Fire Emblem: Three Houses’ director says completing one house will take 80 hours
Completionists are looking at more than 200 hours of playtime
During Japan Expo 2019, the French website JeuxVideo interviewed Fire Emblem: Three Houses’ director Toshiyuki Kasukihara and game producer Genki Yokota about the next entry in the series coming to the Nintendo Switch on July 26. When asked about the run time of the game, Kasukihara revealed that playing through just one of the three houses takes 80 hours.
“To the end the game with just one of the three houses, it took me 80 hours. I did not cut the vocals or cutscenes, of course.” Kasukihara said, “So if you want to do the three paths, it can take you more than 200 hours.”
JeuxVideo said the three different houses will lead to three different ends, so if you want to see every one of them, you’re looking at a time investment of more than 200 hours. The runtime is sizable, but not so surprising given that most games in the series are pretty lengthy. If the different houses do lead to "relatively different scenarios" or endings, that's certainly a good motivation to do multiple playthroughs.
Three Houses takes place on the continent of Fodlan, where you play as a professor who has to choose to take charge of one of the three houses at the Officers Academy. Each house specializes in different weapons and will no doubt present their own challenges: the Golden Deer house use bows, while the Black Eagles house wields magic and axes, and the Blue Lions house are good with spears. Each house also has a different house leader that you can get to know, as well as particular students for each. You’ll lead the students into the classic turn-based battles and help them hone their fighting styles. There's nothing quite like living out your very own Fire Emblem meets Hogwarts fantasy, and from the sounds of it, it'll be keeping you busy for a long time.
If that wasn’t enough for you, Fire Emblem: Three Houses is getting its own expansion pass, too.
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I started out writing for the games section of a student-run website as an undergrad, and continued to write about games in my free time during retail and temp jobs for a number of years. Eventually, I earned an MA in magazine journalism at Cardiff University, and soon after got my first official role in the industry as a content editor for Stuff magazine. After writing about all things tech and games-related, I then did a brief stint as a freelancer before I landed my role as a staff writer here at GamesRadar+. Now I get to write features, previews, and reviews, and when I'm not doing that, you can usually find me lost in any one of the Dragon Age or Mass Effect games, tucking into another delightful indie, or drinking far too much tea for my own good.