REVIEW: ‘Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave’ Is The Series’ Most Ambitious Game Yet

Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is Intelligent Systems’ latest major installment in the beloved Fire Emblem series. As a new mainline entry, it features several standout elements, including a grand, engaging narrative, endearing characters, several new gameplay features, and more. It is one of the franchise’s most ambitious titles to date, and while it has its share of hiccups, it cements itself as one of the better entries.

Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave’s story is deeply layered and includes many characters. The game begins when the protagonist, Eshmel, a mysterious fighter from the past, is revived by Sothis, the Progenitor God, to stop the demon lord Balor after he has brought ruin and havoc to the world. To stop his deeds, the protagonist, along with Fortuna, the Goddess of Fate, travels back five years to recruit four heroes, all of whom set out to join the Heroic Games for their own goals. In the process, their fates intertwine as their journeys lead them to assemble to defeat Balor.

Each hero has a distinct personality and unique goals. Cai is a starry-eyed young boy whose father is imprisoned, and he joins the Heroic Games to find out why he was captured and to free him. Theodora, on the other hand, is a queen seeking to bring glory to her homeland and improve the reputation of both her homeland and her goddess. Leda enters the Heroic Games to find her father’s killer and exact her vengeance, and Dietrich, a renowned swordsman, enters to seek his strongest opponent yet.

Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave’s story is deeply layered and includes many characters.

In Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave, each character has an individual storyline and campaign that players can select after the prologue, each with its own supporting cast, mechanics, and perspective on the overall narrative. Eventually, these stories connect, leading to a satisfying endgame. What makes the structure especially engaging is that players can switch between campaigns whenever they want, rather than being locked into one at the start. This freedom lets players choose whichever story they wish to finish first, especially if they want to complete the more engaging ones first.

Some campaigns, like Dietrich’s, are less engaging due to lower stakes compared to campaigns like Theodora and Leda, which are gripping from the start and have more interesting story concepts. Regardless, the overarching narrative showcases a fantastic level of depth.

The game features immaculate world-building on a level not seen in many other games. It features several heroes, deep history with lore of past and present civilizations, several gods and goddesses, clans, and more. Additionally, watching the interactions and relationships between characters, especially as they get closer, is often entertaining and even funny, leading to many entertaining moments. All of this makes Fortune’s Weave’s narrative and storytelling incredibly gripping, giving players reasons to explore the world and engage in the characters’ stories.

The biggest new addition in Fortune’s Weave is Blaze Arts.

The combat system is another one of the game’s strongest features. Like previous games, Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave keeps the familiar grid-based battles series fans are familiar with, while adding some new systems. This includes several classes, each with its own abilities, as well as several types of equipment often found between battles, which players can use to tailor several character builds.

The biggest new addition in Fortune’s Weave is Blaze Arts, which lets the main heroes execute powerful abilities in exchange for HP. Using them also builds a gauge that can provide additional bonuses, but pushing it too far can trigger a Burst that reduces the hero’s maximum HP for the rest of the battle. This creates genuinely tense decisions, especially since keeping your main hero alive is crucial to winning most battles.

Like in previous games, prioritizing positioning, using link attacks, and leveling up relationships between characters is the recipe for success in battles, especially the tougher ones. Additionally, the mechanics tied to each protagonist give players a lot of freedom in building their army.

Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave notably introduces Clash Battles in dungeons.

Each of the four heroes has a distinct gameplay style, which helps maintain the unique feel of each campaign. Cai focuses on mobility and area damage, with his Blaze Art letting him unleash flames across multiple enemies, while his world-map ability lets him capture animals that can become mounts. Dietrich is much more aggressive and close-range-focused, with his teleporting Blaze Art and Moving Shadow, which allow him to warp across the battlefield and attack immediately afterward, making him excellent at reaching enemies that would otherwise be difficult to approach.

Theodora is more of a powerful frontline fighter, using her lance to dish out damage while her Earthen Hurl Blaze Art lets her tear up chunks of ground and hurl them at distant enemies. Leda takes the biggest departure from the others, as she’s more of a support character who uses her vihuela to perform Spellsongs that can strengthen nearby allies or summon a Demonic Beast. Her unique ability on the world map also lets her quickly earn resources and money. Each hero is different from the others, encouraging players to build and play their armies differently.

Outside main battles, the game also lets players travel around Dagda, grind out levels with smaller overworld skirmishes, complete side quests, train units, recruit new characters, gather resources, and explore dungeons. Fortune’s Weave also notably introduces Clash Battles in dungeons. This new game mode temporarily moves away from the traditional grid system, adopting a more conventional turn-based system with a five-person party and shared health pools. They provide a nice change of pace and are generally much quicker than the main battles, although they quickly become repetitive the more players do them.

Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave offers a lot, but the pacing suffers.

In fact, after several dozen hours, some of the game’s activities begin to feel more like a slog. Recruitment is a noticeable example. Getting new characters requires more involvement than simply progressing chapters, which can make recruiting someone feel rewarding. However, this can make the process unnecessarily demanding, especially when players are trying to build Support levels or meet specific requirements. The same problem can also be seen in some of the game’s side content. While Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave offers a lot, not everything feels substantial enough to justify the time required.

As a result, the pacing suffers in Fortune’s Weave, as the constant cycle of exploration, management, training, and smaller activities can significantly slow down the campaign. Lastly, the game’s cast also varies in quality. While the major protagonists and their closest companions receive a satisfying amount of attention and development across each campaign, some recruitable characters do not. This can make spending time recruiting certain characters feel less worthwhile than it should be.

Visually, Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave looks fantastic and improves on previous entries in the series. The models are crisp, detailed, and expressive. The animations, particularly those seen during combat as units attack each other, are fantastic, and the art direction and character designs, chiefly seen in the main characters’ attire and in each region, are impressive in many ways. Lastly, the game’s soundtrack is one of the best in the series so far, featuring several amazing songs and a highly memorable main theme. Performance-wise, the game runs excellently on Switch 2 with no frame drops or stuttering. However, it is also unfortunately locked at 30 FPS despite running on Nintendo’s latest console.

All in all, while Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is occasionally held back by some imperfect features, its amazing combat, overall narrative depth, world-building, and visuals make it one of the best titles in the franchise, and one that can easily be recommended to series fans.

Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave is available now for Nintendo Switch 2.