Review of "Fire Emblem Awakening"

Fire Emblem Awakening (henceforth FEA) is one of the last games in the turn-based tactical RPG series Fire Emblem. FEA introduces some new features and a 3D mode, since it is the first Fire Emblem game on the Ninitendo 3DS.

Grade:

Plot:
The story is about the main character (you) that you can, to an extend, create yourself. You can choose your gender, height, hair style, hair color, and voice.
Important to note is the fact you can choose a strength and a weakness. Choosing a weakness of luck will lower all your stat caps a little (this is, obviously, not good).
After character creation, you wake up on a field, where Chrom, his sister, Liz, and their guardian, Frederick, come to greet you.
The tutorial map starts soon afterwards, where you have to beat a group of bandits with the four of you. The gameplay mechanics in the game are explained from this point onwards in a way that incorporates it into the story.
You, quickly afterwards, meet some interesting enemies. Quite zombie-like, these creatures are called "Risen" and become the "generic" enemies afterwards.
After that, the story focuses on multiple wars with Chrom's kingdom at stake, that you have to take an active role in.
In the first couple maps, you will get a lot more party members to work with. They usually have a conversation to give a clue towards their personalities.
During the entirety of the game, you come closer to realizing the significance of you and Chrom's place in the world and your partnership gets tested on multiple occasions.

Mechanics:
After character creation, which is fairly easy to understand and make use of, you get thrown into the first battle almost immediately. The explanation of the mechanics is pretty well done (although a bit cryptic at times) with handy cue cards on the bottom screen to give more specifics.

  Maps:
Every map has a goal to achieve. This goal can range from "beat enemy X" to "get on tile Y" or "hold out for Z turns" and a couple others. Every goal is clearly stated at the start of a map and can always be looked up on the lower screen.
When starting a map (except the first few) you go into a battle setup screen. Here you can choose the characters you want to use, manage their inventory and skills, change their class if possible, and a couple other features that are either very clearly explained or easy to figure out.
FEA is based on a grid. All your (and enemy) characters are on the grid and can block opponent's access to tiles they are standing on. This makes blocking passages with strong defensive units a very viable and useful tactic.
Every tile has a certain field type. Some field types deal damage when standing on them at the end of your turn, while others make it harder to go over them and/or give you defensive boosts. The forts and gates in particular are good to keep in mind, because they give high defensive boosts and give passive healing at the end of the round. All tile effects apply to both your allies and your enemies.

  Classes:
Every unit has a class. A class specifies its looks, stat caps, weapon use, skill gain, and weaknesses.
There are some characters, like the main character, that have unique classes. These unique classes, just like other classes, have their own strengths and weaknesses, but are generally not obtainable by other units (unless in VERY specific circumstances).
Once a unit reaches level 10 or higher (level 20 HIGHLY recommended) and you have a master seal or a second seal, you can change this unit's class. The master seal makes the unit go into an advanced class and the second seal makes the unit go into another (or the same) base class. In both cases, the unit starts at level 1 again and will usually lose a couple stat points. This decrease is not very significant compared to the stat gain while leveling up, so do not worry about it too much.
Some unique classes can not get promoted, but the units using the class can change to another class using a second seal.
For a simple representation of what the master seal and the second seal do, think of it like this:
The master seal moves your unit's class upwards (an upgrade).
The second seal moves your unit's class sideways (changes it).
You CAN use a second seal on a promoted class and this will allow you to go back to a base class or go to another promoted class instead.
Every character only has access to a particular set of classes. There is no way for the first generation to get access to more classes, and the second generation is completely dependent on their parent's base classes. The main character and its child(ren) can use almost every single class.
Some classes are gender-based, so they can only be accessed by people of that gender, even if their parent has the base class.

  Skills:
Another important feature to keep in mind, is skills. Skills are special (either passive or semi-passive) abilities that can drastically change the course of battle. They vary a lot and can deal extra damage, increase your stats, buff allies, allow your unit to survive a killing blow, give extra movement, give passive or active healing, give you extra attacks, etcetera. Any unit can only equip 5 of these skills at a time and it can not be changed in the middle of playing a map.
Skills are obtained through leveling up as a specific class. Usually, the better skills come from the promoted classes, but there are some neat skills in the series of base classes as well.
Once obtained, the skills can never be forgotten. They can only be equipped or unequipped at that point.

  Dual system:

FEA adds a very new feature to the series. Namely, the dual system.
The dual system allows for 2 units to stand on the same tile and support each other.
There is always a unit in front and a unit in the back. The unit in the back is completely safe from harm, as long as it stays in the back and the front one does not die.
The dual system works in three different ways simultaneously. The first is dual support. Dual support gives stat boosts to the front unit. The stats boosts in question depends on the character and the class of the supporter.
The second is dual strike (or dual attack). This one allows the supporter the chance to attack whenever the front unit is attacking, even if the enemy is normally out of reach for them. The chance of a dual attack happening is based on the relationship between the characters involved. Skills can be used while dual attacking, as well, but not all of them. The supporter's attack ignores some enemies' defensive skills as well.
The third and last one is dual guard. This allows the supporter the chance to defend the front unit, completely nullifying the damage to both. The chance of this happening is generally lower than the chance of a dual attack and is also based on the relationship between the characters in question.
The movement of the group is completely dependent on the front unit's movement. This means that a group of a slow foot soldier (read: on foot) in the back and a fast flying unit in the front can go very far in a single turn. This particular combination can even stand on tiles that are normally not accessible to foot soldiers.
The dual system is very useful for attacking as well as defending and using it is rarely detrimental to the battle. Getting a unit out of a pinch can be done quite easily with this system as well.
The front and the back unit can be switched when it is your turn, but only once per group per turn. Switching to a fast unit to move over to an enemy and then switching back to the strong unit being carried can not be done in the same turn.

  Relationships/support:
If characters that can have a support conversation stand next to each other when one of them is in a fight (the dual system counts here) the characters will get support points with each other. Once their support reaches a certain point, they can have a support conversation. These are generally very funny and/or informative in nature and act as a means of getting to know the characters.
Getting the support level up between 2 characters increases the dual system's effects.
In support conversations, there are 4 ranks: C, B, A, and S. The first 3 can always be accessed one after the other if the support level is appropriate. The S rank support can only be done between particular characters and has them marry. Once married, their dual system effects are maxed out and, if the main character or certain female characters are involved, they can get a child. This child "grows up" instantly and can be put in your army after helping them in their fight. The game explains the reason for them becoming available so quickly very well, but explaining it would go into spoiler territory, so I will not.
Chrom is quite special in terms of relationships, because he has to marry at a particular point in the game. If he is not married at that point, he will instantly marry the marriable woman he has the highest amount of support with, skipping the other conversations entirely.

  Child characters:
Besides the normal characters that you can get while playing through the story, there are also child characters (second generation and a single third generation) that you can get. Child characters are dependent on their mother, the main character, or Chrom. If one them marries, their child's challenge map (paralogue) will appear. Once you enter said paralogue, the child character gets their stat, skill and class rolls. Generally, the stronger the parents at the time of the roll, the stronger the child. Classes get inherited from both parents and gender-specific classes turn into different classes if the child is a different gender. Lastly, the skills inherited from the parents is the last skill in both parent's skill list (except for Chrom, who gives specific skills to his offspring). The main character's child(ren) will be able to use every non-gender-specific class as well as gender-specific ones of the other parent.
Because of how this works, be very careful when you enter the children's paralogue to make sure you get the best setup.
All child characters start at level 10.

  Map system:
In between battles, you go to the map screen where you can go to different places to shop, battle Risen, do paralogues, or go for DLC maps.
Risen can randomly pop up on any map that is already cleared and provide opportunities to get experience and items. On the highest difficulty, these encounters will be almost impossible to beat, unless your team is pretty much maxed out in every way.
In the map screen, you can also forge some items, making them stronger by adding damage, critical hit chance, or hit chance. Doing this requires funds, so make sure you only do it for the weapons you use a lot.
The next stage is always very clearly marked.

  Game modes:
At the start of the game, you can choose the difficulty and the game mode. The hardest difficulty will be locked until beating the game once.
The game modes are Casual and Classic. Casual allows your units to "die" in battle and not be permanently gone, while Classic will have your units disappear forever when they die in battle.
For the best Fire Emblem experience, I recommend going Classic, especially if this is your gateway into the series (since the other games in the series tend to go Classic automatically).

  Weapon triangle:
Understanding the weapon triangle is a must for higher-difficulty play. It works as follows:
The hit chance of a weapon is increased if it has an advantage over the enemy's and a lower hit chance when it has a disadvantage. As a general rule of thumb, swords are good against axes, axes are good against lances, and lances are good against swords.
There are some weapons that reverse the weapon triangle, so be on the lookout for those. Those weapons usually have "slayer" in the name.

Characters:
The most important characters are the MU (My Unit, your own character), Chrom, and Lucina.
The MU is generally calm and calculating, with some funny quirks here and there when you go through certain support conversations.
Chrom is the serious prince of his kingdom, but has a soft spot for his allies. He is very level with just about everyone, despite being royalty.
Lucina would be spoiler territory, but suffice to say she is important and quite a lot like Chrom in many ways.
All the characters can usually be categorized by a couple main attributes, with some unexpected quirks strewn throughout the support conversations. Personally, some of them put a big smile on my face, sometimes out of surprise.

Graphics:
The graphics of FEA are sprite-based, except for the battles themselves. The battles themselves are highly detailed and fully 3D models of all the characters are involved.
The 3D function of the Nintendo 3DS can be utilized both during battles and on maps. Because 3D functionality tends to strain your eyes a little, I recommend not using it full time (or, if you do, on a low setting), but seeing the environment or battles 3D is certainly worth seeing every once in a while.

Music:
Like the majority of games, the music does not overpower the gameplay. It tends to support the game and the specific scenes it plays in very well.
Overall, the music is rather calming in the menus and interactions, with a couple spikes for important scenes and battles.
The map music tends to pump you up for battle by having a marching style.

Tips and tricks:

• Try to get every recruitable character. Sometimes they are enemies and you need to talk to them to get them. Do it. Just about every character is worth it in some way, even if only for the support conversations.
• Want to know all the classes and the skills you can get from them? Look no further than here.
• Want to know the characters you can get? Look here for where to get them. You can click on their names for more details.
• Galeforce is a very good skill to have, because it allows for hit-and-run tactics (amongst others). This can only be gotten from Dark Fliers, which is female-only, so try to give it to male children through inheritance when possible.
• Watch out for skills like Counter, Lethality, and Breakers. Counter is a skill that returns any damage done by melee attacks as long as the user does not die. Lethality is an instakill move when it triggers. Breakers make it a LOT harder to hit an enemy with that weapon type.
• A third generation child is possible. Marry the MU to any second generation child and his/her child will be third generation.
• You can walk an extra tile by having someone go into a tile with someone else (dual system), then moving that unit as far as possible, and then dropping off the unit being held.
• You can chain-move a unit using the above trick, but instead giving the held unit to a new unit at the end of the movement. Very useful for getting slow units to a specific spot on the map quickly.
• Choose wisely when to do the children's paralogues, because their rolls are very important for their usability

Good points:

• Very good gateway game for the series.
• Funny and interesting supports.
• Solid tactical gameplay.
• Keeps with the formula of the former games.

Bad points:

• Higher difficulties are insanely difficult to start out and stay that way if you do not use DLC.
• The dual system is OP. Enemies can not use it and you can abuse it.
• Can be repetitive (especially when leveling).

Conclusion:

FEA is a solid game for any fan of tactical and/or turn-based games. If you like funny interactions, you will probably also like this game.

In the Fire Emblem community, FEA is widely considered to be one of the easiest games in the series and would therefore be a good gateway into it. Keep in mind that, if you go for the other games, you will have to have experience with at least the weapon triangle and Classic gameplay and could possibly get overwhelmed by the difficulty.