Talk:Fire Emblem Engage/GA2

GA Review

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Reviewer: Cukie Gherkin (talk · contribs) 22:30, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Lead

• I think the lead paragraph could be split into two, with the second paragraph beginning at "One of the core parts". Also, certain story elements, I'd recommend cutting down - for example, I don't think it's important to mention in the lead Alear's age,
  • Hmm, I'm gonna push back on this some. The first paragraph is 7 sentences and 172 words. That's a pretty typical size for a paragraph. I'm not averse to short paragraphs - I use them in the body a decent amount - but the lead needs to be the most tightly written section of the article, and splitting this in two results in paragraphs that are a bit clipped to my eyes. Additionally, the part about both Alear and Sombron seeking to control the rings is "finishing" a thought brought up earlier in the paragraph that was describing the game's central conflict. If a reader reads the first paragraph, they'll know what's being fought over in setting and the relevant stakes, while I feel it ends up cut off if such a paragraph break is added.
  • I don't think Alear's age is discussed? I suppose you mean the "awaken from a thousand-year slumber" part. I don't think that's there to discuss age, really, but rather set up Alear as a new actor on the field - they weren't participating before and don't know anyone and are an outsider, but are thrust into the conflict now, rather than being an existing part of the world. It also sets up that there was some relevant backstory 1,000 years prior to the current events, which is true.
• Having no development info in the lead makes it feel incomplete.
  • I mention it above on this talk page, but IMHO, many video game articles are entirely too focused about development details in the lead section, especially for games that don't have "celebrity" designers like Yoko Taro or Hidetaka Miyazaki. I'd kind of like to train the habit out of our GAs. For something like Elden Ring, we have sources that talk about Miyazaki & George R. R. Martin and such, but our development sources here are essentially all interviews. And this leads to a problem: some of the stuff in the interviews isn't reliable compared to what shipped, so we're stuck only discussing "this was the intent" level stuff. More generally, I have run Wikipedia articles past people in the past and a routine point of feedback - from people deeply invested in video games (!) - is that there is too much boring, irrelevant detail about the development that they don't care about. A combination of reader disinterest, lack of secondary sources, and reviews not talking about development much suggest that Wikipedia should stash this information away and not highlight it in the lead. I suppose there is *one* point that I could include about development in the lede, but I'm going to warn you that it's going to sound like axe-grinding. The development interviews make it very clear that the dev team wanted to do something different from Three Houses, and the reviews / other sources talk quite a bit about "Three Houses vs. Engage" and how Engage usually comes off worse. So... I could try to work that in. It's gonna sound like a Three Houses fanboy working a "take that" into the lead, though, since it can't help but come across as anything other than "look at these idiots trying to mess with a winning formula".

1. I'm pretty much satisfied with the lead in its current state.

Infobox

• Being single-player should be mentioned in the article's body
  • I believe it already is - last sentence in "Gameplay"?
    • Ah, my mistake - I expected it to be sooner.
• A lot of the staff is unmentioned later in the article (and possibly unsourced), and I think it's important that including someone in the infobox should have some evidence of specific importance to the game's development. I feel like it might come off as indiscriminate.
  • By default, it's sourced to the game's credits (fandom copy, but it matches the in-game credits to my knowledge). Hmm, you're even more aggressive about trimming down the Infobox than me! I'm definitely a fan of a lean & mean Infobox, but looking at the documentation of Template:Infobox video game...
    • I don't like to be too much of a stickler about this, I just feel like it makes the infobox really unwieldy (for me it pushes the screenshot down and makes the gameplay section look a little worse). There was a discussion on WT:VG about this, and as I recall, there was a feeling that there should be stricter expectations of who to include and why.
  • The directors and one of the producers are in the article. The documentation for producers just says to include people with that title if there are three or less of them, and there are indeed exactly three.
  • I'd already removed designers & programmers, which are the fields the documentation says not to include in modern big budget games.
  • Composers / Artists are maybe the most interesting ones. We do discuss Pikazo, so I think she needs to stay, but if we're including anybody, I think it's fair to include the other leads - Teraoka is at least mentioned as an art director in this interview [1] even if it didn't fit into the main article, and Hiromi Tanaka is credited as "Art Design Lead." I think they're fair to keep. Composers, it's a long list, but we do discuss that a team of composers were used intentionally to create different styles of music in the article - the Infobox is verifying that yes, it's a team. If we stick just the one guy with a wikilink there, it may look like he did *all* the music. This is the part that is most debatable, but I'd personally rather keep 'em as proof of the "team" composing aspect, but I suppose we could delete all of them, or move it into an endnote or something.
• Another issue relating to staff is whether there's any commentary relating to the game's composers. There is some talk of music, but is there any commentary by the composers? Is any one of the composers the lead composer?
  • No, I wasn't able to find any commentary by the composers, unfortunately. The most I got was that it was done by a team as the development section discusses. Yasuhisa Baba is credited as lead composer but I didn't find any sources discussing his specific work. [2] is the most in-depth thing I've seen on the topic: Tei said "One sound composer was assigned to each country" and Nakanashi says "Takeru Kanazaki wrote Solm's music." That's it.

Gameplay

1. Unique personal skills or a unique personal skill?
   • Could be either, but I interpret that sentence as referring to each character individually. A single character has multiple stats and multiple growth rates, but just one personal skill.
2. Is support level the same as support rank?
   • Yes, they're basically synonyms. If you search, you can find sources using both "rank" and "level."
     • I'm aware they're synonyms, I just think it might be confusing to someone if they see support level and support rank and think that these may be different gameplay terminologies.
       • I checked the game and the tutorial under "Support" seems to use "Support levels" (and the tutorial called "Bond Level" says... well...), so I've standardized on that.
3. "rivers might by impassible to ground-based units" and "fortresses might grant defensive bonuses" just checking, but are there circumstances where ground units cannot cross rivers, or fortresses cannot benefit from defensive bonuses?
   • I'll rephrase to be less confusing. "Might" is referring back to earlier in the sentence to "terrain in general", i.e. it's hinting that different terrain has different effects, but fair point that it can also be read that Fortresses can work differently (which was not the intended reading). Went with a different phrasing, take a look and feel free to edit it further.
4. Unless I overlooked it, the article doesn't cover range
   • I feel like this is too in-the-weeds on gameplay. I went back and checked some other FE GAs, and it's not discussed in either Fire_Emblem#Gameplay or Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn#Gameplay for examples. Fire_Emblem:_The_Blazing_Blade#Gameplay mentions "attack range" in passing, once, but with no further elaboration and while talking about something else. I feel that going in-depth into range would require discussing weapon types first: e.g. Arts have range 1, Bows usually have range 2, spells usually have range 1-2, etc., and I expect the GAMEGUIDE police would get angry about that. But more generally, I think this is just basically understood about any sort of tactical game already - of course swords would have different range than bows. The final kicker is that game reviews don't seem to talk that much about range either. So I'd rather leave it as is, but happy to discuss.
5. Some terms use quotation marks around them, but others don't. This feels a little inconsistent. Not a big deal, just think it might be worthwhile.
   • Checking... so I try to use quotes when calling out non-standard usages of terms, i.e. "don't try to interpret this as normal English, it's a term of art". For example, "Engage" doesn't really mean English engage, but the non-standard use "power-up". Same with "Skirmish" (quotes clarifies it's a specific term the game calls it, not just a casual use of the word). I've looked them over and think they're used acceptably at the moment, but happy to take another look - basically quotes calls out "no, this isn't a typo for prologue, they're really called Paralogues."
6. Not a failing issue, but I wonder if it wouldn't be better to merely select a few Emblems instead of listing all that were available at launch.
   • Given that many of the Emblems have articles to link to... I feel like the Emblems are central enough to the game that it's worth listing them. If nothing else, it's definitely helpful for the DLC lest the DLC just say something vague like "wave 3 included more Emblem Bracelets", and once all the DLC Emblems are listed, I feel like the 12 main-game ones might as well be included too. On a more pragmatic note, if we did only list a few, I have no idea how we'd restrict which ones to mention. I guarantee that well-meaning editors would hop along to add the others that are missing, and I'm not even convinced they'd be wrong to do so. If we really did want to lock this down, the only way I could see it working is to mention only Marth and nobody else, given that Marth is on the cover and is the most plot-relevant Emblem. But... eh, I feel like "which Emblems are in the game" is of more interest to readers than 90% of the other content. So I'd rather just keep them all - 12 isn't so many as to be over-the-top, especially given that we can get them out of the way in a sentence.

• Side note on "like" vs. "such as": I believe "such as" is correct for those. A quick Google brings up [3] which writes that "Like is used for comparisons and isn’t inclusive, whereas such as is used to introduce categories or examples that are inclusive." Rivers and fortresses are examples of terrain actually in the game, not hypothetical examples, so the inclusive phrase "such as" is proper. SnowFire (talk) 04:06, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

Development

• Is there any info about localization?
  • Not really. The localization was mostly drama-free. You can find Bounding Into Comics and idiots on Twitter claiming the localization was "censored" but these are not reliable sources and are also wrong anyway. When reviewers discussed the English game script, they mostly didn't discuss the translation or blame any plot problems on a bad localization.

• I've interleaved some replies above - feel free to tell me if you prefer I create a separate reply section. SnowFire (talk) 04:38, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

That's consistent with what I've found too regarding localization. Idle grumbling about trivial changes on Twitter and non-RS like Niche Gamer, but nothing noteworthy made it to reliable sources. Sergecross73 msg me 12:19, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

So there's no RSes to even state that content was changed? Not asking for a controversy section or anything. - Cukie Gherkin (talk) 17:47, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't believe any content did change, other than some of the names that would sound weird in English being replaced (Ryul/Ryūru -> Alear, Fogado / Timerra's class being the English word "Vigilante" in Japanese but the implications being all wrong in English, and thus becoming "Sentinel", etc.).

To go into it in some more detail: the main accusation that the niche sources surface is that the localization either censors or tones down some of the S-rank dialogue / endings between Alear and younger characters (Anna) or characters that would be incest (Veyle). But... this just isn't actually true. What is true is that there are words that can be translated multiple ways in the same way that words have multiple definitions in the dictionary, and it's possible to translate some of the words in the most lovey-dovey way and still have it technically be a defensible translation as far as "my Japanese-English dictionary says this is a meaning." But real translations take into account context to pick which word. Like... a classic example is kuso which, technically, can potentially be translated as "shit." But the usage is fairly harmless and 8-year olds can say it without it being offensive or anything in Japanese culture, so if you have a cute 8-year old in a non-edgy media saying "kuso", you should probably use "crap" or "poop" or the like in English to get the right vibe. In the same way, the mood of the scenes - even in Japanese - is very "best friendsy" for most characters. They're not getting married or anything, just complimenting each other as The Best etc. As such, interpreting every word as if it should use its most maximally romantic connotations would be inappropriate.

That said, I agree it would be nice if there was some source that talked about the localization in more depth - I'll keep an eye out if one crops up, but I haven't seen any yet. SnowFire (talk) 02:54, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Images

1. The Alear arts have a white background on my setting, which I think can be fixed.

• • Is this really desired, though? I imagine if someone has a skin that has a different background, they might still want a consistent backdrop here. I could certainly edit the image to make the white area transparent, I just assume that's not a good change in a Wikipedia context that wants a consistent display. Is there a policy or discussion on this to your knowledge? If not, happy to kick this over to WT:VG. SnowFire (talk) 06:22, 15 August 2023 (UTC)
    • I believe that the image, if made properly transparent, will have a background that matches any style.@Kung Fu Man: - Cukie Gherkin (talk) 21:26, 15 August 2023 (UTC)
      • That's correct that it'll match any style, I'm just saying that's not always a good thing. Less of an issue with Alear because they're very colorful anyway, but you wouldn't want, say, a background that matches the outline of the character that'd cause it to be difficult to detect where the character starts at a glance. Anyway, looking closer at File:Fire Emblem Engage Alears.png, it seems that the image is transparent in the background already. (And while Alear is wearing white, the edges of Alear's outline aren't except at the shoulders, so the default white works fine as a background IMO.) SnowFire (talk) 04:06, 17 August 2023 (UTC)
        • I'm entirely unsure why it's not a good thing in this case. I don't see anything about the image that suggests making it properly transparent. And I'm aware that it appears transparent, but in practice, it is not. - Cukie Gherkin (talk) 08:08, 22 August 2023 (UTC)
          • Hmm, so what are you looking for? Like I said before, the background is already transparent, by which I mean it's alpha channel has the opacity of the background set to just pass through what's "behind" it. You can see an example at https://fireemblem.fandom.com/wiki/Alear where the blue background there is in the background of the page.
            • I won't fail for that, it's just a thing I notice with some transparent images that they are less "successfully" transparent than others.

Reception

1. Multiple reviews in the table do not appear to be utilized in the reception section. Namely Destructoid, Famitsu, Game Informer, and Siliconera. I recommend incorporating the sources into the text, either by adding them to help further substantiate a point or expand on any new points that they may touch upon that the article currently does not.
   • Famitsu isn't really usable because we only have a score. Daytona USA is a recent FA that went against the guideline about using everything in the table in text on grounds of a wider, international viewpoint to keep Famitsu, so I'd rather keep it. Went ahead and added the other three, although...
     • I'm not gonna be a pain in the butt about that. Might be worthwhile to see if anyone has access to that copy of Famitsu if you wanna being it to FA though!
2. "Reviewers generally considered the gameplay of Engage excellent" This is a minor nitpick since the text afterward seems to substantiate the claim well enough, so I don't know that the Vice citation needs to be attached to verify that. I'd suggest either removing it or adding Vice's specific praise of the gameplay if you can make it fit.
   • I removed it, but also snuck Siliconera in as a replacement. Wasn't sure what to call out since that was a 10/10 review so having it next to a generically positive statement seems okay - I don't want to have TOO much space be devoted to calling out specific magazines.
3. "Other reviewers were outright hostile to the cast" Without checking the reviews, the way they're described - as having boring support conversations - does not seem hostile to me, just mere dislike. I'd recommend either changing it from hostile to a more neutral descriptor or clarify what was particularly hostile about the criticism.
   • I'd consider calling them boring is pretty hostile for media designed as entertainment! I guess boring is one step above offensive at least. Anyway, from The Gamer review used as a reference:
     • It's frustrating in the extreme - I just do not care about these characters and their plight, and even the ones where I might have, the game offers me no reason to invest whatsoever. I highly recommend Fire Emblem Engage because the gameplay and battles are stellar. Just be prepared to find yourself skipping a lot of stuff by the end.
   • Here's Kotaku:
     • Engage is so shallow about its worldbuilding and characters that I find myself feeling unattached to any of them.
   • And fairly extensive other complaints on the writing / plot. TheGamer also writes "It may also be that the writing, both in terms of plot and dialogue, is horrendous" and Kotaku also called out "terrible writing". Went ahead and expanded that to make clear it goes beyond just the characters themselves. I didn't cite her again on that sentence, but Ash Parrish's Verge review also mentioned "flat, uninspiring characters" and "Your companions, while visually interesting, seem like mere placeholders" which sounds pretty hostile to me.
     • I think that's a much better setup.

Miscellaneous

1. I don't know why, but there's an error on this source: [4]
   • Fixed.

• Annoyingly enough, the Destructoid review had some ad that was so bad that it froze Chrome so badly I had to entirely restart, losing everything I wrote here on the talk page and my in-progress edit, so the above was typed again along with some of the changes having to be written again. Very frustrating. On the double spaces thing, MOS:DOUBLESPACE allows both styles; it's just editor preference, there's no effect for the reader. Obviously fine to prefer single spaces if you're making an edit, but no need to go through and redo all the sections as a generalized clean-up. SnowFire (talk) 06:48, 23 August 2023 (UTC)
  • Okay, it looks good. Sorry for the delays, it's been kind of hectic IRL. - Cukie Gherkin (talk) 09:33, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Overall

1. Well-written
2. Verifiable with no original research
3. Broad in its coverage
4. Neutral
5. Stable
6. Illustrated