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[djtiesto]

In the midst of SC (most of the way through the 4th chapter) and am loving it, definitely more than FC. The battles are quite challenging and rely heavily on resource management (my favorite type of battles) along with knowing which enemies to attack first, lots of risks and rewards... At first the game seemed almost too punishing, but after getting some characters, things have been going a lot smoother. Though the bosses and monster hunts are still nicely challenging, I'll usually die once or twice before I figure out what to do.

The story seems a lot more active than FC, which is expected. But it's nice since it's constantly making me want to play more. The 3rd chapter was pretty slow (especially since

Spoiler

Grancel

is such a big town and you had to do a lot of wandering around town/talking to people) but ended with a total bang. Nice pacing, there.

My only complaints are that a lot of the areas are repeated from the first game (though some of the new dungeons are pretty cool) and the music is mostly taken from it too. Didn't particularly care for the music in the first game (I'd take the typical Falcom buttrock over smooth jazz any day of the week, not particularly a jazz guy). But the repeated areas aren't too bad since I played through FC 5 years ago (whenever the PSP game came out in America) and a lot of the summaries helped me to remember a lot of what went on in that game.

Gonna try to play Cold Steel later this year, too. Looking forward to that, and of course TITS the 3rd.

 

[Gu4n]

My only complaints are that a lot of the areas are repeated from the first game (though some of the new dungeons are pretty cool) and the music is mostly taken from it too. Didn't particularly care for the music in the first game (I'd take the typical Falcom buttrock over smooth jazz any day of the week, not particularly a jazz guy). But the repeated areas aren't too bad since I played through FC 5 years ago (whenever the PSP game came out in America) and a lot of the summaries helped me to remember a lot of what went on in that game.

In the game's defense, FC and SC together form one story and were originally intended to be one game that got split because of constraints and Falcom's ridiculous ambitions. It would be weird not to re-use those areas.

 

[SatelliteOfLove]

Falcom don't write buttrock and it's clearly atypical whatever it is, sir.

 

[ZoronMaro]

I think the main battle theme for generic monster fights in SC is inferior to FC, I also think the same of the generic "not in a city theme, or in a dungeon" theme. However pretty much all the other tracks in SC are either the same or better.

It really bothered me in the first half of the game, but in the second half you don't hear those themes nearly as often so I tend to forget how inferior they are, especially after hearing the far superior boss themes.

I thought I was going to beat the game last weekend but thanks to

Spoiler

everyone spoiler-ing literally everything it turns out there's way more chapters than I expected. I'm at the beginning of chapter 8 though

so I'll probably beat it next weekend.

 

[Mashing]

Spoiler

Rean's group wasn't sent in Jurai during chapter 5 indeed, but the other group, with Crow, went to Jurai. And do you remember at Garrelia Fortress how bitter Crow sounded when he called out on Machias who mentioned how people looked nice and happy when they where there? That's a major hint.

I honestly don't remember that. I'll look for it on my replay.

Cold Steel Spoilers: There's also something minor in chapter

Spoiler

4

too. Where

Spoiler

Crow shows up in the upstairs cafe in Heimdallr by himself.

I didn't find that weird. I mean there were other people from the academy there as well.

 

[SolVanderlyn]

In the game's defense, FC and SC together form one story and were originally intended to be one game that got split because of constraints and Falcom's ridiculous ambitions. It would be weird not to re-use those areas.

I honestly cannot imagine those two as a single game. It would be quite possibly the longest JRPG in existence.

 

[Thoraxes]

I honestly don't remember that. I'll look for it on my replay.

I didn't find that weird. I mean there were other people from the academy there as well.

I was just pointing out that unlike coming

Spoiler

with George, Angelica, or Towa

, he went there by himself a day early than the rest of them, iirc. Surely it was only for the horse races though

Just kind of a neat side thing to notice a second time 'round.

I honestly cannot imagine those two as a single game. It would be quite possibly the longest JRPG in existence.

I'm the total opposite on this one! Though, I think with my first playthrough times it'd be about... 125 hours give or take.

 

[djtiesto]

I think the main battle theme for generic monster fights in SC is inferior to FC, I also think the same of the generic "not in a city theme, or in a dungeon" theme. However pretty much all the other tracks in SC are either the same or better.

It really bothered me in the first half of the game, but in the second half you don't hear those themes nearly as often so I tend to forget how inferior they are, especially after hearing the far superior boss themes.

I thought I was going to beat the game last weekend but thanks to

Spoiler

everyone spoiler-ing literally everything it turns out there's way more chapters than I expected. I'm at the beginning of chapter 8 though

so I'll probably beat it next weekend.

Hmm, I'm just about to start chapter 5... how long would you say I have to go? It kinda feels that

Spoiler

after re-visiting the 5 towns, the game would wrap up pretty fast

but with how long this game already seems, who knows? Does the endgame move pretty fast?

 

[Famassu]

Hmm, I'm just about to start chapter 5... how long would you say I have to go? It kinda feels that

Spoiler

after re-visiting the 5 towns, the game would wrap up pretty fast

but with how long this game already seems, who knows? Does the endgame move pretty fast?

There's still a few chapters AFTER the fifth one. So.. you're really not all that close to finishing TitS SC...

 

[ZoronMaro]

Hmm, I'm just about to start chapter 5... how long would you say I have to go? It kinda feels that

Spoiler

after re-visiting the 5 towns, the game would wrap up pretty fast

but with how long this game already seems, who knows? Does the endgame move pretty fast?

Based on my save files, it took me ~20 hours to get from the end of chapter 4 to where I am now

Spoiler

which is the end of chapter 7

. YMMV because I talk to nearly all the NPCs and do all the quests I find.

Spoiler

I've no idea what to expect from the final chapter, but I'm estimating it takes me another 20 hours at least to finish the game.

 

[jonjonaug]

Hmm, I'm just about to start chapter 5... how long would you say I have to go? It kinda feels that

Spoiler

after re-visiting the 5 towns, the game would wrap up pretty fast

but with how long this game already seems, who knows? Does the endgame move pretty fast?

There's more chapters past the fifth one, and a couple of them are REALLY long. You have quite a lot of game left.

 

[Thud]

Took me about 85+ hours to complete SC. It was a max BP run tho.

 

[Thoraxes]

Took me about 85+ hours to complete SC. It was a max BP run tho.

I missed 2 hidden quests on my first playthrough, and that was about 76 hours for me.

I think before Third comes out, i'll do a max BP run of FC and SC

Can't replay them enough!

 

[Bebpo]

Sen no Kiseki II

Up through Act II-3's end

~40 something hours in now on Sen II, got what I assume is probably the last new gameplay system

Spoiler

The lost arts from defeating the genjuu. Pretty fun.

it's a good jrpg, but I dunno if it's a good Kiseki game. It's much better than Sen I, but there's still a lot of stuff weak about the game. I think, especially in Act II, a lot of the "payoff" is based on how much of a joy and excitement it is to see all your old school NPC buddies like "Stephen" and "Gren" and stuff, which is intertwined with how much you cared about constantly talking to and finding the school NPCs interesting, which if you didn't find them that interesting, yeah....; I prefer Anton to basically every kid at that school. Act II was exciting at first because Sen became a real gameplay-based rpg for the first time. Was cool going around and doing quests like a normal rpg. But then it gets old pretty quick and you realize that Act 2 is a 20+ hour lull in the game where pretty much nothing happens story-wise besides

Spoiler

taking back places in a few quick events with almost no build up to care about them.

. While having a gameplay-focused section of the game built around exploring and doing quests is fine, the fact of the matter is that in Sen 1 nothing happens for 95% of the entire game, Sen 2 act 1 is basically just re-introducing the old cast & the new characters and not a ton really happening beyond that. and now act 2 is just

Spoiler

collecting schoolkids and taking back locations

with nothing really happening, so basically adding Sen 1's playtime and Sen 2's playtime together that's like 120 hours of introducing the characters and world and nothing really happening plot-wise, and the entire "story" of Sen 1 & 2 is being pushed back to the last 1/3rd of Sen II to cover, which frankly seems like it might be too much weight to carry in a short amount of game to be a satisfying payoff. But then there's Sen III...and probably Sen IV.

Yeah, at this point in Sen II, it's really really obvious how much they constantly split and shove "EASTERN EREBONIA" into every phrase about Erebonia and make it super obvious there's going to be a completely separate Western Erebonia game almost like it's its own country. I'd be more ok with that idea if it really was like a whole new country game with an entirely new (and better) cast. But pretty sure it's the same cast. Also while I was hoping Sen III would be the last Sen game and we'd move on to Calvard after one more game, I'm pretty skeptical Falcom will actually introduce an entirely new world map probably the size of Sen I & II's Eastern map, and tell it's entire story in one game without reusing all the locations in a second game a year later. Adding to that I realized the Sen III announcement didn't say anything about being the FINAL CHAPTER/end of Sen no Kiseki, so it really to me at this point feels almost certain we'll get a Sen III in Western Erebonia and then a year later a Sen IV and then we'll finally move to Calvard 2 years or so after Sen IV comes out. Which is way too long to stick with Erebonia and this cast, especially because it means they can drag out some plotlines for 4 games instead of 2, but at least it's still better than being stuck in FFXIII's universe for an entire generation.

Sen II's a good game, and I'm having fun, but it'd be nice if the last Act is Ao levels of good, exciting and crazy, because right now I'd put Sen II below Zero/Ao/Third/SC and only a better game than Sen 1 and Sora FC. It's about an 8/10 rpg at this point.

Also I picked up the LE's for cheap and listened to the Sen I drama cd. Can't believe some of the main game story stuff they relegated to the LE drama cd like Rean telling the story of his flashback. It'd be like if Ren's story wasn't in the 3rd but was in a drama cd attached to the first press of one of the games. It's not a really big deal since you get the gist of all the same stuff in the main game, but there's a difference between getting the idea of what happened and actually experiencing the events. Sucks for the localization as well since they just lose out on the drama cd canon events.

 

[omgfloofy]

As a note, regarding something you mentioned in your post.... Falcom had planned on more than what they did with Sen II, but apparently there were performance and capacity issues of some kind and that had to actually be pulled.

Before Sen III was announced, Kondo was talking about the next game taking place in Calvard, but then later backtracked a bit and said that there may be more in Erebonia to work on. As a result, I think Sen III is going to be the last game in Erebonia- and I've suspected that Sen III will be to Sen and Sen II more like what 3rd is to FC and SC.

I also suspect Sen III would be making use of the content that was planned to be in Sen II.

 

[Bebpo]

As a note, regarding something you mentioned in your post.... Falcom had planned on more than what they did with Sen II, but apparently there were performance and capacity issues of some kind and that had to actually be pulled.

Before Sen III was announced, Kondo was talking about the next game taking place in Calvard, but then later backtracked a bit and said that there may be more in Erebonia to work on. As a result, I think Sen III is going to be the last game in Erebonia- and I've suspected that Sen III will be to Sen and Sen II more like what 3rd is to FC and SC.

I also suspect Sen III would be making use of the content that was planned to be in Sen II.

Idk, I found this quote from May 2015 where Kondo is already talking about struggling to fit all of Sen III into a single game:

Regarding the future of the Kiseki series…

Kondo: “Although there’s still some way to go before release, we’re making progress on a Sen no Kiseki sequel set in the Erebonian Empire. However, the story is stretching out more than we thought it would, so now we’re considering what to do about the volume.

Another Kiseki game story/volume struggling to fit into a single game? Sounds familiar I really think we're going to see Sen III/IV for two years in a row. Especially since it seems Falcom is struggling a bit on the tech side (Ys VIII Vita out this summer, PS4 delayed until 2017 and you know Sen III is going to be Vita/PS4 and maybe PS3). Having a two year release gives them more time to work on the game and gives even more time until Calvard for them to get their PS4 tech together.

But yeah, I'd be happy with another 3rd style one-off game that closes Erebonia and sets up the next couple of chapters. Just feels at this point, before I've finished Sen II, that Sen III (or IV) will be more of the SC style half of the Erebonia story, because Sen II at this point in Act II is still feeling like an FC Erebonia game with lots of stuff being setup, but none of the really interesting stuff happening yet.

 

[Aeana]

I do hope they don't make a Sen 4. As much as I love Sen 2, I want to see Calvard.

 

[Nyoro SF]

After completing Sen II I agree that one of the first thoughts that came to me was that they would almost have to make a Sen IV. Not only are there a boatload of questions that they probably don't have the time or resources to get through all at once in a single game, but half of the continent needs to be covered too.

 

[Bebpo]

Well, I think when we find out where Sen III takes place, we'll know if there's going to be a Sen IV. If Sen III all takes place in one location like 3rd's dungeon, then it's probably a one-off. But if Sen III takes place all across a new map of Western Erebonia, when was the last time Falcom introduced a new world map and didn't re-use it for a second cheaper to make, higher profits game?

Tbh, I like Falcom a lot, but I'm also kind of a cynicist so while I think the split games shared world were originally out of good intentions, at this point they purposely make each story a two game split so they can get 2x the sales for 1.3x a full rpg's worth of assets.

Sen II

Not to nitpick the game too much, as it's enjoyable, I do need to get off my chest how despite how slow paced the Sen games are, it's really disappointing and sad that they still struggle to tell some of the stories they're trying to tell and those subplots come off as underdeveloped.

For instance, Angelica,

Spoiler

The final showdown between her and her dad in Act II-II should have been a big satisfying emotional payoff for her character arc. I like the subplot concept of her and her dad and I like the idea behind each of the characters. They definitely attempted to do a full, developed storyline as they'd introduced her plot of her & her father in Sen I at multiple times and then it concludes in Sen II.

Yet, it doesn't really imo, have the payoff it should have had, because Angelica's character and her relationship with her father were underdeveloped. Same with a severe lack of spending time developing her father's character which would have been nice to have happen since he seemed like he could've been an interesting character being fairly neutral of the nobles. Hell, one of the best scenes in Sen 1 & 2 was In the Sen I drama cd where she gives Rean her bike. That scene surprisingly gave her more character and nuance about how she feels about her and her dad, than almost any of her short scenes in the games. If they wanted to make Angelica's plot more satisfying, they really should have spent more time developing Angelica in the games.

It kind of pisses me tbh, because these games are SO LONG, and not a ton of plot in them, so when you had 120 hours to develop a subplot like Angelica & her father, and you weren't able to do it and still needed more time and more scenes to have done it properly, it just feels like poor use of time and scenario charting. Too much filler, not enough time spent on real character development & content.

I think one of the issues is that the game has too many characters. So Sen is trying to develop subplots for all 9 of these lead characters + the few teachers, year 2 characters + the overall world storyline + all the tiny NPC plots and what you get is the game time spread too thin and a lot of stuff comes across as half-baked and underdeveloped.

I really hope that Sen III (and/or IV) is a game with a much smaller cast so it can tell a tighter and more satisfying story.

 

[Famassu]

While we haven't seen the western part of the nation, I'm not sure if they really need to use another game just to set up the events in western Erebonia that would have to be resolved in a fourth Cold Steel because introductions & build-up takes all of Cold Steel III. Even if we haven't been there, it's still part of the same country, so I'd assume a lot of the characters in play would still be people we already know or who've gotten some build-up through dialogue & world-building in previous games and even if the locations are technically new, they are still part of the same country so the culture, history etc. of the locations shouldn't be so far removed from everything else in Cold Steel I & II/Erebonia we already know that they'd need extensive introductions & build-up that takes up a whole game.

Of course I'm saying this without any knowledge of what happens in Cold Steel II, so I'm not sure how well Cold Steel II wraps up everything in Erebonia started in Cold Steel I. If CSII wraps up everything neatly and Cold Steel III would need to star a whole new story arc/conflict that needs time to brew, there's perhaps a danger of needing another game. But then again, they could do something that is closer to Trails in the Sky FC's somewhat self-contained story arc where they managed to introduce the region & new characters, build up a

Spoiler

coup

and then solve it within one game, though maybe without some of the kind of Shocking Revelations™ near the end that setup another sequel.

 

[Gu4n]

Falcom jumped back in time once to chronicle the other half of Phantasmal Blaze, but I don't think they will do that again just to catch up with what happened in west Erebonia. Since they'll have the assets for that in Sen III anyway, they might include some (playable) flashbacks. They still have a lot of ground to cover time-wise -- (Ao/Cold Steel II spoiler)

Spoiler

Cold Steel II concluded in March S.1205 whereas Crossbell wasn't liberated until S.1207

-- and they most certainly want to wrap it up in this third game.

 

[Bebpo]

Sen II

Quick question about one of the elemental

Spoiler

Temples.

So is there no way to access the Fire Elemental Temple in Act 2-2 and do an AP test boss & see a memory? Because as far as I can tell when you're in Roer in 2-2 you can't go in the Fire Temple, and then once you get the airship in Act 2-3 any temple you go to just has the crystal at the end because it's story important, same with Act 2-4 so far.

So is it normal that the Fire Temple doesn't have an AP boss + memory flashback? I just want to make sure I didn't miss a flashback because I like those.

Nm, found the answer:
http://jp.wazap.com/question/英雄伝説閃の軌跡Ⅱ 火霊窟には試しの地しか無いのですか？ 他の所には試しの地.../817810/

Guess it just doesn't. Strange.

 

[Marche90]

How precise is Amazon when it comes to release dates? Today I saw ToCSII available for preorder in Amazon MX and it specifically says that the release date is Sept. 16. Checked Amazon US for consistency's sake and the date is the same. If that date ends up as true, it looks like we won't have to wait for long to continue the storyline.

Anyway. Although I got ToCS a month ago, I haven't really made any progress, other than finishing the prologue. The fear of missing any quests and screwing myself in the affinity missions is real (lol). Does a guide exist for those points?

 

[coredecepts]

XSeed hasn't announced a release date, so any release date you see is a guess.

 

[Nabae]

XSeed hasn't announced a release date, so any release date you see is a guess.

This. All we have is a window right now: fall 2016. It's not uncommon for Amazon's placeholder to be off by a month or two.

 

[Droplet]

Anyway. Although I got ToCS a month ago, I haven't really made any progress, other than finishing the prologue. The fear of missing any quests and screwing myself in the affinity missions is real (lol). Does a guide exist for those points?

I used this one. Seemed good, although it spoils basic things like who you're going to run into or boss names (and later on includes pictures of a boss). Not sure what affinity missions are?

 

[Marche90]

I used this one. Seemed good, although it spoils basic things like who you're going to run into or boss names (and later on includes pictures of a boss). Not sure what affinity missions are?

I'm missing the actual name, that's why I used that. Bonding events or whatever the name is that affects characters' relationships.

Also, I don't care about spoilers, so I'm not concerned about that (I spoiled myself in some things, including big things like the ending of Sen II, for example)

 

[Thoraxes]

I'm missing the actual name, that's why I used that. Bonding events or whatever the name is that affects characters' relationships.

Also, I don't care about spoilers, so I'm not concerned about that (I spoiled myself in some things, including big things like the ending of Sen II, for example)

Because of availability of Bonding Points in some chapters, it will require 2 playthroughs to be able to see all the bonding events required to fill out all the character profiles. Imo, just do the ones you want the first run and don't worry about it.

 

[Bebpo]

Sen II

End of Act II-4

Spoiler

Man, whoever thought having a single vocal song play on repeat for all the elemental temples After 2 hours of 3 temples in a row with 1 track on repeat, I was basically muting the audio even if it is a nice song.

So glad to be done with all the temple stuff, tonight was a pretty dull session going through the remaining 3. Hopefully also done collecting school kids. That was semi-enjoyable, but it wasn't particularly great and 4 chapters of it within Act II was enough. Finally ready to progress the story once again.

The Wind Temple was the worst because Rean, Ema, and Laura are locked + you need a gun/arrow person to reach the blue chests so Slot 4 is either Alisa or Machius, which leave 2 slots free and the two chests are Sarah/Jusis & Fi/Millium, meaning you can only do one chest at a time, then back out switch parties and do the other chest and then if you don't want those characters for the dungeon boss fight, gotta back out and change party again the funny/sad thing is that Sarah can activate the windmill lifts with her gun but her gun animation won't active for the final bridge you need to raise to get to the warp point/boss. Seems like a bug. I did most of the dungeon the first time with Sarah as my gun character activating lifts only to find out I had to leave and bring Alisa or Machius because only they could activate the bridge lift at the end.

Also fwiw Act II was straight out the same Kiseki formula that's been done in every game so far. Each chapter in Act 2 is like, go do a bunch of sidequests (collecting schoolkids is essentially just additional sidequests) -> do main story for the chapter where things happen -> Ok, now we're back to nothing happening again -> talk to everyone again -> do a bunch of sidequests -> do main story, repeat x 4 for the 4 chapters of Act II. Was kind of hoping from all the Sen II breaks new ground discussion that Sen II would be a whole lot less of that and more normal rpg pacing which Act I was closer too even if that was repetitive as well. Kiseki = the repetition rpg series I guess.

That being said, I really enjoyed the freedom of Act II. Wandering around the country talking to people, doing quests, fighting optional bosses, collecting chests, driving motorcycles, riding horses and such was all quite fun. I hope Sen III keeps similar freedom of exploration.

Btw, the whole boss thing introduced in Sen II where bosses regen and buff is pretty lame/annoying. Nothing like being about to win a 10 min boss fight when the boss regens a huge chunk of HP right after you've used up all your CP/EP. I've learned my lesson to play conservatively for the first 50% of a Boss HP and then unleash at all the lost arts/overbursts/S-crafts etc... and wipe the remaining 50% HP out before the boss gets a single turn so it can't regen. Also the S4 Damage S-Craft's like Sarah's are pretty amazing for damage when buffed.

 

[Bladenic]

Man I wish we could get 3rd Evo :/
Oh well just getting 3rd is enough for me

 

[holysan]

After seeing EVO’s character portraits, I never ever want to play those versions tbh.

 

[Bebpo]

Sen II

Act 3 start

Spoiler

It's really weird every time Rean and party say they aren't fighting the Nobles, they're not interjecting into the war, and they're a third wind when all they do the entire game is fight the nobles and retake all of eastern Erebonia for the country army.

Like I get they did wrote it conceptually this way so they can turn around and fight the country's army once Osborn comes back and goes warmongering, but in the context of Sen II it's really weird and takes the believability out of the story (or alternatively just gives the game bad writing) when Rean keeps insisting he's not fighting the Nobles when that's exactly what he keeps doing @_@

Anyhow, that's been bugging me the whole Act 2 so just needed to get that off my chest. I think it's one of the reasons why I don't really like Rean and crew a ton is they come off constantly as immature dumb kids compared to the cast of Sora and Crossbell.

That being said, I started Act III and am heading to the palace place to liberate it and I think I'm gonna take a break from this game for a few days. The story just depresses me constantly because I find it so unengaging and even when things happen (like woohoo Lector showed up on screen!) it's always boring and a letdown and a wasted opportunity (Lector gives his most dry unemotional dialogue yet and signs off; doesn't even seem like the same character that was fighting at Crossbell tower a week before), another wasted opportunity instance was Olivert showing up at the intermission with his ship guns blazing and suddenly the thought of playable Olivert joining the party makes Act 2 really promising and makes up for a lot of stuff, but then he doesn't even stay on the ship and just takes off right away to the West along with Blonde Bracer guy who actually helped make Act 1 a lot better. So again, like often in Kiseki your left to do the dull stuff with the less interesting characters while you hear about that somewhere else tons of crazy awesome stuff is happening (in Ao you're hearing about the epic battles of good v evil happening in Erobonia with Church Knights, Oroboros agents, multiple factions all clashing; then in Sen II you're hearing about how West Erebonia is completely unstable and full of conflict with Mueller, Olivert, Duvall, Nahart, and most of the cool character over in the West doing all the exciting stuff).

While I'm sure fun stuff will happen in this final act as that's when fun stuff constantly happens in Kiseki games, it's really clear at this point the main story of Sen 1/2 is the story of Rean and friends and their school pride and school love and deep connections of how great Japanese high school is and to me that's a really dull engaging story to have wasted two long ass Kiseki games on. I just can't get into it and all the story I was looking forward to, the Olivert stuff, the Osborn, Lector and Iron Children stuff, the Holy Church stuff, the Genei Keikaku continuation with the 3 major Oro players from Ao moving into Erebonia to finish the plan; all of that stuff either isn't in the game or is barely in it. Though my opinion may change after I finish Sen 2, at this point Sen 1&2 feel like filler games in the Kiseki series. They've shown zero reason for why we needed to go back in time because the story they've shown by going back in time with boring Nobles taking over and getting beaten by boring school kids was not very interesting and did not add much to the overall Kiseki world plot.

I see even at this point what people have said about Sen II being conclusive, because scenario arc-wise, it does feel like the end of Rean and school friends story. So hopefully Sen III has an all new cast and if so please god do not make them be in school. A new cast would give a fresh start even if it's in Erebonia and would be another chance to try to do a good exciting Erebonia Kiseki game.

You know, the series has been basically Suikoden x Xenogears since Sora SC, so it's kind of funny to see them borrow even further from those two. You could say the Ship base + collecting school kids is right out of Suikoden's Stars collecting and of course the Robot Fights are straight out of Xenogears. Then Sen adds in a bit of Persona 3/4. At least Kiseki knows what it is

 

[Shouta]

Sen II

Act 3 start

Spoiler

It's really weird every time Rean and party say they aren't fighting the Nobles, they're not interjecting into the war, and they're a third wind when all they do the entire game is fight the nobles and retake all of eastern Erebonia for the country army.

Like I get they did wrote it conceptually this way so they can turn around and fight the country's army once Osborn comes back and goes warmongering, but in the context of Sen II it's really weird and takes the believability out of the story (or alternatively just gives the game bad writing) when Rean keeps insisting he's not fighting the Nobles when that's exactly what he keeps doing @_@

That's not really strange because of what goes in in each situation.

Spoiler

They don't engage either side directly as a military force all through out the game. Any time they fight the nobles it's because they're on a mission as the "third wind" and are impeded as a result, forcing them to fight. The convenient part is that the Nobles are all doing bad shit or something making it so the Thors crew has to intervene.

This is a huge part of all Kiseki games. The Bracers and the SSS were all 3rd party forces that could act when the two major forces within the story were locked in conflict, they acted as the conscience in the situation. They even had to fight various forces that they didn't want to either.

I think the biggest problem for this area of Sen is simply that we know the Noble Alliance members are all villains in this story. That really diminishes the 3rd party aspect of it because we know they're up to villain-y stuff. Making their interventions happen because of each side's transgressions would have helped a lot more to make it feel like a multi-sided conflict. However, I think they wanted to setup for later instead of doing that in the story which is why they handled it like they did and built up some of the background.

 

[ZoronMaro]

Whew so I've finally finished Trails in the Sky SC, and it was quite a ride.

I don't think my opinion is much different from everyone else's in that it great. I mean it's just like FC except stuff happens way more often and the stuff that happens is generally more entertaining. Obviously this is because SC has all the payoff to all the character arcs that have slowly built up over the two games, and since I love nearly the whole cast it was pretty obvious that I would enjoy the bittersweet conclusion. While the pacing in FC and SC are painfully slow, the one advantage of slow pacing is being able to create a satisfying build up if everything is done well, and I think it was. Most obvious example is the relationship between the two mains, but I think they also did a good job of constantly escalating the perception of the main threat and the stakes it raised as well as other smaller things. I was also super happy to finally get what should have been at the end of FC

Spoiler

and get free reign to go anywhere in Liberl during chapter 8.

Now with the praise out of the way I will say I was never surprised ever. The twists and turns the story takes are all clearly visible from a mile away and in some cases I could tell from the last game. I think the story is well executed, but it's very vanilla. I'm pretty sure most of my enjoyment from FC and SC only came because I haven't played such a standard old school JRPG in a long while, but I think I've had my fill now. There were definitely many points in the middle of SC where I was getting pretty bored with pretty much everything, especially the dialogue.

Spoiler

How many times do we need all the characters to gang up on Agate for being a softy? How many times we gotta see Kevin act like a stupid doofus even after everyone in the party finds out it's an act?

Especially with some of the things I've read about Cold Steel, I might just wait for the 3rd to come out first since I'm sure when that comes out 5 years from now I'll be ready for more (only slightly kidding).

TL;DR It's a really good game, but after ~135 hours I'm burnt out for now.

 

[Famassu]

Umm.. Trails in the Sky The 3rd is coming within the next year or so.

 

[ZoronMaro]

Really? I know wikipedia says 2017, but I thought that was just a random guess. Is 3rd that short?

 

[Dragon1893]

Really? I know wikipedia says 2017, but I thought that was just a random guess. Is 3rd that short?

It's not short but it's shorter than SC. What makes it so hard to believe it's out next year? That means they can work on it another 20 months and still make it, though going by what they've said it should be sooner than that.

Was able to put some time into Cold Steel this weekend, really getting into it now.

 

[ZoronMaro]

It's not short but it's shorter than SC. What makes it so hard to believe it's out next year? That means they can work on it another 20 months and still make it, though going by what they've said it should be sooner than that.

Was able to put some time into Cold Steel this weekend, really getting into it now.

Well I guess if they don't have any of the troubles they had with SC then that's totally doable. I temporarily forgot 3rd won't be on PSP so it should be a much smoother process for them I assume. (I'm pretty sure I subconsciously forgot it on purpose so I wouldn't be upset about it anymore)

 

[Gu4n]

Really? I know wikipedia says 2017, but I thought that was just a random guess. Is 3rd that short?

Script size-wise, it's the smallest game. In terms of gameplay length is similar to FC, maybe a longer.

 

[Thud]

Cold Steel got the ball rolling. Welp and they really like to put 3rd out there.

 

[Famassu]

It's not that short (it is noticeably smaller a localization job than SC but maybe a little bigger than FC, IIRC), but as you pointed out there's no PSP version + this is the third TitS game + they've learned a lot about managing large projects with FC & especially SC. All this means that they can work more efficiently and thus they can push out a Trails localization in a decently quick time-frame (especially one with no voice acting & only on one platform).

And yes, they've claimed to be aiming for a Spring 2017 release, IIRC. It's not all that surprising it's being released so quickly (though I initially expected Fall 2017). Trails of Cold Steel II's translation work is done yet they can't move on to Cold Steel III until that is actually released in Japan, as far as the Trails games go. So this is the perfect window to release one of the older Trails games. By the time The 3rd is done, I'm hopeful they can move on to Cold Steel III assuming it hasn't suffered any longer delays (and assuming it's coming to PS4, doubt XSeed is going to go for PS3 & Vita only titles in late 2017 or beyond), after which I hope they'll have time to tackle the Crossbell duo somehow before moving on to whatever Falcom does after Cold Steel III. IF they choose to continue with the franchise past Third & Cold Steel II, of course.

 

[Grim Patron]

Got my Legend of heroes the characters and the illustrations artbooks a few days ago. Really good. are there similar books for Cold Steel/ Sen no kiseki? I own the lionheart edition that has an artbook but I was thinking of getting a full sized artbook for it.

 

[Gu4n]

Got my Legend of heroes the characters and the illustrations artbooks a few days ago. Really good. are there similar books for Cold Steel/ Sen no kiseki? I own the lionheart edition that has an artbook but I was thinking of getting a full sized artbook for it.

It's not exactly what you're looking for, but this artbook is the closest we got to such a book for Cold Steel right now.

(Amazon Japan link)

The artwork it contains is largely the same as the booklet that came with the Lionheart edition, albeit beautifully printed on larger sheets. There isn't a whole lot of information in there, though.

 

[coredecepts]

That reminds me: Is it safe to look through the Lionheart art book if I've played Trails FC, SC, and Cold Steel 1? I avoided the book at first since I heard it spoiled stuff from Cold Steel 1, but I forgot about it until now.

 

[Gu4n]

That reminds me: Is it safe to look through the Lionheart art book if I've played Trails FC, SC, and Cold Steel 1? I avoided the book at first since I heard it spoiled stuff from Cold Steel 1, but I forgot about it until now.

You can go through it from page 1 onward until you hit a page with a huge spoiler to warning. That's where you ought to stop.

 

[coredecepts]

Ok great, thanks!

I guess that means it has Cold Steel II stuff in it, which is very cool.

 

[Grim Patron]

It's not exactly what you're looking for, but this artbook is the closest we got to such a book for Cold Steel right now.

(Amazon Japan link)

The artwork it contains is largely the same as the booklet that came with the Lionheart edition, albeit beautifully printed on larger sheets. There isn't a whole lot of information in there, though.

Thanks for that link. Ill get it with my next artbook order from there.

Edit: Ive also considered getting another lionheart ediiton on vita because I love the hard cardboard outer box they used on this as opposed to what everyone else uses on collector's editions.

 

[psynergylover]

3rd Evolution finally has a release date of July and boxart

so what are the n̶o̶n̶-̶e̶x̶i̶s̶t̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶ chances this comes out in the west?

 

[aravuus]

so what are the n̶o̶n̶-̶e̶x̶i̶s̶t̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶ chances this comes out in the west?

Non-strikethrough non-existent

 

[Thoraxes]

so what are the n̶o̶n̶-̶e̶x̶i̶s̶t̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶ chances this comes out in the west?

Somewhere between 0% and -0%. Plus or minus 0% for margin of error.