Fire Emblem: Crossed Blades



Fire Emblem: Crossed Blades is a fighting game developed by Stardust Citadel and published by Nintendo, set to be released for the Nintendo Switch. The game is a spin-off of the Fire Emblem series, featuring characters from through out the series, the third inner series crossover, preceded by Fire Emblem Heroes and Fire Emblem Warriors. The game is a non canonical installment of the series.

The game is a team fighting game, with each player picking a team of three characters to play as, selecting the order of who fights first. Similar to King of Fighters, the first member of each group fight one another and are able to call out the other members to assist, either offensively or to provide support, but they cannot tag out the current fighter. Once a fighter is knocked out, the next on the team is thrown into the arena and the battle resumes.

Story
In a void, the Time Dragon, Nortia, awakens from her imprisioning slumber. Enraged with the decisions to leave her asleep in an empty dimension, Nortia breaks her nails, which controls the flow of time. This action causes the multiple Fire Emblem timelines to shatter and open portals through out different eras. Nortia doesn't acts alone, choosing to separate parts of her essence to take over the bodies of major members of the different stories, choosing to eradicate the worlds she has a presence in as a payback to those who imprisoned her. The different legends of those realms take their differences to deal with each version of Nortia that exists, eventually reforming her real form.

Upon defeat of the first one, one of the shards of Nortia's nails are recovered, with the dragon Naga telling the heroes they will be capable of fighting Nortia head on if they acquire all of the shards, they will be able to forge the Dragonail Sword, capable of reaching the realm Nortia seldom inhabits and put her back to her slumber.

Gameplay
Crossed Blades is a three button fighter, with each of the attack buttons corresponding to a different type of normal attack (low, medium, high). Inputting commands with different buttons will result in characters utilizing different special moves, the combinations are specific to each fighter in the roster. Two additional buttons are utilized for assists, one to call for the primary assist (whoever is second on the team) and the other for the secondary (whoever is third on the team). Each fighter possesses three weapons, which have durabilities to them, using them for attacks or defense will wear them down and they will eventually break, forcing the player to utilize another weapon while the broken one regenerates. The stronger the weapon, the longer it takes to regenerate. Players can pick the order of the weapons after picking a character in the select screen.

Ciphers
Ciphers are rewards for completing modes such as Tales of Heroes Gone or the other side game modes. They are collectiable cards of characters through out the Fire Emblem series with a short description telling their stories. The name comes from Fire Emblem Cipher, a long running card game based off the series.

Trivia

 * The game was made to be a better Fire Emblem crossover than Warriors, which the article creator considers lackluster in its roster, neglecting many characters through out the series in exchange for a roster that is overtly focused on main characters.