This review contains spoilers
This game is an improvement from FC for sure but it's still very flawed for me.
For one thing, the pacing in the game is very bad. Every chapter until chapter 6 has the same repetitive structure of going to a country, an ouroboros member is causing problems, beat them, rinse and repeat. It's tedious. The game often doesn't even try to make these chapters feel distinct apart from chapters 3 and 5. The game is also filled with a ridiculous amount of backtracking which makes the tedium even worse.
Another thing is I did not personally vibe with Estelle and Joshua's dynamic very much. It had potential, but I didn't enjoy their personalities too much.
Estelle is a decent protagonist who's main characteristic is that she's optimistic no matter the situation she's placed in, and will also be a beacon of hope to everyone around her. That's a trope I'm typically fine with but Estelle doesn't do it in an interesting way imo. She lacks any flaws that would make her feel more grounded for me. By the end she didn't impress me much. Her dynamic with Renne was pretty good though and has a lot of potential moving forward in the series.
Joshua is a different beast entirely. He was incredibly disappointing especially with the amount of potential he had. He barely accomplished anything when he was separated from Estelle, and spends most of the entire game sitting on his airship instead. The game decided not to give more introspection for his character during his time alone which is a puzzling decision. Instead he either does very inconsequential things or just sits on his ass. Estelle reunites with Joshua again in chapter 6, and in that same chapter she convinces him to join her again, which I felt is very rushed as she essentially just talk no jutsus his lifelong trauma away. It overly simplifies what could have been an interesting exploration on his lack of self worth, and martyr complex. Joshua's dynamic with Loewe I liked quite a bit though.
Speaking of Loewe, he's by and large the best character of the game for me. Very enigmatic with a lot of presence, a cool design, and just being plain badass. His role in the story was very strong too as it greatly emphasizes the game's core message of forming connections with others and how doing that can enable people to walk towards a brighter future, free from tragedy. Loewe is the antithesis of that merely believing in "testing humanity's worth" by a trial with fire through conflict essentially. His clash of ideals with Joshua is one of the main highlights of the game despite it's very short runtime. Loewe's conclusion while rushed, is one of the few payoffs that worked for me. All in all a very good character.
This segues into another problem I have with this game where it spreads itself too thin by spending time on things that don't matter much while integral elements such as Joshua/Loewe dynamic and Weissman's motivations get barely any screentime to make them more impactful. Though for the former it still worked for the most part.
The other characters are somewhat improved in SC partly due to how some of the antagonists serve as foils to them which helps their characters get explored more. Though the execution of this I'm very iffy on. Scherazard and Zin's struggles are not handled well for me as it directly ties into their foils' storylines, which are barely present in the game to begin with. So it's hard for me to care about them. Agate gets a cool arc in chapter 5 and is an example of a well handled arc in this game. Olivier is fairly interesting though his story was backloaded at the very end, and didn't even show up for very much. Kloe didn't do anything particularly standout in this game which is disappointing as I decently enjoyed her character in FC and believed she had potential. Tita isn't all that great but she did her job servicing Agate's arc. Kevin is a standout character who is not only incredibly entertaining, but interesting as well. His scene where he kills Weissman really makes me excited for his character in 3rd.
The antagonists themselves were okay with the highlights being Loewe and Renne. Weissman was an underwhelming main villain for me. He barely had any screentime, and didn't do much with the screentime that he has. His motivations of basically wanting humanity to become ubermensches to stop all conflict was fascinating but it literally comes in the last hour of the game, and it more so feels like an excuse he's using to cause more suffering to people as he enjoys it.
All in all the story was fairly disappointing for me despite the huge potential it had.
The ost was fairly decent throughout with a few notable standouts like Silver Will which is often noted as being Loewe's theme.
As for the gameplay, it's very good. It is basically a mix of tactical RPG combat and traditional turned based JRPG combat, and it's great. You have to react to enemy arts as you can cancel them out which is cool. The gameplay is made easier with arts such as earth wall, which is borderline necessary for some fights. The enemies though are incredibly annoying with how they consistently spam status effects, and almost always operate as a group which makes it difficult sometimes to react to them. They also often pullout very cheap moves that can just one shot you without warning (looking at you Weissman). Hopefully the later games make the enemies less annoying. Really interested to see how the gameplay evolves from here.
Overall, I really wanted to like this game more especially given its near universal praise, but sadly it just has too many glaring issues for me to ignore. I am still very excited to experience 3rd and the later games as they looked very appealing to me.
For one thing, the pacing in the game is very bad. Every chapter until chapter 6 has the same repetitive structure of going to a country, an ouroboros member is causing problems, beat them, rinse and repeat. It's tedious. The game often doesn't even try to make these chapters feel distinct apart from chapters 3 and 5. The game is also filled with a ridiculous amount of backtracking which makes the tedium even worse.
Another thing is I did not personally vibe with Estelle and Joshua's dynamic very much. It had potential, but I didn't enjoy their personalities too much.
Estelle is a decent protagonist who's main characteristic is that she's optimistic no matter the situation she's placed in, and will also be a beacon of hope to everyone around her. That's a trope I'm typically fine with but Estelle doesn't do it in an interesting way imo. She lacks any flaws that would make her feel more grounded for me. By the end she didn't impress me much. Her dynamic with Renne was pretty good though and has a lot of potential moving forward in the series.
Joshua is a different beast entirely. He was incredibly disappointing especially with the amount of potential he had. He barely accomplished anything when he was separated from Estelle, and spends most of the entire game sitting on his airship instead. The game decided not to give more introspection for his character during his time alone which is a puzzling decision. Instead he either does very inconsequential things or just sits on his ass. Estelle reunites with Joshua again in chapter 6, and in that same chapter she convinces him to join her again, which I felt is very rushed as she essentially just talk no jutsus his lifelong trauma away. It overly simplifies what could have been an interesting exploration on his lack of self worth, and martyr complex. Joshua's dynamic with Loewe I liked quite a bit though.
Speaking of Loewe, he's by and large the best character of the game for me. Very enigmatic with a lot of presence, a cool design, and just being plain badass. His role in the story was very strong too as it greatly emphasizes the game's core message of forming connections with others and how doing that can enable people to walk towards a brighter future, free from tragedy. Loewe is the antithesis of that merely believing in "testing humanity's worth" by a trial with fire through conflict essentially. His clash of ideals with Joshua is one of the main highlights of the game despite it's very short runtime. Loewe's conclusion while rushed, is one of the few payoffs that worked for me. All in all a very good character.
This segues into another problem I have with this game where it spreads itself too thin by spending time on things that don't matter much while integral elements such as Joshua/Loewe dynamic and Weissman's motivations get barely any screentime to make them more impactful. Though for the former it still worked for the most part.
The other characters are somewhat improved in SC partly due to how some of the antagonists serve as foils to them which helps their characters get explored more. Though the execution of this I'm very iffy on. Scherazard and Zin's struggles are not handled well for me as it directly ties into their foils' storylines, which are barely present in the game to begin with. So it's hard for me to care about them. Agate gets a cool arc in chapter 5 and is an example of a well handled arc in this game. Olivier is fairly interesting though his story was backloaded at the very end, and didn't even show up for very much. Kloe didn't do anything particularly standout in this game which is disappointing as I decently enjoyed her character in FC and believed she had potential. Tita isn't all that great but she did her job servicing Agate's arc. Kevin is a standout character who is not only incredibly entertaining, but interesting as well. His scene where he kills Weissman really makes me excited for his character in 3rd.
The antagonists themselves were okay with the highlights being Loewe and Renne. Weissman was an underwhelming main villain for me. He barely had any screentime, and didn't do much with the screentime that he has. His motivations of basically wanting humanity to become ubermensches to stop all conflict was fascinating but it literally comes in the last hour of the game, and it more so feels like an excuse he's using to cause more suffering to people as he enjoys it.
All in all the story was fairly disappointing for me despite the huge potential it had.
The ost was fairly decent throughout with a few notable standouts like Silver Will which is often noted as being Loewe's theme.
As for the gameplay, it's very good. It is basically a mix of tactical RPG combat and traditional turned based JRPG combat, and it's great. You have to react to enemy arts as you can cancel them out which is cool. The gameplay is made easier with arts such as earth wall, which is borderline necessary for some fights. The enemies though are incredibly annoying with how they consistently spam status effects, and almost always operate as a group which makes it difficult sometimes to react to them. They also often pullout very cheap moves that can just one shot you without warning (looking at you Weissman). Hopefully the later games make the enemies less annoying. Really interested to see how the gameplay evolves from here.
Overall, I really wanted to like this game more especially given its near universal praise, but sadly it just has too many glaring issues for me to ignore. I am still very excited to experience 3rd and the later games as they looked very appealing to me.
This is essentially a 70 hour long JRPG finale and its absolutely awesome.
Trails never disappoint in the stories that they tell. This game compared to FC was so much better because this was the execution of everything that FC set up, and it was beautifully done. The only thing that falls off with the story is some chapters felt like they were in there to help I guess pad out the game a bit. The characters were all fantastic (Kevin is now of my favorite Trails characters ever). The combat is about the same as it was in the first game, but this game introduced the chain attacks (which are like the link attacks that later games established). The music was fantastic all the way through, and that is always good for a JRPG. In the end, I came in expecting grander, and I came out with the fulfillment of the joy that this series brings me so much.
This review contains spoilers
A substantial improvement over FC but still can't help over how disappointing it was in so many areas.
The Plot is not very well-paced. The first half of the game is filled with repetition and backtracking and is often predictable just like the first game. Even when it does pick up it's not all that impressive, as most of the moments don't leave a huge impact on me. But there are some big highlights, Leowe attacking Weissman and breaking that barrier, and Kevin killing Weissman in cold blood were some of them.
Most of the Characters this time have their full-fledged arcs, while most of them stood between either meh or okay.
Agate's arc was very well done and gives justice to his character, and Leowe playing an important role in it makes it even more interesting. But I think it'd been better without Tita being in it.
Zin and Scherazard's arcs were fine. It's how most JRPG arcs go. Kloe and Olivier's arcs were more like shoehorned in the plot and didn't really matter honestly as the whole political tension. Tita is just there and no one cares about her and they did not even bother to give her her own arc.
Leowe was by far the most interesting character and I was hooked to the screen whenever he made his appearance, he was well-written and executed really well as an antagonist compared to Weissman who was one of the most JRPG of all-time final bosses. Leowe's dynamic with each character was very interesting to see as well, especially with Estelle, Joshua, Renne, and Agate.
Speaking of Joshua, he is the most disappointing character in the whole game, while having a rich backstory and strong impressions by the end of FC, his role was little to none in the first half, and by the time he comes back into the party, he's back to being how he was before leaving. Even his return feels rushed and more to the point where writers just talk no jutsud him back in the party. His struggles were very little addressed in the beach scene and Estelle just tells him and he agrees.
All there's left is Estelle, well she was the main character so she must be the most well-written one right? WRONG. While I do not have a problem with Positive characters, they lose their charm real quick if there's nothing interesting about them. Estelle falls into that category, there were moments where it showed a potential development for her, but they all went to shambles by the end as all she ended up being was the "sun that guides everyone". receiving no development, and her motivations hardly getting questioned.
Also, I hate whenever a character starts talking about Cassius, he's the Ultimate Plot Convenience this game pulls, and has all the godly feats possible that even the legendary Dragon knows him. He is only available when the plot demands it, the rest of the time he is unavailable. Honestly, it would have been better to have killed him in the plot if they weren't going to properly utilize the trope.
Other than this I am also not a fan of how this game handles romance, or more like relationships in general. Estelle and Joshua started out as siblings but throughout the FC everyone around them shipped them and Estelle developed feelings for Joshua over that. This feels so wrong because their relationship actually felt sibling-like and they just changed it halfway through the game. I find it hard to understand how people call their romance well-written after this.
Agate and Tita have a similar case, Tita was supposed to be a Mischa-like presence in his life, and the way other party members ship them in Chapter 6 felt really uncomfortable considering Tita is a Minor and Agate is 24 years old.
I am not going to talk about the gameplay, the music, or the worldbuilding as they are just better than what was already good in the first game (And I am not in much of a mood to praise this game).
Trails in the Sky SC turned out to be a really disappointing experience as the prologue was very promising. Hopefully the last game in the Liberl Arc will redeem itself.
The Plot is not very well-paced. The first half of the game is filled with repetition and backtracking and is often predictable just like the first game. Even when it does pick up it's not all that impressive, as most of the moments don't leave a huge impact on me. But there are some big highlights, Leowe attacking Weissman and breaking that barrier, and Kevin killing Weissman in cold blood were some of them.
Most of the Characters this time have their full-fledged arcs, while most of them stood between either meh or okay.
Agate's arc was very well done and gives justice to his character, and Leowe playing an important role in it makes it even more interesting. But I think it'd been better without Tita being in it.
Zin and Scherazard's arcs were fine. It's how most JRPG arcs go. Kloe and Olivier's arcs were more like shoehorned in the plot and didn't really matter honestly as the whole political tension. Tita is just there and no one cares about her and they did not even bother to give her her own arc.
Leowe was by far the most interesting character and I was hooked to the screen whenever he made his appearance, he was well-written and executed really well as an antagonist compared to Weissman who was one of the most JRPG of all-time final bosses. Leowe's dynamic with each character was very interesting to see as well, especially with Estelle, Joshua, Renne, and Agate.
Speaking of Joshua, he is the most disappointing character in the whole game, while having a rich backstory and strong impressions by the end of FC, his role was little to none in the first half, and by the time he comes back into the party, he's back to being how he was before leaving. Even his return feels rushed and more to the point where writers just talk no jutsud him back in the party. His struggles were very little addressed in the beach scene and Estelle just tells him and he agrees.
All there's left is Estelle, well she was the main character so she must be the most well-written one right? WRONG. While I do not have a problem with Positive characters, they lose their charm real quick if there's nothing interesting about them. Estelle falls into that category, there were moments where it showed a potential development for her, but they all went to shambles by the end as all she ended up being was the "sun that guides everyone". receiving no development, and her motivations hardly getting questioned.
Also, I hate whenever a character starts talking about Cassius, he's the Ultimate Plot Convenience this game pulls, and has all the godly feats possible that even the legendary Dragon knows him. He is only available when the plot demands it, the rest of the time he is unavailable. Honestly, it would have been better to have killed him in the plot if they weren't going to properly utilize the trope.
Other than this I am also not a fan of how this game handles romance, or more like relationships in general. Estelle and Joshua started out as siblings but throughout the FC everyone around them shipped them and Estelle developed feelings for Joshua over that. This feels so wrong because their relationship actually felt sibling-like and they just changed it halfway through the game. I find it hard to understand how people call their romance well-written after this.
Agate and Tita have a similar case, Tita was supposed to be a Mischa-like presence in his life, and the way other party members ship them in Chapter 6 felt really uncomfortable considering Tita is a Minor and Agate is 24 years old.
I am not going to talk about the gameplay, the music, or the worldbuilding as they are just better than what was already good in the first game (And I am not in much of a mood to praise this game).
Trails in the Sky SC turned out to be a really disappointing experience as the prologue was very promising. Hopefully the last game in the Liberl Arc will redeem itself.
"I just think that living honestly, with that spark of life from others as your driving force...
That's what it means to live."
That's what it means to live."
This review contains spoilers
after playing fc, which I enjoyed a lot, I had high hopes for sc and this game really met these expectations
the start of this game was pretty slow tbh and things were gettin repetitive for the first 3 chaps, icl it wasn't a big problem for me and it shows by how long it took me to finish this game, I was locked in throughout the whole game, the party selection, combat, side quests and the main parts are all super fun in sc as well as fc, there's not much to complain about but a few pacing issues which I didn't really mind, for the trails games that i've played (only two lmao) you can tell things aren't meant to get good straight away and its more of a slow burn typa game
however, after chapter 5, things started to change and improve in quality drastically, things got really serious and i could not get off the game, literally this game got me sleeping for 3 hours max for the past week because so much stuff was happening and I was just locked in, there's so many moments in this game that you can choose from and are actually great, the end of chapter 6 and the final were def my fav parts in the game.
one of my favourite parts of the game is how each character gets their individual moments and amazing dynamics, trails is pretty cast heavy so there's a lot of characters to go over. Agate and Tita were probably my fav dynamic out of the side characters, they were so good in chapter 5. I don't think I really dislike anyone in the main cast they're all great and this is one of my favourite parts of the game.
a character that blew my mind apart from Estelle and Joshua is def Leowe, I could've spoken about many other characters like Schera or Oliver but Leowe is def a personal favourite, learning about his past and his own morals and ideologies really made me intrigued about his character and his conclusion was great, my goat fs. Also the main antagonist group, Ouroboros having direct and individual dynamics to the main cast was really cool, we see this especially in the axel tower where we have to defeat each of the members as a player, seeing how certain characters react/sympathise as well as understanding one and other was coolio. overall this game was amazing and I cant wait for the future trails installements, it would be hard to top this, can't wait for the 3rd, will start soon, very soon
also why are the monsters in this game so ugly bruh, I was looking up close to some of them and they're so ugly man
"I have no idea where this path will lead us... but I'm sure something awaits us at the end"
the start of this game was pretty slow tbh and things were gettin repetitive for the first 3 chaps, icl it wasn't a big problem for me and it shows by how long it took me to finish this game, I was locked in throughout the whole game, the party selection, combat, side quests and the main parts are all super fun in sc as well as fc, there's not much to complain about but a few pacing issues which I didn't really mind, for the trails games that i've played (only two lmao) you can tell things aren't meant to get good straight away and its more of a slow burn typa game
however, after chapter 5, things started to change and improve in quality drastically, things got really serious and i could not get off the game, literally this game got me sleeping for 3 hours max for the past week because so much stuff was happening and I was just locked in, there's so many moments in this game that you can choose from and are actually great, the end of chapter 6 and the final were def my fav parts in the game.
one of my favourite parts of the game is how each character gets their individual moments and amazing dynamics, trails is pretty cast heavy so there's a lot of characters to go over. Agate and Tita were probably my fav dynamic out of the side characters, they were so good in chapter 5. I don't think I really dislike anyone in the main cast they're all great and this is one of my favourite parts of the game.
a character that blew my mind apart from Estelle and Joshua is def Leowe, I could've spoken about many other characters like Schera or Oliver but Leowe is def a personal favourite, learning about his past and his own morals and ideologies really made me intrigued about his character and his conclusion was great, my goat fs. Also the main antagonist group, Ouroboros having direct and individual dynamics to the main cast was really cool, we see this especially in the axel tower where we have to defeat each of the members as a player, seeing how certain characters react/sympathise as well as understanding one and other was coolio. overall this game was amazing and I cant wait for the future trails installements, it would be hard to top this, can't wait for the 3rd, will start soon, very soon
also why are the monsters in this game so ugly bruh, I was looking up close to some of them and they're so ugly man
"I have no idea where this path will lead us... but I'm sure something awaits us at the end"
This review contains spoilers
Trails in the Sky SC is another one of those games that from an objective standpoint is probably a better game than its predecessor, but is missing some of the quirks from the original that I liked. Right off the bat, the pacing is way improved from the first game. For one, it doesn’t take 12 hours for the plot to kick off, and on top of that, the chapters are actually divided up in a way that makes sense. Second Chapter having ten chapters that last 3-5 hours as opposed to First Chapter’s five chapters that last 5-10 hours feels way better to play through in terms of pacing out one’s play sessions. Second Chapter also goes out of its way to give backstories to the majority of the main cast, in some cases drastically increasing my appreciation of the attached characters. I actually like Agate now, and Schera and Joshua… well, I still don’t love them, but I don’t hate them anymore, which is an impressive feat in and of itself, so props to the writers for pulling those ones off.
Where some of my gripes start to come in is with the plot itself. For Second Chapter they pivot away from First Chapter’s political drama and choose instead to focus on the secret society of Ouroboros. I found this sort of disappointing because even though most JRPGs have fantasy politics lingering somewhere in the background, rarely are they put right at the forefront of the conflict like they are in First Chapter, so it felt like something of a breath of fresh air for the genre. To choose to then pivot from there to the most generic sort of antagonist you can have, an undercover organization bent on world domination, seems a bit like wasted potential to me.
Additionally, while all of the protagonists are great, some of the supporting cast left something to be desired. Cassius is still astonishingly poorly written. This time around, not only does he know every important person in Liberl, but he’s also well-connected to politicians from other countries and is apparently on good enough terms with a LITERAL DRAGON DEITY to call in a favor right at the end of the game for one final Cassius ex machina. Dude is straight-up impervious to conflict. I feel like I’m going crazy because he is the most aggressively “Gary Stu” character I’ve ever seen and I haven’t seen anyone else online acknowledge it.
My burning hatred for Cassius Bright aside, I was also kind of disappointed with the Enforcers. Most of the game they were being set up as individual foils for members of the party, and I thought that was pretty cool, but come the end of the game when it’s time for them to explain their motives and they give some of the dumbest reasons I have ever heard. Even the game’s main antagonist, Weissman, has pretty shaky logic if you think about it for more than like, one second. It’s not a huge deal because none of this comes up until the final few hours, so you don’t get to linger on it for very long, but I thought I’d mention it anyway because it felt surprisingly stupid compared to the rest of the game’s writing.
Now two games in, the Trails series has been a solid time for someone like me who likes fantasy epic JRPGs, but I can’t help but feel it’s missing a little something to push it over the edge. As previously stated, I enjoy the main cast and their dynamic quite a bit, so I can only conclude that it’s the overarching narrative that feels a bit lacking. I wish it would push for some slightly more daring concepts or jarring plot twists. First Chapter’s ending and the stuff with Hamel come kind of close, but those feel more like exceptions to the rule than anything else. Knowing that Ouroboros remain the antagonists for the rest of the series, I’m not super hopeful this will happen, but hey, I hear Zero and Azure are really good, so maybe I’ll be pleasantly surprised.
Where some of my gripes start to come in is with the plot itself. For Second Chapter they pivot away from First Chapter’s political drama and choose instead to focus on the secret society of Ouroboros. I found this sort of disappointing because even though most JRPGs have fantasy politics lingering somewhere in the background, rarely are they put right at the forefront of the conflict like they are in First Chapter, so it felt like something of a breath of fresh air for the genre. To choose to then pivot from there to the most generic sort of antagonist you can have, an undercover organization bent on world domination, seems a bit like wasted potential to me.
Additionally, while all of the protagonists are great, some of the supporting cast left something to be desired. Cassius is still astonishingly poorly written. This time around, not only does he know every important person in Liberl, but he’s also well-connected to politicians from other countries and is apparently on good enough terms with a LITERAL DRAGON DEITY to call in a favor right at the end of the game for one final Cassius ex machina. Dude is straight-up impervious to conflict. I feel like I’m going crazy because he is the most aggressively “Gary Stu” character I’ve ever seen and I haven’t seen anyone else online acknowledge it.
My burning hatred for Cassius Bright aside, I was also kind of disappointed with the Enforcers. Most of the game they were being set up as individual foils for members of the party, and I thought that was pretty cool, but come the end of the game when it’s time for them to explain their motives and they give some of the dumbest reasons I have ever heard. Even the game’s main antagonist, Weissman, has pretty shaky logic if you think about it for more than like, one second. It’s not a huge deal because none of this comes up until the final few hours, so you don’t get to linger on it for very long, but I thought I’d mention it anyway because it felt surprisingly stupid compared to the rest of the game’s writing.
Now two games in, the Trails series has been a solid time for someone like me who likes fantasy epic JRPGs, but I can’t help but feel it’s missing a little something to push it over the edge. As previously stated, I enjoy the main cast and their dynamic quite a bit, so I can only conclude that it’s the overarching narrative that feels a bit lacking. I wish it would push for some slightly more daring concepts or jarring plot twists. First Chapter’s ending and the stuff with Hamel come kind of close, but those feel more like exceptions to the rule than anything else. Knowing that Ouroboros remain the antagonists for the rest of the series, I’m not super hopeful this will happen, but hey, I hear Zero and Azure are really good, so maybe I’ll be pleasantly surprised.
Sky SC has to be one of the few games I cried as the ending credits rolled not because the ending was sad but because I couldn't believe it was over.
There's a lot of flaws to Sky SC. Namely how formulaic the story was, the amount of backtracking near the end, and how stereotypically anime the Ouroboros Enforcers were.
However the storytelling and characters more than carried the entire game on its back. FC was essentially a 60 hour introduction to the Liberl arc and SC is where everything pays off. And the payoff is so, so worth it.
Estelle Bright is one of my favourite protagonists. She's incredibly well-written and her character development across both games, from a type naive airhead to a maturing young woman, sure of her path and the people she wants to walk beside, is incredible and completely believable.
All the characters in the game are so well written. It was never a drag to read through all the dialogue in the game because I love all these characters so much. Do yourself a favor and install the EVO voice mods. I can't imagine playing the game unvoiced. From Agate to Oliver to Kloe and Loewe, watching their struggles to find their own path was no less a delight than watching the magnetic relationship between Estelle and Joshua. And Estelle and Joshua's relationship is peak.
FC was a good JRPG. SC is something else entirely. I'm struggling to put it in words but something about how comfy the game was despite the raised stakes, the well written characters and their relationships with each other, the incredible writing, story and world building makes this something really special.
Congrats Falcom. I'm hooked. I'm playing the next 11(?) games in the series.
There's a lot of flaws to Sky SC. Namely how formulaic the story was, the amount of backtracking near the end, and how stereotypically anime the Ouroboros Enforcers were.
However the storytelling and characters more than carried the entire game on its back. FC was essentially a 60 hour introduction to the Liberl arc and SC is where everything pays off. And the payoff is so, so worth it.
Estelle Bright is one of my favourite protagonists. She's incredibly well-written and her character development across both games, from a type naive airhead to a maturing young woman, sure of her path and the people she wants to walk beside, is incredible and completely believable.
All the characters in the game are so well written. It was never a drag to read through all the dialogue in the game because I love all these characters so much. Do yourself a favor and install the EVO voice mods. I can't imagine playing the game unvoiced. From Agate to Oliver to Kloe and Loewe, watching their struggles to find their own path was no less a delight than watching the magnetic relationship between Estelle and Joshua. And Estelle and Joshua's relationship is peak.
FC was a good JRPG. SC is something else entirely. I'm struggling to put it in words but something about how comfy the game was despite the raised stakes, the well written characters and their relationships with each other, the incredible writing, story and world building makes this something really special.
Congrats Falcom. I'm hooked. I'm playing the next 11(?) games in the series.
im at a loss for words ngl this game is so peak i wouldve given this 6 star if i could
PEAKSTELLE. An amazing sequel with updated and more fun combat, as well as the story and characters becoming much better. It was so much fun to see Estelle grow and fight for what she loves, goated game.
I was pretty amazed by the story, if the first game was like slowly opening a box and looking around the room for all the keys, then this one was like finding out that the box was full of dynamite that's also all on fire.
I usually get suckered in whenever there's a bad guy group with some interesting varied characters.
Estelle is like the most likeable protagonist in the world which in a big part carries this and the previous game too for sure.
So yeah i think it's really good, very entertaining and gripping story, if you don't like slow games then none of the games in this series are for you and that's ok.
I usually get suckered in whenever there's a bad guy group with some interesting varied characters.
Estelle is like the most likeable protagonist in the world which in a big part carries this and the previous game too for sure.
So yeah i think it's really good, very entertaining and gripping story, if you don't like slow games then none of the games in this series are for you and that's ok.
"but garb!" the imaginary man in a green suit says to me, the representative of my millions of fans. "technically Trails in the Sky was supposed to be a two parter, and 3rd was made while crossbell was being straightened out! you can leave a legitimate review, saying how much you loved the game while still feeling like you experienced the whole thing!"
"nay..." i mutter aloud, causing the cute girl in front of me in my accounting class to glance at me awkwardly. "nay i tell you," this time spoken internally. "i shant write such a serious review quite yet..."
i think to myself "what is a funny short sentence i can write about the game that can garner me backloggd likes" all of a sudden i figured it out. the review that would get me the likes i deserve, the review that properly shows my wit and humor. one that nobody would find long, one that nobody would find unfunny. the perfect one sentence review.
She Trail on my Sky til i SC
"nay..." i mutter aloud, causing the cute girl in front of me in my accounting class to glance at me awkwardly. "nay i tell you," this time spoken internally. "i shant write such a serious review quite yet..."
i think to myself "what is a funny short sentence i can write about the game that can garner me backloggd likes" all of a sudden i figured it out. the review that would get me the likes i deserve, the review that properly shows my wit and humor. one that nobody would find long, one that nobody would find unfunny. the perfect one sentence review.
She Trail on my Sky til i SC
i love loewe and renne
i love sc
i love this game
this is real gaming that started this series and pushed it into favorites
i love sc
i love this game
this is real gaming that started this series and pushed it into favorites
My favorite JRPG of all time. Great story and characters, love the setting. The music from this entire franchise rules.
A much-needed and much-improved continuation of the first chapter. The gameplay can be really frustrating and the pacing is really weird at times, but the characters, story, and world are pretty great. The time spent with Estelle and the rest of the party around Liberl is fun, and the way in which you become familiar with them is done really well with serious attention to detail. I enjoyed it more than I thought I would and will be checking out the third game soon.
Trails in the Sky SC (second chapter) picks up immediately after the events of the first game so unfortunately it is hard to keep this completely free of spoilers for the first game, so if you want to avoid spoilers then advise to stop reading this after this paragraph. I’ll try and keep spoilers for SC out of it as much as possible. With that out the way, let’s dive into the journey that is Trails in the Sky SC.
Being a direct sequel and continuation of Trails in the Sky, SC carries over the majority of the first game’s gameplay, mechanics and areas. You’ve still got that rpg battle system with light strategy elements, side quests are still tied to the guild, and we’re still travelling around Liberl. A few new elements have been added, such as Chain Crafts that allow multiple characters to use CP to attack an enemy at once and Orbments have been upgraded to allow for more powerful spells to be learned.
While mechanically little has changed from the first game, it’s ultimately been used as the perfect foundation to craft a thrilling and engaging tale which would have been extremely difficult to do without that experience the first game leaves on you. The story picks up directly from where the first game left off. Estelle and her crew managed to prevent a coup, saving Liberl but the mysterious Weissman had revealed himself as the person behind people’s memories being messed up, unlocking Joshua’s memories of his horrific past causing Joshua to abandon Estelle to protect her as he finds a way to try and bring down the mysterious Society of Ouroboros. It leaves Estelle distraught and heartbroken having just realised her true feelings for Joshua and as such she sets out on a new journey to find Joshua as well as fight back against the Society who have done so much damage to the people she cares about. With Joshua leaving her life, it causes Estelle to realise just how much she has relied on him and she sets out on a special senior bracer training course before she sets out on her journey proper. There’s a strength to her character as she grows into the person who she wants to be, learning how to overcome her weaknesses as well as using her strengths better.
Once again the game takes its time to really get going. The bulk of the first half sees you visiting all the towns of Liberl again as you help them deal with mysterious phenomena that have been brought about by the Enforcers, high ranking powerful officers, of the Society. Having been to all these places before in the first game, there’s an attachment you have to their people that spurs you on through these revisits to help each town and take on the sidequests. It’s something strongly helped by the strength of writing that has gone into the worldbuilding and NPCs of this series and you get a lot of heartwarming moments because of it. Like one side quest saw me having to find a lost ring for a young engaged couple and there’s a moment later in the game where you can stumble into the chapel as they’re getting married and it’s beautiful. There’s an attention to detail here with its minor characters that is hard to think of another game that goes to these lengths.
Another strength of SC is how it takes the party members you have grown to love from the first game and adds so much more to them here as they peel back layers you never see coming. There’s heartwarming moments between Agate and Tita, shocking revelations surrounding the lovable Olivier, the difficult past of Schera, and Kloe finding her resolve to take her path forward. Plenty of the characters also have an Enforcer that they have a history with that brings so much more personal gravitas to the conflicts that are fought throughout the game. We also get a few new party members to use like the mysterious travelling priest Kevin as well as a few other surprise people that I won’t spoil here.
SC allows you to choose your party much more often than the first game did but also ends up taking one or two slots for mandatory characters during important story events so you end up with a nice middle ground that allows you to get use out of almost every character while letting you bring along your favourites more often.
With the stakes being much higher this time round, the game does offer a lot of scintillating moments with high action battles and brilliant use of the music to sell these moments as best they can with the little character models. There’s definitely a few moments where I was wishing for cutscenes to be used to further sell the intensity of these battles, but what they did with a limited budget was still incredible.
Let’s get onto my favourite part about the story this game tells: Estelle Bright. There is one surefire way to get me to love a character and that is by making them suffer through losing someone they love and the majority of this game is Estelle dealing with Joshua abandoning her. There’s moments where she visits an area where the two of them had a special moment and the game flashbacks to a scene from the first game and my gosh it brings the tears so easily. Estelle’s journey is full of moments I could relate to on a personal level. The way she keeps so much of her struggles to herself as her friends try to support her, the moments of self doubt and questioning if she’s on the right path, and ultimately the resolve to keep pushing forward despite how much she’s hurting, it’s all wonderful character moments. Her greatest strength is being able to use even the most hurtful and darkest moments to give herself motivation and strength to push forward in her goals instead of giving in to despair like many of the characters who oppose her. Like her mother dying is what inspired her to be a bracer and help others, Joshua leaving her inspired her to find the strength to not only bring him back but also take down the organisation that made him like this. Estelle is just this wonderful ball of optimism and positivity that is so infectious. Her ability to speak from her heart and reach others, no matter how far into despair they’ve fallen, and pull them out of that darkness is nothing short of incredible. At the end of the first game, Joshua described her as the sun, the person who brings warmth to others and he hit the nail on the head, Estelle is on another level with her kind heart. She still has moments of hotheadedness and will act rashly at times, but she’s come a long way from how she was in the first game, gaining much more confidence in her abilities as well as realising her strength in getting through to others. And of course, she still has her plethora of witty remarks and one liners that allows her to steal almost any scene she’s in. The tender moments she has warms my heart every time while her silly moments never fail to make me laugh. All this to say, I think Estelle is one of my favourite characters of all time, if not my new favourite (I need to give it time for my feelings to settle)
The story doesn’t quite wrap everything up. While it does give Estelle a fitting send off, it does leave the trails of plotlines to pick up in future titles, which could be disappointing for some but exciting for others. I wasn’t left feeling unsatisfied from what they left for future games to cover, instead I was enthralled by the journey, given incredible character development for everyone I could ask for and enough tidbits to make me excited for the potential future of other characters.
While there are few new areas to explore, the new areas that are included are genuinely amazing areas, particularly where the finale takes place, bringing in a particular trope I love. Dungeon designs are also a step up, with more interesting layouts to explore and some with traps to avoid. Music wise there are plenty of new songs that live up to the standard of the first game while all the old locations have their original catchy music.
Trails in the Sky SC builds upon the strong foundations of the first game to deliver a truly special and incredible experience that will live long in the memory. Fantastic character driven moments with plenty of surprises and heartwarming moments take this game on a level few can match as it carefully crafts a tale that will see you shed tears throughout its wonderful journey. SC not only left me with another game to add to my all time favourites list but also a character in Estelle Bright that I have grown to love on so many levels. What an experience and one I am so glad to have had.
Being a direct sequel and continuation of Trails in the Sky, SC carries over the majority of the first game’s gameplay, mechanics and areas. You’ve still got that rpg battle system with light strategy elements, side quests are still tied to the guild, and we’re still travelling around Liberl. A few new elements have been added, such as Chain Crafts that allow multiple characters to use CP to attack an enemy at once and Orbments have been upgraded to allow for more powerful spells to be learned.
While mechanically little has changed from the first game, it’s ultimately been used as the perfect foundation to craft a thrilling and engaging tale which would have been extremely difficult to do without that experience the first game leaves on you. The story picks up directly from where the first game left off. Estelle and her crew managed to prevent a coup, saving Liberl but the mysterious Weissman had revealed himself as the person behind people’s memories being messed up, unlocking Joshua’s memories of his horrific past causing Joshua to abandon Estelle to protect her as he finds a way to try and bring down the mysterious Society of Ouroboros. It leaves Estelle distraught and heartbroken having just realised her true feelings for Joshua and as such she sets out on a new journey to find Joshua as well as fight back against the Society who have done so much damage to the people she cares about. With Joshua leaving her life, it causes Estelle to realise just how much she has relied on him and she sets out on a special senior bracer training course before she sets out on her journey proper. There’s a strength to her character as she grows into the person who she wants to be, learning how to overcome her weaknesses as well as using her strengths better.
Once again the game takes its time to really get going. The bulk of the first half sees you visiting all the towns of Liberl again as you help them deal with mysterious phenomena that have been brought about by the Enforcers, high ranking powerful officers, of the Society. Having been to all these places before in the first game, there’s an attachment you have to their people that spurs you on through these revisits to help each town and take on the sidequests. It’s something strongly helped by the strength of writing that has gone into the worldbuilding and NPCs of this series and you get a lot of heartwarming moments because of it. Like one side quest saw me having to find a lost ring for a young engaged couple and there’s a moment later in the game where you can stumble into the chapel as they’re getting married and it’s beautiful. There’s an attention to detail here with its minor characters that is hard to think of another game that goes to these lengths.
Another strength of SC is how it takes the party members you have grown to love from the first game and adds so much more to them here as they peel back layers you never see coming. There’s heartwarming moments between Agate and Tita, shocking revelations surrounding the lovable Olivier, the difficult past of Schera, and Kloe finding her resolve to take her path forward. Plenty of the characters also have an Enforcer that they have a history with that brings so much more personal gravitas to the conflicts that are fought throughout the game. We also get a few new party members to use like the mysterious travelling priest Kevin as well as a few other surprise people that I won’t spoil here.
SC allows you to choose your party much more often than the first game did but also ends up taking one or two slots for mandatory characters during important story events so you end up with a nice middle ground that allows you to get use out of almost every character while letting you bring along your favourites more often.
With the stakes being much higher this time round, the game does offer a lot of scintillating moments with high action battles and brilliant use of the music to sell these moments as best they can with the little character models. There’s definitely a few moments where I was wishing for cutscenes to be used to further sell the intensity of these battles, but what they did with a limited budget was still incredible.
Let’s get onto my favourite part about the story this game tells: Estelle Bright. There is one surefire way to get me to love a character and that is by making them suffer through losing someone they love and the majority of this game is Estelle dealing with Joshua abandoning her. There’s moments where she visits an area where the two of them had a special moment and the game flashbacks to a scene from the first game and my gosh it brings the tears so easily. Estelle’s journey is full of moments I could relate to on a personal level. The way she keeps so much of her struggles to herself as her friends try to support her, the moments of self doubt and questioning if she’s on the right path, and ultimately the resolve to keep pushing forward despite how much she’s hurting, it’s all wonderful character moments. Her greatest strength is being able to use even the most hurtful and darkest moments to give herself motivation and strength to push forward in her goals instead of giving in to despair like many of the characters who oppose her. Like her mother dying is what inspired her to be a bracer and help others, Joshua leaving her inspired her to find the strength to not only bring him back but also take down the organisation that made him like this. Estelle is just this wonderful ball of optimism and positivity that is so infectious. Her ability to speak from her heart and reach others, no matter how far into despair they’ve fallen, and pull them out of that darkness is nothing short of incredible. At the end of the first game, Joshua described her as the sun, the person who brings warmth to others and he hit the nail on the head, Estelle is on another level with her kind heart. She still has moments of hotheadedness and will act rashly at times, but she’s come a long way from how she was in the first game, gaining much more confidence in her abilities as well as realising her strength in getting through to others. And of course, she still has her plethora of witty remarks and one liners that allows her to steal almost any scene she’s in. The tender moments she has warms my heart every time while her silly moments never fail to make me laugh. All this to say, I think Estelle is one of my favourite characters of all time, if not my new favourite (I need to give it time for my feelings to settle)
The story doesn’t quite wrap everything up. While it does give Estelle a fitting send off, it does leave the trails of plotlines to pick up in future titles, which could be disappointing for some but exciting for others. I wasn’t left feeling unsatisfied from what they left for future games to cover, instead I was enthralled by the journey, given incredible character development for everyone I could ask for and enough tidbits to make me excited for the potential future of other characters.
While there are few new areas to explore, the new areas that are included are genuinely amazing areas, particularly where the finale takes place, bringing in a particular trope I love. Dungeon designs are also a step up, with more interesting layouts to explore and some with traps to avoid. Music wise there are plenty of new songs that live up to the standard of the first game while all the old locations have their original catchy music.
Trails in the Sky SC builds upon the strong foundations of the first game to deliver a truly special and incredible experience that will live long in the memory. Fantastic character driven moments with plenty of surprises and heartwarming moments take this game on a level few can match as it carefully crafts a tale that will see you shed tears throughout its wonderful journey. SC not only left me with another game to add to my all time favourites list but also a character in Estelle Bright that I have grown to love on so many levels. What an experience and one I am so glad to have had.
This game isn't really a sequel but rather the second part of a cohesive whole. It takes all the good parts of the first game and improves on them. My love for the franchise grows as I continue to get to know the whole world from the lighthouse keeper to the friendly airship engineer.
Trails SC : A Mixed Bag of Goodness
(This serves as both a review of FC an SC but the rating is for SC)
The Trails series is one that I wanted to try out for a while now, Falcom is an historic company that was for the most part in advance for its time no matter the era you're looking into but never got the success of exposure of companies like Squaresoft, Enix, Bandai Namco or even Atlus despite their huge catalog.
So far my journey had led me to try out a few of the Ys titles which were a pretty pleasant experience if you can handle the crust of some of the earlier titles but the series they're probably more known for is the Legend of Heroes series and most importantly the "Trails" subseries of games which by that point is its own beast of its own much like Persona has become independent from the SMT series.
One year and an half ago, I played through Trails in the Sky FC and thought it was an alright game honestly, mind you nothing truly mind blowing but it has a lot of charms and the simple nature of the story that continuously build up to one big bombastic finale , it is a slow game that made me think of older Dragon Quest titles were you go around the world solving little cases here and there while discovering the world along Joshua and Estelle who are simply put one of the most iconic pair in JRPG history at least to me. Estelle and Joshua but much more so Estelle are absolutely great. They don't truly fit the typical JRPG protagonist role which was quite refreshing to see, Estelle for example is an absolutely fantastic exemple of a strong female character that doesn't fall into the "too cool for school woman that needs no man" mentality that is seen way too much with this type of character, she's a spunky tomboy who kicks ass, take no shit from anyone and will often times make quirky sarcastic remarks to mock the different antagonists with a stick up their ass.
The rest of the cast is also really damn nice, not all of them are created equal mind you, Agate and Zin barely have any screen time and barely anything resembling a character arc in FC but this is something that the sequel does fix a little. My absolute favorite character to me is Olivier, he's just a random sexually ambiguous spoony bard with an heart of gold ans a passion for beauty and grace that makes him so corny yet so enjoyable and every time he was on screen was a good time (which is why he stayed for a long while in my party during SC, I just love the dude that much on top of also being an excellent spellcaster).
The alchemy between these characters and the little moments most of the cast has together especially in SC makes you attached to these characters almost instantly and since FC was the introduction, SC does expand on them and put some neat little twist on them. This is of course served wonderfully by the dialogues which are written in such a snappy and natural way, these characters speaks like human people and not actors on a play like most JRPG tend to do (which mind you isn't a bad style just a different one) and it fits the tone of the game perfectly, no matter how casual the dialogues between party members or NPC's tend to be, there's always something to look forward to.
Which leads me to talk about another one of the series strong point, its sense of cohesion and attention to detail for the most part of FC you're going on your little adventure minding your own buisness and are only introduced to serious stuff at the end of the game making you feel like a single unit in a vast world, in a way Trails pulls off something that reminded me of Durarara (a pretty damn cool show, if you can handle the concept being kinda wanky), even if you're a bunch of JRPG protagonist with important roles and stuff, do know that every single member of the world live lives that are about as complex and intricate as you ! Each NPC in the game has a name and some of them even have small little character arc , yeah totally faceless random NPC becomes more interesting because you get to see them throughout the course of the game either during the sidequest when they ask you something or just by randomly talking to them, the world feels dynamic and alive and I'd say that the way trails introduces his worldbuilding is buttery smooth and rarely revolves around pointless infodump, there's truly a delicious amount of hidden lore that you can only find if you go out of your way to find it, there's a local newspaper for exemple that talks about what has been going on in the background while you were doing JRPG protag thing and the NPC's themselves always have something new to say and different reaction and routine in response to events of the story (FOR FUCK SAKE EVEN THE EMPTY CHESTS HAVE LORE).
This of course is one of the game strongest aspect and what made it so in advance for its time, that does mean that you probably gonna miss a lot of things by the end but the game make sure you at least retain the finer details in a way that feels satisfying enough.
The sequel SC also continues these little subplots from the first game and most of the NPC's you go to will remember you for what you helped them with in the previous game thanks to the transferable data between each games changing some small stuff here and there.
Gameplay wise, the game certainly does have some depth to its battle system but playing on normal I felt was piss easy and I only had trouble during the final boss of the game and some encounters during side quests, the exploration was also fairly simple but there's definitely a huge issue with back tracking between places which is something you will do a lot especially if like me, you're the type of person to do all the side content (which the game kinda pushes you to do anyway since it's the only effective way to gain money without fucking you over gameplay wise and they go from "cool" to mediocre to borderline insanely tedious at times).
The dungeon layouts are pretty barebones and often times confusing with the rotating camera that can disorient you if you're not paying attention and they're basically just huge caves with monsters in them , nothing truly standout in that area but Liberl does have tons of charm as a region visually. The game kinda looks like an evolution of games like Grandia mixed with Digimon World 2003 aesthetically and while it might not please everyone, it does give the game a very relaxing and comfortable vibe to it and honestly I'm a sucker for minimalism and chibi models usually.
But at the end of the day, despite my praises and the flaws I mentioned , I'd say that FC was a decent and fun experience that I did end up having some fondness for while looking back on it after a year.
Yeah I did wait a solid year and an half to finally dive into SC properly, not because I didn't want to play the game (in fact who the fuck would not want to play the second one immediately after the big reveal at the end of FC seriously) but because a lot of things came in the way and I just forgot about it and became a Muv-Luv fan instead (which I dunno if it's honestly better than becoming a Kiseki fanboy lmao).
But honestly I didn't feel the need to replay FC to refresh my memories and attachment to the cast, after all JP people had to wait 2 years for this game and English people had to wait 4 between the first and second chapter translation so my situation while being far from ideal is actually closer to the intended rhythm you're supposed to play these games with and beside the game will constantly remind you of what happened in FC and the characters are as good if not better than they were in FC.
I'm not gonna expand on the points mentioned above since I do think SC retains a lot of the same qualities as FC in terms of its writing and general "kiseki" vibe BUT THE FLAWS SHINES WAY MORE IN THIS SEQUEL THAN THEY SHOULD DO.
The game is the very definition of padding the fuck out of a story that could honestly have been told in less than the required 100h of game it took me to complete it, if the first game was around the 50h mark which was decent to say the least, this game is LONG and doesn't really respect your time with all the shit it's pulling at you.
The first half of the game is especially dreadful and if I have one word to describe the SC experience it's definitely "redundancy", the first 5 chapters of the game follows a structure that I swear makes it more boring than literally anything happening in FC which isn't much. The game pretty much makes you go on a second tour of Liberl where you have to solve cases related to Ouroboros the new group of antagonist to this game, so yeah you thought the first game was build up and character introduction ? Well fuck you here's even more build up and this time the formula gets tiring very fast, this second round of Liberl does make for some cool and cute scenes of nostalgic melancholy of your journey in FC at times but these moments are so few and far between that the entire package feels like it could've been delivered in a better way.
Because the game is a direct sequel, you do explore literally all the same maps and dungeon you've been backtracking endlessly already in the first game, but this time you double the backtracking and divide the fun by zero because while in the first game you were discovering these places, in SC you're pretty much dragging your ass through all of the same content and the game will not let you continue unless you do so, so prepare yourself to do all of that shit all over again. And the villain of the week formula truly doesn't help, most of the chapters follows a similar structure that gets old very very fast.
SC plot structure is like
-Go to Place
-"Oh no something is making people shit themselves"
-"Oh my god what could it be?"
-"It's ouroboros but I'm not sure..."
millions of fetch quest later
-"It was Ouroboros"
-"HAHAHA I'M POOPWINKLE THE DICKWINKLE ENFORCER N°69 OF OUROBOZOS FIGHT A RANDOM TRASH MOB FOR ABSOLUTELY NO REASON"
-Repeat
This is literally the first half of the game and mind you by the time you're over with chapter 5, you've already sinked 60h into the game and almost no important plot progression has happened outside of a few more intimate scenes between characters which are for the most part really good, in order to even access that good content, you have to put up with so much tedium that you could fill an entire mine with it. It also truly doesn't help that outside of Loewe (and maybe Renne), the Ourobozos actually are a rather pathetic attempt at the vilain organization trope, they're pretty ridiculous and corny and rarely ever fun to interact with, It's cool that some of them have connections to some of your party members , making for some cool scene but the group itself are pretty barebone and generic anime villain, which is insane considering the original game had Richard which was quite honestly an amazing vilain with great motivations and which ideals and goals fitted with the nuanced and grounded world Liberl is. Meanwhile at depressed chuuni boomers with world domination fetish, we're so evil that the main bad guy has to play to organ in a very clearly evil manner to remind you how evil they are, the subtlety has been thrown out the fucking window with these clowns being around and since they're the main center of attention and source of conflict within the narrative, suffice to say that it makes them as ridiculous as they sound and even Estelle mocks them constantly at how bad they are, really going from Richard to some cartoon network villain , is truly saddening.
There's little to no variety in the plot and it fucking drags as fuck, fortunately once you gain back Joshua, the game starts to pick up again and the rythm becomes somewhat consistent but there's still a lot of needlessly long and stretched out gameplay section, chapter 7 and chapter 8 could've honestly been both a series of cutscenes but no, in chapter 7 you go through the 4 towers to defeat the 4 bad guys, so you're dragging your ass through 4 very similar looking dungeon to defeat one bad guy and maybe have a cool scene or two and chapter 8 tries to do the "world of ruin" bits from FF VI but instead of it being a major event that changes not only how you approach the world but also the tone of the game , it's another way to drag you through all the same location for more backtracking but this time WITHOUT YOUR SPELLS because we gotta keep shit RP. The chapter ends on a pretty high not tho so it's not entirely wasted.
The final chapter is actually really damn nice even if again, it needlessly drag, it's like Falcom was scared that the game wouldn't have been worth our money if each chapters wasn't at least 10h long to go through but some other JRPG's can tell much more and much more meaningful stuff in less than the time and with less the tedium while keeping the variety afloat.
Which this whole thing is a shame because story wise, SC does deliver on a lot more emotional bits than FC and brings closure to almost every characters and subplot almost perfectly while introducing new cool characters to booth, I liked Renne and Kevin the most out of the new characters and much like Estelle I damn wish Renne wasn't part of Ourobozos because she clearly deserves better than being indoctrinated by an evil organization which goals and ideals are...
Well I don't know and the game never truly expands on that actually..., I guess it's part of the continuous narrative of the series to answer all of these questions but if that's the case then let me tell you that the introduction of that plot was less than optimal cause the most memorable thing about them would be the Weissman plotwist in FC and nothing else so far (and it's insane the game actually tries to make a case for Estelle joining them but they barely gave any valuable reasons to do so...)
Loewe honestly should've been the final antagonist of the game by a land mile and he was done so dirty by Falcom at the end, he should've killed Weissman and carry the plan himself like any good villain sidekick do in a JRPG especially since he doesn't like the guy all that much anyway and also he's just way more cool and has still one of the sickest battle theme ever, that would've made for a way more meaningful and cathartic final confrontation imo.
Some scenes in the back half of the game makes it worth it but there was probably another way to go around some of the most tedious bits of the game I think and some corners could've honestly been cut or reworked in a way to be more digestible.
I'd say that yes, SC was overall a less enjoyable experience than FC because FC at least had qualities that SC doesn't ruin by needless padding, the plot does deliver a lot more but it's truly the structure that make or break this game. Estelle has great character development and is probably the best aspect of the game storywise honestly, she matures without having a drastic change in character too much and becomes able to empathize with way more complex situation than her and we go on this journey along with her.
SC overall is about as good as FC quality wise but the flaws are that much more prevalent and by the time I approached the ending, I really wanted this to end already which is honestly never a good sign.
So yeah, looks like despite some genuine qualities, I ain't gonna rate this game highly in my mind or even in my heart and it's a damn shame since I truly wanted to enjoy this experience to the fullest and I still love the cast and a lot of the neat stuff the game does with its world and characters, I hope 3rd changes my mind on the series for me to consider going forward with it.
TL;DR : Estelle is Bestelle
(This serves as both a review of FC an SC but the rating is for SC)
The Trails series is one that I wanted to try out for a while now, Falcom is an historic company that was for the most part in advance for its time no matter the era you're looking into but never got the success of exposure of companies like Squaresoft, Enix, Bandai Namco or even Atlus despite their huge catalog.
So far my journey had led me to try out a few of the Ys titles which were a pretty pleasant experience if you can handle the crust of some of the earlier titles but the series they're probably more known for is the Legend of Heroes series and most importantly the "Trails" subseries of games which by that point is its own beast of its own much like Persona has become independent from the SMT series.
One year and an half ago, I played through Trails in the Sky FC and thought it was an alright game honestly, mind you nothing truly mind blowing but it has a lot of charms and the simple nature of the story that continuously build up to one big bombastic finale , it is a slow game that made me think of older Dragon Quest titles were you go around the world solving little cases here and there while discovering the world along Joshua and Estelle who are simply put one of the most iconic pair in JRPG history at least to me. Estelle and Joshua but much more so Estelle are absolutely great. They don't truly fit the typical JRPG protagonist role which was quite refreshing to see, Estelle for example is an absolutely fantastic exemple of a strong female character that doesn't fall into the "too cool for school woman that needs no man" mentality that is seen way too much with this type of character, she's a spunky tomboy who kicks ass, take no shit from anyone and will often times make quirky sarcastic remarks to mock the different antagonists with a stick up their ass.
The rest of the cast is also really damn nice, not all of them are created equal mind you, Agate and Zin barely have any screen time and barely anything resembling a character arc in FC but this is something that the sequel does fix a little. My absolute favorite character to me is Olivier, he's just a random sexually ambiguous spoony bard with an heart of gold ans a passion for beauty and grace that makes him so corny yet so enjoyable and every time he was on screen was a good time (which is why he stayed for a long while in my party during SC, I just love the dude that much on top of also being an excellent spellcaster).
The alchemy between these characters and the little moments most of the cast has together especially in SC makes you attached to these characters almost instantly and since FC was the introduction, SC does expand on them and put some neat little twist on them. This is of course served wonderfully by the dialogues which are written in such a snappy and natural way, these characters speaks like human people and not actors on a play like most JRPG tend to do (which mind you isn't a bad style just a different one) and it fits the tone of the game perfectly, no matter how casual the dialogues between party members or NPC's tend to be, there's always something to look forward to.
Which leads me to talk about another one of the series strong point, its sense of cohesion and attention to detail for the most part of FC you're going on your little adventure minding your own buisness and are only introduced to serious stuff at the end of the game making you feel like a single unit in a vast world, in a way Trails pulls off something that reminded me of Durarara (a pretty damn cool show, if you can handle the concept being kinda wanky), even if you're a bunch of JRPG protagonist with important roles and stuff, do know that every single member of the world live lives that are about as complex and intricate as you ! Each NPC in the game has a name and some of them even have small little character arc , yeah totally faceless random NPC becomes more interesting because you get to see them throughout the course of the game either during the sidequest when they ask you something or just by randomly talking to them, the world feels dynamic and alive and I'd say that the way trails introduces his worldbuilding is buttery smooth and rarely revolves around pointless infodump, there's truly a delicious amount of hidden lore that you can only find if you go out of your way to find it, there's a local newspaper for exemple that talks about what has been going on in the background while you were doing JRPG protag thing and the NPC's themselves always have something new to say and different reaction and routine in response to events of the story (FOR FUCK SAKE EVEN THE EMPTY CHESTS HAVE LORE).
This of course is one of the game strongest aspect and what made it so in advance for its time, that does mean that you probably gonna miss a lot of things by the end but the game make sure you at least retain the finer details in a way that feels satisfying enough.
The sequel SC also continues these little subplots from the first game and most of the NPC's you go to will remember you for what you helped them with in the previous game thanks to the transferable data between each games changing some small stuff here and there.
Gameplay wise, the game certainly does have some depth to its battle system but playing on normal I felt was piss easy and I only had trouble during the final boss of the game and some encounters during side quests, the exploration was also fairly simple but there's definitely a huge issue with back tracking between places which is something you will do a lot especially if like me, you're the type of person to do all the side content (which the game kinda pushes you to do anyway since it's the only effective way to gain money without fucking you over gameplay wise and they go from "cool" to mediocre to borderline insanely tedious at times).
The dungeon layouts are pretty barebones and often times confusing with the rotating camera that can disorient you if you're not paying attention and they're basically just huge caves with monsters in them , nothing truly standout in that area but Liberl does have tons of charm as a region visually. The game kinda looks like an evolution of games like Grandia mixed with Digimon World 2003 aesthetically and while it might not please everyone, it does give the game a very relaxing and comfortable vibe to it and honestly I'm a sucker for minimalism and chibi models usually.
But at the end of the day, despite my praises and the flaws I mentioned , I'd say that FC was a decent and fun experience that I did end up having some fondness for while looking back on it after a year.
Yeah I did wait a solid year and an half to finally dive into SC properly, not because I didn't want to play the game (in fact who the fuck would not want to play the second one immediately after the big reveal at the end of FC seriously) but because a lot of things came in the way and I just forgot about it and became a Muv-Luv fan instead (which I dunno if it's honestly better than becoming a Kiseki fanboy lmao).
But honestly I didn't feel the need to replay FC to refresh my memories and attachment to the cast, after all JP people had to wait 2 years for this game and English people had to wait 4 between the first and second chapter translation so my situation while being far from ideal is actually closer to the intended rhythm you're supposed to play these games with and beside the game will constantly remind you of what happened in FC and the characters are as good if not better than they were in FC.
I'm not gonna expand on the points mentioned above since I do think SC retains a lot of the same qualities as FC in terms of its writing and general "kiseki" vibe BUT THE FLAWS SHINES WAY MORE IN THIS SEQUEL THAN THEY SHOULD DO.
The game is the very definition of padding the fuck out of a story that could honestly have been told in less than the required 100h of game it took me to complete it, if the first game was around the 50h mark which was decent to say the least, this game is LONG and doesn't really respect your time with all the shit it's pulling at you.
The first half of the game is especially dreadful and if I have one word to describe the SC experience it's definitely "redundancy", the first 5 chapters of the game follows a structure that I swear makes it more boring than literally anything happening in FC which isn't much. The game pretty much makes you go on a second tour of Liberl where you have to solve cases related to Ouroboros the new group of antagonist to this game, so yeah you thought the first game was build up and character introduction ? Well fuck you here's even more build up and this time the formula gets tiring very fast, this second round of Liberl does make for some cool and cute scenes of nostalgic melancholy of your journey in FC at times but these moments are so few and far between that the entire package feels like it could've been delivered in a better way.
Because the game is a direct sequel, you do explore literally all the same maps and dungeon you've been backtracking endlessly already in the first game, but this time you double the backtracking and divide the fun by zero because while in the first game you were discovering these places, in SC you're pretty much dragging your ass through all of the same content and the game will not let you continue unless you do so, so prepare yourself to do all of that shit all over again. And the villain of the week formula truly doesn't help, most of the chapters follows a similar structure that gets old very very fast.
SC plot structure is like
-Go to Place
-"Oh no something is making people shit themselves"
-"Oh my god what could it be?"
-"It's ouroboros but I'm not sure..."
millions of fetch quest later
-"It was Ouroboros"
-"HAHAHA I'M POOPWINKLE THE DICKWINKLE ENFORCER N°69 OF OUROBOZOS FIGHT A RANDOM TRASH MOB FOR ABSOLUTELY NO REASON"
-Repeat
This is literally the first half of the game and mind you by the time you're over with chapter 5, you've already sinked 60h into the game and almost no important plot progression has happened outside of a few more intimate scenes between characters which are for the most part really good, in order to even access that good content, you have to put up with so much tedium that you could fill an entire mine with it. It also truly doesn't help that outside of Loewe (and maybe Renne), the Ourobozos actually are a rather pathetic attempt at the vilain organization trope, they're pretty ridiculous and corny and rarely ever fun to interact with, It's cool that some of them have connections to some of your party members , making for some cool scene but the group itself are pretty barebone and generic anime villain, which is insane considering the original game had Richard which was quite honestly an amazing vilain with great motivations and which ideals and goals fitted with the nuanced and grounded world Liberl is. Meanwhile at depressed chuuni boomers with world domination fetish, we're so evil that the main bad guy has to play to organ in a very clearly evil manner to remind you how evil they are, the subtlety has been thrown out the fucking window with these clowns being around and since they're the main center of attention and source of conflict within the narrative, suffice to say that it makes them as ridiculous as they sound and even Estelle mocks them constantly at how bad they are, really going from Richard to some cartoon network villain , is truly saddening.
There's little to no variety in the plot and it fucking drags as fuck, fortunately once you gain back Joshua, the game starts to pick up again and the rythm becomes somewhat consistent but there's still a lot of needlessly long and stretched out gameplay section, chapter 7 and chapter 8 could've honestly been both a series of cutscenes but no, in chapter 7 you go through the 4 towers to defeat the 4 bad guys, so you're dragging your ass through 4 very similar looking dungeon to defeat one bad guy and maybe have a cool scene or two and chapter 8 tries to do the "world of ruin" bits from FF VI but instead of it being a major event that changes not only how you approach the world but also the tone of the game , it's another way to drag you through all the same location for more backtracking but this time WITHOUT YOUR SPELLS because we gotta keep shit RP. The chapter ends on a pretty high not tho so it's not entirely wasted.
The final chapter is actually really damn nice even if again, it needlessly drag, it's like Falcom was scared that the game wouldn't have been worth our money if each chapters wasn't at least 10h long to go through but some other JRPG's can tell much more and much more meaningful stuff in less than the time and with less the tedium while keeping the variety afloat.
Which this whole thing is a shame because story wise, SC does deliver on a lot more emotional bits than FC and brings closure to almost every characters and subplot almost perfectly while introducing new cool characters to booth, I liked Renne and Kevin the most out of the new characters and much like Estelle I damn wish Renne wasn't part of Ourobozos because she clearly deserves better than being indoctrinated by an evil organization which goals and ideals are...
Well I don't know and the game never truly expands on that actually..., I guess it's part of the continuous narrative of the series to answer all of these questions but if that's the case then let me tell you that the introduction of that plot was less than optimal cause the most memorable thing about them would be the Weissman plotwist in FC and nothing else so far (and it's insane the game actually tries to make a case for Estelle joining them but they barely gave any valuable reasons to do so...)
Loewe honestly should've been the final antagonist of the game by a land mile and he was done so dirty by Falcom at the end, he should've killed Weissman and carry the plan himself like any good villain sidekick do in a JRPG especially since he doesn't like the guy all that much anyway and also he's just way more cool and has still one of the sickest battle theme ever, that would've made for a way more meaningful and cathartic final confrontation imo.
Some scenes in the back half of the game makes it worth it but there was probably another way to go around some of the most tedious bits of the game I think and some corners could've honestly been cut or reworked in a way to be more digestible.
I'd say that yes, SC was overall a less enjoyable experience than FC because FC at least had qualities that SC doesn't ruin by needless padding, the plot does deliver a lot more but it's truly the structure that make or break this game. Estelle has great character development and is probably the best aspect of the game storywise honestly, she matures without having a drastic change in character too much and becomes able to empathize with way more complex situation than her and we go on this journey along with her.
SC overall is about as good as FC quality wise but the flaws are that much more prevalent and by the time I approached the ending, I really wanted this to end already which is honestly never a good sign.
So yeah, looks like despite some genuine qualities, I ain't gonna rate this game highly in my mind or even in my heart and it's a damn shame since I truly wanted to enjoy this experience to the fullest and I still love the cast and a lot of the neat stuff the game does with its world and characters, I hope 3rd changes my mind on the series for me to consider going forward with it.
TL;DR : Estelle is Bestelle
The peak of the peak fiction game.
There were times when the pacing of the first game was superior to this one, however, in general, it was the same level as the first game. But it turns out that the second half of SC shines more intensely than the entire home straight of FC, ending up being much superior.
Updating the review, for me Sora no Kiseki has the best cast of characters in the entire Kiseki series. Calvard, Erebonia, Crossbell, Liberl, the Church... It's one of the most dynamic ones, featuring a cast of characters from the entire west of Zemuria, making it as basically a perfect prologue for what the game wants to convey. They were very smart.
Sora was also, until the 13th game, the only one that directly confronts the Ouroboros. Such an important game, even though loved, is a little underrated beyond such great franchise.
There were times when the pacing of the first game was superior to this one, however, in general, it was the same level as the first game. But it turns out that the second half of SC shines more intensely than the entire home straight of FC, ending up being much superior.
Updating the review, for me Sora no Kiseki has the best cast of characters in the entire Kiseki series. Calvard, Erebonia, Crossbell, Liberl, the Church... It's one of the most dynamic ones, featuring a cast of characters from the entire west of Zemuria, making it as basically a perfect prologue for what the game wants to convey. They were very smart.
Sora was also, until the 13th game, the only one that directly confronts the Ouroboros. Such an important game, even though loved, is a little underrated beyond such great franchise.
MERCILESS SAVIOR
i don't even have a joke review or anything to say this was just one of the greatest games i've ever had the pleasure of experiencing. builds off of everything FC established to the utmost perfection on essentially every level. i think the last time i can remember enjoying a jrpg this much was first playing persona 3 all the way back in 2016
joshua and estelle were already incredible in FC, especially in that final chapter and cliffhanger. but in this game? the two of them have become some my favorite characters in anything i've ever experienced, joshua especially. every element of their journey, of joshua's self-hatred and weakness disguised with harsh intimidation, estelle's warmth reaching to him no matter the darkness that shrouds him, that infests him. learning to love one another and complete one another, walking to the very end hand in hand even as they face the literal end of their lives and the world they know. just beautiful beyond words. their main scene in chapter 6 is arguably the strongest scene in the entire game
the characters of agate, kloe, and loewe also very much stood out to me as highlights. chapter 5 was one of the high points of the entire game, and a large part of that was because of how masterfully done agate's arc was executed. a powerful representation of guilt masqueraded as strength, and how that slowly consumed him. kloe, of everyone in the cast, feels the most like a genuine person. like i think of everyone in the cast, her issues and her personality make her feel the most like a real human being you could meet
and loewe is just, tragedy in human form. a story as bitter and sorrowful as the past which created him. realizing his mistake and his foolishness when it became too late to truly walk back his path. i won't lie, seeing the way his story concluded (especially in regards to joshua) genuinely almost broke me. there was only one way it could go, but witnessing it happen felt like a knife being shoved through my ribcage
i'm VERY excited to start 3rd and am looking forward to it massively, but honestly, i really wonder if or how it can beat this. honestly, i wonder if any of the later kiseki games (even the typically described "peak" ones like azure and CS3/4) will match up with this. incredible in every single way, a true and utter masterpiece on each and every level
joshua and estelle were already incredible in FC, especially in that final chapter and cliffhanger. but in this game? the two of them have become some my favorite characters in anything i've ever experienced, joshua especially. every element of their journey, of joshua's self-hatred and weakness disguised with harsh intimidation, estelle's warmth reaching to him no matter the darkness that shrouds him, that infests him. learning to love one another and complete one another, walking to the very end hand in hand even as they face the literal end of their lives and the world they know. just beautiful beyond words. their main scene in chapter 6 is arguably the strongest scene in the entire game
the characters of agate, kloe, and loewe also very much stood out to me as highlights. chapter 5 was one of the high points of the entire game, and a large part of that was because of how masterfully done agate's arc was executed. a powerful representation of guilt masqueraded as strength, and how that slowly consumed him. kloe, of everyone in the cast, feels the most like a genuine person. like i think of everyone in the cast, her issues and her personality make her feel the most like a real human being you could meet
and loewe is just, tragedy in human form. a story as bitter and sorrowful as the past which created him. realizing his mistake and his foolishness when it became too late to truly walk back his path. i won't lie, seeing the way his story concluded (especially in regards to joshua) genuinely almost broke me. there was only one way it could go, but witnessing it happen felt like a knife being shoved through my ribcage
i'm VERY excited to start 3rd and am looking forward to it massively, but honestly, i really wonder if or how it can beat this. honestly, i wonder if any of the later kiseki games (even the typically described "peak" ones like azure and CS3/4) will match up with this. incredible in every single way, a true and utter masterpiece on each and every level
Trails in the Sky SC is a great sequel to FC, and I really enjoyed my time with it. I especially like the characters and the fantastic worldbuilding. I honestly don't have much more to say, despite the fact that I can totally recommend Trails in the Sky FC and SC and that this game definitely exceeds Trails in the Sky. It'd also be nice if we could have the Trails in the Sky games on modern consoles.
I think for most people this second entry is considered a vast improvement over the first game and for the most part I would agree. The basic gameplay has been improved allowing for more customization and strategies and the story does a wonderful job of paying off every major story beat set up in the first game. In all regards it is a superior game but I still think I find myself enjoying the first entry a tad bit more.
The major reason for this is the retreading of all the same locations in the first game. One of my favorite parts of an RPG is exploring new locations and making my way to new towns. The retreading of this familiar locations, while it makes complete sense in the story, lessened my enjoyment of spending time in these locations and interacting with one of the games strongest quirks that being the unique dialogue for every single NPC in the game. I praised the first game for how interconnected the whole world felt in it and this game improves that writing even more I just did not engage with this aspect nearly as much. The sheer length of the game and the retreading of familiar ground eventually lead to me burnt out more than once.
Despite my complaints the story is still great and has more cemented the fact that I am a fan of this series.
The major reason for this is the retreading of all the same locations in the first game. One of my favorite parts of an RPG is exploring new locations and making my way to new towns. The retreading of this familiar locations, while it makes complete sense in the story, lessened my enjoyment of spending time in these locations and interacting with one of the games strongest quirks that being the unique dialogue for every single NPC in the game. I praised the first game for how interconnected the whole world felt in it and this game improves that writing even more I just did not engage with this aspect nearly as much. The sheer length of the game and the retreading of familiar ground eventually lead to me burnt out more than once.
Despite my complaints the story is still great and has more cemented the fact that I am a fan of this series.
A Truly Amazing Game!
The game's prologue was a great immediate continuation of the finale of fc and served as a nice break from everything we saw from trails thus far in terms of the mountain area and it's structure.
The first half is admittedly pretty slow but it has enough switch-ups in it's episodic returns and investigations of each region (especially 3 & 5), for me to keep interested. A latter chapter also has some element of repetitiveness and it's something that I do wish could have been injected with more variety but the boss fights are fun and it serves it's purpose.
The character work is still incredible and potentially even much better, FC's planted seeds begin sprouting and some characters growth or just in general presence is great.
The story was irresistible especially near the end and the way it tugs on your heartstrings was special.
Multi-tiered orbal slots are cool and so are multi-party member s crafts.
Excited for the rest of this series.
The game's prologue was a great immediate continuation of the finale of fc and served as a nice break from everything we saw from trails thus far in terms of the mountain area and it's structure.
The first half is admittedly pretty slow but it has enough switch-ups in it's episodic returns and investigations of each region (especially 3 & 5), for me to keep interested. A latter chapter also has some element of repetitiveness and it's something that I do wish could have been injected with more variety but the boss fights are fun and it serves it's purpose.
The character work is still incredible and potentially even much better, FC's planted seeds begin sprouting and some characters growth or just in general presence is great.
The story was irresistible especially near the end and the way it tugs on your heartstrings was special.
Multi-tiered orbal slots are cool and so are multi-party member s crafts.
Excited for the rest of this series.
Fuck me man two games in and I'm already on my knees. I'm so invested in the world and characters of Liberl man. Estelle and Joshua 🥲
The best JRPG ever. It's something spawned out of wish fulfillment that feels like we honestly shouldn't have it in our hands. it's a game that can only exist as a culmination of everything before it, the swan song of the JRPG Golden Age of the 1990s and early 00s. A work created out of pure passion by a struggling company that had fallen behind the times and was developing for a dying platform. Even with the first 4 chapters of the game being slow-paced and full of retreading environments from FC, it is still the best JRPG, and one of the best video games ever made. Everything introduced in FC is resolved in SC in the most impactful, poignant way possible. It's a work of pure passion, created by RPG fanatics themselves and no doubt something that would spawn new ones, even in the west where it is being praised en masse decades after its original release. Game of the year all years.
Before I even start, I should probably make something clear here. If you haven't played FC yet, do yourself a favor and get to it if you're interested in this arc of games. This game's the textbook definition of a sequel done right, but it won't mean much without FC.
To give my short version of the review first, Sky SC is simply one of the best games I've ever played and I think everyone should give this series a shot for its world building, amazing cast of characters, memorable music, and its narrative. It takes everything good about FC and just cranks it up to 11.
For the actual review, Sky SC is one of the best sequels I've ever played for several reasons. Back in Sky FC, you get to see Joshua and Estelle's journey through Liberl through the lens of Estelle, where her pure yet unknowledgeable view of the world lets you learn more about the continent of Zemuria, glimpsing into some of its political conflicts, different nations, the time line, etc. Joshua, on the other hand, is Estelle's much more intelligent half, often being the one to guide Estelle and make up for her more reckless and head empty actions. On the journey, you meet what is the main cast of the arc as each chapter passes by, with each character coming and going after their respective chapter until the final chapter, where they all come back together. This allowed them to get some spotlight, but it also made this game feel almost episodic in nature with the main plot slowly building up till the end. With Sky SC, Joshua has left and Estelle is now left to find him, leading to some of the best character development I've ever seen. Her naivete is left behind as she is faced with worsening odds of finding Joshua due to her getting a glimpse at just how powerful some figures in the world of Zemuria truly are, but even when her idealistic views are put to the test, her core as a bright and bubbly character who attracts everyone around her "like the sun," as the game puts it, never changes. Rather, it is recontextualized and takes on new meaning because said ideals are no longer coming from a bubbly and naive child, but rather an experienced bracer who has gone through many hardships and having to make up for what she lacked when Joshua left, making their reunion all the more emotional. She's not the only one that gets excellent characterization, as everyone in the main cast gets more attention in this game now that FC has set the background for not only the rest of this arc, but also the rest of the series I'd argue. We get to see more of the effects of the Hundreds Day war that happens before the events of the series personally through Agate's backstory, where he lost his sister to the battle and has been since venting his anger as a bracer as almost a form of self punishment, like a wandering blade with no purpose. Tita ends up helping him through this trauma and accepting what happened, and although no one could replace what Agate lost, she serves as a little sister figure to him that makes him realize what he still has and gives him new conviction to fight, rather than running on sheer anger. Hell, you can see how Agate develops just by comparing his Sky portrait to his Cold Steel portraits. His fire is still there, but he's overall a much more mature and less angsty character now. Olivier doesn't change that much, but he is still probably one of my favorite characters in the series and one of the contributing factors is this game, where we get to see his true identity as an Erebonian prince and glimpse into what would be his main battle for the rest of the saga, which is his opposition to Osborne. He also just makes every cutscene he's in better with his whimsical nature lmao. There are more examples, but this reviews already getting awfully long. Gameplay wise, this game is nothing too special, but I always have fun customizing with the games orbment system, even if there are some spells you will quite literally never use. To cut it short, this games overall an amazing experience with peak characters, peak story, peak music (which I didn't get to talk about all that much, but this game has one of the best final boss tracks I've ever heard), and peak world building. It takes everything good about FC and just makes it better on every front, building on every story beat, character, etc. A must play series for any rpg fan.
To give my short version of the review first, Sky SC is simply one of the best games I've ever played and I think everyone should give this series a shot for its world building, amazing cast of characters, memorable music, and its narrative. It takes everything good about FC and just cranks it up to 11.
For the actual review, Sky SC is one of the best sequels I've ever played for several reasons. Back in Sky FC, you get to see Joshua and Estelle's journey through Liberl through the lens of Estelle, where her pure yet unknowledgeable view of the world lets you learn more about the continent of Zemuria, glimpsing into some of its political conflicts, different nations, the time line, etc. Joshua, on the other hand, is Estelle's much more intelligent half, often being the one to guide Estelle and make up for her more reckless and head empty actions. On the journey, you meet what is the main cast of the arc as each chapter passes by, with each character coming and going after their respective chapter until the final chapter, where they all come back together. This allowed them to get some spotlight, but it also made this game feel almost episodic in nature with the main plot slowly building up till the end. With Sky SC, Joshua has left and Estelle is now left to find him, leading to some of the best character development I've ever seen. Her naivete is left behind as she is faced with worsening odds of finding Joshua due to her getting a glimpse at just how powerful some figures in the world of Zemuria truly are, but even when her idealistic views are put to the test, her core as a bright and bubbly character who attracts everyone around her "like the sun," as the game puts it, never changes. Rather, it is recontextualized and takes on new meaning because said ideals are no longer coming from a bubbly and naive child, but rather an experienced bracer who has gone through many hardships and having to make up for what she lacked when Joshua left, making their reunion all the more emotional. She's not the only one that gets excellent characterization, as everyone in the main cast gets more attention in this game now that FC has set the background for not only the rest of this arc, but also the rest of the series I'd argue. We get to see more of the effects of the Hundreds Day war that happens before the events of the series personally through Agate's backstory, where he lost his sister to the battle and has been since venting his anger as a bracer as almost a form of self punishment, like a wandering blade with no purpose. Tita ends up helping him through this trauma and accepting what happened, and although no one could replace what Agate lost, she serves as a little sister figure to him that makes him realize what he still has and gives him new conviction to fight, rather than running on sheer anger. Hell, you can see how Agate develops just by comparing his Sky portrait to his Cold Steel portraits. His fire is still there, but he's overall a much more mature and less angsty character now. Olivier doesn't change that much, but he is still probably one of my favorite characters in the series and one of the contributing factors is this game, where we get to see his true identity as an Erebonian prince and glimpse into what would be his main battle for the rest of the saga, which is his opposition to Osborne. He also just makes every cutscene he's in better with his whimsical nature lmao. There are more examples, but this reviews already getting awfully long. Gameplay wise, this game is nothing too special, but I always have fun customizing with the games orbment system, even if there are some spells you will quite literally never use. To cut it short, this games overall an amazing experience with peak characters, peak story, peak music (which I didn't get to talk about all that much, but this game has one of the best final boss tracks I've ever heard), and peak world building. It takes everything good about FC and just makes it better on every front, building on every story beat, character, etc. A must play series for any rpg fan.
I fucking hate this game. 10/10
If you didn't like FC then don't play this-- it's a lot more of the same but digs a lot deeper into the game's world, the main conflict, and the partys' characterizations. I personally loved FC and found it super cozy, so going into this was really exciting. The story picks up directly where the first game leaves off and the gameplay does too, carrying over your levels and data including everything you interacted with or didn't. Seeing the payoff of sidequests I did in the first game and even the continuing stories of random NPCs I talked to absentmindedly was rewarding in such a mundane but satisfying way.
The gameplay itself improves decently from FC. I don't see people talk about it much but the dungeon design in this is pretty significantly improved; it's still Falcom jank but it's not nearly as mind-numbing as FC's dungeons (the final one in that game made me wanna kms). Re-exploring the areas between cities and dungeons might get kinda tiring depending on how long ago you played the first game, because they're largely the same, but as always the constantly evolving city dialogue and fun sidequests keep things engaging. As for the combat itself, the game gives you much more options now as you continue to level your characters and progress through the game (the first game capped at around the 40s, this game goes from 40 to the 90s). The amounts of crafts you have on each character doubles and the amount of abilities you have like... triples. There's a shit ton of new orbments, causing your orbment set-up to feel like it really matters and it can completely change the tide of boss battles for you. The dude a few reviews below me complaining about bosses being too tanky and getting instakilled was just preparing for fights incorrectly, orbments are very accessible and the game gives you a surplus of gear and accessories to take on the tough fights even without having to buy any. There's also a ton of party members you can use, whose crafts have a pretty big effect on battles, but seeing as how dialogue changes based on what party members you have you'll prolly end up just rocking with the characters you like the most (Agate and Olivier the GOATs). The amount of options you have actually kinda gets pretty annoying at the end since the final stretch gives you a handful of cool new party members to use, but you can't really use them since a few climatic scenes in the final dungeon require specific party members to see.
I can't say much about the story without spoiling stuff, if you played the first game you know what it's gonna be about and what you're getting into, but the twists and surprises the plot has in store are absolutely mindblowing and several of them end up recontextualizing the first game entirely. All of the mysteries shot off in the first game land on their feet with perfect precision and do a double fucking somersault in the middle of it. The weakest part of the story is prolly the Enforcers that serve as the main group of antagonists throughout the game, they feel pretty one-note monster of the week-y and their backstories are way too "tell don't show" for me to care about them besides Loewe and Renne. This is a pretty big problem since some of the party members' arcs are paired with the Enforcers' stories that aren't very relevant to the world and don't even go anywhere, at least in this game, causing characters like Zin and Schera who were already on the weaker end of the cast in terms of substance not really coming out of this game feeling any stronger.
Overall it was a fantastic and memorable ride that honestly has me itching to start 3rd already, but I'm gonna force myself to take a break so I don't get burned out. Dunno what to expect from the rest of the series, but if it has as many beautiful, awesome, and emotional moments as the first two then it may grow to be one of my favorites.
The gameplay itself improves decently from FC. I don't see people talk about it much but the dungeon design in this is pretty significantly improved; it's still Falcom jank but it's not nearly as mind-numbing as FC's dungeons (the final one in that game made me wanna kms). Re-exploring the areas between cities and dungeons might get kinda tiring depending on how long ago you played the first game, because they're largely the same, but as always the constantly evolving city dialogue and fun sidequests keep things engaging. As for the combat itself, the game gives you much more options now as you continue to level your characters and progress through the game (the first game capped at around the 40s, this game goes from 40 to the 90s). The amounts of crafts you have on each character doubles and the amount of abilities you have like... triples. There's a shit ton of new orbments, causing your orbment set-up to feel like it really matters and it can completely change the tide of boss battles for you. The dude a few reviews below me complaining about bosses being too tanky and getting instakilled was just preparing for fights incorrectly, orbments are very accessible and the game gives you a surplus of gear and accessories to take on the tough fights even without having to buy any. There's also a ton of party members you can use, whose crafts have a pretty big effect on battles, but seeing as how dialogue changes based on what party members you have you'll prolly end up just rocking with the characters you like the most (Agate and Olivier the GOATs). The amount of options you have actually kinda gets pretty annoying at the end since the final stretch gives you a handful of cool new party members to use, but you can't really use them since a few climatic scenes in the final dungeon require specific party members to see.
I can't say much about the story without spoiling stuff, if you played the first game you know what it's gonna be about and what you're getting into, but the twists and surprises the plot has in store are absolutely mindblowing and several of them end up recontextualizing the first game entirely. All of the mysteries shot off in the first game land on their feet with perfect precision and do a double fucking somersault in the middle of it. The weakest part of the story is prolly the Enforcers that serve as the main group of antagonists throughout the game, they feel pretty one-note monster of the week-y and their backstories are way too "tell don't show" for me to care about them besides Loewe and Renne. This is a pretty big problem since some of the party members' arcs are paired with the Enforcers' stories that aren't very relevant to the world and don't even go anywhere, at least in this game, causing characters like Zin and Schera who were already on the weaker end of the cast in terms of substance not really coming out of this game feeling any stronger.
Overall it was a fantastic and memorable ride that honestly has me itching to start 3rd already, but I'm gonna force myself to take a break so I don't get burned out. Dunno what to expect from the rest of the series, but if it has as many beautiful, awesome, and emotional moments as the first two then it may grow to be one of my favorites.
This review contains spoilers
Trails in the Sky SC is the payoff for getting through what was essentially 40 hours of buildup in FC. If you are even REMOTELY interested in this series do yourself a favor and give it a shot.
Revisiting Liberl after the events of the first game and witnessing Estelle's growth from a ditzy airhead to a woman who's capable of taking charge during military negotiations is awe inspiring. Not to mention the rest of the cast who all get their time in the spotlight to shine including the supporting cast. The worldbuilding and consistency of what you do in the game affecting character dialogue and influencing other parts of the story is amazing and i'd love to see more like this in other games.
I am fucking hooked for the next games. Hook, line and sinker.
Revisiting Liberl after the events of the first game and witnessing Estelle's growth from a ditzy airhead to a woman who's capable of taking charge during military negotiations is awe inspiring. Not to mention the rest of the cast who all get their time in the spotlight to shine including the supporting cast. The worldbuilding and consistency of what you do in the game affecting character dialogue and influencing other parts of the story is amazing and i'd love to see more like this in other games.
I am fucking hooked for the next games. Hook, line and sinker.