With Elroy and Lucrezia in this game, all that was needed for a full reunion of the Society of the Moonlight Horse was everyone's favorite super-maid Sharon.
I had the same feeling when I played it too. Though people have convinced me it's more like France than America since then, the two do have quite a few parallels anyway. Thanks for the comment 👍
Your review of this game would be very similar to my own. Although you are definately a lot more forgiving for the last 2 chapters of the game, which isn't a bad way to look at it. it made me feel like maybe im being too down on what is overall a pretty great game. Initially to me, with all the questionable character motivations/decision-making, absurd premises being constantly broken with no consequences- that is what left a real sour taste in my mouth after such a strong start. It just lost all sense of stakes. Those last two chapters felt like i was playing Cold Steel 5. All the villain exposition before their defeat was just laughably bad because it was so unearned and melodramatic. Melchloir ended up being the only villan i give a hoot about.
I bet if I played through the game a second time, I would be less forgiving as well because I made this video right after I finished it the first time, so I was still on a bit of a high. After playing the second game, it really made it feel like they learned nothing and have no intention to improve as long as the droning fanbase keeps lining their pockets.
did you notice that the oct genesis work mostly like the gospels from sky 1 & 2? I think that they will end up being our connection with this arc's glaringly missing sept-terrion.
Well you don't have to wait if you don't want to. The fan patch for PC is easily available, and there's even ways to play it on console using a translation overlay with a capture card. Up to you.
I too committed to full chaos and went Ouroboros route in chapter 5, and killed all of Armata's members. I really adored all of the villains in this game. With Gerard, Melchior and Ellroy, Falcom really nailed the "pure evil" character in a way that very few have done, yes. Gerard compares to Luca Blight as one of the coolest and scariest video game villains who completely revel in being evil. And don't get me started on Harwood: Ellroy Harwood is so twisted and scary that I often compare him to the Joker from Batman (and think he's even better than the Joker), and one of the greatest mysteries this game left for its sequels. Yeah, we know next to nothing about Harwood, and I already think of him as one of my favorite villains in all of gaming. Seeing his S-Craft in Kuro 2's trailer (said S-Craft being shown as a blatantly supernatural attack made of dark aura, strongly contrasting with what we know of Harwood as a non-superpowered user of artificial chemical weapons) made me headcanon weird-ass stuff like Ellroy possibly being one of the five Demon Lords or something, let me repeat, you take the one who is basically the Joker of Trails, and then you also give him demonic powers: if this isn't badass, I don't know what is. Unlike you, however, I was OK with Elaine, it makes sense for Van to act as he does around her: he loves her but fears to endanger her, hence why he pretends not to love her and broke up; maybe future games will make an important element of the plot that Van and Elaine ultimately stop fearing for the other and ultimately open up to each other
Yep, Ellroy is an awesome villain even after just Kuro 1, where he barely does anything significant in the story. I look forward to seeing more of him. As for Elaine, it's going to depend on how it plays out in Kuro 2 and 3 for me. I just find her and Van's interactions annoying in this game lol.
@@LowestExpectations I haven't played Kuro 2 but I have spoiled myself: in Kuro 2, since it's technically a 1.5 episode which mainly focuses on Swin and Nadia and how they're going to join Arkride Solutions Office, so Elaine is mostly out of focus. And it makes sense that way, probably, as Falcom would never resolve an important plot point such as Van's romance in what is technically a spin-off.
@@LowestExpectations I apologize deeply and from now on will not reveal any other details. I hope you forgive me. I only revealed you very few details because Kuro 2 is filler (I don't consider a spoiler revealing that a game is filler or that a certain question left open by Kuro won't be answered in the sequel, spoiling is saying how a question will be answered, but I haven't said anything about what happens in Kuro 2, only what DOESN'T happen). While spoilers ruin the surprise, I personally like spoiling myself about the Trails series specifically, since not only are the Sky games very hard to find (they're PSP exclusive, and emulating PSP is hard) but Trails takes a lot of time to come to the west (if it comes at all), also Trails has got an intricate worldbuilding that is very interesting to read about, with some pieces of lore that are almost impossible to get by playing (or require playing through the games twice, and for such long games, being forced to play twice kills the fun). Unless people are seriously interested in Class VII, I personally advise people to play only Zero, Azure, CS3 and CS4 and then Reverie (Kuro can be played whenever you want, in my opinion, as it's mostly independent from the rest) and spoil themselves about CS1 and CS2 rather than playing them because most of Class VII sucks as characters and CS1 and CS2 are overall not very good.
@@vittoriopugliese3352 All good man, when I eventually make the Kuro 2 video you can post whatever you want about it lol I always try to go into not just Trails, but any piece of media, with as few details as possible, so everything is fresh and I don't have a tainted or skewed opinion or expectations beforehand. It's hard to resist sometimes, like how I admitted to spoiling some of Quatre's story for myself. I'd still say people should play all of them in order because while I do agree that CS1 and 2 are not great compared to the rest of the series, they're still fun and enjoyable games at the end of the day. In addition, Sky the 3rd gives a lot of really important lore details about the world of Zemuria, so I consider that game absolutely required, which then requires you to also play Sky 1 and 2, otherwise you'd be lost. Getting the full context of the story is part of why people like me get so attached to the series and continue to stick with it despite its failings in games like CS2, CS4 and Reverie. I know there's varying opinions on the "What order should you play Trails in?" question, but I prefer to just keep it simple and say "Go play Trails in the Sky".
Though Kuro 2 (which I haven't played either) should technically be called Kuro 1.5, as it works like a filler episode with lots of dungeon crawling like Sky 3 or Reverie; it makes sense for Kuro 2 to disappoint, and I am 1000% expecting it to not be as good as Kuro 1. Though the hopes for Kuro 3 are very high, considering how great Kuro 1 is and that almost all of the questions Kuro 1 left open will be answered in Kuro 3, not in 2.
Calvard is definitely late 20th/early 21th century France just like Erebonia was early 20th century Germany. West Zemuria in general is inspired by Europe.
@@LowestExpectations I posted this somewhere else but this is the long and short of it: Falcom takes a lot of inspiration for zemurian geopolitics from real life 1. Liberl is England, old country ran by a Queen with deep traditions, that fends off a larger war machine with air superiority (WW2 Battle for Britain), also started the industrial revolution (profesor Russell). 2. Erebonia could be seen as Germany, but in it's Prussian Empire era, outdated class system, big but outdated war machine, then Hitler (Osbourne) comes in, reforms the economy, the military and the class system, anexes peripheral countries prior to the break of the big war. 3. There is a region south of Germany and North of France called Alsacia and Lorena, beautiful and rich with reasources, both Germany and France have always laid claims for it and it has been the core of many of their disputes, having been part of one or other through the centuries (Crosbell problem) 4. Cars were invented in Germany by the mercedes benz guys, but they caught up as a trend very early and quickly in France, which is also the land that first started a big movie craze in the early 1900's before Hollywood even existed. There is also a more blatant clue, in Calvard there is a city that we have not yet been to called Dijon, which is also a city in France. Also the history of Sheena Dirke's revolution in Calvard to dethrone the Monarchy resembles a lot the french revolution that dethroned King Louis XVI, (La Bastille, the guillotine, even her three companions resemble Robespierre, Russeau and Voltaire) and instaured Democracy, until Napoleon came in and created an empire again. (foreshadowing??? Grameheart/Bonaparte??) I think Zemuria is Europe in snow globe, what with the obscure fact revealed in CS 4 that planes and ships cannot go over certain amount of miles from the continent and the septian church is keeping this fact under wraps. I think they live in a simulation or are part of a very sick "observational petry dish" project, like they are living in a dream and therefore the Grandmaster's ultimate plan is called the orpheus final plan. But that is just me and my tinfoil hat going brrrrrrrr.
As a person who really did not like Cold Steel (Main character, the lack of development for other characters, female characters only existing to be the main character's potential love interest, absolutely AWFUL sexist female character designs and many more) this game was SUCH a fresh breath of air for me. I loved Van and the rest of the cast. I loved their interactions. Heck, I even loved the bonding events since they feel like actual events rather than spending time with your "friends" Sure I have some nitpicks. Like I don't think Feride gets any real development after her chapter but no game is perfect. This was a blast from start to finish....not minding the desert section :D In terms of gameplay, I really loved the achievement system here. I spent hours in the first dungeon unlocking them to get useful trinkets. The active battle system feels more like an evolution of field attacks from the previous games rather than a full on Ys style one. Instead of hitting the enemy once, you can whale on them and kill them without initiating turn based battles but I personally preferred to combine the two most of the time. The mix of orbment systems from CS and the previous games was fun. You still equip arts but you can also get great bonuses by increasing your orbment's elemental value. I am not sure as to where to place it yet but I MUCH prefer this over the boring shit in CS. Also, I am just happy we don't have any harem shit in this game. Van only has 2 romantic interests and one of them is his previous girlfriend whom he left due to...well reasons. I personally ship him with Elaine more than Agnes since she is his age group AND they have some of the best romantic scenes in the game. Agnes is a decent character with a strong drive but I personally think Elaine and Van have more synergy. I absolutely adore Agnes' main outfit though. Such an improvement compared to all the bullshit we got in CS. There are only 3 character designs I don't like in this game and 2 of them belong to the returning cast. To be fair, this is Fie's best design by far but her model is designed in a way that it always leads to weird shots. As for Rixia....they got bigger again?!?! And they are so tight now you can actually see the fishnet under her outfit jesus. Favorite male character is probably a tie between Van and Aaron but I gotta respect the absolute unit that is Barkhorn. That man has put a new perspective on the phrase "put your back into it." Favorite female character is Judith weirdly enough. I just love that she never puts up with anyone's shit you know. You have this Divine Blade or whatever whipping out her dick and our other characters getting into the fight, while Judith, being the responsible adult that she is, just gives them all what for. And finally, damn the animation got SO MUCH better. There are so many moments throughout the game both slow and fast where the animation goes HARD. A far cry from two figures standing there and tanking hits in CS. I have not played Kuro 2 but from what I hear it has one of the best intermission chapters in the series. Sadly, the rest of the game seems to be really awful story-wise.
Wow, thanks for the long comment. Always interesting to get someone else's detailed thoughts on the game. I too liked Kuro a lot more than Cold Steel (though I did like CS3 a lot), and I've heard some bad things about Kuro 2 as well, but I'll wait and see for myself. I've heard the fan translation patch is done or close to being done, so maybe sooner than later. I made a tier list for my favorite characters but I forgot to include it in the video. My favorites besides Van were Renne, Yumé, Aaron, Ellroy (I can't wait to see more of this guy lol), Jack & Halle, Dingo Brad, Walter, and Melchior.
Kuro 2 improves the combat system and makes it more fun. Plot is not that bad, but it has issues... It also has great moments in it at certain points, but it's clearly padding and probably was not intended to be released as such, but since Falcom needed to release a game per year... Kuro 3 will then have to cover way more plot than it was supposed to do at first, so... either we got a Kuro 4 as well, or we got a Kuro 3 part 1 and Kuro 3 part 2. That's what I expect
Yeah, I'll find out when I play it. The fan translation is mostly completed at this point, so I'll probably make another video on it afterwards. Thanks for the comment 👍
They changed Elaine's title because she doesn't like it in-universe. It's given to her by the media, and they focus entirely on her appearance Sword Maiden doesn't really convey that. Beauty's Blade sounds a bit too cringe so it isn't a great change either
It doesn't matter if Elaine likes it or not. Her title is part of the story, and NISA changed it simply because _they_ don't like it. As far as I'm concerned, the localizations are non-canon.
@@LowestExpectations Sure, that's fair But then you'd have to acknowledge being a hypocrite because the localization has been making these changes since Sky FC. Estelle isn't the endearing funnywoman in the Japanese version; she's pretty basic and dull, with a catchphrase (loudly going "WHAAAT?") being removed in the English version, replacing it with variety of lines to make her more enjoyable. All of her most memorable lines are localization only. "Justification for the beatings", "I have a very big stick", "etc" I'm not saying Beauty's Blade is an enjoyable name (it quite literally isn't) but this has been something they've been doing since the very beginning but it's clear you're only taking issue with it now. Honestly as someone who can understand Japanese the scripts are dry as hell in the original version.
@@PKRockin7 I don't think I've ever defended XSeed on this channel, and I will never waste my breath doing so. I don't know where you're getting the idea that I wouldn't criticize XSeed for the same reasons, but their work on the Trails series was old news by the time I started making videos on the series, so it would be pointless. I'm aware of some changes they've made, but not the full extent because I can't read JP (yet?). If the original script really is that dull, then that's a problem, but rewriting the game is another problem, and I'd prefer if they didn't do that.
For the sake of those who do play the localization, I hope they don't too. At least I don't expect any visual aspects to be censored because NISA have not done things like that in-game for quite a long time (they have a history of censoring their own flagship Disgaea's cover arts though, which is ridiculous), but I do expect the dialogue to be heavily toned down. We'll have to wait and see. Thanks for the comment 👍
@@LowestExpectations But I'm Italian, those who made the fantranslation aren't, so if Falcom can't say Armata properly because Japanese confuse L with R, you should trust me. After all, Alma Ata is the name of a city in Kazakhstan, why would a violent mafia name itself after a city in Kazakhstan rather than after an italian word for "the Armed Ones"?
The translations, both official and fan-translated usually have this kind of issues. Zemuria for instance, should have been translated to Zemlya, which in slavic language means Earth. This is also used in official books by Falcom. Retributive tower instead of Reverse Babel is also another translation issue.
Kuro 2 was the buggiest game on launch in the modern day for Falcom their have to have 1 game a year policy really got this game A least it made Ys 10 a lot better Kuro 3 will have a lot on its plates to make up for lost time expecting a Kuro 4
