So I just got my copy today. w00t!
I've decided to go ahead and play on normal on my first go around. I know that I'll end up playing through on harder difficulties in follow up play sessions. I'm only on the third prologue mission right now, but I've like what I've seen thus far. Here are a few highlights:
-Cavaliers can no longer move after making a non-attacking option. There movement is basically like everyone else at this point.
-When attacking an enemy, you can use the X or Y button to cycle through a characters different weapons. This saves a ton of time.
-Pressing the A button on an enemy will keep their attack range on the screen. Pressing the X button anywhere on the map will give the attack range of every enemy on the map.
-Leaving the curser on any unit, hero or enemy, will show his/her attack and movement range.
-When moving a unit, you can highlight an enemy to see battle stats instead of moving next to them first. This is identical to the attacking system in Advance Wars: Days of Ruin.
-When attacking an enemy, all the animations happen on the top screen. Some characters have a second attack animation if they get to attack twice in a row. Basically it's the same as how the characters attack in the GC & Wii versions.
-The old mission statistics from the GBA versions of FE are displayed on the top screen. This page will change if you highlight a hero/enemy and press the R button.
-All of a characters stats, weapon levels, equipment, portrait, equipped weapon, and current terrain are all displayed on one page. It's clean, easy to understand, and saves a ton of time flipping through pages.
-It doesn't look as though there are supports in the game, which is a bit disappointing.
-According to the instruction manual, you will be able to forge weapons ala the GC/Wii version during the deployment phase of a map.
Honestly, the game just feels a lot faster and more streamlined than any other prior Fire Emblem. This mostly has to do with the 2nd screen of the DS. I haven't tried out the Wi-Fi yet, but will do so in the coming weeks. Apparently, you can do a 5v5 battle with an friend (with optional voice chat), a random opponent (no voice chat), shop online, upload units to a server for random people to use, or download units units from the server to use in the single player. Loaning is a bit tricky, but goes something like this:
-You can "borrow" up to 10 units.
-You can only loan out characters in your current save file.
-You can only use one borrowed unit at a time.
-You can borrow any unit you like, but can only use that unit if you've recruited them in the single player already.
-A borrowed unit will co-exist with your version of the unit, but both units cannot be deployed at the same time.
-Any stat gains of a loaned unit will not be carried over to your version of the unit.
-If the borrowed unit dies in combat, your version of the character dies too. Be careful!
-Any units that you "lend" to another player are not lost and can still be used like normal. It's more like you are "copying" them and then "pasting" them onto a server or another players copy of the game.
That pretty much sums up what I've gleaned thus far from my limited play time. Ask any questions you like and I'll answer them post haste.
Topic: Fire Emblem Shadow Dragon (Read 30879 times)
