Mar 2024 Comment: Many times have I dropped and picked back up the game to try and finish the main story, and I still dont fully understand what happens. Book 1 existed, Book 2 was fine, Book 3 was enjoyable, Book 4 onwards is a blur. Still its definitely my most played mobile game that I still get on today and I have a large collection of PNGS. I dont necessarily buy much in-game unless its guaranteed as I have bad rng lol, but either way its enjoyable and I have a lot of fun seeing my favorite characters in many different outfits and forms. Many which wouldn't make much sense, but its cool seeing them dress up and seeing them again with voice acting is also good. Overall I dont have much to say, its still a gatcha and still a mobile game, but it fills up my time, and it's enjoyable enough. Still due to those reasons though, I cant put it much higher as its not typically why I enjoy Fire Emblem. Character interactions and combat is why.

(No proper beat date as they always expand on the main story, I havent been up to book in like 2-3 years though)

The best example of power-creep in a game. I left it a while back and I didn't look back. The gameplay is FE light but it power of units has increased dramatically since launch that it's really unsustainable unless you put in a lot of money to keep up.

The plot wasn't great, and the time between story bits doesn't help. I'm not expecting like Fate: Grand Order levels of story for the wait but, at least FGO doesn't make me wait a year for the crumbs of a "story arc" to be laid out.

It was good getting to hear old favorites have a voice, but unfortunately the idea of using your favorites is difficult to with due to how much you would need to put into old units to keep them up to par.

Just imagine there's a weaponskill description here.

Accelerates Special trigger (cooldown count-1). Effective against armored foes. If unit initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, grants Atk/Spd/Def/Res+X to unit during combat (X = number of【Bonus】and【Penalty】 effects active on unit × 2, + 5; excludes stat bonuses and stat penalties), reduces damage from foe's first attack during combat by 40%, and also, if【Bonus】is active on unit, grants Special cooldown charge +1 per attack during combat. (Only highest value applied. Does not stack.)

【Bonus】
All effects that last "for 1 turn" or "that turn only." Includes bonuses granted by a skill like Rally or Hone and positive status effects (extra movement or effects like Dominance).

【Penalty】
All effects that last "on foe through its next action." Includes penalties inflicted by a skill like Panic or Threaten and negative status effects (preventing counterattacks, restricting movement, or the effects of a skill like Triangle Adept or Guard).

I have to imagine that a “game as a service” must evolve in some meaningful way over time for the experience to continue to be worthwhile. For example, MMORPGs like World of Warcraft and Runescape regularly add more content – places to explore, quests to do, bosses and raids to play, and so on. Fire Emblem Heroes though really only “evolves” in one dimension: increasing the power ceiling of new units. Outside of the 1,000+ units that continue to skew more and more powerful with each new addition, only a handful of new (and actually different from preexisting) gamemodes have been implemented, and the level of writing in the main story and events has only evolved a step beyond “Hi, I’m Belf; I’m gonna Belf all over these guys,” which I have to say is embarrassing for a game coming on 8 years of live service.

When the largest positive I have for FEH is “at least you’re not expected to grind it as much as some other gacha games?”, I think there’s a problem, and at this point in FEH’s existence there’s no reason to expect the situation to change. The Fire Emblem series has decades of characters and stories to draw on to create something of interest, and yet this game has never capitalized on it beyond asking the shallowest of questions like “What if Tharja put on a bridal outfit? Would you wanna pull for her? Or how about if Byleth wore a swimsuit? That’s gotta be worth a few dollars, right? Hey, do you remember Sigurd? Wasn’t he pretty cool in Genealogy of the Holy War? Why don’t you try pulling for him here? We gave him a boatload of powerful effects, just like he had in his original game!”

This game is not worth your money, or (more importantly) your time.