Fire Emblem Heroes (Free) has already proven to be a smash hit for Nintendo, at one point topping even Clash of Clans and Game of War in the App Store’s Top Grossing charts. That said, the combination of a well-known brand and Nintendo’s name almost ensures that any release from the company will make a mark in the charts. What Nintendo has yet to pull off is keeping an app there. Though Fire Emblem has slid a little bit, it’s still doing quite well. In hopes of keeping that fire burning, Nintendo has sent out a notice detailing a few changes coming to the game in the next few weeks.

As mentioned, Fire Emblem Heroes has already started to cool off. There could be many reasons for that. Many players have long since plowed through the majority of the story missions, leaving little to do. The Arena mode has some serious balancing issues to work out, too. In general, the game doesn’t seem to scale well at the higher end. Stamina never increases even as the cost of attempting stages goes up, there’s no way to increase the size of your friend list, and ranking characters up requires an almost comical amount of an item that is relatively hard to come by. Not all of these points are addressed by the coming changes, but what’s here should alleviate some burdens.

• Units will be able to earn EXP even against units of significantly lower levels. Right now, if a unit has too many levels on their opponent, they won’t gain anything from attacking them.
• The App Release Bonus that gives players two summoning orbs per day is being extended to at least March 14th. That will give players at least another couple of 20-orb summon chances.
• The Worldwide Launch Celebration looks like it’s here to stay. That means stamina costs for the Training Tower will remain halved and equipping skills won’t cost any stamina. Extremely good call on this one, Nintendo. Charging players stamina to change their load-out was a baffling design choice and I’m happy no one is going to have to deal with that nonsense.
• Rewards will be added to the Training Tower starting from next Monday or Tuesday. What kind of rewards? Nintendo didn’t say. I hope it’s orbs. Or feathers. Or feather-orbs. Or orb-shaped feathers? I’m not picky here.

These are all good things, but I hope Nintendo has more content coming soon. All the changes in the world aren’t going to keep the game going if people feel like there’s nothing left to do but grind up their characters and pray they don’t run into a Takumi/Olivia train in the Arena. The core game is good enough to go the distance with proper support, and all of this is a good first step if nothing else. Let’s see if they can keep that old ball rolling.