The Legend of Heroes series.

[Cakka]

Anyone else here been playing The Legend of Heroes games? I myself only first heard about these games first in 2014, and thought they sounded kinda interesting adding them to my mental backlog, but didn't actually start playing them until late last year. After starting to play Trails in the Sky though I couldn't stop until 100+ hours later when I finally finished the Second Chapter!

These games seem to have flown somewhat under the radar for many due to the fact they are being released about 10 years late compared to Japan. Having played them now they have some of the most likeable characters, extremely detailed world and lore, great combat system, interesting equipment/"orb" system, etc. Both the first and second chapter entered my top 10 RPGs of all times immediately.



Now waiting my copy of Trails of Cold Steel to arrive, EU release day being this Friday. Luckily unlike the Trails in the Sky games these seem to be coming to the West pretty fast considering they are only couple years old, and the 3rd Cold Steel game still being under development.



So any other new or old LoH fans here?

[unfilteredJW]

I'm playing the first right now when I get my JRPG itch.

I'm impressed with the amount of time devoted to dialogue. It's like playing an anime.

[Cattleya]

Finished Sky FC and SC, (slowly) playing through an imported Zero no Kiseki, and awaiting Cold Steel's arrival in Europe this week.

And yeah, thank god they're way faster with the Sen (cold steel) games, with Cold Steel 2 on schedule for a 2016 western release as well.

[Cakka]

I'm impressed with the amount of time devoted to dialogue. It's like playing an anime.

That's pretty good way to describe it. Same kind of feeling I had when playing the FF and Persona games for example.

Finished Sky FC and SC, (slowly) playing through an imported Zero no Kiseki, and awaiting Cold Steel's arrival in Europe this week.

And yeah, thank god they're way faster with the Sen (cold steel) games, with Cold Steel 2 on schedule for a 2016 western release as well.

I read they are already pretty far with the CS2 translation so I'm guessing either summer or fall release. Will be interesting to see where they go after that though. Hopefully we get even more LoH games translated!

[unfilteredJW]

I'm actually going to take the night off of multiplayer stuff and fire this up when I get home.

Thanks for reminding me.

[Arrashi]

I picked first part during the steam sale, and i must say that was pretty good. I really liked that it was a little more "calm" than most RPGs nowadays, and focused more on story, setting and characters. I loved attention to detail, and the fact that everytime a smallest change occurs, every NPC has something new to say.

Also, olivier is simply amazing.

[Mechazod]

You probably know this already, but there are three other Legend of Heroes game that got English ports on the PSP prior to Trails in the Sky. They are not as good as Sky and Cold Steel (IMO), but are still worth a play through of, though you have to keep in mind that the release order is kind of wonky for the translated versions.

[Cattleya]

You probably know this already, but there are three other Legend of Heroes game that got English ports on the PSP prior to Trails in the Sky. They are not as good as Sky and Cold Steel (IMO), but are still worth a play through of, though you have to keep in mind that the release order is kind of wonky for the translated versions.

Honestly, the only game in the Gagharv trilogy that I actually enjoyed was Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch. Tear of Vermillion and Song of the Ocean were pretty bad.

[Cakka]

You probably know this already, but there are three other Legend of Heroes game that got English ports on the PSP prior to Trails in the Sky. They are not as good as Sky and Cold Steel (IMO), but are still worth a play through of, though you have to keep in mind that the release order is kind of wonky for the translated versions.

Yeah, I've heard of them but as you say I've also heard that they aren't anywhere near as good as the more recent games are.

These are games I wanna play before those three:

Trails in the Sky: First Chapter (done)
Trails in the Sky: Second Chapter (done)
Trails in the Sky: The 3rd (not translated, yet)
Trails of Zero (not translated, yet)
Trails of Azure (not translated, yet)
Trails of Cold Steel (bough)
Trails of Cold Steel II (coming later this year!)
Trails of Cold Steel III (under development)

[Cattleya]

Finished Cold Steel last night, those last 2 hours were a real doozy. Can't wait for the sequel, but in the meantime I'll continue my quest to get through the untranslated Zero and Ao. At least Cold Steel gave me some more motivation to do that

[Cakka]

Finished Cold Steel last night, those last 2 hours were a real doozy. Can't wait for the sequel, but in the meantime I'll continue my quest to get through the untranslated Zero and Ao. At least Cold Steel gave me some more motivation to do that

Speaking of Cold Steel it is out on PC now!



Turbo mode alone makes this the best version there is. Better graphics, voices, etc. are just gravy on top of that.

[blackpink]

man I want that game so badddddddd but I have no money Also I heard there's a massive cliffhanger so Ill just wait till 2 comes out and binge them together.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I've been playing Cold Steel since it came out on Wednesday (I've been eyeing it since 2013 but I don't have a playstation, and got absolutely HYPED when the PC port was announced), and I can already confidently say that this is one of the best JRPG's I've ever played; it's up there with Xenoblade Chronicles in my book.


I'm fifteen hours in, and I'm absolutely loving Trails of Cold Steel! I haven't enjoyed a singleplayer game this much since... wow, last year's Banner Saga 2. The story is pretty interesting (Cold Steel is a trilogy of games that basically follows your typical shounen story path: starts off light hearted with the young heroes meeting each other and training their superpowers/magic/mecha piloting skills/whatever while the big evil plot slowly builds in the background before eventually something really big happens and our heroes embark on massive adventure to save the world. Trails of Cold Steel focuses on just the lighthearted build up part, with the sequel going full adventure/serious story). I haven't played a game that made me genuinely laugh out loud as much as I did today since Valkyria Chronicles.

Turbo mode is a god-send, and the game looks pretty good! Running on max settings (including Durante's new graphical additions for the PC port), and haven't encounter ANY framerate drops or crashes during my five hours so far. Impressive! The new dialogue made the game even more immersive.

Sara Veilstein has got to be one of my most favorite fictional teachers ever, and I mean she's up there with Kakashi! Darn woman, she's amazing!

I've found THE ONE TRUE WAIFU of Thor's Military Academy: student-council-president-kun! I'm absolutely serious folks FIGHT ME!

I love how Jusis is a pretty friendly and humble noble, but he plays up the arrogant-entitled-prince stereotype just to mess with Machias.

Gaius is such a bro! *fistbumps*

Seriously, Cold Steel is great guys. If you want a quality, anime-esque JRPG to invest sixty hours into (possibly 200 hours if you play the entire Cold Steel trilogy), then pick this up. It's $36 on Steam for this week.

Jeff's opinion on the series:

[Edge-]

I noticed the turbomode auto-pauses in combat when the timed key presses happen. That's fuckin rad, Durante did such a good job with this port from everything I've seen.

[Karamaru]

The world building in these games is amazing the devs really are putting some serious effort into it and I must say I really like Estelle as a Protag.

[Cakka]

The world building in these games is amazing the devs really are putting some serious effort into it and I must say I really like Estelle as a Protag.

One good example of that is that there are side NPCs, and I'm not talking about questgivers, just purely filler NPCs that have their own stories that not only continue through one game, but multiple games.

[Danner]

I found out about Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel yesterday, and it was an instant buy. Then all of a sudden it was 3 AM and I was remembering that I was about supposed to make an early dinner that day. That's a quality in JRPGs that I haven't seen beyond Persona 5 in recent years. This is exactly the game I have been craving, without even knowing about it. My HD replay of FF12 is indefinitely on pause as a result, this game is far superior in just about every way.

If I look at the game with objective eyes, I have to state that the game does feel like a PS Vita port. The game's rooms do feel somewhat empty, and I have a serious impression that this is due to technical limitations. This is especially notable in dungeons (old school more so than the fields), but also in the real world you will see that there aren't a lot of people around in the same area. This school should have 100+ students, but I see only 3 in one room at any time. I'm also not really convinced the combat system is all that interesting, having finished Trails in the sky. Sure it's in 3D, and the addition of the major orbs really spices up things - but is it really all that different and interesting? I'm not sure yet.

But you know... that's about the only negative I can think of. The world building alone makes up for any downside. As expected of a trails game, this game weaves together believable characters, an interesting setting, and a game world that promotes exploring the people in it. On gameday 2 I was toggled to find a book for a character had lost the day before. And... lo and behold, the book was literally where she had been the day before. That's an eye to detail that I can seriously appreciate. Whereas the school in Persona 5 had the same people in the same location every single day - this game throws something new to explore every single time you finish a cutscene. That's just as ridiculously impressive as it used to be in the previous games in the series.

My favourite aspect of this game is however the awesome main cast. 9 students and a bad-ass teacher, introduced in a very effective manner. I love how they are interacting, and I while I have a tangling feeling that the story and character developments between the cast is going to be a linear affair, it doesn't feel that way. My free time feels like it matters, and more so than another old game of mine that resembles this game greatly: Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis. I am getting some distinct persona character interaction vibes from the game, and even the illusion of this is enough to keep me on my seat. I care about this cast, and I wish to see them grow and interact, open up to each other and ... just get to know them. In short - I am in love with this game thoroughly, despite only having played it for 11 hours. Promises that there will be 50 more hours in this game alone makes me really really happy right now. A promise of sequels, more so.

Verdict so far: HELL YES. If you like JRPGs with anime style, this is the best game ever.

[Velshin]

I recently started playing the first one man I missed that good old feeling of true old school JRPG. Really love the setting of the game and the dialog reminded me of the old Wild Arms series the ones that was in PS1.

So the question is are all of the Trail of Heroes series related? or is it like Final Fantasy where each one has different and has it's own new characters and storyline?

[Danner]

Not quite. They are from what I understand all set in the same world, with a few years apart and in slightly different locations and new characters whenever the names change. So while you can play them independently, there are cameos and names popping up everywhere that is a throwback to previous (and sometimes later!) games. Well, at least since Trails in the Sky, I'm not too sure about the first two chapters and whether they fit into the big thing.

There are 13 games in the series, but they are divided into chapters. Basically, some games are direct continuations of each other, while others start a new cast at a new place and time.

• Dragon Slayer (2 games), released in the 1990s, I know literally nothing about these games.
• Gagharv (3 games), also released in the 1990s, but apparently translated to english. I have never tried them.
• Trails in the Sky (3 games). All available on steam right now. The first two are direct continuations of each other, featuring the same main character and continuing the same story. Both of the first two games are amazing and must be played. The third game is more of a side story apparently, featuring a different main character and cast. I haven't played the third game due to me playing Persona 5 at the time of release. It's on my todo-list. I was actually looking for this game on steam when I found trails of Cold Steel instead
• Zero no Kiseki / Ao no Kiseki (2 games). Apparently XSEED skipped translating this game and went for translating the latest game series instead. I guess that sells more. But yeah, it's set in the same world, starting months after the end of the previous game - but in a different country altogether and with a new cast. I have not spoiled myself on the game, so can't tell you much about it.
• Trails of Cold Steel (3 games). First one available on steam right now! All three will feature the same main cast, and continue where the previous left off.

[Edge-]

So the question is are all of the Trail of Heroes series related? or is it like Final Fantasy where each one has different and has it's own new characters and storyline?

Cold Steel apparently has some connections with Trails in the Sky, it takes place afterwards and references bits of the Trails in the Sky story. So you'll understand more if you play Cold Steel second, and you'll possibly spoil some bits of Trails in the Sky if you play Cold Steel first.