Fire Emblem

Fire Emblem (ファイアーエムブレム, Faiā Emuburemu?) is a fantasy tactical role-playing video game franchise developed by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo. The Fire Emblem series is well known for its innovation and for being one of the first Eastern style tactical role-playing games, with a strong emphasis on Western forms of medieval folklore. The series is also renowned for having deeply developed characters, as well as the fact that most units' death—or defeat in battle—is permanent in the game until the end of the playthrough. The series currently spans twelve games, with a thirteenth game on the way, and has been released on the Family Computer, Super Famicom, Game Boy Advance, GameCube, Nintendo DS and Wii. In July 2010, Nintendo released Fire Emblem: Shin Monshō no Nazo: Hikari to Kage no Eiyū for the Nintendo DS, a remake of the third game, Fire Emblem: Monshō no Nazo, to commemorate the series's 20th anniversary.

Most games in the series have been released exclusively in Japan. Fire Emblem, the seventh title in the series, became the first game of the franchise to be released internationally in 2003, largely due to the popularity of Fire Emblem characters Marth and Roy's appearances in Super Smash Bros. Melee. Released outside Japan as Fire Emblem, the game was designed specifically with newcomers to the series in mind, and the first ten chapters were structured in a manner that eased newcomers into the gameplay. All Fire Emblem games produced since have also been released internationally, except for Fire Emblem: Shin Monshō no Nazo: Hikari to Kage no Eiyū.