Fire Emblem Awakening

Fire Emblem Awakening is a 2012 tactical role-playing game developed by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo 3DS. It is an installment of the Fire Emblem series, and the first to be developed for the Nintendo 3DS. The gameplay, like previous Fire Emblem games, focuses on the tactical movement of characters across a grid-based battlefield and fighting enemy units. Other features include the ability to build and foster relationships between characters to improve their abilities and multiple camera perspectives in battle.

The story is set 2000 years after the events of the original Fire Emblem and Fire Emblem Gaiden and focuses on Chrom, the prince of Ylisse, and his personal army, the "Shepherds". They rescue Robin, an Avatar whose name, gender, and appearance can be customized by the player, who has amnesia and takes on the role of their tactician. Over the course of the story, Chrom's army travels across Ylisse and defends it from undead invaders called the Risen and attacks from the hostile nation of Plegia.

Development of Fire Emblem Awakening began in 2010, with multiple veterans of the Fire Emblem series filling key development roles. Development was handled by Intelligent Systems with supervision from Nintendo. As the series had seen declining sales with previous installments, Awakening was designed as the possible last entry in the series, incorporating elements from all previous Fire Emblem games. Due to the 3DS still being fine-tuned by developers, the team's decisions for content and graphics were made based on what they thought was feasible for what they had available to them. However, some gameplay options and proposals were met with mixed reception, such as the option to disable permanent character death, colloquially known as permadeath, a staple of the franchise.

Upon release, Fire Emblem Awakening received critical acclaim and strong sales worldwide, with many critics praising new additions to the traditional gameplay and accessibility to newcomers. After release, the game was nominated for multiple awards from video game publications, often being cited as one of the best games on the 3DS platform and one of the greatest games of all time. It is also credited with boosting sales for the 3DS, with its commercial success ensuring the continuation of the series. A successor to Awakening, Fire Emblem Fates, was released in Japan in 2015 and worldwide in 2016.