CS2 is truly special because its thematic undertone is so striking in comparison to the Sky and Crossbell arcs. Despite the shift to 3D and the colorful characters and countryside, Erebonia is actually a miserable place, cursed to drive itself to both internal and international conflict and war (much like another superpower in the real world). There is a song on Zero's soundtrack called "New Days ~ Omen" which plays during the beginning of the end credits and its beat feels uplifiiting and trimphant - the SSS didn't solve everything but they won the day over the cult and there's no major cliffhanger; it concludes on such a cheerful note, characters waving and smiling which was definitely welcome considering the subject matter it tackled. Contrast that song with the one that bookends CS2's very first scene and the finale with Crow's goodbyes called "Remaining Glow" at the 27-second mark which uses the exact same notes, but the mood is completely opposite - an astounding form of musical motif foreshadowing and worldbuilding which many players may not have consciously noticed. As the Loa Luciferia dialog reflects, the entire game is a series of hollow victories - Rean reunites with his classmates and friends in Act 1, only for the antagonists to invade Ymir and demonstrate that they could have crushed them anytime at their whim. Rean earns control over his ogre power, but he's no match for McFireBro's unnatural power yet. Class VII corrals their fellow student classmates back aboard the airship and together liberate Trista and unite the student body, but they only get a single night there together before the impending threat of an invasion from Calvard without Garrelia fortress as a deterrent coerces their involvement in the events of the finale. They scale the Infernal Castle but are ultimately outmatched against each of their opponents and need to get bailed out by stronger allies (it's also fascinating looking back at how the infernal castle opponents end up becoming allies later on). And it ends with everyone in tears overwhelmed with sadness and loss instead of filled with hope and positivity like the endings of SC/3rd/Zero/Azure. CS2 is lowkey one of the darker Trails games, but it's darkness is much more in subtext and theme rather than overt violence or depravity. Even within the outstanding multithreaded storytelling achievement that is the Trails epic, CS2 deserves its own acclaim.
A more in-depth look at the next few games sounds great to me! It's always so nice listening to these retrospectives at work and recalling everything that happened in the game :)
1:07:09 This scene is what FULLY sold me on Rean for the long haul! One of my favorite parts of Rean's character is his exploration on bonds. Due to being incredibly critical of himself, it causes Rean to have tunnel vision, feeling like he needs to contribute SOMETHING to validate his relationships. Not only does this scene help further cement the lessons he learns in the two hot spring scenes during Act 1 - that relationships can solely be as simple as people caring about each other without expecting anything in return - but also learns that the effects of bonds is a two way street. He's not the only one being impacted by them - OTHERS ARE TOO - and Elise perfectly exemplifies this. She left for St. Astraia because she felt she was a burden to him, being a reminder of his guilt from what happened eight years ago when he first awakened to his ogre power. Just like how Rean left for Thors since he felt he was burden to his adopted family. I love the parallel between the two here, making this such an impactful scene to advance Rean's character! As for Act 2, I think part of the reason why the mandatory side quests can make it feel like a slog - at least for me - is because Class VII feels far less proactive compared to Act 1. In Act 1, Rean and co. were always going to places with the goal of re-uniting Class VII and everything that happened during those excursions were just a bonus. Meanwhile in Act 2, conflict just comes knocking on their door as Class VII is meandering doing miscellaneous side quests that ultimately don't progress the plot very much if at all. It makes the sessions before those big conflicts feel like filler, as I do agree that Act 2 itself is DEFINITELY not filler! But it does feel like it was stretched longer than it needed to be with these lull periods as they don't add to the incoming conflicts and feel wholly disconnected. Guess what I'm trying to say is that Class VII ends up involved in these major conflicts largely due to happenstance rather than actively seeking them out. Despite some gripes I myself have with CS2 tho, I still thoroughly enjoyed it! I loved Act 1, the major conflicts we dealt with during Act 2 were engaging, and the Finale onwards gotta be one of my favorites in the whole series, both for how absolutely hype and thematically satisfying it is!
OH FUCK I missed this, I gotta turn on notifications. I was sitting here thinking "With the daybreak streams wrapping up I hope he gets to CS2 soon." lol
@@EasilyBoredGamer 😂 I was very bad at remembering to plug this tbf.... But yeah I hope you enjoy it! The combined CS1+2 video is coming later this month as well :) I put a lot of work into this sucker so I hope ya enjoy it!
Ok so I've been mulling this over for a while and i don't think the problem with Act 2 is that it's filler. Rather, I think it's just the worst example of something that is prevalent in the entire series. Every trails party is made up of passive characters. Every single one. The games are all designed to make characters passive, since in all of them things only happen after you accept a request or are given an order. What this means for Act 2 is that you have a group of characters very confidently saying "we're going to find another way" and then not looking for that way at all. Everything they do, they do because they are prompted by someone else. Even when they give themselves an objective in liberating Trista, they don't arrive at that point through their own initiative. Rather, they conveniently react to a series of a events that just so happen to open up the way to the town. If the noble alliance wasn't so commited to war crimes, Class VII would not have opened up the way to Trista. They go to the spirit shrines because Crow tells them to. They liberate Celdic because no name npcs took a hostage. They go to Roer from other people telling them about the situation. And they liberate Bareahard because Duke Albarea is a crazy person. This even bleeds to the finale, where from their perspective, the Infernal Castle just kinda shows up. This is the exact same problem CSIV's act 2 has. And it's something all other trails games manage to mitigate, since the chapter structure gives the party an objective for every stretch of the game. But in CSII and CSIV, it feels like you're just waiting on the plot to show up, because the objectives you do get feel so detached from the overall plot. But that's me.
I agree with everything here except the CS4 point. I actually find CS4 to have a better version of CS2's Act 2 structurally. Unlike CS2 where Class VII is just waiting for a conflict to fall into their lap, CS4 contrasts that by having a team ACTIVELY look for information to save their friends and family while Rean and co. are out doing side quests (or side quest in this case since you only need to do one to progress the plot rather than 2), discuss said information, and then proceed to act on it. It's very much the complete opposite of being passive since there's an actual goal consistently being worked on there while in CS2 they're absolutely are. The issue with CS4's version is that the conflicts that they run into upon acting on their information are far less interesting than CS2's conflicts (aside from the final section of course). Funnily enough, both Act 2's swap their strengths and weaknesses: CS2: The conflicts themselves are usually very interesting but feel like a slog due to Class VII not doing anything to work on their primary goal themselves. CS4: Class VII is far more proactive in seeking out these conflicts themselves but said conflicts are usually fairly bland in comparison to CS2's Act 2.
@@gamerraito2153 I'd agree with you if we got to play as the group collecting the information. Even if members of class VII are out there looking for stuff, the group you control is still just responding to things other people do.
@@SomewhatlikeIsaac Fair point, but the very fact that they have an information team at all is, in itself, being proactive and not passive, even if the members of Rean's party aren't the ones doing the information gathering. CS2 in comparison, the group usually stumbles into a conflict by accident or by randomly getting an report from an unaffiliated source. But in CS4, the members tasked with finding information always find it themselves and discuss said information with the whole group before taking action. This makes it feel like the Class VII overall finds the conflict by their own skills and set up rather than just stumbling upon it, which I consider not passive, or at the very least far less so than CS2.
Right off the bat I love how excited and passionate you sound while talking about this game. IMHO that easily makes it so any viewer of this review/retrospective want to buy the game. You certainly got me wanting to.
Can't not get enough of the 'transfer aspects to the next title' or a new chapter asking you if you have any save data. Always so cool and deeply connected each chapters are, despite new arc standing alone until a connected from the past show up.
This turned out great man I hope you're proud of all your effort and grind. The result is self evident the editing,the jokes,the visuals. I also like the new structure for this review. This is probably my favourite review of your retrospectives yes Cold Steel 2 is my favourite Cold Steel game how did you know?
I'm so glad I played all Trails games with downloaded new game plus save files. Alongside a walkthrough guide, it allowed me to get the complete experience on the first playthroughs with multiple games. Thank God for the cheats too.
I think that my problem with act 2 isn't that it has a lot of stuff, it's that it just throws so much at you all at once, which can be a bit overwhelming and it's easy to burn out if you're used to talking to every NPC. It's still not to bad though, the one in Cold Steel 4 is much more egregious.
So my experience with this game is just as you described actually lol. I started with CS1 (started it back in 2021 but dropped it in Bareahard chapter, only picked it back up this summer and got addicted to Trails), IMMEDIATELY purchased and started CS2 in the same day. When I got to the Divertissement I already knew that Lloyd and Rixia were from the Crossbell games by way of just existing on the internet. The only real thing that was spoiled for me was that Rixia is Yin. I don't recall the details of Deiter Crois' arrest being explained here so it's up in the air if he was a villain in the Crossbell games or if he was wrongfully arrested. After continuing CS1 I beat it in a week, then I beat CS2 in the following week, then I beat Zero in the following week, and Azure took 2 weeks cuz of work. Now I'm currently on the Final Chapter of Cold Steel 3. The past couple months have been filled with Trails PEAKness and I appreciate seeing your content after I beat the games. Looking forward to the CS3 video!
I didn't feel this game as a "filler" at all. In fact, I love the story of this game, it makes a lot of sense that it is structured that way since you are in a war (you are more like a guerilla but wathever) and provides a lot of backstory to Erebonia as a country. The bigguest problem I have with this game is the very last dungeon, now that's a filler right there (even the last boss says it lol). Overall a very solid game and one of my favorites so far with Sky SC and Trails from Zero (currently starting CS IV and yes, I'm one of those people who liked Zero more than Azure)
@@yoshy66 glad you liked the video and definitely agree on most of that. I don't quite agree on that last bit. Since the overall theme of the epilogue was the MC's wanting to find closure and release after everything that happened after the end of CS1. And the dungeon works basically as one last outing where they get to end on a positive note. And gameplay-wise, it's there to let the players have some place where they can use the full roster. It's for the fans of the gameplay. Valid to not like that tho lol. Everyone is different. Thanks for the comment :)
@@GenmaTheSamurai I understand your points, really, but that section feels too disconected to the rest of the game in my opinion. You can, for example, have them in the Class VII dorm talking about the same things in the very last night they would be together and have a similar moment. I don't know, maybe It's just that didn't like the final boss or that I was too hooked in the history when suddenly I had to stop to do another dungeon out of nowhere. Anyway, can't wait to hear you talk about the next CS games, cheers.
I rate CS2 so low because I had unrealistic expectations of it. I was so engrossed by what Azure and the ending of CS1 had shown us (graphically especially) that I expected to be in the middle of the war instead of on the sidelines - and while Class VII plays an important role, it remains surprisingly nearly bloodless and positive instead of the CS3-ending tier situation that I had hoped.
@@Momoirokagami thanks so much! Again, I'm not sure what this was like as someone who's never played the games but I'm glad you enjoyed it in spite of that 😂 The back half of this was definitely meant for people that played all 7 games up to this point more or less lmao.
@@GenmaTheSamurai Your retrospective videos have definitely left me tempted to buy the games. Though the gameplay seems daunting and I'll probably have a hard time finding them at reasonable prices. I don't think I'd have any interesting without your videos though. Currently I'm gonna watch one of the anime adaptations for the series. The Legend of Heroes: Sen no Kiseki Northern War and see if that's any good.
@@Momoirokagami oh no LOL. So that is not an adaptation, it's basically an event that happened between Cold Steel 2&3. It's also not very good imo... There's no anime adaptation of the games themselves. Closest thing is an OVA of Trails in the Sky SC which I don't recommend 💀 (I think there's a manga adaptation but I actually don't know too much about it.) All the games are on PC though, and they go on sale all the time on Steam. Sky 1 is usually like $10 when it goes on sale. I think the first 5 games should also run fine on basically any PC. As for the combat, it's a lot to learn. But Sky is definitely the series at its simplest. Definitely look in the Bracer notebook to learn how to make spells and stuff. Hope that helps.
@@GenmaTheSamurai I watched Northern War and didn't think it was awful. Liked the characters. Enjoyed the cameos from some of the characters you covered in your retrospectives of Cold Steel 1 & 2. I got the feeling this is a game series that would definitely benefit from a 52+ episode anime adaptation of the games themselves. I was already getting that vibe from your retrospectives, but watching Northern War just confirmed it for me. Maybe it will happen someday. I vastly prefer anime to manga, but maybe I'll check that out. And I'll keep my eyes on the prices of the games on Steam. Hopefully my laptop can run them.
@@MomoirokagamiI never got a notif for your reply but glad you enjoyed it! Yeah most of my issues are because it's an adaptation of an off-screen event from CS3. And they kinda butchered the most important moment imo but I'll probably go into that in my CS3 review 😅 But yeah whenever you get to the games I hope you have a good time :)
Great video. Your whole retrospective series are probably some of my favorite pieces of Trails analysis I've seen. It's clear that a lot of work goes into them, and it absolutely pays off. Your critical voice (as in, the structure of your video writing, your complimentary analysis, criticism, and rebuttal of popular criticism where relevant, anecdotes from your initial playthroughs and replays, etc) is very strong and so is your delivery. It's so refreshing--and extremely hype--to be able to watch such quality content from someone with such clear and genuine passion and love for the series that doesn't shy away from that passion and has the confidence to criticize without downplaying it. Thanks so much for all you do! Definitely enjoy switching things up and analyzing something from a different genre, I'm sure that will be great too. ⬆🧱👍
Great retrospective and yeah I too do like me some Mecha anime, also while Millium and Altina are inspired by Kamisawa Dolls, I share the opinion that design wise they are inspired by White Heart (Blanc) and Black Heart (Noire) from the Hyperdimension Neptunia series. Heck one of the games has the personification of Falcom themselves who's a girl with Estelle Bright attire and pulls a Rean line at one point.
Heh, when you say rean calling out valimar really give you gundam vibe. You should check out his jp va other works on Gundam unicorn. He calling his gundam "UNICORN!!" with sawano soundtrack started playing. Really give you the goosebump!
Great video! Well worth the wait! I actually finished out the CS arc (minus reverie, which I’m currently playing) recently, and this game is definitely one of my favorites from the arc, along with CSIII and CSIV
Someone should sit there and do a deep analysis on the plot and dialogue for the entire series to find what is important and what it not (ideally including Drama CD's and mangas). My guess is that, while no chapters would be labelled as filler, A LOT of the dialogue in the controversial sections would do.
I. Absolutely. hacked the shit out of CS2 for the sake of making it easier to manage on hard and also to give me the options to see all the final bond events
First time I played CS2 , I thought it was a great game but a bit more of the same, too long, neverending in the Epilogue, and technically compromised as the Vita was about to explode with it. But when I replayed it in the PS4 port after having beating CS3 and CS4 , I discovered another game....with its own tone, attitude, setting and fantastic set pieces, music, with a very dramatic plot toward the end and a message that you can only totally grasp once you have finished the tetralogy and go back.
i think dodge build are incredibly overvalued in CS the point of them is making a hard fight more manageable but the problem is your party is eighter immune or the boss is already dead sice they can be quite literaly be onshot most of the time
Ah I've been feeling kinda crappy about coming here and just being negative, so fuck it. I'm the weird sort of fella who somehow ended with CS3 as my favorite CS game. 2's right behind it though. Even if a trails game has a flaw I don't enjoy (in CS2's case it's what i described about act 2) none of them dip below good. Like, for over a year after playing it, I absolutely despised CS1. Then I started a replay to sort out my thoughts and the very first thing I said as the opening credits started playing was "mah babies
@@beeforbacon I am with you. You're not the only one, I actually suspect most of the fanbase enjoys CS just it's the arc that gets the most criticism. Even from enjoyers sometimes.
@@GenmaTheSamurai Yeah I think my superpower in this regard is I play through really slowly. Like 30mins a day. I feel like if I tried to rush it I would probably get burnt out. Obviously gotta set aside like 2-3 hours for the finale of each game though hahaha.
I did not like the Geofront dungeon after the finale when i played CS II because i never played the Crossbell saga, now i'm going to enjoy it a lot the next time i replay this game.
As a Trails player that started with Cold Steel 1-2, I have to say it was a decent starting point for me. As for context, I couldn't get into Sky or the Crossbell games. The art style and gameplay just wasn't appealing to me and kept me away for many years. I only gave Cold Steel a chance after playing a few other Falcolm titles in Y's 8 and Tokyo Xanadu EX+ and wanted another Falcom title to tide me over. That's where Cold Steel 1-2 came in and it hooked me in. Those two games incentivize me to play the all 3 sky games, followed by Zero and Azure before starting Cold Steel 3. While Cold Steel I-II may not be the best starting off point, it certainly beats not playing any Trails games. It served as a great gateway for those who may have been out off by the earlier games and may in fact get them to eventually play those earlier entries they were putting off.
I strongly disliked CS2 for a variety of reasons. The first act opened so strong only for the second act to devolve into waiting for the reformists to manipulate you into doing their dirty work while rean and co kept declaring they were neutral. As you stated this game has alot of the same beats as SC but unlike SC didn't really back the story mechanically. For example in SC your orbments stop working when the bad guys got a win but in CS2 other then dialogue their was nothing to really mechanically to show a civil war was going on other then a very minor part. Also the twist at the finale had no real build up and just came out of nowhere were twists earlier in the series there was hints leading up to it that you could catch if you where paying attention or I cant believe I missed that on a replay. Also the whole premise of the epilogue is dumb you want me to believe that they want someone of reans caliber wasting time in high school?
CS2 is truly special because its thematic undertone is so striking in comparison to the Sky and Crossbell arcs. Despite the shift to 3D and the colorful characters and countryside, Erebonia is actually a miserable place, cursed to drive itself to both internal and international conflict and war (much like another superpower in the real world).
There is a song on Zero's soundtrack called "New Days ~ Omen" which plays during the beginning of the end credits and its beat feels uplifiiting and trimphant - the SSS didn't solve everything but they won the day over the cult and there's no major cliffhanger; it concludes on such a cheerful note, characters waving and smiling which was definitely welcome considering the subject matter it tackled. Contrast that song with the one that bookends CS2's very first scene and the finale with Crow's goodbyes called "Remaining Glow" at the 27-second mark which uses the exact same notes, but the mood is completely opposite - an astounding form of musical motif foreshadowing and worldbuilding which many players may not have consciously noticed.
As the Loa Luciferia dialog reflects, the entire game is a series of hollow victories - Rean reunites with his classmates and friends in Act 1, only for the antagonists to invade Ymir and demonstrate that they could have crushed them anytime at their whim. Rean earns control over his ogre power, but he's no match for McFireBro's unnatural power yet. Class VII corrals their fellow student classmates back aboard the airship and together liberate Trista and unite the student body, but they only get a single night there together before the impending threat of an invasion from Calvard without Garrelia fortress as a deterrent coerces their involvement in the events of the finale. They scale the Infernal Castle but are ultimately outmatched against each of their opponents and need to get bailed out by stronger allies (it's also fascinating looking back at how the infernal castle opponents end up becoming allies later on). And it ends with everyone in tears overwhelmed with sadness and loss instead of filled with hope and positivity like the endings of SC/3rd/Zero/Azure.
CS2 is lowkey one of the darker Trails games, but it's darkness is much more in subtext and theme rather than overt violence or depravity. Even within the outstanding multithreaded storytelling achievement that is the Trails epic, CS2 deserves its own acclaim.
A more in-depth look at the next few games sounds great to me! It's always so nice listening to these retrospectives at work and recalling everything that happened in the game :)
1:07:09
This scene is what FULLY sold me on Rean for the long haul! One of my favorite parts of Rean's character is his exploration on bonds. Due to being incredibly critical of himself, it causes Rean to have tunnel vision, feeling like he needs to contribute SOMETHING to validate his relationships. Not only does this scene help further cement the lessons he learns in the two hot spring scenes during Act 1 - that relationships can solely be as simple as people caring about each other without expecting anything in return - but also learns that the effects of bonds is a two way street. He's not the only one being impacted by them - OTHERS ARE TOO - and Elise perfectly exemplifies this. She left for St. Astraia because she felt she was a burden to him, being a reminder of his guilt from what happened eight years ago when he first awakened to his ogre power. Just like how Rean left for Thors since he felt he was burden to his adopted family. I love the parallel between the two here, making this such an impactful scene to advance Rean's character!
As for Act 2, I think part of the reason why the mandatory side quests can make it feel like a slog - at least for me - is because Class VII feels far less proactive compared to Act 1. In Act 1, Rean and co. were always going to places with the goal of re-uniting Class VII and everything that happened during those excursions were just a bonus. Meanwhile in Act 2, conflict just comes knocking on their door as Class VII is meandering doing miscellaneous side quests that ultimately don't progress the plot very much if at all. It makes the sessions before those big conflicts feel like filler, as I do agree that Act 2 itself is DEFINITELY not filler! But it does feel like it was stretched longer than it needed to be with these lull periods as they don't add to the incoming conflicts and feel wholly disconnected. Guess what I'm trying to say is that Class VII ends up involved in these major conflicts largely due to happenstance rather than actively seeking them out.
Despite some gripes I myself have with CS2 tho, I still thoroughly enjoyed it! I loved Act 1, the major conflicts we dealt with during Act 2 were engaging, and the Finale onwards gotta be one of my favorites in the whole series, both for how absolutely hype and thematically satisfying it is!
OH FUCK I missed this, I gotta turn on notifications. I was sitting here thinking "With the daybreak streams wrapping up I hope he gets to CS2 soon." lol
@@EasilyBoredGamer 😂 I was very bad at remembering to plug this tbf.... But yeah I hope you enjoy it! The combined CS1+2 video is coming later this month as well :)
I put a lot of work into this sucker so I hope ya enjoy it!
@@GenmaTheSamurai certainly is nice to get a quick refresher on CS2 while im currently starting act 2 of cold steel 4, the parallels are cool.
jusis is one of my favorites too. I love his trademark "This is a fine horse" line 😂😂
you deserve more followers, man. Great content. Can't wait for the rest of your retrospectives!
Ok so I've been mulling this over for a while and i don't think the problem with Act 2 is that it's filler. Rather, I think it's just the worst example of something that is prevalent in the entire series.
Every trails party is made up of passive characters. Every single one. The games are all designed to make characters passive, since in all of them things only happen after you accept a request or are given an order.
What this means for Act 2 is that you have a group of characters very confidently saying "we're going to find another way" and then not looking for that way at all. Everything they do, they do because they are prompted by someone else.
Even when they give themselves an objective in liberating Trista, they don't arrive at that point through their own initiative. Rather, they conveniently react to a series of a events that just so happen to open up the way to the town.
If the noble alliance wasn't so commited to war crimes, Class VII would not have opened up the way to Trista.
They go to the spirit shrines because Crow tells them to.
They liberate Celdic because no name npcs took a hostage.
They go to Roer from other people telling them about the situation.
And they liberate Bareahard because Duke Albarea is a crazy person.
This even bleeds to the finale, where from their perspective, the Infernal Castle just kinda shows up.
This is the exact same problem CSIV's act 2 has. And it's something all other trails games manage to mitigate, since the chapter structure gives the party an objective for every stretch of the game. But in CSII and CSIV, it feels like you're just waiting on the plot to show up, because the objectives you do get feel so detached from the overall plot.
But that's me.
I agree with everything here except the CS4 point. I actually find CS4 to have a better version of CS2's Act 2 structurally. Unlike CS2 where Class VII is just waiting for a conflict to fall into their lap, CS4 contrasts that by having a team ACTIVELY look for information to save their friends and family while Rean and co. are out doing side quests (or side quest in this case since you only need to do one to progress the plot rather than 2), discuss said information, and then proceed to act on it. It's very much the complete opposite of being passive since there's an actual goal consistently being worked on there while in CS2 they're absolutely are.
The issue with CS4's version is that the conflicts that they run into upon acting on their information are far less interesting than CS2's conflicts (aside from the final section of course). Funnily enough, both Act 2's swap their strengths and weaknesses:
CS2: The conflicts themselves are usually very interesting but feel like a slog due to Class VII not doing anything to work on their primary goal themselves.
CS4: Class VII is far more proactive in seeking out these conflicts themselves but said conflicts are usually fairly bland in comparison to CS2's Act 2.
@@gamerraito2153 I'd agree with you if we got to play as the group collecting the information. Even if members of class VII are out there looking for stuff, the group you control is still just responding to things other people do.
@@SomewhatlikeIsaac Fair point, but the very fact that they have an information team at all is, in itself, being proactive and not passive, even if the members of Rean's party aren't the ones doing the information gathering. CS2 in comparison, the group usually stumbles into a conflict by accident or by randomly getting an report from an unaffiliated source.
But in CS4, the members tasked with finding information always find it themselves and discuss said information with the whole group before taking action. This makes it feel like the Class VII overall finds the conflict by their own skills and set up rather than just stumbling upon it, which I consider not passive, or at the very least far less so than CS2.
Right off the bat I love how excited and passionate you sound while talking about this game. IMHO that easily makes it so any viewer of this review/retrospective want to buy the game. You certainly got me wanting to.
Can't not get enough of the 'transfer aspects to the next title' or a new chapter asking you if you have any save data. Always so cool and deeply connected each chapters are, despite new arc standing alone until a connected from the past show up.
This turned out great man I hope you're proud of all your effort and grind. The result is self evident the editing,the jokes,the visuals. I also like the new structure for this review.
This is probably my favourite review of your retrospectives yes Cold Steel 2 is my favourite Cold Steel game how did you know?
Thanks man! It means a lot, this was a journey and half lol.
I'm so glad I played all Trails games with downloaded new game plus save files. Alongside a walkthrough guide, it allowed me to get the complete experience on the first playthroughs with multiple games. Thank God for the cheats too.
"Is that a gundam?!" I love this video a lot. Really insightful and entertaining. 🥰
@@azumishard150 Thanks Azumi!!! Glad you enjoyed it :)
I think that my problem with act 2 isn't that it has a lot of stuff, it's that it just throws so much at you all at once, which can be a bit overwhelming and it's easy to burn out if you're used to talking to every NPC. It's still not to bad though, the one in Cold Steel 4 is much more egregious.
Snake: kept me waiting huh?!
So my experience with this game is just as you described actually lol.
I started with CS1 (started it back in 2021 but dropped it in Bareahard chapter, only picked it back up this summer and got addicted to Trails), IMMEDIATELY purchased and started CS2 in the same day. When I got to the Divertissement I already knew that Lloyd and Rixia were from the Crossbell games by way of just existing on the internet. The only real thing that was spoiled for me was that Rixia is Yin.
I don't recall the details of Deiter Crois' arrest being explained here so it's up in the air if he was a villain in the Crossbell games or if he was wrongfully arrested.
After continuing CS1 I beat it in a week, then I beat CS2 in the following week, then I beat Zero in the following week, and Azure took 2 weeks cuz of work. Now I'm currently on the Final Chapter of Cold Steel 3.
The past couple months have been filled with Trails PEAKness and I appreciate seeing your content after I beat the games. Looking forward to the CS3 video!
I didn't feel this game as a "filler" at all. In fact, I love the story of this game, it makes a lot of sense that it is structured that way since you are in a war (you are more like a guerilla but wathever) and provides a lot of backstory to Erebonia as a country. The bigguest problem I have with this game is the very last dungeon, now that's a filler right there (even the last boss says it lol). Overall a very solid game and one of my favorites so far with Sky SC and Trails from Zero (currently starting CS IV and yes, I'm one of those people who liked Zero more than Azure)
@@yoshy66 glad you liked the video and definitely agree on most of that.
I don't quite agree on that last bit. Since the overall theme of the epilogue was the MC's wanting to find closure and release after everything that happened after the end of CS1. And the dungeon works basically as one last outing where they get to end on a positive note.
And gameplay-wise, it's there to let the players have some place where they can use the full roster. It's for the fans of the gameplay. Valid to not like that tho lol. Everyone is different. Thanks for the comment :)
@@GenmaTheSamurai I understand your points, really, but that section feels too disconected to the rest of the game in my opinion. You can, for example, have them in the Class VII dorm talking about the same things in the very last night they would be together and have a similar moment. I don't know, maybe It's just that didn't like the final boss or that I was too hooked in the history when suddenly I had to stop to do another dungeon out of nowhere. Anyway, can't wait to hear you talk about the next CS games, cheers.
God, the ending for one broke my heart!!! 😢
Great video
CS2 is really an underrated game imo and it's good to see it getting some love
I rate CS2 so low because I had unrealistic expectations of it. I was so engrossed by what Azure and the ending of CS1 had shown us (graphically especially) that I expected to be in the middle of the war instead of on the sidelines - and while Class VII plays an important role, it remains surprisingly nearly bloodless and positive instead of the CS3-ending tier situation that I had hoped.
Really great video Genma. Pat yourself on the back and be proud.
@@Momoirokagami thanks so much! Again, I'm not sure what this was like as someone who's never played the games but I'm glad you enjoyed it in spite of that 😂
The back half of this was definitely meant for people that played all 7 games up to this point more or less lmao.
@@GenmaTheSamurai Your retrospective videos have definitely left me tempted to buy the games.
Though the gameplay seems daunting and I'll probably have a hard time finding them at reasonable prices.
I don't think I'd have any interesting without your videos though.
Currently I'm gonna watch one of the anime adaptations for the series. The Legend of Heroes: Sen no Kiseki Northern War and see if that's any good.
@@Momoirokagami oh no LOL. So that is not an adaptation, it's basically an event that happened between Cold Steel 2&3. It's also not very good imo... There's no anime adaptation of the games themselves. Closest thing is an OVA of Trails in the Sky SC which I don't recommend 💀 (I think there's a manga adaptation but I actually don't know too much about it.)
All the games are on PC though, and they go on sale all the time on Steam. Sky 1 is usually like $10 when it goes on sale. I think the first 5 games should also run fine on basically any PC.
As for the combat, it's a lot to learn. But Sky is definitely the series at its simplest. Definitely look in the Bracer notebook to learn how to make spells and stuff. Hope that helps.
@@GenmaTheSamurai I watched Northern War and didn't think it was awful. Liked the characters. Enjoyed the cameos from some of the characters you covered in your retrospectives of Cold Steel 1 & 2.
I got the feeling this is a game series that would definitely benefit from a 52+ episode anime adaptation of the games themselves. I was already getting that vibe from your retrospectives, but watching Northern War just confirmed it for me. Maybe it will happen someday.
I vastly prefer anime to manga, but maybe I'll check that out. And I'll keep my eyes on the prices of the games on Steam. Hopefully my laptop can run them.
@@MomoirokagamiI never got a notif for your reply but glad you enjoyed it! Yeah most of my issues are because it's an adaptation of an off-screen event from CS3. And they kinda butchered the most important moment imo but I'll probably go into that in my CS3 review 😅
But yeah whenever you get to the games I hope you have a good time :)
58:39 - Just a correction, the feature does actually return for trails through daybreak II which is awesome especially with the new engine!
Great video. Your whole retrospective series are probably some of my favorite pieces of Trails analysis I've seen. It's clear that a lot of work goes into them, and it absolutely pays off. Your critical voice (as in, the structure of your video writing, your complimentary analysis, criticism, and rebuttal of popular criticism where relevant, anecdotes from your initial playthroughs and replays, etc) is very strong and so is your delivery. It's so refreshing--and extremely hype--to be able to watch such quality content from someone with such clear and genuine passion and love for the series that doesn't shy away from that passion and has the confidence to criticize without downplaying it.
Thanks so much for all you do! Definitely enjoy switching things up and analyzing something from a different genre, I'm sure that will be great too. ⬆🧱👍
Thank you so much. It genuinely means a lot to hear stuff like this. Really glad you enjoyed the video.
Great retrospective and yeah I too do like me some Mecha anime, also while Millium and Altina are inspired by Kamisawa Dolls, I share the opinion that design wise they are inspired by White Heart (Blanc) and Black Heart (Noire) from the Hyperdimension Neptunia series. Heck one of the games has the personification of Falcom themselves who's a girl with Estelle Bright attire and pulls a Rean line at one point.
Heh, when you say rean calling out valimar really give you gundam vibe. You should check out his jp va other works on Gundam unicorn. He calling his gundam "UNICORN!!" with sawano soundtrack started playing. Really give you the goosebump!
Great video! Well worth the wait! I actually finished out the CS arc (minus reverie, which I’m currently playing) recently, and this game is definitely one of my favorites from the arc, along with CSIII and CSIV
Yeah I definitely need to take a break and think out how I want to tackle CS3&4, but excited to replay them.
Someone should sit there and do a deep analysis on the plot and dialogue for the entire series to find what is important and what it not (ideally including Drama CD's and mangas).
My guess is that, while no chapters would be labelled as filler, A LOT of the dialogue in the controversial sections would do.
Loved the video man. Take you're time with CS3 cuz I'm still working on it myself 😅
Cant wait for your video on cs3!
Great video🙏🏻
I. Absolutely. hacked the shit out of CS2 for the sake of making it easier to manage on hard and also to give me the options to see all the final bond events
First time I played CS2 , I thought it was a great game but a bit more of the same, too long, neverending in the Epilogue, and technically compromised as the Vita was about to explode with it. But when I replayed it in the PS4 port after having beating CS3 and CS4 , I discovered another game....with its own tone, attitude, setting and fantastic set pieces, music, with a very dramatic plot toward the end and a message that you can only totally grasp once you have finished the tetralogy and go back.
i think dodge build are incredibly overvalued in CS the point of them is making a hard fight more manageable but the problem is your party is eighter immune or the boss is already dead sice they can be quite literaly be onshot most of the time
Cold Steel 2 is so underrated.
Ah I've been feeling kinda crappy about coming here and just being negative, so fuck it.
I'm the weird sort of fella who somehow ended with CS3 as my favorite CS game. 2's right behind it though.
Even if a trails game has a flaw I don't enjoy (in CS2's case it's what i described about act 2) none of them dip below good.
Like, for over a year after playing it, I absolutely despised CS1. Then I started a replay to sort out my thoughts and the very first thing I said as the opening credits started playing was "mah babies
Its great how even when it dips in quality its still good! The testament of Falcom games is that consistency in quality
i like rean but i dont like all dead charc plot from 3 and 4 xd it become too complex cause i dont like grill rpg so i dont play as zero and azure
I enjoyed all 4 cs games tbh. Maybe I'm weird actually I enjoyed every trails game
@@beeforbacon I am with you. You're not the only one, I actually suspect most of the fanbase enjoys CS just it's the arc that gets the most criticism. Even from enjoyers sometimes.
@@GenmaTheSamurai Yeah I think my superpower in this regard is I play through really slowly. Like 30mins a day. I feel like if I tried to rush it I would probably get burnt out. Obviously gotta set aside like 2-3 hours for the finale of each game though hahaha.
I did not like the Geofront dungeon after the finale when i played CS II because i never played the Crossbell saga, now i'm going to enjoy it a lot the next time i replay this game.
1:04:35 - Are you trying to make me ship it Genma?
1:25:48 - Oh...
I have no idea what this is like for someone who has never played these games but hey hope you have enjoyed this LOL.
support comment (I am not caught up)
Cs2 really is, and I honestly felt like cs4 copied alot beats/moments from it. That and the "consequences"
58:18 - Emil Castagnier? Huh?
Costume in Tales of Xillia 2 lol. Snivy's pick.
As a Trails player that started with Cold Steel 1-2, I have to say it was a decent starting point for me. As for context, I couldn't get into Sky or the Crossbell games. The art style and gameplay just wasn't appealing to me and kept me away for many years. I only gave Cold Steel a chance after playing a few other Falcolm titles in Y's 8 and Tokyo Xanadu EX+ and wanted another Falcom title to tide me over. That's where Cold Steel 1-2 came in and it hooked me in. Those two games incentivize me to play the all 3 sky games, followed by Zero and Azure before starting Cold Steel 3. While Cold Steel I-II may not be the best starting off point, it certainly beats not playing any Trails games. It served as a great gateway for those who may have been out off by the earlier games and may in fact get them to eventually play those earlier entries they were putting off.
I finally played Zero, Azure and now i'm playing post game of Reverie, next stop is Sky.
I strongly disliked CS2 for a variety of reasons. The first act opened so strong only for the second act to devolve into waiting for the reformists to manipulate you into doing their dirty work while rean and co kept declaring they were neutral. As you stated this game has alot of the same beats as SC but unlike SC didn't really back the story mechanically. For example in SC your orbments stop working when the bad guys got a win but in CS2 other then dialogue their was nothing to really mechanically to show a civil war was going on other then a very minor part. Also the twist at the finale had no real build up and just came out of nowhere were twists earlier in the series there was hints leading up to it that you could catch if you where paying attention or I cant believe I missed that on a replay. Also the whole premise of the epilogue is dumb you want me to believe that they want someone of reans caliber wasting time in high school?
Geez man I just got done with this game two days ago. I was really hoping you would drop this soon.🫡🙏🏾🤌🏾