The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky

The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky: First Chapter might have an ostentatiously long name, but is at its core a solid, no-frills throwback to an era when JRPGs ruled the Earth. Originally released in 2004 for the Japanese home computer market, the sixth The Legend of Heroes game follows its forebears closely in an effort to appeal to an extant fanbase, similarly to how each subsequent Dragon Quest takes careful consideration to adhere to its roots to maintain its venerable charm. A spin-off of Falcom's more experimental Dragon Slayer franchise, games in the The Legend of Heroes series are as traditional as JRPGs come: there's turn-based combat, multiple party members, lots of room for customizing each character and fairly standard fantasy trappings throughout. Though Trails in the Sky has a few modern conveniences and some unique ideas, its developers have made the conscious decision to dial back fancy graphics and outlandish gimmicks to present some very straightforward and fundamental-focused genre fare.

We follow Estelle and Joshua Bright, step-siblings who are working to join the Bracer's Guild of their home nation of Liberl. Bracers are jack-of-all-trades: agents, mercenaries, adventurers, exterminators, community helpers and detectives. As Bracers-in-training, their goal is to become fully fledged Bracers by visiting every region of Liberl and receiving a recommendation from the local guildmaster, thus creating a contrivance to explore the entire world of Liberl in episodic chapters that focus on a particular area, each with their own little self-contained plot, supporting characters, array of dungeons and clues towards some overarching diabolical conspiracy that's affecting the nation as a whole. It's an effective storytelling strategy, because it helps break out a longer game into manageable chunks, and also gives the featured characters of that chapter chance to shine. Estelle and Joshua themselves are the only constants; the first is a proactive if scatter-brained heroine with strong intuition and martial art skills, due in part to being the scion of a legendary Bracer (who has always struck her as a lackadaisical buffoon), and the second is a mysterious foundling that the Brights took in five years prior to the game's events with an clearly dark past that nonetheless becomes Estelle's calm, thoughtful rock. The pair complement each other well, gender-reversing the usual dynamic of the brash hero and considerate heroine, and when the inevitable love story kicks in the game finds a lot of mileage out of the "will they, won't they" relationship bubbling underneath the surface of their interactions.

If I had to nail down the game's greatest strength, it is its extensive and exceptional script and the English localization of same. The game has an immense amount of text, a sticking point that has been causing issues with localizing the other two games in this series for a western audience, and its due to the amount of attention to detail that the game affords its world and characters. NPCs are everywhere, and will change their dialogue after every major and minor story moment. In addition, the many optional Bracer sidequests regularly create conditional scenarios where, in order to continue the story, you might have to meet with a person whom you had already previously helped in a sidequest: in these cases, the character recognizes you and thanks you again for helping them out. If you didn't help them out previously, the dialogue deviates. Cutscenes have a lot of sterling writing as characters regularly elaborate on courses of action and there's a lot of comedic moments in the game, most of which mined from a few specific characters in particular, like the foppish Olivier Lenheim: a grandiloquent nobleman bard, proficient gunner and profligate epicurean who the party bumps into and can't ever seem to shake from then on. There's also small touches, like how every chest in the game -- once emptied of its contents -- delivers a sarcastic and/or passive-aggressive message should you decide to check it again. The whole game is a treat for those that like to read and who want to explore a world that feels more authentic and believable due to the vast amount of attention that's been lavished onto its creation.

When I talk about the game's old-fashioned approach to turn-based RPGs, it's not entirely to suggest that the game is stuck in the past or is beholden to the standards and practices of its forebears. Rather, the game has a significant amount of interesting features, many of which were introduced for this particular entry in the Legends of Heroes franchise. Because interesting mechanics in RPGs have always been a fascination of mine, I'm going to indulge you all with a bulletpoint list of what makes Trails in the Sky stand out:

• The Quartz/Sepith system: Quartz are created by spending sepith -- gems earned from fighting enemies -- at Orbment facilities available in most larger settlements. Quartz can be slotted into a character's "orbment" and contain various buffs and spells -- sort of like the materia of Final Fantasy VII. The spells you get, however, depend on the strength of the quartz and the elemental totals they provide. If the right total of elements has been met, stronger spells become available. This can often involve juggling around quartz on a character's orbment screen to ensure that the numbers sufficiently add up to yield the strongest elemental and healing spells. For instance, while many healing spells become available by having a few water elemental quartz, the stronger ones like group heals and revives require a few other elements in addition, requiring some careful consideration towards quartz placement. The best part is that this service doesn't cost a penny, and surplus sepith can even be sold for a small boost in funds whenever necessary.
• Bracer Quests: The tasks provided by each Bracer Guild, observed on bulletin boards inside each one, make up the vast majority of the main story missions and side-quests in the game. Many involve standard RPG objectives like killing specific optional boss monsters, or going into a dungeon to accomplish one goal or another. There are also missions that feature some detective work in tracking clues to locate a culprit, and others that require you navigate dialogue trees successfully. Many have bonus objectives, which earn the player additional "bracer points": a currency used for promotion within the guild. Going up bracer levels earns you special and very powerful quartz, and completing missions in general is the best source of money in the game. Best of all, the bracer point total is one of the few things that carries over from game to game, unlocking various additional quartz upon starting the Second Chapter.
• Turn-order malleability: Like Child of Light, Final Fantasy Tactics or the Atelier Iris/Mana Khemia games, the turn order of the player characters and enemies can change depending on several factors. The first factor is how much effort the previous turn cost, so simply moving across the battlefield to re-position the character would be less strenuous than an attack and results in that character's next turn coming sooner. Casting spells requires postponing the turn for an amount dependent on the power of the spell to allow it to charge up, and spells can be interrupted during this period. Several attacks also have a "turn delay" affect, forcing the target to wait longer for their next turn, as well as the usual status effects like slow, haste or stun causing subsequent turns to be deferred or expedited. The degree of tactical mastery that this system provides can lead to a lot of interesting battles, even against regular monster encounters.
• Turn Bonuses: In addition to the above, there are random turn bonuses that are provided to whoever the bonus happens to land on. However, with the aforementioned turn malleability, it's possible to steal a bonus intended for an enemy unit by changing the turn order so an allied character receives it instead. Preventing enemies from getting these bonuses, which occasionally include heals and strength boosts, can often be vital.
• CP, Crafts and S-Crafts: The characters have a gauge that charges up each time they hurt (or are hurt by) an enemy, which maxes out at 200 CP, or Craft Points. At 100 and above this gauge can be activated at any time in the battle -- including before an enemy's turn in order to interrupt it -- to unleash a powerful attack called an S-Craft. A small fraction (usually 20 or 30 CP) can be burned off on the character's turn to perform a Craft instead: a stronger and/or tactically superior move than a basic attack -- though not as powerful as an S-Craft -- which can range from party buffs to area-of-effect attacks. The player is free to consider whether to let the gauge fill up for a powerful one-off special or strategically deplete their reserve of CP to perform stronger moves each turn.
• Bigger emphasis on cooking and food as curatives: Stronger healing items can be hard and/or expensive to come by, especially early on. There are many recipes in the game that allow the player to cook food at any time in the field, producing meals that can cure a large amount of health, remove status effects and provide temporary stat bonuses. They come in "sit-down" varieties -- which are eaten then and there outside of battle and operate like a free Inn stay -- and weaker "to-go" varieties which can be eaten whenever the player wishes, including in battle. Tasting local dishes in new regions unlocks more recipes as the game continues, and the ingredients to make them are plentiful as drops and common store items.

The most telling aspect of the game's overarching story is that this is simply the first chapter of three, and the game sometimes emphasizes this aspect (unwittingly or deliberately) by producing a lot of situations where it's clear that some element of the plot will be further elaborated upon in future chapters. These include dungeons that feel truncated, or unavailable, including the game's four largely optional tower dungeons which will clearly have more significance in future games as their ancient secrets are brought to the forefront. Several characters are hinted to have larger backstories and secrets that they're hiding, Joshua most of all, and there's naturally a big cliffhanger for the sequel once the game's core story has concluded. Sometimes there's a sense of the game spinning its wheels, simply introducing many of its elements without delving too deeply into them to leave somewhere for the sequels to go. Make no mistake; Trails in the Sky has a satisfying self-contained story and a lot of depth to its characterization and world-building, but it's also a game that was built intentionally to be the first part of a trilogy, and there's a lot of loose threads as a result. Because there are financial concerns about the third game ever seeing a localization even with Carpe Fulgur (the excellent localization team behind the Steam releases of Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale and Chantelise) helping XSEED out, it might be worth keeping in mind should you be considering picking this game up.

Trails in the Sky is an easy recommend. If its humble presentation and more generic traits are not a concern for you, the discerning RPG fanatic who cut their teeth on SNES and PS1 classics like Chrono Trigger, Grandia, Final Fantasy 4-9 and others, then Trails is one of the most impressive games to come out of the JRPG genre in quite some time. Many modern JRPGs are focused on the spectacle, rather than the core, and Trails in the Sky bucks that trend by sticking to what truly matters in games like these: fascinating and engrossing game mechanics, a deep and intriguing story and world and that optimistic sense of adventure and fun that makes this genre so compelling. (Though it's available on UMD for PSP, I'd perhaps recommend either buying it on the PSN store for PSP/Vita or waiting to see if that Steam version ever transpires.)