Now… For the chapters… Again, spoiler ahead.
Detailed review of each chapter
Prologue is a nice start. It’s a bit harder than usual prologue chapter in Fire Emblem chapter, but it’s still manageable. I really love that you implement a gameplay feature in prologue that set out the event of the entire game.
Chapter 1 is hard. Your units start out separately. Kyra cannot counter at 1 range. Apate cannot attack. Hecate is frail. Soter and Phobos are your only reliable units at the start, until Kairos joins. Pheme is very weak, but at least she didn’t start out in the middle of enemy. You cannot turtle here if you wanna save all village too, so you need to carefully plan your unit in this chapter.
Chapter 2 is a pretty straightforward bandit fortress raid chapter. Nothing much, but the story and gameplay integration with Unlock staff is really nice. (This is probably the most prominent moment of Unlock staff since Thracia 776.)
Chapter 3, a prison break chapter, is another great chapter. You are encouraged to rush not only by the promise of ‘thing going worse’ after a certain chapter, but also to get closer to Apate so she can heal you with Physic staff. This is the chapter that really teaches you the importance of healing.
Chapter 4 is a wonderful chapter. Again, you have to escape the prison area, but this time you have multiple escape path that you can take. The path looks straightforward at first, but there are detour paths that encouraged you to take to stop the reinforcement and get the item/character. However, if your unit lag behind (which is easy to do so with detour paths and if you deploy the armored knights), it’s going to be bad for you since Sandy spawns as soon as your first unit escape.
Chapter 5 is a simple and straightforward chapter. Nothing much to say.
Chapter 6 is another simple chapter, but this is the first chapter with major branched paths. It might seem like a no-brainer to split your party into two to cover both sides of the lake, but if you do, you will learn a hard reason in this game. You only have one healer for the majority of the game, so if you split your group, one group won’t have healer, which makes it a lot harder for they to keep going.
Chapter 7 is another wonderful chapter. You have to cross two bridges to get to the other side, but it’s a lot harder said than done. The enemies across the bridge, the cavalier, and the ballista will make your life hell, and Apate alone cannot really keep up with healing. You also have to send frail Eupraxia to the other side of the map to recruit Wulfric and Tiresias, which is highly encouraged to do so since both are incredible units, which is hard since you have to face the enemies on the right bridge (which you normally won’t get near since it’s closer to take the left bridge). You also have to do it fast if you want to save the village on the other side of the bridge. The only complain I have about this map is that Telemus’ recruitment is obscured since the chapter objective told you to seize the fort and says nothing about escaping to the south. Instead, you have to visit the one house to get a hint about sparing Telemus and escaping to the south.
Chapter 8… I don’t really like this chapter. At this point, the scarcity of money starts to take effect, and enemy starts to become stronger, especially those Mercenary that you cannot easily double. The Wrexham knights are, simply put, terrible at their job, especially with those Shaman and Archer with Cleave Bow. You have to rush through a bunch of hard enemies to save them, and the Wrexham Keep being located up the hill so you have to go around the hill make it tedious to get to it since you still don’t have flier at this point of the game.
Chapter 9 is a breather chapter after all the hell that are chapter 7 and 8. Those Longbow Archer are annoying, but at least you get Fiadh to help dealing with them here.
Chapter 10… Oh, boy… Chapter 10… Where to begin… First, you have a forked path, encouraging you to split your army into two, which means the side without Apate will suffer greatly, especially with those armored knight with Seagall. They are real menace in this chapter since your physical unit won’t do much damage to them, and they tend to take a lot of damage from them sice they don’t have high Resistance. Using mages against them is a big no-no since Seagall deals supereffective damage against them, able to kill them in 1 hit. You will have to use Armorslayer/Hammer or magic weapon against them. You also cannot turtle since thieves will appear and steal treasures, especially the Blue Gem. It might seem like a good idea to have all your units go one side together, but for some reason, at least in my case, Beautrix always spawn on the opposite side of your group, and she will be alone against a bunch of enemies. And the biggest issue I have with this chapter is Polonius’ recruitment. The hint about it is very vague and easily miss, forcing you to replay the entire chapter again to recruit him (and he’s a very important unit, so you will want to recruit him). And when you try to not kill the zombie, the zombie will gather around your units, clogging up the hallway and potentially surrounding your unit, and preventing you from checking the global range since the global range will also show the zombie’s attack range despite that they do not attack you. At least the zombie in the throne room doesn’t move, but other zombie are extremely annoying. If I ever have an idea to start another run of this game, this chapter will be the one chapter that keeps me from doing so.
Chapter 11 is another forked path chapter, but this one is better than chapter 10 since each path has different terrain and enemies, and at least you can ferry Apate between each path with Teresa, so it is a lot better than chapter 10.
Chapter 12 is a pretty straightforward chapter, with the only concerns being the ballista and getting to the village before the brigands destroy them.
Chapter 13 is an interesting chapter. It’s technically a 4-side battle since you have your side, the two margraves, and the bandit. You start off across the river from the two margraves, giving you time to deal with bandit before dealing with the margrave army. The green units in this chapter are actually nice since they don’t simply rush toward the boss and clog up the path.
Chapter 14 is another straightforward chapter. Just be careful not to kill Aura and be careful of magic enemies.
Chapter 15 is a big chapter. It’s an open field with enemy coming at you, but at least there’s a chokepoint you can use to deal with the enemies. There are also the bandits on the side that you want to deal with fast if you want to save the village. And the recruitment of this chapter is simply unique and ruthless, I love it.
Chapter 16… This chapter is a chef’s kiss. Everything about this chapter is simply perfect. The story. The atmosphere with burning village, a new, intense battle preparation OST and map OST. The fact that Kyra and Apate start off in the middle of the enemies. Kyra’s promotion and Apate finally can attack. Tiresias finally joins you and give you another healer. Telemus’ epic defection. Waves of armored knights that hits hard and hard to kill. Sandy’s 10 leadership star and coming after you eventually. The revelation of the traitor. All of these shock factors… This chapter is simply sublime to play, easily the best chapter in the entire game.
Chapter 17 continued the gravity of Chapter 16 in a delightful way. The bright open field setting of this chapter doesn’t really do justice for this chapter. The despair from the story, felt by the characters, can also be felt by players when you check the map. All the relentless assault from all directions are ruthless. You really have to think it through, lest the reinforcement overwhelm you. You also have to rush ahead and visit the ruin to see Demeter too. (I am not sure if you have to visit all 4 ruins throughout the game to eventually recruit Demeter or not.) Sandy’s 10 leadership stars doesn’t help. At least she eventually left and replaced with Alastor, who has less leadership stars. Still, this chapter is the 10 most intense turns of the entire game.
Chapter 18 is the aftermath of Chapter 16 and 17. Though not intense as the past two chapters, it’s still a great chapter. Three new units start off in the middle of the enemies. Rescuing Xinyi is simple enough, while Jingyi and Edward are tricker to do so with the Bounty Hunter with Halberd/Swordslayer blocking the exit, so you have to send your units in to rescue them before they are overwhelmed. At least those two can hold their weight good against other enemies in the room, so it’s easy to rescue them. The forest at the entrance is annoying to get through, but they are very helpful in slowing down incoming cavalier reinforcement. Those Archers with Arbalest are very annoying though.
Chapter 19… Why did this chapter exist again? This chapter sits in a very weird spot. After all the intensity of Chapter 16 and 17, and the aftermath of it in Chapter 18, and then you are going directly head-on with the inquisitor army in Chapter 20 onward, you have Chapter 19, which have you deal with… random bandits on your way. Really, this chapter serves no other purpose than letting the main cast know about Dolus IV’s sickness. Story-wise, not counting the party learning about Dolus IV’s sickness part, this chapter would be better being Chapter 16, and Chapter 16-18 becoming Chapter 17-19 instead. For the map itself, you basically cannot move really far onto the right side of the map because of the constant reinforcement on the left side threatening the merchant, and they are Berserker. You might as well deal with thieves for stat boosters, recruit Coronis in the wood, let Plato approach you so you can recruit him with Pluto, and then stay on the left side near the merchant until the boss finally moves.
Chapter 20 is a pretty straightforward chapter. The big open field with White Dragoon and Malig Knight reinforcement can be bothersome, and recruiting Ziying can be a bit tricky, though.
Chapter 21… This reminds me of Thracia 776 Chapter 14x, where you have to go through a valley with flying enemies ambushing you from the side, except this chapter is a lot more manageable. A good chapter.
Chapter 22… This is a huge chapter. You basically have to use every tool available to deal with all the defense on the enemy side. Seeing all the various ways you can deal with the enemies is the best part of this chapter. A great chapter where both sides have to use every card they have to win.
Chapter 23… The map OST of this chapter doesn’t do justice. I know that this chapter is supposed to be melanchony chapter of Kyla losing Elias and Alastor and the Inquisitors doing their last stand against your army, but this kinda goes against your army being near their ultimate goal. On the bright side, I love the conversation Kairos has when he visits the church.
Chapter 24… This Chapter forces you to split your army into two, meaning that you will have a bad time if you don’t train Tiresias. Other than that, it’s a pretty straightforward chapter. There’s no reinforcement in this chapter, as far as I remember, despite that it’s a showdown against the hierophant himself. I would say that, for how much the game made the hierophant to be, he is pretty pathetic in this chapter, a pretty disappointing showdown against him, to be honest. Still, it’s a nice chapter.
Final 1… This chapter has the second best atmosphere after Chapter 16. The intense rain and lightning and the intense battle preparation OST and map OST really sold this chapter for me, not counting the enemy description. Lorenzo’s recruitment event is also a great event.
Final 2… The final battle against the traitor… It’s a pretty underwhelming chapter, and the traitor’s end is pretty underwhelming. Again, this underwhelming setting is what this traitor deserves.
Final 3… The first part is surprisingly pretty straightforward. While the enemy benefits from Sandy’s 10 leadership starts, you are given unlimited Silence staff to deal with those mages, which makes this chapter a lot more bearable. Combat-wise, Sandy is as threatening as she is shown throughout the game, and I truly didn’t expect her to have battle conversation with characters like Fango and Delilah. Though… I feel like the Gluttony sword is obtained too late in this game. You only get to use it against Sandy in Final 3 part 2. I think Nestor, the Wyvern Lord boss in Chapter 21, should have Gluttony, which you get at the end of Chapter 21, so you get to use it more, and then give Sandy a personal weapon instead. Anyway, for the Final 3 part 2… At first, I was disappointed that there’s no final map conversation among your characters, until I found out that every character has a battle conversation with the final boss. Speaking of the final boss… Oh, boy… This is exactly what someone like her deserves. The final battle is also very unique and creative too, which I really love. This is truly the grand finale this game deserved… Also, you are very cruel to give Fortify staff to Apate yet Apate is unavailable in Final 3 Part 2.
Character review coming later.
