Fire Emblem Engage (NSP, XCI) ROM + v2.0.0 Update + All DLCs

Fire Emblem Engage A thousand years have passed since the four kingdoms united to vanquish the Fell Dragon, an evil force threatening the Continent of Elyos. But now, the seal binding the dragon has weakened, and the threat of its reawakening looms large. As a Divine Dragon, you must use your strategic skills and customization options to collect Emblem Rings and restore peace to the land. This game is a tactical role-playing game developed by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Switch. It is the seventeenth installment in the Fire Emblem series and was released worldwide on January 20, 2023.

GAMEPLAY

Fire Emblem Engage is a tactical role-playing game. Players control the main character whose name and gender can be specified at the start of the game; by default, the main character’s name is Alear. The player controls Alear and their allies through a series of battles as the plot advances; there are also optional “skirmish” battles and “Paralogue” side missions if the player wants to further strengthen their team. In between these story battles, the player can have their characters relax and engage in social activities with each other. New characters will regularly join Alear’s team as the game progresses; these characters have their starting statistics (stats), stat growth rates, and unique personal skills.

Each character has a specific set of other characters they can gain “support levels” with. As their support level increases, units unlock conversations and increase bonuses when fighting nearby in battle. The battles feature a grid map, similar to a large chessboard, where both the characters under player control and enemy units are laid out. The flow of the game is turn-based, with the game alternating between a player phase where player units move and act and an enemy phase where hostile units move and act. The maps feature a variety of pathways and obstructions. As an example, rivers are impassable to ground-based units and only traversable by flying units. Other terrain grants defensive bonuses; for example, fortresses give an occupying unit an evasion boost and regenerate a portion of the unit’s health at the start of the turn.

Units have a character class that determines their available weapon types, and movement capabilities and affects the growth of their stats. For example, an armored class might have low movement and slow speed but have a high defense stat allowing them to take little damage from enemy physical attacks. Characters are equipped with weapons, magical tomes, and other items by the player which the characters use to attack hostile units or heal friendly units. Magical staves allow characters who can use them to perform other utility actions such as creating temporary obstructions on the map or warping units across long distances. When a unit is commanded to engage in combat, the stats of both the attacker and defender are compared to determine how powerful and accurate the attacks are.  The game features a “weapon triangle” seen in earlier games of the series: swords have an advantage over axes, lances have an advantage over swords, and axes have an advantage over lances.

Additionally, brawling attacks have the advantage over bows, daggers, and magical tomes. If a unit attacks with weapon triangle advantage and hits their target, the defender is inflicted with a “Break” status that stops them from counterattacking both in the current combat and their next combat. Two new mechanics are Chain Attacks, which allow certain classes to chip in and help an ally’s attack on a nearby foe, and Chain Guards, which allow certain support classes to completely nullify an attack on an adjoining ally. In addition to three difficulty levels, Engage has both a “Classic” and a “Casual” mode the player selects from. In Classic mode, if a character falls to 0 HP and is defeated, they are lost forever, never to be deployed again. In Casual mode, defeated characters are only unavailable for the remainder of the map, but will be restored for later chapters of the story.

SETTING

Engage is set on the continent of Elyos, a land divided into five regions: Lythos, Firene, Brodia, Elusia, and Solm. Lythos is a central holy land reserved for the Divine Dragon and their attendants. The realms of Firene, Brodia, and Solm largely cooperate, while the kingdoms of Brodia and Elusia are on hostile terms, fighting frequent skirmishes over their borderlands. Most citizens of Firene, Brodia, and Solm revere the Divine Dragon as their deity, while most Elusians worship the Fell Dragon. Dragons live in human form for the vast majority of their long lifespans, with only a select few capable of transforming into a classic draconic form, and even then doing so only rarely, an aspect similar to other games in the Fire Emblem series.

One thousand years before the events of the plot, a great war was fought between Lumera, the Divine Dragon, and Sombron, the Fell Dragon. Sombron was gravely wounded, and the country he had ruled, Gradlon, was sunk beneath the ocean. The most important weapons of the ancient war were the Emblem Rings, twelve magic rings that gave their wielders incredible power. To prevent any one person from easily gathering and misusing their power, the rings were spread across Elyos, with six of the rings entrusted to the human countries, and Lythos keeping the remaining six rings under the personal watch of Lumera and her stewards.

STORY

Alear, a dragon, is awoken from a one-thousand-year slumber. They have amnesia, and only vague memories of fighting against Sombron one thousand years ago with the aid of Emblem Marth, and are told they were wounded in the struggle. It quickly becomes apparent that Sombron is recovering, too, as his allies enter Lythos to capture its Emblem Rings: undead known as Corrupted and an army from the Kingdom of Elysia. An unknown young woman working with the invasion force kills the Divine Dragon, Lumera, leaving only her child Alear to take on her mantle as the Divine Dragon. While others are surprised to learn that the supposedly childless Lumera had a successor, adherents quickly accept Alear as the new Divine Dragon.

Alear and their allies decide to set out on a quest to gather the scattered Emblem Rings and use them to defeat Sombron, while Corrupted undead wreck havoc and Elusia’s armies vie with Alear in the struggle to take control of the Emblem Rings. Alear visits both Firene and Brodia, gathering rings and recruiting allies. Alear also meets and befriends Veyle, a mysterious, naive young woman who is searching for her lost sibling. Alear attacks Elusia in a bid to prevent the restoration of Sombron’s full power but fails to arrive in time, as King Hyacinth of Elusia has already successfully performed the sacrificial ritual to revive Sombron. Sombron devours Hyacinth for even more power and takes personal control of Elysia.

Worse, it is revealed that Alear’s friend Veyle and the unknown enemy commander who killed Lumera are the same person. Veyle, saying she is Sombron’s daughter, steals the six Emblem Rings that Alear has gathered so far, meaning their associated Emblems will serve Sombron. Defeated, Alear and their allies flee from an army of Corrupted, Veyle, and a team of Sombron’s most trusted generals called the Four Hounds. The heroes gain renewed hope when Ivy, Hyacinth’s daughter, and her retainers come to Alear’s aid, bringing two of the Emblem Rings that Elusia had controlled. Alear starts a new quest to gain Emblem Rings with which to challenge Elusia’s armies and travels to Solm, the desert queendom; returns to Firene; and invades Elusia a second time, all while fighting against Veyle and the Hounds. It becomes apparent that Veyle has two personalities: one innocent and trusting, and another cruel and loyal to Sombron.

The Hounds and Alear realize that Alear, too, is a child of Sombron and the lost sibling that the innocent Veyle had been seeking. Lumera had adopted Alear after they defected from Sombron’s forces during the ancient war. In a climactic struggle back at the ruined castle of Lythos, the evil Veyle is defeated, allowing the innocent Veyle to break the magical mind control placed on her. However, Sombron kills Alear, who dies protecting Veyle and collects all twelve rings. Sombron uses the power of the Emblems to raise the fallen land of Gradlon and open the way into the broader multiverse. Veyle uses her fell powers to temporarily resurrect Alear as a Corrupted, and the two recover the twelve rings discarded by Sombron, although Corrupted Alear soon begins disintegrating. The Emblems unleash a secret power to resurrect a person and revive Alear as the new thirteenth Emblem, the Fire Emblem.

FELL XENOLOGUE

“Fell Xenologue” is a downloadable content (DLC) side-story that runs parallel to Engage’s main story. In it, Alear visits a parallel version of Elyos where most everything is inverted: the royalty of the four nations have opposite personalities to the main game and are hostile foes to defeat, while the parallel versions of the Four Hounds are heroic allies known as the Four Winds. In this world, Alear and Sombron are both dead, having killed each other in the war one thousand years earlier. Seven Emblem Bracelets containing the Emblems added as DLC are the point of contention. Dragon twins Nel and Nil pray for aid in reclaiming the seven Emblem Bracelets. With the help of the Four Winds, the party defeats the armies of these parallel versions of Firene, Brodia, Elusia, and Solm and takes their bracelets. Nel reveals that all of the armies and royals they’ve encountered were Corrupted, their living selves long dead.

A suddenly hostile Nil takes the bracelets collected so far. The group follows him to an alternate version of the Somniel that has fallen from the sky. Nil, driven insane by a corrupted dragon stone of Sombron’s, demands that Alear use their power to break the seal on the final bracelet by threatening Nel’s life. Alear cooperates and Nil obtains the ultimate power of the seven bracelets, transforming him into a powerful fell dragon form. Nel, Alear, and the Four Winds battle and defeat Nil. After the battle, Nil reveals that his real name is Rafal and that the original Nil, Nel’s brother, died in the war a thousand years prior. Rafal had taken the role at the original Nil’s request. Nel stabs herself in the stomach with her blade. Nil is overcome with grief and vows to spend the next thousand years reviving her. With no one left in their ruined version of Elyos, the Four Winds agree to accompany Alear back to their world and are eventually followed by a revived Nel and the repentant Rafal.