Game:

Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade (2002)

Category:

Let's Play

Duration: 2:20:38

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23

FE7 ROM Hack by Primefusion: https://forums.serenesforest.net/index.php?/topic/25912-the-road-to-ruin-complete-v303-released/
Recorded on February 21, 2020
I have a Twitter: https://twitter.com/mageknight404
With me are Billy, Matt, Steven, and Zach.

5:39 - Skip Interlude VI

Ava continues to mourn for her fallen brother as Vance does his best to comfort her, reflecting on his own issues. Yet they can't rest on their laurels for long, knowing that Merovech is still prepping for his schemes atop Pinnacle Tower. As fortune would have it, Bjorn appears with a contigent of Dracoknights at Ulrigar's request to provide Vance with some assisstance. (and not to flex his ego for once!) Though Vance and company have already succeeded, they use the opportunity to have the dracos fly them to Pinnacle Tower to assist Raizen.

Raizen and Vance's parents make it to the top just as Merovech is hashing out his plans in his head. A bitter mind of vengeance has been building for forty years and the king of Aksum will see his plans come to light, time be damned. Ulrigar isn't interested in his spiel and takes the first blow, but is quickly tossed aside by the mighty king, putting him out of action just in time for Vance to arrive with the game-winning assist. It's one last battle and Vance is looking to tell Merovech that he too needs to... let go.

====

It's not really hard to see why The Road to Ruin stands as my favorite GBAFE ROM Hack.

Prime wanted to tell a shorter, more grounded personal tale about one lad and his pals choosing to rebel against those who wronged him and fight for a more noble cause that just happened to involve taking down a misguided monarch. I think he did a bang-up job. Though some may take umbrage with the use of Interludes to let loose with the exposition I personally think they did their job in keeping the story's pacing in check. I feel Vance is a bit of a divisive figure as after Aier gives him the mind magic he spends a lot of time giving guff about his father, who is equally damning his son and it feels a bit long in the tooth after a while, which hurts his otherwise fairly reasonable image as a protagonist. On the whole, however, the story is told well with genuinely believable characters on both sides of the spectrum.

Gameplay is rock solid with some consistent map design quality throughout. Though not perfect as some maps could have cut back on the girth slightly while others could have given more player flexibility with unit usage, the difficulty felt just right for me, mirroring that classic GBAFE feeling without going overboard with certain gimmicks or map tricks. Enemy density felt right with lots of variety in their ranks and the inclusion of playable generic units in some maps helped sell the feeling of war, even if their execution could use some fine tuning. Nothing extreme regarding stats, no skills or anything, a healthy variety of weapons... It's all kosher.

I geled a lot with the smaller roster of playable characters and there was just enough class diversity to go around, though I did wish we got a second flier. Torie is amazing and I really like her, but I feel like some maps would become much trickier if she turned out bad or dead, so having that extra bit of insurance would have been nice. The roster as a whole is pretty fine in general, to the point that I wished a number of them got more lines of dialogue in places to help flesh 'em out a bit more as they only have one support partner per character. (please give Lanora more to say, she's the best)

What -really- sells the game for me is its presentation which only few projects at the time could even match. Character design is simple but effective and there aren't any real bad spritework even in the worst of times. The darker, muted map palettes give the game its own feel. Enemies have different color schemes depending on their faction that visually pop. The writing and lore is very solid with only a few quibbles here and there. The custom music tracks, while few, all sound great. The world map events, which Prime pioneered, are handled excellently and tell the story of Pandosia well. It all makes for a well-oiled machine.

I have only a few suggestions to make this great game even better - stuff that I've already mentioned in writing just now, a couple of CGs for select scenes to give them a bit more punch, giving Aaron and O'Riley a bit more to do when they join up with Vance as there was a big focus on them at the start, tweaking of the generic unit only maps to make them a bit more rewarding to the player, maybe make the ending just a -teeny- bit longer as it kind of ends after Vance parts with Raizen, make Raylena playable... Really, these are nitpicks if nothing else.

Prime, you did a stellar job and I'm glad I took the time to play this. I'll gladly give it another go someday! Thanks to everyone for watching this playthrough!

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