Hacks I think are cool that weren't at FEE3 2022

So you’ve caught up with FEE3 (somehow) and you’re probably thinking, man, I wish there was MORE promising in-progress hacks to look at, right? No?

Well too bad, because I’m making this post anyways. I want to shout out some interesting hacks I’ve played in the past year that aren’t at FEE3. It’s no FEE3 video, but if I found these cool, you might find them too.


Attempt 3

Attempt 3’s immediately apparent spin is that your starting units are entirely made out of trainees. Every possible trainee is here, each with 3 promotion branches at tier 1, giving a lot of player choice in building their squad.

A bit further into the early game, there’s also a party split in the player can determine how units are split. There’s also some interesting chapter objectives like preventing explosives from going off while escaping and preventing a dark ritual.


Transcending Darkness

The main post doesn’t make it apparent that big progress is happening behind the scenes. I’ve only scratched the surface of what is available in the discord but the first ten chapters have well designed maps that are fast paced and interesting. The opening chapter where your units burn down villages is a fantastic introductory chapter. Another notable chapter that I’ve seen is the ship going down behind the player army, and your units do sink.

This also has a party split, but one that is completely. I do appreciate being able to use two armies because just using the same dozen or so mainstays isn’t enough, I want TWO sets of them. And they’re units I want to use too, the fighter one hitting a mage with a steel axe doesn’t get old.


Das Kapital

So far this only has one chapter, but its a very strong chapter that showcases its main feature very well. It leans more into the RTS style than RPG style with no individual unit progression. The player can buy a wide selection of generics from 4 different trainers, who the player then must defend from enemies while also taking out side objectives to get more gold to hire more units.

I’ve replayed the singular chapter quite a few times to try and make some kind of optimal unit buy order and unit selection. The enemy spread seems to encourage buying many kinds of unit rather than stacking one type, which is what makes it interesting.


Frozen Throes

I do believe that most hack devs can make visually appealing maps, but Frozen Throes reaches new levels of fantastic map aesthetic. However they aren’t just pretty, Frozen Throes experiments a lot with tile changes and map gimmicks that shake up the game while also being nice to look at.

A specific example is that of chA2-4, where the map initially starts as a foggy defend map. Partly way through, the entire map is covered by snow and fog disappears, and defend transforms into an optional escort objective. Still on hiatus as time of this post, but don’t let that stop you.


Illuminated

I was quite invested in where its story was going, particularly in regards to how someone I initially expected to be 'Johnny McBad' interacts with the party. One of its features is a low unit count compared to conventional FE, but there's some fun units in this roster, like the fighter Sam who can heal (and only heal) with weaker patch-up kits, and the cleric Lana who also doubles as a thief.

It also has maps that shake up the standard formula, like a beach map which path changes with the tides, a rain map that makes use of movement difference between indoors and outdoors and a map where you race to save playable generics from being overun with the help of a ballista.


Heaven's Fall

I came into this one having finished its predecessor War on Two Fronts which I also think is pretty cool, but Heaven's Fall feels like a step up from it. It has a strong early game and I think incredibly powerful assassin jeigans are awesome. Kinda me-specific, but I'm hyped up for when characters from WOTF show up like Kalma and Kestrel. It has skills, but only for very few characters which is an approach I see surprisingly little of, but I do like it.

I am interested to see where the story goes given its not quite the conventional ‘resistance beats bad empire’ story. I just want to mention that the Lord starts a terrorist attack by having his kid sister hand an explosive teddy bear to the Governor. That is not a sentence I expected to type about a FE romhack.


If there’s any in-progress hacks you think are interesting that weren’t at FEE3, feel free to talk about them about below. Hacks are cool.

19 Likes

I am going to shill my own hack because I think its very cool.

I don’t really have much to say as most of the progress in the past few months have been polishing the portraits I’ve made so far and porting to buildfiles!
If you want a more deflated stat experience with a three way alternating party split, I guess play Searching For Light(Except maybe not yet, the public patch is so out of date)
Fire Emblem: Searching For Light[FE8U][Complete up to Chapter 3][WIP]

How do you do the bigger blocktext that shows a thread?

3 Likes

I LOVE TRANSCENDING DARKNESS :exclamation::exclamation::exclamation:

Some FE Hacks look cool from my perspective and I like to share them as well.

Book of Exiles is one that I got my curiosity in with the multiple perspectives from 4 Main characters which interested me.

A Mercenary’s Tale has a Side Story of Elibe focusing on a different person and their group. It’s like showing some unexplored potential about Elibe and learning more about the unfolding culture within the history of Elibe.

The White Feather offers an Alternative Timeline of Post World War I with a nice flair of FE which offers excellent references to Historical Monuments and Figures.

Cult of Yarudr brought in some nice gimmicks on Treasure unlocking by showing some random items and weapons that you don’t get later in the game.

Believe that is far as I know of FE Hacks that weren’t in FEE3 2022.

3 Likes

This mod wasn’t even posted on FEU, but it’s absolutely amazing. It restructures 3H to completely remove the monastery and cut down all the pointless padding so you can focus purely on the actual maps, with changes to recruitment and classes that make 3H structured more similarly to a normal FE game. Units join with 3-4 intermediate classes already unlocked, beginner classes were completed axed and their skills were put into weapon rank skills, units join at fixed times throughout the game with some pretty awesome bases (the people who join in late part 2 are so strong and fun to use!), etc. I normally can’t stand playing vanilla 3H because of all the stupid chores, but this mod is so great that it got me to play 3H again three times in a row. That should speak to how fantastic this mod is.

11 Likes

Hey @Rivian, thanks for the shout out and the kind words. I’m very appreciative of it. Hopefully I can have a good finish to the story and project that will make the hack (and your consideration) worth it.

FEE3 was awesome. I’m still grateful to all of the community for all of their work not only on the showcase but also to FEU and the fire emblem hacking scene in general. It’s always great seeing so many projects (both in FEE3 and those who didn’t make it) and I’m thankful for all the support the community gives. I wouldn’t be anywhere in my project without it.

2 Likes

Wanted to go ahead and shout out Fire Emblem Fates+ real quick. The hack takes the already giant roster of Fates and adds 20+ new characters, while reworking nearly every bad Rev unit into a powerhouse. It adds new weapons (including a brand new playable weapon type, saws for mechanists), tons of new classes, new supports for new and established characters, and a superboss ala Apotheosis.

It’s an excellent hack, great for ironmans and casual playthroughs alike, and I will never be playing vanilla Fates again because of it

I didn’t know I needed this until now, thanks.

Myth of Blight is another to add to your list