This technically answers both: Stories revolving around princes/princesses or what have you. I’m personally fed up with whole “prince good guy” / “princess good gal” fighting “big bad country/empire” type of stories.
I assumed this would be a common-ish note. I haven’t played every single original hack, but I’ve played quite a few (along with the GBA games). I agree some of the GBA games (and associated hacks) are a bit cartoony in their portrayal of the central conflict. I think the nature of the platform and the games’ assets push that style on the hacker/developer a bit, but I agree it gets redundant. I also think a lot of the thematic and allegorical content these pieces deliver is not nuanced enough and doesn’t do a good job of making the player consider complex ideas; the delivery of said ideas are often overt and haphazard.
There are repositories of F2U (free to use) music and animations, so there shouldn’t be a need to worry about them.
I did not know that, thank you for the tip! I have noticed some of the same classes/animations across different original hacks, so I assumed there was something like a library, but I didn’t think it was free or public.
If this is your first time hacking ever or in a very long time, I highly recommend using FEBuilder GBA. The simplicity of the program makes it very easy to understand how things in the ROM work. It also has a database of patches ready to use that you can use to experiment.
I did some hacking a few years ago that didn’t really go anywhere due to time constraints. I used Blazer’s guide with Nightmare, Mappy, etc… But FEBuilder is much more streamlined and has pretty much everything in one program, so I am indeed using it.
Lastly, if you want to see some hacks that I think did some of these things really well, take a look at some of the following projects(these are just a few that come to mind, there are plenty others!):
Thank you for your reply. I agree most of the hacks I’ve played are either too easy or have balance issues. And I will have private tests, but at the moment I don’t think I’ll be releasing anything until 1.0. But I have endured a fairly significant editing process in the past, which required a restructuring of my novel’s third act - so I am keenly diligent about iteration and taking my time.
Somehow, I haven’t played any of the hacks you listed, so thank you for letting me know. I play FE GBA hacks daily, for both pleasure and to examine my peers’ work.
Different types of stories - we’ve done the generic FE formula enough. Come up with a theme and drive the story off of that.
One of the main reasons for this hack’s creation, is the exploration and utilization of a theme I have not seen in any FE game or ROM hack (it may be in 3H from what I can tell, not sure, don’t have a Switch and have just seen reddit posts). The game’s overall narrative may feel a bit Fire Emblemy, but the character’s personal journey will have a new, unique twist. As a poster said, I don’t see these characters as chess pieces. These are “real” people that I want the player to emotionally engage with, and that is the basis for many of my plot decisions.
Also, overhauls to the weapons in the game.
This is something I’m surprised more hacks don’t do. The tools available allow for a huge amount of creativity it what weapons, spells, and items can do.
Some general notes/replies on balancing: I imagine there is a slight lack of cohesion in the FE fanbase (and these replies express that a bit) in that some people want to use any character however and whenever they want, and some people want each character to have individual identity and utility. At the moment, my hack is leaning toward the latter. Most characters should still be viable (with sufficient leveling) for most situations, but there will be instances when a particular character/class is obviously better to use for a specific situation. It probably won’t be so specific that if you happen to leave that character behind for a chapter, you’re SOL, but there should be some situations where your choice of tactic/move is limited by conditions such as enemy type/level, terrain, etc.
I do not want to make that the dominating ethos of the hack. But I also don’t want this hack to be Sacred Stones “Normal” mode levels of easy. Strategic thinking and tactical planning will be necessary. I may include an Easy mode for those who just want to follow the narrative.
Thanks for the notes everyone, very helpful. 