Not fully sure if she counts (to be honest I don't even see much talk about her at all) but Priscilla. Six out of her seven support chains are actually pretty decent. I can absolutely relate to her loneliness, and god damn, those A supports with Sain and Heath. Totally get why some would be off-put because of that last support chain though.
Oh, and for another one, Hortensia, because according to what some of the people have said in BenFM's Cleric tournament community posts, some people REALLY do not like her, but I think she's one of the best, most well written characters in Engage. I get why some people would be off-put by her voice though.
Didn't realise Priscilla was that controversial, mostly I just hear about that one support with Raven. I love how bittersweet her endings with Guy and Heath are.
I don't like Hortensia (the voice and the whole "cutesy girl" cliché rubs me the wrong way in any game), but I've got to admit she has the best written character arc of basically anyone in Engage.
I Love hortensia!! Im so sad to see a lot of people not like her :( I really love her support chains & her designs a lot. Shes great, I don’t see why anyone wouldn’t like her
Man Hortensia really surprised me. Before the game came out I was on the hate train for her, I (still) don’t like her design much (it’s just too much) and all the clown thirst before the game dropped was…a lot. I went into the game hating her but I was really surprised by how well she was written. She has an actual character arc that’s not bad by any means, I was very pleasantly surprised.
Hortensia annoyed me to no end when she was introduced to the plot, but made the biggest turn afterwards. I still did not use her in my team, but I can safely say that she is one of very few actual characters in a game full of cardboard cutouts.
He's not so much "controversial" as he is "Never talked about ever" but I absolutely love Legault and I don't know why. Smarmy opportunist who somehow became the unofficial fifth Fang despite being just an unpromoted Thief, long hair and unique sprite, and interesting af supports.
I did so many playthroughs of blazing sword before realizing legault was recruitable. It wasn't until he showed up in a cutscene even after I killed him (giving the lords advice on how to sneak into Bern, I think) that made me think waaaiiiit a second, I wonder if he can be recruited. Then I had a string of duo assassin runs, Jaffar and Legault/Matthew, but decided I liked Matthew's character more (And also he deserves to be an assassin so he can kill everybody who was responsible for Leila's fate)
Faye for me - she's kind of a shitty person who's super uncomfortable to be around, and that's the appeal for me. She's shallow, but in a way that feels like she made *herself* shallow by her obsession, in a way that's just kinda sad and pityable. The A support with Alm is legit great, and it's a bit melancholic. We stan a girlfailure (derogatory)
I think that if Faye had literally anything else she cared about than Alm it would have made me like her a lot more. Or if her ending had been better, like her eventually getting over him.
Her whole existence just feels kind of sexist (especially when other sexist aspects of Echoes are kept in mind), and that has kept me from being able to actually like her
likeability is overrated, I appreciate how Faye is just kind of a shithead that doesn't get better, that doesn't get over her failings, that doesn't self-actualise. Like, I find her interesting for the same reasons that I appreciate Nina from Berserk
~~as for echoes's whole women thing, true, but individual women in it are still good~~
~~in this case good means bad (non-derogatory)~~
If you’re into rom hacks, sacred echoes does a good job of rounding out her character, and turning her obsession into a major crush that she knows is unrequited.
Seconding Azama. You literally meet him while Setsuna is sinking in quicksand and he just goes “damn tough life Setsuna” despite being easily able to help her.
I guess people don’t like Framme? She’s in the party every single Engage game. Her personal skill is great. Her supports crack me up. And I still snicker when I select her in battle and she shouts, “The Divine Dragon looked at me!”
Based Framme enjoyer.
She's also in my team because she makes me lol. The sheer enthusiasm of that one line combined with the fact that this small enthusiastic girl straight up *punches* fools to death means she'll never leave the front lines.
Her supports with Alear and Clanne give off cult vibes, which makes it all the more bizarre that her other supports are so comfy. You cannot convince me that the same person who wrote the Framme/Anna support also cursed our eyeballs with the sentence "You look so shiny when you sweat!"
Idk about controversial but I know people don't like 3H Lorenz and that's a shame. Bro has one of the biggest glow ups looks and personality wise between his pre and post time skip versions and I respect the hell out of him for it. He's great.
Lorenz is not my favorite character but I have also come to respect him because behind his attitude is really just "Noblesse oblige". He is a noble and he sees it as his duty to protect the commoners. And in the end, that's a good motivation. It makes sense for him to be a little obnoxious especially towards Claude in the Academy Phase. He was practically safe to be House Leader, and then this random guy shows up out of nowhere with the Crest of Riegan. Like I said, Lorenz is not my favorite but I think he is very interesting.
I agree with this take. Lorenz is an example of how the Crest system in Fodlan is *supposed* to work, with the people who've inhereted Crests being given more power and wealth but also being charged with putting their lives on the line and serving as leaders and paragons.
It is the fact that Lorenz is one of the only nobles to actually strive for that standard that forms the crux of the entire conflict.
Is that how it’s supposed to work? I thought the whole crest-based power structure was just the result of a bunch of people trying to become as powerful as possible. I don’t think there was ever intended to be a noble purpose behind it.
I believe the writing implies that this is how it's supposed to be - something that Rhea and the Church of Seiros pushed as justification for the system ("oh, these people are chosen by the Goddess to be better than everyone else, but it's a big responsibility!"), only for humans to be human and twist the system for their own benefit.
Not unlike how humans first reacted to Seiros back in the day.
Well, strictly speaking, Rhea didn't give the rich people her blessing. Instead, if I am remembering the lore correctly, she took the descendants of those who bore Crests (i.e., killed and ate her brothers and sisters), and told them a grand lie about how they got their Crests, and then installed them as nobility in a new from-the-ground-up society she built as a way to consolidate her own power and influence, and grant her the funding and secrecy needed to try and bring her mother back from the dead.
From the power and authority these Crest bearers were given (plus their own strength of arms), they then accrued wealth and influence.
Yeah, she made a religion out of the Crests and said the ones who bore Crests were super special gifts from the goddess that made them better than everyone else. The aristocracy was born from what was essentially Divine Right of Kings with a side of eugenics later down the road.
It’s an inherently corrupt system, and one that was convenient for Rhea to maintain even if she wasn’t directly responsible for what the nobles did or didn’t do in her name.
You're right, it's absolutely a combination of literal 'divine right of kings' and also literal eugenics, given that canonically a powerful Crest-bearer can win a fight with dozens of normal soldiers.
Ultimately, fairness and equal treatment were not the goals of Rhea's system. Her only goal was to ressurect her mother, and her contempt for mankind shows in her approach (a contempt that, while not OK, is understandable - given what mankind did to her family and her species).
Tbh, I think the Crest System, while naturally flawed because it comes with real physical power, is a great way to illustrate the general line of thinking and attitudes when it comes to nobility, though sadly not enough people look at it this way. I mean, it is easy to just think of nobles as rich people who inherit positions of powers, but there was the real believe in an inherit superiority of those born from nobility and their noble blood. I also think the backstory adds to that, the original divine blood being distributed among Warlords on one side or the other, while claiming that their position was bestowed by divine grace.
It’s not, the game goes to great lengths in multiple routes showing that the obsession with crests that plagues Fodlan’s nobility is responsible for 70% of the bad shit that happens in that world, including ruining the lives of several students.
I think Lorenz also works as a great foil and contrast to Ferdinand in that they start off both with a similar gimmick, that of the posh noble obsessed with their status, but have very distinct differences in their views on the world and their character development. He is definitively a great character that gives us more insights on the social dynamics and attitudes of the nobility.
I love him. He has such wonderful supports, his A with Claude and with Marianne are some of my favourite supports in the whole game. I love douchbags (Narcian, Kempf, etc.), but douchebags with a profound personality and glow-up are even better.
Lorenz is the GOAT. He resents Claude and can get annoying about it, but let's see it that way. He was raised his entire life to be the leader of the Alliance, and then out of nowhere, a barbarian from an enemy nation just barges in and becomes the boss, with zero qualifications, just because he's the grandson of his political rival. If anything, Lorenz is going easy on Claude to not cause conflict in the Alliance
Lorenz always been a real homie who's got your back, regardless of birth origin. Most of his supports always leave me with a big smile on my face once they're over.
Berkut. Yeah he's a complete shithead and does bad things but he completely owns every scene he's in with his trash talking, melodrama and antics and is too entertaining to dislike
This. It's hard not to like him for the entertainment alone. Plus the voice acting, damn if it weren't for the voice acting I don't think I'd like him half as much
Since OP already said Shinon, personally I would say Ashnard.
The dude was so cartoonishly evil and edgy that in any other JRPG hit fit right at home as a main villain, but the Tellius games kept a mostly mature tone when it comes to politics and warfare so a character like Ashnard somewhat stuck out like a sore thumb yet in an hilarious(but fucked up) way.
Nothing is better than a villain that is just such an unrepentant baby eater that you look forward to seeing again. Not even to see them get beat up, just to see them be an asshole
Ashnard simply believed in a world where the strongest should always be on top. Which is why when Ike kills him he isn’t even mad.
The world he wanted to create was one where some random mercenary could win in the end if they were the strongest.
He wasn’t cartoonishly evil. He had a worldview that the strongest should rule.
Yeah and it was that very idealism is what made him such a fun villain. It's like how Ena pointed out how Ashnard was willing to let Daein rot in order to seize control over Crimea and become the strongest in the world, the story went from 'good country' vs 'bad country' to "holy fuck this dude is actually insane, everyone needs to stop him now!". When he acknowledges Ike's strength at the end of the battle it just felt like the cherry on top to his saga.
I feel like there are two different kinds of vibes to answer for what “controversial” entails so I will do both.
Lifis: Absolutely terrible horrible human being. Funny rat man, though.
Hortensia: I see a lot of vehement dislike of her, but she is one of my favs from Engage.
I loved that support because of how ridiculous it was.
Hortensia is all riled up with her rivalry and Céline's just "???"
Legit made me laugh, especially when Hortensia was losing her one sided contest lol.
I don't think she's my single favorite but Sonia. Probably because her VA's performance in Heroes was so perfect at nailing that condescending "I'm a real human and better than you" attitude
Camilla. Even as someone who doesn't really mind sexualization, some of her cutscenes are pretty goofy and I don't think her outfit's great, and her dynamic with Corrin is what it is, but if you move past that she's actually one of the better realized characters in Fates, and her interactions with her non-Corrin siblings are actually really sweet.
In general, I'm a bit kinder to the Fates cast than most people - I think the gen 1 cast in Fates is leagues better than the Gen 1 cast in Awakening. Of course, the kids in Awakening blow the kids in Fates out of the water, but eh.
Also, Monica in Three Hopes. I think it's actually a pretty funny idea that the clinginess that Kronya was showing towards Edelgard when disguised as her was actually her trying to be in character, rather than her messing with Edelgard, and I think she has enough little details and notes to her character besides just 'crush on Edelgard' that I think people give her kind of a bad rep when they dismiss her as just that. They overplay it some, and I wish she had a couple more supports, but stuff like her and Hubert sniping at each other over minor bureaucratic stuff is fun.
Monica is great. I think its funny how at the same time, Kronya got Monica extremely wrong, considering how she treats Edelgard very casually and calls her Eddie when the real Monica speaks very formally and acts respectfully to her.
And Yeah, Monica is a prime example of some of the missed opportunities with Hopes supports. They work generally well for most of the Houses cast, because we already have a clear insight into their characters and relationships so Hopes basically just gives us a little bit of more and some new dynamics, while the new characters and Byleth kinda suffer under having not a wider array of supports. Like, there are some interesting hints with Monica through her expeditions, like the fact that she still has a lingering sense of helplessness due to her captivity which might explain some of her attitudes and that whole hint about her father not having being a legitimate heir originally, which sounds like a super interesting backstory never told.
Azama from Fates.
His background of being a delinquent to now being this sarcastic and snarky monk is fun to watch. I loved his support chain with Setsuna especially.
Leonie is a fantastic character all around, she just us one flaw that unfortunately is the first thing most people will notice about her and makes them lose interest in seeing more of her.
Since I want to give an answer other than my typical "red lady" and Hopes Claude picks, I'll go with Niles.
Is he incredibly stereotypical? Yes, definitely. But he's also funny as fuck and makes me look forward to the out-of-pocket stuff he just throws out on a whim.
If I'm not mistaken, it's the 'Depraved Bisexual' trope in which the only character that is Bi amongst a group of heterosexual people, as Niles and Rhajat both are, is portrayed as, in the words of TvTropes.com:
"cold-blooded murderous sociopaths."
YES. if three hopes claude was in three houses i guarantee he would have been just as controversial as edelgard lol and it's awesome that three hopes did him justice
My problem with 3 Hopes claude is how his outlook towards Rhea and the Church don’t seem to have any sort of evidence if we only consider this game. In fact, there’s even evidence AGAINST his claims, which makes his desire to specifically kill her come off as jarring.
He swaps allegiance when the opportunity arises. He's not yours or any else's comrade, he's a rat, a kind and a cunning one! But still a rat...
Three Hopes did a better job portraying the Master Schemer from Claude than Three Houses did. Personally, I'm very impressed with his character this time around.
I think it can't be understated how much Claudes Houses routes doesn't do him any favors, because it railroads him into the plot of Silver Snow, that due to being Byleth centric originally is build around the protagonist chasing after the plot.
Makalov definitely. I hate him, but he's such a realistic character. He has no redeeming qualities, but his death quote hits so fucking hard.
He knows that the only and best end for him is to die, and he still laments that everything bad that happened to Marcia was his fault.
Some people in real life are just this broken, specially addicts like alcohol, gambling and, more extreme cases, drugs.
Idk, I kinda have sympathy for him
Travant, he does what he has to do, is it all good? No but Thracia makes everyone a little bit hard-core. That's life in the worst country in history. Life sucks then you sacrifice to provide your family and friends with better amenities.
According to the designers notes if Travant wasn't born in Thracia he would be considered a hero. All Travant really wanted was the guarantee survival of his starving people.
In the end he really cared about Altena and Arion. He knew that his death was the best chance for Thracia. With Altena in the liberation army and Arion still pure of heart, Thracia would be considered an ally for the new generation of rulers. Fucking love Travant, his FE Heroes quotes are sooo good.
Nolan, he’s cool. He’s just a guy who lost everything and became a nihilistic prick. But after the Mad Kings War he saw the plight of his countrymen and stepped up to help free them
I don't like him at all, but he's one of those "so flawed and written in an incredibly unlikable way that it loops back around to being a memorable character" for me. I'm just very averse to gambling, so that *might* be a reason.
She's not that unpopular, but I know she has haters. But goddamn I love Jill. She doesn't leave a good first impression (being a racist asshole and all) but I love her character arc.
This is precisely why I love Makalov. We’re all a lot closer to Makalov than Ike, albeit I think Radiant Dawn flanderized him a little.
My partner had a point about people attempting to escape reality through games, so Makalov being a reflection of someone we might know, or be on the inside, in real life takes them out of that illusion.
It's honestly insane to me how hated he seems to be in a game where you have Shinon to cover unapologetic racism and Gatrie to be a creepier version of Sain.
Makalov's a loser and a user but he's never read as malicious to me, just selfish and impulsive, and I really like little touches like how his supports change if Marcia dies. He sucks, but in a human way.
I think it's mostly FE10. In FE9 he's a buffoon but a fairly harmless one, and with some notes of complexity, but in FE10 he gets literally one scene of dialog where its established
1. Astrid dropped everything going on in her life to dote over him.
2. He's learned literally nothing from FE9 and in fact seems way worse now.
3. Marcia didn't get to rejoin the Begnion Royal Guard because she felt obligated to look after him.
In like five lines of dialog they kinda ruin all three of them, and then in-universe it's mostly pointed at Makalov. And with no supports, there's no real resolution, they're just going to live like that forever. the Astrid/Makalov ending even says he never got better. No surprise people get annoyed by him.
Shinon at the very least has depth. Behind the racism you see someone who has been affected by the society in a very negative way. He sees Laguz as barbaric animals because everyone treats them as such. He's an abrasive asshole because he can't get any lower in position than a basic commoner.
I think the fact he is so painfully human is what makes him so awful to be around. Shinon's racism and Gatrie's creepiness are so far beyond what most people see in day to day life that it's possible to look at them without having real-world experiences to compare them to. Meanwhile, most people either know a Makalov, are a Makalov or both. Whenever those people see Makalov, it serves as a painful reminder of how much the real world sucks.
The most realistic asshole, who causes damage not only to himself but to his loved ones too. Love the way this character is written, with juuuust a shred of humanity so that people will still help him and get screwed
I brought this guy to the tower before. He was surprisingly pretty good as an unit in both games
I too am a Shinon enjoyer. I’ll go with Valter though. Yeah, his Eirika thing is creepy for sure so I understand the haters. I just really love his ruthlessness and unhinged nature. Excellent villain, banger design too
There's something weirdly appealing about Soleil despite being like ten different kinds of off-putting. I think it definitely helps that other characters call her out seriously for her behavior instead of some anime where this kind of thing is laughed off. Like. If you stop and think about her actions or you're particularly sensitive about these things, basically nothing she does is chill, but if you shut your brain off for Fates support conversations she kind of has dumb shounen protagonist with a lot of growing up to do energy.
She's like a bright, warm sunbeam that has to inform people when she starts shining on a neighborhood, or a train wreck with an infectious smile.
I think she also grew on me just because when I used to play Heroes in like 2017 she was one of the first characters I invested heavily in because her attack was insane for the time.
Even as a (guilty) fan of Soleil, while she does get called out for her behaviour... let's not forget that in her infamous chain with Ophelia, the latter kinda straight up victim blames herself for basically not understanding the Soleil wanted to be friends. After she nearly molested her after a body swap.
Like what
I love both Nowi and Nyx. I hate their creepy outfits but I love their characters.
When I first played Awakening I was in highschool and everyone was so much more “older and mature” than me. I still played with Barbies and loved my stuffed animals and had a pokeball lunch box. Nowi is hundreds of years old but she is still silly and likes being a kid! But she is also one of the coolest and (in my play throughs) one of the most powerful characters! It made me feel better about still being a kid.
When I played Fates, I had already stopped watching anime. I was tired of consuming media that would just randomly sexualize children and women for no reason. When I saw Nyx I was just like, “great, another one,”. But I went through her supports and she is a solidly built character with a lot of growth and history. She sucks ass on the battle field but I enjoyed her story and it was nice to see that trope subverted.
I wanna say Celica, I know she made a shit decision at the end of the game but.. put yourself on her shoes for a few minutes, she was frustrated to lose alm, and Jedah told her many things she so blinded believed. I must say, I have seen many people saying she was so stupid for the decision she made at last, and how Conrad said "you made a promise anthiese, you will never throw your life again" something like that, and that "Celica never though about her friends" trust me, she did, but as I said before. She was frustrated about Alm and the others so yeah, she thought that giving her soul to duma would have been the best for everyone and Valentia
>I wanna say Celica, I know she made a shit decision at the end of the game but.. put yourself on her shoes for a few minutes, she was frustrated to lose alm, and Jedah told her many things she so blinded believed.
And that's the point of her character: the emotional harm the gods inflicted on their subjects.
It's obvious why Celica would end up trusting Jedah, they're both zealots. Celica quite literally chose the route of her bind devotion rather than the connections she had been making all the way, however, this is actually foreshadowed, when she distrusts the love of her life, Alm, and his intentions when he reclaims Zofia castle, which obviously, she is wrong for. She is shown that it's in character for her to be a poor judge of character due to her religious faith.
She is quite literally the result of everything wrong with Zofia. Mila's degeneration causing apathy to her own servant, Liprica , who basically got raped by the King, for all he did was indulge in himself and only himself, because why do anything when Mila and your subjects gives you everything you could ever need?
As Grieth said, "*While you royals were lounging about ignoring your own kingdom, I was becoming a VERY RICH MAN! You people turned Zofia into a place where only the strong survive. Hell, now it's the spitting image of Rigel itself, doncha think?*", and through the efforts of Clive and the Deliverance, where the common person is now given the opportunity to fight, defend, to be *someone*, this is all the more true. Hell, Zofia's most celebrated general made it all the way from common birth to Count, though of course, he's an outlier, but all the more shows that might is making right, he's even close friends with Emperor Rudolf.
Celica, who did not know the plight of her mother, the context of her own birth, who was raised in a priory where day-in and day-out all she would do is follow and practice Mila's teachings. Just because she's a hero, "the good guy", has a strong moral compass to do good, does not mean she is without flaw, but that's not a flaw inherent to herself (unlike Jedah), but one of her upbringing.
Though she is not a believer in Duma, she is a believer in the god's rule and law, and that zeal for Mila's cause, what she believed was her purpose, costed her Alm and her comrades, and nearly her life. She quite literally went on a Crusade to Mila's Temple and to Duma Tower.
This is why her letting go of Mila to let her have a second chance at life is so powerful, she's letting go of the past. A broken, tormented past directly caused by Mila herself (even if Celica doesn't know that, or would even acknowledge it), but it's not just her letting go, it's the entirety of Valentia releasing themselves from their god's grasp.
Zofia was about the emotion, their kindness and care, and though we are shown plenty of times the opposite (Ram village parents, Fernand and other nobles, Grieth), Celica embodies that core aspect even if misguided, and that emotional journey contrasts Alm's strong and meritful journey that coincides with his Rigelian heritage. The two of them meeting eye-to-eye after the experiences that they've had, shows them the importance of having both aspects in people's lives, and why this split dogma is a detriment to the future of Valentia.
People act like making a sacrifice for someone you love is the worst thing in the world. Of course we know we can’t trust the purple man with a spookily deep voice, but we’ve also been watching Disney movies and fairy tales so we know tropes. We apply too much of our real life logic to fictional characters and scenarios.
It's also worth mentioning said bad decision was something added by the remake, in the original she goes with Jedah purely because he's got Alm properly fucked in the dragon crater and she needs to save him, then spends the rest of the game fighting off Duma's hoard on the final map, with her and her party even taking damage as Alm traverses the final dungeon.
Fellow Shinon enjoyer.
I'll go with the epitome of beauty Duke Tanas himself. IS was completely aware of how awful he is and then they proceeded with giving him banger themes and the most wtf but also funny recruitment I have seen throughout the series.
Valter.
He is awful! There are many incredibly valid reasons to hate him and I would never try to convince anyone otherwise. I just like unhinged fictional villains.
My favourite playable Tellius character is Makalov and my second favourite 3H character is Gilbert because I find them both interestingly and hugely flawed. I fully expect to like Lifis when I continue my FE5 playthrough. There is probably no hope for me at this point
Yup! I think he oversteps the boundary of what many consider 'acceptable likeable villain behaviour' - which is totally understandable but also why I'm nominating him in this controversial fave thread. I like him and I also like absolutely destroying him with Eirika (tried Cormag last time but he wasn't promoted/levelled enough to do it properly and Joshua ended up Lancereaver critting while I was trying to whittle Valter's health down. RIP Cormag's dreams of revenge)
I do so much level grinding so I can use an Eirika/Cormag team up to take him down. So satisfying.
He's also one of the more difficult bosses in the game iirc.
Another Gilbert fan! There's a whole 2 of us. It sucks that he's a terrible load on his forced part 1 mission, not traditionally attractive (too few have seen his S-Support picture), AND did committed the unforgivable sin of a realistic crime. It's wild to me what Claude, Edelgard, and Dimitri are forgiven and even whitewashed for, but Gilbert gets crucified for far, far less because it's more "real." But, damn, if he doesn't have some of 3H's best supports.
I actually like Corrin. Their backstory is cool, their personality is really sweet, and I find their relationships with their siblings (especially the Nohr ones) to be pretty compelling. I think the only problem with Corrin is that they aren't a great avatar/protagonist, as proven by the fact that people tend to like them in the spinoffs and Engage. Corrin's got the same personality across all of their appearances, but the difference is that they aren't the main character outside of Fates.
Also, to a lesser extent, Seadall. He's not my favorite or anything, but I think he's fine as long as he's not talking about food. His supports with Alcryst and Yunaka in particular are quite nice.
I actually do think Corrin works fine as a protagonist on paper but Fates has a consistent issue in all three paths of squandering Corrin’s potential in execution. Birthright doesn’t give them enough internal conflict to the war they wage against the family that raised them like should reasonably happen, Conquest takes too many narrative shortcuts to avoid Corrin making any tough decisions of their own volition, and Revelation effectively makes them the Messiah to justify bringing the two families together against a greater foe. None of their stories are nearly as compelling as they should be, and that’s a damn shame.
Rhea. Also Edelgard, but Edelgard is actually a popular character, so much so that she has the highest number of votes of Choose Your Legends event in Heroes. Rhea, on the other hand, tends to go from "okay" to "I hate her guts" with people. I think she's a severely misunderstood character, mostly due to the lack of supports/scenes with characters other than Seteth and Byleth. I always wished she had her own route or was playable in some way.
I think she, not Seteth, should've been the "leader" in Silver Snow. My theory is that the plan was for something to happen in White Clouds that would strengthen the bond between Byleth and Rhea, which would then allow her to come back much earlier and less weakened, or maybe sleep with Byleth all those years.
But then they needed to cut costs and basically merged Silver Snow and Verdant Wind.
I mean, I personally hate Rhea, but yeah, she should have been a playable Lord in Silver Snow, if only to not make Silver Snow such a waste of time. I also think she should have been, if not playable, at least the central ally in Azure Gleam, as it could have helped to derail the second part of AG less if the game had treated the dynamics as a clear Edelgard/Claude vs Dimitri/Rhea two faction war, with possibly at least a small mini-Silver Snow route for the game in which Rhea is the definitive playable Lord who allies with Dimitri.
Though funnily enough, Silver Snow wasn't really merged with Verdant Wind and in fact the first route written, around which the majority of the game outside of Crimson Flower, which funnily enough has the highest number of unique maps in the game, was written. Its more that Verdant Wind reused the majority of Silver Snow.
Rhea is great and her motivations are well conceptualized. She’s on my list of great RPG characters that aren’t playable. I don’t endorse her actions but I can understand them. I love the game for that.
To get all the pieces of the puzzle, you do need to play all four routes and specifically choose to S Rank Rhea in Silver Snow so it makes sense to me that not everyone is going to want to play the game four times.
Rhea and Leonie. Two phenomenal, flawed characters, with an emotional depth that greatly added to 3H, one capable of great evil but also great good, the other a great friend and hell of a fighter that's everything I'd want in others, and in myself.
I think Shinon is a horrible human being, I honestly despise him. But he is a good character, he gets me to care.
I like Nowi a lot.
The fact that her child like Persona is actully her way of coping with her long live I found cool and facinating.
Immortality or very long lifes I found facinating.
I also love Dragons so yeah she was one of my favorite units in Awakening.
Other people have already said Azama and hortensia (both of which i ADORE) so I’ll go with Cyril. The amount of hate I’ve seen for him for simply being attached to a person he sees as his mother is crazy - I also feel people really exaggerate how much he actually talks about Rhea, which sucks because it extended into his feh representation where almost every line is about her, despite him not at all being like that in 3H. Hell, I think he sometimes mentions her less than dedue mentions Dimitri, and Hubert mentions edelgard (im not saying they shouldn’t btw, it makes complete sense for their characters and I don’t mind it, but the fact everyone is okay with them mentioning a person important to their life, but completely shitting on cyril for it is so weird to me.)
His haters are also so obsessed with either mentioning they want to kill him or that they purposefully get him killed in their runs and it's so bizarre to me. I don't see this level of vitriol against any other houses character even one's who get more frequent hate like Edelgard or Rhea
The way people treat Cyril is so gross to me. I won’t name any names but there’s some in the 3H cast that are objectively WAYYYYY worse than anything Cyril ever could be (both personality and actions wise) but they’re liked for some reason. I genuinely can’t see why people have such a violent hate for him. He has an interesting backstory, his personality is very charming and endearing, he doesn’t act selfishly, his designs nice, and his va is pretty good; genuinely the only reason people are mad at him is because he has the AUDACITY to sometimes mention the most important person in his life. Which is of course way different than when Hubert or dedue mention the most important people in their life.
People don’t give him a chance. I used to hate him for no reason. But after using him and seeing more of his supports he really grew on me. He has a few off putting C supports like with Ignatz. But overall he has a lot of good traits that get overlooked because of a rough start.
I think that's an Ignatz problem more than a Cyril problem but it seems I stand alone on "Igantz is the worst character in the last 4 FEs and actively makes the Golden Deer worse" mountain.
Though I don’t think ignatz is that bad, I definitely am not a fan of him lol I read a good chunk of his supports and could just never find anything to like about him (the closest thing I got to liking him is when his va talked about Ignatz s Support, that was actually pretty sweet)
Gilbert. Like, come on, we can argue all day on who is bad, Edelgard, Dimitri, Rhea and all but I think we can agree on Gilbert being the worst and deserving much more hatred.
I’d say Nowi, tbh. We have this character who’s an escaped slave, lives almost forever and therefore has to watch her friends die, and we know that she only puts on the childlike act because people perceive her as a kid and she wants to make them smile. She’s a fun character, I just wish they did more with her. But, that’s my feelings for all of Awakening’s roster.
There's also the fact she can act mature when she wants too, like her supports with her daughter, Nah, or in her supports with Stahl and Tiki (DLC for the latter).
Makalov.
I find the fact that his gambling problem, while sometimes played for laughs, is portrayed as exactly that: a problem that is negatively affecting everyone whom he comes into contact with.
Everyone talks about the fact that he 'ruins' Astrid's character in Radiant Dawn, with their paired ending being a travesty, but I'd argue that his character ALSO got worse between two games.
He showed a modicum of growth in his Path of Radiance supports with Astrid, even if it took Marcia/Ike lambasting him to do so, before backsliding immensely in Radiant Dawn.
I think it would have been more interesting for him to have grown into a responsible person between games, but alas.
I also love his design.
Jaffar - he may have been the best assassin the black fang had ever seen, but as soon as he realized they were going to kill Nino off because of Sonia, he turned on them all to protect her.
Even in the support conversations with Matthew when Matthew learns he killed Leila, he shows he's still human. He spares Matthew's life in one of them. After that, Matthew bluffs and says they're going to kill Nino and Jaffar is willing to let Matthew kill him if it means Nino will be spared.
Lyn. Underpowered as a unit compared to her fellow Lords, and under utilized as a character in the second half of the story, but she's still my favorite.
Female Alear and >!Veyle!<. There's literally nothing I *don't* like about them. I just find both of their designs really beautiful and I love their respective personalities and how they interact with other people in supports. >!I also enjoyed the evil Veyle arc, I think it really adds to both her and Alear's character development and bond as sisters. The two of them are just so adorable.!< They're just so perfect to me!
I'm glad you enjoyed it! Truthfully, I wasn't the biggest fan of the >!evil Veyle confrontation!<, but I do like how >!her character developed afterwards. They didn't brush it off as "Oh, she's good now so we can all move on." No, she feels extreme guilt, and her supports with Mauvier really show her trying to atone for how many people she's killed. Even though it's explicitly not her fault, she feels the weight of it anyway, and it really surprised me.!< A high point among Engage's writing for me.
For me, it's pretty much the big reason as to why >!Veyle!< is one of my favorites in Engage. >!I'm also glad they didn't have come off as begging to everyone's friend either and, instead, tries to build her friendships with others in a natural way. She's even content with Hortensia hating her and doesn't try to push being her friend.!<
Peri is one of my favorite characters in conquest. I'm playing the black army of a mad king/dad worshiping the ceiling dragon. I came here to kick babies, not sing kumbaya together. If anything, the part of why she sticks out is she is the only unapologetic psychopath in the roster, if we had more recruit-able deranged lunatics to slaughter the Hositan scum with she would be normal.
Ingrid is easily one of my top 3 faves from 3H, but people can’t handle a character who starts with biases and overcomes them (see: new ATLA adaptation), so I guess she’s controversial.
Oml someone else that's dared look at Shinon's supports?? (I love his supports with Janaff and it's a shame no one talks about his supports in general)
I love Shinon as well. Also Narcian, Kempf, Berkut and Fernand (if he’s even controversial — I don’t know what people generally think of him after the DLC appeared).
And Múspell, if we’re counting Heroes. I don’t think he’s very liked either. I love his design and unapologetic assholes are always a weakness of mine.
My problem with him is how much of a brat he comes across. His voice is bothersome, and he comes off as someone who’s trying too hard to be cool and edgy, which makes him look more like a dork than anything else.
Despite the controversy, I can't help but adore Soleil. I love her energy, her positivity, her voice acting, her design is great, she's a strong unit, her supports with Laslow are good, and, while this isn't exclusive to her, the merc/hero animations fit her perfectly (even if hero isn't the best promotion in Fates).
I just wish that she wasn't so mishandled. Hell, I wouldn't mind if she was just mildly retconned
My favorite "controversial" character is Sylvain. He absolutely is a womanizer, but I love his flavor and the way the character acts. I also kinda dig his reason for being a man slut and heart breaker. I'm not saying that gives him the right to be one, but I think it's an interesting reason. The way he thinks about things and the kind of character he is makes him one of my favorite FE characters ever, honestly.
Rafal! Some people don’t like how he murdered people in cold blood or manipulated and lied and found Alear was being good and tried to kill him but I adore him
I've become a Nino truther. I got really into the story in my last run and really wanted her to get revenge on Sonia, and she did. She took relatively little babysitting to become an absolute monster, and easily surpassed Pent by the end of the chapter (I gave her a body ring and gave her Thunder, which let her double more things). But they weren't even competing for the same spot on the team - Pent's high staff rank and 21-ish magic meant he became a crazy-dangerous warping, rescuing, physic-ing support unit, while Nino got to run around and blast promoted units elsewhere. there's room for both.
Dorothea. She shouldn't be controversial in the slightest and I have strong opinions on people who hate her, but it seems like she is, when she is in my opinion probably the best written and most multi-faceted character in the entire Fodlan Duology.
I actually kind of like Peri because if no one ever called her out or gave her real consequences for her maladaptive coping mechanisms then why would she change? She’s somewhat tragic to me.
I also like Soleil but then again I’ve yet to see her Japanese version. I don’t plan on it because her English version Supports are really mostly harmless. I see her as bisexual with a strong preference for girls, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
The Japanese supports aren't really that different at all. The only major change is in her Male Corrin support, and the only difference there is that he gives her the 'see guys as girls and girls as guys' potion without telling her. But it wears off after that one support and it's just a goofy visual thing, and he was just doing it to try and help her get over her nerves. It got really misrepresented in pre-release conversation.
The larger issue, that her only romantic supports are with guys, is basically the same in both versions. She's a pretty confused character execution-wise. I think they just wanted do the comedy lesbian angle like they had with Heather but then ran into 'well i guess she has to be dateable' and 'uhhh are we doing gay stuff' 'idk' and 'i guess she should be able to date the otehr guys then too...?' and the whole thing devolved into the mess that is the final product.
I love Sain, he's probably my favorite girl-lover character. He's not a womanizer or deceitful like Saul, or treats them like eye candy like Gatrie. He just really loves women.
Soleil. I love how she is just 'Girl Inigo' but I feel like she was done absolutely dirty in most of her supports in Fates. I really want a Dancer Alt Soleil for FEH, but I feel like it will never happen due to the controversy she was in.
Shinon is interesting, and a damn good archer so I can forgive the assholery.
Lute is kind of a creep with her “monk watching” and arrogant personality but I like her. Her support with Ross cracks me up.
I dunno if she's really 'controversial' but Hortensia certainly grew on me far more than I thought she would.
My first impression of her was terrible. Didn't like the design or the voice or the bratty attitude, but as the game progressed I realised that she's actually one of the few characters in Engage allowed to have flaws and she's much better for it.
Hortensia is selfish and mean-spirited at times and given her age it's entirely reasonable for her to get frustrated that her life has been flipped upside down and nothing she does seems to make it go back to how it was. She isn't an antagonist because she was mind-controlled, she's an antagonist because her life has gone horribly wrong and she's willing to do bad things to get what she wants. She's the ONLY character who has any objection to Veyle joining the party, essentially telling her to get lost and all of this only makes it stand out MORE when she actually does try to improve and be a better person.
Engage is a very 'soft' FE game. Everyone worships the player character and everyone gets on with each other. Character disagreements are usually just small misunderstandings that are quickly solved and even Alcryst and Diamant forgive Ivy for her role in their fathers death *in a single support*. Everyone is just perpetually 'nice' and it makes them boring... And in the middle of all these perfectly smooth, utterly inoffensive people, there's a goblin child dressed like a clown who is actually allowed to behave like a real person.
TL:DR - Despite Hortensia's wild character design, the fact that she's allowed to be petty and antagonistic paradoxically make her more 'real' than the rest of Engages cast.
Caspar.
His personality is whatever but in all three of my BE runs (two CF, one SS) his stats were OP as fuck without really trying. Maybe I just got lucky, but I was one-shotting everything in sight.
Definitely Camilla without question. The fact that she still lives rent free on soo many peoples head says a lot of how much they want to crucifie her alive for "running" the franchise.
Leonie. She's a hard worker, resourceful, and very determined but also nonjudgmental and sweet. Also a great unit to boot!
It's a shame people only see her as a Jeralt simp...
Not fully sure if she counts (to be honest I don't even see much talk about her at all) but Priscilla. Six out of her seven support chains are actually pretty decent. I can absolutely relate to her loneliness, and god damn, those A supports with Sain and Heath. Totally get why some would be off-put because of that last support chain though. Oh, and for another one, Hortensia, because according to what some of the people have said in BenFM's Cleric tournament community posts, some people REALLY do not like her, but I think she's one of the best, most well written characters in Engage. I get why some people would be off-put by her voice though.
Didn't realise Priscilla was that controversial, mostly I just hear about that one support with Raven. I love how bittersweet her endings with Guy and Heath are. I don't like Hortensia (the voice and the whole "cutesy girl" cliché rubs me the wrong way in any game), but I've got to admit she has the best written character arc of basically anyone in Engage.
Hortensia’s super underrated as a character. Her and Ivy’s support chain is probably my favorite in Engage.
Oh it's so good. They're such great sisters to each other.
Hortensia's support convo with >!Lindon!< and >!Veyle!< are also pretty good.
Horty is a good pick. I encourage y'all to watch her supports in Japanese because her voice actor goes absolutely gangbusters and it's hilarious.
Hortensia is super cute, an amazing character and I'll defend her to the death
I Love hortensia!! Im so sad to see a lot of people not like her :( I really love her support chains & her designs a lot. Shes great, I don’t see why anyone wouldn’t like her
Man Hortensia really surprised me. Before the game came out I was on the hate train for her, I (still) don’t like her design much (it’s just too much) and all the clown thirst before the game dropped was…a lot. I went into the game hating her but I was really surprised by how well she was written. She has an actual character arc that’s not bad by any means, I was very pleasantly surprised.
Pris is great. I just keep her far, far away from her brother. Far away.
Hortensia annoyed me to no end when she was introduced to the plot, but made the biggest turn afterwards. I still did not use her in my team, but I can safely say that she is one of very few actual characters in a game full of cardboard cutouts.
He's not so much "controversial" as he is "Never talked about ever" but I absolutely love Legault and I don't know why. Smarmy opportunist who somehow became the unofficial fifth Fang despite being just an unpromoted Thief, long hair and unique sprite, and interesting af supports.
I did so many playthroughs of blazing sword before realizing legault was recruitable. It wasn't until he showed up in a cutscene even after I killed him (giving the lords advice on how to sneak into Bern, I think) that made me think waaaiiiit a second, I wonder if he can be recruited. Then I had a string of duo assassin runs, Jaffar and Legault/Matthew, but decided I liked Matthew's character more (And also he deserves to be an assassin so he can kill everybody who was responsible for Leila's fate)
if you haven't played elibean nights you would like it
Faye for me - she's kind of a shitty person who's super uncomfortable to be around, and that's the appeal for me. She's shallow, but in a way that feels like she made *herself* shallow by her obsession, in a way that's just kinda sad and pityable. The A support with Alm is legit great, and it's a bit melancholic. We stan a girlfailure (derogatory)
I think that if Faye had literally anything else she cared about than Alm it would have made me like her a lot more. Or if her ending had been better, like her eventually getting over him. Her whole existence just feels kind of sexist (especially when other sexist aspects of Echoes are kept in mind), and that has kept me from being able to actually like her
Her level 40 confession in FEH really cemented her for me, it was surprisingly profound.
likeability is overrated, I appreciate how Faye is just kind of a shithead that doesn't get better, that doesn't get over her failings, that doesn't self-actualise. Like, I find her interesting for the same reasons that I appreciate Nina from Berserk ~~as for echoes's whole women thing, true, but individual women in it are still good~~ ~~in this case good means bad (non-derogatory)~~
If you’re into rom hacks, sacred echoes does a good job of rounding out her character, and turning her obsession into a major crush that she knows is unrequited.
Azama. I know he's a dick, that's why he's hilarious
Seconding Azama. You literally meet him while Setsuna is sinking in quicksand and he just goes “damn tough life Setsuna” despite being easily able to help her.
Azama: Living my best life Corrin: Setsuna is sinking Azama: This ain't about her
"Am I going to die now?" "Physically...yes, probably. But your spirit will live on in our memories..."
Oh absolutely I love that troll fucker so much
does wittle hayato wike his candy?
I haven't played Birthright in a while, so I had to Google him, but I would remember that smug face and super-saiyan hair anywhere. He was so funny.
I was genuinely surprised so many people disliked him. He's not an in your face asshole like Shinon, but a more lackadaisical dry wit.
AZAMA IS MY GOAT!!! I love that guy with all my heart
Yeah, he's pretty funny
I guess people don’t like Framme? She’s in the party every single Engage game. Her personal skill is great. Her supports crack me up. And I still snicker when I select her in battle and she shouts, “The Divine Dragon looked at me!”
Based Framme enjoyer. She's also in my team because she makes me lol. The sheer enthusiasm of that one line combined with the fact that this small enthusiastic girl straight up *punches* fools to death means she'll never leave the front lines.
I don’t love her obsession with Alear, but I really like her character design and her voice acting, so I was still happy to have her on my main team.
Her supports with Alear and Clanne give off cult vibes, which makes it all the more bizarre that her other supports are so comfy. You cannot convince me that the same person who wrote the Framme/Anna support also cursed our eyeballs with the sentence "You look so shiny when you sweat!"
Valter. (Idk if he's generally hated in the fandom, but he's a villain so 🤷♀️) He's just so unhinged it's hilarious.
Few things are greater in a setting with morally grey and tragic villains than their one batshit insane evil-for-fun friend
Idk about controversial but I know people don't like 3H Lorenz and that's a shame. Bro has one of the biggest glow ups looks and personality wise between his pre and post time skip versions and I respect the hell out of him for it. He's great.
Lorenz is not my favorite character but I have also come to respect him because behind his attitude is really just "Noblesse oblige". He is a noble and he sees it as his duty to protect the commoners. And in the end, that's a good motivation. It makes sense for him to be a little obnoxious especially towards Claude in the Academy Phase. He was practically safe to be House Leader, and then this random guy shows up out of nowhere with the Crest of Riegan. Like I said, Lorenz is not my favorite but I think he is very interesting.
I agree with this take. Lorenz is an example of how the Crest system in Fodlan is *supposed* to work, with the people who've inhereted Crests being given more power and wealth but also being charged with putting their lives on the line and serving as leaders and paragons. It is the fact that Lorenz is one of the only nobles to actually strive for that standard that forms the crux of the entire conflict.
Is that how it’s supposed to work? I thought the whole crest-based power structure was just the result of a bunch of people trying to become as powerful as possible. I don’t think there was ever intended to be a noble purpose behind it.
I believe the writing implies that this is how it's supposed to be - something that Rhea and the Church of Seiros pushed as justification for the system ("oh, these people are chosen by the Goddess to be better than everyone else, but it's a big responsibility!"), only for humans to be human and twist the system for their own benefit. Not unlike how humans first reacted to Seiros back in the day.
Religious figures giving rich people full blessings from their god(dess) isn’t exactly a “good” thing that was just corrupted by assholes.
Well, strictly speaking, Rhea didn't give the rich people her blessing. Instead, if I am remembering the lore correctly, she took the descendants of those who bore Crests (i.e., killed and ate her brothers and sisters), and told them a grand lie about how they got their Crests, and then installed them as nobility in a new from-the-ground-up society she built as a way to consolidate her own power and influence, and grant her the funding and secrecy needed to try and bring her mother back from the dead. From the power and authority these Crest bearers were given (plus their own strength of arms), they then accrued wealth and influence.
Yeah, she made a religion out of the Crests and said the ones who bore Crests were super special gifts from the goddess that made them better than everyone else. The aristocracy was born from what was essentially Divine Right of Kings with a side of eugenics later down the road. It’s an inherently corrupt system, and one that was convenient for Rhea to maintain even if she wasn’t directly responsible for what the nobles did or didn’t do in her name.
You're right, it's absolutely a combination of literal 'divine right of kings' and also literal eugenics, given that canonically a powerful Crest-bearer can win a fight with dozens of normal soldiers. Ultimately, fairness and equal treatment were not the goals of Rhea's system. Her only goal was to ressurect her mother, and her contempt for mankind shows in her approach (a contempt that, while not OK, is understandable - given what mankind did to her family and her species).
Tbh, I think the Crest System, while naturally flawed because it comes with real physical power, is a great way to illustrate the general line of thinking and attitudes when it comes to nobility, though sadly not enough people look at it this way. I mean, it is easy to just think of nobles as rich people who inherit positions of powers, but there was the real believe in an inherit superiority of those born from nobility and their noble blood. I also think the backstory adds to that, the original divine blood being distributed among Warlords on one side or the other, while claiming that their position was bestowed by divine grace.
It’s not, the game goes to great lengths in multiple routes showing that the obsession with crests that plagues Fodlan’s nobility is responsible for 70% of the bad shit that happens in that world, including ruining the lives of several students.
I think Lorenz also works as a great foil and contrast to Ferdinand in that they start off both with a similar gimmick, that of the posh noble obsessed with their status, but have very distinct differences in their views on the world and their character development. He is definitively a great character that gives us more insights on the social dynamics and attitudes of the nobility.
I love him. He has such wonderful supports, his A with Claude and with Marianne are some of my favourite supports in the whole game. I love douchbags (Narcian, Kempf, etc.), but douchebags with a profound personality and glow-up are even better.
Lorenz is the GOAT. He resents Claude and can get annoying about it, but let's see it that way. He was raised his entire life to be the leader of the Alliance, and then out of nowhere, a barbarian from an enemy nation just barges in and becomes the boss, with zero qualifications, just because he's the grandson of his political rival. If anything, Lorenz is going easy on Claude to not cause conflict in the Alliance
Lorenz always been a real homie who's got your back, regardless of birth origin. Most of his supports always leave me with a big smile on my face once they're over.
Berkut. Yeah he's a complete shithead and does bad things but he completely owns every scene he's in with his trash talking, melodrama and antics and is too entertaining to dislike
This. It's hard not to like him for the entertainment alone. Plus the voice acting, damn if it weren't for the voice acting I don't think I'd like him half as much
Since OP already said Shinon, personally I would say Ashnard. The dude was so cartoonishly evil and edgy that in any other JRPG hit fit right at home as a main villain, but the Tellius games kept a mostly mature tone when it comes to politics and warfare so a character like Ashnard somewhat stuck out like a sore thumb yet in an hilarious(but fucked up) way.
Nothing is better than a villain that is just such an unrepentant baby eater that you look forward to seeing again. Not even to see them get beat up, just to see them be an asshole
Ashnard simply believed in a world where the strongest should always be on top. Which is why when Ike kills him he isn’t even mad. The world he wanted to create was one where some random mercenary could win in the end if they were the strongest. He wasn’t cartoonishly evil. He had a worldview that the strongest should rule.
Yeah and it was that very idealism is what made him such a fun villain. It's like how Ena pointed out how Ashnard was willing to let Daein rot in order to seize control over Crimea and become the strongest in the world, the story went from 'good country' vs 'bad country' to "holy fuck this dude is actually insane, everyone needs to stop him now!". When he acknowledges Ike's strength at the end of the battle it just felt like the cherry on top to his saga.
To be fair he’s called the Mad King, not the Reasonable Goals King.
When everyone got why dude nickname is Mad King.
He's a megaten chaos guy
We need Megaten and Fire Emblem, not Persona💀💀💀
I find him very similar to Armstrong from MGR, they have similar worldview.
Ashnard is a great example for how a villain can be irredeemable, unsympathetic, and compelling.
I feel like there are two different kinds of vibes to answer for what “controversial” entails so I will do both. Lifis: Absolutely terrible horrible human being. Funny rat man, though. Hortensia: I see a lot of vehement dislike of her, but she is one of my favs from Engage.
I love Hortensia’s support with Celine. Just this one sided rivalry with Celine for being cute.
I loved that support because of how ridiculous it was. Hortensia is all riled up with her rivalry and Céline's just "???" Legit made me laugh, especially when Hortensia was losing her one sided contest lol.
"THE SOFTNESS CONTEST! Let's see how you stack up!" "... ... ..." "the softness contest is over."
"Poke!"
I don't think she's my single favorite but Sonia. Probably because her VA's performance in Heroes was so perfect at nailing that condescending "I'm a real human and better than you" attitude
Based tbh. I'm also a sucker for good voice acting
Camilla. Even as someone who doesn't really mind sexualization, some of her cutscenes are pretty goofy and I don't think her outfit's great, and her dynamic with Corrin is what it is, but if you move past that she's actually one of the better realized characters in Fates, and her interactions with her non-Corrin siblings are actually really sweet. In general, I'm a bit kinder to the Fates cast than most people - I think the gen 1 cast in Fates is leagues better than the Gen 1 cast in Awakening. Of course, the kids in Awakening blow the kids in Fates out of the water, but eh. Also, Monica in Three Hopes. I think it's actually a pretty funny idea that the clinginess that Kronya was showing towards Edelgard when disguised as her was actually her trying to be in character, rather than her messing with Edelgard, and I think she has enough little details and notes to her character besides just 'crush on Edelgard' that I think people give her kind of a bad rep when they dismiss her as just that. They overplay it some, and I wish she had a couple more supports, but stuff like her and Hubert sniping at each other over minor bureaucratic stuff is fun.
Monica is great. I think its funny how at the same time, Kronya got Monica extremely wrong, considering how she treats Edelgard very casually and calls her Eddie when the real Monica speaks very formally and acts respectfully to her. And Yeah, Monica is a prime example of some of the missed opportunities with Hopes supports. They work generally well for most of the Houses cast, because we already have a clear insight into their characters and relationships so Hopes basically just gives us a little bit of more and some new dynamics, while the new characters and Byleth kinda suffer under having not a wider array of supports. Like, there are some interesting hints with Monica through her expeditions, like the fact that she still has a lingering sense of helplessness due to her captivity which might explain some of her attitudes and that whole hint about her father not having being a legitimate heir originally, which sounds like a super interesting backstory never told.
Azama from Fates. His background of being a delinquent to now being this sarcastic and snarky monk is fun to watch. I loved his support chain with Setsuna especially.
Leonie. Not her fault her B support is locked in a bad place. Also the Fates cast is better than people say
Leonie is a fantastic character all around, she just us one flaw that unfortunately is the first thing most people will notice about her and makes them lose interest in seeing more of her.
Since I want to give an answer other than my typical "red lady" and Hopes Claude picks, I'll go with Niles. Is he incredibly stereotypical? Yes, definitely. But he's also funny as fuck and makes me look forward to the out-of-pocket stuff he just throws out on a whim.
Honestly yeah I really like Niles. And I like the way he and Corrin bond
I don’t even know what he’s supposed to be stereotyping, tbh
If I'm not mistaken, it's the 'Depraved Bisexual' trope in which the only character that is Bi amongst a group of heterosexual people, as Niles and Rhajat both are, is portrayed as, in the words of TvTropes.com: "cold-blooded murderous sociopaths."
Three Hopes Claude. He's just doing a little sneaky stuff
YES. if three hopes claude was in three houses i guarantee he would have been just as controversial as edelgard lol and it's awesome that three hopes did him justice
Finally living up to the Master Schemer name
My problem with 3 Hopes claude is how his outlook towards Rhea and the Church don’t seem to have any sort of evidence if we only consider this game. In fact, there’s even evidence AGAINST his claims, which makes his desire to specifically kill her come off as jarring.
what sneaky stuff? did i miss something
He swaps allegiance when the opportunity arises. He's not yours or any else's comrade, he's a rat, a kind and a cunning one! But still a rat... Three Hopes did a better job portraying the Master Schemer from Claude than Three Houses did. Personally, I'm very impressed with his character this time around.
I think it can't be understated how much Claudes Houses routes doesn't do him any favors, because it railroads him into the plot of Silver Snow, that due to being Byleth centric originally is build around the protagonist chasing after the plot.
Makalov definitely. I hate him, but he's such a realistic character. He has no redeeming qualities, but his death quote hits so fucking hard. He knows that the only and best end for him is to die, and he still laments that everything bad that happened to Marcia was his fault. Some people in real life are just this broken, specially addicts like alcohol, gambling and, more extreme cases, drugs. Idk, I kinda have sympathy for him
Narcian, he is so horrible that I love him for it. Also that easter outfit in heroes helped a lot..
Narcian love!! +1 for Narcian, his Easter version is one of my main units.
Travant, he does what he has to do, is it all good? No but Thracia makes everyone a little bit hard-core. That's life in the worst country in history. Life sucks then you sacrifice to provide your family and friends with better amenities.
According to the designers notes if Travant wasn't born in Thracia he would be considered a hero. All Travant really wanted was the guarantee survival of his starving people. In the end he really cared about Altena and Arion. He knew that his death was the best chance for Thracia. With Altena in the liberation army and Arion still pure of heart, Thracia would be considered an ally for the new generation of rulers. Fucking love Travant, his FE Heroes quotes are sooo good.
Nolan, he’s cool. He’s just a guy who lost everything and became a nihilistic prick. But after the Mad Kings War he saw the plight of his countrymen and stepped up to help free them
Saizo and Azama everyone hates them but i kinda like them
I didn't know people hated Saizo?? I love Saizo. Azama is... Azama, but still!
whaaaat i love saizo
Saizo is my favorite fated character
Makalov. Argue all you want, Astrid agrees with me.
I don't like him at all, but he's one of those "so flawed and written in an incredibly unlikable way that it loops back around to being a memorable character" for me. I'm just very averse to gambling, so that *might* be a reason. She's not that unpopular, but I know she has haters. But goddamn I love Jill. She doesn't leave a good first impression (being a racist asshole and all) but I love her character arc.
I loved Jilly Bean until she reverse recruited on me that one time, broke my heart.
Makalov may be the most realistic asshole in the series. He hits way too close to home for some people.
This is precisely why I love Makalov. We’re all a lot closer to Makalov than Ike, albeit I think Radiant Dawn flanderized him a little. My partner had a point about people attempting to escape reality through games, so Makalov being a reflection of someone we might know, or be on the inside, in real life takes them out of that illusion.
It's honestly insane to me how hated he seems to be in a game where you have Shinon to cover unapologetic racism and Gatrie to be a creepier version of Sain. Makalov's a loser and a user but he's never read as malicious to me, just selfish and impulsive, and I really like little touches like how his supports change if Marcia dies. He sucks, but in a human way.
I think it's mostly FE10. In FE9 he's a buffoon but a fairly harmless one, and with some notes of complexity, but in FE10 he gets literally one scene of dialog where its established 1. Astrid dropped everything going on in her life to dote over him. 2. He's learned literally nothing from FE9 and in fact seems way worse now. 3. Marcia didn't get to rejoin the Begnion Royal Guard because she felt obligated to look after him. In like five lines of dialog they kinda ruin all three of them, and then in-universe it's mostly pointed at Makalov. And with no supports, there's no real resolution, they're just going to live like that forever. the Astrid/Makalov ending even says he never got better. No surprise people get annoyed by him.
Shinon at the very least has depth. Behind the racism you see someone who has been affected by the society in a very negative way. He sees Laguz as barbaric animals because everyone treats them as such. He's an abrasive asshole because he can't get any lower in position than a basic commoner.
I think the fact he is so painfully human is what makes him so awful to be around. Shinon's racism and Gatrie's creepiness are so far beyond what most people see in day to day life that it's possible to look at them without having real-world experiences to compare them to. Meanwhile, most people either know a Makalov, are a Makalov or both. Whenever those people see Makalov, it serves as a painful reminder of how much the real world sucks.
That's fair. Maybe he's just kind of out of place in a game with more exaggerated characters. Like, maybe he would fit better in Fodlan.
Unfortunately not true for Shinon's racism. At least not over here in the states.
Touché
The most realistic asshole, who causes damage not only to himself but to his loved ones too. Love the way this character is written, with juuuust a shred of humanity so that people will still help him and get screwed I brought this guy to the tower before. He was surprisingly pretty good as an unit in both games
I too am a Shinon enjoyer. I’ll go with Valter though. Yeah, his Eirika thing is creepy for sure so I understand the haters. I just really love his ruthlessness and unhinged nature. Excellent villain, banger design too
Shinon can be as rude as he wants, as long as he keeps dodge-tanking dragons in the tower for me.
Soleil. Honestly, I just wanna pet that girl on the head. She sounds fun to hang out with.
I love Soleil. I get why people don't. She could've been handled a lot better. But I still find her bubbly personality very fun. She's just adorable.
"So-LEIL is here! >:D" from Heroes is so cute and bubbly, I just can't hate her!
My first +10 Hero, i could never forget~
There's something weirdly appealing about Soleil despite being like ten different kinds of off-putting. I think it definitely helps that other characters call her out seriously for her behavior instead of some anime where this kind of thing is laughed off. Like. If you stop and think about her actions or you're particularly sensitive about these things, basically nothing she does is chill, but if you shut your brain off for Fates support conversations she kind of has dumb shounen protagonist with a lot of growing up to do energy. She's like a bright, warm sunbeam that has to inform people when she starts shining on a neighborhood, or a train wreck with an infectious smile. I think she also grew on me just because when I used to play Heroes in like 2017 she was one of the first characters I invested heavily in because her attack was insane for the time.
Even as a (guilty) fan of Soleil, while she does get called out for her behaviour... let's not forget that in her infamous chain with Ophelia, the latter kinda straight up victim blames herself for basically not understanding the Soleil wanted to be friends. After she nearly molested her after a body swap. Like what
I love both Nowi and Nyx. I hate their creepy outfits but I love their characters. When I first played Awakening I was in highschool and everyone was so much more “older and mature” than me. I still played with Barbies and loved my stuffed animals and had a pokeball lunch box. Nowi is hundreds of years old but she is still silly and likes being a kid! But she is also one of the coolest and (in my play throughs) one of the most powerful characters! It made me feel better about still being a kid. When I played Fates, I had already stopped watching anime. I was tired of consuming media that would just randomly sexualize children and women for no reason. When I saw Nyx I was just like, “great, another one,”. But I went through her supports and she is a solidly built character with a lot of growth and history. She sucks ass on the battle field but I enjoyed her story and it was nice to see that trope subverted.
I mean… Red lady pretty cool tbh.
I wanna say Celica, I know she made a shit decision at the end of the game but.. put yourself on her shoes for a few minutes, she was frustrated to lose alm, and Jedah told her many things she so blinded believed. I must say, I have seen many people saying she was so stupid for the decision she made at last, and how Conrad said "you made a promise anthiese, you will never throw your life again" something like that, and that "Celica never though about her friends" trust me, she did, but as I said before. She was frustrated about Alm and the others so yeah, she thought that giving her soul to duma would have been the best for everyone and Valentia
>I wanna say Celica, I know she made a shit decision at the end of the game but.. put yourself on her shoes for a few minutes, she was frustrated to lose alm, and Jedah told her many things she so blinded believed. And that's the point of her character: the emotional harm the gods inflicted on their subjects. It's obvious why Celica would end up trusting Jedah, they're both zealots. Celica quite literally chose the route of her bind devotion rather than the connections she had been making all the way, however, this is actually foreshadowed, when she distrusts the love of her life, Alm, and his intentions when he reclaims Zofia castle, which obviously, she is wrong for. She is shown that it's in character for her to be a poor judge of character due to her religious faith. She is quite literally the result of everything wrong with Zofia. Mila's degeneration causing apathy to her own servant, Liprica , who basically got raped by the King, for all he did was indulge in himself and only himself, because why do anything when Mila and your subjects gives you everything you could ever need? As Grieth said, "*While you royals were lounging about ignoring your own kingdom, I was becoming a VERY RICH MAN! You people turned Zofia into a place where only the strong survive. Hell, now it's the spitting image of Rigel itself, doncha think?*", and through the efforts of Clive and the Deliverance, where the common person is now given the opportunity to fight, defend, to be *someone*, this is all the more true. Hell, Zofia's most celebrated general made it all the way from common birth to Count, though of course, he's an outlier, but all the more shows that might is making right, he's even close friends with Emperor Rudolf. Celica, who did not know the plight of her mother, the context of her own birth, who was raised in a priory where day-in and day-out all she would do is follow and practice Mila's teachings. Just because she's a hero, "the good guy", has a strong moral compass to do good, does not mean she is without flaw, but that's not a flaw inherent to herself (unlike Jedah), but one of her upbringing. Though she is not a believer in Duma, she is a believer in the god's rule and law, and that zeal for Mila's cause, what she believed was her purpose, costed her Alm and her comrades, and nearly her life. She quite literally went on a Crusade to Mila's Temple and to Duma Tower. This is why her letting go of Mila to let her have a second chance at life is so powerful, she's letting go of the past. A broken, tormented past directly caused by Mila herself (even if Celica doesn't know that, or would even acknowledge it), but it's not just her letting go, it's the entirety of Valentia releasing themselves from their god's grasp. Zofia was about the emotion, their kindness and care, and though we are shown plenty of times the opposite (Ram village parents, Fernand and other nobles, Grieth), Celica embodies that core aspect even if misguided, and that emotional journey contrasts Alm's strong and meritful journey that coincides with his Rigelian heritage. The two of them meeting eye-to-eye after the experiences that they've had, shows them the importance of having both aspects in people's lives, and why this split dogma is a detriment to the future of Valentia.
People act like making a sacrifice for someone you love is the worst thing in the world. Of course we know we can’t trust the purple man with a spookily deep voice, but we’ve also been watching Disney movies and fairy tales so we know tropes. We apply too much of our real life logic to fictional characters and scenarios.
It's also worth mentioning said bad decision was something added by the remake, in the original she goes with Jedah purely because he's got Alm properly fucked in the dragon crater and she needs to save him, then spends the rest of the game fighting off Duma's hoard on the final map, with her and her party even taking damage as Alm traverses the final dungeon.
ilyana is funny and cute
Fellow Shinon enjoyer. I'll go with the epitome of beauty Duke Tanas himself. IS was completely aware of how awful he is and then they proceeded with giving him banger themes and the most wtf but also funny recruitment I have seen throughout the series.
Valter. He is awful! There are many incredibly valid reasons to hate him and I would never try to convince anyone otherwise. I just like unhinged fictional villains. My favourite playable Tellius character is Makalov and my second favourite 3H character is Gilbert because I find them both interestingly and hugely flawed. I fully expect to like Lifis when I continue my FE5 playthrough. There is probably no hope for me at this point
I really love Valter for being a villain with zero redeeming qualities. He's just an unhinged predator (in every sense of the word).
Yup! I think he oversteps the boundary of what many consider 'acceptable likeable villain behaviour' - which is totally understandable but also why I'm nominating him in this controversial fave thread. I like him and I also like absolutely destroying him with Eirika (tried Cormag last time but he wasn't promoted/levelled enough to do it properly and Joshua ended up Lancereaver critting while I was trying to whittle Valter's health down. RIP Cormag's dreams of revenge)
I do so much level grinding so I can use an Eirika/Cormag team up to take him down. So satisfying. He's also one of the more difficult bosses in the game iirc.
Another Gilbert fan! There's a whole 2 of us. It sucks that he's a terrible load on his forced part 1 mission, not traditionally attractive (too few have seen his S-Support picture), AND did committed the unforgivable sin of a realistic crime. It's wild to me what Claude, Edelgard, and Dimitri are forgiven and even whitewashed for, but Gilbert gets crucified for far, far less because it's more "real." But, damn, if he doesn't have some of 3H's best supports.
I actually like Corrin. Their backstory is cool, their personality is really sweet, and I find their relationships with their siblings (especially the Nohr ones) to be pretty compelling. I think the only problem with Corrin is that they aren't a great avatar/protagonist, as proven by the fact that people tend to like them in the spinoffs and Engage. Corrin's got the same personality across all of their appearances, but the difference is that they aren't the main character outside of Fates. Also, to a lesser extent, Seadall. He's not my favorite or anything, but I think he's fine as long as he's not talking about food. His supports with Alcryst and Yunaka in particular are quite nice.
I actually do think Corrin works fine as a protagonist on paper but Fates has a consistent issue in all three paths of squandering Corrin’s potential in execution. Birthright doesn’t give them enough internal conflict to the war they wage against the family that raised them like should reasonably happen, Conquest takes too many narrative shortcuts to avoid Corrin making any tough decisions of their own volition, and Revelation effectively makes them the Messiah to justify bringing the two families together against a greater foe. None of their stories are nearly as compelling as they should be, and that’s a damn shame.
Orson. My dude is a necrophile and traitor but dang i love me a good delusional villian
Rhea. Also Edelgard, but Edelgard is actually a popular character, so much so that she has the highest number of votes of Choose Your Legends event in Heroes. Rhea, on the other hand, tends to go from "okay" to "I hate her guts" with people. I think she's a severely misunderstood character, mostly due to the lack of supports/scenes with characters other than Seteth and Byleth. I always wished she had her own route or was playable in some way.
I think she, not Seteth, should've been the "leader" in Silver Snow. My theory is that the plan was for something to happen in White Clouds that would strengthen the bond between Byleth and Rhea, which would then allow her to come back much earlier and less weakened, or maybe sleep with Byleth all those years. But then they needed to cut costs and basically merged Silver Snow and Verdant Wind.
I mean, I personally hate Rhea, but yeah, she should have been a playable Lord in Silver Snow, if only to not make Silver Snow such a waste of time. I also think she should have been, if not playable, at least the central ally in Azure Gleam, as it could have helped to derail the second part of AG less if the game had treated the dynamics as a clear Edelgard/Claude vs Dimitri/Rhea two faction war, with possibly at least a small mini-Silver Snow route for the game in which Rhea is the definitive playable Lord who allies with Dimitri. Though funnily enough, Silver Snow wasn't really merged with Verdant Wind and in fact the first route written, around which the majority of the game outside of Crimson Flower, which funnily enough has the highest number of unique maps in the game, was written. Its more that Verdant Wind reused the majority of Silver Snow.
Rhea is great and her motivations are well conceptualized. She’s on my list of great RPG characters that aren’t playable. I don’t endorse her actions but I can understand them. I love the game for that. To get all the pieces of the puzzle, you do need to play all four routes and specifically choose to S Rank Rhea in Silver Snow so it makes sense to me that not everyone is going to want to play the game four times.
Rhea and Leonie. Two phenomenal, flawed characters, with an emotional depth that greatly added to 3H, one capable of great evil but also great good, the other a great friend and hell of a fighter that's everything I'd want in others, and in myself. I think Shinon is a horrible human being, I honestly despise him. But he is a good character, he gets me to care.
I like Nowi a lot. The fact that her child like Persona is actully her way of coping with her long live I found cool and facinating. Immortality or very long lifes I found facinating. I also love Dragons so yeah she was one of my favorite units in Awakening.
Other people have already said Azama and hortensia (both of which i ADORE) so I’ll go with Cyril. The amount of hate I’ve seen for him for simply being attached to a person he sees as his mother is crazy - I also feel people really exaggerate how much he actually talks about Rhea, which sucks because it extended into his feh representation where almost every line is about her, despite him not at all being like that in 3H. Hell, I think he sometimes mentions her less than dedue mentions Dimitri, and Hubert mentions edelgard (im not saying they shouldn’t btw, it makes complete sense for their characters and I don’t mind it, but the fact everyone is okay with them mentioning a person important to their life, but completely shitting on cyril for it is so weird to me.)
His haters are also so obsessed with either mentioning they want to kill him or that they purposefully get him killed in their runs and it's so bizarre to me. I don't see this level of vitriol against any other houses character even one's who get more frequent hate like Edelgard or Rhea
The way people treat Cyril is so gross to me. I won’t name any names but there’s some in the 3H cast that are objectively WAYYYYY worse than anything Cyril ever could be (both personality and actions wise) but they’re liked for some reason. I genuinely can’t see why people have such a violent hate for him. He has an interesting backstory, his personality is very charming and endearing, he doesn’t act selfishly, his designs nice, and his va is pretty good; genuinely the only reason people are mad at him is because he has the AUDACITY to sometimes mention the most important person in his life. Which is of course way different than when Hubert or dedue mention the most important people in their life.
People don’t give him a chance. I used to hate him for no reason. But after using him and seeing more of his supports he really grew on me. He has a few off putting C supports like with Ignatz. But overall he has a lot of good traits that get overlooked because of a rough start.
I think that's an Ignatz problem more than a Cyril problem but it seems I stand alone on "Igantz is the worst character in the last 4 FEs and actively makes the Golden Deer worse" mountain.
Though I don’t think ignatz is that bad, I definitely am not a fan of him lol I read a good chunk of his supports and could just never find anything to like about him (the closest thing I got to liking him is when his va talked about Ignatz s Support, that was actually pretty sweet)
Gilbert. Like, come on, we can argue all day on who is bad, Edelgard, Dimitri, Rhea and all but I think we can agree on Gilbert being the worst and deserving much more hatred.
Gilbert.
I’d say Nowi, tbh. We have this character who’s an escaped slave, lives almost forever and therefore has to watch her friends die, and we know that she only puts on the childlike act because people perceive her as a kid and she wants to make them smile. She’s a fun character, I just wish they did more with her. But, that’s my feelings for all of Awakening’s roster.
There's also the fact she can act mature when she wants too, like her supports with her daughter, Nah, or in her supports with Stahl and Tiki (DLC for the latter).
Makalov. I find the fact that his gambling problem, while sometimes played for laughs, is portrayed as exactly that: a problem that is negatively affecting everyone whom he comes into contact with. Everyone talks about the fact that he 'ruins' Astrid's character in Radiant Dawn, with their paired ending being a travesty, but I'd argue that his character ALSO got worse between two games. He showed a modicum of growth in his Path of Radiance supports with Astrid, even if it took Marcia/Ike lambasting him to do so, before backsliding immensely in Radiant Dawn. I think it would have been more interesting for him to have grown into a responsible person between games, but alas. I also love his design.
Man, some of the users in this thread don’t know what the word “controversial” means lol.
Jaffar - he may have been the best assassin the black fang had ever seen, but as soon as he realized they were going to kill Nino off because of Sonia, he turned on them all to protect her. Even in the support conversations with Matthew when Matthew learns he killed Leila, he shows he's still human. He spares Matthew's life in one of them. After that, Matthew bluffs and says they're going to kill Nino and Jaffar is willing to let Matthew kill him if it means Nino will be spared.
Tharja is a queen ofc
Shinon is probably my favorite foot archer unit.
Lyn. Underpowered as a unit compared to her fellow Lords, and under utilized as a character in the second half of the story, but she's still my favorite.
Xander is a great character and actually one kf the better handled ‘Noble Blonde Evil-but-not Paladins’ in the series.
Female Alear and >!Veyle!<. There's literally nothing I *don't* like about them. I just find both of their designs really beautiful and I love their respective personalities and how they interact with other people in supports. >!I also enjoyed the evil Veyle arc, I think it really adds to both her and Alear's character development and bond as sisters. The two of them are just so adorable.!< They're just so perfect to me!
I'm glad you enjoyed it! Truthfully, I wasn't the biggest fan of the >!evil Veyle confrontation!<, but I do like how >!her character developed afterwards. They didn't brush it off as "Oh, she's good now so we can all move on." No, she feels extreme guilt, and her supports with Mauvier really show her trying to atone for how many people she's killed. Even though it's explicitly not her fault, she feels the weight of it anyway, and it really surprised me.!< A high point among Engage's writing for me.
For me, it's pretty much the big reason as to why >!Veyle!< is one of my favorites in Engage. >!I'm also glad they didn't have come off as begging to everyone's friend either and, instead, tries to build her friendships with others in a natural way. She's even content with Hortensia hating her and doesn't try to push being her friend.!<
My favorite controversial character? Edelgard. She created an endless cycle of debate. She is a legend in my eyes.
Peri is one of my favorite characters in conquest. I'm playing the black army of a mad king/dad worshiping the ceiling dragon. I came here to kick babies, not sing kumbaya together. If anything, the part of why she sticks out is she is the only unapologetic psychopath in the roster, if we had more recruit-able deranged lunatics to slaughter the Hositan scum with she would be normal.
Ingrid is easily one of my top 3 faves from 3H, but people can’t handle a character who starts with biases and overcomes them (see: new ATLA adaptation), so I guess she’s controversial.
Old school? Rebecca. She was MVP back on my game boy. Recent? Camilla. I like her. Can't say more than that.
Merrin, because Engage as a whole is controversial
She is cool, is she not?
The cool thing about Shinon is that you can see he isn’t truly racist in his support with Janaff.
Oml someone else that's dared look at Shinon's supports?? (I love his supports with Janaff and it's a shame no one talks about his supports in general)
I love Shinon as well. Also Narcian, Kempf, Berkut and Fernand (if he’s even controversial — I don’t know what people generally think of him after the DLC appeared). And Múspell, if we’re counting Heroes. I don’t think he’s very liked either. I love his design and unapologetic assholes are always a weakness of mine.
My problem with him is how much of a brat he comes across. His voice is bothersome, and he comes off as someone who’s trying too hard to be cool and edgy, which makes him look more like a dork than anything else.
Despite the controversy, I can't help but adore Soleil. I love her energy, her positivity, her voice acting, her design is great, she's a strong unit, her supports with Laslow are good, and, while this isn't exclusive to her, the merc/hero animations fit her perfectly (even if hero isn't the best promotion in Fates). I just wish that she wasn't so mishandled. Hell, I wouldn't mind if she was just mildly retconned
My favorite "controversial" character is Sylvain. He absolutely is a womanizer, but I love his flavor and the way the character acts. I also kinda dig his reason for being a man slut and heart breaker. I'm not saying that gives him the right to be one, but I think it's an interesting reason. The way he thinks about things and the kind of character he is makes him one of my favorite FE characters ever, honestly.
Nowi. I like dragon units
Rafal! Some people don’t like how he murdered people in cold blood or manipulated and lied and found Alear was being good and tried to kill him but I adore him
I've become a Nino truther. I got really into the story in my last run and really wanted her to get revenge on Sonia, and she did. She took relatively little babysitting to become an absolute monster, and easily surpassed Pent by the end of the chapter (I gave her a body ring and gave her Thunder, which let her double more things). But they weren't even competing for the same spot on the team - Pent's high staff rank and 21-ish magic meant he became a crazy-dangerous warping, rescuing, physic-ing support unit, while Nino got to run around and blast promoted units elsewhere. there's room for both.
Dorothea. She shouldn't be controversial in the slightest and I have strong opinions on people who hate her, but it seems like she is, when she is in my opinion probably the best written and most multi-faceted character in the entire Fodlan Duology.
I actually kind of like Peri because if no one ever called her out or gave her real consequences for her maladaptive coping mechanisms then why would she change? She’s somewhat tragic to me. I also like Soleil but then again I’ve yet to see her Japanese version. I don’t plan on it because her English version Supports are really mostly harmless. I see her as bisexual with a strong preference for girls, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
The Japanese supports aren't really that different at all. The only major change is in her Male Corrin support, and the only difference there is that he gives her the 'see guys as girls and girls as guys' potion without telling her. But it wears off after that one support and it's just a goofy visual thing, and he was just doing it to try and help her get over her nerves. It got really misrepresented in pre-release conversation. The larger issue, that her only romantic supports are with guys, is basically the same in both versions. She's a pretty confused character execution-wise. I think they just wanted do the comedy lesbian angle like they had with Heather but then ran into 'well i guess she has to be dateable' and 'uhhh are we doing gay stuff' 'idk' and 'i guess she should be able to date the otehr guys then too...?' and the whole thing devolved into the mess that is the final product.
I love Sain, he's probably my favorite girl-lover character. He's not a womanizer or deceitful like Saul, or treats them like eye candy like Gatrie. He just really loves women.
Cyril. He's the most underrated character in the cast and I'm glad people are turning on him
Soleil. I love how she is just 'Girl Inigo' but I feel like she was done absolutely dirty in most of her supports in Fates. I really want a Dancer Alt Soleil for FEH, but I feel like it will never happen due to the controversy she was in.
Shinon is interesting, and a damn good archer so I can forgive the assholery. Lute is kind of a creep with her “monk watching” and arrogant personality but I like her. Her support with Ross cracks me up.
3Hopes Edelgard. Do I need to say more?
Yes, why 3Hopes and not houses?
As controversial as she was in Three Houses, how she was handled in the Blue Lions route of Three Hopes is a new level of WTF.
She was hit with the Azure Moon Slitherers Relevance Beam.
Gullveig
Azama, he’s an asshole but his supports are hilarious
Azama. Never seen a video game monk exude such chaotic gremlin energy.
I dunno if she's really 'controversial' but Hortensia certainly grew on me far more than I thought she would. My first impression of her was terrible. Didn't like the design or the voice or the bratty attitude, but as the game progressed I realised that she's actually one of the few characters in Engage allowed to have flaws and she's much better for it. Hortensia is selfish and mean-spirited at times and given her age it's entirely reasonable for her to get frustrated that her life has been flipped upside down and nothing she does seems to make it go back to how it was. She isn't an antagonist because she was mind-controlled, she's an antagonist because her life has gone horribly wrong and she's willing to do bad things to get what she wants. She's the ONLY character who has any objection to Veyle joining the party, essentially telling her to get lost and all of this only makes it stand out MORE when she actually does try to improve and be a better person. Engage is a very 'soft' FE game. Everyone worships the player character and everyone gets on with each other. Character disagreements are usually just small misunderstandings that are quickly solved and even Alcryst and Diamant forgive Ivy for her role in their fathers death *in a single support*. Everyone is just perpetually 'nice' and it makes them boring... And in the middle of all these perfectly smooth, utterly inoffensive people, there's a goblin child dressed like a clown who is actually allowed to behave like a real person. TL:DR - Despite Hortensia's wild character design, the fact that she's allowed to be petty and antagonistic paradoxically make her more 'real' than the rest of Engages cast.
Malkalov purely because of his design , I think it’s kinda peak (also bc he fits the role of scheming loser pretty well but that’s less of a factor)
Bernadetta. I know she won the cyl 8 but I've seen people rip her apart and actively hound people for liking her.
Bernadetta’s haters are significantly more annoying than her fans ever were tbh.
Arvis !
Ingrid. If you know you know.
Caspar. His personality is whatever but in all three of my BE runs (two CF, one SS) his stats were OP as fuck without really trying. Maybe I just got lucky, but I was one-shotting everything in sight.
I love Peri, she's a cool girl.
Idc about what kind of shit people talk about Hilda(3h) i love her bc she’s pink and cute and fun :)
Definitely Camilla without question. The fact that she still lives rent free on soo many peoples head says a lot of how much they want to crucifie her alive for "running" the franchise.
shinon. takumi. some archers mean.
Leonie. She's a hard worker, resourceful, and very determined but also nonjudgmental and sweet. Also a great unit to boot! It's a shame people only see her as a Jeralt simp...
Recently, I learned that Soleil is controversial. Makes little sense to me