Trails of Cold Steel
Beaten. Well, CS 1. Short version: It's great! Very, very well done. A bit of a pleasant surprise, as I was skeptical of Yet Another High School type story, but dang if they didn't somehow make it mostly work. As per CK / Sopko, if I had a complaint about it, it's that it's a little too anime pandery. Oh well. Still, I'm a person who managed to play all the way through Growlanser: Wayfarer of Time (still sketchy weeb award winner for me), so I can deal, and Rean being a good protagonist salvages the worst of this kind of game.
If I had to mention one thing that's worth hyping about the game, it's that it is possibly the most player-friendly RPG out there in terms of interface, accurate records, and respecting the player's time. Not sure what you're doing? Check a quest list. Need to get around town for shopping or chatting or events? Press square and warp to wherever you want to go. Want to know enemy stats? We'll reveal all of the data over time, and you never lose it once you have it, but even at first, we'll always show status and elemental susceptibilities and current HP (well, after a single hit). And you can look it up easily afterward. You always have a helpful minimap that takes no time to check, shows recent player movement (so even if you turn the Vita off then turn it back on, you can see which way you came from and which way you were going), lets you zoom in and out, shows people to talk to / monsters / event trigger locations. If you lose a fight, you can just press retry. Forget which armor / orbment / etc. it was you just picked up from a treasure chest? It's cool, new stuff has a nice "new" marker on it until you hover over it once. Most of the outdoor encounters are skippable if you are even vaguely good at dodging, just run right past them, so if you're not in the mood for randoms they are generally not an issue, barring a few close-quarters dungeons, which is fine. And even then, you still have a run command. But fights are *fun* in this game, so not even a big deal!
But yeah, good times. This was a ~100 hour game for a completionist like me, and it's amazing how much more stuff I still wanted in the game - people talking more (read: at all) about what happened on the crazy other field studies that Rean didn't go on, people asking Olivert how the hell he convinced our rivals in Liberl to help him out, more details on the Reinford Company, etc.
A few random positive notes:
* A lot of the cast had a bit of a weak start - the Class VII females especially, who basically were introduced as anime archetypes. However, the game built 'em up into characters worth caring about by the end. I will take that any day over "cool concept that we do nothing with."
* The gigantic cast of NPCs that you can stalk all through their daily lives and struggles, a Trails tradition, is still totally here. And most of them are p. great.
* I liked Rean, Elliot, Gaius, Laura, Jusis, Crow, Sara and all the instructors. Fie, Emma, & Machias, took some time to find their groove but got there. This is, like, most of the main cast, so this is a good sign.
* The plots to almost every chapter are pretty good. There's definitely some convenient luck that various evil plans just happen to go into effect when Our Heroes stop by, but that's just how games roll, it's cool.
Some nitpicks:
* A lot of Japanese video games are really into the "person who voluntarily serves another character with complete adoration and dedication" trope. (Oddly enough, not Final Fantasy, at least, but certainly your average Suikoden game has a few of these.) With modern anime tropes, this has kinda half-merged with the maid/butler fetish. Now if you want to serve this trope for people who are into it, fine, but I do find it mildly annoying that every maid/butler at the Academy seems to be utterly dedicated to their patron with no thought for themselves. You'd think they could include a few maids who just shrug and say "it's my job" then go home at night, and a butler who has grown resentful of their boss and is seeking a way out as soon as they pay off their debt or whatever.
* Millium started off annoying, but the writing eventually sorta smoothed it over. Sorta. Towa felt like another fanservice character, but the kind that I'd find tolerable, so she was okay-if-not-spectacular.
* There's definitely some hanging plot threads I suspect won't be answered in CS2 because they're a little too local. Notably, the big dramatic Prologue confrontation at Garrelia Fortress ends up a tad anticlimatic and nonsensical based on later events (and the incident at Legram still needs some explanation too...). Badass and exciting, sure, but still nonsensical.
* THE TWIST: Okay, it was cool, and yes it's hinted at early (heck, was even telling Sopko about it in C4), but it still doesn't REALLY work. I respect not wanting to hint the player TOO hard, but... this was a pretty cataclysmic failure on the part of the good guys. Kinda like Harry Potter book 4? I'm sorry, but there should have been more signs - a lot more. Recruiting an international terrorist organization takes time; so does cultivating contacts and supporters. Yes, I've seen Code Geass, so I know that high schools are secretly great places to run a rebellion and it's a more impressive reveal, but you need "this person is absent for an entire week and comes back with some crazy excuse/story" type events. There was also a body in the helicopter according to the Imperial Chronicle... who was that?
* Ouroboros: What are you idiots doing again? Well, Cold Steel keeps you on your toes if you're a Skies player, I'll give it that much. (The Chancellor was their guy. Why the hell are they selling bots to the Imperial Liberation Front which is trying to kill their ally. Or having the 2nd Anguis help C get a super mech. I kept expecting that some Cunning Plan would be revealed that made this make sense, but no such luck. I can only hope that in CS2 it's revealed they had some falling-out with the Chancellor, or else that the 2nd Anguis just hated the Chancellor personally while Sharon was his ally, or something. Honestly I'll be happy if they're extremely awkward allies in CS2 a la ME2 Cerberus, it'd make sense, although I doubt it.)
* Alisa R. When she's being a normal person, being a mild techie, having Ferris rivalry fun, she's fine. Having Rich Girl problems and ranting about Reinford being too big, eh, not my cup o' tea, but fine. But when the writers are like "you know what, people love jealous tsunderes, let's go with that," she's miserable, because the game has such terrible excuses to set her off. Rean goes to meet a contact - one who you've met before - for purely business reasons, with another person, and is also uh "out of his league", and this sets you into a jealous fit? That MIGHT make vague sense if she was openly Rean's girlfriend and Rean had been "bad" lately and she was just looking for an excuse to dump on him, but she isn't, and this is an utterly harmless incident. Sheesh. She helps drag down the Prologue, too.
* Sopko asked me to guess when I started the game how many of Class VII's parents would still be alive. Come on, game. I get that your cast is way way way too big already, but you can merely acknowledge the existence of other relatives off-screen. (While I'm at it, a few too many of C7's parents are Big Shots. This is fine for the nobles like Laura & Jusis, and I guess Alisa R fills the important role of "richer than a noble" commoner that sets off noble jealosuy. And Machias gives you some insight into the merits of the Reformists. But... you need some commoners who are just random commoners, whose parents were petty merchants or something. Gaius's family shows how "normal" people can be perfectly interesting too, but... Rean/Fie/Crow/Millium all have unique situations, Elliot's dad is a surprise big shot, Emma has a presumably weird situation, etc. I guess having at least one normal family is something, but it does make you wonder.
And some negative ones:
* The last chapter is weirdly weak, especially since I checked with Sopko and he confirmed that there's no particular extra explanation for the dungeon in it in CS2. I don't mean the final fireworks, but the dungeon is the slowest and biggest of any dungeons, and there's not a great plot excuse for what's going on, just a noisy invitation for some hardcore training or something. Not even sure why Celine is hissing at it. Granted, it's still *okay*, just considering how good the excuses for dungeons are everywhere else, it's an obvious letdown to basically say "hey surprise dungeon time."
* Elise Schwarzer. The *idea* of her is fine. "Happens to be classmates and friends with princess at exclusive boarding school for nobles" is actually one of the better excuses for RPG heroes to get to meet a princess on instantly good terms. But, aside from that, she exists solely for very poorly-sold siscon. Ugh.
* Gwyn. I think Donald Trump may have ruined "pervy old guy who can't shut up about how hot his relatives are."
* Angelica. Look, I'm not the Christian right. I'm not gonna complain about lesbians, and I'm not going to complain about lesbians who aren't shy about it and are very, uh, forthright. That said, if you imagine Angelica was a guy and give her the same lady-hunting lines, you can see what an utter creep she'd be. She just can't shut up about how she's going to deflower every delicious maiden in sight. This might be fine for 25% of your lines, but not 75% of them when you're a reasonably major character.
* While on the above note, Rex. Yeah, minor character so no big deal, and I guess they did gave him a moment of seriousness in the very final chapter, but ugh, "takes surreptitious pictures of pretty women" is such a pathetic and odious gimmick trait to have. I guess this is more a JAPAN complaint since that's an issue they have there and just don't seem to treat very seriously.
Gameplay:
* V & C in C6 probably the hardest fights. S, a mere one chapter earlier, the easiest plot fight, although Nosferatu was very dangerous in the same chapter (probably not if you equip the right status resistance before, though). Earlygame bosses in general pretty badass too. Loa Erebonius not so bad, really, and midgame bosses generally pretty easy.
* Final party was Rean/Jusis/Fie/Laura/Emma/Alisa/Machias. Jusis shouts at people with Noble Command. Fie & Laura unload a bunch of damage (had Domination & Gladiator Headband on Fie for huge random clearing). Alisa has Angel which is basically the best MQ in event of dangerous boss (totally saved the day vs. both V & C). Emma's a solid mage, and Machias is the best "oh crap" support to bring in if things go south due to having tankiness + EP healing + time shotgun.
