Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light

1990 video game

Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light (ファイアーエムブレム 暗黒竜と光の剣, Faiā Emuburemu: Ankoku Ryū to Hikari no Tsurugi) is a tactical role playing video game developed by Nintendo and Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo for the Famicom. It is the first installment in the Fire Emblem series and was originally released in Japan in 1990. Set on the fictional continent of Archanea, the story follows the tale of Marth, prince of the kingdom of Altea, who is sent on a quest to reclaim his throne after being forced into exile by the evil sorcerer Gharnef and his dark master Medeus, the titular Shadow Dragon. Forming new alliances with neighboring kingdoms, Marth must gather a new army to help him retrieve the sacred sword Falchion and the Fire Emblem shield in order to defeat Gharnef and Medeus and save his kingdom. The gameplay revolves around turn based battles on grid based maps, with defeated units being subject to permanent death. Beginning development in 1987, it was conceived by designer and writer Shouzou Kaga: he wanted to combine the strategic elements of Intelligent Systems's previous simulation project, Famicom Wars, with the story, characters, and world of a traditional role playing video game influenced by Kure Software's First Queen (1988). Keisuke Terasaki acted as director and Gunpei Yokoi produced, while the music was composed by Yuka Tsujiyoko. The scale of the game meant that the team needed to find ways around memory storage problems, and make compromises with the graphics and storyline. While initial sales and critical reception were lackluster, it later became popular, launching the Fire Emblem series. The game would later be credited with codifying and popularizing the tactical role playing genre as a whole. The game was officially localized and released outside of Japan for the first time on the Nintendo Switch on December 4, 2020 in commemoration of the franchise's 30th anniversary. This updated version features new quality of life improvements such as fast forwarding and rewinding through player and enemy turns, and the ability to create save states in the middle of gameplay. It was available digitally for a limited time until the end of March 2021.

Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light is a tactical role playing game where players take on the role of Marth and his growing army during their campaign across the continent of Archanea. The game progresses in a linear fashion, with maps being unlocked and played as dictated by the storyline. Each playable character is assigned to unique character classes that have various functions in battle, such as being mounted or having access to magic. A unit's class affects their range of movement and strength on the battlefield: mounted or flying units have greater mobility, archers have a greater attack range, while heavily armored characters have more defense. Each character has a set character class, and each time a unit raises its experience level its various stats increase randomly. There are a total of 52 characters that can be recruited over the course of the game. Currency is limited to certain scripted or player driven events, or wagering on arena battles. If a character falls in battle, they are subjected to permanent death, removing them from subsequent missions and the rest of the storyline. The game ends if Marth falls in battle. It began after Intelligent Systems turned its attention away from developing hardware for the Famicom towards creating what they called "simulation games". The music was composed by Yuka Tsujiyoko, with technical guidance from Hirokazu Tanaka. Tsujiyoko, who would become a recurring composer for the series, became involved as she was the only composer then employed by Intelligent Systems. The initial development team was not very large, and several staff members undertook multiple tasks. The concept was first decided upon after the completion of Famicom Wars, as the team wanted to move away from the war based setting of Famicom Wars and create a role playing experience. The project was first proposed to Nintendo by Kaga with a design document. The document included all the basic elements, including the story, main character and gameplay mechanics. At this stage, the project was called "Battle Fantasy Fire Emblem". Kaga cites Kure Software's First Queen (1988) as an influence for the game. The staff never considered the game as a commercial product, being defined by Kaga as a dōjin project that was made on a whim. To make the game accessible to a wide audience, Kaga did his best to avoid emphasizing stats and other numerical data. During the early story draft, there were two dragons that acted as bosses: the Earth Dragon Gaia and the Water Dragon Neptune. While Neptune was scrapped due to hardware limitations, Gaia would evolve into the character of Medeus. The artifact's title made reference to war and the power of dragons, which would form a key part of future entries. The use of such an extensive story approach was a rarity in Famicom games at the time, which were still beset by memory storage problems. When it was discovered that the chip only had one megabyte of memory, the team were forced to streamline the graphics and visuals, resulting in the setpiece graphics being cut. In Japan, an emulated version of the game was released via Virtual Console. It was released for Wii on October 20, 2009; for Nintendo 3DS on August 1, 2012; and for Wii U on June 4, 2014. The game was made available for Nintendo Switch Online subscribers in Japan and Hong Kong as of March 13, 2019. To commemorate the franchise's 30th anniversary in 2020, the game was officially localized for the first time and released as a standalone title for the Nintendo Switch in North America, Europe, and Oceania. This version of the game featured various built in emulation features, such as save states, fast forwarding, and rewind features. A special edition Fire Emblem 30th Anniversary Edition bundle was available exclusively in North America, which includes a download code for the game as well as various physical items, including a replica NES Game Pak with its own packaging and instruction manual. This release was a limited time offer, being available from December 4, 2020 up until the end of March 2021.

According to Kaga, upon release Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light received extensive criticism from Japanese publications. Many of them noted that it was difficult to understand and had fairly poor graphics, awarding it low scores. Likewise, sales of the game were flat for the first two months of sales, but improved after word of mouth had spread. According to Metacritic, the Nintendo Switch version received "mixed or average reviews", based on a weighted average score of 62 out of 100 from 29 critics. The website also stated that the game "understandably failed to impress modern critics." In 2023, Time Extension included the game on their "Best JRPGs of All Time" list.

Despite the slow start, Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light proved enough of a success that a sequel was commissioned. This would become Fire Emblem Gaiden, which was released in 1992. Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light was partially remade as part of the third installment, Fire Emblem: Mystery of the Emblem, which also continued the story of Marth. A full remake for the Nintendo DS was released internationally under the title Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon, marking the first time the content of the first Fire Emblem was made available outside Japan. Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light not only launched the wider Fire Emblem series, but is also seen as the reason tactical role playing genre became popular in Japan. It has thus been credited with indirectly influencing the creation of other notable games within the genre, including Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together, Final Fantasy Tactics, and the Disgaea series. The basic mechanics within Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light would form the basis for the gameplay of nearly all subsequent Fire Emblem titles. Its combination of battle and story segments also provided inspiration for the gameplay of the Sakura Wars series.