Developed By: Intelligent Systems
Published By: Nintendo
Category: RPG
Release Date: 09.17.26
Price: $69.99
For the past five years, Fire Emblem has been the gaming franchise that I’ve been the most addicted to. My first time playing Three Houses in 2021 was an insane experience. It got me into SRPG’s and anime, and is my third most favorite game of all time. After playing that, I went back and played some of the older games and bought a bunch of collectors items. I was dumbfounded with how good they were.
Two years later was my first time experiencing a new Fire Emblem game as it released with Engage. It was great, but I didn’t have the same level of awe as I did with Three Houses and Fates. Then Fortune’s Weave came out a few weeks ago, and the absolute joy that I felt in 2021 came back. The day I picked up the game, I told myself that I would only play for an hour because I had work the next day. But after 15 minutes I told myself, I’ll be fine if I play all night. That’s how much I was loving the game.
The Dagdan Empire is on the verge of collapse after the return of Balor, a resurrected demon god whose armies threaten to destroy everything in their path. That’s where you come in, you’re sent to guide a group of heroes as they try to save the empire. This part is similar to Three Houses because you get to follow along with one of the heroes along their journey at a time. Each one has their own storyline. They interwine amongst each other very well too.
The game takes place during the Heroic Games, a tournament that allows the winner to receive any wish they like. The story is great, like in all Fire Emblem titles, but the gameplay is still the core. Like usual, there’s large scale tactical battles that play out on a grid. They all follow the same standard Fire Emblem formula where you must defeat someone or protect someone while fighting hordes of enemies.
Units move across grid based maps, exploit weapon and elemental weaknesses, use terrain to their advantage, and rely on carefully planned attacks to survive. Each unit has their own specialities and abilities, and coming up with a balanced team is important. I’ll be honest though, I skipped over Combat Arts like I did with Three Houses. I just brute forced everything whenever I could.
But tactical battles aren’t the only kind of battle that you’ll experience. Fortune’s Weave introduces dungeon exploration, which includes standard turn based RPG battles. You just run up to an enemy lurking in the dungeon and a normal battle triggers. After putting hundreds of hours into Fire Emblem tactical battles, seeing quicker turn based battles was a surprise. But it’s not unwelcome, these battles are quick and bring more life into the dungeon gameplay. You can also speed up or outright skip these battles.
Just like with Three Houses, the cast is on another level. This time around, there are four main protagonists followed by a bunch of supporting characters. Im not going to lie, I didn’t really feel as attached to them as I did with the Three Houses characters. But they’re still all great. I grew to really like Cai, Hong Hua, Esmeralda, and Talimun over time. Just like with Three Houses, there was a ton of voice acting that really brought each character to life.
That scale can occasionally work against the game. Fortune’s Weave is packed with characters, battles, side activities, dungeons, story scenes, and systems. It can definitely feel overwhelming at times. One thing I really liked about Three Houses was that everything was locked behind the chapter by chapter progression that slowed things down. There’s more going on in Fortune’s Weave, and you can also jump back and forth between the selected paths. Though I personally don’t recommend that.
The campaign itself demands a serious time investment. The standard tactical battles will definitely be time consuming, there will be a certain level of grinding that needs to be reached, there’s units to recruit, and there’s story stuff. Realistically, I don’t think you’re reaching the end in under 70 hours. I’m already well past 200 hours and I don’t think I did everything. But that’s because of how much I love Fire Emblem. I didn’t want to just beat the game. I wanted to see all the dialogue that every character has so I could learn about them all. I wanted to hear all the music. I wanted to create an unstoppable party.
Speaking of music, there’s a lot of great songs. The overall soundtrack isn’t as good as Three Houses, but I still loved many of the tracks. Hell, when Sothis appears for the first time and an oddly familiar track plays, I nearly teared up. Two of the songs that I really liked were Bloodstained Arena and Throngs in Dagsion, and there were a few more that somewhat grew on me later on.
Is Fortune’s Weave something that I recommend? Definitely. It’s currently my third most favorite Fire Emblem game behind Three Houses and Fates. It might be overwhelming to newcomers, but longtime fans are going to have a great time and likely sink more than 100 hours into the experience. Honestly the only downsides for me were I didn’t love the characters as much as Three Houses and Fates, and liking four or five songs isn’t the same as liking 40.
But those were just minor issues that barely changed a great grame. Three Houses and Fates were both life changing games for me, the kinds that made me hyper fixate on a bunch of characters. But Fortune’s Weave pulls its own weight greatly. The story itself is amazing and quite emotional, and the gameplay is quite fun. Fortune’s Weave does everything right in it’s own way. It has big shoes to fill, and even though they don’t fit the way I would have liked, it’s still a grand experience.
10/10