Birthright

Polygon (8.5)-"Fire Emblem Fates is an emotional war game"

Gamespot (80)-"Fire Emblem Fates: Birthright polishes the series' time-tested strategy combat and adds intimate, exciting interpersonal relationships."

Destructoid (8.5)-"Birthright is probably the best starting place for newcomers. Not only does it offer unlimited grinding opportunities to beef up your party, but the actual missions mostly consist of easy "rout (kill) the enemy" parameters."

IGN (9.4)-"I’m addicted to Fire Emblem Fates, and that’s fine by me."

Gameinformer (9.3)-"Birthright takes Awakening’s combination of narrative flexibility and tactical strategy and makes it even better"

Conquest

Polygon (Shared review with birthright)

Destructoid (9.5)-"Conquest on the other hand is a more enjoyable from my perspective as a strategy veteran. It's much more complex from the start, and offers bigger maps, more interesting objectives (such as point defense or sieges), and a more intriguing plot."

Gamespot (7)-"Fire Emblem Fates: Conquest is a punishing strategy RPG that marches forward and never looks back."

IGN (9.5)-"The intense difficulty is squarely aimed at veteran Fire Emblem players, and its satisfying campaign is full of variety and challenge."

Gameinformer (9.3)-"Conquest is a challenging game that richly rewards players willing to undergo its trial by fire"

Revelation

Gamespot (90)-"Of all three Fire Emblem Fates titles, Revelation is the most rewarding."

Destructoid (9)-"It's a great middle-ground overall, really. Players can still grind like they can in Birthright (a mechanic that's eliminated from Conquest), but the difficulty is more in tune with the other release."

Started playing an old save of Awakening this week in hopes to beat it before Friday, and that's made me super excited for Fates. Really happy to see it's getting good reviews, think I'm gonna give Conquest a try first.

I thought it was real funny that Peter Brown's review of Conquest at Gamespot basically boiled down to: It was too hard for me because I couldn't grind. 7/10.

seems like id like revelations the best as I do like the challenge of the older FE games but I also like the new offerings from awakening.

Still probably going to start with Birth goto Rev than play conquest/

So I love Fire Emblem. I played a good chunk of the Gamecube one, but REALLY got into the series with Awakening. And while I'm unbelievably excited to play Fates, I now finally accept that I have absolutely NO idea how to play Fates. Like, which one do I start with? How does it all fit together? Is there some order that I'm not picking up on? I just don't know. I may just be an idiot and not able to pick up on it, but if anyone can help me understand it would be super appreciated.

@johncallahan: I don't think it matters when one you play first between Birthright and Conquest. As I understand, they both start out in the same place and then branch off into different, but simultaneous paths along the same story. I believe Revelation is the final chapter of the story that is meant to be played after the others, but I don't think you necessarily need to play both before Revelation.

@johncallahan: That really depends on what you want out of your Fire Emblem. If you want something closer to Awakening, with grinding and more plentiful resources, get Birthright. If you want something more like the older FE games, with no grinding and varied map objectives, get Conquest. Revelation is basically the golden "third route" that seems like a combination of the two, but it also seems like something best saved for after playing one of the other two.

@johncallahan: Both paths lead up to Revelation. Alexa Ray recommends playing Revelation last because the twist is based on seeing the ending of either Birthright or Conquest.

Feel free to actually play the other version. Outside of the first 5 maps, it's 90% unique maps, characters, skills, weapons, classes, etc.

I'll personally be playing in the order of Birthright, Conquest, and then Revelation.

I'm so hyped that I started a new Awakening file just to brush up a bit.

im going to buy all of this aren't i

Can someone clear this up for me? Cause I've seen some odd statements. Let's say I go out and buy a physical copy of Birthright/Conquest. I can then digitally purchase the other and Revelation for $20 a piece, right? My big question is, does the one you play first matter? Do you then go back and play the other fresh? Is it like a NG+ thing and some stuff carries over? Are the social storylines the same(for characters that are in both).

@yi_orange: My understanding is that nothing carries over between each game. If you were to play through more than one, you're starting from scratch each time. Which is OK, since they're completely different games beyond the first set of chapters. Essentially, they're three different perspectives on the same conflict that plays out depending on who the main character decides to side with.

If you want to get all three games, you purchase either Birthright or Conquest for $40, then you can purchase the others for $20 each.

For my part, I'm extremely excited for Friday. I picked up the collector's edition and will be playing through all three (Conquest first, then Birthright, then Revelation). As much as I'm enjoying XCOM 2, this is the turn-based tactics game that I was truly looking forward to.

@johncallahan: birthright = awakening

conquest is old school and apparently quite a bit harder

@azrailx: I've seen a lot of confusion, including Dan Ryckert on this. It is Awakening in that it has an option to grind (The grinding is just a map option to summon random battles). There's no world map in any of the games.

Pretty soon I am going to buy the cheapest form of 3DS (probably a 2DS) just to play the now 4 FE games. Pretty excited for this. All three of these seem interesting and although it is kind of crazy in format, hard to complain about three whole games with different flavors to them.

Leave it to Gamespot's Peter Brown to write an embarrassing written review for Conquest. Props to IGN's Jose Otero for giving an excellent in depth review for each version from someone who actually understands the material, and actually realizes this is a strategy game. Glad to see the game has gotten amazing reviews, I'm super excited :)

ha it kinda did read that way. I don't think I've ever seen a game docked before for having less grinding.

So by all accounts, did they actually kinda develop 3 different Fire Emblem games that are structured quite differently? Or does the split not happen until like 50% through, so it's more like they designed the opening 50% of a Fire Emblem game, then designed three different latter 50%s of 3 different Fire Emblem games?

Can someone tell me if the missions between games are different or if you are just playing from the opposite army's perspective? I know that they are structured differently with the overworld and whatever but if the scenarios are the same I'm only buying one version. Also, there is still no EU release date announced. Very jealous that people can play already.

@bisonhero: Each game is supposed to be roughly the length of Awakening, which had 25 main story chapters (plus prologue/epilogue stuff) as well as 17 "paralogues" (full length optional chapters) at launch. The split in Fates happens 6 chapters in, so we're looking at three pretty much full length games.

@49th: They are different. Birthright has mission goals similar to awakening. "Route the enemy" or "kill the commander" are all you will see from what I've heard. Conquest has much more varied objectives required to finish a map.

@mezza: Does it take place on the same maps/layouts though?

Peter's review is fine. I think it's obvious from everything that's been said about the three games that Conquest was going to have more limited appeal than the other two games given its a callback to older FE games. It didn't read at all to me like it was just complaining about the game being tougher. The question raised in the review was valid: was it a fun challenge, or did it just remove a lot of gameplay to make it feel tougher? For him, he preferred the Awakening style of FE game.

It's just a different review. Dismissing it because you happen to disagree with it is of course the individual's choice.

@49th: That I don't know specifically. Only someone who's played both could answer. I can only go by word of mouth from the Japanese version and reviews/ads.

Ok now it is time for me to read everyone else ask what version to buy and figure this out

Conceptually I don't really have any issue with how this was broken up, but it's a LOT of Fire Emblem. That's probably fine for people who are really into the series, but as someone who enjoys playing these games once for the plot, having to sink this much time into playing what seems three full games just seems kinda overwhelming. This reminds me of the LoZ: Oracle games, and I never bothered to get the true ending for that... Anyways, at least glad to hear that the games themselves seem pretty good.

yurop/10

fuck again

People that played both say Conquest have more interesting missions. Whether that's better map design or simply better mission objectives, I'm not sure. I suspect both.

@ichthy: Playing all three seems like something only for the most hardcore of fans. Or just something the average person would come back to later. I don't think it's a necessity to understand the overarching plot.

No. When people say "different maps," they mean different maps. Like, Hoshido fights in a volcano pit that doesn't happen in Nohr campaign. You are fighting in different places completely, outside of 1-2 stages. Not counting the first 5 missions, it's basically 33 route-unique missions since the kids also have their own paralogues.

I sure do wish this game had a release date here.

There are a handful of maps that are shared between the 3 different campaigns, but it's only like 2-3 for each.

This reminds me of the fact that my brother lost my copy of Awakening. I was kind of really bummed about that at the time. I could probably replace it with one of these new games, but I'm still kind of bitter about the fact that they're releasing two different version like pokemon.

I guess I'll just go wallow in my misery elsewhere.

@taesoawful: true, but the map in awakening was really just a fancy level select with some random shops thrown in

Did anyone else order the special edition from amazon? if so, is your copy coming tomorrow? because they havent even started shipping mine...

Goddammit.

@babychoochoo: Mine has shipped and is supposedly arriving tomorrow. You're not the only one I've heard complaining about special edition delays though.

So, I'm still conflicted about this. I'm super in the mood to play a new Fire Emblem, but the format of this whole thing really irritates me. Knowing that the games are 90% different at least alleviates me fear it was a huge ripoff, but the idea of having to choose a story path AT PURCHASE still annoys the hell out of me. I'm not a guy that replays games, even if they are 90% different, so I'm locked in once I buy one. It's stressful!

If EA released Mass Effect: Andromeda as two separate "Paragon" and "Renegade" discs, people would loose their damn minds.

@arbitrarywater: uuuuugh this is like the third time in a row when I was supposed to get release day shipping and Amazon just said "nooooope" for some reason. The even dumber part is it's like they bump it down to regular two-day shipping every time this happens because it doesn't arrive the day after release either. It's always Tuesday if the game comes out on Friday or Thursday if the game comes out on Tuesday. I'm getting sick of this shit. sigh

@babychoochoo: I ordered the limited edition 3DS and haven't even been giving a estimated delivery date or any information on it yet other than "we got your order, delivery date pending". Not happy about that, but I can't imagine having that happen with the game itself. That really sucks.

If "Paragon" and "Renegade" were two entirely separate games with unique content and story I'd probably be okay with that. In fact, it could potentially be better, because choosing Paragon or Renegade tends to have minimal impact on the actual plot and often feels pretty forced.

This Fire Emblem is nothing like that though. These are different games that happen to share a connected plot. This game is much much more akin to what Zelda did with Oracle of Ages and Seasons (which I don't remember anyone getting up in arms over) than any comparisons to Pokemon or the suggestion that they just cut a single game up into parts.

Just pick one, play it to completion, and be happy. Someday if you feel like playing more Fire Emblem you can pick up a different one.

The two games are completely seperate but share a story, it's nothing like picking a good or evil path in a bioware RPG. Both are about the same length as previous fire emblem games and if you buy one and want the other you can get it at a discounted price on the eshop. I don't really have a problem with the way they've handled this.

I love the setup so far. I just got to the part where it lets you "choose" which faction to decide on and its a pretty tough choice even though I had already made it by buying Birthright. I kinda wish they had just called this Fates and let you make that choice for real (though maybe there's just not enough room on a cartridge for that since they are completely separate games). I think the digital version does that. Its pretty weird in the physical version though since you've already bought the game and are presented with the option of buying the other game. It should just move the story forward without displaying that choice in the physical version.

But other than that I am really liking this so far. I can tell (or at least I hope) there will be some emotional moments having to fight against the Nohr princes/princesses. I didn't think I would play both games, but after seeing the setup I may try out Conquest before heading to Revelation.

The bundled version comes with both on the same cart.