Darkest Fire Emblem Games

Highlights

• Fire Emblem games are known for their complex and dark stories, often showcasing the horror and despair of intense conflicts.
• Each of the highlighted games explores mature themes and presents distressing scenarios and characters.
• The gameplay itself in Fire Emblem can contribute to the dark tone, through difficult maps or character deaths in permadeath runs.

Fire Emblem may have taken a much more colorful and uplifting tone with the latest release, Fire Emblem Engage, but it’s a series that is still known for its complex, mature, and at times, very dark stories. A lot of the games achieve this by focusing on a small conflict, before then growing into a war on a much grander scale, showcasing all the horror and despair that can often come as a result of intense conflicts.

Because of the unique gameplay of Fire Emblem, it does mean that it can also create a dark tone through means other than the story itself, such as with the characters’ dialogue on permadeath runs, or if a map is designed to be brutally difficult and oppressive. Still, there are a handful of games out of the entire catalog that longtime fans of this beloved tactical RPG series have often considered to be among the most mature in their overall themes.

1 Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows Of Valentia

Shadows Of Valentia Highlights How A Grand-Scale War Can Impact Regular Civilians

Shadows of Valentia is an extremely impressive remake of the 1992 game, Fire Emblem Gaiden, brushing off a lot of the rust to present a game with a compelling story and some extremely lovable characters. While there are many lighthearted moments shared between Alma and Celica’s party members, there are still plenty of bleak events and imagery throughout the game that remind the player about the seriousness of the war that’s still raging on in the background.

The backstory of the Witches is just one example of how distressing the conflict has been for regular people, having been created after women were forced to offer their souls to the Evil Duma. After their Soul is discarded, they gain immensely strong magical powers but also become a husk of who they once were in the process. The constant hunger for power and supremacy in Shadows of Valentia leads to some very distressing scenarios and characters.

2 Fire Emblem: Awakening

Awakening Depicts A Future Where All Humans Are Turned Into Mindless Zombies

Awakening deservedly gets a lot of praise for saving the franchise at a time when sales for the games were dwindling, but while the streamlined gameplay made it very accessible, Intelligent Systems didn’t pull any punches with the story, especially where Lucina is concerned. Lucina, who goes under the persona “Marth” for much of the game, reveals that she has traveled back in time to warn Chrom about the dangerous Grima, who has invaded the world in the future.

In this timeline, not only does every human become a mindless zombie under the control of a menacing tight-fisted warlord, but Chrom and his friends are also executed, leaving no chance of anyone retrieving the Fire Emblem. There’s also an ending where the player’s avatar, who has grown to be a brother in arms to Chrom throughout the game, completely disappears after dealing the final blow to Grima, resulting in a very upsetting final scene.

3 Fire Emblem: Three Houses

Three Houses Force Players To Mercilessly Kill The Friends And Allies They Had Grown Close To

The social simulation aspect of Fire Emblem: Three Houses wasn’t loved by everyone who played the game, but one aspect that no one can deny went above and beyond was the story, especially Edelgard’s campaign. It’s made clear throughout the game’s story that the world has become far too obsessed with Crests, small indications of power that define someone’s social status. Edelgard, who had been the victim of a horrific experiment to implant a Crest inside her, swore to destroy everyone who had a part in creating the Crests, including the Church of Seiros.

This results in a long and bloody war where the player will be forced to cut down the friends and allies that, only a few hours earlier, they were hanging out with in their free time, and chatting with in the church courtyards. The game also contains one of the most unnerving maps in the entire series, where the player and their students must defend themselves against a horde of possessed civilians in a village that is burning down in the background.

4 Fire Emblem: Thracia 776

Thracia 776 Manages To Create A Gloomy Tone Through Both The Gameplay And Story

Thracia 776 is quite a unique game as, for nearly the entire first half of the game, the player must take on Escape maps since Leif’s army is so small. This means that the goal is all about evading the enemy forces who will willingly execute anyone they manage to catch, and it’s a great way of showcasing just how dangerous and merciless both armies can be in such an intense conflict through the actual gameplay.

The game also starts on a dark note, with an entire village being massacred and Leif’s friends being kidnapped, all within the first few hours. Thracia 776 does an amazing job at showcasing the horrifying extent armies and commanders will go to in wartime, and while there’s still a handful of plucky characters to help lift the mood when it’s most needed, it’s hard to ignore the dark areas and themes that this story explores.

5 Fire Emblem Fates: Conquest

Corrin Is Constantly Losing The Ones He Loves Throughout All Of Conquest

Fire Emblem: Conquest is one of three campaigns that the player can choose in the Fire Emblem Fates series of games, and it’s often seen as the more difficult and mature game out of the trio. At the beginning of Conquest, the main protagonist Corrin decides to defect from his family to join Nohr, a brutal kingdom that Corrin hopes they can reform from the inside. This inevitably sets up a pretty sad ending though, as Corrin would eventually have to face his real family in battle, but the game isn’t shy about showing just how unforgiving this sort of encounter can be.

At one point, Corrin’s brother Ryoma takes his own life on-screen to save Corrin from having to do it himself. It’s also revealed that Takumi, a young and skilled archer, had been dead for several days and that their body was simply being manipulated until Corrin managed to overcome them and free their soul. The game also forces the player to kill multiple major characters as part of the gameplay, such as Hinata, who is a plucky young retainer whom Corrin must defeat to progress the story.

6 Fire Emblem: Genealogy Of The Holy War

Sigurd Goes Through One Of The Most Distressing Experiences Of Any Video Game Character

Every good Fire Emblem game needs a frightening villain to keep the stakes high in the plot, but Genealogy of the Holy War takes this to a whole new level with its multitude of antagonists. Manfroy is a particularly evil standout, single-handedly instigating a war, assassinating key characters, and wiping the memory of Sigurd’s wife to rearrange her with another villain in the game, Arvis.

The game also features one of the most horrific events in the entire series, the Battle of Belhalla. After being lured out into an open battlefield, Sigurd is betrayed by his closest allies, being incinerated by the Valflame while his entire army is bombarded by Meteor spells as he helplessly watches. Genealogy of the Holy War maintains an incredibly dark and bleak tone from start to finish, and it’s a big reason why the game stands out so much compared to its peers.

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