Ylisse / Valm: The Final Member of the Worst 3

Historical Lore                                              3.5 / 10

                             Before I begin let me clarify something about how I’m going to rate Ylisse and Valm in this category. I am aware that these two are the descendants of Archanea and Valentia so you could make the argument that their scores here should be a slightly improved version of the lore in the older games. I personally don’t believe that it’s fair to give Ylisse a really high score simply because it piggybacks off of Archanea. I would rather rate Ylisse and Valm based off what they bring to the table in terms of lore and what they do to add to Archanea and Valentia. So that’s how I’m going to rate them.

                                Now that we got that out of the way let’s begin. While this world is a definite step up from Fateslandia and Valentia I do think it leaves a lot of room to be desired. Awakening’s explanation for the existence of the countries in Ylisse is that there was a schism that happened. We’re never told why it happened or how. We’re just simply told that it happened. Another critical component here is that the “first Exalt” of Ylisse sealed Grima and put him into a slumber. We never learn the name of the first Exalt nor is it revealed entirely who he is. When I first played the game I thought the first Exalt was Marth, but after playing closer attention I don’t think that’s the case. We’re also never told who Grima is. Is Grima related to Medeus? Where did Grima come from? Normally I wouldn’t care but since Ylisse is supposed to be the future Archanea it seems necessary to have some kind of an explanation here.

                                  Then we have Valm. The naming and explanation behind Valm makes sense and we’re told that the Valmese Empire “saw rise to conflict and split into several nations.” Once again we are never told why there was a conflict in the first place and what precipitated it. That would have been nice to know.

                                The Awakening worlds have a barely workable explanation for why they exist and how they came to be but they’re severely hampered by a lack of detail that would have been really nice. I think that if the writers had done a better job of thinking things through the lore might have actually been somewhat decent.

Politics                                                          3 / 10

                             Once again Awakening seems to be a huge improvement over Fates and Valentia but on its own merits its not as good as it could have been. The best element here is the Gangrel Arc. There was a pretty solid explanation behind the war prior to the start of the game  and how its effects could still have an impact on the events of the story. However, this never gets fleshed out as much as it should and it turns into Gangrel simply trying to egg Ylisse into starting a conflict with Plegia with only a semblance of an explanation why.

                        According to Fire Emblem wiki “Walhart united the empire once again so that he could prevent the resurrection of Grima.” (Source: http://fireemblem.wikia.com/wiki/Valm) During the Valm arc we see Say’ri lead a resistance and help out Chrom. We also get to see Excellus pull off some manipulative shenanigans but unfortunately these politics never really go anywhere and it feels like the Valm arc consists of Chrom and company steamrolling the continent. The Plegia arc is not very political at all which doesn’t do Awakening any favors either.

Family Tree / Relationships                          7 / 10

                                    http://fireemblem.wikia.com/wiki/Altean_Royal_Lineage

                           Take a look at the Altean Royal lineage. It’s a really well developed family tree. Thanks to Fates the Ylissean royal family has 4 generations. Chrom’s Dad - Emmeryn, Chrom & Lissa - Lucina and Owain - Ophelia. The only other family lineage that’s that extensive is Jugdral. So on the one hand it’s pretty clearly impressive to see a family lineage developed that well. Other major types of relationships within Awakening are:

• Validar, Robin & Grima: Robin is Validar’s son so there’s an obvious connection there. Then there’s the fact that Robin is supposed to be Grima’s vessel which leaves for an obvious connection.

• The Second Generation: Any Fire Emblem game that has children is instantly going to do well in this category. It gives an extra level of connection between characters.

• The Shepherds: Once again, obvious connection is obvious. The Shepherds here is like a less close-knit version of The Greil Mercenaries. It gives a lot of characters that wouldn’t normally tied together a connection.

                           So on the one hand there are a lot of good relationships and connections with the characters, but on the other hand there are other games who simply do a better job in actually connecting their characters together.

Nation Development                               2.5 / 10

                          So what do we know about these countries? Let’s see, we know the different types of religions of most of these people. Ylisse and Valm worship Naga while Plegia worships Grima. This is a major reason why there are so many conflicts between Plegia, Valm and Ylisse. Regna Ferox has an interesting form of government that you don’t see in most Fire Emblem games. Have two khans pick a champion and fight each other for control of the country. Plegia’s form of government consists of one part theocracy and one part monarchy. I wish there was more of an explanation as to how this worked and why but at least there’s some attempt at making a unique country. Their geographies and militaries are distinct from each other so that’s good. There is something though that bothers me about Valm though. Valm has wyvern riders. Valentia did not. How did Valm get wyverns when Valentia did not? I would have appreciated an explanation about that.

Geography                                            5 / 10

                 https://serenesforest.net/awakening/miscellaneous/world-map/

 

                                   I’m rather lukewarm when it comes to Awakening’s geography. It has more locations on its world map than Valentia or Magvel do on theirs and yet the geography of both of those places stand out far more than the geography here. I can only think of a couple of locations between Ylisse and Valm that tend to stand out. That’s not very good. Granted the few places in it that are memorable are nice but they’re insufficient to make up for all the “bleh” that make up this world.

Magic Critters                                           5.5 / 10

•                         Manaketes & The Taguel: The Taguel are probably the worst of Awakening’s magic critters. They come across as gimmicky and are completely unimportant to the plot. You could just remove Panne and Yarne from the game altogether without making a difference to the story. Plus the idea of turning into a killer rabbit is pretty funny, which I doubt is the reaction that the writers were intending. Manaketes are in a similar boat here where they’re there just to be there. At least turning into a dragon seems more plausible.

• The Risen: The majority of Awakening’s points in this category come from the Risen. They’re everywhere in Awakening and unlike the taguel there is a plausible explanation for why these things exist.

Bonus Categories

• Connections to Other Worlds              5 points

                            Awakening is the undisputed champion of this category. The Outrealms and DLC contain connections to all the other games in the series which is a huge plus. There’s also the fact that Chrom and Lucina are descendants of Marth and that stuff like the Falchion and the Shield of Seals are major plot points as well. Valm is obviously named after Alm and there’s even a shrine made out to Mila (although Mila’s Shrine in Awakening is obviously in a different place than Mila’s Temple was in Gaiden. That’s kind of weird don’t you think?). Priam is also related to Ike and the world of Awakening is the only world that’s connected to the world of Fates.  

• Women Rulers                              4.5 points

                        I consider Ylisse to be the second best in this category. Here are the list of characters I could think of that count:

• Emmeryn: Sole female ruler of Ylisse for the first part of the game
• Aversa: Works for Validar, but also helps out Gangrel. Is shown leading armies.
• Say’ri: Leader of the resistance against Walhart.
• Flavia: One of the khans in Regna Ferox.
• Female Robin / Female Grima: Female Robin serves as Chrom’s tactician and makes a lot of important decisions in the army. Grima is the same gender as Robin so if Robin’s a girl then so is Grima which means that Awakening is one of the few games in the series where the final boss is a woman.
• Lucina: Leader of the other children.
  
  

  

Non-Monarchy / Empires                   + 1.5 points

• Regna Ferox: Two Khans who fight for control of the country. That’s pretty unique in the context of the series.

• Plegia: Half monarchy, half theocracy. Since it does have a king it doesn’t get a full point here but it is referred to as a theocracy and it seems like the Grimleal have more control than Gangrel did. I’ll award them a half of a point.

Severe Lack of Countries                      - 8  points

                              The continent of Ylisse has only 3 countries. Valm, for all intents and purposes, has 2. Having a small number of countries means that there’s less variety than is usual for a Fire Emblem game. Since there are two continents that have a tiny number of countries that means that I’m going to have to dock points for both countries, hence the - 8.

Overall Score: 29.5 / 60. Thanks to Fates Awakening’s worldbuilding doesn’t look quite as bad as it did before. Granted, in comparison to the rest of the series (Gaiden being the exception here) Awakening looks awful. It really needed to expand on its lore and its politics. There seem to be some good ideas that in the hands of more capable writers could have been something special. A lot of Awakening’s saving graces stem around the connections that it makes to other fictional universes like Archanea but that can only take you so far and when it came to Awakening’s own worldbuilding it seems to be sorely lacking.