They probably benefited a lot from the 18-25 and 25+ audience becoming more important during the ps360 era. The spin offs and remakes will probably do a lot of good to the franchise, probably more than augmenting the budget of main series games.
Overall it reminds me of the current state of the persona franchise, even though we still have to wait for Persona 5 worldwide results. If the Persona series grows bigger with the same strategy, Fire Emblem will probably follow.








