Fire Emblem Sacred Stones, is a must have for any GBA owner or fan of Turn Based Strategy. Click continue to read on!
Story - Okay I won't give anything away, but lets just say this isn't the best plot you'd find in a Fire Emblem game, but still, it provides an interesting and compelling plot that you'll get into almost straight away. Every character has a story tied to them, and throughout the game the characters can interact with each other, building bonds and having interesting conversations which you can view. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Graphics - FE8 has impressive battle animations when your multiple units decide to engage in combat against the various hordes of evil. The character animation is done fluently and the magic spells look beautiful. The portraits of the characters are all drawn in a light anime style, which makes them each look diverse and detailed. The backgrounds for battles and during cut scenes all look very good, matching the battles and the environment quite well. The graphics outside of battle are not very detailed, but trying to cram your characters, the enemies and the interface on the screen is a hard job and Fire Emblem does a good job with this as well. The game also has several pieces of artworks, used during some cut scenes which look great.
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Sound - Fire Emblem Sacred Stones has almost 70 different music tracks for various battles, cut scenes, areas and character themes. These match the emotion quite will, delivering dramatic music for those epic battles and those sad tones when characters are at a loss. The other sounds, like selecting units, weapon strikes, and other sounds throughout the game are of decent quality, the sounds accompanying the wonderful battle animations.
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Gameplay & Replay Value - This game has a very complex turn based strategy style game play. Each different (TYPE) of unit can move different amount of spacing, and there are many different types of units in fact. Each character has different statistics which go up when they level up, which happens after gaining 100 experience points from killing enemies or using their class specified abilities and magic. Statistics can also be increased through the use of many STAT increasing items which can be found throughout the campaign and if you play your cards right you can also buy them from shops on the world map and in play. When your character gets over level 10 (level 20 being the limit) they can be promoted into a more powerful unit with the assistance of an item. Many weapons can be equipped to your units to increase fighting capabilities, and in some cases, decrease them as you'll find many weapons have special abilities, some of them not aiding you any further and some of them allowing you to down your foe in just a few hits. The battles take place in Turn Based Fashion, allowing you to move your units across the map to perform various acts and engage in combat. When all your units have been moved the enemy has its turn. This may sound dull to some and originally it sounded dull to me, except the Fire Emblem series is what truly made me appreciate TBS gaming. Outside of the campaign battles, you can also battle randomly generated skirmishes against evil monsters on maps you've already done battle on. These skirmishes get harder as you venture across the map of Magvel. There is also the tower of valni, a tower in which you can fight through several different floors against more monsters. You can complete this as much as you like, and after you complete the last of many campaign chapters you can gain special characters from completing this tower in different ways. There is also the Lagdou Ruins, which is a much harder version of the Tower Of Valni, which you can also gain special characters from it after completing the game. Each battle throughout the game will keep you excited and pleased, allowing you to play through these maps and skirmishes with joy.
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The verdict? - Fire Emblem is one of the best GBA games out there, and if you haven't tried the Fire Emblem games before, pick this one up and see what you are missing out on. 10/10 !