Oh wow, I didn’t realize it was so popular to have animations on.
As someone who usually plays without battle animations, I had never really thought to include animations from the repo in my own project. But this makes me reconsider.
To me, battle animations just kill the pace of the game, as they’re so slow and also cut the map music (which they thankfully changed in the 3DS+ games), and they don’t even look that good (they’re much more bearable in KagaSaga/Tellius/3DS imo).
It doesn’t help that they’re a monumental pain to deal with hacking-wise too.
I have them off pretty much all the time in pretty much every game. Map animations are nicer in the games they’re in but they’re still slower than GBAFE’s or DSFE+'s map animations, ideally I’d like to be able to switch between those two (which I can in FE10! ain’t that nice).
Not only would I not mind at all for any hack to forego battle animations entirely, but as a hacker I am willing to ignore them (as I have already done in the past) in order to not only lighten my work charge but also to make implementation of battle-related features much more straightforward and much less headache inducing. Knowing that it might turn people off does make me kind of sad tho.
I’d never play Fire Emblem without animations. It would be far too boring without it. Visual engagement is important to me, so without battle animations, I’d never have even touched a Fire Emblem game. This is the same reason I don’t play rpgs with a first person battle view.
I even kept them on while playing SNES and FE9, which are exceedingly boring and basic as hell because they increase the game’s appeal just that much more.
I was especially disappointed that healing animations were axed in later Fire Emblem games.
I am very disappointed with the lack of variety in choreography and movement when it comes to 3d FEs after 10.
It really depends on what games were talking about as OFF & ON animations are significantly different in each. And some even have sophisticated OFF Animations.
for example FE4&5 i like both for different reasons so i sometimes have them off and on depending on the classes, like swordmasters are always on (as i don’t like the off ones), cavs & mages are in between etc.
For GBA its pretty much almost always on unless there is a specific reason for them to be off.
POR is a case of having them off because of how the animations are paced, although i actually do occasionally turn them on (even in maniac mode which i do enjoy) if say a crit or skill proc might happen or maybe its a boss.
RD is the one that actually annoys me the most that people go for the full on OFF animations when MAP Animations are 3 times nicer, not to mention the button that allows you to switch from MAP & ALL ON if you feel like speeding it up or the polar opposite.
As much as id like to go through the rest, ehh i’ve spoken long enough.
People would not complain so much, if the animations could be speed up so that they could be observed but at the same time not take so much time on the screen, which is why in awakening they put that choice.
Personally, I usually keep the animations on, but it’s true that at a certain point, for example, when you have to restart the map, I usually turn it off or if there are simply too many enemies and I feel that it’s not progressing as smoothly as I want to.
I agree with Stan entirely. If there’s a custom animation in a hack I’m playing, I’ll play with animations on once or twice, and then turn them off. Exceptions include if I want to see staff hit rates, since the box doesn’t show up (it’s on the to-do list).
I’ve only played GBA FE, so I can’t comment on other games, but I’d probably turn them off there too. I’ve seen them tons of times; it’s not like something new is going to happen after the 50th or 500th time you watch an animation.
For mainline FE, unless I’ve had to reset a given chapter several times over and am getting tired of it, I almost always play with animations on, even in FE9/10. To me, the game is more about the overall experience and enjoying myself which means ‘look at the pretty pictures’ more than it means ‘mach zoom’.
If FE’s combat window worked like that of Super Robot Wars (pops up before every fight on every phase, lets you change weapons or Defend or attempt to boost your evasion at the expense of no counter attack, lets you set the animation state before combat), I would probably switch animations off for most of Enemy Phase though, at least for the enemies that didn’t really matter, since that seems to be the phase that slogs more.
Usually keep them on because they’re cool, though I do find myself turning them off if I’m replaying a map for long enough.
(given the option, I’m usually speeding up through it all anyway)
It all depends on whether or not I have access to some kind of fast-forward function (playing on emulators or newer FE games where you can hit a button to skip them). Yes? Animations on. No? Animations off. The “L button to toggle animations” hack is nice and gives flexibility to easily watch an animation for cool/new stuff, but on the other side of that coin there are games that force animations for all boss fights, which I find extremely annoying.
Then there’s the wrinkle of “do units on the map swing their weapons and stuff even with animations off”, à la FE5 and FE9. I actually prefer watching the map units fight each other over transitioning to animation scenes. If GBA had something like that, I would just zero out all the animation pointers and have the fighting map sprites exclusively.
Can we also talk about animation option 1 (no background) versus option 2 (with background) in the GBA games? I see people change it to 2 all the time, but I actually prefer option 1 because it makes the “the battle scene pops out of the map like a diorama” effect even more persistent, with no need for a screen transition at all, and that’s coolradcool.
I almost exclusively play with battle animations on, the only exception being when I’m doing something like boss abuse or grinding Nils up to level 7+ to gain access to Chapter 19xx in FE7.
For one thing, combat animations really help draw me in and get me to connect more with what’s going on in the game, and for another, the GBAFE animations are just too fun and charming for me to wanna forego watching them!
Features like skipping or speeding up combat animations that were introduced in later games are certainly appreciated, but I don’t consider them at all necessary for my own personal enjoyment of a Fire Emblem game.
I usually turn off battle animations.
This is because animations take a lot of time, even if you use frame skipping.
However, I only want to see battle animations when I’m fighting a boss.
There’s a patch that forces the animation to be turned on only when fighting the boss, so I hope you’ll take advantage of this.
NAME=敵将強制アニメON
NAME.en=Boss Animation ON
NAME.zh=敌将强制动画开启
TYPE=BIN
TAG=#ENGINE
PATCHED_IF:0x057A7A=0x00 0x28 0x1A 0xD0 0x03 0x28 0x18 0xD0 0x01 0x28 0x16 0xD1 0x4D 0x46 0x28 0x68 0x00 0x8D 0x00 0x04 0xC0 0x0F 0x10 0xD1
//BIN:0x000589c2=000589c2.bin //FE8J
BIN:0x0057A7A=00057A7A.bin
INFO=設定でアニメをオフにしても、ボスフラグを持つ敵と戦うときは、強制的にアニメーションをONにします。
INFO.en=Even if you turn off animation in settings, when you fight an enemy with a boss flag, turn on animation forcibly.
INFO.zh=即使您在设置中关闭动画，当您使用敌将标志与敌人战斗时，也会强行打开动画。
AUTHOR=aera Transport:7743
I think my first run through a game I’ll play with the animations on through the early parts of the game, and then I eventually lose my patience and turn them off once my party gets going. Second time through a map on a reset I will play without.
I do find I get more invested in the game when there is some battle animation more than just the GBA map anims. Thracia style map anims are my favorite, but GBA I like to show animations (especially when recording). I find animations and seeing the battle unfold helps add tension to a map especially when playing iron man, and forces me to pay closer attention to what’s happening.
I would totally play a game without them if the gameplay is good.
I answered “Sometimes on”. I tend to set animation on whenever I feel like, but majority of the time I play without animations or I skip/speed-up through them. New animations are nice to see, but for me personally the novelty wears off pretty quickly.
As for the question if I’d play a hack without animations, I’ll say yes unless the hack is lacking in other areas as well.
Imagine playing FE7 and never hearing “Strike!” for the billionth time. That cruel fate is avoidable if animations are always on.
More generally, fe music epic and fegba battle animations are iconic. Gets my blood pumping. I would appreciate a skip button like in later games, though.
