The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky the 3rd
released on Jun 28, 2007
The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky the 3rd
released on Jun 28, 2007
The final game in the Trails in the Sky trilogy and end of what is considered the 6th story of the The Legend of Heroes series. Join Kevin Graham and Ries Argent in their quest to retrieve an ancient artifact for the Septian Church. Featuring the largest cast of playable characters in the Trails series up to that point, new minigames, a stellar soundtrack by Falcom jdk Sound Team and even more gameplay features, Trails in the Sky the 3rd brings the Liberl arc story to an end while also teasing new plot developments across the continent of Zemuria.
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Kevin Graham, the GOAT.
This review contains spoilers
I hate this game. I am hating so hard on this game right now. I am confused why they made a trails game, which is a series known for having a lot of story, which has little story. This is a game where you go through the exact same dungeons you did in the last 2 games for 40 hours. Chapter 5's final boss can suck the fattest cock known to man kind, I hate getting petrified and then having to back out, put on the petrify immunity accesories and then do it again. Chapter 6 is like 15 hours long and filled with endless walking through empty dungeons from the last game. Chapter 7 started with me walking aimlessly then the game just decided that its time to proceed when I didn't do anything. I also clipped into the ground in chapter 7 because I was using fast forward and lost a lot of progress so be careful with that. Chapter 8 pulls a FF6 and makes you use all your party members, so have fun leveling and getting new equipment for literally every character.
The door mechanic is a lazy way to implement story that doesn't actually matter. I am not here to play a VN, this is a jrpg. Its like they gave up on trying to balance the story and gameplay and just said "fuck it, do it yourself". I personally don't care for these cutscenes, I don't need more character development in this game, I already have 100+ hours invested in these characters.
The characters trying to ship Agate and Tita together is absolutely fucking disgusting. Tita is a child and Agate is a grown adult, and Anelace, one of the other characters says that the age gap is nothing to their love. Ew, gross, I can put the Estelle and Joshua love thing aside because they aren't blood related and it's also just weird shit they do over in Japan that you get used to if you've watched enough anime. I didn't talk about this in my SC review but it's also gross how Agate uses Tita as a substitute for his dead little sister. His arc would've been a lot better if it was about him learning to cope with his loss and not just finding a new sister replacement.
I think Kevin's arc is interesting but I think Falcom struggles with displaying emotions through writing. I feel like they tackle these issues on a very surface level without getting too deep into. I don't know what they are afraid of, but they failed both times with Joshua and Kevin at making me feel anything for these characters. Like yea, Kevin feels like he should go to hell, and then literally goes to hell, but it falls flat, it doesn't truly express the despair Kevin is feeling to the player, or at least me personally.
Otherwise, in terms of story content, I struggle to understand how any of this is important. This is a fanservice game, they get all the characters together, write about whatever random bullshit they did between SC and 3rd and put them in doors, and repeat dungeons from the previous games. I just find FC the best, everything is new, every character doesn't hang out with you like they do in SC because like real people, they got stuff to do. The character dynamic between Estelle and Joshua was great, and fleshing out the world was great. SC gave me the impression they were gonna dig deep and make true on the promising writing of FC but then they just wrote shounen slop. Then 3rd is a nothing burger for fans, and 15% new content. At this point, I just want to get to crossbell. The combat system is stale with nothing new, the story is irrelevant and non-existant, the soundtrack is probably the weakest, and environments are painfully generic. My expectations are now in the gutter and I expect nothing from crossbell.
FC really did feel refreshing to play too. The combat system was weird but different and fleshed out thoughtout that one unlike SC and 3rd where it stagnates. The main character was a WOMAN. That never happened back when this was made, AND she is properly fleshed out. Olivier is bisexual??? Maybe, I am uncertain about this but he says a lot of things that made me think so. It was so different from the FF games where you play as a blond guy with his short black hair girl friend to kill god. FC did not end with killing god. I pray that the future games can capture some of those feelings I felt during FC and sharpen them.
The door mechanic is a lazy way to implement story that doesn't actually matter. I am not here to play a VN, this is a jrpg. Its like they gave up on trying to balance the story and gameplay and just said "fuck it, do it yourself". I personally don't care for these cutscenes, I don't need more character development in this game, I already have 100+ hours invested in these characters.
The characters trying to ship Agate and Tita together is absolutely fucking disgusting. Tita is a child and Agate is a grown adult, and Anelace, one of the other characters says that the age gap is nothing to their love. Ew, gross, I can put the Estelle and Joshua love thing aside because they aren't blood related and it's also just weird shit they do over in Japan that you get used to if you've watched enough anime. I didn't talk about this in my SC review but it's also gross how Agate uses Tita as a substitute for his dead little sister. His arc would've been a lot better if it was about him learning to cope with his loss and not just finding a new sister replacement.
I think Kevin's arc is interesting but I think Falcom struggles with displaying emotions through writing. I feel like they tackle these issues on a very surface level without getting too deep into. I don't know what they are afraid of, but they failed both times with Joshua and Kevin at making me feel anything for these characters. Like yea, Kevin feels like he should go to hell, and then literally goes to hell, but it falls flat, it doesn't truly express the despair Kevin is feeling to the player, or at least me personally.
Otherwise, in terms of story content, I struggle to understand how any of this is important. This is a fanservice game, they get all the characters together, write about whatever random bullshit they did between SC and 3rd and put them in doors, and repeat dungeons from the previous games. I just find FC the best, everything is new, every character doesn't hang out with you like they do in SC because like real people, they got stuff to do. The character dynamic between Estelle and Joshua was great, and fleshing out the world was great. SC gave me the impression they were gonna dig deep and make true on the promising writing of FC but then they just wrote shounen slop. Then 3rd is a nothing burger for fans, and 15% new content. At this point, I just want to get to crossbell. The combat system is stale with nothing new, the story is irrelevant and non-existant, the soundtrack is probably the weakest, and environments are painfully generic. My expectations are now in the gutter and I expect nothing from crossbell.
FC really did feel refreshing to play too. The combat system was weird but different and fleshed out thoughtout that one unlike SC and 3rd where it stagnates. The main character was a WOMAN. That never happened back when this was made, AND she is properly fleshed out. Olivier is bisexual??? Maybe, I am uncertain about this but he says a lot of things that made me think so. It was so different from the FF games where you play as a blond guy with his short black hair girl friend to kill god. FC did not end with killing god. I pray that the future games can capture some of those feelings I felt during FC and sharpen them.
Hey you. Yeah, you, the one that's thinking about skipping this game.
Don't even think about it twice. You will love it.
Don't even think about it twice. You will love it.
If you come in expecting Trails in the Sky Third Chapter, you might leave disappointed since it is quite different from FC and SC - most notably, you don't explore the world of Liberl, instead are trapped in an otherworldly dungeon for the entire game. That said, if you treat it as a half-epilogue, half-spinoff, it is maybe the best of the Sky games. Kevin and Ries are a bit more interesting protagonists than Joshua and Estelle, and the Sky combat is refined even further. The door system is an... interesting... choice as the game alternates between essentially a visual novel for hours at a time, and a dungeon-crawler, so the story/gameplay beats are more separate than in FC/SC, which holds it back in my opinion. It does give some nice closure to many of the Sky characters, allowing you to move on to the Crossbell and Erebonia arcs, while introducing new plot threads to be picked up later.
This game gave me so much whiplash at the start! It felt like it really wanted to be a videogame, and the opposite thing, at the same time. It's full of very gamey mechanics, but at some points it just goes "fuck playing games, read all this text for the next one/two hours". But man, was it all worth it.
I think I get what people see in this series now, and what other people don't. It's a series about all this through world-building, and seeing the individual journey of each character as they meet with others and go through various events and adventures in their life, in this world full of mysteries and intrigue. The games are so faithful to this formula, to the point you'll either fall in love and want to see more and more, or you'll just get bored. Of course it will also depend on how much you like each character, and while I can say they aren't all super original or crazy well written, there's a lot of value in the bigger picture: seeing this little (okay maybe not little) world unfold and develop before your eyes.
And this is what 3rd is all about. It's a world-building game. I see some people call it "filler". If one thinks so, I wonder what they are into this series for?! In the end, THIS is Trails. It's the little slice-of-life moments that make the people come alive and come together, it's the lore drops that brings questions and answers, and make you wonder about the past, present, and future of this world.
But enough meta-commentary, I wanna talk about the game too! The gameplay remains the same-old from the previous entry, though you have of course way more variety in terms of characters you can use. I only wish they added a few more new powerful quartz to use. I really like the dungeons set in the new locations in the Phantasma, but mostly because of their looks and music than the gameplay. However, the ones where you control multiple parties are super fun!
The story, as you can guess, is VERY plentiful in this entry, but of course in an extremely different way from previous games, as it's more about world and character building than progressing a plotline. It's a full-on buffet! It's amazing to have so many different characters get all that attention to them. And some plot points introduced leave your mouth watering for the future. And a specific one will break your heart and soul and leave you hollow inside. [ Received ⦿Nothingness. ]
The music is Falcom. Takeshita is my goat. Listening to his 3rd tracks reminded of Ys Origin and so my heartstrings have been tugged. "Recluse Cube" is such a mystic and wonderous track I couldn't help but not skip the game intro everytime because of it (thank you Sonoda). "Golden Road, Silver Road" is such a fun and endearing track, it's on my mind and keeps coming every now and then. It also played in a great dungeon so it can't be helped! And oh boy, there are so many great tracks I'd like to mention... It could be a review of the soundtrack on its own to be fair. But I'll finish with saying the final dungeon and boss tracks go above and beyond.
And on the topic of the final dungeon... What a climax to this game, and to the Sky trilogy. It was such a rich and heartful experience that I'm sure to never forget the feelings I had. The visuals, gameplay, and soundtrack all come together perfectly to enrich each other, to deliver you the kind of experience only games can, and they all should strive to do. "Castle of Illusions (Phantasmagoria)", absolutely one of my favorite Falcom tracks of all time. Thank you, kings. And a very special shoutout to the chest messages in there too, hehe.
It's a game that really makes you feel thankful. For all the artists, writers, programmers, musicians, translators, managers, QA people, marketers... And all the passionate people who live and breathe this series. I'm definitely one of them by now, and I'm here for this ride across Zemuria.
I think I get what people see in this series now, and what other people don't. It's a series about all this through world-building, and seeing the individual journey of each character as they meet with others and go through various events and adventures in their life, in this world full of mysteries and intrigue. The games are so faithful to this formula, to the point you'll either fall in love and want to see more and more, or you'll just get bored. Of course it will also depend on how much you like each character, and while I can say they aren't all super original or crazy well written, there's a lot of value in the bigger picture: seeing this little (okay maybe not little) world unfold and develop before your eyes.
And this is what 3rd is all about. It's a world-building game. I see some people call it "filler". If one thinks so, I wonder what they are into this series for?! In the end, THIS is Trails. It's the little slice-of-life moments that make the people come alive and come together, it's the lore drops that brings questions and answers, and make you wonder about the past, present, and future of this world.
But enough meta-commentary, I wanna talk about the game too! The gameplay remains the same-old from the previous entry, though you have of course way more variety in terms of characters you can use. I only wish they added a few more new powerful quartz to use. I really like the dungeons set in the new locations in the Phantasma, but mostly because of their looks and music than the gameplay. However, the ones where you control multiple parties are super fun!
The story, as you can guess, is VERY plentiful in this entry, but of course in an extremely different way from previous games, as it's more about world and character building than progressing a plotline. It's a full-on buffet! It's amazing to have so many different characters get all that attention to them. And some plot points introduced leave your mouth watering for the future. And a specific one will break your heart and soul and leave you hollow inside. [ Received ⦿Nothingness. ]
The music is Falcom. Takeshita is my goat. Listening to his 3rd tracks reminded of Ys Origin and so my heartstrings have been tugged. "Recluse Cube" is such a mystic and wonderous track I couldn't help but not skip the game intro everytime because of it (thank you Sonoda). "Golden Road, Silver Road" is such a fun and endearing track, it's on my mind and keeps coming every now and then. It also played in a great dungeon so it can't be helped! And oh boy, there are so many great tracks I'd like to mention... It could be a review of the soundtrack on its own to be fair. But I'll finish with saying the final dungeon and boss tracks go above and beyond.
And on the topic of the final dungeon... What a climax to this game, and to the Sky trilogy. It was such a rich and heartful experience that I'm sure to never forget the feelings I had. The visuals, gameplay, and soundtrack all come together perfectly to enrich each other, to deliver you the kind of experience only games can, and they all should strive to do. "Castle of Illusions (Phantasmagoria)", absolutely one of my favorite Falcom tracks of all time. Thank you, kings. And a very special shoutout to the chest messages in there too, hehe.
It's a game that really makes you feel thankful. For all the artists, writers, programmers, musicians, translators, managers, QA people, marketers... And all the passionate people who live and breathe this series. I'm definitely one of them by now, and I'm here for this ride across Zemuria.
I had a feeling this was going to amaze me in some way but damn I was not expecting some of those moments, especially Star Door 15.
Trails in the Sky the 3rd is a significant improvement compared to FC and SC, primarily because of how well-written the Protagonist is in this game. Kevin Graham is a really interesting character about whom I was inquisitive by the end of SC and he didn't disappoint at all.
Ries the female Protagonist is also really fleshed out and has a strong dynamic with Kevin that makes the pair work (unlike Estelle and Joshua).
Most of the other characters were just returning from previous games with very little to offer and the side stories didn't make them any better for me as I already don't like those characters and one backstory isn't enough for me to suddenly start liking them (except some).
Another fact I noticed in this game was how good Estelle and Joshua are as a supporting cast. I liked Estelle and Joshua here a lot more than I liked them in FC and SC. I am now excited for how their roles are gonna play out in the next couple of entries.
Still, I've got my issues with the game, the first half of the game can be very boring as very little is going on other than Kevin's backstory at the beginning of each chapter which keeps me intrigued to know what's to come. But the chapters themselves are not very well done until the second half of the game.
Also, this is supposed to be a Love Letter for the Liberl arc, while also wrapping the remaining plot points left after SC, but it's hard to enjoy this since I never really got into the characters in the first two games so another miss for me.
Another problem might be a personal one, but I'm not a fan of the dungeon crawler aspect of this game, it got boring real quick and I just didn't enjoy much of my playthrough because of that.
Finally, Trails delivered something that I had expecting from the series since the very first game. And while it took its sweet time, if they are gonna continue with this level of character writing and well-done backstories, then I am really interested in what's to come from the later games. Hopefully, they don't disappoint me as the First two games did.
Trails in the Sky the 3rd is a significant improvement compared to FC and SC, primarily because of how well-written the Protagonist is in this game. Kevin Graham is a really interesting character about whom I was inquisitive by the end of SC and he didn't disappoint at all.
Ries the female Protagonist is also really fleshed out and has a strong dynamic with Kevin that makes the pair work (unlike Estelle and Joshua).
Most of the other characters were just returning from previous games with very little to offer and the side stories didn't make them any better for me as I already don't like those characters and one backstory isn't enough for me to suddenly start liking them (except some).
Another fact I noticed in this game was how good Estelle and Joshua are as a supporting cast. I liked Estelle and Joshua here a lot more than I liked them in FC and SC. I am now excited for how their roles are gonna play out in the next couple of entries.
Still, I've got my issues with the game, the first half of the game can be very boring as very little is going on other than Kevin's backstory at the beginning of each chapter which keeps me intrigued to know what's to come. But the chapters themselves are not very well done until the second half of the game.
Also, this is supposed to be a Love Letter for the Liberl arc, while also wrapping the remaining plot points left after SC, but it's hard to enjoy this since I never really got into the characters in the first two games so another miss for me.
Another problem might be a personal one, but I'm not a fan of the dungeon crawler aspect of this game, it got boring real quick and I just didn't enjoy much of my playthrough because of that.
Finally, Trails delivered something that I had expecting from the series since the very first game. And while it took its sweet time, if they are gonna continue with this level of character writing and well-done backstories, then I am really interested in what's to come from the later games. Hopefully, they don't disappoint me as the First two games did.