I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a blast with Trails of Cold Steel, but I can’t help but feel that was more the result of the game riding the coattails of its predecessors, rather than being a great experience in its own right. After the immaculate worldbuilding of the Crossbell games, I’m pretty much game for whatever this series has to offer, which is why I blazed through this nearly 60-hour game in a week in a half, but if you’re not already invested in the world building and overarching narrative like I am, I can’t see there being all too much here to appeal to you.

When I say this game has no plot, I’m only slightly exaggerating. The main antagonists who ostensibly drive the story of this game barely have any screen time. They show up at the end of most chapters to cause some trouble, but those events don’t feel like they meaningfully build up or into one another, leaving you with what in terms of a narrative? It feels like they wrote nine character arcs, a basic outline of Erebonian political tensions, and then decided to base the whole game around that. A lot of people will tell you that characters are the most important part of a story, and I agree with that to an extent, but your characters need to be doing something to make it interesting.

The thing about this that frustrates me the most is that at the end of chapter 6, you get an exposition dump outlining several major events that seem like they would be far better shown and not told, a move that goes from confusing to infuriating when you find out that in fact, it was shown, just not in the game itself. Instead, it was relegated to a Japan-only drama CD. What? I read online that this part was supposed to be included in the game, but was cut due to the Vita’s hardware limitations. If that’s true it makes even less sense! Surely the characterization from any of the first three chapters could’ve been moved somewhere else so that they had the space to fit in these clearly important plot points, but no. It appears that including 20 hours of almost nothing was a conscious decision on Falcom’s part, and not just your usual case of a mildly bloated JRPG being mildly bloated.

I do have to give credit where credit is due though, the final chapter was a high note for the game to end on in terms of story, and the final plot twist in particular was excellent. The writers also deserve an extra round of applause for making the Noble Faction devious enough that Chancellor Osborne, the most comically evil character in this series, did not seem like the obviously greater evil between the two. As usual, Olivier comes out on top.

On an unrelated note, I finally have a reason to talk about the combat again, as it’s received its first set of substantial changes since the foundation was laid all the way back in First Chapter. My opinions are mixed. I’m not a big fan of the changes made to the orbment system. While having specific quartz directly correlate to certain artes does simplify the system in a way that makes it more accessible, it comes at the cost of more engaging customization. Now that stacking quartz of the same element doesn’t add new artes to the list of artes you already have, you’re a lot more limited in what a single character can do. Some may view this as a welcome challenge, but to me it just meant that I became a lot less interested in creating specific builds, and preferred to just throw healing quartz on the healers while giving everyone else a random assortment of powerful offensive artes.

I thought the link system was a fun addition to combat that gives the player more of a reason to use regular physical attacks, but since the links break whenever a party member dies or is swapped out for another party member, I often forgot to re-set them, and as I result I didn’t utilize the feature nearly as much as the game probably wanted me to. I wish there was a way to make them set automatically.

As a final note on the gameplay, I felt that the balancing was a little off in this one. Of course, this wasn’t too big of a problem, as Falcom solved grinding ages ago with the retry offset feature (a mechanic with which each passing game I’m becoming more and more convinced is actually the best quality of life feature ever implemented in a JRPG) but for the first half of the game I was consistently underleveled, despite not avoiding encounters any more often than I did in the Crossbell games.

I would be remiss not to mention the characters, who, considering the lack of anything else happening in the writing department, are by default the highlight of the game. I’m being facetious, but in all seriousness, most of them do live up to the series standard. Towa easily ranks among my favorite characters in the series thus far; Sharon is thoroughly entertaining if for nothing else but the fact that she could not have been more suspicious if she tried; and I liked Sara a lot, which is funny because she’s just Schera again, and I didn’t like Schera at first. I do feel the need to note that Millium’s voice is obnoxious, but she meshes well with the rest of Class VII, so I ended up being pleasantly surprised with her character overall. There was admittedly a bit of an issue with screen time. Because of the way the field studies work, some characters got solid development, only to then be cast aside and promptly forgotten about for a couple hours. This was an especially big problem for Jusis and Machias, who the game didn’t seem to know what to do with after their feud concluded. It didn’t do any favors for Crow and Millium either, as they joined fairly late in the game, but overall I liked Class VII and the game’s supporting cast.

It’s strange, because Cold Steel was the series’ most accessible entry point for a while, and so I would guess that it’s where a lot of people started, but now that the full series is more or less widely available, I would never recommend starting with Cold Steel. There’s simply not enough happening to capture new players’ attention. I know that if I started here, I wouldn’t have finished the game in under two weeks—play sessions probably would’ve been spread across a couple months, if I finished it at all. On top of that, though they don’t go into so much detail that new players would be lost, they casually reference the events of the Crossbell games far more often than those games reference the Sky arc. As someone who is in the loop, it was cool to see those events unfold from afar, but to new players it probably would seem strange that such major events are being relegated to background details.

Hardcore Trails fans would probably call it sacrilege, but if you’re not like me, and you’re a normal person who is hesitant to jump into a series of twelve interconnecting JRPGs that last 30-60 hours each, I would actually recommend you start with Zero. Of all the arc openers, it hooks you in the fastest and has the strongest world building. Then, if you like the Crossbell arc, you can go back to the Sky games to see what you’ve missed, knowing that it’s a much slower burn, and once you’re finally all caught up, you can start on the Cold Steel games.

A huge step forward for both the series and Falcom, the first of Cold Steel saga is relatively a mixed bag compared to two very strong entries that came just before. However, that also is due to the role the game plays in the series, both the Erebonian arc and the Trails series as a whole.

I remember playing this after Persona 4 Golden, and thinking its school setting and the academic schedule structure were a poor man's imitation at what Atlus had done with the two Persona games up to that point. However, playing it now after the Crossbell arc, it is essentially a evolution of the Zero and Azure way of storytelling--one big event happens once about a month, and one chapter covers that. In a way, the school setting itself is superficial and misleading; one can even say that visually announcing its structure like that made it so rigid that it becomes even more codified and standardized, which works against the game. However, beneath that false expectation lies an evolution of the Crossbell games in terms of structure.

Instead of everything happening in a single state, each chapter has (half of) the crew travel to another place in the Empire. If the Crossbell games allowed the region itself to be a character of its own, which fed into the Azure's late game stories better, the Erebonian Empire of the Cold Steel saga is a massive place. I'm not talking about the physical size of the map here: the storytelling structure, the regions themselves and how the characters from different parts of the country all interact with each other build towards just how massive Erebonian Empire is as a concept.

People joke about how this is 70-80 hour prologue of a game, but it is true--in a good way. Those hours are not just used to introduce characters or meander in low-stakes events, but they build a world where so many pawns are at play with differing interests that are not revolving around the main cast. When you leave a region, unlike most RPGs, you know that socio-political issues you experienced there does not end. You know that those regions have their own life almost, and they interact with others in the system. If Crossbell is portrayed as a character you want to protect, Erebonia is a sleeping monster you know is about to wake soon--and everyone in it is trying to align their interests desperately to what's to come. In that sense, the school setting also makes sense--this is not a high school like Persona, this is more like the academy in Fire Emblem Three Houses, where people from different backgrounds gather in a melting pot of a place, bringing all their baggages and troubles. It serves as a nice comparison to the local regions the party visits throughout the game, which in turn adds to the world building further. I don't give a f-ck about my school in Persona, but yeah, I would give my life to protect Thors.

Cold Steel gets a lot of flak (some deserved) for an aesthetic style that is "too anime" but beneath all that, this kind of world building is still there, and the game uses most of those hours to build them up. Only Trails would dare to have an entire game this long as a prologue, and I would say they pulled it off.

(Scores are for my own purposes and aren’t trying to be objective, and are subject to change as I add more to my list)

So, Trails of Cold Steel. My first game in this series, and I had mixed feelings going into it, not being sure what to expect. I ended this game completely sold on playing ALL the games in this franchise.

I came to this accustomed to Atlus’ SMT/Persona style of turn based JRPG. The first thing that took getting used to was the fact that you could move around the field and that positioning, formation and ranges were important parts of battle. At first I found it daunting, but once I got into the groove of things, it was really satisfying using my pary members to fulfill different roles, with tanks drawing enemy aggro, healers in the back etc.

The combat system is also extremely versatile. You can “link” characters together to enable followup attacks and other useful abilities. As the game goes on, this ability strengthens and becomes even more versatile.

The spells in this game are known as Arts, and are determined by the quartz system. Its great since it essentially allows you t completely respec your characters arts on the fly at any time, by rearranging and redistributing quartz amongst party members and in conjunction with your typical selection of different accessories, weapons and and armour.

Characters also have innate abilities known as Crafts, which can be used based on a separate gauge which automatically charge up. At 100-200 craft points, you can use an ultimate attack, which can be used to interrupt enemy attacks. Useful when the enemy is about to take a critical hit turn, but you steal the turn for yourself! They’re also extremely fun.

Different turns sometimes have different buffs or debuffs that apply to whoever takes that turn, which adds another layer of tactic to the game, which I love.

Another thing I liked about the gameplay loop is that, for narrative reasons, half of the areas force you to create a party from half of your classmates, which means you are forced to learn each characters niches. From a narrative standpoint, it also allows the characters to develop their own arcs without following the trope of the entire group going through the exact same experiences.

The narrative is also amazing, however this game is ultimately just buildup to the second game. But my god is it worth it. All the worldbuilding in this game feeds in massively to the next games’ arc. All the different factions you meet, and the references to the events of other games which happen concurrently make the world and story very rich and lived in. Narratively, this franchise is ambitious with its scale.

For this game specifically though, it does follow a fairly rigid structure of going on a field study in a various region, solving one of your classmates personal issues, then exploring the dungeon at school and doing some quests and events on your free days

This game is very tropey however. Plenty of typical anime highschool hijinks as the backdrop for this political narrative. I think it gives the game a certain charm however, pretty reminiscent of some 00s anime. Thankfully the overarching story is pretty good, with amazing setup for future games, many games become super tropey without any substance.

Without the final few hours/cliffhanger ending, my score probably be a bit lower since the entire game is set up for something much larger. Still well worth my while, because that ending is one hell of a rush though.

“The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel” is a fascinating game for those who’ve played through the series before. It’s the sixth entry in the series, and yet many fans used it as a starting point for getting into the series. I’ve been playing through the Trails series for nearly three years now, but I didn’t start the Cold Steel saga until earlier this year. Both the Sky Trilogy and Crossbell arcs are near and dear to me, not only because I think they are enjoyable to play, but because their stories and characters are so memorable and engaging. It’s safe to say that the games that follow those up have some big shoes to fill. Going into the Cold Steel saga was a little foreboding, considering how long a stretch it is, and I’ve heard mixed opinions about its quality, pacing, and length. Now, having put in many hours into the first game of the saga, I think it’s safe to say that, even in spite of its issues, it is simultaneously a return to form and a step forward for the series.

Story and Pacing:
A friend of mine introduced Cold Steel 1 as the “Trails in the Sky FC of the Cold Steel saga,” and when it comes to storytelling, I think that’s an apt comparison. The required story quests, pacing, and even story beats are very reminiscent, if not flat out references, to portions of FC. The pacing for each chapter is meticulous and formulaic, which can be to its detriment. The scope and pacing of FC gave ample opportunity for the development of its two primary protagonists, while also filling each chapter of the story with new party members and revealing more about the kingdom of Liberl, its history, and its residents. Cold Steel 1 uses similar pacing and storytelling, though it offers a more centralized setting and a broader scope.

At the start, Cold Steel 1 introduces the main setting of the story, Thors Military Academy, and the focus of the story, the nine members of Class VII. The class’ leader, Rean Schwartz, is the primary protagonist, the one character who is always playable and in the story, much like Estelle and Joshua in Sky FC. One major difference from FC, however, is that the rest of the Class VII members get considerable amounts of screen time throughout the game, instead of having only one or two chapters worth of relevance. While you are limited to certain Class VII members depending on story progression, this is the first time in a Trails game where you have multiple different party members available to you very early on. This is an interesting dynamic, as it combines the kind of storytelling and character interactions that the Sky trilogy had, while also providing a consistent cast like what Trails of Zero and Trails to Azure had to offer.

This dynamic has its pros and cons, however. The Sky trilogy excelled with its character interactions because, outside of the protagonists, your party members changed with every chapter. Zero and Azure excelled because they used their small cast to the fullest, focusing on how the protagonists all interacted with each other. Cold Steel tries to do both, and as a result, really nails some character interactions, while scarcely touching upon others. That’s the trade off for having a larger cast, but it does leave some characters with very few interesting interactions, or several interactions that come off as same-y. For example, Machias and Jusis butt heads throughout the game, and even though they have an arc where they learn to understand each other, they consistently act pretentious with each other throughout the entire game, painting both characters as needlessly stubborn and shallow.

Cold Steel 1 can be described as a slow burn, perhaps more so than Sky FC was. A lot of time is spent on school life at Thors and developing the new locales and characters across the cities and towns that Class VII visit during their different field studies, all while setting up a lot of story elements for later down the line. Because this game is meant to be a gateway into the large-scale plot that the rest of Cold Steel is founded on, it inherently has to spend a lot of time on establishing the world. It is a dialogue-heavy game, and your enjoyment of it may depend on how much reading you’re willing to put up with. I used this game for learning Japanese, so reading was one of my reasons for playing through the game in the first place. I also think the game progresses smoother if you take your time with it, instead of trying to binge through it several hours at a time. The game does have several tense moments spread throughout, but when the pacing is more relaxed, I think taking your time has its benefits.

Gameplay:
Cold Steel 1 iterates upon the classic Trails gameplay formula and, as each game tends to do, offers new mechanics and quality of life changes. Overall, the game feels great to play and offers a nice but fair challenge on higher difficulties. This game is pretty easy to break if you have the right equipment and strategies, so normal difficulty is probably more than comfortable to play through for fans who’ve gotten this far into the series. For my playthrough, I went through hard mode, which offered some really tough bosses but wasn’t frustrating to run through.

Apart from some changes to how orbments work, and some tweaks and additions to status effects and buffs, the biggest additions are the break and Link mechanics, which offer different varieties of follow-up attacks and back-up support. I wouldn’t consider them game-changers, but they have just enough strategy and impact to feel worthwhile and are effective enough to help turn the tides in a sticky situation.

The Link mechanic levels up as the bond between two characters grows stronger. Because Rean is the character that the player is always controlling, the player is only ever in control of leveling up his bonds with other party members. Leveling up a character's bond happens through both story quests and side content, so it isn’t difficult to raise if you’re sticking to just the main quests. Rean consistently levels up his Links with all of the cast, meaning you can comfortably max a good amount of them if you know what you’re doing; however, the Links between any other characters rarely level up at all. By the end of my playthrough, I didn’t have any characters with a Link level higher than 3, making it feel like an afterthought.

Presentation:
The presentation is as charming as Trails games typically are. For the first time, Trails has jumped fully into the 3D space, ditching the sprite style it maintained for the previous five games. That said, graphically, it shares the same limited but appealing feel that Trails games usually have. The music is once again great and does its job in fitting the mood, whether in calm and slow moments or intense and high-tempo duels. The voice acting is great as well, but the number of voice clips feels substantially downsized from previous titles. There are far too many scenes where not every character on screen has a voice. It’s especially noticeable, not to mention confusing, that in many of those scenes, Rean is the only one who isn’t voice acted. Refusing to give a voice to the protagonist that the player will spend the entire game controlling when the other classmates and supporting cast have voices is incredibly bizarre and breaks some of the immersion. I hear that the English dub has more recorded lines, but because I played with the original Japanese voices, I was stuck with random awkward silence between voiced lines.

Conclusion:
Cold Steel 1 is a quality experience, but it’s hampered down by its pacing, limited character development and interactions, and odd quirks. I had a fun time with the game, but I can see why others would consider it a weak entry in the series. When ranking it among the rest of the games, I think it’s fair to compare it to both Sky FC and Zero, since all three of them are introductions to their own respective story arcs. I consider it better than Sky FC, primarily for the gameplay being far more quality, fun, and fair, but I don’t think it holds up as well as Zero, which not only had quality gameplay but also had a more engaging story and characters.

Trails of Cold Steel has good dialogue and a well thought-out setting. The combat system has some interesting mechanisms vis-a-vis cast timing, positioning, and multiple resources to balance, on top of extensive and granular elements & status effects. Unfortunately the level design is just dreary Persona hallways and combat is largely overshadowed by lengthy cutscenes and dialogue. The main weakness of this game is the absolutely glacial pacing. This is a game you are meant to sink your teeth into and chew very slowly. It may very well be worthwhile for fans of expansive JRPGs, but I won't stick with a game that doesn't respect my time.