Fire Emblem: Engage is the latest entry in the long-running turn-based tactical series published by Nintendo. Engage has been the first of my most anticipated releases of the year, so I was greatly looking forward to finally diving into this franchise once again. While Engage certainly isn’t a horrible game, I did find myself let down significantly over the course of my playthrough.

The story of Fire Emblem: Engage is easily one of the weakest the series has had in a while. You take on the role of the Divine Dragon (Alear) who has been asleep for a thousand years and has no memory of their past life. Upon waking, you take up a quest to gather together the magical emblem rings scattered throughout various kingdoms. Each ring contains the spirit of heroes from past games in the series. Your end goal is to use these rings to defeat the growing evil cultivated by the Fell Dragon, Sombron. It’s all very generic, littered with almost amateurish storytelling and horribly written dialogue.

Fire Emblem has not always relied on strong storytelling, but it is something the series has become known for within the past few entries. As a result, the flaws become exceedingly noticeable here and many aspects of the world are underdeveloped. Another big issue for me was the characters. Engage certainly boasts one of the largest rosters within the series, and that only serves to provide more hindrances to the narrative. A majority of characters fall into two categories: bland, or exceedingly annoying and quirky. Oftentimes, these traits are made worse by the garish character designs that just have way too much going on.

Additionally, I was hoping that the emblems of past characters would get additional opportunities for characterization. However, they act as nothing more than nostalgia-flavored power-ups and though the spirits of the characters are present in game, the soul is not.  The concept of Engage presents a unique opportunity to create interesting dynamics between heroes, but never once did I feel it capitalized on it well.

Fortunately, I have some positive things to say about the gameplay. Like all games within the Fire Emblem series, you take command of a party of heroes each with different classes and weapons while fighting against foes moving around a map and taking part in turn-based combat. Fire Emblem: Engage introduces many new mechanics to the series. First and foremost, are the Emblem Rings which all bestow your characters with a variety of unique skills. During combat, units equipped with rings can choose to “Engage” for a period of three turns. This comes with a multitude of benefits including stat buffs, unique weapons, and the ability to unleash devastatingly powerful attacks when activated during battle.

Learning just when to time your Engage powers is key to mastering the combat and allows you to turn the tables on your opponent. Additionally, pairing a unit with an Emblem Ring for multiple battles will increase the bond between characters, which will unlock additional skills and buffs. The unique skills granted by each emblem allow you to create some interesting builds that offer a ton of versatility to every encounter.

Additional gameplay features include the break mechanic along with new classes and weapons. Breaking allows you to stop your opponent from counter-attacking by hitting them with a weapon that gives you a tactical advantage. Most Fire Emblem titles follow a weapon triangle that gives your units an advantage over one another: Swords beat axes, lances beat swords, and axes beat lances. With the break system, this longtime mechanic was given new life and it certainly helps to speed up combat a little.

I also enjoyed how terrain becomes more of a key feature within Engage. Placing your character in forests or towers increases evasion and this can create some truly exciting combat exchanges. There is also a class that can double your terrain bonus allowing you to make some fighters virtually unhittable if placed correctly.

Whenever you aren’t fighting against armies you can explore the floating fortress called the Somniel. This allows you to interact with your allies, play mini-games and buy supplies. While the environment of the Somniel looks visually appealing, I never found myself engaging much with the life simulation aspects here. Most activities are almost needlessly providing virtually no benefit to the core gameplay and thus, I was never incentivized to interact after the initial tutorials.

I did very much enjoy the crafting system, however, as it allows you to increase the potency of your weapons and mix and match various buffs on your favorite pieces. Usually, weapons in Fire Emblem are limited use so it was a nice change of pace to have the option to enhance beyond the usual parameters.

In terms of graphics and music, there isn’t much to discuss. The visuals are passable but nothing groundbreaking. It’s clear the Switch is often being pushed to the limits of its capabilities, as there are significant load times and a lack of fluidity within some animations outside of combat. However, in my experience, there weren’t any game-breaking performance issues within Engage and the frame rate was always stable.

The music here is similar. There are a few compositions and battle themes that are quite nice but nothing particularly stood out to me, especially when compared to previous entries in the Fire Emblem series. Also, for some reason, Engage decided to forgo using the series’ signature theme in favor of a truly awful new piece that is proudly blasted during the title cinematic. It’s another strange choice that only further hurt my overall enjoyment here.

While I still enjoyed parts of Fire Emblem: Engage, this was a long way from what I was expecting after the initial announcement. I’m not sure I’ll ever have the urge to replay Engage as I do with some of the DS titles. It’s also definitely a step down from its predecessor, Three Houses and I would recommend playing that over Engage if you’re looking for the best the series can offer on the Switch.

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Fire Emblem: Engage

$59.99

5.5

Score

5.5/10

Pros

• Emblem system in combat
• Break system
• Great strategic combat

Cons

• Poor Narrative
• Bland, Irritating characters
• Life sim aspects