Well I finally beat awakening. The one word I would use to describe the entire latter half of the game is this: Galeforce. It completely invalidates any difficulty once you unlock it and pass it onto your children. The only strategy I needed was to have Inigo charge down one flank and Severa the other, both with Galeforce, and watch as enemies broke themselves upon them, either missing entirely or doing next to no damage. I had a couple other users of it too, Maribelle, Brady, Lucina. Maribelle especially I was surprised by, she stayed relevant throughout the game. Hell I wouldn't have been able to OTK Grima without her doing the most damage between her, Inigo, and Severa with a Valflame I picked up somewhere. She's the only parent generation unit that was still relevant in my playthrough. "Relevant" sells her too short though, she carried hard, as hard as the above two.
I'm a big fan of the reunion feels trip that the children have with their parents, tears me up a lot it does, Inigo's especially. Which is why it annoys me that the Awakening trio would throw their kids into the deeprealm in Fates, it feels completely out of character. I think the story would have been a little better if the entirety of it revolved around trying to prevent the future apocalypse instead of fighting random wars until the last 2 or 3 chapters. They also could have handled Lucina's reveal with Chrom a little more... deftly. I was surprised they made no big deal out of it.
Last thing to mention would be the map design. Pretty boring, honestly. Feels very GBA era with how simple and uncomplicated the designs are -- enemies rush you, then you go kill the boss. I have to wonder how the map designs compare to the Tellius series, since that came before this. Really brings out the shine of Conquest's design.
