If I had to pick one game where my opinion has changed the most since I did my last reviews back in 2014 I would pick Awakening. Back in 2014 I said that Awakening was my third favorite game. I had even put it above the likes of Thracia 776 and Radiant Dawn. So what changed? Well I’ve learned a lot about analyzing Fire Emblem and how different mechanics impact the game. This caused me to take a more critical eye towards the games and, well I ended up agreeing with Awakening’s critics when I took a closer look at the game. Even though I’ve begrudgingly admitted that Awakening is a seriously flawed game, I still enjoyed it once upon a time. You might be wondering why I’ve put Awakening above Fates. I’ll get to why even though I imagine most people will think differently than me.
Plot: First, let’s start with Awakening’s story. The game divides itself into three arcs. The first arc is the best one and had the potential to be good. The idea of the main character’s country starting an unjust war and then having the bad guys be vengeful about it due to the consequences it had is a fantastic idea overall, but unfortunately the game botches the execution. Plegia is obviously in the wrong while Ylisse is obviously in the right. Had a better writer stepped in and tried to give this game more moral ambiguity this could have been a fantastic arc. Another main point I’d like to touch upon is Emmeryn’s death. I’m not going to deny that this moment in the game emotionally impacted me, but I do think that this could have been done better. We should have spent more time with Emmeryn.
Then there’s Valm. If you cut the Valm arc out of the game nothing would change. The game forgets that Valm ever existed once the player finishes it. The arc isn’t very memorable and there aren’t a whole lot of narrative stakes involved since once again you spend most of the time waltzing through different parts of Valm wrecking everything in sight. I remember that Say’ri had a brother and he died….I think. Was his death supposed to be memorable or was it supposed to hit us in the feels? Personally I didn’t care about the character so when the game tries to “hit me in the feels” it comes across as hollow and contrived.
As far as the final arc is concerned: It wasn’t terrible. The dark bishop finally puts his plan into action by bringing about the Big Bad final villain. How...totally generic for a Fire Emblem game. I do have to say that I LOVED the plot twist that happened though. I actually thought the writers were going to kill him off. Then to have Basilio come back and explain everything as in “in your face” moment was admittedly cool for me. Then there’s the ending. I wish the choice that the game gave you actually mattered. I wish that we could actually have different outcomes. Instead Robin will survive regardless of whatever decision the player actually makes. Lame! -_-
Other points
- I wish that Lucina had more to do in the story. She’s a cool character that deserved to have a bigger role in the story. She saves Chrom’s life a couple of times and delivers vital information but outside of that she takes a backseat to Chrom and Robin. As it stands Lucina suffers from Trinity syndrome. Speaking of Lucina why did she have to dress up as Marth again? What purpose did that serve in the story? It’s not like the first generation would have recognized her anyway. Also, while the Chrom vs. Lucina cutscene was cool it doesn’t make sense. What if Lucina had accidentally killed Chrom? Wouldn’t she cease to exist by that point? Even if that wasn’t the case I don’t see how she would have benefited from doing that.
- I disagree with the criticism that “Robin steals the spotlight from Chrom”. This criticism operates under the assumption that Chrom is the sole protagonist of Awakening while Robin is only a side character. I’ve always believed that both Chrom and Robin are the main characters of Awakening. If Robin dies its game over. Plus Robin always is important to the plot so I don’t think that I’m suggesting anything crazy by mentioning that both Chrom and Robin are the main characters of the story. Part 1 is mostly about Chrom while Part 3 is mostly about Robin. They’re about equally important in Part 2 so I’d say that that both characters are important to the story.
- This game did not do time travel properly. There are only 3 stories that I’ve personally witnessed that do time travel right: The Back to the Future trilogy, Chrono Trigger and Stein’s Gate. The reason why time travel works in those stories is because it’s the main focus, as opposed to being a one-time gimmick, and there are clearly established rules that they follow. Awakening never bothers to establish any rules for its time travel so couldn’t they go back in time before Grima was a threat and just simply kill him off? This is the same criticism I have of the Harry Potter franchise too. See “How Harry Potter Should Have Ended” below:
It just feels like time travel was used so that Awakening could have a second generation without doing what Holy War did before it. At the very least they should have done more with time travel and I would have LOVED to have a Fire Emblem game that mainly dealt with time travel. As it stands, it hurts the story.
Overall Summation: This game has one of the worst plots in the entire franchise. It deserves the criticism that it gets for it. It had good ideas, but its execution is poor.
Another problem with the prior Ylisse/Plegia war is Gangrel wasn't even affected by it per his background and he says in supports he started the war for no reason at all outside of powerlust.
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