I have an update regarding patches to the game that I was told after I had already started editing this video. Things that I and any other reviewers found up to this point won't be addressed at launch. This is my assumption, but I believe 1.01 *is* the day one patch. Any other changes would come later. All I was told is that the localization team was looking over what was being sent to them, so hopefully there will be another update later down the line once they've batched up a large number of reports.
Lets also not forget that XSEED wasn't perfect with names, terms, and such on release for each game either. Especially for Sky, they released several patches that corrected localization, to say nothing about the original PSP release for FC. As said, the Trails series is massive both in script count and everything you have to keep track of. So people, just remember even the 'sacred cow' that is XSEEDs localizations had issues that needed to be fixed, and that deadlines that need to be met do exist. They seem to have put in a real effort to make this as good as possible, and even if they didn't hit perfection on the first attempt, it worth remembering that they did make that effort and its worth giving them the benefit of the doubt for now that they'll continue to make the same effort.
@@tcaz Well said. If anything the translation for Sky FC was the worst piece of schlong in the US Trails series, with most of the currently accepted terms becoming a thing when the First Chapter's PC version and Second Chapter releases came around. Heck, Xseed was still changing and fixing their translation by the time The 3rd came around, as proven by changes to already established names and such.
this review was really bad right off the bat bud like what do you mean he knows whats going on hes a dog for the military and when he asks the "right questions" does he get any answers no he just gets run around by his father. also the best way I can describe this is as a cheap knock off of the first game like lets be honest its the first game all over agin just with different charactors
Great comprehensive review! I'm excited to see Rean's character growth based on what you've described. Sean Chiplock did an excellent job at making him sound wiser and more confident! Good to hear that NISA still gets a stamp of approval from you, even if the localization isn't the same S-tier standard of CS1+2. I agree that marketing has been nothing short of astounding though; it's really unbelievable to me considering how truly niche Trails is. As the entire comment section has already brought up though, geez Campy's new voice will really take time to get used to... It's just a little too...literally campy...too Bleublanc and not enough low-key mischievous, yet still mysteriously sinister...like the comparison between Japanese Bleublanc and Campanella vocal performances. Shirley and Randy's English voices make me particularly excited though!! Very fair review! Really hope CS3 is a big success for NISA so that more Falcom releases will be secured in the future~ Thanks for your hard work Scott! 👌
Thanks for this vid! The teething problems were to be expected, so I'm pretty pleased with how it sounds provided they fix some of the mistakes. I was kind of taken aback by the Campanella voice clip in this. WIll take some getting used to that one. Shirley does sound absolutely fantastic though. Very pleased as she's one of my favourite antagonists in the series so far.
@Reborn In Rationality I personally hope that they just got the guy who does Groundskeeper Willie from the Simpsons. "Aye, Nobles and Commoners arrre natural enemies, like Celdicfolk and Duke Albarea, or Celdicfolk and Jaegers, or Celdicfolk and Celdicfolk. Damn Celdicfolk, they ruined Celdic!" "You speak like a poet, Hugo. It's a pity that you barter like one too!"
@Dlon Alokin [Muffled Trails in the Sky the Third cries from PSP/PSVita players in the distance] Regardless, I have faith that we'll get a PC port down the line. I'm hoping for something like half a year to 8 months from now, but we'll see. If we were able to get the entire Sky trilogy, I think we can get Cold Steel 3 (and hopefully 4 if/when it gets localized) as well. In the meantime, I'll be waiting for the Geofront translation of Trails from Zero, play that, and then get Trails to Azure alongside an english patch for it.
If you are interested in a game on a different platform 1. Prepare to wait a long time for a possibility of a port/remake. 2. Just buy the platform and game it originally came for. I do not recommend restricting yourself to 1 platform, but that is up to the individual.
@@SupriceSupplies I played the crossbell games with the current leaked english patches, and honestly they were fine. Sure theres the occasional garbage sentences here and there, but it did not ruin immersion for me, and i ended up caring about the characters alot. That saga is an emotional rollercoaster, way more messed up than Sky was. Be prepared for the lack of the turbo function in Zero and having to watch the bus quick travel animation so many times you want to rip your hair out. But what im trying to say is, dont wait forever for the "perfect" english patch, cause youll never end up playing it lol.
For millium I thought she had the same voice actor with the direction of try to sound older for a character that basically don't age at first 😂 so least that new one sold me that well
Relieved to hear that this turned out better than Ys VIII. Didn't expect it to be perfect, but it sounds like the good outweighs the bad. Trails of Cold Steel III is easily my most anticipated game of the year so I've been a bit anxious about it's localisation. Sounds like I can relax a bit on that front now and look forward to playing it soon!
Okay so I'm pretty alright with randy and tio but damn campy what happened to you? lmao He sounds like gilbert now, how am I suppose to take him seriously without his cool ass voice? :c
Thanks for the review more into the localization. I agree that the size of the script is what can cause some moments of contradiction but not much we can do about that, it will be fixed in time . I have been super excited to see how much this game has been promoted. I just hope the Falcom hardcore can relax a little and understand patches will come in time. Hell Falcom themselves has to patch for text errors or bugs for their own games so this is no different. Nice review. Can’t wait for next week! I took a week off work to binge this long awaited game so my BODY IS READY!
I actually played Ys VIII a year after is released because too many other games on the Switch caught my attention, so I had no idea that the English translation that I played was re-localized. I am glad that NISA is trying their absolute hardest to at least match the X-Seed localization of the first two Cold Steel games with Cold Steel III and was meet with very positive results. Hopefully, if Falcom ever decides to release Ys IX to the West, NISA won't make the same mistake they made with VIII. Though with the way NISA handled the localization in this game, there's very little doubt in my mind that'll be the case. All NISA needs is more time and familiarity with the series.
That "Other" Trails in the sky Character who had a returning voice actor really surprised me. I wouldn't have noticed if they had a voice actor change, mostly because of the minimal voice acting in the Sky games. in fact the only reason, I recognized the voice actor returned was because I knew the actor of Sky Character, also did X, Y, and Z, and hearing them in CS3 I thought "Oh its the voice actor of Z, and Y!... wait that means its the same voice actor as in Sky! Cool!"
It would be nice to hear your thoughts on other Falcom games (review). Great video, like normal. Sen III is my favourite in the Erebonia arc, so I'm happy NISA done good. The way they promoted the series is massive. I think we will get Cold Steel IV and Ys IX in 2020.
I was never really worried about the whole localization issue especially BECAUSE of the Ys VIII debacle. I mean... That was so bad they had to fix it with no additional charge for the existing buyers. That strains funds a lot more than actually doing it right the first time around, so image aside, doing it right the first time after realizing fans won't support a half-assed effort, is the way better business decision as well. So I was positive even corporate executives would be pushing for quality.
My problem is that I played the first two games on PC, which had save loading and transferring of microtransactions (for which I paid a pretty penny). If 3 has even a slight amount of save transfer from the first two games, then I would feel cheated for having gotten the PS4 version. And no, I'm not playing two 80 hour games again. It's not going to happen, at least not for another 10 years.
Something you didn't mention are the NPCs and how they have been localized. Is there a sharp contrast between the main script localization and the one for NPCs? The main strength of XSEED also has been to give NPCs their own "voice"/personality. How well did NISA? I think that's quite important to know since NPCs are the bread and butter if Kiseki's world building.
I really didn't have time to do an NPC sweep my first run. Game was like 100 hours just main story + all quests and I finished editing this video with less than 48 hours to go until embargo lift. I've been doing it in NG+ and yeah, it's a bit more stilted in NPC lines than main scenario. Basically all the voiced stuff is great. Main scenario and quests that aren't voiced is a little below that. Then NPCs and all the other things a little below that too.
A big shame that Silent Rean was kept in CS3. But seeing how much NISA had to tackle for their first localization of a game in this series, I suppose they couldn't risk biting off more than they can chew.
In your CS3 review you mentioned that the game was developed using an old engine. Did Falcom use PhyreEngine for this like they did with 1 and 2 or was it a different engine altogether?
Wow... Like everyone else, Campanella's voice seems REALLY out of place considering his personnality, I hope this voiceline is just him showing off and he'll have more serious ones sometimes, because how am I supposed to take him seriously if he talk like that all the time ? (I know it's just another difference VO/VA but the contrast is WAY more significant than with Juna)
Campanella was always a silly weirdo. That's his personality. He does it to always undersell his true potential and make everyone think he's some joker not worthy of the effort. Even his fight in Ao no Kiseki was him screwing around and playing "party tricks" on you then just calling it quits once you "defeat him" even though he makes it fairly obvious he could have taken you on once more if he actually had any stake on what was happenning in Crossbell. The only time they ever show Campanella being downright scary was when he faces off Kevin and basically steals the Aureole.
Quite a bit late, but I seriously despised Campanella's English voice over in this game. He seems like a completely different character than I had heard during the Liberl and Crossbell arcs with the Japanese VA.
12:05 Ai Nonaka, who voiced Fuuko from Clannad, Elena from Ys: The Oath in Felghana, and Towa from Tokyo Xanadu (Same face, eyes, hair color and height like her Trails of counterpart. It had to be intentional).
Gotta say I was disappointed by the fact our saves was counted for this game and that none of our choices mattered this time around. I get it that PS4 to ps3 cuz that cell processor stuff on the three makes it hard to but they should have accommodated to us for that. Right now it feels the first two are more connected than the third. But I wanna hear your review more than anyone else as u are an expert in this field especially and cuz I love the series since playing cold steep on a whim and never regretting it. Thanks for the review. Imma listen to it right now lol
I really feel weirded out with Campanella's. He does the clown act very well, don't get me wrong, but it's vastly different than the soft-spoken sadist voice that Itou Kanae had, far more than even Juna's.
Camp is not supposed to be a fool in the literal sense he's just the arcana "The Fool". It has nothing to do with being silly which for some reason the dub decided to make him...
Sounds like they did pretty good for their first time with this series. I'm still in the beginning at Trails in the Sky Chapter 1. Lol. Overall, I think the marketing will at least give the series the boost it needs, and become more widely known. The scenes with Rean not being going back and forth with the voicework is jarring as hell , though.
i have a vita and played 1 and 2 there.. but since vita is dead and no 3 would come out. i really hope a PC version would come out. i would gladly wait for a year just please make it happen. i already given up playing on consoles since ps2 era and i prefer portability(PSP and VITA).. i use a laptop to play games now and i love it. i could go to a beach and could still play my game.. well, after enjoying the beach ofcourse, im a nerd but i still have a life =)
Not interested until the final chapter is announced for the west. Near release date of the 4th installment is when I will binge the series but until then I'm not a big fan of cliffhangers :/ . Waiting for Trails in the Sky 2 gave me cliffhanger PTSD.
@@swike784u7 Yeah, I actually spoiled myself a year ago from watching a Japanese game play video. That's how I knew there would be a brutal Cliffhanger... I might just play it though since the game looks great. Honestly, Japanese entertainment is full of cliff hangers. Anime being the worst considering how fast they drop a series or delay them. So many 3-4 year old animes on crunchyroll that remain unfinished.
Man Victor being voiced by Price now is pretty fitting considering he's also the english voice of Lu Bu in the Dynasty Warriors games. That mad power, insane skill, but he's more cool and collected than Lu Bu haha.
@@fierytigergaming8112 That was Michael McConnohie, He's in WarCraft, He's Elizabeth's dad in 7 Deadly Sins, He's in Tales of the Abyss, he's also in Code Geass. He's got quite the resume under his belt.
Won't lie, I like new Campanella. His characterization isn't the same but he's fine as is. Some of his battle dialogue "That's messed up!" was the most memorable of the game because of its characterization. As for localization quality, I seen few, and I mean VERY few issues considering the size of the game. I checked, and most of what I found, NISA already had in the document of known issues they sent to us with the review codes. There was 1 issue I seen not in the document where a tutorial screen had "hold X to walk" instead of "hold O to walk," but by the time I started ng+ it was already fixed.
It would be my dream come true if Xseed and NISA divide their work... Like cold steel 4 will be localized by NISA while YS9 will be localized by Xseeds. Falcom's release schedule is pretty tight and fast, so one publisher wouldn't be able to handle the workload. Although Xseed recently made some serious mistakes, but I still can't hate them since they spoiled us with the quality localizations.
Honestly the best voice in the entire game so far (I just started chapter 3) is Tio. GODDAMN HER VOICE IS JUST SOOO SOOOOTHINGG!!!! And it matches her blank expression as well. My main concern with the English voices are the battle lines. Let's face it, anyone of us will feel extremely cringed if we have to shout out skills in combat just the same as the Japanese actors as well. Nevertheless i expected more in this game. The battle voices compared to CS2 are imo mediocre. Especially from returning actors. Sean did an amazing job with Rean as always and Juna's actress (Can't remember the name) is spot on (My second favorite of the new voices). However some of the returning actors don't sound right. For example, when using Machias' Burst skill the phrase he says is just a mouthful compared to the one he used in CS2. Same with Alisa and other characters. I guess the issue is not with the actors but with the scripts giving them literal translations of the words in Japanese instead of finding an equivalent one in English. Great review buddy!
I have a question. How many blocked scenes, if there are any, are there in this game? I always hate it when games do that because it makes impossible to save funny clips or take screenshots and the like.
@MegaRizwan20 I got some information on this now. This is based on Sen III but I'd expect it to be the same in CS3. There were blocked scenes at the end of chapters 3 and 4, and during most of the final chapter. I also have a friend that had a review copy as well and they'd be taking hundreds of screenshots using the PS4 UI, so had anything been blocked in the first half of the game, they would have mentioned it to me.
Hey guys someone know if the collector's edition will have some code with the cosmetic bundle or we will have to buy it independently? If the last is the case, it will be available in the ps store, right?
@@MeatyThigh perfect thanks for the answer!!!! Another question though, the costumes of the preorder (juna's sss costume and Rean's unspeakable) there will be available too? I mean outside the digital preorder
thanks for the review my biggest worry was this game would be another ys 8. This is one of the most highly anticipated games in the trails series on par with trails of azure, as to the length of lore that this game holds. You answered all my questions pretty quickly which i'm mostly happy with what the job nis America has shown. However it does bum me out they cut rean's lines again for voice acting not sure if it's from time restrains or lack of budget. Myself i'm waiting for the pc release since I been played all of the series on steam and currently don't have access to a playstation 4. Overall i'm just really happy that this isn't a complete botch job. Thanks again.
@@cid3303 He is. Matt still voices Olivert and George, but no longer voices Cedric. I neglected to mention that in the video because everyone assumed Cedric would get his own distinct voice actor for this game and he did.
I only have ONE request. Please for the love of god dont have cut scenes like that with Jusis where one character is fully voiced and the other is mute. CS1-2 did this too, and not just with Rean.It was annoying, and it bothered my friend too who was just watching me play. Either a scene should be fully voiced or fully muted. Shirley with the deeper voice was a nice touch to reflect the growing and aging of the character. Still needs more crazy laughter though!
My god, please. I was able to run perfectly on Windows 10 with a I3 3220 and 8gigs of Ram with a freaking R9280 cheap video card, and the game runs flawlessly on PC. And I have the game for a year now. The game is fixed guys, YS8 works amazingly well. Better than Trails of Cold Steel 2 does actually. The game never crashed once for me while I was softlock three times and the game crashed two times on Trails of cold steel II. Yeah, they made a big mistake on Ys 8 localization, but that's fixed and, the PC port is the best version of the game. If I could run the game with a trash PC back then and I can still do it with my current one on maximum settings, let's just focus on the bad localization, that was inexcusable, but the bugs are fixed now, and the game works better than the last XSEED port of Cold Steel. I don't see anyone complaining about that one though. About the review now: I agree with a lot with you about the game, but at least NISA gave us both voice actings, English and Japanese. This was so big that forced XSEED to put the Japanese audio on the Pc releases, and some people really love to have a choice, the more choices I have, the better. I love to play the game both ways: The way they bring it to us, and the way Japanese people can play the game too. So every time a developer gives us all of the options, for me: The most they worked to give us the better outcome possible. And I appreciate that even more than anything else. Mute Rean, however, is a problem of the Japanese scripts, not the English. If NISA gives us the ports for PC real fast, like in months, I doubt there would be extra Dialog voices, XSEED took their sweet time with the ports and extra audios. And I mean A LOT of time. But, if they master the port to PC(Which they are probably traumatized with Ys8), maybe they will bring the extra audio lines. They suffered a lot just to port Ys8. Imagine how much time it would take for them to add new content inside the code, content that isn't on the original release in Japan. xD Anyway, I like to be realistic. If we want a Port with lots of extra lines of dialog dubbed, we need to wait. A LOT too.
I don't mind a PC port for CS3 coming about 1-2 years later as long as it's done near flawlessly. The PC ports for CS1 and CS2 were some of the best I've ever seen for JRPGs ported to PC (KB+Mouse controls especially). While the YS8 problems were mostly fixed, the KB+Mouse controls were never refined (although still manageable compared to Idea Factory games ported to PC). Aside from the Dual audio option issue (Japanese especially), I still think XSeed would've done a better job in the PC port of YS8 with much better KB+Mouse controls (I just prefer them over a controller), but that's already water under the bridge. I'll just keep my fingers crossed and hoped NISA learned a lot in that dubious YS8 affair, and this time hire the right people when it comes to finally porting CS3 (and CS4) to PC.
Honestly i had zero REAL issues with this game. It was an amazing experience that i loved every minute of. And honestly, i'd rather have this than nothing (and it really wasn't bad, mistakes aside).
I feel the same, I only noticed one heavy mistake in regards to a certain nurse from Crossbell, everything else was fine. Didn't expect it to be good, turned out to be good :)
Guys important question! I played all of the Trails series in pc but planning to get this one in my ps4. Does it have anything similar to cold steel 1 and 2? with the relationship and save file carry over? you know what I mean? please I need an answer as soon as possible! much appreciate it!
Lore wise, you need to play Cold Steel 1 and 2 to understand further Casts, Organizations, and History relating to the events that happened in Erebonia. You could probably find a sale for Cold Steel 1 and 2 in a bundle somewhere. And I dunno if there are 'bonuses' for having save files to load into CS3 or at least costumes and such.
Is it just me or did Campy sound like a high pitch kid? Oh well. Maybe its just me that expects that Campy will sound like the Joker or something similar. Nonetheless, excited for 22. NISA did a great job no matter what. (I am one of the people that finished Ys VIII before January 2018 with no problems to translation. Nah, not picky. Still better that one with minor translation errors than none at all)
Thank you for the video. You have assured me that I won't have to cancel my order, and a huge amount of anxiety I've had about this release has lifted. The cover change hiding Juna's legs also had me worried, but it seems all PS4 games these days are getting that treatment. I haven't had the best opinion of NIS-A for the past 10 years. The Ys VIII thing really upset me, and still does on account that it still crashes on my system. I'm glad that I have a PS4 I can use to play this game but would really like to see a PC version. If they can do it right and with good timing I will gladly double dip. However I'm going to be very skeptical.
I'm just glad cold steel 3 doesn't habe that annoying affinity thing in attacks like the first 2 games Cos it kinda got annoying having to constantly switch character's just cos your qrapoj was ineffective against the enemy
I have mixed feelings, after watching this, as someone who was cautiously optimistic. On the one hand, it does sound like they avoided another total disaster, which is a good thing. I understand this is a MASSIVE undertaking for them, and I get it's there first time working on a Trails/Kiseki game, but if the end result really is "slightly worse" compared to Xseed, that leaves me disappointed. I know they can patch things over time, and again, I get the difficulties of the situation, but imo, if a different publisher is suddenly going to take over an established series several games in, they better aim to do at least as good as the previous company, if not better. Typos, grammar errors and the like are expected, so whatever. What does bother me is you saying they got some terms and character names wrong, at times. That's the exact sort of thing that plagued Ys VIII at launch, so that has me VERY worried. Also, the fact they didn't add any extra voice work in feels lazy, imo. The whole thing comes across to me as they put in the best minimal effort they could, to ensure it wouldn't be a total letdown, but didn't go the extra mile to make it as good as it could have been and that saddens me. I will, of course, reserve full judgment until I've played the game, and I really am hoping the localization doesn't sink the game for me, but I guess I just wished my dream for an excellent localized version of this would be a reality, and it sounds like that may not be the case. It sounds just "decent" or "pretty good", instead of "top tier", I guess.
Oh god...Campanella..that voice is awful. That said, I'm hoping Cold Steel II goes on sale at the same time Cold Steel III comes out (that's what I'm banking on). Great review, I want to play this soooo bad (still have to beat Cold Steel II).
I'm late to the game but I did not like Trails 3. If I could put them in order I would say 2, 1, and 3 last. The new Class 7 was not as likable as the original class, and I found myself rushing through their scenes until I got to the occasional team up with the original class 7.
@@OTioRean I mean you can only watch so much Ash: I'm the edgy jrpg protagonist from the 90s. I don't care about nobody except for those random times that I slightly care and that's suppose to completely redeem me. Musse: I'm mysterious and slutty but the burn is so slow that when the truth is revealed it really wasn't worth the slow burn it took to get there. Juna: My entire personality is a watered down Tsundere who is going to whine most the game. Alisa did it better, Kurt: I have swords. Altina is cool. She's the only one I like better than her counterpart.
@@AllPwrflSteve to like this characters you need first to be a good person yourself ...whats not the case atleas here on the internet... you're not good....just ignorant so yeah... good luck with god of war and whatever you like to play and kee working on the good person side
@@OTioRean I feel like I'd be insulted if we spoke the same language. Maybe your lack of English comprehension is why you like Trails 3 so much. Trails 2 is the best! Old Class 7 is better than new class 7. Enjoy your shit taste and go play FF7 since you love 2 dimensional characters so much!
I'm extremely glad to hear that the localization is of quality, even if it isn't quite at XSEED's, which is completely understandable for reasons you've stated. And of course, I'm already happy we're getting the game here to begin with. For me however, I'll have to wait for the (hopefully) eventual PC release. I have several games to keep me occupied however, and with the Geofront's Trails from Zero patch releasing soon™, I think 2020 is going to be a great year for me. (As I'll probably tackle azure with an already existing patch, combined with the other 2 games already mentioned, I'll (likely) have a whole THREE games in the series to enjoy next year.)
@@SuiteLifeofDioBrando Who's to say? Ys 8 still got a PC port 7-8 months after the original western release, even with the relocalization efforts (potentially) having been in the way. So unless they don't have the port planned, I'm gonna stay optimistic on this one.
Yep, all the leadership skills he gained in Trails 2 were thrown out of the window - and he became an edgy "Uh, if you don't want to be here you could leave" instructor - and then they throw the "Spirit Unification" out of the window using trauma as an excuse. The only characters they kept to their former calibre were Fie (Being a bracer is understandable, since she's trying to hunt down zephyr for answers), Elliot (Always had an interest in music, so musician is best job), Alisa (Was the heir of Reinford Industries anyway), and Laura (Teaching her fighting style to others). I mean, Machias was the son of the governor - and all of a sudden Rufus is in charge - when he took over from his father as running Bareahard.
@@6zdog Remember how Rean was voiced in the Vita and PS3 versions of Cold Steel 1 and 2 before all the new voiced lines were added to the PC version? We're basically back to that. So he speaks less frequently than one would like, but he still has a lot of voiced lines.