You play as a professor in Three Houses and have to pick one out of three houses, each with their own list of students and story in Part 2 of the game.

Between each mission, you can walk around the whole monastery area, talk to NPC, interact and bond with your students, take side quests, have a meal with your students, go fishing, etc...

Characters are no longer soft lock in their class progression, you can train your students any skill you want and turn them into any class you want them to be. The class system is very flexible too. e.g. mages can use swords and spears too. 

The weakness triangle of the old Fire Emblem games is gone. Instead, each individual students have their own weakness and strength. This makes me care more about the student too.

You can recruit students from other houses to be on your team if you meet the student's requirements. You can make your own harem if you try. 😆

There are lost items around the monastery that you can give them back to the correct students and earn affection and raise their motivation points. The only hint you get is their personality so pay extra attention to the students. 

Gifts also work similarly to lost items. Give the gift depending on what the student likes to maximize the affection point and motivate them.

You can train your own main character in any skill and change to any class you want. 

Hire and attach battalions to your students for small status buffs and to use their unique skills in battle.

The main story battle stages are fun and some of them have unique scenarios such as mist, or navigating difficult terrains. Unfortunately, side/optional battles maps are reused many times and are not unique.

Sidequests are mostly fetch or battle quests with no story to them.

Relationships take a backseat here with only a cutscene shown at the end of the game with your chosen partner.

The difficulty is easier than in previous games on hard mode, especially if you are an experienced player.

Turn-Based Strategy

JRPG

This is the best-looking Strategy JRPG I have played to date. Everything is in 3D, be it walking around the monastery, cutscenes between two students, battle maps, and combat scenes. 

The battle top-down maps graphics are not very detailed but the maps are bigger than the previous Fire Emblem I have played.

Combat scenes when attacking or defending are fully 3D animated and they look fantastic with smooth animation. If the student has battalion attach to them, they show up in the battle scenes too making it feel more like an all-out war than a 10 to 12 person skirmish.

Anime cutscenes are beautifully illustrated and look stunning. 

UI designs suit well for the fantasy medieval world with the paper-like background, banner, and decorated edges. 

Two characters talking to each other could have more animations than reusing the same animations. They are not really moving around either and just standing and talking. A full-fledged animated scene here would be a huge plus. e.g. when two characters are sparring, make them actually spar instead of a black screen with sword sound effects.

Everything is voiced including none important characters when you talk to them. Voice acting is average to excellent depending on the character. Most characters have good voice acting.

The game doesn’t have a big list of music but the music the game has sounds phenomenal and memorable. The music also makes the story scene and battle feel more impactful.

Battle music also changes accordingly, music becomes more uplifting when the enemy's numbers become lower.

There are two parts to the story, the first part is the same for any house you pick while the second house story depends on the house you pick.

Part 1 of the story is an easy-going, slow professor and student life. Battle and story are still building up to the big reveal for Part 2 of the story.

The slow Part 1 of the story allows the player to bond well with the student, instruct and shape them into the class you want them to be, and recruit students you want to have in your team. 

I choose the black eagle house and it has a unique branching path in the story. The story is also pretty unique and no longer the typical group of people saves the world and more of clashes in ideology and war.

Part 2 of the story makes me feel bad because no matter which path I take, I will have to face certain students in battle or let down some others people.

The story also shows the ugly nature of war that no matter which path is taken, the enemy side is villainized, and whoever wins the war writes the history as the good guy when either side is actually not free of wrongdoing.

Most of the students have a unique personality, proper backstory, worries, likes, goals, etc... The support conversation between you and the student or student to student makes the student's personalities shine and make me care for them more.

Since the story only progresses once a month mostly, there are things that are left unexplained. Some students also have some moments of bland personalities and backstories.

Fire Emblem Three Houses Review

Reviewed After : Crimson Flower Completed, Silver snow Chapter 17

Played On : Nintendo Switch

Final Score

9