Trails franchise (Trails In The Sky, Trails Of Cold Steel etc)

Crow was the Flame Emperor before it was cool.

The harem mechanic sucks, but I will eternally be grateful for it denying canonicity to Rean and Alisa.

Alisa is the worst Class VII girl, fight me.

Went to find out if it's true that Laura has a lack of material, sadly it's true even Fie and especially Towa has more then her.

Edited by The-Azure-Star-Of-Orion on Apr 21st 2024 at 10:16:06 AM

What's your problem with Alisa?

DAMN IT. Internet gonna internet!

Oh no, you REALLY want to start a discussion over anime game waifus?

There is no 'Harem mechanic' though, in the end you can only choose 1. Its just options... and because there are options it all ends up being half baked.

This is why Estelle's the best, she just sidesteps all this nonsense. Also she gets to be vulnerable in a way that Rean and lloyd don't, they can do more with her character in terms of plotting.

Alisa slapped Rean that one time, ergo she is a horrible monster.

Definitely not, y'know, a teenage girl who made a bad decision while she was embarrassed, quickly realized as much, and apologized to Rean

Yeah, I feel like a set love interest would also allow the plot to use it more.

Estelle and Joshua having feelings is plot relevant, it factors into a lot of story points.

There’s some glaring moments where I feel like certain girls should take an action but just doesn’t because the plot doesn’t account if they are chosen by the player.

Like, I feel that since Laura talks a lot about how she wants to be the sword by Rean’s side, she’d actually emotionally support him being forced to work for Osborne. Rean is clearly miserable and hates doing Osborne’s dirty work, and I feel it’s seriously out of character for her to not either stay with Rean and help him be an inside reformist trying to limit casualties, or drag him to come with her and his future father in law to go do training.

Yes, I’m still emotionally broken by Cold Steel 2.

Edited by RedHunter543 on Apr 21st 2024 at 10:10:25 PM

Slapping Rean over what was very obviously an accident is physical abuse, not self-defense. And she later admits she knew it was an accident at the time but slapped him anyway, so she doesn't get a pass.

Also the whole "glaring and growling when Rean interacts with other women" thing, such as when Rean visited Claire in Chapter 6 of Cold Steel I. It kind of comes off as possessive and falsely entitled and she still does it even after she's ostensibly matured.

I'm not going to hyperbolically claim she's some kind of monster or anything but I do find her off-putting at times.

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Apr 21st 2024 at 1:43:17 PM

Yeah, but given her life circumstances I can at least understand why she's a little unpleasant at times.

And she pretty much grows out of it from CS 3 onward anyways.

The writers think her tsundere routine is funnier than it is. Like, they have a perfectly solid moment in the train station where they berry the hatchet, but it still pops up a lot throughout the games. All the self-reflection doesn't really matter if she still does it, and hadn't really learned anything.

Still, I do wish they'd had like, 3 love interests to pick from, then just lock it down by the end of CS 2. I'd like everyone more than I do if they could've been written in a way where they got to do anything other than just passively be there for Rean.

We've been here before, with Anomalocaris saying that Alisa is an abuser for slapping Rean at a time when they barely knew each other and saying Alisa is controlling for being annoyed that Rean snuck out during a class trip to go to a bar with Claire. Alisa doesn't seem to have a problem with Rean actually getting together with another, and I'm honestly having trouble remember her growling at Rean.

Alisa is not very Tsundere tbh. Like there was the Icebreaker and the glare at Rean sleeping in the same room thing in Celdic but that is it. Considering her background as a sheltered kid who had a maid pretty much doing everything for her, her reaction to both is completely understandable. She actually adjusts to living without everything in a month... which is extremely fast. Celdic was a complete setup by Sara to get Rean and Alisa to be better friends anyway... just like Jusis and Machias, Laura and Fie.

Also she was mad at Rean in Ruer for pulling a Rean, risking himself as usual... that's a running plot with Rean and everybody gets mad at him for it, not just Alisa. Alisa is just the first one to be vocal about it. Complaining about Alisa when what Emma does later is sooooo much worse.

So, do you mean the part where Emma puts Rean's head in her lap while he's sleeping, or their CS 4 bonding events?

Machias is the one who criticizes Rean for recklessly rushing out to meet up with someone. Alisa spends the whole convo angrily glaring at Rean specifically for the fact that it was with a woman.

The intent of her role in the scene is very obviously "haha Alisa jealous tsundere".

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Apr 21st 2024 at 5:37:09 AM

No, the one where she attempts to commit suicide by curse.

if anything Machias was the jealous one there and speaking to Alisa and Sharon after it makes it clear what Alisa was mad about and the fact that Sharon gas lit Alisa after she flat out told Rean she wouldn’t tell anyone… cause it was funny.

Edited by Memers on Apr 21st 2024 at 3:37:14 AM

I've been replaying Persona 4 for the first time in years. I found that I'd let online discourse heavily color my perception of certain characters, and that while there where definitely moments where Yosuke and Chie could be thoughtless, rude, and callous, those weren't really indicative of their general personalities.

They are teenagers, that comes with the territory. If anything Cold Steel is pretty unrealistic in the fact that everyone actually gets along as well as they do. Aside from the big chapter rivalries like Machias and Rean’s issues should have gone on a lot longer, no one ever has any issues with Emma despite everything she’s done… Rean just yells at Celine for a bit, Crow in general…

Most of the real stupid things are with people outside Class Vi I, like Rean and Patrick, Alisa and Faris, Patrick and the fencing club and so on.

It’s something that New Class VII improves on a lot. Kurt’s beatdown of Ash in Hamel in CS 4 was freaken awesome and well… Vice President Musse , Juna being hard on Rean,and Altina being blunt with absolutely everyone to name a few.

Edit: Rean and Alisa actually have an arc… to the point where she basically straight up breaks up with him for a time in CS 4 to focus on her family fight.

Edited by Memers on Apr 21st 2024 at 4:28:10 AM

Machias was envious, Alisa was jealous.

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Apr 21st 2024 at 7:28:28 AM

As someone who does like Alisa but is also annoyed when the writing makes her stereotypically tsundere anime, I can let the slap slide personally because 1, it's a heat of the moment thing, 2, she DOES realize it's all a misunderstanding and they move on from it.

As for the "Is jealous that Rean met up with Claire and assumed he was being a perv", yeah that did annoy me because it's a Trails thing where the cast keep acting like the male protagonist, who is generally not a pervert, is a pervert, and she does come off as entitled, but it's just a one time thing and she never does it again. I get being annoyed by it, but to me, it was just the writers going "Oh hahaha, see? She does have feelings for Rean underneath her tsundere vibes."

Like I said, it really helps she doesn't get jealous ever again. Not like she's trying to seduce Rean and act passive aggressive towards Laura.

That's Elise's schtick.

I feel like that trope kinda stopped working without Joshua's presence. Like, yeah, he attracts girls, but he genuinely doesn't give a shit aside from Estelle. It's also more about Joshua's mystique attracting the girls, and less the other male leads being accused of being perverts.

It helps too Estelle gets to share in the confusion, and gets to shoot back, feels less one-sided than everyone ganging up on the protagonist for the sake of a joke.

Hey Kevin. I love how his carefree idiot persona isn't at all fooling Kloe's bodyguard.

Anyway, he's here to do some investigation on the ruins from the endgame of FC. And if this were any other RPG, I'd assume he's here on behalf of the Church to procure artifacts and the tech here so the Church could use it for nefarious reasons.

But this is Trails, so they just want it locked away. So Kevin deduces that based on Schwarz's description of what happened when Richard activated the Aureole using the Gospel, it opened up a path to a treasure left by Adios.

I just assumed when Richard did his thing it sent out a signal that was then broadcasted to all the towers around Liberl to activate the Liber Ark or whatever is going on.

Guess we'll see.

Kevin: Based on the trajectory of the signals and the towers pointing upwards, you could say that "puts on sunglasses" those trails are in the sky.

Estelle is realizing she's now mostly on her own and that the task she seeks to accomplish is going to be one hell of an uphill battle since now she's up against Ouroboros, trying to find Joshua, and her bracer duties.

Well, the stage is set, and the game is ready to start, so let us start our real journey towards greatness and bring Joshua home.

Maybe find a new sibling along the way.

So Cassius is now head of the army which means he can't help us out directly. But on the plus side, the government is fully on our side now. Hooray for nepotism and bailouts!

Also the monsters in Liberl have gotten stronger and more vicious, probably because of Ouroboros, so that justifies why we have challenges fighting them in level 10 areas.

Maybe look out for any bases or airships that have the Ouroboros symbol, check their discord server, might luck out and catch Campy monologuing to himself about how Ouroboros' plans are proceeding exactly as planned, and that's he's the Fool.

Might wanna watch out for Alba tho. He's the only member capable of being discreet.

SOMEONE CANCEL AGATE! HOW DARE HE SAY THAT MEN ARE STUBBORN OAFS!!! NO I WILL NOT CHANGE MY MIND ON THIS, I"MMA BENCH HIM FOREVER FOR SAYING THAT!

Okay, but seriously, this game really needs a hook right now, I think the burnout is coming back. Quick gimme an Oliver scene.