That’s set to change sometime in the near future. Nintendo of Europe sent out a tweet about it yesterday, in fact.
However, the game’s director, Genki Yokota, recently provided some more information. While we don’t know whether Fire Emblem: Three Houses’ new difficulty will be called “Lunatic Mode” as it was in previous entries, Game Informer initially reported that Yokota told Famitsu the team was working very hard to finish the extra difficulty mode and is hoping to have it up soon after launch.
How soon, Yokota didn’t say, but it’s safe to assume Lunatic-or-whatever Mode won’t be part of the upcoming Three Houses expansion pass, with all its content tailored for SRPGs.
The general consensus is that Three Houses follows a path similar to Fire Emblem Echoes, offering a fairly tame experience on Normal, with Hard ramping up the stakes and tension a good deal more.
Traditionally, Lunatic Mode (or Maniac Mode, depending on the game) carries things even further, adding more and smarter enemies, more waves of reinforcements, different reinforcement spawn points, and bumping enemy stats up to, well, insane levels.
Starting with Fire Emblem Awakening, the highest difficulty modes essentially forced players to take advantage of every tactic and gimmick available, especially the Team Up feature.
Three Houses introduces a range of new features, like gambits and team attacks, along with giving players greater control over their character development. It’s likely, then, Three Houses’ Lunatic Mode will push players even further than previous entries and require mastery of skill allotment and class progression.
As such, it definitely earns its name and isn’t recommended for series newcomers or the faint of heart.
