About a month ago, Nintendo had a direct that included a trailer for the newest installment of the Fire Emblem series. Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave looks promising — clean, sharp, and with enough familiarity and hints of new mechanics for me to look forward to it.

And then Sothis appeared during the last few seconds of the trailer.

Don’t get me wrong, Sothis’s appearance doesn’t negate any excitement I have for Fortune’s Weave. However, her existance confirms that the game will take place in the Three Houses universe.

That’s great. Cool. I loved Three Houses (Claude should have been bi, and other characters should have had canonical gay pairings) even if I stand by the opinion that Byleth should have been a student like the majority of the characters.

No, instead, I inwardly panicked at seeing Sothis in the trailer because I haven’t finished all of the routes in Three Houses. I also haven’t finished Engage (which apparently is just being skipped over — Why was Fortune’s Weave not an Engage sequel? Why wasn’t Fortune’s Weave developed after Three Houses?). A familiar character appearing in a new game slammed into me the fact that I have not been able to recreationally play the latest games in one of my favorite franchises in quite some time.

Lately, Rachel and I have been looking forward to Pokemon Legends: Z-A, and we’ve been trying to find the time to pick up Legends: Arceus again to finish those games. We’re close to the end of the story and are chugging along, but we wish we had the time to restart those games and properly enjoy the story in one fell swoop. Instead, we picked Arceus back up recently to continue where we left off and realized that the last time we had played the games were in 2022. 

So, what happened? Why did it take us literal years to pick up Arceus again when we enjoyed it? Why have I put down Three Houses and Engage when I enjoyed them?

Life happened. Nothing bad… just life. So many games, so little time (and money, but I digress).

Thinking on this, I got hit with a wave of nostalgia for when I first started playing the Fire Emblem games as a kid. The Sacred Stones was my first experience with the franchise. I picked it up on a whim in Toys R Us and fell in love with the fantasy setting, the characters, and the story itself. I was petrified of the perma-death and saved all the time to ensure that everyone lived to reach their happy ending. 

Back then, we just played the game. I wasn’t constantly connected to the Internet, didn’t get spoiled or see all the characters before the game released. Back then, I had the time to play the game through and enjoy it.

I miss that feeling. I miss taking the time to slow down and just play a game as intended, taking as long as I want or need without the rush of another game popping up and being spoiled all over the Internet before I have the chance to save up to buy it. There’s this pressure to always get the latest game on pre-order, to play and finish it as quickly as possible instead of just savoring it.

I know I sound old. I know there’s really nothing stopping me from focusing on a game when I have the time to do so instead of trying to keep up with all of the latest entries. Yet, there’s always that fear of missing out, you know? And with how connected the world is today, there’s always the chance of being spoiled on a game before I can play it myself.

I’ll still get Fortune’s Weave when it comes out, but I do hope to return to Three Houses and finish the last couple of routes before then. Like life, I’ll just take my gaming journey one step at a time.

What about you? What games do you wish to take it slow and savor, and what games do you rush out to buy and play immediately?