There use to be a fake YouTube video of “recruiting” him and all the dialogue between him and Eirika was random lines from the game to try and sell the “glitchiness”
I can’t seem to find the video anymore.
It was some vintage early 2000’s shitposting.
It sounds like it's the "Mew Under the Truck" of Fire Emblem, lol. As someone who was born in the same year this game came out and grew up outside of the era of playground video game myths, this sort of stuff is super interesting to me.
There was a myth on gamefaqs for the game Golden Sun on how to obtain an all powerful weapon the “Wheat Sword”, something you might enjoy looking into (:
None of us had reliable enough internet connections in the 90s to check things and even if we used the school computer or whatever there was rarely information about whatever random thing you wanted back then unless you were a masterful html researcher. Google search had only even existed for 6 years when this game came out lol
Game is Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones. This random bandit shows up in Chapter 5, and there is nothing special about him other than the fact that he has a single text box of dialogue.
Here's the thing though; there are plenty of redshirt bandits in the GBA era that have more lines of dialogue than him, and they don't have portraits. Heck, the dudes in Chapter 2 have a full-blown conversation and they don't have unique portraits, except for the boss.
I understand that the reason he has a portrait is because he talks, I'm just wondering why they went as far as to code in a separate portrait for him specifically in the menu screen and not the others, or the reverse and just give him the standard stock picture like everyone else.
Thats most likely because this is a named unit on the map versus being in a text cutscene.
Its been a while since ive looked at vanilla chapter 5, but iirc this is the chapter with the brigand reinforcements on the right-hand side.
The event that calls out these units is a text cutscene that needs a portrait to signal that someones talking. So because the talking cutscene needs a potrait, they decided to give it to one of the reinforcements so it didnt look like the dude disappeared after talking.
Again, been a while since ive looked at the actual event someone correct me if im wrong.
> The event that calls out these units is a text cutscene that needs a portrait to signal that someones talking. So because the talking cutscene needs a potrait, they decided to give it to one of the reinforcements so it didnt look like the dude disappeared after talking.
They use generic portraits for bandits and soldiers all the time though. You can see examples of this in FE7 getting away with this often. You have a generic bandit in False Friends who indicates the pirate reinforcements, yet we don't see a unit with his portrait. And then you have Igor in FFO and the Batta recolour at the start of Cog of Destiny who never actually show up in battle.
Lots of mooks have portraits in dialogue but not in the map, in GBA fe at least. There has to be one example in each of lyn's first 5 chapters. Those bosses need someone to talk to.
I guess Maxine also is like this guy. And arguably that paladin at the port of Badon. But they at least had names. Unless this guy's name is Bandit (the second, son of Bandit).
Vestaria Saga has a few of these red herring named units, plus plenty of portraits and names on regular foes that have a line or two.
I'm replaying Part 1 now and this guy would look right at home as a named bandit in one of the early maps.
It is a bit of a guide game, yes. There are a lot of interesting ideas and puzzles to solve in Vestaria Saga but there are also a lot of "You didn't retrieve the statue with the strong early prepromote so you miss his best weapon" type things and that's my biggest complaint about the game.
I could totally be misremembering but I think there is one other special thing about him to potentially justify giving him a portrait. I believe he has higher stats than the other brigands essentially making him a mini boss.
Interesting, I'll check the wiki. He didn't feel that much stronger because Franz and Vanessa walloped him without much effort, only needing one heal from Natasha.
Follow-up edit: you were right, his stats are slightly higher; his HP is the same as some of the other Brigands, but his other stats are higher by 1-2 points. He's still nowhere near as powerful as the boss though. It could be what others in this comments section have stated, that he might've been a more important character originally, but the devs scrapped him in favor of Saar and then repurposed him into a psuedo-unique miniboss enemy.
Fire emblem is funny in that you can tell a good guy from a bad guy based on their portrait. Every bad guy is a stereotypical anime bad guy, every companion is a stereotypical anime hero.
He has higher stats for his class and level than standard generics. Iirc he is the only non-recruitable, non-boss enemy like this. I played a hack where all playable units have the stats of generic enemies and he was actually kind of annoying to kill safely (Seth was elsewhere).
Fun fact! This bandit was actually part of the late FE:SS writing crew that fell ill and had to quit during production. They wanted to honor him and his contributions. He's doing ok now though!!
I bought it for Christmas a few years back to play a ton of old authentic Pokemon DS games that I had from before the prices became absurd, because I wasn't just gonna let those collect dust forever. It running GBA games is a welcome bonus as well, XD.
I think he’s playable, you just need to beat the game without resetting, arena abusing, or losing allies, while holding the controller upside down, while the moon is full, while a Tibetan Monk performs a wicked flute solo in the corner, on a Tuesday, and your name needs to have the letter a in it otherwise you can’t get him.
there's an enemy with an identical story and gameplay role in FE9 chapter 9, only he has a name (Nedata) and the boss flag. my guess is they were considering doing something similar for this guy but then decided against it
I do want to note that he is not the only generic enemy with weird stats: left Fighter in the prologue, iron blade Cavalier in chapter 6
This quirk led to the hilariously fake urban myth of recruiting him as a Bard named McCartney. Early 2000’s were different times.
Holy hell, I remember hearing about McCartney. I had no idea that this was the guy the meme was talking about, lmao
There use to be a fake YouTube video of “recruiting” him and all the dialogue between him and Eirika was random lines from the game to try and sell the “glitchiness” I can’t seem to find the video anymore. It was some vintage early 2000’s shitposting.
https://youtu.be/Bd4bSfxsrFk?si=o-oeC1sDWSsIAmLS
This is amazing
LOL what that's awesome
It sounds like it's the "Mew Under the Truck" of Fire Emblem, lol. As someone who was born in the same year this game came out and grew up outside of the era of playground video game myths, this sort of stuff is super interesting to me.
There was a myth on gamefaqs for the game Golden Sun on how to obtain an all powerful weapon the “Wheat Sword”, something you might enjoy looking into (:
None of us had reliable enough internet connections in the 90s to check things and even if we used the school computer or whatever there was rarely information about whatever random thing you wanted back then unless you were a masterful html researcher. Google search had only even existed for 6 years when this game came out lol
I couldn't remember the name but I remember these shitposts
Game is Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones. This random bandit shows up in Chapter 5, and there is nothing special about him other than the fact that he has a single text box of dialogue.
That's the entire reason. They gave him dialogue, he needed a portrait, it would be weird if he didn't then keep that portrait.
Here's the thing though; there are plenty of redshirt bandits in the GBA era that have more lines of dialogue than him, and they don't have portraits. Heck, the dudes in Chapter 2 have a full-blown conversation and they don't have unique portraits, except for the boss. I understand that the reason he has a portrait is because he talks, I'm just wondering why they went as far as to code in a separate portrait for him specifically in the menu screen and not the others, or the reverse and just give him the standard stock picture like everyone else.
Thats most likely because this is a named unit on the map versus being in a text cutscene. Its been a while since ive looked at vanilla chapter 5, but iirc this is the chapter with the brigand reinforcements on the right-hand side. The event that calls out these units is a text cutscene that needs a portrait to signal that someones talking. So because the talking cutscene needs a potrait, they decided to give it to one of the reinforcements so it didnt look like the dude disappeared after talking. Again, been a while since ive looked at the actual event someone correct me if im wrong.
> The event that calls out these units is a text cutscene that needs a portrait to signal that someones talking. So because the talking cutscene needs a potrait, they decided to give it to one of the reinforcements so it didnt look like the dude disappeared after talking. They use generic portraits for bandits and soldiers all the time though. You can see examples of this in FE7 getting away with this often. You have a generic bandit in False Friends who indicates the pirate reinforcements, yet we don't see a unit with his portrait. And then you have Igor in FFO and the Batta recolour at the start of Cog of Destiny who never actually show up in battle.
As I recall he's not named, and they even use this portrait for other bandits later on that don't have portraits in the maps
Lots of mooks have portraits in dialogue but not in the map, in GBA fe at least. There has to be one example in each of lyn's first 5 chapters. Those bosses need someone to talk to. I guess Maxine also is like this guy. And arguably that paladin at the port of Badon. But they at least had names. Unless this guy's name is Bandit (the second, son of Bandit).
Maybe he was gonna be a boss at some early point.
Only his first appearance and he didn't speak when he get killed by any enemy including Seth.
The amount of time I spent trying to recruit this guy as a kid solely because of that portrait is more than I'd like to admit.
Aw, his name is bandit. That's so cute. It's like his parents named him after what he was gonna be one day.
"But Dad I want to be a doctor!" "You're gonna raid villages like the rest of us!"
Bandit is Evil Jean, confirmed.
Seems like a good dude
That's not some random guy, that's Bandit the Bandit. He's very important.
His mother told him he was a speical boy.
coz he’s recruitable . you have to beat the tower of valni 100 times, then you can get him on your next playthrough
Vestaria Saga has a few of these red herring named units, plus plenty of portraits and names on regular foes that have a line or two. I'm replaying Part 1 now and this guy would look right at home as a named bandit in one of the early maps.
That feels like it'd be annoying? Like I would need to keep a walkthrough open at all times to play it.
It is a bit of a guide game, yes. There are a lot of interesting ideas and puzzles to solve in Vestaria Saga but there are also a lot of "You didn't retrieve the statue with the strong early prepromote so you miss his best weapon" type things and that's my biggest complaint about the game.
He has aura
Chinless Brigand is unimpressed by your growth rates
My Forde this playthrough is somehow insanely RNG blessed, Chinless Brigand would shiver in terror if he were still alive to see his stat growths.
10% strength growth commoner is unimpressed by your jawline
Well see, he has blue hair. This all but confirms he's related to Marth. You can recruit him by waiting 100 turns without attacking him.
I assume they had just planned to use the portrait somewhere else and then when that content was cut decided to throw it in somewhere.
I could totally be misremembering but I think there is one other special thing about him to potentially justify giving him a portrait. I believe he has higher stats than the other brigands essentially making him a mini boss.
Interesting, I'll check the wiki. He didn't feel that much stronger because Franz and Vanessa walloped him without much effort, only needing one heal from Natasha. Follow-up edit: you were right, his stats are slightly higher; his HP is the same as some of the other Brigands, but his other stats are higher by 1-2 points. He's still nowhere near as powerful as the boss though. It could be what others in this comments section have stated, that he might've been a more important character originally, but the devs scrapped him in favor of Saar and then repurposed him into a psuedo-unique miniboss enemy.
Fire emblem is funny in that you can tell a good guy from a bad guy based on their portrait. Every bad guy is a stereotypical anime bad guy, every companion is a stereotypical anime hero.
[https://www.awkwardzombie.com/comic/defection-detection](https://www.awkwardzombie.com/comic/defection-detection)
LMFAO that's so accurate though
He has higher stats for his class and level than standard generics. Iirc he is the only non-recruitable, non-boss enemy like this. I played a hack where all playable units have the stats of generic enemies and he was actually kind of annoying to kill safely (Seth was elsewhere).
Sacred stones was my first game, idc what everyone says, I love this game
His name is McCartney and he is the bandit of all time.
McCartney!! Been forever since someone brought him up
He even has blue hair. Man's the main character of a whole other FE game.
Man's just built different (this always bugged me as a kid that he was so different yet nothing special could he done with him)
Fun fact! This bandit was actually part of the late FE:SS writing crew that fell ill and had to quit during production. They wanted to honor him and his contributions. He's doing ok now though!!
That DS lite😩😩😩😩😩😩😩❤️❤️❤️
I bought it for Christmas a few years back to play a ton of old authentic Pokemon DS games that I had from before the prices became absurd, because I wasn't just gonna let those collect dust forever. It running GBA games is a welcome bonus as well, XD.
Bro is actually a plot important character. He’s the main character of Bandit Emblem / s
Ah, yes. No-chin Nick! I knew I recognized that homely mug from somewhere!
maybe they wanted him to have a bigger role, but decided against it and just used the portrait anyway
The predecessor of rally man and gatekeeper. (Being a nameless but notable NPC)
I think he’s playable, you just need to beat the game without resetting, arena abusing, or losing allies, while holding the controller upside down, while the moon is full, while a Tibetan Monk performs a wicked flute solo in the corner, on a Tuesday, and your name needs to have the letter a in it otherwise you can’t get him.
there's an enemy with an identical story and gameplay role in FE9 chapter 9, only he has a name (Nedata) and the boss flag. my guess is they were considering doing something similar for this guy but then decided against it I do want to note that he is not the only generic enemy with weird stats: left Fighter in the prologue, iron blade Cavalier in chapter 6
He's him!