Soundtrack: I LOVE this game’s soundtrack! Definitely one of the best themes in the series. It really does a great job of adding the atmosphere and the “feels” that this game is trying to give you. Ike’s theme has to be my favorite track in the entire game.
It feels so epic and grand and it fits with what this game is trying to do.
Other highlights:
- “Hymn of the Righteous”:
“Urgency Drives Us”:
- “Zealot’s Prayer”:
This game also brought back classic tracks like The Black Knight’s theme, Caineghis’s theme and Path of Radiance’s recruitment theme. I think what Radiant Dawn’s OST is very good at is either giving a sense of epicness, as if the player is about to engage in an epic war over the fate of continent (which is exactly what you’re doing toward the end of the game).
The OST is also great at creating an atmosphere of anxiety and tension too. Interestingly enough there are also some great tranquil tracks that help the player feel the exact opposite. There’s also a lot of tracks that can give one a sense of urgency as if the event is really important and the player needs to pay a lot of attention to what’s happening.
Overall Summation: Fantastic score. Definitely one of the best OSTs in the series. It adds a lot to the overall feel and atmosphere which I really enjoy. It adds to the epic feel of the game and I love it for that.
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Gameplay: This is another hit-or-miss category for the game. I’ll start with the negatives and then move on to the positives:
- Poor unit balance: This game shot itself in the foot when it chose to bring back the majority of Path of Radiance’s cast. In addition to that this game added A LOT of new playable characters which led to the game having one of the biggest casts in the series. Naturally any Fire Emblem game with a really big cast is going to have some major balance issues with its units.
What’s worse is that the different teams that the game forces you to bounce between are extremely imbalanced too. The Dawn Brigade is full of terrible units like Meg and Fiona while the Greil Mercenaries effortlessly steamroll through the game. Last we have Crimea which ranges from mediocre to bad. On the one hand I LOVE steamrolling with the Greil Mercenaries! On the other hand I hate playing as the Dawn Brigade. I find myself trying to blitz through the Dawn Brigade’s chapters so that I can get to the Greil Mercenary chapters where I tend to have the most fun.
Another contributing factor that leads to these major imbalances comes from the fact that availability is all over the place. Some units barely have any time to be used like Elincia, Tormod, Muarim or Vika which hurts this game’s overall replayability value.
2. The wackiest difficulty curve in the series: This game’s difficulty tends to bounce all over the place. Part 1 is pretty difficult because of all the weaksauce units that you have to use, Part 2 is meh, Part 3 is easy and Part 4… I’m still not even sure how I’d describe Part 4’s difficulty. Annoying maybe? It does feel tedious with the abundance of all those Rout levels. Another major problem I have is with the fact that Hard Mode arbitrarily removed the weapon triangle for no discernible reason. Also, why did they decide to prevent the player from checking enemy movement ranges? Did they suddenly feel nostalgic for Gaiden? I ask because the removal of these two features helps the game to feel more like an old-school Nintendo game which is NOT a good thing.
3. The overabundance of Rout Maps in the Endgame: How’d we go from wonderful map objective variety to all these rout levels in the endgame? Yuck. Rout maps I am told easily turn into “place juggernaut with 1 - 2 range weapons in range of an enemy horde and watch said enemy horde get rekt”.
4. The Mastery Skills: The Mastery skills are stupid. Most of them for all intents and purposes are “kill enemy unit and if they miraculously survive prevent them from doing anything”. Extra props to The Black Knight for having the most ridiculous skill in the entire series, Eclipse: “5x Strength and negates enemy’s Defense”. Is there any unit in the series that can possibly survive that without a skill of some kind? What on earth were the designers smoking when they came up with that?
So was there anything that you liked about it’s gameplay? Yes there is.
- That ledge mechanic: The ability to attack uphill or downhill is awesome! It adds to the map design and incorporates an element of real life combat into the game. In fact, I like this mechanic so much that I’m bringing it back into the game I’m trying to create.
- Limited resources: This seems like one of the few games in the series where you’re given a limited amount of resources and the game expects you to use those funds wisely. The only other games I can think of that do this are Fire Emblem 12 and Conquest (Thracia 776 doesn’t count for reasons that I will explain when I review that game). Bravo Radiant Dawn. Bravo indeed.
- The map design: In my opinion this game has better map design than Path of Radiance. The ledge mechanic is a nice feature that adds to the overall design of the game. Most of the time the map objectives are varied (up until you get to the endgame) which is a neat plus.
Another thing I’d like to point out about Radiant Dawn’s maps is that even if they’re poorly designed there’s usually at least a grand aesthetic to them that makes it easy for me to ignore its flaws. Take Elincia’s Gambit for example. That level can be cheesed in about 1 - 2 turns with Haar but it looks like such a huge, epic battle that I tend to forget how easy to cheese it can be. It looks like a lot of fun trying to fend off hordes of enemies that I usually prefer doing that than skipping it with Haar. There are other maps where this is also the case too.
- Being able to remove skills: I can’t credit Radiant Dawn for coming up with the neat capacity system, but I can credit Radiant Dawn for letting me remove one skill from one unit and placing it on another. It’s a fun little addition that adds to the strategy of the game.
Overall Summation: There are a lot of noticeable flaws. There are some nice things too. I like the fact that we got a more challenging Tellius game this time around. One of my few complaints with Path of Radiance is how easy it is. Even when I can point out the flaws in this game’s design I tend to enjoy the crap out of it anyway because of how much it resembles the gameplay of Path of Radiance.
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