I love the free moving aspect of the turn-based battles. Going back from this to any of the older games makes you feel like you're stuck in a cage while it's your turn. Instead being able to move around to set everything up is incredibly cathartic

I started on Azure but went back and played Sky Trilogy and now I am caught up. I can say Daybreak is easily the best game in the Trails series BY FAR! It changes up the setting and makes the cast so much more diverse not just in personalities but in background, age, experience, lifestyle, culture and so much more. And the setting allows it to make it truly feel like a bunch of unique individuals are truly coming together without the setting forcing them to. As much as I enjoyed Erabonia and Crossbell the Penultimate games just felt like they were missing something. Cold Steel 2 and Zero are just by far the best in their respective arcs. Also this Arc is different in many ways and one is a huge tone shift. This is vastly more mature than the rest of the series. Pretty much every mature theme you can think of is in this game and for the better. They even incorporate the D:F Cult into it which is like easily the most fucked up thing to happen in the Trails Series. Also the villains are just as phenomenal as the main cast, mainly Melchior and Gerard. They are amazing because they are unapologetically evil. No backstory, no grand ambition of conquest. They just do evil psycho shit because, surprise, they are evil psychopaths. It is phenomenal and refreshing to not have some morally ambiguous villain or a broken here with a boohoo backstory or a villain with some idea of grandeur or conquest. This feels so much more real. They are the mafia and just like you expect from the real life mafia, they do diabolical shit without any remorse. They don’t apologize. They don’t feel bad. They aren’t doing for the greater good. THEY ARE THE MOB! Ofc they are evil and self indulgent. Speaking of getting real I love that the trails games are loosely following real life history. In Sky Trilogy they had just discovered air travel, in Crosspell they had great leaps in medical science, in Erebonia they hit the Industrial Revolution where things were developed, tested, processed and manufactured in a fast and efficient way. Or more specifically Cold Steel as the name suggests, focused on machinery and advancement in machine structures which was one of the bigger aspects of the Industrial Revolution. And now we are in Calvard where the world has made vast Technological Advancements and is on the very cusp of discovering NUCLEAR ENERGY! When that happened I was like “whoa……shit is quite literally getting real”. Also characters that die in Daybreak actually carry weight. Even the deaths of the villains feel like they matter in some way. There is meaning and weight in the deaths that happen. Also love that Van isn’t some Harem King like Rean or Lloyd. Romance in this game is handl very mature and tasteful. Speaking of the MC Van has got to be one of the most relatable MC in gaming. He is just a guy who enjoys the little things in life. He loves Sugar and he loves his baby Ingret(his car). He is just an average joe living his best life. He also has a lot of baggage and I love that he is willing to carry it by himself. When he said Aaron was just like him in the sense “he loves something or SOMEONE so much he has to let them go”. Basically speaking about Elaine and how he loved her so much he was willing to completely abandon her to protect her. Daybreak is such a great change of pace in every aspect. 🤌

Babe wake up Ian uploaded another trails review.

Finished the game yesterday. God I love this series so much easily top 3 RPG series of all time and Daybreak might actually be my favorite in the series now.

My PS4 copy comes in the mail on Tuesday. So excited. I've played the entire series so I'm all caught up. I'll start Daybreak once I platinum Trials of Mana.

3, 4, and Reverie are better games than 1 and 2 when experienced in isolation. The issue with Cold Steel is the haramization of romance and its impact on character development and intra-party relationships. What's bad ass about the first three arcs overall is the role of the non-playable meta-protagonist, that of course being Gilliath Osbourne. Sky FC is also one of the greatest games ever made. As for this one, I played the fan translation a while ago and it left me wanting the full localization. I'll revisit it as an appetizer to Kuro 2's release, as the game itself is exceptional.

Feel you on the arts and crafts, wasn’t until I made it to azure(played from sky) that I realized it lol

Daybreak is my first Trails game. Played the demo and bought the game yesterday. Enjoying it so far.

Problem with going back is that people can't handle downgrades. So they will stuck with old combat system and a lot of people will skip it. Some will simply watch youtube videos of past events but that is a slap in a face to the series which takes it time to develop every NPC and cohesive lore which is one of the best to this day. To me it's not a problem where people start it's the problem if they don't want to go back.

Daybreak is great! Been playing the series since Sky 1 dropped on PSP. Honestly I love the mix of action combat and turn based. Has made the game infinitely better to try to get through mobs. So cool how you can switch to turn based on the fly

While im still going through cold steel 3, just looking at the combat for this next game has me incredibly excited. Its fixing my one biggest issues I had with the combat of the first 3 arcs where you cant control movement without wasting a turn by letting you just rotate around an enemy before making your move. Also i hope im not misreading this menu 8:30 but DID THEY BRING BACK THE QUARTZ LINE ELEMENT TREE?! Thank GOD they did that if so, because that was my biggest criticism of Cold Steel so far!

I dont think there is a wrong place to start, but if your not a hard-core turn based anime fan, then i would start with this game, because its going to save a new palyer alot of time and money. I see it as if you dont like trails of daybreak, then you probably wont like any others.

i hope Vann sticks around as the protag for more then 3 to 4 games

Love trails series basically play every titles.. but iam still so reluctant to play reverie for some reason..

If the difficulty is up there, the game will be great for me.

Finally, a reasonable Trails fan that doesnt force players to start from Sky.

I’ve got the game and played all the previous entries and can not wait to play, but I’m still playing persona 3 reload🤣

I love the Trails series, but I literally could not finish Reverie. The Reverie Corridor has got to be the worst thing ever introduced beyond CSII. As a plot device, it sucks. Let's have all these chars meet, but not add to the story because their memories are temporary here. Oh yeah here are all these minigames like Pom Pom Party. Felt unnecessarily grindy and I just peaced out. Daybreak I has no minigames? Sign me up.

"Being a fan can sometimes be complicated" As a fan of Pokemon and Dragon Quest this has got me feeling some type of way. Also reminds me of the times I have whined about tesl. You play SMTV:Vengeance yet?

The patch is downloading right now and im frothing

Playing on very easy you never die

It's good new trails game. I hate action combat mode tho.

I like the game but not a fan of the cooking aspect of this game. The lead character Van, I don't like too much he is just annoying. The free moving in combat is great makes it easier. The new quartz system is annoying. Much prefer the old system. This game seems like they made it alot easier for people who dont play games alot.

so literally dude is saying he's playing only one jrpg in he's whole life best jrpg in YEARS ahaahhaahahahhahaahhahaa

The second game is a huge waste of time.

"What are your pronouns?"

my response to your title is you must not have played many RPG's. This game is literally, no BS, 95% dialogue and 5% combat. There is no exploration. It's just so difficult to go 45 minutes and realize you've been watching a scene that is just 4 people at a dinner table plus the 8 characters they introduced during that same scene who just happen to stumble into the restaurant and give you their backstory. I did like the combat but it certainly isn't worthy of an 85 hour game IF you don't skip any dialogue.