happily take for an overall great improvement.

CHARACTERS
Just like with main story beats, this game improves on the cast essentially unanimously across the board. Every character I loved in Three Houses I somehow loved even more in this game, namely characters like Edelgard, Ferdinand and Dorothea. Especially Ferdinand, he gets some really great content even in the main story. Characters I felt more neutral towards I liked a lot more, maybe even love them now, characters like Caspar, Jeritza and the Ashen Wolves. Jeritza especially, I don't know what they did but man he was really cool in this game. I love all his supports, while not a high number of them just as in Three Houses, they were just really good and added a nice layer of depth to his character. Characters I kind of bordered on disliking in Three Houses I liked the content they got here, they felt fresh and new and overall non archetypal, which is an achievement for Fire Emblem. Characters like Bernadetta, Ignatz and Raphael, actually had some great content. Obviously I didn't play Ignatz and Raphael's main route, but they have a great Paralogue I did. Nernadetta actually had a good amount to contribute in the main story, as her dad was a big key piece of Edelgard's plan and basically always a factor in the story to think about. Even in her supports, of the ones I saw, she didn't get dragged out of her room or pass out once. Now I could have missed some where that happens, but the fact that she has such a nice variety compared to Three Houses, where they keep repeating those gimmicks I mentioned save for one support or so, to this game where she has great supports with characters like Hapi and Marianne that utilize her under explored traits from Three Houses, or letting the player actually see her gain confidence in herself (also seen in her Shez support). I won't talk about every character, but the fact that I don't dislike any of them and that I enjoyed every support is such a nice thing to see. I only had two supports where they used quirky support music, and even those were pretty funny. Paralogues, as they aren't main story and rather character stories, I'll talk about here, I enjoyed pretty much all of the ones I got. They use good groups of characters of similar styles or familiar ties, like Manuela and Dorothea both being singers, or Leonie and Shamir both being mercenaries, or just all the Ashen Wolves together. This makes a great break from the main story to enjoy some more character focused content. I think Shez is a great character for everyone to bounce off of in supports and paralogues, I greatly enjoyed their supports with Edelgard, Ferdinand, Jeritza and Lysithea, but I liked them all. Only real negative is Linhardt's main story cutscene commentary I disliked, as well as any content he gets outside of supports and paralogue. He just kept repeating "war is bad, we should stop fighting" like every cutscene. You could say that's his role and that's his archetypal dialogue, but even more archetypal characters like Bernadetta, Petra and Caspar had interesting stuff to add now and then with their archetypes. Even then, Dorothea is a better character to deliver the same message, her role as a commoner makes her sympathizing with the common folk suffering from the war feel a lot more earnest and genuine than just Linhardt kind of blankly complaining, but this isn't a big issue as I do like his supports and paralogue a lot. Villain wise, I guess it's an improvement from Three Houses, but like, congrats lol. Similar vein as the playable characters, the ones I like (Rhea, Dimitri) I liked more And ones I felt neutral on or disliked (Claude, Slithery boys) got better. But still nothing I'd put among the best of the franchise. A new spoilery villain also wasn't super great, as they connect with the unanswered questions I mentioned in the story section.

GAMEPLAY
As mentioned earlier, I am not a musou fan, never played many of them, so this was a fresh experience to the genre with nothing really to compare too. But man it was great, I really enjoyed playing this game. General combat is overall pretty fun, targeting can be a bit quirky, certain classes are a bit awkward for a while and maybe certain reoccurring mechanics can get old after a while (I didn't really feel this but I can understand if someone doesn't). I liked all the classes, even awkward ones like mages, they all had fun stuff to use. From combat arts to warrior special animations to unique abilities and adjutant combat and warrior specials, man this game is just fun to play, great visual animations on all these things too. Especially warrior special animations, Shez's default ones are cool, the swordmaster one is raw, the Gremory is great, and it having different animation details for each "canon" Gremory is really cool. Shez's base class is a bit over powered, so it doesn't really give much insetive to experiment with them. But reclassing is implemented well in this game, you can train certain classes even if they aren't equipped, the only ones I really messed with were Edelgard was a wyvern rider for a bit and I made Manuela an armor knight when I was messing with the mechanic for the first time and never really changed that lol, so she was a Great Knight at the end of the game. A great accomplishment this game makes is implementing Three Houses gameplay elemts in a much better fashion, your base camp has a lot more going on and it doesn't feel empty after a while, you get a lot more content for and worth out of micromanaging training your units, building supports etc. This game does combat arts and abilities really well too, just a great implementation of Three Houses core content. Only thing to really complain about in the base camp, and this could easily be removed, is the resource loop. Managing smithing stones and building materials felt pretty awkward for a while, didn't hit a good stride till late game, but I say this can be removed as it could easily just be me being s dumbass. Maybe I missed a feature (extremely common) or didn't get the right pattern for upgrading or resource looping. So maybe in subsequent playthroughs I'll figure out a good pattern and I won't have an issue. But as it is now, it isn't a huge deal.

OTHER
Visuals
Man, another huge improvement over Three Houses (but another "not hard" moment) but even with the super low bar set, it is surprising how well it improved itself. Animated cutscenes don't look like 10 fps garbage, they actually looked pretty great. In engine stuff looked a lot better, I think the lighting just worked with the environments and models really well. I like most of the new character designs as well. So I don't know who in the studio made a big improvement, but I am happy they did.

OST
I enjoyed Three Houses OST, no real complaints there, some great tracks in fact and this game just made me like it more. With some great remixes of songs I already liked, and some great new stuff. I just loved what this OST did, definitely felt the more action vibe needed for the genre change.

Voice Acting
I loved Three Houses voices overall, and this game was just more of a good thing, getting to hear more from great voices I love was a very nice treat. Especially characters like Edelgard, Hubert, Jeritza and Ferdinand, I greatly appreciate their new content.

Conclusion
Left some spoilery stuff off this review, certain characters I liked a lot, I'd have nice things to say about them in the main story, characters and voice acting sections of this review. If you know you know basically. So yeah, this was only one of three routes in the game (and maybe more?) So obviously this isn't my permanent opinion on the game as a whole, so while my rating may seem odd, it's just how I feel. I greatly enjoyed my time with this route, if subsequent routes suck ass, so be it. There are some issues here and there, but nothing that I think can combat the scales against such a drastic improvement over Three Houses. I love Scarlet Blaze, I love Three Hopes so far, I love Ferdinand Von Aegir.

This game exceeded my expectations in pretty much every way.

Narratively, I don't think it will carry much weight if you don't have a strong attachment to the cast of Three Houses. But if you are a big fan of FE3H (as I am), it's a blast to see these characters again.

The main plot is kind of a mess. I played Golden Deer and, without spoiling, there are some really cool ideas explored in this "what if?" storyline but none of them really come together. And while I appreciate Three Hopes not wanting to retread established plot beats of Three Houses -- the pacing is SO fast we don't get appropriate buildup or context for many moments. This didn't stop me from enjoying the Golden Deer navigating a new scenario, but I think this story could've been just as powerful as Three Houses with another draft or two.

Mechanically, this is the most I've enjoyed the Musou genre. Like P5 Strikers, this feels more like a collaboration than just a Warriors game with Fire Emblem characters. While it plays somewhat traditionally, giving units orders scratches the tactics itch. And because every character plays so uniquely, combat rarely gets old.

The camp (Three Hopes' Monastery equivalent) is a blast to revisit, and the loop of doing missions to further upgrade the camp is the main pull of the game. There are also a lot of QoL and UI improvements in Three Hopes that I would love to see folded into the mainline series.

Overall, this game is a clever way to give Three Houses a sequel. There are a lot of cool ideas explored in the plot, and some great support scenes between characters who didn't have them in Three Houses. Mechanically, it feels like a fresh take on a very familiar genre, and also introduces ideas that I think FE as a series can benefit from.

This game may be tailor-made for fans, but as a big fan of this series, it's fun to indulge.

I played the pretty extensive Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes demo since my friend recommended me to do so before I ultimately decide to buy or skip it and I don’t think it’s worth the money.

Even if I would get this game for less, I’m not even sure if I had enough motivation to finish this game, because I already got a bit tired of this game in the demo.

It gets grindy. And completing the game thrice is something that doesn’t sound good to me, even if you can transfer most of your progress to your next runs.

I really appreciate that they chose to use the Three Houses setting for this game, since I really love Three Houses, especially its world building and characters. Persona 5 Strikers did the same and they gave that game its own spin and that spin was so present that you almost forgot that you are playing a Musou game. That’s not the case with Three Hopes.

So I’m glad I listened to my friend. Otherwise I would’ve bought and regret it.

I had a lot of fun with the demo and I think I got the most out of Three Hopes with that demo.

As a follow up to Fire Emblem Warriors, this improves upon nearly every aspect of that game. By using Fire Emblem: Three Houses as a foundation for its focus, we get a bucket load of characters and three routes following much more indepth stories than what the original FE Warriors had.
A lot of Three Houses DNA makes it over with base camp exploration, freedom of class choices, cooking, training, etc etc. There's a ton of supports to gain as well as characters to recruit that in a lot of ways, this is Three Houses but with Warriors battles instead of Tactical RPG fights.

I don't think the game's story stands on it's own though. A lot of what makes the story enjoyable is that it expands upon stuff that Three Houses didn't make enough time for and as a result it assumes you have a lot of knowledge from that games characters and story. For example that academy phase in this game barely lasts a chapter and then it diverges into one of three routes depending on what house you chose. If you had played Three Houses, then the event that abruptly ends the academy phase is a huge oh shit this is cool moment, if you haven't play it then I can only guess you would be like wtf is happening here. So in that regard, while this is an alternate take on the Three Houses story that is completely different, it is also one that you really need to have played to really get the full experience from.

As for the three routes, I started with the Blue Lions and Azure Gleam and while I enjoyed it diving into TWSITD and the Tragedy of Duscur a lot more, I think it also horribly handles Edelgard's character and a few key characters from the Empire. I still found it enjoyable overall but I come away from it thinking it may be the most mixed route of the bunch

But yeah, there's plenty of content here and Fire Emblem meshes so well with the Warriors gameplay. I still have two routes to play at the time of writing this but I feel confident in saying this is the best Nintendo Warriors spin off we have gotten so far

Updating for Scarlet Blaze thoughts:
A very consistent route that handles it's characters well and doesn't fumble anything like how Azure Gleam does. My favourite route so far despite being more of a Blue Lions fan from Three Houses

We didn't see that coming. How could we not? Why would they not make use of the engine to give us this? Not bad, though. Game's managed to prove it had a reason to exist which can't be said for me yet but working on it, one cringe review at a time. The most glaring aspect of Three Hopes is that it is arguably the best Musou adaptation so far, although engine stuff is a bit cheating so Age of Calamity is worth mentioning. But regarding the gameplay, it does go hard! Every mechanic from 3H seems to come back, from the monastery activities to map mechanics like gambits, most important of all being the grand return of yeeyee ass haircuts 😎✂️🤓

I was planning to finish the game before Engage came out but wasn't fast enough. I know I'm close yet so far. My blue lions babies are waiting for me... plus random story recruits. Minus Bernie. I was supposed to knock some sense into her but I've absolutely obliterated the winds outta her. AITA?

One thing worth knowing that my friends really insist on is to not expect much out of the endings. Game acts as a non-canon midquel and sometimes, story gets hype and you might forget that fact. That's a shame, why were we given the best avatars in the series then? Can't forgive y'all for not appreciating the purple and orange combo. It's hard to pinpoint exactly what makes Shez so perfect, he's still getting a super duper cool power and climbs military ranks before you can say "Genealogy remake when?", although his interactions with other characters have substance to them.

Wait... hold the phone.. that's two times I'm picking the male avatar. Impressive, Fódlan. Male self-inserts tend to be subpar so I'm positively impressed. I wonder if anyone would choose me as a self-insert? Not sure whether a "yes" or "no" would be the more respectable answer.

If Arval were not a thing, this game would be perfect. I love warriors games and this is definitely the best one I've played. This game gave us supports that were not a thing in the og game and further developed certain characters. I loved everyone's re-designs and everyone's unique playstyle. Usually in games like this, you can pick out 1 or 2 characters that are broken and you feel like you 'have' to use them because of how good they play. That's not the case in this game; everyone has potential to be incredible. I love the unique conversations you can unlock by pitting people against each other in battle (ex. Yuri x Count Varley, Annette x Mercedes), it brings a whole new level of depth into the game. I do wish the stories were longer and there were more battles in between chapters but that's just because I enjoyed the game so much, it left me wanting more. Arval is the only downfall, being incredibly annoying and unimportant to the plot, I could see them being cut out of the game entirely but that's just my opinion. I really hope there is DLC for this game because I know I'm going to be going back to it as my 'comfort game'.

[GOLDEN WILDFIRE]

Whenever I killed an enemy as Holst, I said to myself, "I think that enemy got the point!"

Also, when you give Hilda a command in battle, I can't be the only one who hears her say "Don't worry, I won't fuck up!"

My hype for this game was immense during the release wait, and I still love it to this day. Albeit, battles can get very repetitive, and the endings - for both the Good and Bad variants - are incredibly sorely done, with no exact reasoning being given for Arval's existence or Shez's past.

Still, the systems introduced in Three Houses are all improved here! You can keep track of supports more easily, given gifts now show you what characters previously liked or didn't like, tea times (expeditions now) will also show you the responses you previously bombed at as well, so there isn't much memorisation to be done now.

Playing as different Three Houses characters is also a blast! For a good while, I spent many of my initial hours maining Bernadetta, Annette, and Edelgard. It's a simple treat, and it also helps that the campaigns in the game expand on stuff from Three Houses and offer up new possibilities as a result of a different timeline split.

Lastly, this game has a wholesome Bernadetta-Marianne support chain. Need I say more?

[Golden Wildfire]

story starts off pretty solid before nosediving at like two different points before leaving me off with an anticlimactic finale. what were they cooking with this story i've GOT to know. there's interesting stuff here but almost all of it is left underdeveloped.

i love marianne :)

shockingly good. not to say its a masterpiece, but it is without doubt a great game, which is not what i was expecting at all.

looks beautiful, feels great to play, killer voice acting as per usual and some lovely music to round things out. the story is a fantastic expansion on three houses, while unfortunately not adding as much as it ought to given the nature of the game's existence. if you loved fe16, its more of that except (a bit) less messy, which is fine by me.

some unfortunate major caveats, however. the story does abruptly end without a conclusion (roughly 40 hour game for one playthrough so its not an issue of length), just reeks of not planning out development well. many issues with the original characters still remain too. claude still doesn't really have much to do with whats going on, edelgard is still a pretty messy character, but getting more to the point with everyone's actions and interactions alleviates this.

best fire emblem game ever if you like supports too. the new stuff with arval and sothis was really cool, but unfortunately brief.

given the letdown of fire emblem warriors and the messiness of three houses you'd expect a low point here, but its a must for returning fans and a great game in its own right.

The original Fire Emblem Warriors was a proof of concept game that did not even think to expand its scope as a full-fledged standalone title of its own. It was a good Musou game, with great movesets and a hint of Fire Emblem's tactical gameplay spicing up the usual hack-n'-slash affair, but it was never more than a typical collaboration game where it was really a Warriors game with Fire Emblem coat of paint, never seeking to truly maximize its potential of bringing these two franchises together. Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes, however, is possibly the first Warriors collaboration project that is fully aware of the synergy between the two franchises it is merging, even more so than Persona 5 Strikers, which very much sacrificed the Warriors aspect for the sake of its Persona-ness.

On the outset, Three Hopes is simply Three Houses where battles are repalced with the Musou combat. But it's more than that. Three Hopes streamlines the camp/monastery activities in-between battles that became a slog in the main game, and allows it to feed into the fast-paced combat of the Warriors formula. The camp is smaller than the monastery but with all the important facilities present, and upgrading them feeds into the progression loop that is constantly satisfying. After a battle, there is always something to do--a facility to upgrade, a new support to watch, a new equipment to check out. The game keeps on going and once it finds its rhythm it can become dangerously addicting to some.

Perhaps the biggest difference Three Hopes has to other Musou games is the class system. Unlike other Musou games where a moveset usually equals a character, Three Hopes takes from its mainline counterpart to allow characters to change their classes at will, and the movesets are tied to classes and what weapon they use. Unlike the first Fire Emblem Warriors where the oversaturation of sword-users really hampered the tactical experience by not having enough options on lances or axes, Three Hopes allows a diversified and balanced party of characters at your disposal at all times. Characters are instead differentiated by their unique skills, their gimmicks that are applied to any moveset/class they use. In previous Musou games these gimmicks where tied to the movesets themselves; here the moveset is just another equipment that you can mix-and-match to build a character of your own.

And the freedom of build is very much there. The way Three Hopes fuses the character-building freedom of Three Houses and the fast-paced action of Musou really transcend this game to a proper action RPG. You can just use the preferred classes of each character, such as Annette as a tome-wiedling gremory, but why would you when she can ride a dragon with a hammer that deals magic damage? Maybe you want to have the testerone-obsessed Raphael use a physical tome to somehow beat the sh-t out of enemies with a book. The class sytem, unique personal skills, equippable abilities and arts, weapons with interesting attributes, these all synergize with each other to provide abundant opportunities to experiment at your heart's content.

The Musou combat itself is very much at its top form as well. While some movesets are from the original, it also has many new ones that can change pretty dramatically depending on which character you are using due to their unique abilities. As before, the game very much expects you to use the sword-axe-lance attack triangle when fighting enemy officers (and this time, gauntlet-tome-bow triangle is added), which means for the most part, you will be hoping from one character to other constantly, while ordering others to deal with far away NPCs. It's also important to use the newly added combat arts/magic mechanic--first introduced in Pirate Warriors 4 and now a staple of the recent Warriors games--as they break up the enemy's frequent super armour stances so their guard guage can be broken down. On top of these, add in the parries and perfect dodges (which were more or less perfected with Age of Calamity), the combat offers surprisingly wide variety of actions at your disposal--a simple button-mashing Musou game, this is not. The game is designed to have the player constantly check the map and give orders, maybe excessively so.

While most non-Musou fans wouldn't notice, but a lot of mechanics in Three Hopes are what Omega Force already experimented in their previous titles. Three different routes with world-map UI is from Warriors All-Stars, base-building has been staple of the series including Spirit of Sanada, the R-button active skills are from Pirate Warriors 4, which in turn is an evolution of Sacred Treasures system of Warriors Orochi 4, ordering troops and changing characters on the fly are from Samurai Warriors games, weapon weakness/strength and switching to deal with that are from Dynasty Warriors 8, dodge/parry have been in many of the recent titles most notably in Age of Calamity, and many of the unique gimmicks of each characters resemble those that were already present in Dynasty Warriors 8. But what makes Three Hopes stand out is that never have Omega Force actually brought these elements together to have its mechanics actually synergize so well that the gameplay loop is this natural and addicting. As a fusion of Musou and Three Houses, the game just works and works exceptionally well.

Of course, there are some gripes I have, but they are mostly "why didn't they go further here." For example, Battalions feel like a throw away mechanic here since they have no actual presence in the game other than giving a passive boost, unlike Three Houses where you could use special moves and they would actual be present on the battlefield. There also could be a bit more tactical options, such as being able to route multiple orders, or being able to order CPU combat arts on enemies. And there are some annoying decisions such as S-Rank being too annoying sometimes and the weapon grinding is too random compared to traditional Musou titles. But these problems are minor when the game's elements synergize so well. And that's the underlying key concept of this game, synergy. This is a game that has a plethora of mechanics that synergizes with each other to feed into a gameplay loop that keeps on going--something that Three House also did extremely well.

Now, an Empires mode as DLC would make it perfect.