Anything not mentioned was made by me (although if you made something that was not properly credited by me, please let me know! Very possible I missed something).
I hope you enjoy!
Edit:
PHOTOSENSITIVITY WARNING!!! There is a pink flash when booting up the title screen on version 4.0 and earlier, It is fixed in 5.0 please proceed at your own discretion!!!
Ok, Random FEU guy, not an actual judge, I am just trying using the rubric of the Event:
Gameplay: The hack is pretty fun your first time around, the second time feels a little lacking, but you’ll know what to do so it’s not hard it just takes time. The gimmick of changing map areas and units is pretty surprising but can keep you on your toes, but doesn’t really change so it has more of a one trick pony to it. (I suppose it makes it easier to find out the truth later on) The map has enough enemies and things to worry about to not feel bored but isn’t immune to turtling, but that still gives you a little time to assess and approach your next move cautiously as things can change for worse or for better. Some items do not feel like they can be utilized as much such as the silence staff and maybe the Javelin (that might be because of me), Your units feel very powerful but can still be focus fired to death and it doesn’t mean you can just turn your brain off.
Skills don’t matter as much but can still do something at points (They serve more of a narrative function I think). Also the final boss can be a bit easy and that might not be it’s intention but is still challenging enough
Presentation: The presentation utilizes it’s character design to great effect and ties in well with the plot of the hack, the use of the two different styles to show the whitewashing of events and the reality of what happened is well utilized (Falsehood-FE Splices, Reality-Dev’s Artstyle) The setting of a Dark and Stormy night is a classic and helps bolster the myth presented. The OST is a good selection, no notes on that (Gaiden Truther you are). The splices in the hack are well done and Joelius having hair that more goes to the sides of the head rather than just flush on the back is a great choice IMO.
Story: The Story is a well told piece about the biases of history and the cruelty of truth, and appearances not being what they seem. As the hack want you to “find the truth” while editing a piece of propaganda, the Story of Secco, a Warrior raider who raised villages and stole the emperor’s sword. As events unfold you learn that Secco’s whole story is a falsehood. Secco never existed. The Story of Secco was used by the Empire to cover it’s crimes and maintain it’s authority. As Secco’s real story is of that of Person named Orr who was betrayed by her friends and had her sight, sword and life stolen from her. The use of portrait splices help reinforced this idealized, more palatable version of events (especially for the typical Rom-hack playerbase), and when the truth is revealed the characters in the story it shows more of Dev’s Art (which is less conventional for the audience), Orr was the one who tasked you on the editor’s assignment and it is a great twist in retrospect and you can pick up more on your “Fire Emblem An Informed Second Look” through, A little more info can be found out in the game’s Hard Mode.
3.0 Visual and gameplay changes (mainly removed an event as it did not work properly and made things more confusing than necessary)
4.0 Very minor visual changes (I am pretty happy with how things are)
This will likely be the final version, at least before the deadline for LEAF. The only thing that may be added in the future is custom menu graphics once I figure out what I want to go for with my main project, but for now this is it! Please enjoy!
Played the version 5.0, I really liked the game, but I wonder if the ending is indeed a game over screen being peak trolling or if I missed something (Only thing I can think of is the pendant died alongside other unit), going to try to save the pendant on mc idk maybe it’s a bug? Also I think there should have been an extra hint about the dragon ignoring terrain, didn’t pay much attention at first and distracted it with phantoms, but once I can’t summon them anymore I planned to try a kill on the forest choke point, but yeah the dragon ignored terrain and 2 units died.
Edit: Saw the screenshot of what seems desert so maybe the game over screen isn’t the ending? Kept the pendant but did nothing, maybe getting the ally/traitor soldier alive is the thing so when it respawn I did some manip to one round the boss but I still get game over, tried suspending the game but doesn’t seem to change anything, dropped all items because I had no other idea and no result. I’m using mgba 0.10.5, playing on Hard Mode, Windows 11, or idk maybe the game over screen is actually the ending.
Hello! Thank you for playing, it really brightens my day to see someone go out of they’re way to play my work!
As for the things you mentioned: The ending (I assume) you got is still the ending of the game and if you’re satisfied with that, then congrats you beat it! However, if you wish to see what else is in store,you get an extended ending if you have the civilians go to the escape point in the ruins on the top right in the town on hard mode and then beating the map in the historically accurate way (you can kill Estragon, its just very unfeasible and results in a different, less serious ending, you can very easily do this in the oldest versions if you’re curious otherwise get to using corrosion with eclipse [there’s probably some other way, that’s just the “dev intended” solution]). It still results in a game over because I wanted it to, but also because if I didn’t then the unit endings would loop which is not what I want to happen. I truly have no idea why that is the case, but I am planning a final update once I get further along in the main project I have in mind to fully polish this as well as other things. The dragon terrain thing is also just a vanilla feature, they are flying units. Perhaps I should have put some hint towards that behavior but I assumed it wouldn’t be that big of deal since its movement is pretty low anyways.
