Why Simple Stories Are So Effective (Case Study: Fire Emblem Engage)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 ก.พ. 2023
- FULL SPOILERS AHEAD INCLUDING IN THIS DESCRIPTION!
Still not one of my planned videos, but "Simple Stories are Good" is something I've wanted to talk about for a long time and the discourse around Engage was a great motivator so here we are. To be honest, I think Engage isn't "simple" but "straight-forward", but it still works as an example. To anyone reading this, I'd love to know if you think this works for those who don't already know the story of Engage, or if I didn't do a good job of breaking it down enough. In the case of the latter, my bad!
P.S. The shard isn't hidden in the past, it's just the only "place" they can get at it. I wanted to make the explanation simpler, but that was probably so simple it was misleading!
Videos:
Fire Emblem Three Houses/ Engage: Nintendo America
Footage:
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Great story discussion, I agree that the story was more engaging than I was anticipating. (Pardon the pun) Glad I gave the story a chance. It was like watching an animated movie. Good celebration of the franchise.
I'm glad you feel the same way, it was so much better than people give it credit for! And you're right, it's a great celebration of Fire Emblem to boot!
Thank you for making this video! You brought up a lot of great points in this about why this game's story is very well done.
It didn't try and be something it wasn't, but instead did something done before and nailed it on the head very well.
Engage overall just resonated with me and I'm very grateful to see it does the same with others.
Thank you again for talking about this game's story and why it's so well done!
Thank you so much, I'm glad you feel the same way! I think Engage gets a lot of hate just because it doesn't have Three Houses' scope, but I think that misses the point of what it wanted to be, just as you say. Thank you again!
Great video, I 100% agree that for the kind of game Engage is trying to be, a simple plot is just fine, plus there were some genuinely good moments in it. As a long time fan of the series I was very pleased with all of the callbacks to past games.
I'm glad you feel the same way! Engage knew what it wanted to be and nailed it. I'm happy you enjoyed it so much!
I was very surprised at how much I liked Alear after initially being super skeptical due to their design and seemingly being another worshipped avatar.
Out of the 'modern' FEs, I actually enjoyed Awakening and Engage's stories despite them often being critiqued as bad. I really like Lucina and Alear and their backgrounds. They feel likeable and genuine. In contrast, I never resonated with the 3H lords or Corrin, and wasn't sure why. Maybe it's precisely because of Awakening & Engage's relative simplicity. They are not pretentious with their stories.
Engages story reminds to awakening and i liked awakening. Its simple and enjoyable for what it is.
As much as i love three houses, it chokes on its own ambitions with plenty of holes on the final result. Just look a how Jeritza was added for example.
Well said! I like Three Houses too, but I really appreciate Engage telling a more concise story instead of the former's sprawling epic. Thank you for your kind comment!
Simple stories can be good if done well, but Engage has quite a few other problems- poor worldbuilding (we know next to nothing about Elyos' history apart from the war with the Fell Dragon 1,000 years ago), relatively one-note characters who don't contribute much to the plot, lots of exposition through infodumping (e.g. Lumera in Chapter 1), villains who get tragic backstories at the last minute and plot contrivances (Zephia's time travel crystal), among others. Shadows of Valentia was much better as a "simple" story.
Honestly, this was the more boring FE ive played. The only thing that had me invested was just beating it once. I felt no connection to the story and especially the MC. At least the combat was more entertaining than the tale they tried to tell
Engage was effective in being cringe.
The story was still bad.. they could have put much more effort in story