An Adventure Worth Waiting For: A Trails from Zero Review

By Manuel

Player(s): 1
Platform(s): PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, PC (Via Steam)

The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero (Which I'm going to refer to as simply Trails from Zero from here on out.) is an RPG in the somewhat confusing Trails series that is a subseries of the Legend of Heroes series, which itself started as a subseries of the Dragon Slayer series. This long running series quite the varied history when it comes to overseas releases and has seen several games be left behind in Japan. Trails from Zero was one of these titles and it's finally making its way to the US. Is it worth both the hype and the long wait though? Let's find out!

Trails from Zero originally was released on the PSP in 2010, with an updated PlayStation Vita re-release in 2012. It recently received a fan translation in 2020, and that served as the basis for this official release from NIS America. I mention that fan translation part as I feel it lends a lot to some of the quirkier dialogue, with some lines that really had me wondering if a purely "professional" translation would've gone to some places this game does. Translation aside, it was always a point of contention with fans of the Trails series that we never got the "Crossbell Arc" titles (of which this is the first of two) during their initial release as these games fall right in the middle of the current Trails continuity; following Trails of the Sky and preceding Trails of Cold Steel. NIS America has been doing great work with Nihon Falcom releases recently, and hopefully this is the first of several releases that will see the full mainline Trails series finally easily accessible for English-speaking fans.

Lloyd's drive comes from a deep place.

Elie is my favorite character btw.

Trails from Zero is a JRPG with a setting that mixes both modern technology and standard fantasy fare with the player taking on the role of Lloyd Banning, a rookie recruit of the Crossbell Police Department who has dreams of following in the footsteps of his older brother in becoming a Detective. Crossbell itself is an independent city-state that is sandwiched between two rival powers: The Erobonian Empire and The Calvard Republic. Political intrigue within Crossbell sways the state between one or the other, and this plays into the plot as well as the game goes on. Lloyd is joined by Elie McDowell, Randy Orlando, and Tio Plato to make up a new department/task force within the CPD: The "Special Support Section" or "SSS". This new department is meant repair the image of the CPB by directly helping the citizenry who don't carry a lot of trust for the CPD and who prefer the presence of "Bracers", a sort of private mercenary force whose goal it is to help civilians from threats but without any ties to the many political powers of the region. The SSS have their work cut out for them as the people of Crossbell, the CPD, the Bracer Guild, and just about everyone else don't hold the highest opinion of them and they constantly find themselves butting heads with the aforementioned Bracer Guild, not to mention also receiving unfavorable articles in the local newspaper: The Crossbell Times. The plot actually goes much deeper than just the drama of establishing the SSS, but the actual central plot takes a while to really come front and center.

The prologue actually has a lot to do with gangs.

Stuff like this can really have you thinking "What?"

Battle is a core part of any JRPG, and while it might initially seem that Trails from Zero keeps things basic, there's actually quite a few mechanics that shake things up. Battles take place on a large field where character/enemy placement, movement, and range matter. Each turn you can move, attack, use arts, or crafts, the latter two requiring points from EP & CP gages respectively. You can also use s-crafts which act as a sort of limit break attack and require a CP gage over 100. All these attacks can cause damage, status effects, and some are more effective against certain enemy types than others. Also, all attacks have range, and some have an area of affect, and these are determined by placement and the chosen action. This sounds pretty normal so far, but speed and attack order are just as important as everything else. Similar to Final Fantasy X each battle has a turn order that can be seen at any time in the upper left, and some attacks can speed up, delay, or even eliminate someone's turn. Delaying an enemy's turn is a skill that is all but required to get through many of the boss encounters as it's these that often require one to use every skill at their disposal to get through without half your party wiped out. Random battles aren't actually random as you can see monsters on the overworld map, with pre-emptive attacks possible if you engage in a battle from behind an enemy, or with them stunned. There's a lot more regarding mechanics within battle, as well as upgrades and equippable items that drastically alter all the things mentioned above, but those are probably best experienced through gameplay.

A Team Rush moment in battle.

This is why I hate taking the bus.

I mentioned Crossbell earlier, and the somewhat lengthy prologue chapter takes place only within its boundaries. The "problem" here is that it's quite the metropolis! Most non-combat sections in RPGs are small and serve only to house shops, inns, and some NPCs that help move the story along, and Trails from Zero definitely has areas like this, but Crossbell is the complete opposite. There are several screen-spanning "districts" that each have their own stores, restaurants, unique locations, and NPCs. It actually is a bit overwhelming at first, and this isn't helped by the many tutorials you have to go through at the start of the game. It's not too difficult to get past these though, and everything becomes intuitive after a while, but it did feel a bit daunting at first. Elsewhere the game throws things at you like fishing and cooking minigames and there's lots to delve into on the side if you're into that kind of thing. Also, the scope of the game does mean that it's really hard to see everything in any one playthrough as some character encounters/scenes have very small windows where you can trigger them. Most of these are simply side content though, and I guess that's what the New Game+ is for. On the topic of replayability, there are several moments where you are given choices regarding how some scenes and battles play out, and once again these rarely have story relevance, but are interesting in that they provide different moments between the characters that you can't see all of the first time around.

Look at those character designs!

This line made me lose it!

Graphics are amazing pure and simple. I played this mainly on the Nintendo Switch in handheld mode (the least optimal of settings) and it ran smoothly while still looking great. It looks even better on Steam and it doesn't look anything like the upscaled PSP game that it is. With that said you're not going to get the most cutting-edge 3D graphics here, but the environments are all rich and colorful, and the sprites are well-detailed and match the key art perfectly. If anything there's a timelessness to the game that is hard to describe unless you've seen it yourself. The only real negative I can think of on this front is that some of the animations of vehicles were distractingly stiff and perhaps the fishing and cooking minigames could've been a bit flashier. That's literally me LOOKING for faults though, so take those criticisms with a grain of salt.

Music in a Nihon Falcom game is usually top notch and Trails from Zero has some of the best music in the entire franchise. There can often be a generic-ness to some themes in an RPG but Sound Team JDK keeps every track lively or atmospheric and it never ceases to amaze me how energetic an overworld or dungeon theme can be. The battle themes really stand out and the only real complaint I have on this front is that the sound mix seems a little off and is hard to "fix" within the settings. Maybe it's just me really liking the music, but I wish it was louder in the mix. Elsewhere the game has voice acting throughout and I was actually surprised how much of it there was considering this game's origins. Some players might be put off to learn that the game only features the original Japanese language track with no English dub, but I didn't find its omission bothersome and it's understandable all things considered.

There's fishing if you're into that kinda thing.

Why is this car so big on the inside?

I saved going too deep into the story of Trails from Zero earlier since I wanted to cover more of it after going over the game's other minutiae, but let's talk about some things that will really get you into the game, and will probably drag you into the entire Trails series after this one. I went into this game thinking I would mostly dunk on the story since an RPG where you take on the role of four police officers, and in 2022 seemed like easy fodder for sprinkling "ACAB" or other such things throughout but I don't think I've ever been so surprised by a set of characters in any RPG before. They all seem somewhat stereotypical at first and you THINK you can put them into a specific category, but they are anything but ordinary and they each have deep backstories that play out over the course of the game. The supporting cast has just as many memorable characters and the writing all around is just superb. All the above can be said about the game's setting as well. Crossbell and the neighboring powers create a world that makes one want to dive into more of this universe and you can do that in other games in the series. Speaking of other games in the series, it was such a shock to see Estelle and Joshua from the Trails in the Sky games appear. I was not expecting that and that definitely brought on a wave of nostalgia as well as a sense of just how BIG this series is as they appear as something of rivals to your party this time around. There's just so much to take in and experience that it's no wonder that Nihon Falcom's president, Toshihiro Kondo, calls the Trails series his life's work.

IT'S ESTELLE BRIGHT!!!

I LOVE the Entertainment District.

It goes without saying that this game comes highly recommended and if anything mentioned above has seemed interesting to you then you should go pick up this game right now. It's the mid-point of the Trails series so far so be sure to keep an eye out for its sequel Trails to Azure next year, and maybe look into the Trails of Cold Steel games that followed these releases. Here's hoping that with the few games that we never got in the US being released now, years after the fact, that we'll get the rest of the series closer to their original Japanese releases and other gems in the series won't be lost to US gamers for over a decade. However you go about it, just be sure to grab this game.

For More Information On The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero:
https://thelegendofheroes.com/crossbell/

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Story: A+
Gameplay: A
Graphics: A
Sound: A+
Value: A+

OVERALL: A+

Pros:
+ One of the strongest overall entries in the "Trails" series and everyone should be excited that it's finally available officially in English.
+ The "Crossbell Arc" games are a great place to jump into the series if you haven't already.
+ Some of the best characters in the entire series, you'll fall in love with both the main and supporting cast very quickly.
+ The music, graphics, and overall design are perfect and do not feel like they belong to a ten year old game.
+ The translation is great and features some dialogue that keep things funny, interesting, and quirky at various points.

Cons:
- The city of Crossbell can be overwhelming at first and the game has a surprisingly difficult prologue.
- Some boss battles can be pretty difficult if you don't have a good understanding of the battle system.
- While not necessary to truly enjoy the game, there are some story elements and references that might be lost on those new to the series.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

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I didn't even mention that the chests all have funny dialogue after being opened! Oh yeah, ACAB!