Game Commentary: Trails of Cold Steel 3

Finally! At around 100 hours, I have completed a 100% run of Trails of Cold Steel 3. I have been anticipating this title for about 3 years and I completely let loose when I could finally get my hands on it. But was it worth the wait? If you may forgive my lack of a larger vocabulary: HELL YES.

CS3 takes place 1.5 years after the end of CS2 and once again, you HAVE to play the first two games before diving into this one. It should go unsaid that if you want to get into the Trails series, you can start with any of the series but never halfway in. I would also like to add that you should at least watch a recap of each preceding series. It's a continuing story with recurring characters. You'd be lost and overwhelmed if you foolishly decide to trudge into this franchise without doing your due diligence.

In CS3, you continue the story of Rean Schwarzer but no longer as a child! Oh no, you get to play Instructor Rean as he gets appointed as the new instructor for Class VII. That's right. Fire Emblem: Three Houses isn't the only game where you get to school your kids.

As the instructor of this new Class VII, filled with new students on a new campus, you'd have to guide them through the year while slowly dealing with the repercussions left on Erebonia at the end of CS2. Teach them, investigate the issues that are slowly resurfacing regarding the Blood and Iron Chancellor and reunite with your old classmates to take down the threat that may doom the peace of the world.

But before we get into the story, I want to talk about the gameplay. It's been improved on so many levels that gosh darn, I love it. There's a completely new UI during combat akin to Persona 5 and, with the additions of the new order and break system, strategy during combat has been significantly ramped up. No longer can you spam Rean's 'Gale' without a care in the world because CP is actually a glorified resource in this game. This means you'd have to rely on a good blend between Arts and regular attacks alongside issuing various orders (that costs your precious BP) that can drastically change the ebb and flow of battle. Whether that favours you depends solely on how you execute your turns.

Would you rather use Juna's Sledgehammer order to break the enemy early on or save your BP for a united attack with all party members? Maybe you'd prefer to issue an order that allows you to reduce the delay between turns but might open you up to a devastating AOE. The choice is yours and it feels great. Especially so when you start taking on tougher bosses where you either win or lose depending on how many turns you're planning ahead. Early on, I had a tough time with some bosses because I wasn't effectively using my orders but by the end, I could indefinitely delay the boss solely because I knew how to take advantage of the order and break systems to its very core. As each party member provides different orders with different effects, understanding your party composition is also key to victory.

There are new Arts and skills to play with as well as a bumped up Orbment system that allows for even more customisation, the knight battles have been expanded upon albeit to a much less degree, character customisation now sports a wider variety of changes such as hair colour, field exploration is a lot more robust, Blade has been replaced with the better Vantage Masters, and FISHING IS BACK. I'm sorry but I love fishing in JRPGs. If a game has fishing, it gets praise!

I've also noticed that while the game still looks dated, it definitely received a graphical improvement over the second game. The overall design of the world looks a little richer, characters look fuller and animations have been improved somewhat. I mean, it's not a huge difference but a small improvement is always better than no improvement. Another upgrade though is the soundtrack because my oh my, are there so many catchy tunes to hum to. Whether's it's during a simple card game with the shopkeeper or during a mission to stop a bunch of assassins, the game did a good job with the music. I'm all for that title screen tune whenever I start up the game.

There are still other details that may yet surprise you and I'll let you discover that yourself but lets dive into the meat of things with the story. Is the story great? Holy hell, you don't know what you're missing until you actually pick up, not just the series, but the entire franchise.

If you've played the series before, then you will know exactly how the plot will flow; lots of exposition and world building until the very end when shit hits the fan. Full throttle all the way to a mind blowing ending. Incredible is probably a great way to put it as I sat there with my mouth hanging agape when the credits began rolling.

The journey you go through to learn about the new Class VII and how the old characters have grown up is pretty darn sweet. I admit, it helps that nostalgia plays into the picture, as timeskips tend to lend towards, but the overall journey the characters I've come to love have gone on to end up where they do is nothing short of spectacular. Being able to learn from being a member of Class VII to then having to teach the new Class VII adds a certain charm to the approach and certainly reinforces Rean's own character development as he takes his place in the world.

Rean's burden is too much for a single individual to handle and he's certainly bearing a lot more since the timeskip but to have some fresh new faces come into the picture and reciprocate his teachings demonstrates just how far he has come. It demonstrates how far each and every individual from the first two games have come. Their character development has finished, that much is clear but how they change the future moving forward solely depends on how they apply themselves to the world they find themselves in.

The old Class VII will do their best to fight for what they believe in but the new Class VII adds that fresh new light, that early buddings of a new era that may yet carry the torch if it ever fails. It's a sweet but scary fairy tale, one that ends in crimson and steel. It's a compelling story that you can't quite figure out yet drawn in nonetheless to see it through to the end. I'm just happy that Class VII's adventure does not yet end here and I can't wait for Trails of Cold Steel 4.