LogFAQs > #937149961

What happens when you set out to make a game based on spitting on the entire concept of two other games and also filling it with tedious gimmicks designed to be unenjoyable? In other words, what happens when you set out to make a bad game?

You succeed.

16. Revelation

The third path of Fates...and right away you can see a problem with this whole premise. You have this weird two games thing built entirely around picking between two sides...and then you add a third path that unites the two, completely going against the entire concept. If the story of Fates as a whole were better I'd probably be really pissed off at Revelation for being designed to make a mockery of it, but thankfully(?) Fates' story is not exactly great. So I'm still annoyed at the idea that they decided a route that just straight up says the whole conflict is meaningless bullshit because these people are totally willing to just cooperate and what you see of them in Birthright/Conquest is wrong, but at least I'm not emotionally invested in it. Unfortunately, the story concept is not the extent of Revelation's sins.

Considering I already dedicated an entry on the worst chapters list to discussing Revelation's fondness for tedious gimmicks that serve only to waste your time, it's probably not necessary to go into too much detail. I don't think it's a controversial statement to say that Revelation map design is largely atrocious, full of maps that just try to occupy you with dull busywork like snow shoveling or riding elevators around. And even when the maps aren't throwing bad gimmicks at you, they're usually not that interesting anyway, mostly consisting of just basic "move through path with lots of enemies" stuff. Not necessarily bad but it's pretty standard stuff, and standard stuff sure as hell doesn't make up for all the garbage you have to sit through everywhere else.

To top it off, Revelation also has some other gameplay issues. While it does benefit from Fates' overall good game mechanics, particularly its far more interesting version of pair up than what Awakening introduced, it also brings some of the most bewildering unit balance in the series to the table, with multiple units that not only struggle to survive on their join maps but actually struggle to even do damage, a problem even true shitstains like Sophia managed to avoid (albeit her accuracy was hot garbage). You get situations like chapter 15 where Shura and Nyx join on the same map, one as a level ten promoted unit, the other level 9 unpromoted, with their respective base stats being about what you'd expect for those levels. Or Odin, whose bases are just worse all around by a long shot than Laslow, who joins at the same time and who isn't even anything special himself, especially compared to Xander and Leo. For a game that supposedly offers the benefit of being able to use everyone from both sides, it sure is determined to make a bunch of units actively unpleasant to ever use. And then for story reasons it doesn't even let you use everyone anyway!

At this point the Revelation fans will bring up that you can grind to fix bad units...well, maybe not because you rarely see Revelation fans outside of youtube comment sections for videos about it, but fans of other games with grinding might take up the torch just for the hell of it. Yes, you can grind. No, that doesn't really matter. Time spent grinding to make bad units functional could also be spent making good units godlike, and the process of having to grind to make a unit feel functional in the first place is simply not a pleasant one for me.

Over on the story side of things, Revelation is...a mess, to say the least. Corrins families make big speeches about opposing him only to be persuaded over to his side later by very little besides "I'm Corrin, trust me" because of this dumb little plot point about a curse that apparently erases people who mention what's going on, which is a great excuse to never have to write a scene where you need to come up with a convincing way to discuss something that sounds like an insane conspiracy theory. You spend the latter half of the game in the "hidden kingdom" of Valla, which looks pretty cool in backgrounds but which also is utterly devoid of backstory, culture, population, really anything to make anyone give a shit about it. And the main villain is a generic evil dragon because of course it is. Anankos apparently has something resembling characterization in DLC, but there's no way in hell I'm paying extra just to learn what the fuck the point of this generic idiot villain was. So as far as I'm concerned he's just a generic evil dragon that destroys shit for the lulz, because that's what Revelation itself actually showed me.

On the plus side, Revelation does have nice music, like most of Fates. The backgrounds tend to be very pretty, as do many of the maps. And cutscenes. Aside from the character designs, Revelation is very aesthetically pleasing. So that's nice. At least you can have nice things to listen to and look at while you suffer.

Revelation is simply...an utter disaster of a game. A bringing together of the Birthright/Conquest casts that undermines the story of those games by virtue of its existence, not helped by the fact that I find the Fates cast in general to be very unlikable. A game that is built on "creative" gimmicks that boil down to wasting your time instead of being fun. A huge cast of characters, many of whom are deliberately terrible in gameplay. Very little about it makes sense and I'm always left wondering who this game was made for. I think the only reason I put it above Thracia is because at least modern Fire Emblem has very quick gameplay, so I can get it over with faster, assuming I ever go back to play it again, which I probably won't because I'm not that much of a masochist.

What I'm trying to say is that Revelation is not good.

Up next: A game I genuinely like to an extent despite it feeling like utter shit by modern standards

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Meow!