VideoGame Heroes of Light and Shadow: The Forgotten Gem
FE 12: Heroes of Light and Shadow, the remake of Mystery of the Emblem. If I could sum it up:
Before Awakening's release: Surprisingly Improved Sequel to Shadow Dragon, one of the better games in the series. After Awakening: Seinfeld Is Unfunny - The game.
Due to this, it's unlikely many people will play this game now. Which is a shame, since it's, well, I said it above. At the time, it was a huge shame it fell into No Export for You. But now, we have Awakening and this game is bound to be igonred.
What Awakening fans should know, is that pretty much everything that made that game so great (Avatar creation, the return of supports, difficulty levels that cater to both casual and hardcore players) debuted here. Sure some of them were much better refined in Awakening (support conversations actually have zero gameplay benefits in this one, they're there purely for flavor, to name one example) but they wouldn't have had a chance to be without this game as a testing ground.
But even on its own merits, this game stands strong. Just about everything terrible about Shadow Dragon has been removed or fixed. You no longer have to kill off your own characters to get sidequests (in fact, the game actually chastises you for it this time), characters have actual dialogue, some of the classes that were majorly nerfed were fixed. Yes, the Reclass system is still there, but the game is perfectly beatable without ever using it. The game also contains an embedded remake of Akaneia Saga, a Fire Emblem game that's pretty hard to get hold of these days.
As far as complaints go, the new villains aren't really fleshed-out much (expecially Legion/Roro), and the game is a little easy on Normal Mode due to enemies keeping their stats from the original FE 3 while yours can now go much higher. Possibly related to this, the vast majority of characters who join after the game's halfway point are virtually useless due to being given base stats as if the stat cap was still 20, which is a shame since some of them are pretty interesting, personality-wise.
On a final note: the only way to play the game in English is through fan translation, but it's top-notch, almost on par wih official localizations in quality. In short, I highly recommend this game, despite Awakening being out.
VideoGame The Perfect Gem and the Ugly Scrawl
New Mystery of the Emblem is a very strange game, in that it can jump between being a game that I consider perfect, and a game that I laugh at. Fortunately, the two halves divide pretty neatly.
From a game design standpoint, people often compare it to its immediate successor, and I feel that's very off. Yes, they both have an avatar, a casual mode, and a lunatic difficulty, but they honestly couldn't be more distinct. Awakening is all about excess: huge numbers, dozens of skills, characters maxed into superbeings, weaponized shipping, legions of enemies to mow down, and the RNG nightmare of its highest difficulty. New Mystery is the opposite: it's deadly focused, and polished to a mirror shine. No skills, no little oddities, no wonky biorhythms or pairup bonuses. It's just you, your stats, your weapons, and the enemy.
And it works wonderfully. It's a game that rewards aggression, movement, and planning things out, further encouraged by the emphasis on Seize. Despite its units being gamebreaking at times, they remain vulnerable enough to need care. And despite the enemy being crushingly brutal, they can still be taken down. When you look at the maps, every challenge and placement feels planned, there aren't six random brigands scattered in a field. The fact that this all feels true on any hard difficulty is stunning. New Mystery's Lunatic is hard, but it's honest. Even on Reverse, the challenge is straightforward and solvable. And yes, about half the cast sucks, but honestly, I find that endearing.
Speaking of things that half suck, the writing.
The original Book 2 is kind of a sleeper hit, story-wise. It's a take on Won the War, Lost the Peace, a Happy Ending Override that actually works, taking Marth's generic hero's journey and giving it a sense of worldliness, history, and tragedy as it delves into complexities of rebuilding after a disaster. When it's being that plot, it's all good. A bit expositiony, but good. New Mystery does provide one big improvement in that regard, which is supports, finally taking the paper-thin Archanea cast and giving them at least a bit of life. Unfortunately, they mostly spend it talking to Kris.
Kris is a character who shows that when Running the Asylum, you may get bad fanfiction: an Author Avatar who claims to be essential but just tags along, borrows scenes from other characters to have stuff to do, and is the best friend forever of everyone in the universe. Every time Kris is onscreen, chances are you're going to see some embarrassingly bad writing, whether it's the latest hat joke, a tedious subplot about assassins, or a character seemingly about to fellate him. He's incredibly bland, yet has just enough character to not work as a Blank Slate, either. And casting his existence as the "true version" is honestly bordering on an insult. No, Kris, Mystery was not your story. Get out of it.
In short: landmark of game design. Don't be afraid to skip cutscenes.