-
Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.
"This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.
The Legend of Heroes Thread - Trails of Cold Steel in the Sky
- Thread starter Crooked Bee
- Start date
This take is almost complete. Don't worry about quest points, but also don't worry about later games.
any reason to skip Cold Steel 1/2 ?
Jinn
Arcane
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2007
- Messages
- 5,507
He's already played them.
- Joined
- Jan 19, 2014
- Messages
- 14,310
I played those and the TitS trilogy.
Reinhardt
Arcane
- Joined
- Sep 4, 2015
- Messages
- 32,457
yes - it's waste of time
Reinhardt
Arcane
- Joined
- Sep 4, 2015
- Messages
- 32,457
just like cold steel
Jinn
Arcane
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2007
- Messages
- 5,507
Move on, dude.just like cold steel
Reinhardt
Arcane
- Joined
- Sep 4, 2015
- Messages
- 32,457
no.Move on, dude.just like cold steel
it's like talking about bg and then everyone assume it's about bear sex.
cold steel is boring and doing disservice to great series.
and rean is one of most bland and boring jrpg protagonists ever.
Jinn
Arcane
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2007
- Messages
- 5,507
No, in fact, Cold Steel does excellent service to the series by fleshing out the setting further. If you're caught up on the protagonist or the military school setting you're missing the point. I'll always agree that Cold Steel 1 is a slog to get through, but 2-4 are good games that have a great deal to add to the setting, and ultimately end up with a great payoff -> see Trails into Reverie. If you don't care about that, then fine, yeah, it's a waste of time. You're also missing some of the best gameplay the series has to offer.
Either way, reiterating your point here excessively does nothing. It's just tedious and pointless.
You calm down there forum police
It's the duty of niggas in the know to dissuade new friends from cold steel clusterfuck
Val the Moofia Boss
Scholar
- Joined
- Feb 3, 2022
- Messages
- 1,280
After 135 hours, I have finished Trails into Reverie/Hajimari no Kiseki on Abyss difficulty.
Reverie was... a mixed bag. As usual, the high points is the character building and turn based combat. Abyss helps make the game more fun since the game is challenging for a longer period of time, but it still follows the pattern of the first one or two chapters being ridiculously difficult, the middle game being fun, and the endgame being too easy. The postgame and true final boss was laughable.
Story wise, Reverie still suffers from the writing problems that plagued the last two games (obnoxious Crossbell wanking, selective morality, lack of accountability, incoherent power levels, intrusive franchise fanservice, character assassinations, etc), but this game's storyline didn't have hundreds of hours of build up so it isn't as disappointing as CS4. Like Pokemon Myster Dungeon: Explorers of Sky, I felt that the postgame storyline was kind of a let down compared to the main story ending. Felt like it should have just ended at the main story final dungeon, leaving the game off on the highest note possible.
The doors/daydreams in Reverie are lackluster compared to the doors from 3rd. In 3rd, you got several really meaty, fleshed out doors like Kloe's time at Jenis Academy, or Schera and Aina in Grancel, or Mary wandering around the Ruan region, or the celebration party atop Grancel castle, etc. Doors where you got to talk to a lot of NPCs. But in Reverie, aside from Ash's door at the Branch Campus, you don't get any such thing. It's either just running through corridor dungeons, or just watching a movie. This is supposed to be a video game. There is supposed to be interactivity here. If I wanted to watch a movie then I would be doing that instead of playing a game. Another issue with the doors/daydreams in Reverie is that - aside from the 3 novellas that you unlocked after beating the true final boss which tease Kuro no Kiseki - none of the doors/daydreams really expand upon the world or set up future plotlines like 3rd's did. A lot of them felt like padding.
Anyway, music was good. Port quality was great. No crashes. The localization is an impediment to gameplay as several craft and item descriptions were mistranslated and provide inaccurate information. Story wise, the localization has some egregious hiccups here and there. The voice acting quality was inconsistent. Some people sound out of character. There are a few standout performances such as Dr. Novartis or the Emperor, but there are also stinkers like Grace and Jingo. There was inconsistent mixing of the audio levels. Sometimes some characters' voices were too low to be heard, while in the same scene another character's voice would be too loud.
Overall had fun.
I'm going to go ahead and play the fan translation of Kuro no Kiseki. I've heard unflattering things about the writing, but I enjoy the combat and aesthetics and music of this franchise, and the characters are usually likeable.
Reading 3 & 9, this would make for a great Thief or Hitman styled stealth puzzle game. Could also make for a good game of forum mafia as Swin makes his bid to escape and the organization begins hunting for the traitor within its ranks.
Starting on Abyss.
Disarmament? In the face of the continuing Calvardian threat? What? Are our leaders even more stupid than I had previously thought?
Don't gaslight yourself. The world war had already been set in motion when Crossbell and Calvard attacked Erebonia in 1204.
Goodness gracious knock it off with this "I'm working hard to forgive myself!" crap.
The English voices sound off. Rean's voice doesn't sound as deep or as authoritative as in the first three Cold Steel games. He sounds a little light and raspy here. Kurt's voice sounds a little too deep, as if several years. Ash, Juna, and Altina sound the same.
Darn. Claire is absolutely brutal on Abyss difficulty. "I will show you no mercy" lmao she means it. I had to level grind to 104, level up my master quartz to level 6 to gain the bonus effect, farm U-materials and sepith to jack up my stats, and this fight was still very hard. Very RNG dependent. That was 3-4 hours of grinding while listening to a podcast.
Finally beat Claire after 40ish attempts, and then beat first phase Matteus in two tries. Just spam your highest damaging crafts and use healing items, don't bother with trying to break boss bars (they instantly recover) or trying to buff defense or speed (you will lose the DPS race if you do). I guess Shining might have helped but Claire spammed a lot of arts so it'd be useless against that.
I like that the characters use their powers and tools in cutscenes, such as the extending chain on Ash's weapon to be used as a stand in for rope to pull someone up or Altina being able to fly.
Took a couple hours of attempts on Matteus phase 2 to beat him within the time limit. Didn't get the AP bonus.
Just realized that I missed a monster scan, one of the soldiers from the fight before Rufus at the end of Lloyd chapter 1. I don't want to redo the past 5-6 hours of grinding and reattempting Claire and Matteus phase 2 over and over so I'll just continue on for now. I've heard that the upcoming magic knight fight is the biggest hurdle on an Abyss playthrough, so if I get stonewalled on that then maybe I will consider starting over on nightmare.
This demonic snail has an topaz heart in the center of its shell? Cool design I.
Yay killed the knight on my third try.
Don't use the phrase "I mean," to start a sentence. Pretty unusual that we are 450+ hours in and Rean is now uncharacteristically using this language. Very strange.
Oh my, that zoom in on that pixelated skybox.
Lloyd's voicelines are very well delievered. Would be nice if the facial expressions for the overworld dialogue would change appropriately, though. He shouldn't be smiling.
The cop accepts the unrepetent assassin working for a crime syndicate lmao
Max Mittleman is back as Lechter yay!
The CGF are the most useless military in Zemuria. They can't even defend ONE city. It has been occupied FOUR TIMES within three years.
It seems there has been a running trend since the Crossbell games. The Trails franchise depicts cities as being the source of warmongering populaces. In Crossbell you had the cityfolk becoming zombies en masse and then later supporting Dieter's one world order. In CS3 and CS4, the Great Twilight not only takes the most root in Heimdallr and Crossbell, the protagonists also comment "seems he has been affected by the curse" on several NPCs in cities such as Saint-Arkh, Ordis, and Raquel. You can find nary an NPC losing their minds in the rural villages like Milsante, Leeves, Eryn, Saint Ursula's Hospital, etc. Only the mayor of the village of Alster becomes affected. And then here again in Reverie, you have the cityfolk of Crossbell going crazy (for the fourth time in three years!) while the rural populace of Armorica keep their heads on straight. I'm guessing in the Kuro games, we will see the city populations of Calvard - particularly the capital of Edith - thirst for blood.
This giant's head design is interesting.
... What? We are 10 games in and we are now taking God's name in vain?
Stilted dialogue.
Aurier's voice sounds really weird.
Now that I think about it, if Osborne is supposed to be the literal incarnation of the LIONheart emperor, then why was his ultimate attack that of a BEAR? Do Zemurian lions look like bears? Hm... I don't think we have seen any actual flesh and blood lions in Trails thus far. Are lions supposed to be imaginary, mythological creatures like dragons are in our world? If so, then perhaps a lion that looks like a bear is no less of a lion than a traditional lion?
Yay I beat the Adeptus boss underneath Heimdallr. Took 30 minutes goodness gracious. I popped everyone's S-crafts except Jusis at the beginning to kill the adds. Used Black Tortoise on Jusis' first turn. I used Rean, Millium, and Altina spamming their high damage high break crafts, Jusis for healing and buffing, Elliot to raise everyone's HP with his S-craft if I was caught with no BP for a Black Tortoise 1/2 damage taken brave order, and swapped in Ash towards the end to use his S-craft as a finisher.
Don't gaslight yourself. The Empire didn't start this war.
There are too many sentences with fully capitalized words. It starts to lose impact.
Why not just say "him"? It's not as if his gender was a mystery. This is very unnatural dialogue.
Aiding our adversary by investing in their businesses rather than that of our own or our allies... these two traitors ought to be shot.
Oh, I see how it is! We tie up our nation's soldiers, but leave mass murderers like Shirley KOed on the floor and don't tie them up either. Got it.
Oh? That didn't stop Roselia from being heavily involved in CS4.
Why the selective morality? Why did you knockout Shirley (shoot up a theater, killed dozens or hundreds of policemen), Sigmund (again slew many), Arios (conspired to launch an unprovoked attack against Erebonia and Calvard and killed hundreds with the Aions), but not arrest them too?
Goodness gracious more vapid platitudes.
Baloney! The Brights couldn't scratch the blue Aion in Ao. The SSS couldn't damage the silver Aion atop Orchis Tower in Ao. And Class VII - the strongest cast as of yet with trained martial artists - couldn't scratch through the first generation Drakhen soldat's reflective armor at the end of CS1. These are third generation Zauber soldats (new models at that). You expect me to believe that these kids with their glorified forklift can not only scratch it, but damage it to the point that it is inoperable? Complete baloney.
Oh look, Bracers breaking their charter and once again meddling in the internal affairs of a country.
Alisa's voice actor sounds weird.
"Suckage"? Really?
Novartis sounds very good in English.
Huh? You've never met McBurn before.
How does McBurn know Agate? They've never met before either.
Also nice that McBurn got his old voice actor back.
Haha, no. Wazy and Sharon are the only ones who won't immediately die in 2 seconds to him.
Bullocks.
If there are robots walking around, can't you just hold up a magnet to people and see if it sticks to them or just slides off of them?
*snore* what hardships?
Why weren't those soldiers turned into red paste? Testa-Rossa shoots real bullets, not those soft energy balls from orbal guns that tickle people.
Don't worry. Heroes don't die in Trails games. You'll be fine.
Yeah no there will be no blood spilt.
Machias, are you insane? Do you not remember the ending of CS1 when the attacks of trained martial artists bounced off of the soldats' reflective armor?
Baloney.
Fun banter inside the Moon Temple.
*Lloyd stands up despite Illya's mindcontrol* sigh.
Arianrhod was worse. She stood by while Novartis kidnapped children and performed horrific experiments trying to link them up with a Gordias mech, killing them until Renne lived. She stood by while Weissman enslaved and experimented upon children. She stood by while Mariabell oversaw a cult that kidnapped and experimented upon children, killing most of them. She stood by while Crossbell burned. She hijacked railway guns and used them to bombard a city, and then mass murderered a garrison of soldiers. Rufus? All he did was subdue a belligerent nation that had attacked his country, and killed that wicked woman Arianrhod.
What? But I used Aeon Shield and my whole team was alive and I got one of the bosses down below 50% HP!
Why didn't you bring your Soldats with you? You guys did it in CS4 act 1. You don't need a Divine Knight, only a witch.
The Mischneider story was pretty touching. Too bad Crow had to just ruin the moment immediately afterwards with a lampshade. Nothing can be be sincere anymore.
That is quite the leap of logic.
This fella doesn't look like he's doing too well.
Why does Rean call Lloyd? They aren't close friends at all. If Rean needed more info from people inside Crossbell, then why not call Altina, Lechter, Machias, Towa, or Claire? People he knows are there and on his side.
Starting on Abyss.
What oppression has the average Crossbellian faced?
What have you suffered?
Your country demolished the peace!
Damn. Our heroes gave away confidential military data to foreign powers? The list of treasnous acts the protagonists commit just keep getting longer and longer.
The volume of the voicelines is inconsistent. Tio and Ellie's voices are considerably lower than the other characters, to the point I can't hear them over the music playing, but if I raise the voiceline volume then the other characters are too loud.
Once again the Bracers violate their charter and begin selectively participating in national conflicts they have no business being in.
Nobody talks like this cartoon caricature. Falcom did this before when they turned Dieter and Cayenne into cartoon caricatures and Rufus into a mustache twilring villain, and now the Imperial soldiers. Feels like Falcom didn't like how Richard had pretty valid motivations that the protagonists couldn't adequately refute, and thus try to turn their antagonists into strawmen so you can't root for them.
Pot calls the kettle black. After Crossbell lost its war, you continued resisting even when there was zero hope of toppling the empire. The only reason the Empire left is because the Chancellor was killed by evil black blob shennagains and the rest of Erebonia's leadership's IQ dropped -50 points.
What hardships?
*laughs* you can knock it off with the revisionism.
When I heard that the Erebonian soldiers ran up to the roof, I was expecting to see them commit seppuku on live television and inspire their countrymen at home. They should've done that instead of surrender.
Free in spite of your actions.
Lmao Juna - the fangirl retconned into the series in CS3 - gets higher billing than Wazy and Noel who had apart of the SSS since Ao.
"Once again"? No, it was never recgonized as an independent state. Knock it off with the historical revisionism.
Darn, Grace's voice actor sounds like she is on HRT or something. Not good.
Kea's English voice sounds like she's in her mid 30s rather than being a preteen girl.
"As you know" exposition.
You're calling the gang leader and drug addict who tried to murder Wazy and trampled a city while throwing a tantrum a "saint"?
Historical revisionism. We see several Crossbell NPCs in CS3+4 who are happy about being a part of the Empire.
Disappointing. It would've been interesting to see how NPCs adjusted after a war. Sadly it was a one day war in which no one died and nobody had to kill.
Why are you babbling this out loud? "S-rank" is a secret, informal title only known to those given it and their confidants.
Oh come on! If Renne can murder so many people she becomes known as the "Angel of Slaughter" and get away with it, so can you! Hell, Rixia is still an unrepetent murderer for hire and everybody still loves her! Crow and Scarlet tried firing railway guns at a tower and they were forgiven! As long as you are nice to the protagonists, you don't have to worry about being held accountable for your actions in Trails.
At least this city isn't run by a crime syndicate!
"Working with the cops made me want to continue being an assassin who kills people for money and works for a crime syndicate."
Finally, a game that gets to the exciting stuff 6 hours in rather than 60.
What have you suffered?
Your country demolished the peace!
Damn. Our heroes gave away confidential military data to foreign powers? The list of treasnous acts the protagonists commit just keep getting longer and longer.
The volume of the voicelines is inconsistent. Tio and Ellie's voices are considerably lower than the other characters, to the point I can't hear them over the music playing, but if I raise the voiceline volume then the other characters are too loud.
Once again the Bracers violate their charter and begin selectively participating in national conflicts they have no business being in.
Nobody talks like this cartoon caricature. Falcom did this before when they turned Dieter and Cayenne into cartoon caricatures and Rufus into a mustache twilring villain, and now the Imperial soldiers. Feels like Falcom didn't like how Richard had pretty valid motivations that the protagonists couldn't adequately refute, and thus try to turn their antagonists into strawmen so you can't root for them.
Pot calls the kettle black. After Crossbell lost its war, you continued resisting even when there was zero hope of toppling the empire. The only reason the Empire left is because the Chancellor was killed by evil black blob shennagains and the rest of Erebonia's leadership's IQ dropped -50 points.
What hardships?
*laughs* you can knock it off with the revisionism.
When I heard that the Erebonian soldiers ran up to the roof, I was expecting to see them commit seppuku on live television and inspire their countrymen at home. They should've done that instead of surrender.
Free in spite of your actions.
Lmao Juna - the fangirl retconned into the series in CS3 - gets higher billing than Wazy and Noel who had apart of the SSS since Ao.
"Once again"? No, it was never recgonized as an independent state. Knock it off with the historical revisionism.
Darn, Grace's voice actor sounds like she is on HRT or something. Not good.
Kea's English voice sounds like she's in her mid 30s rather than being a preteen girl.
"As you know" exposition.
You're calling the gang leader and drug addict who tried to murder Wazy and trampled a city while throwing a tantrum a "saint"?
Historical revisionism. We see several Crossbell NPCs in CS3+4 who are happy about being a part of the Empire.
Disappointing. It would've been interesting to see how NPCs adjusted after a war. Sadly it was a one day war in which no one died and nobody had to kill.
Why are you babbling this out loud? "S-rank" is a secret, informal title only known to those given it and their confidants.
Oh come on! If Renne can murder so many people she becomes known as the "Angel of Slaughter" and get away with it, so can you! Hell, Rixia is still an unrepetent murderer for hire and everybody still loves her! Crow and Scarlet tried firing railway guns at a tower and they were forgiven! As long as you are nice to the protagonists, you don't have to worry about being held accountable for your actions in Trails.
At least this city isn't run by a crime syndicate!
"Working with the cops made me want to continue being an assassin who kills people for money and works for a crime syndicate."
Finally, a game that gets to the exciting stuff 6 hours in rather than 60.
Disarmament? In the face of the continuing Calvardian threat? What? Are our leaders even more stupid than I had previously thought?
Don't gaslight yourself. The world war had already been set in motion when Crossbell and Calvard attacked Erebonia in 1204.
Goodness gracious knock it off with this "I'm working hard to forgive myself!" crap.
The English voices sound off. Rean's voice doesn't sound as deep or as authoritative as in the first three Cold Steel games. He sounds a little light and raspy here. Kurt's voice sounds a little too deep, as if several years. Ash, Juna, and Altina sound the same.
Darn. Claire is absolutely brutal on Abyss difficulty. "I will show you no mercy" lmao she means it. I had to level grind to 104, level up my master quartz to level 6 to gain the bonus effect, farm U-materials and sepith to jack up my stats, and this fight was still very hard. Very RNG dependent. That was 3-4 hours of grinding while listening to a podcast.
Finally beat Claire after 40ish attempts, and then beat first phase Matteus in two tries. Just spam your highest damaging crafts and use healing items, don't bother with trying to break boss bars (they instantly recover) or trying to buff defense or speed (you will lose the DPS race if you do). I guess Shining might have helped but Claire spammed a lot of arts so it'd be useless against that.
I like that the characters use their powers and tools in cutscenes, such as the extending chain on Ash's weapon to be used as a stand in for rope to pull someone up or Altina being able to fly.
Took a couple hours of attempts on Matteus phase 2 to beat him within the time limit. Didn't get the AP bonus.
Just realized that I missed a monster scan, one of the soldiers from the fight before Rufus at the end of Lloyd chapter 1. I don't want to redo the past 5-6 hours of grinding and reattempting Claire and Matteus phase 2 over and over so I'll just continue on for now. I've heard that the upcoming magic knight fight is the biggest hurdle on an Abyss playthrough, so if I get stonewalled on that then maybe I will consider starting over on nightmare.
This demonic snail has an topaz heart in the center of its shell? Cool design I.
Yay killed the knight on my third try.
Don't use the phrase "I mean," to start a sentence. Pretty unusual that we are 450+ hours in and Rean is now uncharacteristically using this language. Very strange.
Oh my, that zoom in on that pixelated skybox.
You can pretty easily hear DC Douglas even through the voice modulation.
Aw, what a short chapter. The new characters have novelty, would like to spend more time with them. Alas, gotta get the boring SSS stuff and incessant Crossbell mastrubation out of the way first.
Aw, what a short chapter. The new characters have novelty, would like to spend more time with them. Alas, gotta get the boring SSS stuff and incessant Crossbell mastrubation out of the way first.
Lloyd's voicelines are very well delievered. Would be nice if the facial expressions for the overworld dialogue would change appropriately, though. He shouldn't be smiling.
The cop accepts the unrepetent assassin working for a crime syndicate lmao
Max Mittleman is back as Lechter yay!
The CGF are the most useless military in Zemuria. They can't even defend ONE city. It has been occupied FOUR TIMES within three years.
It seems there has been a running trend since the Crossbell games. The Trails franchise depicts cities as being the source of warmongering populaces. In Crossbell you had the cityfolk becoming zombies en masse and then later supporting Dieter's one world order. In CS3 and CS4, the Great Twilight not only takes the most root in Heimdallr and Crossbell, the protagonists also comment "seems he has been affected by the curse" on several NPCs in cities such as Saint-Arkh, Ordis, and Raquel. You can find nary an NPC losing their minds in the rural villages like Milsante, Leeves, Eryn, Saint Ursula's Hospital, etc. Only the mayor of the village of Alster becomes affected. And then here again in Reverie, you have the cityfolk of Crossbell going crazy (for the fourth time in three years!) while the rural populace of Armorica keep their heads on straight. I'm guessing in the Kuro games, we will see the city populations of Calvard - particularly the capital of Edith - thirst for blood.
This giant's head design is interesting.
... What? We are 10 games in and we are now taking God's name in vain?
Stilted dialogue.
Aurier's voice sounds really weird.
Now that I think about it, if Osborne is supposed to be the literal incarnation of the LIONheart emperor, then why was his ultimate attack that of a BEAR? Do Zemurian lions look like bears? Hm... I don't think we have seen any actual flesh and blood lions in Trails thus far. Are lions supposed to be imaginary, mythological creatures like dragons are in our world? If so, then perhaps a lion that looks like a bear is no less of a lion than a traditional lion?
Yay I beat the Adeptus boss underneath Heimdallr. Took 30 minutes goodness gracious. I popped everyone's S-crafts except Jusis at the beginning to kill the adds. Used Black Tortoise on Jusis' first turn. I used Rean, Millium, and Altina spamming their high damage high break crafts, Jusis for healing and buffing, Elliot to raise everyone's HP with his S-craft if I was caught with no BP for a Black Tortoise 1/2 damage taken brave order, and swapped in Ash towards the end to use his S-craft as a finisher.
Don't gaslight yourself. The Empire didn't start this war.
There are too many sentences with fully capitalized words. It starts to lose impact.
Why not just say "him"? It's not as if his gender was a mystery. This is very unnatural dialogue.
Aiding our adversary by investing in their businesses rather than that of our own or our allies... these two traitors ought to be shot.
Oh, I see how it is! We tie up our nation's soldiers, but leave mass murderers like Shirley KOed on the floor and don't tie them up either. Got it.
If Rufus has a RAMDA, a battle orbment that can turn him invisible, then why not use it for combat? He could attack people while invisible and most wouldn't be able to properly defend against him.
Renne's new voice sounds way better. She still sounds like a woman in her mid 30s rather than a teenager, though.
Still love this guy's design.
Looks like an enemy robot straight out of Sakura Wars.
Knock it off with the SSS wanking.
The Overseer's voice is really good.
Still love this guy's design.
Looks like an enemy robot straight out of Sakura Wars.
Knock it off with the SSS wanking.
The Overseer's voice is really good.
Oh? That didn't stop Roselia from being heavily involved in CS4.
Why the selective morality? Why did you knockout Shirley (shoot up a theater, killed dozens or hundreds of policemen), Sigmund (again slew many), Arios (conspired to launch an unprovoked attack against Erebonia and Calvard and killed hundreds with the Aions), but not arrest them too?
Goodness gracious more vapid platitudes.
Baloney! The Brights couldn't scratch the blue Aion in Ao. The SSS couldn't damage the silver Aion atop Orchis Tower in Ao. And Class VII - the strongest cast as of yet with trained martial artists - couldn't scratch through the first generation Drakhen soldat's reflective armor at the end of CS1. These are third generation Zauber soldats (new models at that). You expect me to believe that these kids with their glorified forklift can not only scratch it, but damage it to the point that it is inoperable? Complete baloney.
Oh look, Bracers breaking their charter and once again meddling in the internal affairs of a country.
Alisa's voice actor sounds weird.
"Suckage"? Really?
Novartis sounds very good in English.
Huh? You've never met McBurn before.
How does McBurn know Agate? They've never met before either.
Also nice that McBurn got his old voice actor back.
Haha, no. Wazy and Sharon are the only ones who won't immediately die in 2 seconds to him.
Bullocks.
Going to the Nord Highlands again is pretty nostalgic. That was when I started getting super invested in CS1.
Uh oh, is there really no place to modify my orbments in the Nord Settlement? And I can't enter Zendar gate either. Do I have to run all the way up to the Reinforc's cabin?
Awww they're cute with the strawhats on.
Oh wow, Sara and Kurt have after battle dialogue with each other! I should have seen what Altina and Ash had to say to Elliot/Jusis/Elise in Heimdallr.
Knock it off with the Crossbell wanking.
Couldn't be more blatant, Falcom.
Yay killed that turtle superboss! It was pretty demoralizing wiping with him only having 30k health left, but I got him a couple attempts later. My strat was to use Deva/Beowulf on Emma, having her cast Cavalry Edge (time elemental art that the boss is weak too, cast reduction from Deva and Black Bell, Beowulf regens CP for each art cast, and I spam Emma's S-craft to give the team a shield), and to use Elise's 2 BP brave order that gives 50% evasion. I also stacked delay on Gaius and had him spam his S-craft over and over, but it didn't noticeably delay the boss very much.
Little do they know that Gramhardt is building up his military forces and will then unveil them in the next game as an implicit threat against Erebonia.
Look at that. Our leaders are throwing away perfectly good military equipment while our adversary is hulking up.
Oh come on!
Please. No one lifted a finger when Calvard attacked Erebonia during the civil war.
Aurelia's battle voicelines don't sound quite right. Similar issue with Sara's victory lines inside the watchtower.
It's pretty disappointing that Arios also turned out to be a robot. Should have been two warriors fighting for their countries against each other, to the death.
Nah, there would still be mafias and brush wars going on, but there would be peace for us.
Yup.
The 23rd Armored Division's motives of trying to defend Erebonia are incongruent with their intent to swear fealty to the United Nation based in Crossbell. The Supreme Leader not being an Arnor and the capital being located outside of Erebonia would mean that Erebonia would become a vassal state.
Why didn't Gaius call out Bleublanc for trying to burn Nord in CS2? And Crow?
Just so we're clear, you're saying that it was also the choice of the Crossbellians to follow the Supreme Leader then? No more double standards here, right? Good.
Why is Grace involved in this meeting?
Rean using the second form to beat the master of the second form? Bullocks. Welp, if Lloyd can inexplicably beat robo McBurn wielding Angbar, then Rean can certainly beat robo Arios. I suppose this passes.
Looks like the Arbalest from Full Metal Panic. Cool. Hope it has an AI of its own, different from Valimar. Also, did the Zemurian Taichi change color? Didn't it have yellow/gold trim? Why does it have aqua blue lines now? (Wait a minute, did we ever get the Zemurian Taichi back? Was it lost inside the Gral of Erebos? That giant sword was made with the last bits of Zemurian Ore left in Erebonia, and the weapons of the other knights vanished along with their users so they couldn't have been melted down... so is this a new taichi made of regular metal?)
This chapter felt a little bit like Thunderbirds, or a mecha anime. Most of your main characters are piloting mechs or vehicles. Rean, Kurt, Mueller, and Aurelia in Soldats. Gaius and Olivier in their airships. Cool.
Uh oh, is there really no place to modify my orbments in the Nord Settlement? And I can't enter Zendar gate either. Do I have to run all the way up to the Reinforc's cabin?
Awww they're cute with the strawhats on.
Oh wow, Sara and Kurt have after battle dialogue with each other! I should have seen what Altina and Ash had to say to Elliot/Jusis/Elise in Heimdallr.
Knock it off with the Crossbell wanking.
Couldn't be more blatant, Falcom.
Yay killed that turtle superboss! It was pretty demoralizing wiping with him only having 30k health left, but I got him a couple attempts later. My strat was to use Deva/Beowulf on Emma, having her cast Cavalry Edge (time elemental art that the boss is weak too, cast reduction from Deva and Black Bell, Beowulf regens CP for each art cast, and I spam Emma's S-craft to give the team a shield), and to use Elise's 2 BP brave order that gives 50% evasion. I also stacked delay on Gaius and had him spam his S-craft over and over, but it didn't noticeably delay the boss very much.
Little do they know that Gramhardt is building up his military forces and will then unveil them in the next game as an implicit threat against Erebonia.
Look at that. Our leaders are throwing away perfectly good military equipment while our adversary is hulking up.
Oh come on!
Please. No one lifted a finger when Calvard attacked Erebonia during the civil war.
Aurelia's battle voicelines don't sound quite right. Similar issue with Sara's victory lines inside the watchtower.
It's pretty disappointing that Arios also turned out to be a robot. Should have been two warriors fighting for their countries against each other, to the death.
Nah, there would still be mafias and brush wars going on, but there would be peace for us.
Yup.
The 23rd Armored Division's motives of trying to defend Erebonia are incongruent with their intent to swear fealty to the United Nation based in Crossbell. The Supreme Leader not being an Arnor and the capital being located outside of Erebonia would mean that Erebonia would become a vassal state.
Why didn't Gaius call out Bleublanc for trying to burn Nord in CS2? And Crow?
Just so we're clear, you're saying that it was also the choice of the Crossbellians to follow the Supreme Leader then? No more double standards here, right? Good.
Why is Grace involved in this meeting?
Rean using the second form to beat the master of the second form? Bullocks. Welp, if Lloyd can inexplicably beat robo McBurn wielding Angbar, then Rean can certainly beat robo Arios. I suppose this passes.
Looks like the Arbalest from Full Metal Panic. Cool. Hope it has an AI of its own, different from Valimar. Also, did the Zemurian Taichi change color? Didn't it have yellow/gold trim? Why does it have aqua blue lines now? (Wait a minute, did we ever get the Zemurian Taichi back? Was it lost inside the Gral of Erebos? That giant sword was made with the last bits of Zemurian Ore left in Erebonia, and the weapons of the other knights vanished along with their users so they couldn't have been melted down... so is this a new taichi made of regular metal?)
This chapter felt a little bit like Thunderbirds, or a mecha anime. Most of your main characters are piloting mechs or vehicles. Rean, Kurt, Mueller, and Aurelia in Soldats. Gaius and Olivier in their airships. Cool.
If there are robots walking around, can't you just hold up a magnet to people and see if it sticks to them or just slides off of them?
*snore* what hardships?
Why weren't those soldiers turned into red paste? Testa-Rossa shoots real bullets, not those soft energy balls from orbal guns that tickle people.
Don't worry. Heroes don't die in Trails games. You'll be fine.
Yeah no there will be no blood spilt.
Machias, are you insane? Do you not remember the ending of CS1 when the attacks of trained martial artists bounced off of the soldats' reflective armor?
Baloney.
Fun banter inside the Moon Temple.
*Lloyd stands up despite Illya's mindcontrol* sigh.
Arianrhod was worse. She stood by while Novartis kidnapped children and performed horrific experiments trying to link them up with a Gordias mech, killing them until Renne lived. She stood by while Weissman enslaved and experimented upon children. She stood by while Mariabell oversaw a cult that kidnapped and experimented upon children, killing most of them. She stood by while Crossbell burned. She hijacked railway guns and used them to bombard a city, and then mass murderered a garrison of soldiers. Rufus? All he did was subdue a belligerent nation that had attacked his country, and killed that wicked woman Arianrhod.
What? But I used Aeon Shield and my whole team was alive and I got one of the bosses down below 50% HP!
Why didn't you bring your Soldats with you? You guys did it in CS4 act 1. You don't need a Divine Knight, only a witch.
The Mischneider story was pretty touching. Too bad Crow had to just ruin the moment immediately afterwards with a lampshade. Nothing can be be sincere anymore.
That is quite the leap of logic.
This fella doesn't look like he's doing too well.
Why does Rean call Lloyd? They aren't close friends at all. If Rean needed more info from people inside Crossbell, then why not call Altina, Lechter, Machias, Towa, or Claire? People he knows are there and on his side.
This "Gasp! The technological singularity that Professor Epstein predicted!" comes out of nowhere. It was never brought up over the past 1,000 hours of Trails.
Knock it off with the Crossbell wanking.
There is no good reason why it isn't with you.
"LOOK MOM! SCANTILY CLAD WOMEN GYRATING!"
You can't make this up. Wallace and Aurelia's army stationed there (as well as a few NPCs visiting from Ordis) should have been disintegrated.
Gramhardt's English voice is underwhelming. Doesn't have the gravitas of his Japanese voice.
Make up your mind prick. You don't get to cry "Erebonia must disarm while we hulk up our military!" and then turn around and say "Oh, why are you Erebonians being so cautious when it comes to intervening in this territory?".
"Crossbell has consistently needed a multinational force with multiple Gralsritter, Enforcers, A Rank Bracers, Jaegers, Divine Blades, etc, to solve its own issues short of Dieter figuring out how to solve their issues on their own."
"No, THIS time for sure we will prove we can handle crisis with their own borders by having this multinational team of special people take care of it!".
Gramhart and Osborne had a point.
I've noticed that the dialogue keeps switching back and forth between "Babel" and "Retributive Tower".
Sadly it looks like the devs didn't make The Retributive Tower/Babel visible from atop the Moon Temple.
Why is Lucy here? Where is Julia?
Why is my controller rumbling after the end of each fight inside the Retributive tower?
Claire's treasure chest voiceline sounds nasally.
Got stuck on the cube boss for an hour. At one point I thought I would have to go back to an earlier save and readjust Lloyd's team, but I managed to get through it. Just keep Aeon shield up. What I did I would switch to Lloyd, have him use Burning Heart to build BP, and use Chrono Burst to get a heal in there during the electrifying phase to heal Lloyd back up. Then swap back out to Joshua and had him and Rufus spam Cavalary edge. I brought in Estelle because of her S-craft that has a high break rating, and since it's an S-craft that means she has a long delay, which means fewer turns of Aeon Shield lost.
Cool.
That third phase of the Zoa Gilstein divine knight battle was the hardest final boss battle in this franchise yet, surpassing Valimar vs Ordine at the end of CS1. Took me about 2-3 hours of attempts, and my winning attempt took 30 minutes. Basically you want to guard if below 50% HP, try to use Alisa/Elliot/Musse to heal the whole group since that's more efficient than just healing a single mech, and try to stack debuffs on the boss.
Debuff combos:
Sara's Lordly Lightning (costs 300 EP) will inflict SPD down (L), which if followed up by Fie's or Altina's Shadow Rise (costs 200 EP), will extend that to two turns.
Jusis' Silvery Runes (costs 300 EP) will inflict DEF and ADF down (L), which if followed up by Rean's Crescent Flash (costs 60 CP) will extend that to 3 turns. Use this before a 5 BP team attack for maximum damage. Rufus' Divine Arc will extend that ADF down (L) to 4 turns. If Rean still has 60 CP and doesn't need to guard against the boss, then Machias or Juna can accelerate Rean so he can use Crescent Flash and refresh the debuff before it falls off. Emma's and Ash's Silver Ray can also extend the debuffs but only for 2 turns.
Crow and Sara can inflict STR down (L) which lasts 2 turns, and can be extended by Jusis or Juna's Galt Arrow for 2 turns.
When Zoa Gilstein starts nearing 50% HP, start saving up your CP so you can turtle during his enhanced state, which lasts 9 turns. Defending has a longer AT delay than attacking, so if you use defend then the enhanced phase will go by quicker. You can't debuff the boss during this phase (most importantly, you can't slow him down fast enough to defend in time if he changes targets), and his attacks are deadly, so everyone should just defend. You will also be protected from more attacks by Emma's Crescent Shell team-wide DEF up buff. Alisa's art can provide healing and CP so she should be used the most. Use Musse to heal the whole team.
If a support character is not going to use an art, and instead use an item/charge/spirit, then swap that character out to a useless character like Gaius, Kurt, or Millium. That way, when the next support character's turn comes up, you can switch them out if there is an opportunity for a good combo.
Items have a short delay.
Try not to charge EP as the Divine Knight pilot, as has an AT delay of 25 which means you have less time to react and defend if the boss switches to targetting you. Have the arts support character do the EP charging.
It is disappointing to hear that Soldats/Divine Knights aren't playable in Kuro. To me they were one of the biggest appeals of the Trails of Cold Steel games.
The final fight on foot after that was pretty disappointing. Couldn't use Rean, stupid Lloyd forced into my party, and each of the boss' attacks are raid-wide one shots so you are forced to bring Tio and use her Aeon Shield all of the time.
Rufus' friends going back to save him and him realizing he has close friends might have been powerful had they not only known each other for just three days.
Fuck Lloyd. Second game where he has done his best to sabotage this planet.
Is Valimar still inside the Tyrfang? Or is it a new consciousness that has emerged inside it?
Huh? The unrepetent criminals get into the happy ending montage?
No, you didn't.
Kondo lied. I remember the news during the lead up to Hajimari's release. He said that the final scene of the game would be in Kuro's engine. It wasn't. It was a grainy, pre-rendered FMV and the audio was out of sync.
Ending thoughts
Fuck Lloyd and fuck Crossbell, and I'm sure Falcom will find a way to take the story back to Crossbell (again!) and shove the SSS into more stories they have no business being in, and have more characters talk about how amazing Crossbellians are.
One of my biggest peeves with the latter Trails games is Falcom's pathological impulse to shoehorn in characters from prior games - whose stories are over - into stories they don't belong in. SC ended with Ragnard and Cassius telling the kids that there is going to be other stuff going on in the world, but that's not up to them to solve. That is for the people over there to whome those conflicts are relevant to solve. But then here you get Reverie where they're talking about everyone across the world has to come together to solve every problem.
And of all the characters they choose to shove into Rean's and Rufus' story aka Cold Steel 5, they choose the most unlikeable: Lloyd and the SSS. Also, 1/3rd of the game revolves around Crossbell, the story of which had already concluded in Ao and then concluded again in CS4. Class VII and Rufus carried this crisis while the SSS accomplished jack all, and ofcourse Lloyd had to commit sabotage (again!) and destroy life-saving information about an impending apoclaypse.
More empty platitudes about the power of friendship.
Once again - like with SC and Ao - it makes no sense that the final boss could be defeated when he has mastery over space. He could have just used his mastery over space to teleport the protagonists into solid rock, or drown them in the lake below, or crush their space, or whatever. And with mastery over time he could just rewind time everytime they are hit and thus evade that hit, or just delete their enemies from existence.
Knock it off with the Crossbell wanking.
There is no good reason why it isn't with you.
"LOOK MOM! SCANTILY CLAD WOMEN GYRATING!"
You can't make this up. Wallace and Aurelia's army stationed there (as well as a few NPCs visiting from Ordis) should have been disintegrated.
Gramhardt's English voice is underwhelming. Doesn't have the gravitas of his Japanese voice.
Make up your mind prick. You don't get to cry "Erebonia must disarm while we hulk up our military!" and then turn around and say "Oh, why are you Erebonians being so cautious when it comes to intervening in this territory?".
"Crossbell has consistently needed a multinational force with multiple Gralsritter, Enforcers, A Rank Bracers, Jaegers, Divine Blades, etc, to solve its own issues short of Dieter figuring out how to solve their issues on their own."
"No, THIS time for sure we will prove we can handle crisis with their own borders by having this multinational team of special people take care of it!".
Gramhart and Osborne had a point.
I've noticed that the dialogue keeps switching back and forth between "Babel" and "Retributive Tower".
Sadly it looks like the devs didn't make The Retributive Tower/Babel visible from atop the Moon Temple.
Why is Lucy here? Where is Julia?
Why is my controller rumbling after the end of each fight inside the Retributive tower?
Claire's treasure chest voiceline sounds nasally.
Got stuck on the cube boss for an hour. At one point I thought I would have to go back to an earlier save and readjust Lloyd's team, but I managed to get through it. Just keep Aeon shield up. What I did I would switch to Lloyd, have him use Burning Heart to build BP, and use Chrono Burst to get a heal in there during the electrifying phase to heal Lloyd back up. Then swap back out to Joshua and had him and Rufus spam Cavalary edge. I brought in Estelle because of her S-craft that has a high break rating, and since it's an S-craft that means she has a long delay, which means fewer turns of Aeon Shield lost.
Cool.
That third phase of the Zoa Gilstein divine knight battle was the hardest final boss battle in this franchise yet, surpassing Valimar vs Ordine at the end of CS1. Took me about 2-3 hours of attempts, and my winning attempt took 30 minutes. Basically you want to guard if below 50% HP, try to use Alisa/Elliot/Musse to heal the whole group since that's more efficient than just healing a single mech, and try to stack debuffs on the boss.
Debuff combos:
Sara's Lordly Lightning (costs 300 EP) will inflict SPD down (L), which if followed up by Fie's or Altina's Shadow Rise (costs 200 EP), will extend that to two turns.
Jusis' Silvery Runes (costs 300 EP) will inflict DEF and ADF down (L), which if followed up by Rean's Crescent Flash (costs 60 CP) will extend that to 3 turns. Use this before a 5 BP team attack for maximum damage. Rufus' Divine Arc will extend that ADF down (L) to 4 turns. If Rean still has 60 CP and doesn't need to guard against the boss, then Machias or Juna can accelerate Rean so he can use Crescent Flash and refresh the debuff before it falls off. Emma's and Ash's Silver Ray can also extend the debuffs but only for 2 turns.
Crow and Sara can inflict STR down (L) which lasts 2 turns, and can be extended by Jusis or Juna's Galt Arrow for 2 turns.
When Zoa Gilstein starts nearing 50% HP, start saving up your CP so you can turtle during his enhanced state, which lasts 9 turns. Defending has a longer AT delay than attacking, so if you use defend then the enhanced phase will go by quicker. You can't debuff the boss during this phase (most importantly, you can't slow him down fast enough to defend in time if he changes targets), and his attacks are deadly, so everyone should just defend. You will also be protected from more attacks by Emma's Crescent Shell team-wide DEF up buff. Alisa's art can provide healing and CP so she should be used the most. Use Musse to heal the whole team.
If a support character is not going to use an art, and instead use an item/charge/spirit, then swap that character out to a useless character like Gaius, Kurt, or Millium. That way, when the next support character's turn comes up, you can switch them out if there is an opportunity for a good combo.
Items have a short delay.
Try not to charge EP as the Divine Knight pilot, as has an AT delay of 25 which means you have less time to react and defend if the boss switches to targetting you. Have the arts support character do the EP charging.
It is disappointing to hear that Soldats/Divine Knights aren't playable in Kuro. To me they were one of the biggest appeals of the Trails of Cold Steel games.
The final fight on foot after that was pretty disappointing. Couldn't use Rean, stupid Lloyd forced into my party, and each of the boss' attacks are raid-wide one shots so you are forced to bring Tio and use her Aeon Shield all of the time.
Rufus' friends going back to save him and him realizing he has close friends might have been powerful had they not only known each other for just three days.
Fuck Lloyd. Second game where he has done his best to sabotage this planet.
Is Valimar still inside the Tyrfang? Or is it a new consciousness that has emerged inside it?
Huh? The unrepetent criminals get into the happy ending montage?
No, you didn't.
Kondo lied. I remember the news during the lead up to Hajimari's release. He said that the final scene of the game would be in Kuro's engine. It wasn't. It was a grainy, pre-rendered FMV and the audio was out of sync.
Ending thoughts
Fuck Lloyd and fuck Crossbell, and I'm sure Falcom will find a way to take the story back to Crossbell (again!) and shove the SSS into more stories they have no business being in, and have more characters talk about how amazing Crossbellians are.
One of my biggest peeves with the latter Trails games is Falcom's pathological impulse to shoehorn in characters from prior games - whose stories are over - into stories they don't belong in. SC ended with Ragnard and Cassius telling the kids that there is going to be other stuff going on in the world, but that's not up to them to solve. That is for the people over there to whome those conflicts are relevant to solve. But then here you get Reverie where they're talking about everyone across the world has to come together to solve every problem.
And of all the characters they choose to shove into Rean's and Rufus' story aka Cold Steel 5, they choose the most unlikeable: Lloyd and the SSS. Also, 1/3rd of the game revolves around Crossbell, the story of which had already concluded in Ao and then concluded again in CS4. Class VII and Rufus carried this crisis while the SSS accomplished jack all, and ofcourse Lloyd had to commit sabotage (again!) and destroy life-saving information about an impending apoclaypse.
More empty platitudes about the power of friendship.
Once again - like with SC and Ao - it makes no sense that the final boss could be defeated when he has mastery over space. He could have just used his mastery over space to teleport the protagonists into solid rock, or drown them in the lake below, or crush their space, or whatever. And with mastery over time he could just rewind time everytime they are hit and thus evade that hit, or just delete their enemies from existence.
Rixia Door:
lmao "you don't have to stop being a two faced, cold blooded murderer for hire! You're fine just the way you are!".
Tita door: hold up. We are giving away the secret of Erebonian technology to foreign powers? They're not even paying for it, we are? *facepalm*
I cannot believe the localizers thought this was acceptable.
Hold up. Cedric secretly visits the branch campus and gets chewed out for it, but when Alfin does it nobody cares?
Millium door: Airgetlam should stay dead. Give Millium a new combat shell.
More fighting Zauber soldats on foot? For goodness' sake...
Tournament door:
Goodness gracious, this was tied with the main story final DK fight as the hardest battle I've experienced in this franchise. Spent two hours stonewalled on these mages. Most of the difficulty of the fight comes from Roselia, who has devestating crafts and can cast Zeruel Cannon very quickly which will probably kill anyone it hits even with Black Tortoise up. First, you have to restart the fight over and over, hoping to get lucky so that 1. Rean, Duvalie, or Laura get off a line attack that crits and procs BP, allowing you to use the Black Tortoise brave order, and 2. Jusis is able to get Shining on the group (difficult since Roselia usually goes before his cast finishes and uses a craft that will cancel his cast). If you manage to survive that initial part, then you need to immediately move your whole party to Alfin (though in my winning attempt, Jusis was a little outside of range of the rest of the group stacked on Alfin, and avoided being targetted). Use Helix, Lion Rush, and Swift Slash. Kill Alfin first since she can heal and raise shields. After that, target Olivier, and try hit Roselia while you are at it. Once Olivier is done, kill Roselia. Once she goes below 50% HP, you has a high chance of using an S-craft that will kill everyone, so Jusis needs to use Platinum Shield on the group (in a ddition to keeping shining up). If you kill Roselia, then you've won. Kill Toval. Be methodical; don't burn all of your BP on orders just to kill him, instead try to build them for the next fight.
Grandmaster door:
Goodness gracious, the writers are nullifying the only progress we've made towards taking out the 8/8 big bads (7 Anguis + Grandmaster) over the course of 10 games and 1,000+ hours?
Elaine novella:
*sigh* S-rank is a secret rank! Only S-rank bracers and their confidants know about it! Making someone an S-rank bracer for publicity purposes is pointless if the public doesn't know about it!
Ah, so now the Bracer guild's rules matter when you decide it should!
lmao "you don't have to stop being a two faced, cold blooded murderer for hire! You're fine just the way you are!".
Tita door: hold up. We are giving away the secret of Erebonian technology to foreign powers? They're not even paying for it, we are? *facepalm*
I cannot believe the localizers thought this was acceptable.
Hold up. Cedric secretly visits the branch campus and gets chewed out for it, but when Alfin does it nobody cares?
Millium door: Airgetlam should stay dead. Give Millium a new combat shell.
More fighting Zauber soldats on foot? For goodness' sake...
Tournament door:
Goodness gracious, this was tied with the main story final DK fight as the hardest battle I've experienced in this franchise. Spent two hours stonewalled on these mages. Most of the difficulty of the fight comes from Roselia, who has devestating crafts and can cast Zeruel Cannon very quickly which will probably kill anyone it hits even with Black Tortoise up. First, you have to restart the fight over and over, hoping to get lucky so that 1. Rean, Duvalie, or Laura get off a line attack that crits and procs BP, allowing you to use the Black Tortoise brave order, and 2. Jusis is able to get Shining on the group (difficult since Roselia usually goes before his cast finishes and uses a craft that will cancel his cast). If you manage to survive that initial part, then you need to immediately move your whole party to Alfin (though in my winning attempt, Jusis was a little outside of range of the rest of the group stacked on Alfin, and avoided being targetted). Use Helix, Lion Rush, and Swift Slash. Kill Alfin first since she can heal and raise shields. After that, target Olivier, and try hit Roselia while you are at it. Once Olivier is done, kill Roselia. Once she goes below 50% HP, you has a high chance of using an S-craft that will kill everyone, so Jusis needs to use Platinum Shield on the group (in a ddition to keeping shining up). If you kill Roselia, then you've won. Kill Toval. Be methodical; don't burn all of your BP on orders just to kill him, instead try to build them for the next fight.
Grandmaster door:
Goodness gracious, the writers are nullifying the only progress we've made towards taking out the 8/8 big bads (7 Anguis + Grandmaster) over the course of 10 games and 1,000+ hours?
Elaine novella:
*sigh* S-rank is a secret rank! Only S-rank bracers and their confidants know about it! Making someone an S-rank bracer for publicity purposes is pointless if the public doesn't know about it!
Ah, so now the Bracer guild's rules matter when you decide it should!
This place looks cool.
I was stonewalled on the cube boss for three days. Actually didn't play Reverie for a day and played some Granblue Fantasy instead, then came back. My winning team was Lloyd/Kurt/Ellie/Elise/Rean. Put Citrus Bottles (faint resist) on everyone. Give Lloyd the Red Emblem (faint and freeze resist) since he will be in melee range of the boss and doesn't have as high of an evade stat as Kurt. Equip the Brigid master quartz (3 CP regen per turn) on Lloyd and the Infinity MQ (3 CP regened per turn) on Ellie. Put the Gladiator belt (2 CP regened per turn) on Ellie. Equip the Shining quartz on Elise. In the tactics menu, position Elise as far back as you can. The game plan is to restart the fight over and over until the RNG godes favor you and you get a run where your team isn't dead after the boss gets multiple turns at the start. Then, you want to use Elise's brave order to give everyone 50% evade chance. Have Elise run back to the edge of the room so they don't get hit by the boss' physical AoEs. Then have Elise cast Shining on the guys in melee range. I tried having Ellie run back with Elise too, but too often the boss would just run around the guys and attack the girls in the back. If the boss uses their magic attack that lowers everyone's HP to 8, then pop Ellie's heal S-craft. Since Ellie is regenning 5 CP per turn, you can use Lloyd's Burning Heart and Kurt's Sword Dance crafts (which only cost 30 CP) to stall turns while she regens CP. You can also use this to snag turn order bonuses such as 0 CP crafts or 0 Brave Orders. Also, Lloyd's Burning Heart craft gives BP, so you should use this to keep Elise's Brave Order up. Once the boss is down to 5% HP, switch Elise out with Rean, have him use Spirit Unification, use the Raging Fire brave order for 25% more damage, then use United Front Attack, and then pop S-crafts.
I find it very disappointing that in Cold Steel, everyone is best buds with each other. Would have been nice to have seen the Crossbell or Erebonian characters express anonymity towards each other (Erebonians for Crossbell's attack and escalation of the cold war into a hot one, Crossbellians for being annexed), or personal animosity between characters like Gaius disliking Crow and Duvalie for their association with the NA who tried to destroy his home, or Class VII hating the Ironbloods and George for mudering Millium and Laura's father. Or Victor disliking McBurn for causing his lung damage. Could have implemented a Valkyria Chronicles style system where some characters like or dislike each other and that affects their battle performance when paired up.
Oh no are these more tortured souls from 3rd?
I spent a couple hours stuck on the evil SSS fight. I tried doing it the "legit" way, by having Rixia dodge tank in the middle and having my three mages spread out around the arena, but once again there was no way to guarentee that the enemies would aggro onto Rixia, and Ellie and Randy kept killing my mages with their AoE crafts. Eventually I just gave up and used the infinite turns strat (use Sara's Lightspeed Flash and the Chrono Burst art in tandem, uses Lloyd's Burning Heart craft to generate BP and put Brigid and gladiator belts on Lloyd so he can regen CP to turn into BP).
This is a cool fantasy world. It's nighttime, but the land is bathed in a golden light.
The fourth stratum looks cool.
(Beat the main story)
Nothing has changed. Crossbell is still in between Erebonia and Calvard, and the latter is still an aggressive, expansionist superpower. War is inevietable and Crossbell will become a battlefield.
What happened to Rufus' secret bank accounts?
You don't see WRPGs with monsters this imaginative and this cool.
Goodness gracious!
500 hours after Crossbell and 300 hours after CS1+2 is far too late to be introducing a KeA = OZ/Orion connection.
Another game where the female antagonists are given sympathy "oh we must save her!" while no consideration is given to the male antagonists, who are killed.
Mere humans defeating a Sept-Terion - let alone TWO Sept-Terions combined - will never not be silly.
It's kinda disappointing that the true final boss is just an old final boss I already killed 500+ hours ago.
Once again, Jusis got the killing blow on the final boss, this time with the Melville Ray art.
Pretty sure the same thing was said about the Great Power/Ishmelga at the end of CS4, and guess what happened in the very next game? It and the Divine Knights came back.
I was stonewalled on the cube boss for three days. Actually didn't play Reverie for a day and played some Granblue Fantasy instead, then came back. My winning team was Lloyd/Kurt/Ellie/Elise/Rean. Put Citrus Bottles (faint resist) on everyone. Give Lloyd the Red Emblem (faint and freeze resist) since he will be in melee range of the boss and doesn't have as high of an evade stat as Kurt. Equip the Brigid master quartz (3 CP regen per turn) on Lloyd and the Infinity MQ (3 CP regened per turn) on Ellie. Put the Gladiator belt (2 CP regened per turn) on Ellie. Equip the Shining quartz on Elise. In the tactics menu, position Elise as far back as you can. The game plan is to restart the fight over and over until the RNG godes favor you and you get a run where your team isn't dead after the boss gets multiple turns at the start. Then, you want to use Elise's brave order to give everyone 50% evade chance. Have Elise run back to the edge of the room so they don't get hit by the boss' physical AoEs. Then have Elise cast Shining on the guys in melee range. I tried having Ellie run back with Elise too, but too often the boss would just run around the guys and attack the girls in the back. If the boss uses their magic attack that lowers everyone's HP to 8, then pop Ellie's heal S-craft. Since Ellie is regenning 5 CP per turn, you can use Lloyd's Burning Heart and Kurt's Sword Dance crafts (which only cost 30 CP) to stall turns while she regens CP. You can also use this to snag turn order bonuses such as 0 CP crafts or 0 Brave Orders. Also, Lloyd's Burning Heart craft gives BP, so you should use this to keep Elise's Brave Order up. Once the boss is down to 5% HP, switch Elise out with Rean, have him use Spirit Unification, use the Raging Fire brave order for 25% more damage, then use United Front Attack, and then pop S-crafts.
I find it very disappointing that in Cold Steel, everyone is best buds with each other. Would have been nice to have seen the Crossbell or Erebonian characters express anonymity towards each other (Erebonians for Crossbell's attack and escalation of the cold war into a hot one, Crossbellians for being annexed), or personal animosity between characters like Gaius disliking Crow and Duvalie for their association with the NA who tried to destroy his home, or Class VII hating the Ironbloods and George for mudering Millium and Laura's father. Or Victor disliking McBurn for causing his lung damage. Could have implemented a Valkyria Chronicles style system where some characters like or dislike each other and that affects their battle performance when paired up.
Oh no are these more tortured souls from 3rd?
I spent a couple hours stuck on the evil SSS fight. I tried doing it the "legit" way, by having Rixia dodge tank in the middle and having my three mages spread out around the arena, but once again there was no way to guarentee that the enemies would aggro onto Rixia, and Ellie and Randy kept killing my mages with their AoE crafts. Eventually I just gave up and used the infinite turns strat (use Sara's Lightspeed Flash and the Chrono Burst art in tandem, uses Lloyd's Burning Heart craft to generate BP and put Brigid and gladiator belts on Lloyd so he can regen CP to turn into BP).
This is a cool fantasy world. It's nighttime, but the land is bathed in a golden light.
The fourth stratum looks cool.
(Beat the main story)
Nothing has changed. Crossbell is still in between Erebonia and Calvard, and the latter is still an aggressive, expansionist superpower. War is inevietable and Crossbell will become a battlefield.
What happened to Rufus' secret bank accounts?
You don't see WRPGs with monsters this imaginative and this cool.
Goodness gracious!
500 hours after Crossbell and 300 hours after CS1+2 is far too late to be introducing a KeA = OZ/Orion connection.
Another game where the female antagonists are given sympathy "oh we must save her!" while no consideration is given to the male antagonists, who are killed.
Mere humans defeating a Sept-Terion - let alone TWO Sept-Terions combined - will never not be silly.
It's kinda disappointing that the true final boss is just an old final boss I already killed 500+ hours ago.
Once again, Jusis got the killing blow on the final boss, this time with the Melville Ray art.
Pretty sure the same thing was said about the Great Power/Ishmelga at the end of CS4, and guess what happened in the very next game? It and the Divine Knights came back.
Reverie was... a mixed bag. As usual, the high points is the character building and turn based combat. Abyss helps make the game more fun since the game is challenging for a longer period of time, but it still follows the pattern of the first one or two chapters being ridiculously difficult, the middle game being fun, and the endgame being too easy. The postgame and true final boss was laughable.
Story wise, Reverie still suffers from the writing problems that plagued the last two games (obnoxious Crossbell wanking, selective morality, lack of accountability, incoherent power levels, intrusive franchise fanservice, character assassinations, etc), but this game's storyline didn't have hundreds of hours of build up so it isn't as disappointing as CS4. Like Pokemon Myster Dungeon: Explorers of Sky, I felt that the postgame storyline was kind of a let down compared to the main story ending. Felt like it should have just ended at the main story final dungeon, leaving the game off on the highest note possible.
The doors/daydreams in Reverie are lackluster compared to the doors from 3rd. In 3rd, you got several really meaty, fleshed out doors like Kloe's time at Jenis Academy, or Schera and Aina in Grancel, or Mary wandering around the Ruan region, or the celebration party atop Grancel castle, etc. Doors where you got to talk to a lot of NPCs. But in Reverie, aside from Ash's door at the Branch Campus, you don't get any such thing. It's either just running through corridor dungeons, or just watching a movie. This is supposed to be a video game. There is supposed to be interactivity here. If I wanted to watch a movie then I would be doing that instead of playing a game. Another issue with the doors/daydreams in Reverie is that - aside from the 3 novellas that you unlocked after beating the true final boss which tease Kuro no Kiseki - none of the doors/daydreams really expand upon the world or set up future plotlines like 3rd's did. A lot of them felt like padding.
Anyway, music was good. Port quality was great. No crashes. The localization is an impediment to gameplay as several craft and item descriptions were mistranslated and provide inaccurate information. Story wise, the localization has some egregious hiccups here and there. The voice acting quality was inconsistent. Some people sound out of character. There are a few standout performances such as Dr. Novartis or the Emperor, but there are also stinkers like Grace and Jingo. There was inconsistent mixing of the audio levels. Sometimes some characters' voices were too low to be heard, while in the same scene another character's voice would be too loud.
Overall had fun.
I'm going to go ahead and play the fan translation of Kuro no Kiseki. I've heard unflattering things about the writing, but I enjoy the combat and aesthetics and music of this franchise, and the characters are usually likeable.
Sarathiour
Cipher
- Joined
- Jun 7, 2020
- Messages
- 3,281
Look, I would rather pirate the dlc for shinning pom rather than doing 4 hours of farm just for bragging right of clearing abyss.
nigga be like uooh this game is so great i listened to a fucking podcast playing it real engaging stuff there
turkishronin
Arcane
I will try cold steel to see how bad it is
Sarathiour
Cipher
- Joined
- Jun 7, 2020
- Messages
- 3,281
I think the only boss that came close in length to that for me was the secret boss on the ice shrine in CS2 NG+, took over 50min because I was trying to do it without too much cheese and the bastard keeps healing.True true boss took a while.
Some scary stuff at the end.
- Joined
- Nov 14, 2020
- Messages
- 2,205
Do you mean the Magic Knight at Glacia shrine? Yeah, that guy was a bitch.
Expect plenty of healing from this True True Boss® when you get to it as well.
Anyway, that screenshot is only from phase 3, it had two more before that. Total battle time was closer to 2 hours, and that's after failing once already and having to go back and grind for some levels.
As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.