Fire Emblem Heroes Is Embarrassing

thegamer.com:

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is my favourite Nintendo Switch game. While I’ve written about 2019 and 2021 being relatively thin years for games compared to 2018, 2020, and hopefully 2022, Three Houses was a bright spot for 2019 and my personal game of the year. It’s the game that got me into the Fire Emblem series. Unfortunately, it also got me into Fire Emblem Heroes, which continues to be a source of embarrassment.

I’m not embarrassed by the games I play. I don’t really believe in the concept of a guilty pleasure. Do the things you enjoy in the way you enjoy them, and don’t worry what other people think. Unless you enjoy arson. But Heroes is so difficult to love that I have started to resent it.

Related: Pokemon Should Learn Some Lessons From Fire Emblem

It’s a gacha game, but that’s not really the issue. It’s very upfront about what it is, and there’s a lot of interesting mechanics beneath the slot machine. I have over 50 hours in Genshin Impact - gachas aren’t inherently bad, even if they are a symbol of the hyper monetisation that operates behind the scenes of gaming these days. Instead, it’s the way the titular Heroes are presented.

And ‘titular’ is a very choice word. ‘Bazongified’ might have been another. What on Earth is going on with these character designs? The base series doesn’t lean away from giving the characters a sense of sexuality and confidence, but Heroes dials it up to 11 and often loses what makes these characters unique. They stop being Fire Emblem characters and become cosplay bikini posters. Heroes isn't a new game, but every now and then I remember it and I think 'Oh yeah. Ew'.

There are a few topics I write about frequently that get twisted out of context, and women as a concept are one of them.