Monday, March 10, 2014

The Next Frontier: An FEXNA Remake

Exalted Legacy
  • This, but on FEXNA.
  • Tactical Mastery system; think Elibian Nights-style achievements, with a focus on pulling off difficult strategies for reward. An optional flexible difficulty system that modifies the difficulty mid-game based on the number of tactical masteries you've completed.
  • Revamped story that explores the characters and world of Archanea with new depth.
  • Paralogues, unlockable in-game cutscenes that explore the background to this classic story.
  • Awakening-style level up skills, determined by character instead of class. No reclassing.

Gaiden
  • Level-up magic system retained; also adding tomes and staves, which allow units to cast spells without having learned them (at the cost of limited use and weighing down the spellcaster, these items are uncommon and expensive). Learned spells cost HP to use.
  • Revamping gaiden's maps into full-fledged chapters; adding dialogue, updating the story, and redoing the often bland and repetitive maps.
  • Obviously, massive character rebalancing and cast additions to improve class representations. Villagers replaced with specific T0 classes.
  • Expanding on the split party system, with certain points in the story where the parties meet and can swap units and items. You can send items to the other party by talking to an NPC in the villages. Part 3 alternates the parties, and I wanted to possibly add a merged section in Part 4 if it makes sense.
  • Bringing the game into the 21st century of Fire Emblem.

Thracia 776
  • “Class Skills” system revamped; as members of the same group of classes gain levels, their “class level” raises; 5 levels total, with each level unlocking a new assignable class skill. Class skills can only be assigned to one unit at a time, but can be reassigned at will.
  • Improved fatigue system, with more ways to offset fatigue naturally mid-map (instead of just the S-Drink item, which just reset the fatigue count to 0).
  • Fleshing out the game; possibly including some of the beta content that was cut. By and large, the biggest "issue" with FE5 is that it feels unrefined. That's simply the reality of developing a game with minimal distribution on an outdated console.
  • Including an easier mode, making the game more accessible to players put off by the game's renown difficulty.

Binding Blade
  • Expanding the game's route splits, adding to the replay value and making each playthrough potentially distinct. Going beyond simple Ch10A/10B, and adding a real element of choice to the game's progression.
  • Obvious plot enhancements that bring the original Elibian epic into context with the games that came afterwards. This game needs to be less boring.

Blazing Sword
  • A new "orders" feature, increasing the tactician's gameplay presence without resorting to a self-insert unit. Orders impact the battle directly. Offense, for example, gives all allied units +2 Str and +5 Hit, at the cost of -1 Def & Res. The momentum order gives units a small chance to act again (think FE5's movement stars). 15 orders total, with 5 available per playthrough based on the tactician's affinity and obtained by gaining rank stars.
  • Adding skills, updating the game engine with many of the new features developed for BwdYeti's Immortal Sword (that's where the majority of improvements will come from).

1 comment:

  1. While this all sounds incredible, what exactly does it entail? Will these be new projects you intend to work on? If so, than yes please! Your work on Binding Blade looks fantastic and I would love if you could do the same to spruce up the other games.

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