Trails in the Sky FC 2023 Review 

hey i mean you could have mixed it up with 'Tales of' like most people :p

@@jmporkbob I think those 'most people' are ones that actually haven't played the game yet though =P. Since Nintendo Vault HAS, clearly the only reasonable solution is OFF WITH HIS HEAD... Also, cuz he said 'libel' instead of 'liberl', OFF WITH HIS HEAD TWICE! Seriously, I thought it was kinda funny, and frankly I appreciate that he made such a passionate video about something from the heart instead of editing it and all that nonsense. Thank you =)

I'm glad you said that. I'm more glad you liked the game.

Both great games but very different lol

I’m so glad to see this comment because I turned the video off. It’s a pet peeve of mine to hear mispronunciations. My inner keyboard warrior wanted to come out 😂. I’ll go back and finish it the video now.

Iv'e started playing this franchise from the Trials in the sky part 1. The story and Character development are absolutely aweseome. Reading dialogues is definetely an essense of this game, and the dialogues them self are very intresting with a lot dose of humor, like good anime.. but man... this fights mechanic are so, soooo booooring unfortunetaly, making me to abandoned this game, at the very end of the 3 chapter. Im a big fan of older Final Fantasy games, alredy finished FF8, 9 and 10, at this moment im playing FF4 3D Remaster version, and the turn system in this game are way much better than here. When i first saw Trials in the Sky, i thought the fight gonna be based on tactics, but spellcasting for example, which taking one more turn to cast, not casting immedetly, and very short range of those spell, making them useless, and it's better to use skill. Second problem for me is that those fight are taking too long, i mean they are very slow pacing, and tbh i love grinding in RPGs, but in this game I had enough of it, and purposely avoided fights. And the problem is, that those fights, even with a bosses, they are not hard, they are literally boring. Such a shame, i would love to know the entire story.

​@@BiaLy23PoL Having played all trails games, I can tell you that, understandably, Trails in the sky first chapter, unfortunately is one of the most boring chapters, more so than trails of cold steel if you take graphics into account. It is normal for players to drop at those games, easily. For most trails fans, the thought of dropping trails in the sky FC definitely crossed our minds before. In fact, I took about 2 years break after dropping FC, before I gave it another chance. If you dont know if you will like the game, here are some tips. Note: Japanese voice mod will improve the experience for trails in the sky series, and use the original art. Trails series is more of a visual novel game, rather than a turn based game. The battles difficulty is up to you, some fans just skip it, using easy/normal stage and turbo feature. Once you reach near the ending of FC, the prologue chapter is done and the main chapter begins. The story of estelle bright is extremely long. Her story ended at the 5th game, Trails of Azure. After that, Rean story starts at 6th game, cold steel 1 and ended at 10th, trails into reverie. A good way to know whether you will like Trails game is to watch happiness stone door side story quest. It requires no context and it gives you an idea what trails experience will be like from SC onwards.

@@cheatermaster100 Can't say I agree at all. Trails FC has amazing storytelling. Cold Steel 1's easily bottom tier by far. The writing's pretty trash compared to the other games, the cast is incredibly dull and the pacing is the worst in the entire series. The writing in the Sky trilogy is simply much better than that of Cold Steel. Zero/Azure's writing itself is great too, but most of the cast isn't as interesting. Heck, best part of the 2 games is pretty much it finishing up a side storyline that starts in Sky 2.

@@thenonexistinghero if you take graphics into account

On my second playthrough of Sky SC, when I arrived in the Bose region, you want to know the first thing I did? I bolted for Revennus village, to go to the cemetery there and check the tombstone to see if the entire story had been there, in plain site, the entire time. Micha was the last name on the tombstone, and my heart broke all over again. I played Sky FC for the second time after completing Sky SC (with the ending to FC, I wasn't going to play FC a second time, I was going straight to SC to see how this ended), and the entire story had been there, hidden in plain sight. When I played Zero, I was more wary of these things, so I checked the tombstones in Crossbell cemetery carefully. Sure enough, there was one for Saya MacLaine, the date of her passing lined up perfectly with her husband joining the bracer guild. They put in evidence for Arios' backstory before actually telling it; you could figure it out if you were paying attention.

Estelle, Joshua, Olivier, Tita, Agate, Scherazard, Princess Claudia, Renne appear in Cold Steel series as well.

I couldn't get into the sky games. I don't care about Estelle and Joshua as characters, and nothing in the story could hold my interest.

not gonna lie sc finale chapter is a bit too bulky as it took me 30h to beat which is more than half of my fc playtime and i only died once to one of the bosses during the finale chapter

@@niles8576 =o. SC's final chapter is the only one that holds up to FC to me lol. I didn't like the first half of FC because it introduces all the oroborous antagonists like typical saturday cartoon villains where they are bad just because they like kicking dogs MWAHAHAHA. (in future games they are antagonists who have relatable motivations and backstories). But in SC I cringe every time I hear walter say stupid things like hoping his e xperiments killed more people, or how much Blueblanc praises that the ultimate beauty is suffering and despair, and... ugh. don't remind me. You sure you didn't mean the 2nd last chapter w here you have to install those things across the world? that's a bit of a drag.

@@Ghalion666 no it really took me 30h to beat the finale chapter. chapter 8 took like 3h

@@Ghalion666 and u can have your opinion but i personally loved all of fc and sc

@@niles8576 I do too, what makes you think I didn't. The fact I consider trails my all-time fave series and the fact that FC is my fave of it all... how? I just don't think SC is good as FC because it mis-represents the oroborus villains, compared to EVERY OTHER GAME in the series.

6 seconds in and I'm out

@@TrueRandomization japanese release date order. Which is sky fc, sky sc, sky third, trails to zero, trails to azure, cold steel 1,2,3,4 then trails into reverie, then trails into daybreak I believe its called (not out yet in english)

Can confirm from multiple videos/articles that Nayuta is completely unrelated and separate from the other games :)

@@kentedwardnorris5378 are you talking about the fan explanations or the basic known facts?

I am playing on pc and added in the voice acting . It's so good and well worth trying to get for the deck too. Immersion goes way up

xenoblade 2 is also my favorite

Have you tried Xenogears ?

Don’t they have a tangential relationship though? I could have sword that Towa’s grandfather is a minor character.

I laughed at my bro's face recently for a different gaming reason... He's a pretty casual gamer, and rarely finishes games of even average difficulty. But the other day his computer was being repaired and he was desperate to play something so he asked if he could borrow one of my Nintendo DSgames. He pulled out: Knights in the nightmare, Valkyrie profile covenant of the plume (actually a regular ds game but I stored em in the same area), Etrian Odyssey 3, and Devil Survivor. I have like 6 other (Easier) DS games, so I laughed in his face.

Perhaps it is because I'm old... old as "back when 8-bit graphics was something in the future". I'm a more traditional western RPG player... the Ultimas, Wizardries and Bard's Tales... and had never gotten into anime or JRPGS. It was back in 2016 when I got a a bit nostalgic again and having just replayed the Ultima 7 series, I wanted something in a similar style. Trails in the Sky FC was on sale on Steam at that moment, and I bought it on the optics alone. I had a bit of a rocky start. I loved - and still love - the visual style. I found the characters and intial story mildly interesting. I couldn't get into the gameplay sytem and the japanese/anime tropes. I ended my first run not even having left the first major area. But the game still called me. It took me a few months, and then I started over. Got into the mechanisms, the combat system, the magic. Learned to live with the different approach of RPGing. And massively enjoyed it. Fell in love with the world and the protagonists. Bought SC and 3rd as soon as I could. And then I wanted more... and couldn't get it. The Cold Steel Arc was still not finished, and I hate having to wait for sequels. Managed to acquire the Crossbell arc games with the fan translations... and that turned out to have been the best decision in this series. I can understand that people today consider Cold Steel to be more modern and approachable, but I can't agree. When I switched from Crossbell to Cold Steel, I found the graphics clunky and unappealing. It took me ages to get warm to them, and I still prefer the ISO style of Sky and Crossbell. But it is the story progression that I am really glad I stayed on that path. I just recently finished watching a CS1/2 Let's Play... and it feels _weird_ to get all these callbacks to Crossbell, without having the slightest idea of what happened. To be presented with new characters, shown locations, be showered with names in the CS2 epilogue that would mean nothing to a CS-only player. And in a similar way, Crossbell has so many links back to Sky... you would miss out on so much without knowledge of the previous game. And then there is the continual change/improvement of the game system. Sky is perfectly playable today. There are mechanisms that could be streamlined, but it never feels tedious. Over the course of the series, a lot of these mechanisms _were_ streamlined and features added. In the "traditional" play order, these feel like real improvement... but I could see that going in the opposite direction, people might feel frustrated by the lack of things they had become accustomed to. So, in conclusion, I would plead for playing the Trails series in the "official" order. Sky, Zero/Azure, Cold Steel... and onwards. Sky and Zero/Azure are wonderful games to play even today, but for the story alone, someone starting with Cold Steel should read up or watch some videos or complete Let's Plays of these games. They'd be missing out on so much deep content otherwise.

It's probably a bit too late but you'll want to play the other games before you start cold steel 3 & 4. Also the trails series is a sub series of the legend of heroes, the psp games you played aren't connected to the story. The trails series is the sky trilogy, then zero and azure take place at the same time as cold steel 1 & 2.... then you know the rest. Steam sells the sky trilogy, you can also emulate the 1st 2 sky games on psp if you want to

​@@logiclunacy606 Thank you for the information. I did in fact decide to wait on Cold Steel and went back to Trails in the Sky. I'm only halfway through the second one, but it's amusing to see some characters I already know.

@KoryuuCialce I di originally played cold steel 1 & 2 and went back after. So the moment I saw Olivier I got confused because I sware it was the Prince but he had a different name, so I was like is that really the Prince or did he have a twin brother or something.

Were you able to solve it? You can watch the gameplay on RU-vid if you still can’t do it

best cliffhanger ever made!!!! my brother in christ i respectfully disagree

It’s just a matter of opinions.