Andaron Saga Review

Review on the Fire Emblem Romhack: Andaron Saga (SPOILER FREE)

Below is the link to download the Romhack:

I am in no way, shape or form involved in the process of creation of this hack and this is merely my opinion after playing the game.

What about you? What did you think about the hack?

[Mangs]

Thanks for the review. I greatly enjoyed it.

The knowledge I had about hacking and game design at the start of Andaron Saga's development compared the end of it are literally worlds apart. Looking back at it, I wish we had focused more on making the maps quicker to beat and less about making awesome gimmicks and seeing how far we could push the software. Sometimes this wild experimentation came at the cost of player enjoyment.

Ch24 for example, was literally just me going crazy, utilizing everything I've learned to cram as many events as possible into a single map. While creating it was certainly enjoyable for me, it wasn't as fun playing it for some people.

I also regret that the difficulty was absolutely too high on the lower difficulties. Lunatic is for those who enjoy suffering so I'm fine with it being the way it was, but we should have toned down the difficulty on normal and hard by quite a bit.

The hack ended up becoming very dialogue heavy, much to my dismay, especially considering I often criticize other games for being too text heavy. Andaron Saga definitely tries to do too much. 32 chapters + 11 gaidens is quite insane. I think if I had decided to make the hack arond 20-23 chapters instead, it would probably be for the better.

As for the jokey tone, thats something I felt very strongly towards the end of development, but at that point it was too late to do anything about it. I do think its important to have a lighter tone and not be super serious all the time, but we could have cut maybe 50% of the jokes and it probably would be a better experience.

It's still very gratifying to watch someone enjoy a game I spent two years developing, and I have to give kudos to my incredibly talented team who worked very hard alongside me! 😊

I hope to showcase everything I've learned from Andaron Saga in the Rebellion prequel that I plan to release at some point.

Thanks again for this review!😂

[Klokinator]

The problem with AS's story is that when I was handed the script, the main continent's name was Eggdrasil and characters said "Oh my devil axe!" like 15 times in chapters 1-3. So I was like "wow this must be a meme hack". But then I found out five chapters in that a lot of [very bad things] happened later on, and it was like... damn I'd better go back and rewrite some of these chapters to make the tone more consistent before launch" but I had no time to do that.

If I had known from the beginning the game was intended to be a very mature/serious game, I'd have made a lot of different writing decisions. In the end, I've decided to do an entire remake of the game on the Lex Talionis engine. We'll see how that ends up in 2ish years or so. Might take longer, we'll see.

Thanks for the review!

[HanakkoLove]

Thank you for this review! I am one of the betatesters and following this project was a passion I hold dear in me, and I entirely agree with your critique, as biased as I am, there's a lot of points in the story that aren't for me, but I hold it as one of the most grounded and well-paced of the fire emblem hacks out there, and the music and gameplay are definetely peak in terms of hacks out there. I'm glad it was an enjoyable experience to you as it was to me!

[wulfric]

You bring up an interesting point with the tone of the earlygame vs lategame. I think having a mix of light and dark tones in a story is almost necessary, because only having one feel gets a bit boring. In my experience the more light hearted moments in the beginning really helped to warm me up to the characters and there is even a hint of more depth sprinkled in there (e.g. shom's ch1x convo). I found the timing of the jokes to be worse in the later parts of the game actually. They'd sometimes interrupt heavier moments, and I found that they probably could have crept back in in a more elegant way.

[PH_]

Damn we got destroyed for 10 minute and a half and then " It is a fantastic hack ", and i got some indirect praise at the end with balance and gameplay <3.

[Jamstaro]

Dont forget THE AMMOUNT OF SECRETS. I have seen massive differences between playthroughs and the MASSIVE reward in using a theif and playing fast. Knowing how to push the fire emblem games to their max can reward players in a myriad of ways

[ChillstoneBlakeBlast]

I have yet to beat the hack, but Story wise, it was alright. Dialogue definitely needed more time though. Gameplay is really good but I do think inventory gets full very quickly (200 convoy space is not enough IMO). Secrets are mostly straight foward and don't break the game if one does not find out about it. Overall a solid hack to play

[allothecheekclapper]

I'm only on ch17 but I'm loving it so far. My favorite part of this hack is the cast. There's so many characters I like, that I have a hard time deciding who to deploy because I want to use everyone

[randomontheinternet]

My favorite thing that happened in my playthrough was when Ashcleaver bro rolled up on me near the end of the first arc, I went to chip him with Shom for zero damage with Hoarfrost to get the speed drop, and then next thing I know he's down 51 health from a glacies crit. Basically 10/10 gameplay wise just from that.

[vladimirbajkic]

Honestly, best fire emblem gba rom hack to date.

[aetherius]

Has some of my favorite units ever, i love the way enemies are built to have very high damage but low other stats to make the difficulty very defensive in general with many powerful bosses to make you think offensively as a nice pace-change. Really keeps things fresh and fun. The story was very good overall but my biggst issue was that i think somehow the tone of the main story and of gaiden talks got mixed up. Why are most of the jokes in the chapter dialogue? Why are most of the gaiden talks super serious? A chapter tone more similar to FE4 with its heavy, dark andbroad story strokes and gaiden talks similar to the fun, lighthearted and occasionally powerful Tellius base convos and saving most of the jokes for them I think would have both improved the tone and pacing of the game's story. Broadly, I think the first half of the game has incredibly tight, engaging story but sort of falls a bit flat in the middle parts of Jakka's arc. His lowering action after Baud's death and rising action seiging andaron were both very well done and powerful but I really found Timaet/Styxia weirdly willing to overpraise jakka and he was treated much too similar to a friend rather than the opportunistically contracted merc that was needed in exchange for a favor. Was very standard FE build an army of alliances tropey in a way I wouldve expected a bit less campiness to be present in at the very least. Overall, probably the best or second best gameplay of any FE, hacks or mainline, and a good and fun but somewhat tonally dissonant story.

[tokothegecko]

Oh and really great review! I'd love to see more detailed thoughts in a spoiler video, if you ever feel like doing something like that. Also, very clever name for the channel hahaha

[Pororoca_Roknrolla]

Something I've been thinking about that's unique to Andaron Saga is that it's very unusual for the the player base to know the development team as well as we do.

Nearly 100% of us have never had nor ever will have any earthly connection with the people who made the games that changed our lives or even the ones we simply enjoyed. Imagine living in Japan in 1996 and we're calling up Intelligent Systems for some tips from Kaga and the bros on FE4. Mangs and the rest of the development team actually did this for the public at large, and they continue to provide this level of support essentially for free. This level of expertise and availability is to my knowledge unmatched. I've never seen anything like it. And I'm beginning to wonder if there's a hidden price to that.

In the past, a childhood summer playing Path of Radiance would change your life, and push you through multiple playthroughs past the hardest difficulty settings to discover everything. Through your mastery of the game you would begin to convince yourself that you share in a secret that only you and the developers know. This is the baseline in Fire Emblem for secret progression and theorycrafting that plays out over decades. To this day I still wonder if Tauroneo is Rolf's Grandfather. Could it be true?

Andaron Saga is different though because it burned so bright. We didn't get to enjoy the pleasure of living with unanswered questions. It has simply been too convenient for us to ask the developers to soothe or insecurities and hold our hands with step by step guides.

Under normal circumstances Chapter 32 might have taken years to discover. We might have lived for years with the false hope that their could be a way to save those who are dear to us. I personally might have spent years trying to promote Jakka into a Dragoon. All of that and more is painfully exposed, measured and clarified. Such a curse that we each rob ourselves of that future to the extent that our willpower can endure our curiosity.

In gaming I don't believe I've ever seen anything like Andaron Saga. It's the most powerful Fire Emblem game I've experienced since my own golden age. I still marvel at it and don't believe its real. What do think?

[redfoxoffire]

Like you mentioned, my biggest issue was all the fog of war. I'd like to replay because there is so much good in the game but I don't want to deal with all of that fog. Ch 14 in particular had no business being in fog, especially coming off the previous map. What's odd to me is that Mangs stated they didn't put enemy ballistae and siege tomes because it just slows the player down, which I agree with, but I'd argue FoW is much worse about slowing the player down, yet they put it everywhere.

While I definitely understand criticism for some of the dialog, that didn't actually bother me too much.

[qzecwx]

"Hey Klok, got anymore funny jokes about video games?"
"Lance is another name... for penis"
"nanda"

[chiveskirk]

Since you're doing reviews of fan-made Fire Emblem games, how about reviewing Bells of Byelen?
It features most of my favourite mechanics from the Fire Emblem series and implements them really well!
There's also an optional gameplay mode you unlock a few chapters into the game that I really liked!

[chiveskirk]

Yes, I agree completely that a lot of the dialogue, especially around the beginning of the game, is quite dreadful and almost got me to stop playing.

I also have to say that a lot of the story beats in the mid-to-late game felt forced, where the writers really wanted the party to go to certain parts of the world they created.
This isn't terrible, but since it seems a remake is being considered, this is something to take into account.
I really enjoyed the twists in the story and the vast majority of characters, and really appreciated the A-support bonuses and various small branches that give the game more replayability than most other Fire Emblem games.

Generally, the map design was a little all over the place, but it makes sense considering they were made by three different individuals with different philosophies.
Some maps felt very good to play, while others felt bland, and yet others are kind of unfair if you play them differently than how the creator intended.
I agree that more dialogue cues about what will go on during the chapter would be helpful.

The soundtrack and the visuals are honestly stunning, and really were the biggest highlight for me.

[Fieryone]

The first chapter really needed a rewrite to match the tone of the later chapters, I think it fixed itself rather quickly after it.

[edfmed]

Some of the jokes in Andaron Saga felt to me like the food dialogue in Vision Quest, at first its like "haha funny" but after it happens again i become more unfazed until i just don't react to them at all. And its not bad, i mean its jokes and memes, so its not a big deal for me.

[MorphBall]

I agree with your assessment of the story. The story itself was good for the most part but the dialogue should've been more consistent in tone. Personally I had a bigger issue with it in the later stages even if the jokes weren't quite as immature as in the beginning because I think it makes sense to start with a lighter tone and then get progressively more serious.
Still one of the best stories I have seen in a fire emblem hack/game, one of the few where I was actually invested and wanted to see what is going to happen next.