The Short Message is Konami's attempt to recapture the lightning in a bottle that was 2014's P.T and it shows with how desperately dated the gameplay is. The worst example of this happens in a sequence towards the end of the game where you're tasked with trying to navigate a visually confusing mess of rooms to collect some items whilst being stalked that was reminiscent of Slender: The Eight Pages in the worst ways.

When not in these chase sequences there are fleeting moments when you are just exploring the apartment complex the game entirely takes place in that manage to somewhat capture the atmosphere of older titles (including a great sequence that plays with camera perspective). However you are very quickly snapped out of it whenever a character starts speaking; the writing is painfully cringeworthy and the messaging is so on the nose that scenes that are supposed to be serious just come across as comical.

Since this is a free title I don't want to be too harsh, but it's not given me much optimism for the future of the franchise.

i, for one, am thoroughly appalled that this series would ever have the audacity to feature a player character who isn't a totally morally righteous person. this is a travesty. completely out of touch

and the gameplay? it's such a shameless ripoff of the last acclaimed silent hill project that was released. what the fuck were they thinking?

i'm going to go return to silent hill 2 now - the most subtle and least blunt horror game ever created. at least that game doesn't have sticky notes with "bullying" written on them (granted, this one doesn't either, but that's not what i heard from the people who didn't play it, so it must be true)

Gameplay:
At its best, the game does make you feel like a strategist in a huge war, with multiple stories and battles happening at once, and every character feeling like a vital part of the game. Unfortunately however these special moments feel rare, with most of the game being you slogging through the ginormous maps, and lying to yourself that units without horses are somehow useful or fun. The way money and trading work is interesting but sometimes it felt overly convoluted to get an item for a character. It got to the point that the game felt like a chore sometimes.
Story:
There is a good reason why three houses took the general premise from the game. The game has a genuinely cool and engaging story and world, especially for the time. However it does feel like the story needs more detail, and motives to be better defined.
Characters:
Very cool characters with interesting premises, but they also needed much more attention. I would have loved to learn more about Azelle's relationship with Arvis or have more conversations between Seliph and Leif.
Presentation:
The animations are awesome, and make it feel like a much larger world. The music is beautiful, and the character portraits were mostly good, even if a lot of them were reused.
Overall:
A game with an incredible framework and a lot of ambition in almost every aspect, its story, characters, and even gameplay, but ultimately feels like a slog to play through due to convoluted mechanics, and the massive maps. The story and characters are all interesting ideas, that need more ironing out. This is one of those games that I think a remake is very necessary, and if done right, could potentially be the best Fire Emblem game ever. But as of now, I would only recommend this game to fans of the series.

Gameplay:
The gameplay is a lot of fun and has a good amount of replayability. It's nice to see a bit more flare put into the maps again, especially after Three Houses. The engage mode never stops being goofy, but it's a lot fun and is a really dynamic gimmick.
Story:
Not good. Very predictable, and straightforward with overly cheesy dialogue and half-baked world-building. I swear some of the cutscenes dragged on for so long that I actually began to fight the urge to hit the skip button. Disappointing after how ambitious the Three Houses story tried to be. FE has never been the pinnacle of storytelling but this is kind of a new low. I think there was only one story beat that I was actually pleasantly surprised by throughout the whole game.
Characters:
Mostly ok surprisingly. The game unfortunately bombards you with some of the most boring and forgettable characters right at the start of the game, and it takes like 10 chapters until you can get a full team of interesting characters. Like I swear the first characters have some of the lamest supports I have ever had the displeasure of watching. The second half of the game definitely has more entertaining characters, and I am disappointed that some of them were not in a better story.
Art Design:
Hated it at first, but the Vtubers grew on me a little bit.
Overall:
The gameplay really does it for me on this one. Even though the emblems make the story and world hard to take seriously, they offer a really cool gameplay loop that makes me want to replay the game again.