Fire Emblem Ranking
Together we ride.
15 Games
Undeniably my favorite game in the series. Fire Emblem is one of my favorite game series, but no other FE game comes close to hitting all the buttons for me that PoR does.
FE9's narrative is straightforward and engaging. Ike is a stellar protagonist whose knowledge and maturity grow with the player's. And while I think video games as a medium often try and fail to tell compelling stories about race and class, I think FE9 stuck the landing back in 2005.
And I haven't said anything about the mechanics yet! FE9 feels like the culmination of the mechanics that the series had been building up since FE5. Skills, map objectives, and characters are some of the best they'll ever be. And the music slaps.
My favorite Fire Emblem game. And one of my favorite games of all time.
FE9's narrative is straightforward and engaging. Ike is a stellar protagonist whose knowledge and maturity grow with the player's. And while I think video games as a medium often try and fail to tell compelling stories about race and class, I think FE9 stuck the landing back in 2005.
And I haven't said anything about the mechanics yet! FE9 feels like the culmination of the mechanics that the series had been building up since FE5. Skills, map objectives, and characters are some of the best they'll ever be. And the music slaps.
My favorite Fire Emblem game. And one of my favorite games of all time.
1
Dude. Thracia fucking slaps. "LUDO-NARRATIVE HARMONY" at its strategy-game apex. FE5's structure and mechanics serve their narrative purpose of portraying a ragtag band of peasants and workers rising up to liberate their homeland from an invading force. FE5's exploitable mechanics also make it a joy to play through.
Leif has a realistic arc as a naive lord on the run who comes into his own to become the star he'd be in FE4. And the map music is fantastic. Kaga and Intelligent Systems hit it out of the park on this one.
Leif has a realistic arc as a naive lord on the run who comes into his own to become the star he'd be in FE4. And the map music is fantastic. Kaga and Intelligent Systems hit it out of the park on this one.
2
My first Fire Emblem game, and the one I go back to most often. It's a great first FE. The swashbuckling story makes the game feel fun throughout. And Fire Emblem has rarely created characters as fun as the ones in this game. FE7 is a gem. I have no complaints.
3
FE10 is a brave follow-up to FE9. Cards on the table, I don't think it's as good as FE9. But FE10 makes bold choices that I'd like other entries in the series to try sometime. Multiple parts, criss-crossing armies, etc. It's so fun. The end does sometimes feel like a slog though.
4
FE4 rocks. Like with FE5, narrative and mechanics go hand-in-hand as well as a video game ever could. Yes, the gameplay can feel like a slog, but the highs are so damn high that it's worth it. FE4 sells "continental epic" better than any other game in the series.
5
I fucking love this game. Art, tone, characters, narrative, music, production value? All top-tier. Yes, the maps tend to be forgettable. But that's a small price to pay for the best attempt Fire Emblem has ever made at an open structure. This game does it better than Sacred Stones. I think Fire Emblem is at its best when its mechanics serve a narrative purpose and vice versa. The open map structure serves a gameplay loop here (split time between two armies, visit dungeons and towns to learn more about your place in the war), whereas in Sacred Stones it just feels like a fun but extraneous addition.
Shadows of Valentia isn't the best or my favorite game in the series, but it does so much absolutely right for my taste. Like I said, I love this game.
Shadows of Valentia isn't the best or my favorite game in the series, but it does so much absolutely right for my taste. Like I said, I love this game.
6
Fantastic premise. Probably flawed execution? Loved it when I played it. Wanted to play all the routes but was only actually able to do Golden Deer and a significant portion of Blue Lions. The characters rock. The music rocks. The absence of a kickass recruitment theme sucks, but it's definitely a function of the game's structure. I do like to think of the battle theme that plays when you fight a former student as a recruitment theme, but it's not the same.
Great game that feels bloated.
Great game that feels bloated.
7
My feelings on Sacred Stones exist in extremes. I love the openness in class-development. I don't love how the game's openness makes the narrative feel less focused. I also think the artstyle is a step-down from FE7. But I know that's probably a hot take.
At the end of the day, I think the open-map structure works better in Shadows of Valentia.
At the end of the day, I think the open-map structure works better in Shadows of Valentia.
8
Putting Binding Blade here even though I still haven't finished it. As an FE7 kid who always viewed FE6 as his white whale, I've loved my chance to finally see these characters I scoured FE fansites for information about back in the mid-to-late 2000s.
I love what I've played so far. But I do think the maps run longer than they need to, even early on. Right now it's behind FE8 since I haven't finished it. But maybe that'll change when I finally complete it.
I love what I've played so far. But I do think the maps run longer than they need to, even early on. Right now it's behind FE8 since I haven't finished it. But maybe that'll change when I finally complete it.
9
I love Awakening, and it came out at a really important time, not only for the franchise, but for me personally. It got me through a lot of stress in 2013 and played like a warm embrace of nostalgia after not having new FE in what felt like forever.
While I love Awakening, the reason it's so low on my list is I think a lot of its fun goes away after your first time through. Future playthroughs feel more like grindfests if you want to access everything. Maybe that's my problem for trying to pass down galeforce to as many units as possible, but I've barely gone back to it since my second playthrough in 2014. I want to someday though.
While I love Awakening, the reason it's so low on my list is I think a lot of its fun goes away after your first time through. Future playthroughs feel more like grindfests if you want to access everything. Maybe that's my problem for trying to pass down galeforce to as many units as possible, but I've barely gone back to it since my second playthrough in 2014. I want to someday though.
10
Loved Engage while I played it. The artstyle is fun, but I think a lot of the characters aren't particularly memorable. Great mechanical depth, even when the difficulty sometimes feels absurd on a first-time playthrough. Laughable narrative though.
11
I really like Shadow Dragon. Simple, no-nonsense strategy mechanics plus some great music. But while Masamune Shirow's a great artist, I think the in-game artstyle doesn't hit the way the GBA games' does.
12
Better maps, music, and characters than Birthright. I love the return of the Awakening trio. But it suffers from the same problems that plague the other Fates games.
13
I did finish Birthright, but I took a long break in the middle. Should've been a better mechanical evolution of Awakening, but I think Awakening works much better.
14
It's the only Fire Emblem game I've abandoned.
15