Fire Emblem: Three Houses is a tactical role-playing game developed by Intelligent Systems and Koei Tecmo for the Nintendo Switch and published worldwide by Nintendo. It is the sixteenth installment in the Fire Emblem series and the first one for home consoles since Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, originally released in 2007.

 

Three territories. Three houses. Your very own journey. War is coming to the continent of Fódlan. Here, the order is maintained by the Church of Seiros, which hosts the prestigious Officer’s Academy within its headquarters. You are invited to teach one of its three mighty houses, each comprised of students brimming with personality and represented by a royal from one of three territories. As their professor, you must lead your students in their academic lives and turn-based, tactical RPG battles wrought with strategic, new twists to overcome. Which house, and which path, will you choose?

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is a tactical role-playing game in which the player controls a player character whose gender and name are chosen at the beginning of the game. During the open time, the player character is asked to teach at the Garreg Mach Monastery, which serves as the center of the game's activities. Choosing a specific house to teach affects the narrative from that point on.

 

The player's time is divided between story-based combat that advances the main narrative and the Garreg Mach period where they interact with the students and staff there. While the first half of the game focuses on this school system, the story skips forward five years to focus more on combat, and players are locked into the house of their choice for the first half of the game.

 

➽ The Officers Academy is home to three houses: The Black Eagles with house leader Edelgard, The Blue Lions with house leader Dimitri, and The Golden Deer with house leader Claude

➽ As a professor, lead students in their academic lives and on the battlefield

➽ A turn-based, tactical RPG that puts new twists on strategic battling

➽ Freely roam Garreg Mach Monastery and interact with students in a variety of ways to bond with them. In the classroom, tutor your students to help them

➽ Grow in the skill sets required to become specific classes

➽ Fortify your units with battalions for the first time, utilize new Combat Arts to strategize your moves, and also, face a new type of giant enemy-the Demonic Beasts.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses ©Copyright by Gamdise Do not Reproduce. By JoJo

 

The game was released in 2019 with generally positive reviews, with critics praising the integration of the school system and camp mechanics, the narrative, the characters, the soundtrack, and the replay value. At the start of Fire Emblem: Three Houses, you choose one of three houses: the Black Eagles, the Blue Lions, or the Golden Deer. this is an important decision, as any house you choose affects the way the story unfolds and who is part of your initial group of students. From Destiny, the game inherits a deep focus on choice. This is a better, more confident, and tighter game than its predecessor.

 

The Three Palaces are located on the continent of Flanders and are divided by three ruling powers that are currently at peace. The nations are connected through the Garreg Mach Monastery, which has a church and an officer school for students from each nation. Players will take on the role of Byleth, a former mercenary with a mysterious past and the academy's newest professor, and players must choose a class to lead and instruct students in a series of battles. The game retains the turn-based tactical gameplay of previous Fire Emblem games while incorporating elements of social simulation and time management.

 

You will spend a lot of time in the main hub area of Fire Emblem: Three Houses, the monastery. This open-ended style of gameplay is new to the series and breaks up the monotony of RPGs. Here you can perform side quests and mini-activities such as one-on-one battles, choirs, gardening, and more.

 

Although sometimes repetitive, the convent is a great way to relax and learn more about the students. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but it gave me warmth and fuzziness. The kind that only someone like Christmas morning can provide. There's always something to come back to and be surprised by. The majestic tunes and the fact that it was filled with characters I connected with, even as the watch grew from student to warrior, were simply fascinating to watch.

 

One of my favorite parts of Fire Emblem: Three Houses is that no one will have the same experience. While students from the academy of your choice can participate in the battle at the beginning, you can recruit new students, even professors who are not from your academy. To do this, states such as faith, power, and authority need to be built to win their support. With the vast array of options available to you, building your team into your ultimate warrior clan is a welcome challenge.

 

You can completely change any student's curriculum and shift their focus to more than one thing at a time. For example, my Bernadetta might be a swordsman, while yours might be an archer. Between your choice of house, your recruits, and how you teach your warriors, Fire Emblem: Thee Houses offers players an almost overwhelming choice. As mentioned before, no two experiences are the same. Sure, everyone will be similar in some way, but each player will strive to make their team unique.

 

Fire Emblem's combat has always been exciting and satisfying, and in fact, hasn't changed much throughout the three houses. Fire Emblem: Three Houses leans more than ever on characters, relationships, and side stories - and it pays off. One of the things that struck me while playing Fire Emblem: Three Houses was the sheer amount of dialogue in the game. With over 30 students and teachers, there are a surprising number of characters with fully developed personalities and backgrounds, not to mention unique voices and rarely just text on the screen.

 

Students and professors will have something new to say after almost every event in the game. On top of that, each character has support conversations not only with Byleth but with other characters as well. You can use these support conversations to learn the backstory and watch friendships develop, many of which can be heartbreaking or heartbreaking. This element is more than just a game mechanic. It provides a humanizing experience for characters who might otherwise just play NPC roles. I found myself reflecting on their feelings, as well as my own, and often even clinging to them emotionally.

 

Students have a preference for their role on the battlefield. They will come to you throughout the game and ask if they can shift their focus to a different class or multiple classes. It is then up to you to decide if you think it is the best fit. There were many times throughout my playthrough that a character would come to me and say they were not enthusiastic about what they were doing and wanted to make the switch. However, I had to turn them down because I knew what was best for the team.

 

If there's one complaint about Fire Emblem: Three Houses, it's that the game doesn't necessarily manage its two time periods as well as we'd like. The second part of the story is beautiful and doubles down on the character relationships that make this game so great - but it's also much shorter than the first part. This was probably inevitable, as the different paths that aligned with specific houses and made several influential story decisions meant that there was much more variation in the second part than in the first.

 

Other than that, it's a great game. If you're looking for a fun way to spend your time and are a fan of the series, then the Slotomania social app is where you should go.