[00:08] This time bringing you a look at Trails in the Sky Second Chapter, which is not honest with you, though perhaps I should have because I'm bringing you this video via a publicly available demo that was released uh yesterday from the time this
[00:22] is going live. And after having a surprisingly good time with the first game, I'm very ready to jump into the second one. Now, just like the first game, which also got a demo, this demo progress will carry forward. And given
[00:35] the next few weeks, getting a jump on this in a very bite-sized manner that will then carry forward progress was very appealing to me on top of just wanting to play the game itself. So, this demo is available over on Steam and
[00:48] is naturally, by the second chapter moniker, a sequel, of course, to the first chapter. If you didn't happen to catch my review for the original game, I was very curious about it because it is a remake of the original games which
[01:01] people were asking me about it, but it's a very uh longunning series that I had never played before. The Trail series has I think it's like 13 games, something like that. And they're all pretty meaty JRPGs that have an
[01:14] incredibly uh well put together continuity. like all of them kind of directly build off of each other even if there are narrative arcs in between. And as a result, it is admittedly a little hard to jump into the later entries
[01:27] especially prevalent here because with this demo progress carrying over, you can actually import your saves from the original game, which will then potentially give you bonuses and stuff depending on how you did. as there were
[01:40] original game you didn't have to do, but it looks like they reward you for that being able to carry the forward that 100% save. But let's jump into the rest of it. So, I was very happy with the way they carried forward the story just sort
[01:55] of immediately. Now, uh minor spoilers, I guess, but at this point, the story here is kind of wellnown. for the original game. However, it ends on uh something of a cliffhanger with your friend Joshua, you being Estelle in this
[02:08] friend Joshua, you being Estelle in this case, departing on his own after you all save the day, because it turns out he's been sort of hypnotically conditioned to obey the orders of a secretive organization. And he doesn't want to put
[02:20] going to try to take care of that himself. Estelle and Joshua grew very were already pretty close before that, but I mean, a little more romantically, I guess you could say. And so, Estelle does not take him leaving very well. And
[02:34] I guess I would have expected them, with Estelle's personality being, I guess, just immediately jump up and go running after him. But that's not what they do. They actually take a little bit of time to, I think, set up the story in a way
[02:47] that is a little more pleasing than that. even if that uh actually kind of showcases Estelle as a person if anything but what actually happens is she initially refuses to believe that he left and chooses to go back to her home
[02:59] because she's convinced that he would have went there and after you know going to grips with the fact that he actually left Estelle sits down with her father Cassas who initially didn't want to go looking for Joshua after everything that
[03:14] happened and the fact that Joshua is um very lethal let's say so After a lot of insistence, basically Casius and Sherah, one of the companions from the first game, decide that they will go hunting down information about where he was
[03:27] because he's a very difficult person to track down thanks to his skill set. And Estelle continue uh training, getting even stronger. And so, you make the decision to pack up to a bracer training facility. Bracers are not all that
[03:41] different from a mercenaries guild that take care of local problems and just sort of help out the general realms that they find themselves operating in. Estelle and Joshua are in fact bracers. And so you do exactly that. You go off
[03:55] to this training facility and that kicks off the story. Once the training montage is done, it carries forward from there. And I just like the way that they set another point. Another thing I'm always super super curious about when it comes
[04:08] super super curious about when it comes to RPG sequels like this is how does an individual game deal with the fact that in the prior game you were probably a powerhouse when the game ended. I've already told you I brought forth a 100%
[04:20] looks like in the second chapter here, you start at level 25. This is important because it actually gives you access to some uh passive abilities called support abilities and it actually brings forward some of the uh mechanics you had to
[04:33] things you would have gotten access to much later are just available straight away here like the chained brave attacks. Now the other big part of progression though is your orbments or these uh sort of mechanical devices that
[04:47] you slot magical quartz into sort of materia style that then determines the abilities available to that character. You would have likely maxed those out in handle that here is by giving your character an upgrade with the excuse
[05:01] that your previous quartz is incompatible with these new devices, but the new devices are superior, which does actually seem to be the case. But in all of your quartz library. So, you don't get access to that from the first
[05:14] game. However, with this new one, we get the ability to upgrade our slots rather original game, you would unlock slots you upgrade the slots, allowing you to equip better courts on top of there
[05:27] being more and varied abilities available in this one as well. And I think overall that is a surprisingly elegant way to handle the progression from one RPG to the next. I'm enjoying that already in the early game quite a
[05:40] bit. Now gameplaywise, outside of subtle tweaks, um I will say it's mostly a pretty familiar experience. Combat is a mix of I guess you could call it action combat. then you can switch into ideally when you've stunned an enemy into the
[05:55] more uh free form turnbased mode. Now, on the action side of things, you can their attacks, and then this builds a gauge that you can use to unleash more powerful abilities that then can potentially stun the enemy, which if you
[06:09] switch to turnbased combat in that moment, you then come in at an advantage with a big uh brave attack, I believe it's called, which allows you to potentially either chain it or follow up with your party members, dealing even
[06:22] more damage on top of the enemy being stunned and losing their first turn. So, a very strong way to start combat, though obviously boss fights rarely work to start it a little more cold than that. Turn-based is a little more uh I
[06:35] would say traditional in the sense that there is a turn order. Your characters can affect it in various ways with their base stats like speed, but also by using certain abilities to slow or delay enemies, which is important because
[06:47] every turn gets a sort of bonus based on the turn that they were going to take in combat. And by delaying them, you can steal those bonuses. So, there's always uh some things to keep in mind there. And while I wouldn't say it's a terribly
[06:59] complicated system or anything, I think it cuts through a lot of the bloat you could potentially see in other systems and just focuses on the important stuff while remaining engaging via things like the action side of things, but also
[07:11] keeping uh combat itself interesting enough by allowing you to grind out want a turn-based battle every single time and getting stronger that way and then saving the big battles for stuff that is obviously going to be a little
[07:24] more narratively important. Now, to add on to that a little bit farther, we do get a uh new companion in the sense that they're in our party this time, but a character from the original game, Anna, joins us for that training, and I'm
[07:36] more permanent party member. The way this worked in the first game is Estelle party members, and then you had others sort of fluctuate in and out of the party. based on the story. I'm not sure if this will be similar to that or if
[07:49] there will be more permanent companions we take with us along the way, but excited to see how that pans out. When it comes to exploring areas, it's mostly enemies, uh, gathering up all the loot you can find, using those materials to
[08:03] do things like upgrade your quartz, cook food, which gives you some pretty strong one-time bonuses in addition to just being useful items, and eventually doing things like side quests and whatnot to increase your bracer rank. But putting
[08:16] all of that together, uh, the first game is again just a game that surprised me with how much I enjoyed it. I was a little iffy on it uh first impressions was pretty well hooked. I committed to finishing the entire first trilogy,
[08:29] they were remaking those as well with the teaser and the end credits and everything. And so, I am genuinely pretty excited to jump in and play this. Now, unfortunately, this game is sandwiched in between a lot of new
[08:41] releases next month. It is officially releasing on, I believe, the 16th of September. And depending on my exact schedule, I may or may not get to play it right away when it releases. Um, I tend to focus on new things as opposed
[08:54] to stuff like remakes, etc. on top of some crazier scheduling stuff than normal right now. And so, for all of those reasons, I don't know exactly that I'll be able to get to this right away, but being able to jump into this again
[09:06] more bite-sized approach that will carry over was enjoyable. And on top of that, uh, this demo just has me again excited to jump into it, which is the point of a with people. But that's pretty much all I've got for you guys today. Certainly
[09:19] hope you enjoyed the video. If you did, by all means like, comment, subscribe, any of that, truly just thank you so much for watching. I really do appreciate it. May you wander in wisdom and have an amazing day.