Via GoNintendo

This Iwata Asks feature includes series producer Tohru Narihiro, project manager Masahiro Higuchi and director Kouhei Maeda, all from Intelligent Systems...

- Maeda feels the perma-death feature from the Fire Emblem series is a defining characteristic
- Maeda feels that this feature makes players feel more emotionally attached to the characters
- Maeda also feels that this increases tension
- Maeda admitted to resetting the game to make sure he didn't lose a character back in his days prior to working on the series
- work on this title began when the team was working on Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon
- the team feels that Fire Emblem: Heroes of Light and Shadow is almost a completely new title, even though it is based off of a previous release
- making this game accessible to new players was a concern
- the idea of making fallen characters return on the next map was tossed around, but many felt this would take away the heart of the Fire Emblem series
- debates on this topic lasted many hours, with some starting in the morning and ending at night
- past titles had a revival system that was implemented, but yanked right before release
- during development of the Super Famicom Fire Emblem: Seisen no Keifu, the original design doc said you could die up to 5 times. This topic quickly became the subject of heated debate
- originally, the team thought that character revivals should be tied to difficulty settings, but this was decided against
- finally, it was decided that "Classic Mode" or "Casual Mode" settings would let the player allow/disallow character revivals, no matter what the difficulty setting
- it took 4 months to debate this issue
- even when the game is off, time flows in the game world
- your characters will head off on their own in search of items and also build experience
- see what types of items your characters have gathered by visiting the pre battle prep screen

Sacrilege!

I HATE perma-death. It was a total turn-off of Path Radiance.

I was being melodromatic. Its a fine option to have, of course, it's just funny for those of us who learned to live with it.

And I better be able to turn off ALL of these extra changes, not just the optional death. If I have to stop playing for a week or so, I want to be exactly where I left off, not finding out that my characters have gone off and gained a level or 2, especially since odds are those levels would be crappy.

I disagree. It adds a whole new layer of strategy and emotional attachment to the characters. At least for me anyways. At least now you can choose.

Choice is key. It actually increases replay value for new players. First play on casual, then on classic.

As for perma-death, SF series did not have it. And it is considered quite good (or was until Sega screwed it up on the PS2).

Mike from Morgantown

Ok, new guys can enjoy having the option but my masochistic ass will be playing Classic Mode.

The problem is you don't even have time to get attached because they'll die soon and you actually don't even want to get attached because you know they'll die soon so for me it's flawed but yeah it's nice that we have the choice now.

the choice is fine, i cant wait for this game

Honestly, I hate this argument.  If you're unlucky enough to have your characters die when there's a 32% chance of them getting hit, I know your plight well but if you're not prepared to entry a chapter with a viable strategy of attack and you leave your archers and mages in the front of your legion and your knights and cavalier towards the back... you should be penalized.