Back when I made my Holy War review (thank you to all who took the time to read that. I know it was a really long read. I hope it was worth the time you spent reading it :) ) I alluded to starting a series of posts that discussed map design. Well life happened and I got busy (I’m currently working on making a mobile app game with 2 other guys in school in addition to work and trying to get a social life going in the real world in addition to working on my own project, Fire Emblem: The Dark Crusade).
Well I usually have more free time on Mondays so let’s see if I can crank this out. Before starting my series of posts about map design I thought it would be beneficial to first establish a baseline criteria about what makes a good map. For starters, I made a post about map design back when I was creating my “Ten Tips to Improve Fire Emblem” series. You can view it here: http://thecrusadergrant.blogspot.com/2015/11/ten-tips-to-improve-fire-emblem-3-map.html
I also linked to a video done by Mangs where he covered the same subject. It’s a great video and if you haven’t seen it you should check it out:
I may end up repeating myself from before, but I figure that it’s worth repeating since it’s relevant to the topic at hand. So what is the main criteria of good map design? Well, here’s a list of things I will be looking for when analyzing maps:
- Are there multiple ways to approach your destination?
Something that I’ve noticed about a lot of well designed maps is that they often give the player multiple ways to approach a certain spot on the map. This gives the players room to try multiple different strategies. It encourages them to weigh out the pros and cons of each method of approach, which is exactly what a strategy game should be doing. Usually this also means that no part of the map will go to waste either which is always a plus.
2. What anti-turtling incentives are there?
For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term, “turtling” refers two things:
- “Taking unnecessary precautions in how you move your units, like moving slowly to avoid danger where logically the problem could be solved more efficiently with the same net gain/loss. That's my definition I guess.”
- “This, and covering less ground than you can and not gaining any advantage from it.” (Source: http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=48640)
Before I continue let me make one thing perfectly clear: This is not designed to condemn a person for playing the game a certain way. Play Fire Emblem however you want to play it. My only reason for mentioning this is that when a map puts pressure on a player it causes them to think more strategically. Good maps encourage this, bad ones don’t.
There’s a variety of different ways that Fire Emblem maps accomplish this. A few examples include having villages and then threatening them with a bandit. Another example would be map objectives or having a thief try to get to the treasure chests first. There are different ways to accomplish this (and you can get creative with how you approach this too) and as I go along I’ll make sure to point this out.
3. Enemy / Terrain placement: This one’s a no-brainer, but hey sometimes the obvious just needs to be stated. The way a map sets up its terrain and its enemy formations is very important since these two things tend to have a major effect upon how the player will play the game.
At the end of the day the ultimate question one should be asking is: “Does this map make the player play more strategically or less strategically?”
Feel free to list suggestions about what maps I should review. I’m sure I may have forgotten some key elements of map design and if so please point them out to me. I’m looking forward to doing this and I hope that these posts can provide good feedback and thought provoking discussion.
I feel that this is where Revelations falls flat. Not only does the game relive the player of any sense of pressure, tension or danger in the story but this coincidentally affected the gameplay. The maps in this game play so damn slow such as the two shitty FOW maps and many of the Valla chapters which force the player to wait until the map agrees with them. The maps also tend to play themselves such as the platform level and the Sumeragi level. You can't avoid the gimmick of these two levels and it just forces it onto you. You have t wait so damn long before the map realizes you're trying to play the damn game and gives the player control. The problem is that these gimmicks must have short-term memory loss because it then forgets you were trying to have fun and then forces the gimmick on the player. Stop trying to be unique Revelations. A unique map does not equate to a good map all the time. It's like the designers were thinking "We couldn't bother with anti-turtling, well thought out enemy placement and terrain. But the fan base will still love our levels because they are unique so it means that these maps must be good."
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