Happy New Year to all! I hope to be better about actually posting stuff here this year; no excuses, it was just the A N G S T getting to me as ever. But in the past month or so, I have been working my way through Cold Steel III in my quest to catch up to the Trails series. And so, to continue my overly extended joke that wasn’t funny in the first place, I shall continue to post impressions to preserve my place as Lawful Sky.
Ah yes. In the middle of a battle to reclaim a fortress. Better stop to shill Rean.
Tita! Agate!
Towa!
Also, I’m glad Rean and Patrick are friends. Nice to see the latter grow up to not be a jerk. I just really like seeing people change for the better. It’s nice. I like to believe every can be better than they are.
Randy!
‘Class VII will go through an orienteering exercise.’
Rean: “Hello darkness, my old friend.”
Ey! Mueller’s brother.
Juna on Kurt
Rean: “Deja vu! It’s like I’ve been in this place before.”
Hrm… I don’t know that I like Juna. It’s early, but she feels a bit… Machias.
‘[…] prince who lost his sword and his wings […]’
Mueller… Courageous… Say it ain’t so!
Ok. I mean, Cry for Me is my favorite for personal reasons and I love Way of Life, but CS III’s op is a banger. That got me hyped like you wouldn’t believe.
Gasp
Was that Rosine?
Gasp
Was that the trader girl from Crossbell?
Kurt is asking for a beatdown from Rean. Y’know, to show the power of the Eight Leaves.
‘I can’t help but feel like there’s a wall between [Randy and I].’
I think you mean B******, Rean.
Capua deliveries!
Also… Is Rean wearing glasses to Clark Kent it? I assumed it was to look mature; to show that time had passed, as it were. This is… So much dumber.
Munk!
It is Rosine! Hooray for the Gralsritter!
Ey! Millium’s here. And Lechter too, I guess.
So they’re just gonna tell us the Orion’s are homunculi just like that, huh? I mean, I guess it was pretty heavily implied in CS II, but still.
‘Hair dye that turns Millium’s hair a pretty yellow’.
Yeah. And her eyes blue. What the heck kind of hair dye is that?
Well. Glad to see Vita’s kept her unique brand of ‘I came here to laugh at you’. Like, restarting Abend Time basically just to troll the Intelligence Division? Excellent.
‘I wonder how [Randy] would react if he found out who Misty really is?’
I mean… I wouldn’t be surprised if he already knows.
Hrmm. I’m not sure how I feel about Ash. He feels a bit FC Agate-y, which I don’t hate, but it’ll depend on how he develops. Especially since it does seem like he has his moments of not being a jerk. But I’m not sold on him being so interested in fighting / killing Rean.
Mortal Mirage? Still good.
Ey! Celestin.
Huh. Instructor Mary’s family. Neat.
Well. Looks like the Courageous’ Chief Sexiness Officer is back [Footnote 1].
Oh, heck no. Shirley can get the heck out of here. Though I guess it tracks that she’s here for a cat quest again.
Ah! AH! Mysterious middle-aged guy is Fie’s dad. His intro was so similar to Baldur’s, it must be.
Glad Mueller told his brother about the events of 3rd.
Oh… Erynflower. Lavender. Vita’s perfume was lavender scented. Makes sense.
Oh. And the game pointed it out two seconds later. Derp.
Rean, who visibly confirmed everyone else was frozen five seconds ago: “You guys see that?”
Oh… Elliot’s here… Yay…
Huh. A train derailment. Is CS III just Azure 2: Electric Boogaloo? I really hope not.
Wow Rean. Remarkably unconcerned about hearing one of your former teachers’ mom tell you about her (the teacher, not the mom) attempts to woo another of your former teachers. You could at least comment internally. I’m committed to that relationship so you should be too.
A~nd the train derailment was a case of ‘falling rock’, supposedly. Make it stop. Make the Azure stop.
Duvalie!
Wait. No. Not Duvalie and Shirley. She’s the worst!
Please. I am begging you. Stop treating sexual assault like a joke. It’s incredibly uncomfortable to have a good gaming experience thrown off by thirty seconds of groping.
Orvid? No… It’s that guy? Firefly fungus guy?
Oh. ‘Accident prone engineer’. It’s Mint time.
Hmm… Woman. Knows the Vander style… I don’t know? Friedel?
Annabelle! Yes! Day made, I’m here for some fishing.
Oh wow… Laura just killed three archaisms on her own… Isn’t she so cool… Yawn.
‘Hamel… Now there’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time.’
Did we need that Juna shower scene, game? [Footnote 2]
Oh, I think I already hate CS III. That raid on the Field Exercise base was the most asinine thing I’ve seen from Trails. And it kinda made me annoyed with the old Class VII members? Like, I know it’s supposed to be a hype moment where you’re saved by the people you used to play as, but… It just feels so shill-y. Especially since the whole raid is just ‘lol, we’re gonna beat you up for a bit. No reason. Bye~!’ I’m actually rooting for Duvalie at this point. Not Ouroboros. Just Duvalie on an individual level.
Oh yeah. And also, imagine being Tita and just watching all this crap happen when your level’s realistically in the mid hundreds and you should have an absurd amount of experience fighting archaisms for your age.
Ah. Good. Glad to see New class VII is just not here anymore. It’s ok, I didn’t want to learn more about them anyway.
Oh good. Glad to see they addressed the sheer absurd power creep of Master Quartz by doubling down on them. Brilliant.
Wha~t? Ash is working with Lechter? I genuinely didn’t see that coming.
Agate! Uh… again this time I guess.
No Resonant Beat? Elliot will never recover.
Also, Fie should’ve had a stance system like Juna. Just puttin’ that out there.
OH BOY. I JUST LOVE WHEN AN ENEMY HAS MULTIHIT DEATHSTRIKES. THAT’S REALLY FUN AND CHALLENGING GAME DESIGN.
Gasp!
Laura asked if Rean’s holding back. She said the line. She said the line!
Discount Toal– I mean, Neithardt!
Sigh.
Please don’t get yourselves into trouble, new Class VII. Just sit tight so Ouroboros doesn’t beat the crap out of you needlessly. You’re nowhere near on that level yet.
Oh good. And now I’ve experienced my first crash of the Trails series. This is good.
And for the record, that set me back all the way to my complaints about Deathstrikes. In other words, from the return to Parm all the way back to before Dreknor Fortress. There’s a reason I was so disheartened I stopped playing for a solid two days.
Crash count number 2. Didn’t even make it to Parm this time. At least I’ve been saving more often.
Crash count number 3. Still in Saint-arkh. It’s a shame CSIII will be my least favorite Trails game for reasons entirely unrelated to its actual quality.
Crash count 4.
I’ve done it. I’ve broken free from Parm. I’m finally in new ground.
Also what a shock. The guy who was obviously Fie’s dad is Fie’s dad. And the other two Zephyr hooligans are there too.
How funny would it be if Class VII.2 got arrested for treason. That’s it. They went to Hamel without permission and are now in prison. Just VII.1 for the rest of the game.
Remember when you could see what’s happening in Laura’s S-craft?
Duvs and Shirley: Call out Rean, Laura, Agate, and Fie as worthy opponents.
Elliot: “And I showed up too!”
‘Little Miss War Crime’
Okay. I like Ash.
Huh. Rutger seems nice.
Welp. Glad fifty people know about Hamel now. How’s that state secret going?
Also, neither of my Wild Rage bros sound like I’m used to. It makes me sad.
Yeah. Hamel was good. Glad to see this game is off to the rip-roaring start of ‘the best things are the references to the other games’. But at least I’m looking forward to playing more again.
(PS: Still love playing as Agate.)
Alfin!
And Elise… I guess
Alisa!
Tio (not) Tot!
Emma!
And Celine, of course.
‘Conflict in Crossbell’? Ooh.
Josette!
Did… Did someone just call Olivier ‘mature’?
Also, over-under on the chapter 1 boss fight: I’m glad enemy S-crafts are actually reasonable again, but I hate that enemies can still just Enhance spam to keep healing themselves.
Randy! You didn’t build a wall between you and Rean. It was a b******. A b******.
Josette for real this time! And Leeves is her old home. How nice.
Ah yes. Aurelia duel reminding me of how poorly suited this combat system is to duels.
In other words: I hate that fight. And that I had to completely reorient my build in order to have any chance of winning because a Rean whose good in a party setting is not necessarily good in a solo setting.
Aurelia: “Show me the Eight Leaves style!”
Rean: “How about I show you ten Spark Arrows spammed through Divine Song and Wind Bell instead?”
Ugh. Campanella. And here I was actually kinda excited to return to Crossbell.
Dear lord. It feels like the game’s about to crash every other step in Crossbell. What the heck, guys? At least I’m still on 4. So far.
Footnote 1: ‘Did you put that there just so you could make that dumb call-back to CS II?’ — the Twisted Jerk
Footnote 1A: … No.
Footnote 2: ‘Telling you now, the only response you’d ever get to this is that want trumps need‘ — the Twisted Jerk
Footnote 2A: Did we want that Juna shower scene, game?
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