Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance

THE GOOD:
Very nice cutscenes
Awesome battle scenes
Many characters to choose from
Cool classes and characters
Fantastic maps
Good replayability

THE BAD:
Somewhat difficult
Voice acting could be better

SUMMARY:
Fire Emblem is a series that has been stuck to 2D battles and graphics since the release of the first installment entitled "Fire Emblem: The Dark Dragon and Sword of Light". That is, of course, until Nintendo released this game, "Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance", for the Gamecube.

It plays similar to the other games of the series, in that you have a team of fighters that you command to victory. In PoR, however, there are some differences.

For one, the magic triangle was redone a bit. There is no more anima beats light, light beats dark, and dark beats anima. Dark magic was taken out, light magic was kept in but is not part of the triangle, and anima is basically divided into 3 spells: fire, wind, and thunder. Fire beats wind while losing to thunder, wind beats thunder while losing to fire, and thunder beats fire while losing to wind. And as previously stated, light magic is not part of the triangle and therefore doesn't lose to or beat anything.

There are also some class differences:

The soldiers in Fire Emblem 6-8 are now playable. Promoting them is also an option.

Half-human laguz are powerful beings that have the ability to transform into different types of beasts and birds. They cannot promote, however.

Mages are the only magic-wielding units besides healers. They can use all 3 types of spells, as opposed to the mages, monks, and shamans that could only wield anima, light, and dark in Fire Emblem 6-8.

Carrying over from Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones, this game had a bunch of cool skills to choose from to distribute to your different units. You could combine different skills to create a great unit, or use some of the best skills in your stash for an awesome ability for one of your units.

The different amounts of characters that you can have on your team can be fun. If you happen to lose a unit in battle, then no problem, you've got a bunch of stand-ins to choose from.

The graphics are pretty good as well. For being the first 3D game in the series, they did a great job of utilizing it. I also thought the cutscenes to have some fine detail, but the voice acting is a bit weak. I often found myself cranking up the volume on the TV, because for some reason I could not hear what they were saying very well. Some cutscenes were better than others, though.

The only real downside to this game in my opinion besides the voice acting is that it's pretty challenging. Maybe I'm just unlucky, but I thought some chapters were surprisingly difficult. It was increasingly hard to complete chapters without losing any units, but that's where the strategy of this game comes in.

All in all, this is an outstanding strategy game. The graphics are good, the storyline is excellent, and the battles are very well-done. It is a little difficult, yes, but with practice it could probably be overlooked.