[FE8] [WIP] Fire Emblem : Witch's Hope

[Roxas139]

Download here: Witch’s hope WIP

Introduction

Witch’s hope is my first ever ROMhack and creative project in general I have never wrote,drew or made anything before but hopefully this hack will not disappoint even though it is a bit basic. this hack is currently a work on progress, please try it out and feel free to provide feedback and criticism
also this is my second FEU post ever so I hope I included everything that needs to be included lol.

This hack’s main focus is mages and hopefully this is apparent from both gameplay and story.

THIS HACK IS BALANCED AROUND HARD DIFFICULTY NORMAL AND EASY EXIST AND ARE EASIER BUT THEY ARE IN NO WAY TESTED OR BALANCED PLEASE PLAY ON HARD MODE

Features

• Unique prf weapons for every magic unit
• Many QoL features like (items returning to convoy upon death, fast forward battles using R, all the QoL that comes with skill system, check credits for more info)
• A (hopefully) interesting story that will keep you playing
• The hack includes a new weapon triangle that integrates magic in the regular weapon triangle
• Anima is strong vs swords but weak to lances
• Light is strong vs lances but weak to axes
• Dark is strong vs axes but weak to swords

You’ll like this hack if you enjoy:

• Mages
• unique prf weapons to differentiate units
• Lots of QoL

Screenshots

Gameplay notes/important tips

• Some mugs and names are just placeholders from FE8

Credits

portraits:
Hermes - HusbandoEmblem (Made the mug)
Elizabeth - Zess dynamite (For the mugs used in the splice)
Fu’ad - Scraiza (Made the mug)
Eve - Rasta (Made the mug)
Luigi - RandomWizard(Made the mug)
“Boss” - Goldblitzx (Made the mug)
Jason - JiroPaiPai (Made the mug)
Noel - JiroPaiPai (Made the mug)
Michael - JiroPaiPai (Made the mug)
Arthur - JiroPaiPai (Made the mug)
Camelot - Epicer (Made the mug)

item icons:
Hope - LordGlenn
Long spear - Zelix
Pride - Mag, NerysRhys
Erudition - WhydidImakethisaccount

Map sprites:
Sword cav - Agro
Dragoon - Pikmin, unknown
Lancer - ArcherBias
Halberdier - TBA
Bow armor - Agro, Blademaster
Hunter F and M - MeatOfJustice
Marksman F and M - ArcherBias
Dark Knight - flasuban
Twilight General - WarPath

Class Cards:
Bow armor - Der, Epicer
Halberdier - TBA
Dragoon - Kenpuhu

Magic animations:
Pride - ThatBerkawitz, HGS
Erudition - BwdYeti

Battle Animations:
Storagician staff animation - temp
Bow Armor bow animation - TheBlindArcher
Lancer - Markex133
Dragoon - Mercenary Lord, NYZGamer, Pikmin1211, Maiser6, 7743
Halberdier - TheBlindArcher, Spud, MeatOfJustice
Hunter F and M - Leo_link, Spud, MeatOfJustice
Marksman F and M - Leo_link, Spud, MeatOfJustice
Monk - Ultraxblade (removed the white pixels from the vanilla animation)
Dark knight - IS, Orihari_Saki, TheBlindArcher
Dusk general - Leo_link, Nuramon, Iscaneus, The_Big_Dededester, DerTheVaporeon
Cult leader - MrNight48
Bard - Black Mage, Temp, Wan

Music:
Genshin Impact - Hustle and Bustle of Port Ormos - dennougyaru, ZappyPants
Persona 3 portable - Wiping All Out - MysteriousDancer
Castlevania stage 1 - A reliable chair
KH 358 - 2 Days - Another Side - Mycahe
KH SSB - Shrouding Dark Cloud - Azula
Live A Live - Megalomania - RandomWizard
Castlevania Portrait of Ruin - Bloodlines Bequeathed

Patches:
16_tracks_12_sounds - Agro/Brendo
Switch:Animation on / off with L button - aera
AnimNumbers Damage pop-up in battle anime - Huichelaar
AoE Area of Effect - Vesly
AutoGenLeftOAM Reduce capacity by dynamically creating LeftToRightOAM - 7743
Fix CG Fade Glitch - 7743
Convert Chapter Titles to Text_ver2 - circleseverywhere,7743
Actions After Support (Contemporary Style) - circleseverywhere,7743
Actions After Talk (Contemporary Style) - circleseverywhere,7743
CritCap. Fixed critcal from appearing in excess of 100% - Contro
Map Danger Zone (Select: Toggle) - circleseverywhere
Draw attack effect on map animation when battle animation off - Vesly,Viktor Hahn
Remove Enemy Control Glitch - Brendor,7743
Display Escape menu - 7743
COND Check whether all members have withdrawn - aera
Add Event: Character Retreat - aera
ExModularSave - Stan
Allow fast-forwarding of battle animations with the R button - 7743
FE8-Battle Stats with Anims Off ver2 - Vesly, tequila
Rogue Robbery - tequila
Enable Locked Weapon Prf constraints on staffs and items as well - tequila,7743
01command_hack - hextator,7743
48command_hack - hextator,7743
Anti-Huffman - hextator,7743
FillAIDangerMap Efficiency Fix - 7743,HyperGammaSpaces
fix_lz77decompress - tequila
Added a game option that staff and dances do not display anime - 7743
HPBars_simple - Circles,Zane
m4a hq mixer - ipatix
Magic Sword Rework - Sme
Fixed glitch that prevented cavalry’s CANTO move again after open menu - 7743
ModularMinimugBox: VisionQuest Style with ItemList - Pandan,Scraiza, ZaneAvernathy
NarrowFont - Scraiza
Switch the death Quote for each unit who is killer - 7743
Expanded the setting of the ring effect used by dancers - 7743
SkillSystem_CustomBuild - Circleseverywhere, Monkeybard, Black Mage, Blaze, Tequila, Rossendale, StanH, Leonarth, Teraspark, sd9k, Kao, blademaster, Snakey1, Primefusion
Skip the event using the opening world map - 7743
Stairs - Snakey1
Steal with full inventory - Vesly
UnitActionRework - Stan
Items send to convoy upon death - Contro
Change to have multiple units that can be seize - 7743
Add Event: Call the store from event - 7743
ExtendWeaponDescBox - Vesly
Character Custom Animation by EA - 7743
FE8 Text Engine Rework - Tequila, Zahlman, Stan, Black Mage and Eliwan, The Awful Emblem team
AddEvent:EventWriter - circleseverywhere
Group AI - Vesly
Allow to summon multiple classes - 7743
Allows detailed setting of weapons held by summoned units - 7743
NosResire - SME
Make NPC (ally) as the third power - 7743
MultiTileMarker Display multiple exit markers on the map - 7743
256 Color Title Background 20180611 - Leonarth
Add Event: Simple Escape event that can be easily created - 7743 , aera
AddEvent: Set Unit Status - 7743
Unlock various restrictions of chapter 5x - Tequila
Define multiple classes that can discover desert treasures Installer - 7743

Special thanks to the lovely people of the FEuniverse discord server and r/FE romhack channel for handling my onslaught of unending questions about romhacking
And especially to FEU user hatsuru who made the FEE3 2024 trailer for this hack!!!

[Luka_1921]

Played what little you got, gotta say holds promise, the premise is p cool though I wish the writing was a bit less, blunt? or expositiony. The maps were good, ch2 esp no complaints, ch1 was fine, maybe some reinforcement that force you forward or something I dunno, but still ill be watching for futher updates

[Ysor]

For what it is its pretty good overall(No story comments because I’m not really a story guy). Nothing bad in the gameplay at least. My only real complaint is that the 2 maps are a bit too simple but that isn’t bad at all. I like the PRFs with my favorite being wraith. All the units do well enough in combat that I don’t think any of them are outright useless(Max threw me off but he hits hard). The maps play fine but they’re kind of trivialized by Wraith(seriously this weapon is awesome) due to the range. This look promising! The overall presentation need work but that’s a given but even with vanilla FE8 music I had a good time. Short but you’re starting off strong. I look forward to seeing more of this. If you need playtesting let me know.

[YeahNice]

Decided to give this a quick play. Gameplay overall is decent, the maps look nice and play pretty well, and the story concept was quite interesting. As for feedback, I do have a few things I want to bring up.

• The grammar needs a pass through, most sentences had some sort of grammatical error in them whether it be missing commas/periods or missing capitalization.
• Joshua’s PRF is probably too strong. A MAG/2 range bow is a novel idea but it’s got very high damage and no real drawbacks for what it is. The fact that he doesn’t double with it is good, I just wish there was more of a drawback for getting stuck in melee range with it equipped.
• On the topic of Joshua, 3 range only Iron Bows are just plain awkward to work around, and very easily cheeses 2-ranged bosses when it does work.
• Characters overall are very strong and both chapters were very easy to complete. Maybe a harder difficulty option or just plain raising enemy stats/lowering player stats would help, but don’t worry about making them super hard, it’s just the first two chapters.
• The Thunder in the second chapter chest has 251 uses for some reason.
• Adoration crashes the game. It just plain bricks the game with a divide by 0 error, and I’m playing mGBA.

[Roxas139]

The blunt and expositiony writing must be because of my lack of writing experience
I will try my best to improve the dialogue
Some examples of dialogue that felt awkward to you would have been great so i can see what to avoid and improve

[Roxas139]

Thank you very much! i hope you keep playing the updates and enjoy them too
Chapters 1 and 2 were supposed to be an introduction to the units and hack in general so i tried to make them simple and not too difficult
As for wrath the main design choice for it that when other units start leveling up joshua and his prf will start falling off into becoming chip damage that helps feed xp to other units because he can’t double with it the weapon’s might is low and he has jagen str growth i am glad you enjoyed it tho

[Roxas139]

Point 1: noted i will try to improve the dialogue when i add the next chapter
Point 2: wrath is supposed to fall off slowly throughout the game but i may have had his intial power be too strong i will consider nerfing it, my intial thought process was wrath will make joshua able to help feed xp to the other units
Point 3: on the topic of bows, yeah i agree it can be a bit awkward but i think the range buff will help archers feel better and bosses will have 3 range options in the future so they don’t be sitting ducks
But I didn’t give the chapters 1 and 2 bosses any to make it easy to feed xp to a certain unit in these introductory chapters
Point 4: The chapter is supposed to be played on hard mode I apologize because i failed to mention that in the post but i don’t think chapter 1 and 2 are that different on hard
I will test buffing the enemies or nerfing the playables
Point 5 and 6: these are obviously bugs
Idk why did the thunder have 251 uses and i tested adoration while working on it and it worked fine
I must have accidentally done something to screw it up
I will fix it

[Luka_1921]

Maybe an introduction of like the king announcing to a crowd like him making these new laws would be more effective and then cut to her however long later on the run, rather than our hero being like " wow that happened its crazy "

[Roxas139]

SOOO version 0.0.1 is here and here is the patch notes

patch notes:

• Bug fixes - Adoration no longer crashes the game when animations are off
• The thunder tome in chapter 2 no longer has 251 uses for some reason
• increased the difficulty a bit by adding more auto levels and some reinforcemnts nothing major tho

Thanks for playing! And i will add more chapters hopefully soon

[tweetyboy]

Will this hack have supports and paired endings upon it’s completion?

[Roxas139]

While I love supports and hope I can add them,
I still don’t have the ins and outs of writing a story yet.
So to not set expectations for no reason
the answer is maybe.
I might add them after i am done with the hack’s story and characters so I can have more of an idea who or what i am writing for.

[tweetyboy]

Totally far thanks!!! I’ll be on the lookout to see how it develops

[Roxas139]

Hey guys! I hope everyone who sees this is doing well.
I just wanted to write a post on what I am working on right now for the hack.
I have added new dialogue like a cutscene before chapter 1 that showcases the story’s villains and an end event to chapter 2.
And i am also trying my hardest to fix the grammer and punctuation in the existing dialogue
As for chapter 3 it will unfortunately take a while.
My final exams are unfortunately starting tomorrow which means that in this week I won’t be able to get any work done.
But i assure you all that after my finals are done I will pick up the pace and release more content.
And thank you all for being so patient with my extremely slow work pace.

[Ysor]

Good luck with finals

[Roxas139]

Hello hello friends! Sorry for the wait but chapter 3 is finally out and here are the patch notes

Patch notes

• Chapter 3 is fully finished
• A LOT of writing errors has been fixed in the previous chapters
• Added a bit more dialogue to chapter 1’s start event to set the hack’s tone better

and that’s all I hope you enjoy and ofc feel free to share feedback

[Roxas139]

Hello Hello guys!
I am here to say that unfortunately I haven’t started working on chapter 4 yet.
BUT fortunately there is a reason
I have fixed all the bugs in chapter 3 AND made mugs for all the playable characters who were using placeholders!
here are the mugs for each character:

Robin:

Layla:

Max:

Julia:

Leo:

March:

I hope you all like how the mugs turned it!
I will now work on making the mouth and eyes animations for them and add them to the hack alongside the bugfixes then start working on chapter 4.

[ClasicNPC]

I just finish the 3 chapter’s,and here Is my opinion.

Good hack with good potencial.here some things i see playing:

Max,growth In Speed (30%) Is bad for a Pegasus knigth.

Leo growth In mágic (25%) i feel Is bad,he Will tank but no doing damage back.

the boss In chapter 3 when attack you dont say anything.

And for final the Boss In chapter 2 when he dies say ‘watned’ instead of wanted

[Roxas139]

Thanks for taking the time to play my hack I hope you enjoyed it!
As for the issues you mentioned I have already fixed them and they will be added alongside the mugs in the next patch before I make chapter 4.
As for the growths
They are meant to be that way
Max trades the speed associated with pegasus knights for more bulk and offense
While leo trades offense for good bulk and skill.

[ClasicNPC]

Okay i understand the growths now.and by the way the bandits that appear In chapter 3 they talk and when the other 2 appears the same dialogue appear again

[Roxas139]

Hello people! Version 0.2.1 is now out!
the patch notes are a bit small tho lol

PATCH NOTES:

• All playable units now have mugs and battle palettes and they are no longer using fe8 mugs as placeholders
• fixed bugs like the double playing bandit event in chapter 3
• proof read the current chapters and improved the writing a bit
• reworked Elizabeth’s prf tome to make it a bit more exciting to use, it now ignores res instead of hitting def

Now I will start working on chapter 4, its gonna take some time though because I want to stop using placeholder mugs for playables which means more time will go into making mugs for new units.
Also I hope you all can give your opinions on the characters new looks