#I saw zero bonding between the main characters despite being together basically in every scene

[set-wingedwarrior]

I know it happens often to see writers during a long fic to complain at some point about the first chapters because they got better in the meantime and they look bad to them now.

But this is the first time where I saw this happened when the writing actually got worse

[monasatlantis]

My final Review for Trails of Zero and Trails of Azure and also my thoughts about the Trails-Saga so far as a whole

After finishing the Trails in the Sky games, also known as the Liberl-Arc I knew that if I wanted to be fully prepared for playing Trails of Cold Steel 4 myself (I’ve watched a lot from this game on YouTube with subtitles already…) I would have to play the Crossbell-Arc  (Zero and Azure) too and so that is what I did. I have to say I had mixed feelings from the beginning, because many people were Hyping the Crossbell-Games and I tend to be extremely disappointed by hyped games because they almost never met my expectations. However… it was for the greater good. And also for being able to give a overview over how I see the Trails-Games as a whole in the moment, as I have now played almost all the games that have come out so far.

So lets start with my review of Zero and Ao/Azure first…

1.      What is your overall opinion of the Crossbell-Saga games?

 Personally, I think Trails of Zero is among the two worst most boring games in the Trails-Saga so far. I couldn’t help but dislike it and its so called plot from the very beginning. When it comes to game-mechanics and battle-mechanics it was a trails-game so there was not that much to be bothered about, but when it comes to the plot or the characters or the way they were explored it was awful. The only game that is worse, is Trails in the Sky 3, which had the luxury that we already knew most of the characters so that we only had to be unnerved by Kevins and Ries questionable story while otherwise being at least already attached to the other characters and thus following their story anyway, even if it was not half as good as it could have been… IF you saw their story that is, but I digress.

On the other hand, Trails of Azure/Ao no Kiseki was done very well. The plot was indeed one of the best plots of a sole game. (As I personally thinks the deps of the Erebonia-Saga as a whole is better than the ones from Lilberl and Crossbell.) And since we already went through the phase of trying and failing to get to like the characters, but actually at least knew them and had formed some sort of small attachment to them in the previous game, it was easier to overlook the things certain points, since we just accepted it that it was the way it was and learned to enjoy what we had.

 2.      Lets get a little deeper into Zero… what was good and what was bad?

 Good, huh? Uh… ^^’ The only thing I really like about this game were the cameos of Estelle, Joshua and Renne. And I also adored KeA. That was basically it.

One of the main problems of Zero was how awfully badly the plot was delivered and how badly the characters were shown… or not shown. We start with Lloyd who technically speaking has a really interesting story. He was raised by his older brother and the woman said older brother loved for most of his live and said brother, who had worked by the police has been murdered and his murder became a cold case. Now that Lloyd is finally working for the police too, he… gives a damn about any chance for him to solve his brothers murder-case. Like… he never seemed interested in doing that at all. The first thing he should have done after he started working for the police, was actually to take a look at the file of his brothers murder and ask around the police to find any kind of information or evidence about what could have happened to him. (His name was Guy, by the way. Who calls his child Guy?) He never did that. In chapter 4, when the first game was almost over we suddenly found out that like half the people we had regular contact with actually knew Guy or had worked with him and suddenly I wasn’t so sure anymore about Lloyds and Guys relationship. Did he never mention the names of the people he worked with? And why did Sergei hide the fact that he has been working with Guy for so long? Why didn’t Grace or Arios ever think of mentioning that they also knew Guy or worked with him in all the times we meet them before chapter 4? Then again, if Lloyd had asked about him, he might have found out early. Or if he actually had a decent relationship with his brother, this man might have told him. I mean… isn’t it weird? In Ao/Azure its shown that Guy wanted to invite Arios to his wedding… an brag about his brother and you want to tell me that Lloyd never either heard about that man nor ever meet him in Crossbell together with his brother? Seems very weird. The characters as a whole felt extremely… empty in Zero. I can’t explain it fully, but I just couldn’t start to like them or bond with them, because the games made them focus so much on their job as the SSS that you never felt like they were actually people you could relate to. Like they had those problems in their lifes, but we always just scratched on the surface of their lifes and the problems they had. Also… in both Sky and Cold Steel family was really important to every character, even if the family wasn’t blood related, a huge part of must characters character-arcs were connected to how important their families were for them, no matter how hard the circumstances surrounding those families were. And in Zero it seemed like family was so not important to those characters. I absolutely get Randy here, because his family raised him to be a person who sacrificed a whole village for a job, even tho in this village was a person he liked. BUT everyone else was weird for me. As I said, Lloyd (despite stating otherwise later in Ao/Azure) has never shown much interest in finding out anything about his brother or his murder, despite the fact that he had been so close to all the information he needed the whole time. Elie showed in that talk with Lloyd that she was bothered by the fact that her parents both abandoned her and yet she never (until Cold Steel 4 – funny enough) showed any interest in facing them. Even tho it was shown by the game that she loved her grandfather, the game totally failed to deliver it to look like she was really attached to him. I mean, in Sky Tita was traveling around with Estelle a lot and yet, it was absolutely clear that she loved her grandfather nuts AND also missed her parents. (Until they came back suddenly and gave Agathe a hard time that is XD Were it was yet again shown, that despite being separated for a long time, they had a really close relationship. But once again, I digress…) Tio had been a missing child that has been through hell and when she was return to her parents she actually was different and since that was making it difficult she left her parents again. I never really got if it was really fine for her parents that she left or if she herself decided that it was best that way. Which is already a really bad thing without even mentioning how unsatisfying it was that once again, apparently Tios interest in her family seemed really small.

Now don’t start with the “The whole point of this game was that the SSS became a family” because that didn’t really work either, because the game never really spend that much time giving the characters a real time to bond with each other in Zero. When I reached Elies final bonding event I felt like it came out of nowhere, because I never had the feeling that Lloyd got over his awkward “Elie and me? Never!” – stage or that they gotten close enough for an almost kiss at all. (Never had that problem in Cold Steel, although here the bonding events over the course of the game might have helped a lot… but I also think even without the bonding events the bonds between the characters developed really well, dating aside, because here only Alisa had the advantage, but I will digress again if I don’t stop here… ^^’) But lovestorys aside (since I am really picky with them) I also do not feels that the friendship between the characters was so well develop in the game. Obviously they all being doting parents to KeA helped a lot here with making them look more closer, but a child should not be the only-bonding-point between them. And here we come to an example for why the bonding between those characters worked so bad. In Cold Steel (yes, I am going there now…) we had that canon-event with Rean and Alisa exchanging they problems, hopes and wished in Nord while looking at the nightsky. So we had Lloyd and Elie on the rooftop together and Elie was opening up about her life, her past, her feelings and problems…. and Lloyd? Even when Elie mentioned that he has his own problems, he didn’t open up to her. He didn’t tell her how he was raised by his brother, how he is chasing after becoming like him instead of chasing after his murderer, since it was an unsolved case and so on. So the difference in those scenes were, that while Alisa and Rean were both open and honest to each other Lloyd was a great listener but failed to actually help by opening up himself and show trust with that. And that is how this whole game went. In the end of Zero, the SSS didn’t feel half as close as it should have been and would have been if the game would have spent more time with serious bonding.

Through most of this game, I was desperately searching for the plot. Because I was refusing to believe that besting the bracers was the plot, because damn was that a stupid idea and a huge ass fail too. Most of the chapters (even the final chapter itself – which becomes even more clear after Ao/Azure) ended with us being almost killed if no one had come to help/save us. Starting with the Prolog itself. And despite that, until KeA showed up, Lloyd had been simply too proud to ask the bracers for help. It pissed me off so much! Honestly, we’ve been bracers in Sky, we’ve been friends with bracers in Cold Steel, were we also learned how important and great bracers are and in Zero they tried to make you want to be “better” than the bracers. Which was a huge fail not just because of how incapable the SSS was, but also because they brought Estelle and Joshua back, because if we just had the somehow arrogant bracers of Crossbell, wanting to best them would have become a given at some point, even for a player like me, but after those two joined the bracers, there was no freaking way that I would have been able to want to beat them anyone. So as much as I loved Estelle and Joshua being there… I also think it was a very stupid move. Especially since in the end, the most interesting part of the story (also the only one that really found a conclusion in this game) was Rennes backgroundstory and how she found her way back to Estelle and Joshua. The only other interesting thing was KeA and that was never solved in the first game AND she was also introduced far too late in this game.

A lot of potential was wasted in this game. Like Lloyd should have started to hear KeAs voice long before we actually found her, because that would have been something to make the plot interesting. Make you want to find out what is going on. Then again, it was never fully explained why only Lloyd could hear KeAs voice anyway… such a damn waste.

 3.      Now to Ao/Azure! What was good, what was bad?

 A lot of the things from the first game didn’t really change, but I was already used to them and they were buried under a really interesting plot this time and as the plot was also delivered so much better this time, it changed really a lot for how much I enjoyed playing the game. Much less wasted potential. They were going all out with the plot this time and things like KeA acting weird/bothered/unhappy started much, much earlier and with that gave you a good reason to be interested and stay interested. They handled the return of characters from the other games so much better this time too. Honestly? In Zero all I wanted to do was see Estelle and Joshua again and I think this also blocked any chance for me to start liking the other characters as they were so boring and their storys so… boring and then we got Estelle and Joshua, who we knew and loved and who had such an important mission… of course they were more important and more interesting than Lloyd who didn’t give a damn about the question who killed his brother. In Ao/Azure these characters were kind of coming and going in an extremely powerful but satisfying way. People who know me know very well that I love Olivert and was the happiest player in the world for him showing up in Ao and also having a side-mission and lots of screentime in chapter 2 of Ao. And although I found it a bit sad that we couldn’t say goodbye to him and Kloe, all in all they came for a reason and left after what they had to do was done and it felt really satisfying. Honestly, tho? Osborne totally stole the show in this chapter. Kudos to how they handled him in this chapter. You could feel his enormous aura through the screen and the impression they already wanted to give you in Sky, which was that this man is a real monster, really came across as well as what a genius he was. When Olivert was shocked that Osborn used the Red-Constellation in the name of the Empire, he used the excuse that he wanted to protect Olivert (which was in fact part of the contract as Sigmund mentioned earlier) to justify it and the Emperor would have totally understand that and that was one of the ways to show what a genius he was. I also loved the difference between how Rocksmith had been handling the SSS and how Osborne did. He doesn’t need to get them on his side, because he can crush them and that is exactly what he warned them about in a way that was too friendly to be threatening although it had clearly been a threat. I am not a fan of this man (Reans father or not…) but he was really amazing in this chapter but especially in this whole scene with the SSS.

Also really, the secret star of this game was Lechter XD Showing up in the most unexpected times, doing the weirdest things from the beginning to the end. Even showing off that damn, this man is a fighter and he looks cool when he does fight. And I love how in the end, you never know why the hell he works for Osborne as he never sounded like he really liked to work for him, although it was clear at the end that he was very well aware of how capable this man is with his plans and how well they usually work.

However… this game had a lot of great and amazing plottwist and also the usual traitors, traitors who return to our side, never really were traitors and also of course the bad guys who will be forgiven no matter what bullshit they pulled. A true Trails game.

Honestly, even the side characters were so much easier to fall in love with this time. I was so shocked when Ilya was hurt and I cried when Rixia screamed her name. When the game showed you how guilty the characters felt that were protected and thus not badly or just a little bit hurt, it was really emotional. And really realistic. I liked it a lot.

Also… the intermezzo. Total fanservice, really. And yet it was really amusing and a great chance to spend more time with the side-characters that you didn’t spend much time with during the usual plot. I also loved how those useless Urgent-Missions vanished in the end, because in Zero most of the time, they didn’t have anything to do with the game. Why the hell did I have to find that girls Umbrella again? And how can that be an urgent mission?

But while I am at it, here is still some critic. I hated how a lot of information’s that were important for the plot were revealed in side-missions or even hidden-missions. I played non of them and when I had to watch the final from a lets player because of technical reasons I was constantly like “What?”, when all the things were revealed that he got, do to the fact that he played all Support-Requests and Hidden-Missions and got so much more information’s over certain situations and characters do to that. Don’t get my wrong, I think it is great if those missions are not just boring but also give you valuable information, but there is a difference between valuable information’s and stuff that should have been mentioned in the main-plot because you need them to get things. Lloyd often all of the sudden was like: “WAIT! You did these and that, right?” And I never got how he suddenly reached that conclusion, because I missed some important information that were given by missions I didn’t do, because I didn’t had too. If missions have important information, than for gods sake game, force me to do them!

I found that Wald was a weird plot-device that didn’t really… made much use to the story? It was kind of an motivation for Wazy but a questionable one and one that was somehow unnecessary. It felt like they just needed to do something with this man.

Also… uh… KeA just gave up her powers and that was so anti-climatic? At least I would have wished it would not have been so easy for her to do it. Or if she would have sacrificed them to… I don’t know, do something useful. Don’t get me wrong! It was good and right that her powers are gone now (tho looking at CS4 there are some remnants there…) but I just would have wished the way she gave her powers away would have been a bit more interesting or dramatic.

 4.      Any thoughts about the music and the game-mechanics or battle-system?

 Sadly, I couldn’t hear the music with the game but I listened to the OSTs and they were both good. (Not as good as the one from Trails of Cold Steel 3 tho, but that one is hard to beat…)

I didn’t really like how you had no idea how you gathered bonding points. The final bonding event with Elie in the first game was a lucky draw. I chose her to be Lloyds partner every time because I am a shipper with heart and soul, but I was feeling bad about neglecting Tio and Randy and almost didn’t chose Elie for the last one. The game could have at least told me that some of my decisions would influence the bonding with the other characters – I am so damn spoiled by Cold Steel XD - and in the second game I did relay completely on a walkthrough to get enough bonding points with Elie and yet still thought I fucked it up until I got the invitation to the deck ^^’

I totally loved those Combi-Crafts. They were great and I would have loved to also have them in Cold Steel (but I guess we have the Link-Attacks there as an replacement…)

I wished I could have auto-fight or at least a way to make the fights go faster. Grinding was so not possible the slow way this was going.

Holy shit was it impossible to use the Masters-Quarz from Ao/Azure to their full potential because it was so hard to level them up. Much easier in Cold Steel.

 5.      The ending of Ao/Azure, what do you think about it?

 I found both the ending of Zero and Ao/Azure a tiny bit rushed in a way. Like… we hardly get any explanation or an after-credits scene. And the explanation in Ao/Azure was a fucking huge Spoiler. The game tells you that Osborn is alive and won the fight against the noble fraction in the civil war and that he also took over Crossbell for 2 years. Like… uh… when you play CS… this is like some huge ass things to ponder about and if you had played this game before (which you should) you would have known all this already ^^’ Still… I liked how they had the final picture of them standing under the flag of an now independent Crossbell (probably after CS4) after the whole Epilogue-Information felt like we left Crossbell at a really bad time and that this way, it somehow was a unfinished game. But, as we know now… Lloyd and Co. take care of that problem in CS4, so its fine.

 6.      Points for both games?

 4,5 of 10 points for Trails of Zero, because it was fucking bad!

9 of 10 points for Trails of Azure, because it was really good and had just a few flaws. (CS3, by the way, got the same amount of points…)

 A little overview over what I think of the Trails-Saga so far, now that I have played all games currently available to me (aside from CS4 which I have almost completely spoiled for myself anyway at this point XD) follows now. So be aware of SPOILERS!

 7.      Looking at all 9 games that came out so far, what do you think about the Trails-Saga as a whole?

 Something I’ve realized with shock when I’ve been puzzling the pieces of all the games together is how much the Liberl-Arc is actually an outsider here. How it doesn’t feel very important anymore as soon as you move on from the Sky games. Despite the fact that Ouroboros was much more involved in what happened to Liberl than in what happened in Crossbell, it still feels like Liberl is just not half as important as this small town and his two-games. Somehow it feels a bit like the Liberl-Arc was more to introduce certain characters (and Ouroboros) to the player then actually having a huge importance to the actual Trails – Saga as a whole. Of course I know that what Campanella gained from the Liberl-Arc will be important at some point of the Trails-Saga but looking at Cold Steel I think Crossbell is much more prominent and also more important to the Erebonia-Arc (which is huge!) which is not just shown by the connection between those two places, but also by how Rean interacts with Lloyd and how much he seems to honor him for some reason. While Estelle and Joshua, are just some good bracers that helped to solve that one incident in Liberl, Rean seems to have a huge amount of respect for Lloyd and what he did for his hometown.

They of course do have a lot of similarities that connect them somehow, I get that. But in Cold Steel 4, I found the meeting of Rean and Estelle and Joshua so anti-climatic while the one with Lloyd was such a huge deal. I think that we lag a connection between Liberl and Erebonia here. The only thing connecting us to Liberl in the first two Cold Steel games was Olivert, who doesn’t even belong there, but was just traveling through it. Funny enough, what they give us in CS3 is the age-gape-ship – do not get my wrong, I am so not complaining, but I am sure a lot of other western fans are – purely relying on the power of shippings here XD Honestly, it would have been possible to make that work without Tita. By having Shera become a teacher alongside Rean and Randy (instead of hiding her in Erebonia until CS4…) and having Agathe as a Bracer helping out Fie, Sarah and Toval like he usually does. But they had to give us that ship, simply for the reason that shippings always go, if you ask me. But without thinking that a bracer falling for a young girl wasn’t exactly the best representation for Liberl. Once again, do not get me wrong. Both Tita and Agathe are amazing characters. He is a strong bracer and she is an extremely talented and courageous engineer at her very young age. And I personally do treasure their relationship and how it evolved. Okay… I actually love it and supporting the ship with all my might. Yet, looking at how badly ships like that are received in western countries, taking those two as represents for the Liberl arc is questionable at best.

I get it. In CS3 they wanted to form a connection to both the Sky games and Ao/Zero without already giving us the main-characters of those two games because they would have stolen the show XD So they gave us Randy and Tio for Crossbell, with Randy of course being a more prominent person as a colleague of Rean and also a more than capable fighter that also got a connection with Shirley who is working with Ouroboros now. And then they give us Tita and Agathe for Liberl… and you can not help but question the choice. I mean… everyone loved Tita because just like KeA, she was so loveable. And now she turned into a teenager that suddenly is aware that just saying “I love Agathe so much” is not something she should do anymore without giving it a second thought. Agathe suddenly being much more flustered about the teasing from others because obviously its not that unlikely anymore that there are romantic feelings involved here. So… that is our connection to the Liberl-Arc. An Age-Gape-Ship that is not together yet... but too close to thinking about being in love with each other for the likes of most western players. For me as a fan of that ship, it is of course a good choice… but for representing the Liberl-Arc it stays a rather questionable choice if you think about it. Especially since Shera was nearby the whole time and wasn’t shown once and only mentioned close to the end. I feel like that was a choice purely made for evolving Tita and Agathe as a ship somehow and show how those two characters and their relationship has changed in the meantime. Especially with Tita being suddenly self-conscious and also looking at that we go from the Sister-Zone to “For me you are…” in the short span from the beginning of CS3 to the middle of CS4. However… yes… I digress again. I can not help but feel like the Liberl-Arc (despite being a good arc) is less important to the overall plot of the Trails-Saga as a whole. Like… most of the Ouroboros-Guys from this arc are either currently no were to be seen or dead… or on the good-side XD Cassius is showing up for 5 minutes, looking like the powerful guy he became somehow and then he is gone again in Cold Steel 4. Its like he was just introduced to be mentioned every now and then in the other games so you would think: “Ohhhhh!” XD Well… at least he lets Rean become a Swordmaster in the end. He must do something useful at least once in all this games that claim he is a big-shot despite him never being there when actually needed. So he wasn’t really important in the other games either, despite the fuss that was always made about him. So… yeah. Liberl was really just to introduce us to the Trails-Saga and some more or less important characters as well as Ouroboros I think.

Crossbell was used the give Ourobors more people that work for them it seems XD Also, Red-Constellation and Zephir was even mentioned. And then it is in a place that Reans biological father takes over and even uses Rean for that, giving him a feeling of guilt when he thinks of Lloyd who just did what Rean would have done in his stead too, by trying to save Crossbell. Also… in Reans Class was someone from Crossbell (Juna – although we never met her in the Crossbell-saga) but no one from Liberl. Once again, giving that small place called Crossbell a bigger hand. The connection to Erebonia, by the way, and also the way Osborn is mentioned and even shown in both sagas is very huge. As a neightbor of both countries that has the biggest military in the whole Zermuria it was constantly shown in both Liberl and Crossbell as a possible enemies that is threatening them and should be feared. Osborn is mentioned multiple times as a very dangerous and very powerful man and not seldom even as a monster. When he is shown, (which happens in both the Liberl- and the Crossbell-Arc) he fulfills the expectations and shows very well that whatever or whoever stands in his way, will be crushed ultimately. There is no such character in either the Liberl- or Crossbell-Arc that get mentioned or shown so extremely in any of the other games. The Crossbell-Saga, in my eyes, was mostly to show you the people of the City that Osborn uses as a play-toy in his plans so that you feel bad for them, when you reach the part in Cold Steel were Crossbell get annexed and then ruled by someone like Rufus of all people. Also introducing Rean to Lloyd and later having Juna in his class, who adores, fully trusts and supports the SSS makes his feeling of guilt for what Osborn forced him to do in Crossbell even worse. So looking it all that, it seems a little bit like the Crossbell-Saga was a stage that prepared the stage for Osborn and Rean as the major forces of the 4 games long Cold Steel – Saga.

Cold Steel is big and covers a huge span of time (although we had a big time-jump between CS2 and CS3 and also at least one to two months have passed between CS1 and CS2 as well as CS3 and CS4…) and finally deals with the country with the strongest military as well as with the man Osborn himself. With a game as big as this one, we of course get a huge amount of characters as well. Ever single one of them has somehow an important position in Erebonia one way or another. As Rean the main character alone is not just the adoptive-son of a man from the lower-nobility, but also (as it turned out later) the biological son of no other than chancellor Osborn himself (although they were hiding that fact) and became the Ashen Chevalier at the end of the first game. We also have people like Alisa, who is the heir of the Reinford-Company – which is by the way a name that also hear multiple times over the course of the other games, especially in connection with weapons. Jusis, the son of the Duke of one of the four great houses. Emma as being part of the Hexan-Clan and also the “sister” of Vita, who is the second Anguis of Ouroboros. And so on. Even Reans own Class 7 in CS3/CS4 is anything than boring. Although just a commoner, Juna is from Crossbell and was teached at the police academy from no other then our Ironblood Claire Riveld and is also a huge supporter of the SSS. Kurt is the youngest son of the Vanders and with that not just the son and nephew of two huge military-mans, but also the brother of our dearly beloved Mueller Vander, protector and best friend of Prince Olivert and thus of course also known in the royal family of Erebonia. Ash is one of only 3 survivors (technically only two survivors, now that Loewe is dead…) of the nightmare that was the Hamel-incident. And Musse… well… she is… much bigger then she looks like. Besides those main characters we also have guest characters like Princess Alfin the Erebonian-Princess herself. And oh look, Lechter is here too. Even Ouroboros steps up their game in Cold Steel. Adding more and more Enforcers to their Phantasmal Place Plan in the huge state that is called Erebonia. We get our Fool Campanella (the only one who actually shows up in person in all 3 Arcs), we have Phantom Thieve B (who was mentioned in all 3 games, but never showed up in person in Crossbell), the Steel Maiden and her Knights (who were first shown in Crossbell) as well as Vita and McBurn but also Shirley and Mariabell (who both joined Ouroboros around the Crossbell-Saga and were also very present in that arc) which already makes a huge damn amount of Villians or Semi-Villians (as Vita at some point as well as B are at least temporarily joining Team-Rean for a while…) for one Arc. And yet, we get another group of enemies (the Gnomes) added to the list, alongside a few Jeager-Corpses. And although we have plenty of active characters in the Cold Steel-Saga already, yet we also added Randy, Tio, Tita and Agathe as temporary party-members to the game in CS3. Still not enough? You are missing your best friends Estelle, Joshua, Renne, Lloyd, Elie and KeA from the previous installments? Fear not! We add them in Cold Steel 4 were we also have reacurring Guest-Characters like Sully and Grace from the Crossbell-Games. Shera will finally show up as well and did I mention the part in CS4 were Kloe, Cassius and even President Rocksmith joined the game for a short amount of time? And did I tell you that we don’t just travel through Erebonia in this games, but also go to Crossbell? Boy is that game huge! And probably the most important installment of the Series so far.

 Now… lets look at this a little closer…

 8.      The maps of Liberl, Crossbell and Erebonia had different sizes which size was best and which was worst?

 I would say the best size had Liberl. It was not too big but not too small either.

Erebonia (especially after also adding Crossbell to the places we visit do to it being part of Erebonia at that point) was far to huge. Crossing the whole of Erebonia by food like we did with Liberl and Crossbell? Absolut impossible! I mean we had 4 games and managed to visit different places almost in every of those 4 games. Erebonia is simply too huge! No wonder that they needed Trains for traveling.

Crossbell was a little bit too small. After playing Cold Steel before, it was sooo boring to run around the same places the whole time for most of those two games. When I started playing this game, I was lost immediately, because Crossbell as a City is huge. But in the first chapter of Ao I would have found my way from Downtown to St.Ursula Hospital blind.

 9.      As you mentioned yourself, Erebonia has the most characters, but Liberl did have a hand full of characters more then Crossbell. Which is the better amount in the end?

 Funny enough I had absolutely no problem to love almost all the Characters from Cold Steel, despite the fact that we were like 9 main characters from the start. But I would say that even for 4 games, we just have a few too many characters in Cold Steel, although the games handled them extremely well all the time. So I can not really criticizes it.

However, while I found it boring with as much as 4 main characters in the first Crossbell-Game and at least 6 in the last Crossbell-Game, but also just too less side-characters to love and enemies to hate, I think that the Liberl-Arc did best with its amount of characters both main- and side-characters. Although they overdid it a bit in Sky 3 with the amount of main characters (but lets not talk about what a huge fail that game was…) with adding characters like Annalace and Richard while we already had people like Kevin and Ries as constant party-Members.

 10.  Best Soundtrack of all the Trails games so far? (Including CS4)

 As I mentioned before it is definitely Trails of Cold Steel 3. The soundtrack is huge and amazing. I listened to it a lot while playing the Crossbell-Games.

 11.  Best Main Character?

 Rean. Rean. Rean… and did I mention that it is Rean? Yes, absolutely and with no doubt Rean. Followed by Estelle as a wonderfully badass female-main-character full of love, cheerfulness and energy. I do not want to put Lloyd in third place, but I do put him in the last place as he was not half as good or interesting or amazing or cool or amusing as Rean or Estelle.

 12.  Best Character of the whole Trails-Saga?

 Prince Olivert Reise Arnor (also known as Oliver Lenheim) without any doubt. Best character ever.

 13.  Best Side-Kick-Animal?

 I can not decide. I love Celine and I also loved Sieg and I also loved Zeit. They were all 3 very amazing and a great addition to their respective games. Tho I love Celines sassiness probably the most XD

 14.  Top 5 Shippings of all the Trails-Games?

 Huh… uh… okay… that one is hard because I have to decide between the best portrait ship, actual canon or harem-choice-ships and somehow they choices are too much and yet too small.

First place is Rean and Alisa because it’s just so damn perfect for being technically-speaking a Harem-Choice-ship. But what makes them perfect is the fact that their shipping is only technically-speaking a choice. Falcom doesn’t make it look like a choice at all XD Starting with the picture perfect meeting, Reans overprotective-instincts leading to this embarrassing closeness a little too early in their relationship, to them exchanging their fears and wishes under the starlit nightsky, to the heart to heart speech in Alisas home, followed by jealousy and apologizes of its finest after Reans “accidental date” with Claire, to the words that are said if you chose Alisa as your dance-partner, directly to the first heartbreaking reunion hug, the fact that they’ve meet once before as Children with Rean being the night in shining armor here who saved a lost Alisa, over to Rean absolutely not complaining about Alisa sitting in his lap in one of their bonding-events, to the fact that Alisa is the only Girl who gets a Kiss in her final bonding event in CS2, moving on with another long desired, very intimate reunion-hug and Rean admitting that he enjoyed the hug later on when confronted by his students, going to their cuddle-moment on the Rooftop of Reans school, over to Alisa being jealous of “fluffy mint” in their team-phone call going to once again being the only one receiving a kiss in her final bonding event in CS3 and even with them basically breaking up because of Alisas guilt do to her parents involvement in Reans situation after a desperate last hug from behind, going over to Rean not giving up on them and finally spending the night with each other before the final fight, with Alisa going down on her knees begging Rean not to leave her when he sacrifices himself and finally with them being close to each other a lot at Oliverts wedding. It could not be more perfect.

Second place just has to be Estelle and Joshua. From the fact that this ship is canon… like really canon, not actually “Falcom wants them to be canon” – Canon, it should be in the first place, but I just love Rean and Alisa so much more. Anyway… Joshua and Estelle were perfect from the beginning to the end. Be it the moment as a child when Joshua decided to stay with Estelle instead of leaving because he realized how much he loved her. Be it the fact that Estelle wasn’t even conscious of his feelings for her for a long time an did things like feeding each other. Over to the moment she finally became jealous of all the woman who really liked Joshua. Not even ending with this awful excuse of a first kiss and the fact that he carried her to his bed after he made her lose consciousness instead of letting her lay on the castle-rooftop until someone finds her. Even with Joshua pretending to be over Estelle, while closely watching her and making sure she was save in secret and then only needing a hug from her to be reminded that right next to her is were he belongs. Of course their amazing second-first-kiss and them almost dying in each other’s arm. With him loosing his temper when Estelle was almost hurt by Wald and with them both going from place to place to find Renne and finally make her part of their family. A wonderfully perfect lovestory.

Third place was taken by Agathe and Tita somehow between Agathe saving Tita in the first Sky game and rescuing her together with Rean and Co. in Cold Steel 4. I loved how he was owned by her in just such a short amount of time. It was hardly a chapter between him telling her she was not allowed to join them because she was a liability and him not being able to tell her joining them was a no-go because she started crying and he just can not stand that. I just love how Tita won Agathes heart by caring for him when he was sick and hurt, even tho she was still a child and he was already a grown man, one of the strongest bracers in Liberl no less. I just loved how she said she loved him when he almost overdid it in his fight with the dragon. I loved how happy and relieved she was when they finally found him in Sky 3 and that her teary hug was all that was needed for Agathe to not doubt for one second that he was just dreaming that weird place up – not to mention the teasing that followed after that. I loved the freaking Trails-Trademark-Headpat at the beginning of CS3, when Agathe told her how grown up and independent she became and still telling her that if something happens she should tell him and he will be there immediately. I loved how he somehow always seemed to be close to wherever the schools field-trips took her so that he could get immediately in action if something was wrong. I loved how EVERYONE is teasing Agathe about his relationship with Tita. I love how Tita became self-conscious but is still aware that revealing her true feelings for Agathe has yet to wait a little longer. I love how she can hug him as long as she wants, despite the teasing he has to live through afterwards. I love how he rushes to her side in the final fight in CS3 and swears to protect her no matter what. I love how he tells Rean that he can not allow Tita to go into mixed bathing with anyone else besides Class 7. (Which is funny, as Rean, by all means, is the most dangerous male character for any girl in this game… XD I mean it) after actually revealing that in the end, he doesn’t feel the same way for Tita as he did for his sister and even saying that she became very pretty. I also love that when he rescues her with Rean and his team, he realizes that he uses the promise he made to Titas family as an excuse and actually really, truly wants to protect her even tho he has yet to finish his “for me, you are…” sentence with the words “the most important person”, but we are getting there. I love how all the things they will do together on the day before the final fight are actually things couples would do. (Riding the farris Wheel together? Having a walk on the beach together? Romantic anyone?) I love how it seems the only reason they were part of CS3 was to show us how their relationship has progressed since that faithful day when Agathe took a bullet for Tita.

These are actually the only ships I really love. If I absolutely have to finish the top 5 then on fourth Place there would be Olivert and Shera… they do fit extremely well but I have no idea when them falling actually in love with each other really happened so it feels a bit weird at times. Fifth place would probably be Millium and Jusis. A ship that I didn’t see coming but I liked it and enjoyed the few small moments we had. If I had to add any ships from the Crossbell-Saga I would give Lloyd and Elie the next position, followed by Randy and Mirellei for some reason that I can not explain.

 15.  Who from Ouroboros do you like the most?

 Vita, obviously. I also kind of gotten used to Campanella at this point and would miss him if he wouldn’t show up in Calvard XD I would maybe somehow like Thieve B but I hate his riddles so I probably won’t XD

 16.  Which Arc should a new player start with?

 Personally I think starting with Cold Steel is not a bad idea, but starting with Sky is possible too, as they spoiler basically nothing for each other. I personally would say to play Cold Steel before Crossbell, because Crossbell spoils a huge part of the plot of CS2. Although I fear that after loving Reans  Team and Estelles Team before it is almost impossible to learn to love Lloyds Team… at least that was my experience.

17. Any ideas what might happen next?

No. But I do think that at the end of the Trails-Series we will see the Grahlsritter fighting and propably winning against Ouroboros. Why I think that? We had a Grahlsritter in all of the Trails-Arcs so far. The game got to great lengths even to make sure we do not forget our Kevin from Trails in the Sky. Wazy is our Dominion from the Crossbell-Saga and Gaius is the one from the Erebonia-Saga. We propably get one from Calvard too and honestly? I wouldn’t be surprised if even one is among the Ouroboros guys somehow. I mean, Trails games are Traitor-Games, if you get what I mean. So why not a Traitor among the bad guys too?