Hello there, everyone! Been a freakin' while, eh? I had originally wanted to do my impressions and review on Trails through Daybreak 2 earlier this year but with all the stuff I've been goin' through, and having become a bit more involved with helpin' my dad and stuff... I hasn't come to pass... YET! Today though I will give my own small review on the newest release in the Trails series- Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter. A remake of the very first, original Trails game.
The way I'm going to do this is give my first impressions which will be based on the demo for anyone wanting to try the game (trust me, it's a meaty demo. Took me 10 hours taking my time. Mileage may vary but that's the gauge here) then a mini review of the game so far. With a small snippet at the end to... cover a couple things I noticed in both demo and final release. Any who, with that all said 'n' done... let's get to it! Also to note this will have minor spoilers for the first bit of the game. You have been warned.
The game starts with our titular character Estelle who is waiting at home for her dad, Cassius, to come home from some Bracer work. (The Bracer Guild is basically a more legal and non-biased mercenary group that does jobs from odd jobs such as helping ordinary citizens to investigating major incidents and even mediating political affairs as a neutral group) When he arrives home he is carrying an injured boy about Estelle's age and the scene plays out as they help treat him, he wakes up and interacts with the father 'n' daughter as Estelle points out to him he should tell them his name since she already introduced herself. As he's about to say his name it cuts to the intro cutscene which is a very very good 1:1 remake of the original games intro.
After that we cut to a few years later, Estelle and as we find out the boys name is Joshua, are waking up and waiting for their dad to cook breakfast. Joshua has been adopted into the Bright family and the two kids are training to become Junior Bracers, basically trainees, to follow in their fathers footsteps. They are preparing to go take their final exam with Scherazard (or as they call her Schera) and finally be able to do Bracer work. Shortly after this their father is called away to take care of something that happened considering hes one of the best Bracers in the kingdom of Liberl where this game takes place, and could be considered one of the best in the entirety of the continent named Zemuria. The prologue ends with Estelle and Joshua finishing up the work their father left them since he was leaving and finding out that he, and the airship he was on, have gone missing.
With the basis of the story out of the way... I'll get into the demo itself. The demo as I've already said is a meaty one. It gives you basically the entire beginning of the game being the prologue chapter and all the content therein in which you can transfer progress to the full game. You get a very good feel for the game as you get into a few battles, a lot of side quests, and wahtnot. The game really does feel like Trails in the Sky original... but 3D! And with the new Falcom engine they used for the Daybreak games meaning beautiful 3D models IMO and a great n smooth action to turnbased hybrid system. Now, while the game itself is great I noticed a few issues with the demo. This might not reflect the demo on other systems but this is a warning for those that this stuff bothers... there was a main story scene where straight up a Japanese line was left in. There's also a few lines here n there side quest or not that have issues grammar or spelling wise, etc. Then some equipment called Quartz which you insert into the characters' Orbments to get bonuses and spells had a few descriptions with typos. There was also a weird issue where an in battle mechanic that lets characters combo would cut off lines and they wouldn't even be the right lines. Like, voiced line and subtitle would be mismatched. This is going off English dub but it would be an issue in Japanese dub too since the lines cut off anyway. Seems the demo is based on an earlier build and had some serious issues. Despite that, there's nothing too glaring that would take away enjoyment. You'll have a good time and get a feel for the games quality, translation not withstanding.
Now for my mini review of the full release so far... I'm about 20 hours in and within the first chapter still but I think I've played far enough to at least give people my opinion on the game. Firstly, I did some digging by speed running the beginning of the game a little to check a few mistakes I noticed translation wise in the demo and I can say quite a few WERE fixed for the final release. The inbattle stuff I talked about was fixed as well. The game overall just exudes a faithful remake basically taking a game and giving it a fresh coat of paint. Fans of the series, or people new to it... will definitely ENJOY THE HELL out of 1st chapter. The action to turnbased combat is fluid and feels natural. The exploration and quests all flesh out the world, AND you can't miss anything unless you want to because everything is marked on your map. Just make sure to do stuff because quests expire after a certain advancement in the story. Overall, now y'all don't have an excuse to not try this series haha.
The voice acting is top notch but... theres some weird pronunciations. This goes into translation quality now which I have the most to gripe and talk about. A lot of stuff was fixed from demo BUT some of it is inherently wrong. In the prologue there is an area you go to called Esmelas Tower. I cross referenced the PSP version and yes it is called that there... why is it now called Jade Tower? I don't know! And clearly they had Esmelas at first because a tutorial for the map names it Esmelas in both demo and final game. There's even a stone you retrieve called an Esmelas. Whatever, it's not a big deal I guess. Thing is there are other terms that're messed up. Liberl is pronouced "Liberal" which is fair it's a rough word to say sure... but they said it right in later games anyway so... what? Consistency with terms is an issue for this game and it's where the whole idea of "retranslating the game instead of using the originals translation" irks me. I get that theres a bit of new content (which is fine so far from what I've seen, that having original translation is fine with me) but the original game set up so many terms that later games in the timeline have used. Archaisms which are basically machines are now Golems. Yes, that is not an inaccurate translation but that's not what the series has built up terminology wise. I could go on and on but it really is splitting hairs. The game is great, go play it, get into this series already!
Peak in the Sky 1st Chapter is waiting for y'all.
The way I'm going to do this is give my first impressions which will be based on the demo for anyone wanting to try the game (trust me, it's a meaty demo. Took me 10 hours taking my time. Mileage may vary but that's the gauge here) then a mini review of the game so far. With a small snippet at the end to... cover a couple things I noticed in both demo and final release. Any who, with that all said 'n' done... let's get to it! Also to note this will have minor spoilers for the first bit of the game. You have been warned.
The game starts with our titular character Estelle who is waiting at home for her dad, Cassius, to come home from some Bracer work. (The Bracer Guild is basically a more legal and non-biased mercenary group that does jobs from odd jobs such as helping ordinary citizens to investigating major incidents and even mediating political affairs as a neutral group) When he arrives home he is carrying an injured boy about Estelle's age and the scene plays out as they help treat him, he wakes up and interacts with the father 'n' daughter as Estelle points out to him he should tell them his name since she already introduced herself. As he's about to say his name it cuts to the intro cutscene which is a very very good 1:1 remake of the original games intro.
After that we cut to a few years later, Estelle and as we find out the boys name is Joshua, are waking up and waiting for their dad to cook breakfast. Joshua has been adopted into the Bright family and the two kids are training to become Junior Bracers, basically trainees, to follow in their fathers footsteps. They are preparing to go take their final exam with Scherazard (or as they call her Schera) and finally be able to do Bracer work. Shortly after this their father is called away to take care of something that happened considering hes one of the best Bracers in the kingdom of Liberl where this game takes place, and could be considered one of the best in the entirety of the continent named Zemuria. The prologue ends with Estelle and Joshua finishing up the work their father left them since he was leaving and finding out that he, and the airship he was on, have gone missing.
With the basis of the story out of the way... I'll get into the demo itself. The demo as I've already said is a meaty one. It gives you basically the entire beginning of the game being the prologue chapter and all the content therein in which you can transfer progress to the full game. You get a very good feel for the game as you get into a few battles, a lot of side quests, and wahtnot. The game really does feel like Trails in the Sky original... but 3D! And with the new Falcom engine they used for the Daybreak games meaning beautiful 3D models IMO and a great n smooth action to turnbased hybrid system. Now, while the game itself is great I noticed a few issues with the demo. This might not reflect the demo on other systems but this is a warning for those that this stuff bothers... there was a main story scene where straight up a Japanese line was left in. There's also a few lines here n there side quest or not that have issues grammar or spelling wise, etc. Then some equipment called Quartz which you insert into the characters' Orbments to get bonuses and spells had a few descriptions with typos. There was also a weird issue where an in battle mechanic that lets characters combo would cut off lines and they wouldn't even be the right lines. Like, voiced line and subtitle would be mismatched. This is going off English dub but it would be an issue in Japanese dub too since the lines cut off anyway. Seems the demo is based on an earlier build and had some serious issues. Despite that, there's nothing too glaring that would take away enjoyment. You'll have a good time and get a feel for the games quality, translation not withstanding.
Now for my mini review of the full release so far... I'm about 20 hours in and within the first chapter still but I think I've played far enough to at least give people my opinion on the game. Firstly, I did some digging by speed running the beginning of the game a little to check a few mistakes I noticed translation wise in the demo and I can say quite a few WERE fixed for the final release. The inbattle stuff I talked about was fixed as well. The game overall just exudes a faithful remake basically taking a game and giving it a fresh coat of paint. Fans of the series, or people new to it... will definitely ENJOY THE HELL out of 1st chapter. The action to turnbased combat is fluid and feels natural. The exploration and quests all flesh out the world, AND you can't miss anything unless you want to because everything is marked on your map. Just make sure to do stuff because quests expire after a certain advancement in the story. Overall, now y'all don't have an excuse to not try this series haha.
The voice acting is top notch but... theres some weird pronunciations. This goes into translation quality now which I have the most to gripe and talk about. A lot of stuff was fixed from demo BUT some of it is inherently wrong. In the prologue there is an area you go to called Esmelas Tower. I cross referenced the PSP version and yes it is called that there... why is it now called Jade Tower? I don't know! And clearly they had Esmelas at first because a tutorial for the map names it Esmelas in both demo and final game. There's even a stone you retrieve called an Esmelas. Whatever, it's not a big deal I guess. Thing is there are other terms that're messed up. Liberl is pronouced "Liberal" which is fair it's a rough word to say sure... but they said it right in later games anyway so... what? Consistency with terms is an issue for this game and it's where the whole idea of "retranslating the game instead of using the originals translation" irks me. I get that theres a bit of new content (which is fine so far from what I've seen, that having original translation is fine with me) but the original game set up so many terms that later games in the timeline have used. Archaisms which are basically machines are now Golems. Yes, that is not an inaccurate translation but that's not what the series has built up terminology wise. I could go on and on but it really is splitting hairs. The game is great, go play it, get into this series already!
Peak in the Sky 1st Chapter is waiting for y'all.
