Fire Emblem: Three Houses, the latest installment in the long-running RPG, has been out for four months on the Nintendo Switch and it’s one of my personal favorite games next to Fire Emblem: Awakening.
After playing Fire Emblem: Fates, I thought the franchise couldn’t get any worse with its flat characters and lazy writing. However, I was wrong, Three Houses seemed to improve the reputation its franchise by improving their characters and story for the three paths in the game. The game takes place in a huge boarding located on Fódlan that players can freely explore and take part in multiple activities. Most of the students attending Garred Mach come from nobility and have a Crest. Crests are special powers inherited by blood and come from an ancestors who likewise had the same Crest. If noble possess a Crest, they are put on top of pedestal in society, but if a noble doesn’t have one then they are treated as a normal person.
The characters are students at the Garred Mach Monastery and they’re divided among three classes: The Black Eagles, Blue Lions, and Golden Deer. You, the player, who is made a professor, must choose which house to lead during a very early scene in the game, without much information about the houses or the students within them. However, you do get to see the house leaders in the first battle. My first impressions for the house leaders consisted of mixed feelings. I thought Dimitri of the Blue Lions had a flat religious personality and Edelgard of the Black Eagles had a motivated personality which seemed boring to me. Lastly, Claude of the Golden Deer seemed to perk my interests with his scheming and bad jokes.
So in conclusion, you should join the Golden Deer for their interesting leader, characters, and their memes.
When I started my first run for the game, I choose the Golden Deer due to the memes and their handsome house leader, Claude Von Riegan. Unlike the other house leaders who choose to follow a religion or not, Claude is driven to follow his dream to to break the cultural barrier and have each nation more accepting of each other as equals, which leads to his dream of opening Fódlan to the outside world. I felt like many people including myself can relate to Claude’s goals since modern society strives to be equal in race as well.
“Yet we have the strength to scale the walls between us… To reach out our hands in friendship so we can open our true hearts to one another! That’s how we win! — Claude von Riegan”
Besides Claude, the other students of the Golden Deer had colorful personalities and backstories which made me have an emotional connection with them. One of the students I connected with was Lysithea, a noble from House Ordelia. At a young age she was tortured in crest experiments conducted by a mysterious group. After the experiments, her life was cut short by five years which motivated her to work harder despite being the youngest in Golden Deer. As I got to know the rest of the students, I realized they were all misfits of society that bonded together almost like theatre kids. Each student seemed to have their own little quirks that made them special. These quirks didn’t have to contain a tragic backstory like the other characters in the game. From lazy Hilda and all the way to artistic Ignatz, all of the students in Golden Deer had more personal struggles rather than family struggles unlike the other students which made them seem unique.
“That’s the Golden Deer for you. -Claude von Riegan”
Lastly, the memes. Oh yes, the memes for the Golden Deer. On the official box art for Fire Emblem Three Houses, Claude is shown to be upside down and ready to shoot an arrow while the other characters, Dimitri and Edelgard are posing in a normal fighting stance. From a simple piece of art, the upside-down Claude meme was born. Artists and meme makers everywhere began to draw and make jokes about Claude’s choice of position on the box art. Claude’s English voice actor Joe Zieja is one of the big powerhouses for Claude and Golden Deer memes. When Polygon announced the Black Eagles was the most popular house, Joe Zieja stepped in and created an announcement to address the problem by giving three reasons to join the Golden Deer. In his video he created new hand signals to use in public and called it:The Sign of the Golden Deer. Compared to Dimitri and Edelgard’s voice actors Joe Zieja shows dedication to convincing others to join the Golden Deer through his memes.
“We are the House of Memes and We Know it! -Joe Zieja”
Tart is has been playing Fire Emblem games since Fire Emblem: Awakening released for the 3ds in 2013. They are an author and write comics about other Nintendo franchises as a side job while being a student.
Links
“Claude.” Fire Emblem Wiki, https://fireemblemwiki.org/wiki/Claude.
Zieja, Joe. “Polygon Said Black Eagles Was Top House In Fire Emblem Three Houses? A Golden Deer Response” YouTube, 7 Aug. 2019,cccc
Hernandez, Patricia. “Everyone Loves Claude, Fire Emblem’s Meme Machine.” Polygon, Polygon, 8 Aug. 2019, https://www.polygon.com/2019/8/8/20791446/claude-fire-emblem-three-houses-memes-jokes-nintendo-switch.