Awakening was intended to be the final game in the series unless the total sales exceeded 250,000 copies, and so the game was filled with homages and features of previous installments. This includes the return of the marriage and inheritance system from Genealogy of the Holy War, the branching promotion trees and free-roam world map of The Sacred Stones, the skill system from various games in the series, and the custom character from Shin Monshō no Nazo ~Hikari to Kage no Eiyū~. It also included references to previous installments, such as with Owain shouting out the titles of the previous games, the brands possibly referencing the Holy Blood system in Genealogy of the Holy War, and downloadable characters and maps from previous games.

In Frederick's A-support with the avatar, he says the line "my body is ready (avatar's name)! The next sample, if you please!", this is a reference to the E3 2007 Wii Fit demonstration where Reggie Fils-Amié said "my body is ready".

There are three mysterious landmasses on the map which are often assumed to be continents from previous games, however when connected they seem to form a separate Ylisse, the continent in which the game takes place.

It is unclear if this is intentional or simply due to recycled assets.

There is a glitch that causes Sumia to appear in the background of Lucina's reunion with Maribelle as her mother. Sumia says nothing during this scene.

Within the game's textures is a page that features the title "Create a new layer", and an extract of text taken from a tutorial site on how to create a header image in Adobe Photoshop.

If a character with Ignis attacks an enemy with this same skill, the visual damage effect will show a shower of flower petals. The reason behind this is more obvious in the Japanese version, as the skill's Japanese is Kaen (火炎), which roughly means "Magnificent Flame", but also uses the Kanji for flower (華).

In one of Priam's critical hit quotes, he shouts "For the Blue Flame!". This is a reference to the Japanese title of Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, ファイアーエムブレム 蒼炎の軌跡 (Faiā Emuburemu: Sōen no Kiseki), literally "Fire Emblem: Path of the Blue Flame".

Priam's Japanese name 'Paris' is the name Ike from Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance was originally planned to have. This is fitting, as Priam is a descendent of Ike.

If Gregor is Noire's father, in their C-Support conversation, Gregor remarks "Oy! What a horrible night to have curse, yes?", a reference to the infamous line from Castlevania II: Simon's Quest, "WHAT A HORRIBLE NIGHT TO HAVE A CURSE."

All of the children characters birthdays are also the Japaneses release dates of other Fire Emblem games.

If the audio language is set to Japanese, all of the children's critical/skill cut-in quotes are similar variations of their determinate parent's cut-in quote.

During the support conversation rank C with the avatar, Gaius will reference the movie "Taken." When Gaius thinks that the avatar is trying to blackmail him, he will say "If you're looking for ransom, I can assure you I don't have money, but what I do have are a particular set of honey cakes." This is a reference to the famous phone call scene from the film.

Although Naga the Divine Dragon is referenced in several Fire Emblem games, Awakening is the first installment of the series in which she is actually seen.

In the Western version of the Summer Scramble DLC (known as Summer of Bonds in Japan), the image of Tharja in her swimsuit was censored by having a cloth covering her rear.

In Inigo's paralogue, Inigo nicknames a local village girl "Buttercup." This is a reference to the Princess Bride's Buttercup and Inigo Montoya.

In Owain's support conversation with Inigo he makes several references to past Fire Emblem Games, such as Shadow Dragon and Radiant Dawn, and past characters like Eliwood and Shinon.

In the game's battle sequence and some cut scenes, the characters and enemies' feet are partially omitted.

Kellam, a character who, despite his large armor, blends into his surroundings and is often forgotten about while standing by as a joke throughout the game, is actually difficult to see in the box art, as he is in the distance and covered by other characters.

The map for Paralogue 18: The Dead King's Lament was originally created as an early test map for the game, and is a recreation of Chapter 1 of Book II of Fire Emblem: Mystery of the Emblem.

In an interview with Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata, it was revealed by the developers that they had originally pitched for the game to take place in the modern world, one setting "which has the sense of a fairy tale", and another that took place on the planet Mars. All three of these were rejected for being too drastic of a departure from the series.