I just wanted to ask where Jess comes in in chapter 3? I’ve recruited the other 3 characters and Jess hasn’t shown up, with only Stonewall and the boss left on the map.
Nope, don’t worry about that! There’s only one character that permanently leaves the party after joining, and it’s…
Marguerite
I think I forgot to specify this, but Jess doesn’t come out of her house if you visit it before she leaves. So now you have to either restart the chapter, or wait until Ch11 where you get a 2nd refresher (only if Jess hasn’t been recruited/died in the meantime)
Ah, that would’ve been good to know then. An update in the recruitment guide would be amazing if you have the time for it!
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Stuck on chapter 20 when pressing start constant loop event with Willy talking about stones.
Anyways Story was ok i guess but i didnt like the huge cast, it was wayy too big wich made me care only for Sylvester and Zweite, the rest i just let them die.
Gameplay was fair and not that difficult with no spikes so i liked that.
Just shame i wasted my time to get softlocked on chapter 20.
I did read the bugs and avoided them but i still got bugged anyways.
Thanks for this at least what i could play and can u tell me how the story ends in spoilers pls.
Fav char: Sylvester !
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Ah yes! Sorry about the Willy softlock. It’s a bug I only discovered after I started adding more stuff for the next update, and as such I can’t release a fixed patch because the new stuff is incomplete. But it should come out soon, hopefully!
The huge cast, like a lot of things in this hack, can be very hit-or-miss. I personally think there’s no real difference between having a 30 characters cast and a 70 characters cast, as long as most of them are more than just filler (which totf’s cast members aren’t, but then again I think supports not being implemented yet doesn’t help lol). But that’s just a personal game-design thing, and I totally understand not agreeing with it.
As for how the story ends, well…
Spoilers
Sylvester and co defeat Boneface during Ch20. Throughout the chapter you can hear records from Edward, Mina, Boneface and Aster detailing their thoughts and reasons to act the way they do, especially Aster who genuinely believes she’s going to make the world a better place. The final chapter is spent trying to take down Aster in an incomplete alternate dimension she opened herself, as she corrupts herself more and more in order to gain power. Once she dies and her necklace (revealed to be the source of her powers) is broken, the dimension begins falling apart, trapping Arnold and Sylvester inside. They end in a sort of dream-like limbo where Sylvester’s family as well as Arnold’s fellow mercenaries are all alive, but Arnold quickly breaks out of it and Sylvester follows him out. In the end the gang settles in the factory town chapter 12 and 13 took place in, and Marguerite is buried there. Edward and Mina leave so that they can try to fix their mistakes (as well as Boneface’s and Aster’s), and the rest is all individual endings. Nothing too groundbreaking, I know…
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Ty for the story ending, i will play it again after u finish all ur updates since i like this hack.
So did you finally find the issue and fix the bug I reported a while back? Because if so great.
Really looking forward to the patch, I enjoyed it A LOT. Without a doubt among my favorites.
How much chapters does this hack has?
@Marth This hack has 24 chapters currently, although that may be subject to change in later updates!
Also, @CCascoP, the new update has been released, and you should be able to complete the game now!
This update brings some rewritten dialogues and scenes, especially Sylvester’s flashback at the end of Ch13. If anyone playing the game from the beginning to the end notices inconsistencies, please tell me!
Man, this was an amazing hack, and that conclusion just maintained the same quality if not more of the whole hack.
Glad I played this.
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Hey people! Just a few quick announcements.
The game still has a lot of room to grow. Right now, I will be focusing on rewriting much of its story. This is gonna take time, so don’t panic if things keep quiet for a while. ToTF will never get in hiatus (I pray this statement will age like fine wine).
Anyways! One of the things I would like to change about the game is its roster. I will keep it the same size of course, but… I have a few ideas for new, interesting characters. However, that’d require kicking out characters people don’t like/find forgettable. In order to know who the most likely candidates would be, I’ve made a POLL!
Please take a few minutes to vote here, it’s really important. Thanks in advance for your time!
Been enjoying the hack so far, but encountered a small softlock in the chapter 13 end cutscene. Happens right outside the castle (don’t think I need spoiler tags for that). Anyone run into this and have a solution? I can skip the whole thing, but I’d really like to see what happens. If there’s any footage of it instead, I’d also be fine with that.
EDIT: Don’t really know what I did, but I managed to fix it by finagling enough. Still might be worth looking into.
On another note, I have a story question.
Post Ch13 Spoilers
What was the deal with Marguerite and Aster? Did I miss something? I don’t think I skipped around, but I never saw any bit where we had to put them down. Hell, I don’t even know who Aster is. Was the implication that Arnold was seeing things during the post Ch13 cutscene? If so, it wasn’t very clear what actually happened until later on.
Just want to make sure I have things straight, and this is ultimately a minor gripe. I have very much enjoyed the hack so far.
What did you do to fix this softlock? I’ve been trying to figure out how to fix it for a long time but I just don’t understand what causes it.
About the story spoiler, I think that’s an oversight. This patch was made after I began doing some serious rewrites, so honestly I’m surprised there was only one inconsistency. In previous versions, illusions of Marguerite and Aster appeared and had to be put down, but not anymore. Also, Aster is the blonde sage that appears as a green unit during the chapter where you recruit Hercules and Lily and follows Sylvester up to the next chapter’s end even though she isn’t playable. A lot of people admittedly forget about her entirely, so that is also something I plan to rewrite as well.
If you have any other feedback on story or gameplay I’d be more than glad to hear about it!
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I thought that might have been the product of a rewrite, but I’m kinda dense so I just wanted to double check. Anyways, minor issue like I said.
As for the softlock, I kinda just fiddled around with the last few turns of the map. For some reason, it activated when I killed the boss with a Sylvester crit one time, but then after wasting a few turns and hitting him without killing him the softlock didn’t happen. I’m not sure if those are related though, because I proceeded to crit him after the fact anyways and just to double check, I saw if I could quick kill the boss (thanks water walk!) and that also worked. Sorry I can’t be of more help. I’ll probably give more feedback overall once I finish the hack in a few days.
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Very solid hack. I thought that it had a few more chapters so I was shocked when I hit the finale, but it was an overall great experience.
Gameplay
The gameplay was fairly solid. I won’t say it blew my mind, but the maps were fairly fun and general unit feel was solid. I’d say it was probably a little on the easy side with a few exceptions. My units were EXCEPTIONALLY powerful, and even if one died there were plenty of replacements. Most hack creators would say that earlier units should usually be more powerful as a reward for keeping them alive, but I don’t hate this alternate approach. It certainly encouraged a more cavalier playstyle, especially since the game kinda started bugging out once I recruited too many.
Not having mounted units or fliers was an interesting choice. I was left with a selection of a single boots (the second pair on Barry was glitched and I couldn’t steal from him), which did end up making the units feel a bit samey at times. Movement is a resource, and making it nearly uniform made it hard to divvy up tasks when necessary, which I felt dragged things out sometimes. That said, there weren’t a whole lot of pressing secondary objectives, so I wasn’t punished too hard for taking it slow. Still, it might have made things more interesting to either give more movement options, or streamline things even more.
The few exceptions to the relatively lax difficulty were the Sages, Warriors, and the final boss. Sages just randomly had capped magic, and were a massive stopping block for trying to make any sort of offensive push. Normally this might be used to emphasize player phase, as in they are fragile enough to defeat without risking a counter, but with the low overall movement this was generally not the case.
The Warriors were a massive pain in the ass. You either had to use magic, a longbow (which are weak and limited), or enemy phase to manage some of the beefiest units in the game. They weren’t even really threatening in combat, my units ate them for breakfast, but risking most of my life to take them out felt like it slowed down the pace since they were essentially Wobbuffets.
The final boss was a bit of a pain to take out. Defenses that high are tough to crack in even the best of circumstances. As far as I could tell, nothing dealt effective damage, and even some of my best units couldn’t take a single attack from her (said attack was also scarily accurate). Even cutting maybe 5 from her defense and res would have made it more tolerable. The dancer ring helps, but that can only really be used once, and it’s still risky. You can block her off, sure, but it ends up dragging it out since you can kinda just stall until you deal enough damage assuming you can keep up the healing. Final bosses are hard, but I would maybe add more enemies and nerf the main target a little.
As a bit of a sidenote, I felt that the player phase could have been made a little more potent. There are often a LOT of enemies, and while my units were strong, I felt that my offensive options were limited to just bigger numbers sometimes. Some more accessible brave or killer weapons, even if sparse, may have helped here.
Story
I enjoyed the story a lot more than I expected. At first I felt like the lax approach to worldbuilding was a negative, but ultimately I think it was the right choice. This is a very character-focused story, and especially in a world as fractured and messed up as the one you created, people aren’t really gonna care about what’s happening outside their immediate surroundings. It reminded me of One Piece, and that’s a compliment. Exposition was only delivered insofar as it was related to the characters, and the fact that there were still so many mysteries remaining by the end actually enhanced my immersion rather than diminish it.
The characters were also pretty solid, though most of them besides the main 5-6 were really that developed. I was sure that I was gonna hate Arnold, but you did a great job of giving him as much redemption as he deserved. It’s so easy to wallow in despair, and put the impetus on the rest of the world to fix your mistakes (namely by dying), but it was refreshing to see him refocus on what was really important and at least try to live a life that he could be proud of. Sylvester was much the same, although it took a bit before he really endeared himself to me. Arya was another favorite. No one that tall should be so adorable! I enjoyed her arc, even if it wasn’t as in-depth as the other two.
As for criticisms, I felt that the early sections of the game could have used a bit less levity. It was somewhat entertaining, but I felt that drama and comedy was balanced much better after the first third of the game or so. You could have convinced me that this was a parody hack looking at just the beginning, though. I wasn’t nearly as invested in the game until, for lack of a better term, things started happening. That’s just my opinion though, if that was the direction you wanted then don’t let me stop you.
The villains weren’t necessarily the focus, but I feel that if Aster was truly meant to be the final antagonist then she could have used some more screentime. A lot of chapters felt kind of superfluous, like just another misadventure. I don’t think every waking moment needs to be focused on the themes or drama, just that I didn’t really care much for the villains or their ideology. It’s always good to have a hero/villain foil, but by the time they really come to light everyone had already completed their arcs, more or less. Also minor note, but Boneface really shoulda been stronger in my opinion (in gameplay, I mean).
Best Units/Final Roster
Naturally the lord was pretty strong. I think he had the most battles and kills overall, but his performance wasn’t truly the best. I had to baby him a bit to make him truly worthy of the title “Lord”. Then again, it’s his personality and actions that make him the lord, right?
No surprise that Arnold turned out well. One of my most consistently powerful units once I got him. Kinda fragile, but dodgy enough to survive most anything.
Her insane bases carried her through the early and midgame, and she still ended up pretty strong, but she began to underperform compared to the rest by the endgame.
Gave her a boots not realizing she would already get celerity. Super helpful since movement was pretty uniform.
Based horny tomboy. She got insanely blessed early on and juggernauted hard. Still ended up as one of my most consistent killers.
I was hoping Slayer would be more useful, but she still held her own and then some. Ended up being the wielder of Piece of Art.
Probably the true MVP. Insane growths and broken personal skill. Being able to move twice breaks the movement economy, and his stats were also good enough to bust almost anyone. If I didn’t make him a druid, he probably would have used the Piece of Art as well.
Zweite was hard to level as the games “Jagen”, but I still ended up taking him along despite better archer candidates since he was story relevant and the rest of my units were powerful enough to carry him.
Can you tell I like Heroes? Not as good as the other two, but started so strong that I couldn’t not use her.
I won’t lie I manipulated levels specifically to make her good. I couldn’t bear to have her be slow when she’s such a fun character in the story. Gotta love her con and HP. Her personal axe has DUMMY as its description text though.
My dedicated stealer. Some of the others would have been better, but I liked his personality.
Solid lategame swordy, though my other units were so strong that I didn’t need him much.
Kinda just there to fill a slot since I didn’t train enough units to deploy in endgame. Still really strong, though.
Kinda shitty bases, but such a strong personal that he could still hold his own. One of the few ways to take down the final boss, though not without some luck.
Miscellaneous
- The bottom-right door in chapter 20 could not be opened. Seemed like a glitch, but it locked me out of a chest
- Not sure what the “Sorrow Lance” on Suzanne was about, though I can imagine it had something to do with the story at some point.
- I actually ended up taking down the final boss by having Counter on Arya, which was kind of funny.
- I think the bit with Arnold killing his friends was actually a great subversion. We had them long enough to get attached, but not so much as to waste our time. Plus, it ties into the game’s themes while leaving enough lingering story threads to maintain relevance throughout the story. Just wanted to say well done.
- EDIT: I just remembered one other thing I wanted to mention. Losing my convoy at the end of Ch. 19 was a bad move I think. I didn’t have the time to take anything out, and found myself severely neutered for the final two chapters. I was strong enough to manage, but there were many things that I wish I could have used.
- I don’t know, I can’t think of anything else right now.
Well done. I look forward to what else you have in store, but no pressure. You do what you want, I very much appreciate what you’ve made. Thank you for taking the the time to build this experience for us.
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Thanks for the insightful feedback!
Yeah, ToTF has always been designed as a very ironman-friendly game. Of course, I think most players will want to keep everyone alive on their first playthrough, but I think this decision gives ToTF a lot of replay value.
Well, I think streamlining things would take some fun out of the game, so I’m likely gonna give a little more movement. Maybe one pair of boots you just can’t miss, plus several other will-hidden ones. I need to find the right balance though, since giving boots means the player can just give all of them to Sylvester and solo maps…
Well, the final boss is gonna change slightly (I’ll explain more on that when I’ll start replying to the story section), so nerfing her doesn’t feel like an issue. As for sages, I will nerf their magic growth for sure. And about warriors, idk, I like the fact they’re a very gimmicky class you kind of have to dread when you see one (at least on later levels). I may change it though, I still haven’t decided.
Noted! I’ll keep that in mind.
Thank you for appreciating that! For a long while I thought focusing on individual characters may have been a terrible choice, but in all honesty now I’m thinking we already have so many hacks with grand political plots full of backstabbing and manipulating, maybe it can be somewhat refreshing to have a fire emblem game where there is little to no political implications and you just play as a bunch of losers trying to survive.
Yeah about that, I personally believe the FE formula doesn’t allow for a cast where everyone is super developped and stuff. When you have more than 15-20 characters, it simply becomes impossible. And that’s fine. Give the main story’s spotlight to the main characters, and then use optional cutscenes, talk options, recruitment convos and supports to give the others their chance in the spotlight. (Of course ToTF’s supports being only at 1% completion kind of doesn’t help haha)
Well… without spoiling anything, Arya is the only character from ToTF’s playable cast that will be playable a 2nd time in the RPG Maker sequel I’m currently planning out. So her current arc is only the first half of her overall arc 
. I’m glad you enjoyed Arnold’s arc as well! I really hate the “Redemption equals death” trope and did my best to show what an unhealthy mindset that was.
I see what you mean, but the thing is, I wrote the overall story with the idea in mind that Arnold’s mutiny would be a massive mood whiplash. As such, the first six chapters are fairly light-hearted, so the unsuspecting player would play Kuru’s chapters thinking “oh boy I wonder what funny antics these new characters will get into” and then pretty much get hit by an emotional brick.
100% agree. Among the many things I’m planning to rewrite, Aster’s role is probably one of the most significant. Instead of making her a twist vilain, I think I will reveal her role in being the source of the corruption as soon as the slime chapter ends, and have her presence be more than hinted at (for example the lighthouse chapter’s boss refers to a witch in some dialogues, and he’s talking about her. This will be made clearer).
This’ll be changed, no worries 
It was originally supposed to be her and Arnold’s prf but I ultimately never did anything with it…
This is another thing that’s already planned to change!
Thank you very much! The current plan is to plan out the sequel’s story from beginning to the end, then plan out some roster changes (there are several characters I’m currently thinking about deleting), then do all the rewrites I’ve planned, and finally work on supports!
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Hello，I’m trying to translate this version into Chinese because I love Sylvester very much.This man is really full of damned charm，so I want your permission and I look forward to your repl,tks.
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Hi! I would really be honored to see my hack being translated into another language, so you have my full permission to do so!
However, I’m currently in the process of rewriting a lot of cutscenes and changing a few characters, so you will end up either having to translate the game twice, or having a translated version that is very different from the finished product. The choice to continue or wait until the hack is officially finished is yours.
Also, if you want to talk about it more in-depths or ask me any question, here is my discord tag: Zeldacrafter63#5412