of the game, they cross paths at several points of the story, allowing the player to switch allocations of fighters and items amongst the two groups. Runan's story follows a strict set of scenarios where he battles against an enemy empire, while Holmes' scenario allows for more freedom, allowing the player to ignore the main scenarios in favor of gathering treasure and increase the army's strength. Plot The game takes place on an island continent called Riberia, which had long been divided and ruled under four kingdoms. However, these kingdoms were destroyed by the evil Zoa Empire and its devil-worshipping ruler, and the island was starting to regress into a period of instability and darkness. The Rīve Kingdom was one of the four kingdoms of Riberia, and the first protagonist, , is the prince of Razelia; one of the principalities within the kingdom. After the fall of his father's principality, he escaped and went into hiding in a nearby port-town. This town also fell into the hands of the Empire, and Runan and , the prince of another one of the kingdom's principalities, retreat to the newly created Uelt Kingdom with a small contingent of troops. The two receive assistance from the Uelt king, and begin a long journey to destroy the evil empire. Development and release The origins of the game's development traces back to the creation of Nintendo and Intelligent Systems's Fire Emblem. The series was first created by Shouzou Kaga, who worked on the first five titles in the series, from 1990's Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light to 1999's Fire Emblem: Thracia 776. Upon the completion of the fifth title, Kaga decided to leave the company in order to work on games on his own. He founded a new company, Tirnanog in 2000, and shortly after announced their first title, the similarly titled Emblem Saga, for Nintendo's market rival Sony on their PlayStation console. The game was initially announced for a March 2001 release, though the game was later delayed to May 24 in order to polish up the gameplay and add some new content. Prior to the game's release, Tirnanog began receiving legal pressure from Nintendo, who were unhappy about making such an extremely similar game, in both name and concept, for their direct competitor, stating they felt that it "was used deliberately for promotional purposes...bringing false recognition to users". This led