One of the biggest hurdles of the Trails series was how to introduce its world to new players when almost every game is interconnected through multiple follow-up entries. After all, the original The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky subseries was only on PC and older handhelds like the PSP. Fortunately, developer Falcom remedied that with the excellent Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter remake last year – finally, an approachable way to start where the trail began with a slick 3D makeover and updated gameplay. Swiftly following up with a remake of Trails in the Sky 2nd Chapter, this RPG retains all of the best qualities of the original version, such as its story, side quests, and characters, while simultaneously giving it that visual and gameplay overhaul to fit modern standards.
Trails in the Sky 2nd Chapter picks up right where its predecessor ends with our bubbly and confident heroine, Estelle Bright. Now that her adoptive brother and best friend Joshua Bright suddenly recalled his true origins and has disappeared, Estelle is dead set on finding him and bringing him home. It also digs deeper and fleshes out the cultish revelations that were unearthed towards the end of 1st Chapter. As a result, it gives 2nd Chapter heavier stakes from onset, but also with the emotionally resonant edge that keeps you invested.
The characters are equally zany too, and they’re brimming with personality. Estelle’s, ahem, bright, demeanor contrasts nicely with Joshua’s now brooding mood. The two theater nerds in Olivier and the villainous Blueblanc face off in a duel of overindulgent poetry to see who can out-cringe each other. It’s all entertaining to watch and the experience is bolstered thanks to the addition of full voice acting (whereas the original Trails in the Sky games only had voice acting for the combat). In these Sky remakes, the script and story are brought to life even more so with those original voice actors of Estelle and Joshua reprising their roles. It feels like a full-circle moment, especially for fans who’ve stuck with Trails since the beginning.
2nd Chapter is virtually a faithful 1:1 recreation of the original in terms of story structure and side quests, so you’ll be running around Liberl Kingdom going through the same cities and locations as you did in 1st Chapter. While that might seem like a rehash, the order in which you visit them in this sequel is rearranged. Along with a completely different slate of side quests to tackle from the previous adventure, it makes this journey feel much less like a retread and more like revisiting an old home.
There aren’t any multiple divergent storylines that cross together with later entries like Trails Beyond the Horizon and Trails Into Reverie, which also came with a roguelite dungeon where all the characters could interact outside of the story. It works in 2nd Chapter’s favor as it isn’t unnecessarily bogged down with extra story content simply for the sake of having something new. It’s a streamlined adventure that’s easy to follow without superfluous bloat that some later Trails entries would suffer from.
That being said, the pacing in the last chapter before heading into the finale is a bit stunted since you're required to backtrack through previous locations one final time due to story reasons. The issue is that almost all of your fast travel points that you unlocked before disappear, and you’ll have to activate them again, which makes this particular bump in the road a slog.
Leaning into a stylized anime-inspired art direction with these remakes brings bolder colors and a new vision for familiar worlds, however. The transition between combat phases are smoother, and the use of more camera angles and sharp cuts give attacks and crafts more cinematic flair. You can see close ups of every character’s fierce facial expressions as they shout out and execute their attacks in ways that you never could with the top-down sprites of the original. The new character models and animations give the story some extra life, whether it’s the party enjoying themselves while exploring the world or fighting for their lives against an all-powerful foe.
The character animations look a lot less awkward in both gameplay and cutscenes, and in critical junctures, they do a lot to add weight for its more serious, pivotal moments. Along with that, the political machinations and turmoil that dictate its world, and the origins of what you see further in the series, feel more fully realized. And the story here in Sky 2nd Chapter strikes a wonderful momentum for concluding Estelle's and Joshua’s character arcs cleanly and concisely without prolonging them – it’s something that other protagonists suffered a bit from in later Trails sagas.
سەرچاوەی فەرمی بە زمانی ئینگلیزی: https://www.ign.com/articles/trails-in-the-sky-2nd-chapter-review
