Creating Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones
This article is part of the Fire Emblem: Development and Reception series
Development
Development of Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones was started and ran parallel to the next game in the series Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance. There was a surprise for the team because they Fire Emblem: The Blazing Sword would be their last entry for the Game Boy Advance.
The team this time increased the number of directors leading to three, Sachiko Wada, Taiki Ubukata and Kentaro Nishimura. Toru Narihiro and Hitoshi Yamagami as producers. Ryo Hirata and Sachiko Wada returned as character artists. Kouhei Maeda as the scenario writer. Yoshihiko Kitamura, Saki Haruyama and Yoshito Hirano as the music composers.
Major mechanics from both Fire Emblem: The Blazing Sword and Fire Emblem: Gaiden were implemented; the world map, towns, overworld battles and skill-related ideas from the Super Famicom games.
The Fire Emblem is present in every game and this time appeared as a gemstone that carried the Demon King’s soul. The setting this time was chosen to be it’s own standalone continent called Magvel and to this day has no links to any of the other games.
The Sacred Stones was slated to be the final Fire Emblem game on the GBA as well as the being the last ‘original’ Fire Emblem on handheld until Fire Emblem: Awakening released.
Reception
After it’s June, 2004 release in Japan, promotions; special commercials and guidebooks. The Sacred Stone had a sell-through rate of 64% and by the end of 2004 had taken the 48th spot on Famitsu’s video game sales rankings. North America had similar results selling about 96,000 units, ranking it within the top 20 games in Nintendo hardware charts.
IGN’s Craig Harris praised the story as being ‘absolutely top-notch, if just a little wordy for comfort’ as well as again, like in the previous title, making him care about the characters. He also noted more or less negatively that the gameplay had not changed much from Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade so players looking for a different experience wouldn’t find it.
GameSpy’s David Chapman also praised the storyline as being ‘rich’, also noting that multiplayer options were a positive for him.
GameSpot’s Greg Kasavin noted the narrative, heroes and villains were well-written. He especially noted the depth of strategy and the way the game made it so that a wide variety of players in terms of age and skill level could easily get into it.
Eurogamer’s Tom Bramwell also praised the story with an emphasis on the exotic narrative compared to the Blazing Blade. His gripe was his frustration with permadeath while also making note that he enjoyed the nuances afforded to him through character customization.
RPGamer’s Matthew Foster praised the translation work, but in contrary to the other reviewers noted the story was the weak point as it was cliche, noting that since the only the gameplay was it’s best feature, it was still very similar to the previous title.
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References
- Brown, Mark. 2013–04–18. “Pocket Primer: A complete history of Fire Emblem”. PocketGamer
- 2017–03–27. “Fire Emblem 8 // Japanese Commercial.” Parallel Falcon
- “Official Nintendo Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones Player’s Guide.” Nintendo. 2004. ISBN 1–93–020657–7.
- ファイアーエムブレム 聖魔の光石 — 攻略本情報. Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones Japanese Website. 2004–12–07.
- Winkler, Chris (2004–10–09). “Fire Emblem: Seima no Kouseki Sells 100,000 Copies”. RPGFan. 2015–09–05.
- Harris, Craig (2005–05–24). “Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones Review”. IGN.
- Chapman, David (2005–05–25). “Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones Review”. GameSpy.
- Kasavin, Greg (2005–05–28). “Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones Review”. GameSpot. 2015–09–11.
- Bramwell, Tom (2005–06–16). “Review — Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones”. Eurogamer. 2009–07–01.
- Foster, Matthew (2005–07–23). “Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones — Review”. RPGamer. 2005–07–25.
