Shadows of Valentia is such an interesting case where it's almost a perfect game. The presentation, voice acting, narrative, and music are all so goddamn perfect that it carries that really repetitive and mediocre gameplay that this game has. It's clear that Intelligent Systems wanted this game to be pretty faithful to the original Gaiden in terms of gameplay, but I feel that is what really brings it down for me. Especially in the last quarter of the game where the dungeons become a lot longer and the map design is either nonexistent or really bad.

I do really love this game, but replaying it after 4 years from my last replay has made me realized the game's highs and lows pretty clearly.

Pretty middle of the road FE. There isn't much variety in chapters since the game basically consists of siege only maps. There's a lot of really bad filler units that the game constantly gives you, when in the end I just kept using the same characters for the whole game.

Story is also nothing too special. It just feels like a combination of Archanea and Jugdral's stories, and it doesn't really do anything special with them. The true ending however is pretty sweet, and I wished the game had more focus on Lilina, Fae, and Idunn since I think that's what the game really excelled at.

Nothing else much to say tbh. This game is whatever and the foundation is greatly improved with later GBA FE titles.