The currently-untitled Fire Emblem 3DS received a new trailer in last Wednesday’s Nintendo Direct. But if you’re truly a hardcore Fire Emblem fanatic, that may not have been enough to tide you over. If that’s the case, check out this new batch of screenshots for the upcoming game, courtesy of Siliconera!

It’s clear that this game takes after its predecessor, Fire Emblem: Awakening. But did you notice anything different? Take a close look, and compare your observations with ours, below:

• The main character, Kamui, is of a class called “Dark Prince.” This class was only seen once before in the Fire Emblem series, as the exclusive class of antagonist Julius from Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War. (Thanks to reader Ocsttiac for correcting us on this!) Despite the identical name, the Dark Prince class works differently in this game. Here, the class can wield two weapon types: Swords, and transformation stones! Indeed, you can see a Dragonstone in Kamui’s inventory. It appears that the main character is a Manakete, and can transform into a dragon during combat.
• It looks like enemies can Pair Up this time – in Awakening, this was a tactical option available only to the player. This will likely have some major implications for how you approach combat; having to effectively kill an enemy twice means you’ll have to direct more resources toward taking them out before they reach your healers and archers.
• The Thief class can only wield bows this time around; previously, they used only swords. This change allows the notoriously squishy class to attack from a safe distance. However, this means they’ll be even more defenseless in a close-quarters fight.
• Weapon durability is handled differently, at least in terms of the user interface. Notice that weapons are lacking the telltale durability number next to their names, which indicated how many more times a weapon could be used before it snapped in two. Instead, there appears to be a durability gauge behind the weapon icons; it starts fully green, then becomes gradually more red as the weapon becomes more fragile. Is this change made simply to make the durability system more ambiguous, forcing the player to rely on judgment calls? Or is this just an abstraction made for the game’s “simple interface” mode?

This new Fire Emblem entry has neither an English name nor an American release date yet – but we’ll be sure to let you know when either of the two are announced!

My Opinion:

If you can’t tell already, I am incredibly pumped for this game. I am equal parts embarrassed and proud at the 300 hours I put into Awakening, and I expect to do the same for this new title. And with two distinct story paths to choose from, this game is shaping up to be the most expansive Fire Emblem experience yet – which means these tweaks to the formula will be more impactful than ever. Every little detail I find out about the game just makes me hungry for more, and I’m beginning to get the feeling I won’t be able to resist just playing it in Japanese this summer…

Aaron Dobbe is an Associate Writer at MONG specializing in Nintendo but playing a bit of everything else too. Follow him on Facebook and pester him to get a Twitter.