So as someone who recently got hooked into Trails and has enjoyed every game I've played in the series, the idea of a mobile title to collect my favourite characters for a little bit before I inevitably fall off due to the usual gacha mechanics and timers and stuff, was something I could get on board with. I mean like, haven't had the chance to play as characters like Kevin and Anelace in such a long time, surely a mobile title could give me some joy from that alone if nothing else? Well….

Let's start off with a bit of context surrounding Trails of Cold Steel: Northern War and its announcement to release in the West. A mobile game based off the anime of the name (an anime that while I enjoyed seeing a bit more of the North Ambria situation, it was pretty meh) and whose release in Japan in 2023 was met with hilarious bugs like T-posing Richard S Crafts. It's global announcement was through a twitter account that no one knew of until days after it was first made and from there, a steady schedule of lies and deception was clear for all to see.
The twitter account quickly grew in followers to give the illusion of popularity as it was soon clear the majority of the followers were bots.
The goal of 1 million pre registrations with a free Elie being the reward was so impossibly lofty for a series this niche and a game based off an anime few liked, that when it was met, it was clearly a lie.
The twitter account tweeting in English in a way some picked up as probable machine translation.
Why is this important? Well if there was that much lies and deception before the game even launched, what do you think the actual product was going to be like?

I wanted to give the game a fair chance and see how it was for myself so I ignored the red flags from pre-release. I mean how bad could it be really?
Pretty much awful on every level, that's how bad it could be. Developer Userjoy immediately hits you with scenes ripped straight from the anime, in Japanese, with no subs. When you do start seeing English text, it's readable but is awkward to read, even for short tutorial sentences. Then you start diving in further and it becomes clear that the whole thing was machine translated with massive errors like Towa being labelled “The Azure Chevalier” or Duvalie being called “Speed Du Barry”. Characters will have their gender constantly mixed up in descriptions and the whole thing is so bad to the point you can only laugh at it.
The gameplay is just basic battles using a similar system to the main games only the whole thing is automated to the point it feels pointless, with outcomes basically being decided on “power levels”
The 3D models look off just enough that they give off uncanny valley vibes.
Some of the gacha prices are just insane. Rixia and some gacha currency is currently listed at something like 84% off and is still over £60?!?! There's no way that is 84% cheaper than what it usually is. It's so clearly a deceptive way to try and fool the unsuspecting into thinking they're getting a good deal but come on, it's literally more expensive than 90% of full game releases these days. FOR A RIXIA JPEG AND GACHA CURRENCY.
One of the launch banners is a “free trial” that lets you re-roll until you get a character you want…. Only to ask you for £16.99 if you want to actually keep that character, meaning the “free trial” is literally just to try and hook you into the gambling like mechanics of gacha in hopes that you will be lured into spending money on it. I knew there were predatory gacha out there but this was my first time seeing it in action and wow, it feels disgusting.

This is something we can all laugh at but it also sucks as a recent fan seeing just how easily Falcom will let one of its most valued IP be licensed out and treated like garbage. The two animes I've watched for Trails were animated poorly and now this gacha game is trash in almost every aspect. I completely understand that Falcom is a small company and they operate on a tight budget, part of their charm is how much love and care is put into their games despite the monetary limitations, but you gotta do some quality control when licensing out your IP because stuff like this will never be forgotten, just look at Nintendo and the Zelda CD-I games they've tried to bury.

There is one positive to take from this: it shows just how bad the literal machine translation is and how important it is to have actual professional people localise something. The fact that I've put more time and care into writing a review for this compared to what they did for translating the game is a damning indictment. On top of that the game itself is dull and automated as well as full of predatory gacha elements to the point that you just have to call it out for the garbage it is. I'll give it half a star for letting me see Anelace again before uninstalling.

The remake was the perfect excuse to revisit this game again and I am so glad about it because oh man, it's so much fun.

It doesn't change an awful lot but it DOES fix most of the backtracking which is great to see because they can be absolutely diabolical with that at times. Doing the General White part again and thinking about how I didn't have the luxury of having a warp pipe hub connected between previous chapters playing through the original as a kid as I realized just what it was they make you sit through had me in tears. Games really don't affectionately hate their players like that anymore and.. maybe that's for the best.
All of the characters mumble speak now aswell (usually with character-specific noises you're already quite used to) and it adds a surprising amount of fun to the game, genuinely don't think I could do without it now. There's some additional content aswell, but I'm more than happy with just the regular playthrough - so I can't exactly vouch for that. I'm sure there's a few more challenging superbosses out there, so that's bound to be great for anyone looking for a challenge.

Only thing I'm a bit disappointed with is that the game balancing in terms of badges hasn't changed an awful lot, which is a shame because they're pretty lopsided. Power Bounce got nerfed in a brutal way by making the fourth jump a grand total of one frame (good luck with that lmao) which is an odd way to go about it but definitely a valid change considering how ridiculous that was, but even then the difference between jump and hammer badges is still steep. Ofcourse, it's a kid's game so I'm willing to be pretty lenient with it not having to be optimal by any means in this regard - but considering you can jump in pretty much every Mario game and the Hammer is more uniquely a thing for the series' turn-based games, it'd be great to not feel like I'm actively holding myself back by investing in it, and with this balancing issue being pretty well-known with the original being out for about 20 years now (god I feel old) I was hoping to see something along those lines, atleast. Didn't stop me from continuing to hold myself back though (mostly because it is a pretty easy game for advanced players, naturally) so it's not too much of an issue. Would've definitely made the game even more fun for me though!

But even without that, this game is such a blast. Gorgeous music, a unique style with a ton of charm, humor that's still as fun as ever and SUCH a fun and active gameplay system. Always a relief to play a childhood favorite again after so many years and immediately realizing that it's every bit as fun as it ever was.