Strategy RPG is my favorite game genre and I’ve been having a great time with all these games. So I decided to rank all my favorite SRPGs based on this criteria:
1.- First of all, combat system aspects including map design, difficulty design, level of unit customization, objective variety, incentives to get victory as fast as we could, risk-reward frameworks, fun side objectives, real army management, last but not least: original battle mechanics.
2.- Everything related to the story: quality of the script, character development, world building, pace, dialogues, depth, narrative style, beginning, climax and ending.
3.- Artistic features including music, world art, character art.
4.- Visual related works including UI, sprites, 3D models, combat animations.
I’ve played more than that but I need to play even more games. This tier only shows my favorites instead of every SRPG I’ve beaten. It is not meant to be a comprehensive must play strategy games or anything like that. It’s only my structured recommendation. And by the way, I already reviewed some of these games here, so feel free to read about them for more detail.
There are many reasons why Fire Emblem and Shining Force may be considered as rival franchises. However, there are even more reasons to compare Shining Force: Resurrection of the Dark Dragon and Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon. Before jumping into details, allow me to point out some common grounds between them:
-Both are remakes from their matching first game in the franchise. -Both were released on Nintendo portable consoles. -Obviously, they feature an obscure dragon, but the thing is: this enemy is a real threat for the whole world in both games. And it existed in the past and was beaten before, in both games. -Both games involve a dark sorcerer as a mastermind behind everything, and his purpose, is exactly the revival of the obscure dragon. -The main character loses his kingdom and recruits people from all the world in order to counter the enemy. -Only a specific weapon can seal/damage the obscure dragon. -If we consider Archanea Saga as a whole, there’s also the idea of a cursed ruler who is not really aware of what he is doing. -Obviously, both games are SRPGs and follow some similar gameplay trends: common weapons, classes, promotion mechanics.
After mentioning many common settings, now it’s time to dive into the real assesment of both remakes:
1.- New Content. Dark Dragon includes brand new Narsha’s arc, but they are like 3 maps and all of them are almost optional: no reset needed if we lose/no penalties if we lose. Shadow Dragon features many brand new maps but they are all unlocked upon losing our allies (?). Yes, it’s pretty obvious why this terrible joke of idea is exclusive to this game.
2.- Improvements to the battle system. Through 3 new characters, Dark Dragon delivers new means for strategy. Mawlock is a Card master whose skills on the battlefield are as wild as diverse. Narsha is a sick unit that jumps between a strong soldier and she also serves as a versatile magic unit. Zuika is basically an unbalanced fighter focused on strength. But if we bench these people or they are RNG screwed, well, we are almost playing the original game. Shadow Dragon includes weapon triangle, not present in the original material. While it’s not needed on the lower difficulties, it offers the brand new Reclassing-before-battle option for the first time in the franchise. With a few more exceptions, we are still playing SDATBOL with a big coat of paint.
3.- Map design. This property is always a good criteria for quality measurement on every SRPG. Both games fail here: they use the outdated design from their original releases instead of providing modern approaches. However, Shadow Dragon clearly aged worse on this aspect, it also features the same basic goals from before: all maps are beaten upon seizing a castle/throne and lacks an incentive to go fast. Dark Dragon’s maps didn’t age well too but at least they are consistent with providing a reward if the map was beaten below a given number of turns. And it has a bit more of objective variety: defeat boss, route all enemies or arrive to a specific tile.
4.- Game complexity. The truth is they are both very straightforward but I really think Dark Dragon goes further as it continously asks to do some activities like: carefully distributing equipment, having a promotion plan, learning how do distribute EXP, mastering how to leverage Narsha’s/Mawlock’s sick skills to buff and help our party, planning for a low turn count (which grants a reward). For people with little experience with SRPG, Shadow Dragon is ideal, it’s like an entry-level game for beginners. If we learn basic stuff like weapon triangle and bonus damage, we are pretty much with the upper hand. Within the FE world, only Sacred Stones is easier. The only aspect where Shadow Dragon may be considered a bit more difficult than Dark Dragon is it has permadeath, but the lack of challenge and big number of allies we are given is more than enough to forget about this.
5.- Difficulty design. Both get serious only at the last maps, nearby the endgame. But SD provides a useful optional tutorial for beginners, which serves as a solid implementation for learning the basics. For seasoned SRPG players, they can skip this with no problem. However, SD also offers a «save game» tile which makes things very easy. DD lacks a tutorial but challenge slighty increases as we progress, which is a good design. The difficulty of DD Narsha’s maps is overwhelming (they are always surrounded and too much outnumbered) but I said they are like optional levels, which is pointless and only works as building blocks for her story arc. SD provides several difficulty modes and DD handles it using file iteration: a concept where the next run is more difficult after beating the game for the first time.
6.- Army customization. DD offers some depth here: It uses both consumable stat boosters and equipable items to boost stats or to allow a user to cast a spell. These items are scarce and expensive and they are a good approach towards unit customization. Besides, these activities are must do if we want a solid balanced team. SD uses reclassing which is an interesting feature to allow a unit to freely change to a different class (some constraints apply). While this idea provides fullly flexible teams, it is not really needed on many difficulty modes.
7.- Unit balance. Both games fail here. There are many units from both games who are just useless or become easily benchable. On the other hand, both games prefer the idea of broken characters. I never needed offensive mages on the most part of DD. Max and Mae did most of the heavy lifting, specially on mid-late game. Bord/Cord and many more are typical examples of benchable people from SD. But Tiki, Ogma and Caeda are overpowered.
Obscure conclussions: Both remakes offer the best versions of their matching products. However, many features could be better and some ideas feel outdated, even on these remakes. Gameplay-wise, another FE entries go deeper than SD, and the same goes for SF.
Platform: GBA Developer: Amusement Vision Publisher: Sega Year: 2004
Shining Foce: Resurrection of the Dark Dragon is a remake from the original Genesis game, Shining Force: The Legacy of Great Intention (1992). The series is famous for its particular Strategy RPG combat system, where we command an army and fight the enemy on grid based areas. However, according to the lead developer (Hiroyuki Takahashi) of the original Genesis release, it was actually influenced by Dragon Quest and Silver Ghost instead of Fire Emblem.
The GBA remake is faithful to the original plot but goes some steps further with additional arcs and brand new levels. It’s kinda easy to summarize the setting if described as a good mix between Dragon Quest and Fire Emblem: a full kingdom goes down (Guardiana), a hero is born (Max) and he travels around the world on a quest to counter an evil army (Runefaust) led by a cursed king and an evil sorcerer. In addition, there is also the big risk of a Dark Dragon which may be revived to put the whole world in peril. Both the evil army and our hero are looking for a lost legacy, left by the gods. No one knows what exactly the legacy is or where it is, but Runefaust army wants to use it to destroy another kingdoms.
This remake provided improvements on the UI and some QoL features compared to the original material, making it more modern and approachable. It also brings brand new levels to extend the fun, 3 brand new characters and it has an extended story. Gameplay-wise, I know I won’t find a better blend between Dragon Quest and Fire Emblem: grid based battle system, promotions, equipable items to boost stats, unit classes are also very FE (knights, healers, hero, archers, mages, etc), terrain effects. But, after a battle or before it, I can freely visit towns and villages to progress my current quest, find treasure chests, purchase items/weapons or just speak to random NPCs. If some allies are defeated, they can later be revived at the church for some fee, I save the game at the church and if someone is cursed, well… again, this is another service from the church (does this ring a bell for you DQ fan?).
Nevertheless, the real blinding highlights from this shining gem of a game are it’s original ideas for combat: card system for a lot of different effects, magic to boost stats for one ally or group of allies, every map has a reward if beaten below a given number of turns, counter is never guaranteed so we better focus on inflicting most damage with our units. Like I said before, there is no such thing as FE permadeath, there is only a money penalty to revive our fallen allies. Last but not least, the game really encourages us to distribute our best weapons and items to different units for balance. The main character is broken at mid-late game and some people easily grow better than others but still, it’s essential to have a balanced team where everyone has its chance to shine. We can’t rely on 3 units on the hardest maps.
Everything about this game would be just perfect if these flaws didn’t exist: -They completely ruined how promotion works, it follows the original implemenation where the stats are decreased instead of increased. And then, why promote? Base classes can’t go over Lv20 and some weapons are exclusive for advanced classes. -Some features from the UI didn’t age well even on this remake: enemies’ turns may be very slow sometimes, the game stops and focuses each enemy even if they don’t move. Inventory management interface is also a a pain, slow and outdated. And we can’t manage anything on the battle prep menu. -Some characters are completely useless or become completely useless on the battlefield. It also doesn’t make any sense to have new weak recruits on the late game if there are no grinding mechanics. Pointless. -Most of the soundtrack (with exceptions) is bottom tier bad, specially the village music, and sadly it’s over used across all the game. It doesn’t even fit the situation, this track sounds like a childish tune from a cartoon. -The developers said they are not influenced by Fire Emblem and yet they recycled most of the tropes from the Archanea Saga.
Shining conclussions: I can’t forgive the mistakes but still, and considering everything, this is a must-play game for every SRPG fan, and this remake is the desired and recommended place to enjoy it for a better experience. Score: 8.0.
Consoles Universe 