Ahh yes, time to take the trip down the memory lane.
While Fire Emblem: Blazing Blade (2003, holy shit I feel old) was marked rated E for everyone, the story was suprisingly rather grim. I mean it started as a simple story of a girl claiming her birth right, and then in evolves to a story of how an act of one man leads to death of many innocent and misguided characters, and almost plunge the world into chaos. I remember how suprisingly hard the game was as well. This was my first perma-death game, where I didn't realize the characters I let die won't come back. And I had no idea which character was good or bad, so I would sometimes let a character w/ high potential die (rip Guy) or never use them at all (sorry Sain)
Kingdom Hearts...... Oh yes, the first ps2 game I've gotten my hands on. I remember how shocked I was at how difficult the game was sometimes. I specifically remember being excited to leave the traverse town to really start my journey, then getting my ass kicked by the final boss at deep jungle, the court room fight in wonder land, and not making it very far at the colosseum. What started as a simple Final Fantasy x Disney crossover game turned into an adventure filled with intriguing lore not fully explained at this point. I think this was also the first game where I came to appreciate music and soundtracks in video games.
Speaking of Final Fantasy, FF6 shocked me when heroes actually lose their first fight against Kefka. Up to that point I was thinking to myself "My group is strong af, Kefka and Gestahl are nothing but deranged men, I'll save the world!" This was my first experience where the plot made the heroes lose an important battle, and everyone afterward had their reasons on the inability or no desire to take another shot at the main antagonist
