While waiting for the most exciting games of 2020 to drop (at least the ones that weren’t delayed) I’ve been mulling over replaying some of my favorite games from last year. Near the top of that list is Fire Emblem: Three Houses, Nintendo’s brilliant strategy RPG that made schooling your units in the classroom as engrossing as schooling them on the battlefield. The game’s branching story structure meant that even after a single playthrough there was still much left to do. And even if Super Smash Bros. Ultimate does have too many Fire Emblem characters, playing as Byleth did remind me of my love for this particular entry.
Really, the only thing that gave me pause was Fire Emblem: Three Houses’ sheer length. Did I really have a spare 30 hours for a game I already played? Fortunately, the recent DLC episode, Cindered Shadows, provides more of what makes this experience so grand but on a more manageable scale.
Cindered Shadows smartly assumes that most folks playing it have already beaten the main campaign at least once. You can carry over some of its content, along with other DLC content from the season pass, into another proper playthrough. But it’s effortless to start this side story cold even if you haven’t touched Three Houses since last summer.
In fact, the game arguably makes more sense that way. Cindered Shadows takes place in an alternate timeline that has you partnering with all three sexy house leaders instead of committing to a specific path. It also takes place in the more lighthearted first half of the timeline before war erupts. Not only do you get to finally see how Edelgard’s axe harmonizes with Dimitri’s arrow and Claude’s bow, but other students and teachers from across Garreg Mach are available for the group effort.
Opposing you are a motley crew of true outsiders, the secret fourth house the Ashen Wolves. And this is where Cindered Shadows starts getting silly in the best possible ways. Already the idea of a hidden fourth house in a game about three houses is great. But this secret fourth house exists as part of an entire hidden underground society called Abyss that the school just accepts I guess. Its residents all have their own reasons for choosing exile. Between battles you walk around this dank dungeon instead of sunny courtyards.
A new “house” means new students to befriend, and another chance for the character work in Fire Emblem: Three Houses to go above and beyond otherwise easy anime tropes. There’s war monk Balthus, Valkyrie Hapi, thief Yuri, and dark flier Constance. I loved them from the start, even as they were kicking my butt in the first mission.
That’s the other thing, too. Perhaps in response to criticism of the main game’s lack of difficulty, Cindered Shadows is considerably tougher from the jump. Compounding this are harsher limitations on how you can train and reclass units, just because you have less time and space to work with over the half-dozen or so chapters. So if you are rusty your thoughtless tactics will quickly remind you.
Fire Emblem: Three Houses was my second favorite game of 2019. But if I had only known that in a few short weeks it would let me recruit some angsty challenging new cave students, I honestly might have put it at the very top.
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