FALCOM - Trails in the Sky, Cold Steel, Ys Series (SPOILERS)

[Ayn]

Yeah.

Fortunately I got to the epilogue.

Gonna post some thoughts later.

[Ayn]

Ok so:

Spoiler: show

I think the scene with Rean and his sister was just.. they were out wandering and some bear or something attacked him.

As for the ending.. Hito, I'm with you on the Crow thing. Something about Crow's death got me more though: How he just took it like a champ ("karma's a bitch"), but mostly just. . like you said, everything he did was for NOTHING.

Then Rean finds out that Osbourne is his father? The same guy that made his friend's life crappy? That made everything he did in vain?

Kid's gonna have some serious daddy issues.

And Rufus turning out to be an Ironblood. Geez.

Still have to play through the epilogue. The final dungeon didn't bug me as much.

I do agree with you on the 'getting bailed out constantly is old': Made sense for the McBurn fight since the guy's flat out a monster. But the Zephyr Guys? Duvalie and Bleublanc? Eh.

I mean I guess.. in some ways, SC was guilty of that too. I mean, you didn't really 'win' against the Ouroboros Enforcers. Same crap: They just..got bored and walked away or whatever.

[Corrderio]

Spoiler: show

I didn't mind the bailouts too much other than with Zypher. At the end of the day most of your group were still kids unlike TiTS where you could argue Estelle was in the weaker end lore wise compared to mosr of the other group who were senior bracers/generals/etc.

But yeah, the Crow scene got to me. He was a true bro to Rean/Class VII to the end.

[Ayn]

Yeah:

Spoiler: show

Even then, the bailouts were more.. Duvalie's just felt annoying. I'd have rather Bleublanc had some stupid ace card up his sleeve than Duvalie going all hulk smash.

Zephyr I'm mixed on. I get that they're supposed to be tough but.. would've liked Xeno to have had some trap or something set up prior that he'd pulled. Yeah it's being nitpicky but eh.

Crow. It rhymes with bro.

[Hitoshura]

You fight enforcers twice in both SC and CS2. Actually in SC:

Spoiler: show

The first time you fight them is very much like CS in a manner where they weren't even like serious, but the 2nd time you fight them is a legit fight where they go all the way. I think only Baeublanc and Schera's sister were the only ones who got away with some gimmick. Walter and Renne both literally fought all they could and we defeated them fair and square, including an epic duel Zane went through with Walter. Just talking about it is getting me all nostalgic and I barely beat this game not too long ago! Yeah I guess it is being nitpicky but can you blame me? After all the powering up and gathering up we did of all the Class and as far as getting Valimar Zemurian Ore pieces to power him up, along with making at least Rean an ultimate weapon out of the same ore, you'd think man we are unstoppable at LV130+ at this point with AT Delay, Impede, Critical hits, and Earth Wall on everyone in the party. After all that, every fight we end up needing bailing out, we can't even handle them on our own, now I 100% understand with McBurn being basically an even more powerful Loewe, and Arseid needing to step in. But then after all that, we didn't even get to rescue Crow after it seemed things might be okay again. I should have learned from Loewe ugh. Basically being forced to be the Iron Blood Chancellor's lapdog now sucks balls too. Honestly bothers me that they didn't even bother showing WTF happened in that event when Rean and his sister were children. I honestly think it was Osborne's goon's trying to force Rean to come back or something but yeah could be a fuckin bear too. Despite being bothered on how things ended, the Crossbell interlude was fucking amazing. Rixia is omfg waifu material, and I think the only character I spent extra time climbing up ladders. Sucks though I was hoping they could all unite together not fight each other. So is the rest of Class VII like brainwashed or something? Nobody talked about what happened in full detail aside from George, Angelica and Towa when they talked about Crow. and well Rean is the hero now all of a sudden and goddamn I really hope Rean has something epic brewing up for CS3 otherwise.. I have no idea what the hell to expect from such a bad ending, but has an intriguing twist.

[Corrderio]

Okay finally home so I can actually type. Anyway my thoughts on the ending.

Spoiler: show

Okay yeah, the whole "you beat the Nobel Alliance bosses but they were holding back so you needed your ass saved" thing did get annoying 3 times in a row though I can see the point since you're first year military students VS a secret group. Tough I still wish they had a bit of an angel for the Jager fights other than them explaining their reasons for leaving Fie behind.

And yeah, the ending really felt weird. Losing Crow the bro was one thing, but the ending really didn't answer questions as much as it made more. Why did Osborne leave Rean? How the hell did he survive getting shot in the chest? What is Rean's power?

Anyway, I do hope that Falcom does release Cold Steel 3 for PS4 so it will see the light of day in the US. If they do release on PS3/Vita I fear by the time it does get released in Japan XSEED will stop publishing for those consoles by then.

[Ramzii]

I mean, they released SC way past the PSP lifecycle. They're all pretty big Falcom fans so I can't ever see that happening

[Corrderio]

Eh, maybe. All I know is I'm still begging for Azure/Zero to get a US release. Since a Chinese company made the original port (and Falcom later using that for their PC release) I'm not sure if there will be any hurdles involved with that being localized or not.

[Hitoshura]

I don't see how there could be any more hurdles to overcome, Zero/Ao on PC is no longer exclusive to China, JP got their very own ports VERY recently. So there MIGHT be a small chance for GOOD OL USA, if XSEED can somehow cry and reason sales figures with them (which I hope have been good in regards of CS2).

[Ramzii]

What PC port did they get? Zero has been backported to JP but Azure hasn't.

[Ayn]

Hmm.. regarding Rean:

Spoiler: show

Given the conversation with McBurn, we know it's something.. similar to his.

If I had to speculate big time, my guess is that Osbourne had something to do with it since he seems to be in direct opposition to Ouroboros. So with all that he's running around and doing, it wouldn't surprise me if he had some access to whatever experimental fuckery they did with McBurn and did a milder version on Rean? We know that, based on Weissman's dialogue to Estelle (when they were trying to tempt her to join Ouroboros), Renne, and what was done to Joshua, they've got some kind of super soldier serum or crap going on in addition to their enforcer training.

I don't think the incident was Osbourne's goons. I seem to remember it being pretty clear it wasn't anything human.

Plus, given that the Schwarzers seem to be in on knowing his background, and Osbourne's line to Rean before leaving him (also the tone). . while part of it could be part of his grand plan, if I had to guess, he had to leave Rean behind out of concern that the kid would be used as a bargaining chip against him. Considering all of the man's schemes and in general how shitty the Nobles could be, I wouldn't put it past them to try to use the guy's kid against him. Plus, we don't know who Rean's mom is. Is she dead? Is he the product of some dalliance with a Noble woman (points if it was Duke Cayenne's wife, ha!).

I'd forgotten about the Walter/Zane fight -- thanks for the reminder. Course, it probably is worth mentioning in SC you *did* have people like Mueller, Olivert, Schera, Joshua (a former Enforcer), Zane, and Kevin (who flat out told Weissman that, at worst, he would have 'struggled a little' when he was power tripping on the Aureole. Class VII had.. Sara.

But it sounds like we're all in agreement about the first two fights. Seriously, I would have liked Duvalie to just be taken down a peg and humiliated, or just have had Rean go full Spirit Awakening and been like 'lolno' to shut that down; even if the gameplay gimmick had been 'can't use Spirit Unification for the next two boss fights'

[Hitoshura]

Spoiler: show

I guess it could be one of thousands of abominations roaming and terrorizing all the plains and other areas in these games. xD

Honestly Rean's mother, I have no idea. It could even be someone from Ouroboros (GM herself?) considering Osborne was said to have ties with them in the past, and considering he has some sort of power to allow him to live like that, I 100% believe that. I think he basically stayed with Ouroboros until he got what he wanted, and then left. Now he is literally daring them to come after him. It's so fucking brilliant the way he shut down Vita's shit like that, she was fucking speechless and so was I. Crazy to say but this villain and this insane twist added to the story is probably the best part of these entire games, and it's the only thing leaving me thirsty for CS3. I just didn't like the way it ended with the final dungeon and Millium finally showing a tiny sliver of emotion considering she didn't even bat an eye when she found out her own "gramps" was dead.

Yeah it doesn't make any sense for Rean NOT to transform considering how when he rescued the princess, he basically humiliated every villain in the game. Nobody could even touch him, including those Jaegers. I was honestly hoping the actual real Arianhod would show up. They cockteased her in CS1 pretty hard by rescuing Class VII, but then don't follow through?

Just thinking about CS3 on PS4 and Valimar battles, along with what else they have planned since it's their first time making a game for the system. Hype is real now at least.

[Corrderio]

Spoiler: show

We better get to play as Olivert in SC3

[Hitoshura]

Seriously omfg yes. They better add Mueller for good measure.

[Corrderio]

Seriously omfg yes. They better add Mueller for good measure.

Victor would be badassed too

[Ramzii]

edit: nevermind

[Corrderio]

Looks like Alisa's CS3 design may have been revealed:

http://www.siliconera.com/2016/11/22...st-look-alisa/

[Ramzii]

that is exactly the picture i wanted to post but bg was being shit

[Corrderio]

I had a creeping feeling.

Though yeah, where's Laura?

[Hitoshura]

Yeah sucks to have to reupload them on BG bucket, but they do work if you do.

It looks like an early PS4 model but they still have those funny looking monkey looking heads/ears. She looks slightly older as well, I really don't want ANY time skip at this point unless it's absolutely reasonable and necessary.