The Legend of Heroes series.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Okay, now that my rage has subsided, here are my SPOILER THOUGHTS on Cold Steel 1

Spoiler: 

It's pretty obvious that this "Ouroboros" organization are the ones pulling the strings, and more than likely destroyed Garrelia Fortress, not Crossbell. I'd like to know what Ouroboros' MO is, so far I'm assuming it's the standard "take over the world" objective.

If Sharon was an "Enforcer" for the Ouroboros, how can she get away with attacking their lackeys (the ILF) at the end? Even under the excuse that she's just away on break working for the Reinfords, it seems like her employers wouldn't want her back after she sabotaged their plans.

Considering how important Chancellor Osborne was setup to be, I find it hard to believe that he has really departed the narrative. I don't think it was his double who was shot, so either 1. Osborne was shot but survived, or 2. Osborne had a backup plan that goes into effective upon his death, so we'll be dealing with whatever machinations he had in the sequel.

I'd love to know more about C's motivations; we know Jurai was annexed by Osborne not specifically what C was a victim of as a result of that.

Did it just go Code Geass at the end there? It just went Code Geass at the end there. Or, perhaps it would be fitting to say that it went full Vision of Escaflowne at the end; not even Code Geass had this much inexplicable magic. Astonishingly horrible final boss design aside, I love the idea of Divine Knight battles. Perhaps we will get to outfit Valimar with different armaments? Ie, deciding between a two-handed sword or a sword and shield? Looking forward to seeing how the system is built upon in the sequel!

What do you mean, that the Soldats were created by Reinfords "5th development division"? Alisa's description of the divisions during the Roer field study showed that there were clearly FOUR divisions. Well, at least we know where the laundered iron went. I bet the Ouroboros loaned their engineers with their Archaisim tech to the ILF to build the Soldats.

It would appear that the legends of the guardian knight in the Nord Highlands and Legram were referring to the Divine Knights. Who built them? Since they weren't "black boxes" like the artifacts are, I presume that they were created during the Dark Ages. It also seems that the old schoolhouse was actually vault that stored the divine knight, to prevent just random person from stumbling upon this immense power. I presume C found his Azure Knight in a similar installation? How many more are there in Zemuria?

On the note of inexplicable magic at the end (Vita Clotilde/Azure Witch was clearly NOT USING AN ORBMENT at the end there, so I suppose she's casting REAL MAGIC as opposed to the arts our orbments conjure? I'd love to learn more about the witches. Also, is Celine a familiar created by the witches, or is there a race of actual sentient cats in Zemuria? Considering the strange creatures we've seen in the wild, the latter seems plausible.

We still know nothing about Rean's super saiyan/ninetails/evil superpower mode. Hopefully this is tackled as quickly as possible in the sequel, considering that the Valimar probably took him to Ymir.

Considering the true purpose of Class VII and Olivert's 3rd faction, it appears that we are Bracers in all but name, the difference being that we are officially sanctioned by the royal family and protected from the provincial and imperial armies.

Looking forward to seeing Sylphid reunite with her old Zephyr buddies! I wonder if she will rejoin them, or stay with Olivert's 3rd faction.

I hope to see more of Patrick in the sequel; he seems to be becoming nicer. I wouldn't mind him joining us as a party member.

I bet Class VII will be scattered across the empire until they are eventually brought back together under Olivert's flag. Machias and Elliot will return to Heimdallar (or join up with the Imperial Army), Jusis may be taken away to Bareahard, and everyone else will be on their own journey: Fie tracking down Zephyr, Emma tracking down Vita Clotidle/Azure Witch, and Gaius returning to Nord or tracking down Rean. Laura could either return to Legram, or join up with Olivert (her dad already works for him anyways). In the mean time, Rean and Celine would be training up and tracking down C. Angelica will try to escape her home and join the fight. Towa and George could end up anywhere.

I wonder where the instructors will be; perhaps Sara will be traversing the land, tracking down her students? Or she will contact her bracer friends for info and help, or immediately rejoin Olivert. Neithardt will obviously return to the Imperial Army. I don't know about the rest.

With the capital having been hijacked by the ILF/Noble Faction, I wonder where the Railway MPs and the Army will be based at, and who will lead them. Perhaps General Vander?

[Iamanerd]

I've put off playing the LoH series, but now that I've been seeing everyone's reaction to it I pickup the first trails game and I'm going to start there.

[Velshin]

I've put off playing the LoH series, but now that I've been seeing everyone's reaction to it I pickup the first trails game and I'm going to start there.

It's awesome I am at 22+ hours of the first Trail of heroes Sky. Really solid JRPG I may put it among my favorite JRPGs with the Tales series indeed and I have been playing video games and RPGs since the 80s so not everything impress me you know what I mean. :P

[Video Games]

I want to play cold steel the hedgehog, but I kinda feel like I should just wait for part 2 on steam or a ps4 remaster or something though.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I want to play cold steel the hedgehog, but I kinda feel like I should just wait for part 2 on steam or a ps4 remaster or something though.

If you haven't played the first Cold Steel game yet, I highly encourage you do! It's a great 90+ hour long experience, and will give you something to look forward to later this year (the second game). Plus, it's good to have a break between one 90+ hour long game and the release of it's sequel, to prevent burn out. By the time the sequel is released on PC, you'll be more than ready and excited for the continuation of the story!

On the other hand, if you REALLY just want to play a complete saga, then you can just buy the Trails in the Sky duology (and it's self-contained threequel) right now. Note that the third game takes place after Cold Steel, so you may want to hold off of that one if you want to avoid CS spoilers.

[Pendulous]

I'm only three hours into Trails of Cold Steel. But I really like how they set up the game and explain the gameplay much better than Trails in the Sky. Hell, there was hidden options during combat in the first game, so you didn't even know how to access support spells without pressing the right button. Also, nice group of characters with unique personalities to start. Haven't gotten far into much, because holy crap this game takes a long time to set up, but I think I'll enjoy it more than I did Trails in the Sky, which I got bored of quickly.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I'm only three hours into Trails of Cold Steel. But I really like how they set up the game and explain the gameplay much better than Trails in the Sky. Hell, there was hidden options during combat in the first game, so you didn't even know how to access support spells without pressing the right button. Also, nice group of characters with unique personalities to start. Haven't gotten far into much, because holy crap this game takes a long time to set up, but I think I'll enjoy it more than I did Trails in the Sky, which I got bored of quickly.

It's not obvious at first, but the actual "plot" of the game begins when you are first told that you would be apart of the brand new class VII (so basically, when the game started). About eight hours in, it begins "click" that everything I did prior, and have been doing, was actually important all along, and going forward I was really excited to find out what happened next.

- - - Updated - - -

Having beaten the game yesterday, here are some tips:

You can actually DOUBLE STACK buffs, something I didn't realize this until the final boss. For example, on buffs like Rean's Motivate (craft that boosts strength), you can cast it twice for a cap of 50% bonus. The normal buff (when applied to a character) icon appears yellow; double stacking turns it red.

Manipulate turn order! Use Rean's Autmun Leaf Cutter (and other crafts with the "impede" effect) to interrupt enemies while they're casting, and crafts like Arc Slash (with the "delay" effect) to delay an enemy turn. This can make or break many battles; spamming delay attacks (especially AOE delays on large groups) can prevent the enemy from taking action all together and prevent your team from taking any damage (meaning you're healer can focus on attacking, or just swap to another character). Delaying turns means you can also "steal" a turn effect such as "crit damage" or "restore health on turn" for your team.

An alternative way to tank (besides beefing up HP and defense) is to go the "evasion tank" route and get your evasion rating up to 50%, then cast "shining" (which buffs you for an additional 50% evasion). You will dodge ALL incoming attacks, be it arts or crafts, unless it a story scripted fight where you're supposed to lose (which I can only recall ever happening once in the entire game). By endgame, it is possible to make all four people in your party evasion tanks and basically dodge everything, if you want to do sacrifice the gear and quartz slots to do that.

You can obtain different master quartz in the game, some of which DRAMATICALLY change up gameplay. I'd recommend Moebius (master quartz focused on items, gives items an AOE effect, great for buffers) and Criminal (your arts always crit, great for mages) if you want to experiment.

Cooking food is GREAT if you want buffs, ESPECIALLY if you use Moebius; food not only heals but also boosts stats.

USE YOUR ULTIMATES/ S-CRAFTS! They are well worth the CP needed, especially the 200 CP versions. They will deal the bulk of your damage on boss fights, and deal so much damage that even if you are about to wipe to a boss with 30% health left, you can still win.

[Cattleya]

Note that the third game takes place after Cold Steel, so you may want to hold off of that one if you want to avoid CS spoilers.

Wait, who told you that?
Trails in the Sky 3rd takes place before both Zero/Ao and Cold Steel, no issues whatsoever with playing it before them.

Re: your spoiler post earlier, most of those questions will be answered in CS2, naturally. I will say one not-very-spoilery thing: Ouroboros isn't nearly as plain-old-evil as you'd first expect

[Drofdel]

I recently got into the franchise thanks to Trails of Cold Steel I/II and now I'm hooked. I plan on clearing all the Trails in the Sky games on Steam and I'm also highly anticipating ToCS III.

[Velshin]

Question please because I am kinda confused so the Trail of Heroes Cold Steel that been released the start of this month in steam pc is that the first one or the second cold steel if it's the first then any idea when will we get the second one in pc?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Question please because I am kinda confused so the Trail of Heroes Cold Steel that been released the start of this month in steam pc is that the first one or the second cold steel if it's the first then any idea when will we get the second one in pc?

It's the first Trails of Cold steel. Durante is currently working on the PC port of the second one. XSEED announced that both games would be coming to PC this year, so hopefully not too long.

[Velshin]

It's the first Trails of Cold steel. Durante is currently working on the PC port of the second one. XSEED announced that both games would be coming to PC this year, so hopefully not too long.

Awesome thanks! I am currently 26+ hours on the first Trail sky of the series so after it I play the second chapter of sky and third then cold steel correct?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Awesome thanks! I am currently 26+ hours on the first Trail sky of the series so after it I play the second chapter of sky and third then cold steel correct?

I know that the first two Trails in the Sky games take place before Cold Steel, and according to Cattleya above, so does the third, so you can just play all three 'Sky' games before starting Cold Steel, if you want to play them chronologically.

[NightZero88]

Trails series was amazing, I loved it so much. Been playing Cold Steel and don't care for it as much. While it does look prettier, I hate the new orbment setup and not having tons of spells and I'm not a fan of the S-Crafts so far. They are basically all just attacks from what I've seen (Rean, Jusis, Gaius and Alisa) whereas trails in the sky had more buffing. Overall, it seems like they really dumbed down cold steel, you really only have a few attacks and defenses but trails in the sky had a ton more. One positive is the combat links are nice touch.

On a slightly different note, trails in the sky worked really well with a mouse+keyboard but cold steel doesn't work really at all and I'm forced to play with an X-Box controller. Anyone have similar issues?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Trails series was amazing, I loved it so much. Been playing Cold Steel and don't care for it as much. While it does look prettier, I hate the new orbment setup and not having tons of spells and I'm not a fan of the S-Crafts so far. They are basically all just attacks from what I've seen (Rean, Jusis, Gaius and Alisa) whereas trails in the sky had more buffing. Overall, it seems like they really dumbed down cold steel, you really only have a few attacks and defenses but trails in the sky had a ton more. One positive is the combat links are nice touch.

Hm... I haven't played Trails in the Sky yet, but hard mode Trails of Cold Steel was pretty challenging at times; each battles practically demanded stacking buffs (Motivate, La Crest, Adamantine/Mirror shields, Chrono Drive, etc), and maneuvering your characters so that their arts/crafts can reach as many of the enemy as possible or key enemies (especially ones that needed to be delayed or interrupted). I wiped several times throughout the game, and - barring the final battle - I never felt that I lost because of bad luck; I always felt that I lost because I made poor tactical decisions. S-Crafts feel pretty cool; gives each character a distinctive ultimate (visually), but they never felt distinctive gameplay wise as most S-crafts are the same medium-sized AOE super attack. Rosetta Arrow and Cross Raven were standouts because they weren't the same as the others. Hopefully the sequel adds more variety, and hopefully they do more than just "massive damage".

Crafts in Cold Steel aren't just another form of attacks; they have special effects you will need to use. Rean's Arc Slash can delay enemy turns, and you WILL want that during boss fights with adds. His Autumn Leaf Cutter stops enemies from casting, and so forth. The crafts are specific tools to be used in specific circumstances. I never felt like they were meaningless. Each character felt like they brought their own unique tool kit to the fight that I needed. Gaius was the only character in the game that I consistently just spammed "attack" with (since the rest of the party can do what he does and more), only using a craft on rare occasion to delay/interrupt foes, and the only art he used was shining on himself; his usefulness is more passive (carefully positioning so I can get as many counters as possible) as opposed to actively pushing buttons to make use of.

On a slightly different note, trails in the sky worked really well with a mouse+keyboard but cold steel doesn't work really at all and I'm forced to play with an X-Box controller. Anyone have similar issues?

Mouse and keyboard works just fine for me on the Cold Steel steam release. Have you tried using the launcher to reset your input setup? If that doesn't work, the steam forums might have an answer.

[NightZero88]

Hm... I haven't played Trails in the Sky yet, but hard mode Trails of Cold Steel was pretty challenging at times; each battles practically demanded stacking buffs (Motivate, La Crest, Adamantine/Mirror shields, Chrono Drive, etc), and maneuvering your characters so that their arts/crafts can reach as many of the enemy as possible or key enemies (especially ones that needed to be delayed or interrupted). I wiped several times throughout the game, and - barring the final battle - I never felt that I lost because of bad luck; I always felt that I lost because I made poor tactical decisions. S-Crafts feel pretty cool; gives each character a distinctive ultimate (visually), but they never felt distinctive gameplay wise as most S-crafts are the same medium-sized AOE super attack. Rosetta Arrow and Cross Raven were standouts because they weren't the same as the others. Hopefully the sequel adds more variety, and hopefully they do more than just "massive damage".

You really should play Trails of the sky. It gives quite a bit of story to Cold Steel. As far as the game play itself one S-Craft gives immunity for 1 turn, 2 turns if you use it with 200 CP. Another does a full heal for 100, gives defense boost for 200, etc. Then you have your standard issue big damage ones as well. Trails of the sky in my opinion didn't use buff stacking quite so much but I don't play either on hard or nightmare where I think a lot of it comes down to stacking earth guard which is a damage immunity.

Crafts in Cold Steel aren't just another form of attacks; they have special effects you will need to use. Rean's Arc Slash can delay enemy turns, and you WILL want that during boss fights with adds. His Autumn Leaf Cutter stops enemies from casting, and so forth. The crafts are specific tools to be used in specific circumstances. I never felt like they were meaningless. Each character felt like they brought their own unique tool kit to the fight that I needed. Gaius was the only character in the game that I consistently just spammed "attack" with (since the rest of the party can do what he does and more), only using a craft on rare occasion to delay/interrupt foes, and the only art he used was shining on himself; his usefulness is more passive (carefully positioning so I can get as many counters as possible) as opposed to actively pushing buttons to make use of.

Yeah, I'm quite familiar with turn delays, etc. It was also in the first trails games. What is curious though is like I said, Cold Steel seems dumbed down as you only get the "higher elements" in certain areas whereas they existed from the get go in the originals for every enemy the whole game.

Mouse and keyboard works just fine for me on the Cold Steel steam release. Have you tried using the launcher to reset your input setup? If that doesn't work, the steam forums might have an answer.

I'll give that a shot but it does feel much better on an X-Box controller, especially since I have to hold down the turbo button all game. That is a really nice feature.

I also appreciate the post about stacking buffs. Never would have done that and it is really helpful.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Since we have people still playing this game, let's talk about characters and our various thoughts on them: who's your favorite? Who's your least favorite? Who do you think is interesting? Who do you want to learn more about? Who's best girl?

[Pendulous]

Who's best girl?

It was my first day to be able to bond, and it wouldn't let me bond with Fie

[Val the Moofia Boss]

It was my first day to be able to bond, and it wouldn't let me bond with Fie

What do you mean, you didn't have tea with Towa-chan?

Fie is quite the tease though.

[Pendulous]

What do you mean, you didn't have tea with Towa-chan?

Fie is quite the tease though.

That was an option? I assumed you could only spend bond points on Class VII members.