The Value of Newspapers & Books in the Trails Series

Ever wonder why there are so many books and newspapers in the Trails world? Here's why.
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The Legend of Heroes is a series of role-playing video games developed by Nihon Falcom Corporation. First starting as a part of the Dragon Slayer series in the late 1980s, the series evolved into its own decade-spanning, interconnected series spanning fourteen entries, encompassing multiple meta series within it as well. The most recent entry, The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel IV, released in Japan on September 27, 2018
The first entry of the series was released in 1989 as Dragon Slayer: The Legend of Heroes, and was part of Nihon Falcom's Dragon Slayer line of games. It was released for various computer platforms, as well as consoles such as the Mega Drive, Super Famicom, and the PC Engine. The PC Engine version would be the only version to be released in English, and the only Legend of Heroes title released in North America until 2005. Meanwhile, in Japan, the series continued with Dragon Slayer: The Legend of Heroes II, released in 1992 for a similar selection of platforms.
Subsequent games in the series dropped "Dragon Slayer" from the title. The Legend of Heroes III, The Legend of Heroes IV, and The Legend of Heroes V comprised the "Gagharv trilogy", a set of connected games taking place in the same world.
After the conclusion of the Gagharv trilogy, a new story began with a new trilogy, the Trails in the Sky subseries. The three titles in it, First Chapter, Second Chapter and The 3rd collectively made up the sixth entry in the series.
Falcom switched to a duology for the seventh entry, consisting of The Legend of Heroes VII: Zero no Kiseki in 2010, and The Legend of Heroes VII: Ao no Kiseki in 2011. After that, the company moved on to the Trails of Cold Steel subseries, releasing the first title in 2013, the second in 2014, the third in 2017, and fourth and final title in 2018.
#TheLegendOfHeroes #Trails #Kiseki

[@KillScottKill]

I should also add - though they're not technically books or newspapers - that if you're just getting into Trails in the Sky, two reads you should absolutely not miss are the Capel computer in Zeiss Central Factory and the plaques on the displays in the Grancel History Museum. Each have tons of good historical information.

[@BigKlingy]

Best thing about Kitty Talk For Dummies: You can use it to translate Antoine the cat's meows. And everything he says MAKES SENSE IN CONTEXT.

[@thejonbrownshow8470]

Really wish they had animal translation books in all the games that makes you basically become the daughter of Nigel thornberry(he's the only character name I remember from the show lol) and talk to friendly animals in town even in modern trails games

[@AlexKensington]

The Trails books are interesting to read. Carnelia was the first one for me to read fully. As someone with +5 playthroughs on each game, I will say Scott is ABSOLUTELY correct that there are a ton of important details and lore held within the books. Trails has the best world-building for sure.

[@LadyVirgilia]

I really want to believe that Gambler Jack is gonna reflect something going on in Calvard, just like what Carnelia did for the Cold Steel games. And whether you love it or hate it in reality, the fact that the media plays such an integral part in every Trails arc really breathes life into the world. I love the newspaper, so I'm so glad you covered these, since it's interesting how journalism is treated in each different arc. As you stated, war propaganda by the "winners" in Cold Steel vs. more investigative journalism in Crossbell. Great video as always!

[@LeonGun8]

It's important to note that Crossbell was also pushing their own agenda as an "invaded territory" in their own CS2 newspaper. Neither side was completely unbiased. And that makes it all the better as they don't feel like dry pieces of information but actual articles written by a person with their own views and agenda.

[@LadyVirgilia]

@@LeonGun8 Absolutely, great point. Media will always be pushing an agenda in some way. I mean, even all the way back from the prologue of Zero, the media was biased against the SSS. I just think in comparison to the (later) Cold Steel arc, the media in Crossbell didn't have to directly answer to any party/faction. They remained much more independent compared to the Imperial Chronicle under the Alliance (albeit they were forced). In that sense, I believe the Trails series highlights the more investigative journalism of Crossbell (i e. spoilers for Ao when our journalist friend accompanies us to the final dungeon). Edit: I still haven't finished the last third of Cold Steel 2 though, so I'm not sure if Norton gets a more prominent role or not like Grace did.

[@TheKisekiNut]

The books are sadly overlooked so often, and they really add so much more to the world. I'm really happy that someone has pointed this out!

[@LeonGun8]

I think the most overlooked books are Carnelia and Red Moon, especially Red Moon. Sure, people collect them but read them is another matter.

[@NuclearCherries]

Top notch video. Carnelia has to be my personal favourite... The fact that it actually happened made me lose my mind when I found out in Sky the Third. And then discovering Toval was Toby? Legendary.

[@bobbit_the_hobbit]

My favorite as well. It was also cool learning who the lead female character in the book was too

[@murisbukvic2496]

A lot of lore content (not just books and newspapers, but computer logs, diaries etc) often get woefully ignored in games, even if by themselves can make separate games. I often try to collect any piece of info to read upon later because it adds so much to the world, and it proves that it doesn't all focus on the main character(s), and Trails is no exception. Sadly i couldn't collect all of the collectibles (or read them for that matter) because the base game was just so overwhelming. I made myself a promise that i would read all of them later, and now that i'm reminded, i might actually do that btw, subscribed

[@Darknecros7]

I love reading all the little things and books and such. I even like to pay attention to smaller stuff such as the styles of the orbment lights that are along the roads in the various regions.

[@miguelgonzalez6495]

Also, no way in hell is it possible to find the collections without a guide. Lol I hope Jack shows up in Calvard.

[@krimzonstriker7534]

Got to give Micht his royalties for Carnelia :p

[@rafaelrocha2458]

Having Ein in the thumbnail, i see what you did there.

[@TheNukeGeneral]

I really wish I had seen this when I started cold Steel 1. I would have went out of my way to find that book. I read all of the stuff in the library and while it blew my mind how much history they had built for their fake world, I almost forgot and moved on. But I kept finding chapters of a book by accident and I missed a few. Now I wish I had gotten them all. Guess I'm taking a trip to the wiki. I'm still so blown away by how much world building goes into this series to the point I'm addicted. And every night off I have that I spend hours playing cold steel 1 my gf then has to come home from work to me talking her ear off about everything that happened to the point that she now knows as much as I do. So I can't wait to read the books and tell her all about them.

[@ignacywinski192]

Carnelia is really great story, gives me Fullmetal Alchemist vibes. Also I can not wait to have Carnelia in a team someday. She is one of the characters I am so hiped to see in action that it almost feels like I'm watching shonen series in my early teens.

[@l.asriel9005]

Wow, a video about something I just did today! Reading the books on the wiki. DISCLAIMER : all the books aren't translated yet on the wiki. Well, at least Sunshine Agnès isn't yet I believe. Given that Ao no Kiseki cannot be accessed legally, it's understandable though, and I am not blaming anyone for it, on the contrary, I am rather thanking the people who made it possible for us to read all these books when we want on the website. Back to the books, my favorite is Red Moon Rose. Finally, thanks for doing all these Trails Videos, KillScottKill ! You're doing a huge service to the Trails fans and the people who might want to get into the series. It's thanks to your videos that I jumped into these series, and I really enjoy your content, so keep it up!!

[@ynal1001]

Carnelia was one hell of a great read and I only think of the ultimate weapons as a freebie tossed in because of your hard work trying to find the chapters trying to conclude the cliffhangers it left you with

[@TheSwordOfBathelion]

I'd love to see a breakdown of the books that have already had their characters or relevance to the games come to fruition cause some of them aren't particularly obvious. But anyway great video

[@roshrosh100]

One of my favorite is Carnelia story!! I was emotionally invested with the characters inside a book. I was more excited when it really happened.

[@Brahmsonite]

Don't count out Kitty Talk. It helps you complete a quest and I'm pretty sure they use the same cat language in the Y's games too.

[@snailthelostcow63]

Woah, suddenly reccommended a Rare Trails video I LOVE IT Estelle still best girl

[@blackyraypatrick9041]

the worldbuilding is so so so amazing. I really never wanted to read books but the more games of legend of heroes I play the more I like to know and the bigger becomes the pressure of reading those books. the last 2 minutes did sum it up perfectly

[@KaiSaeren]

Lovely video man, I went and read the books on my second playthrough's, because on my first I usually rush through to get the story as soon as possible :D And yea, they are very much worth it, they give you much appreciated context and provide depth outside of the immidiate story and npc conversations.

[@Targuil]

I can definitely vouch for Carnelia. 10/10 would read for the first time again.

[@TheXDanielify]

Red Moon Rose was awesome. Can't wait to see Roselia!

[@ailtonbueno4333]

Great video. Keep the amazing work.

[@MovieClouds]

Reading is cool all my homies love reading

[@BlueKing638]

Can someone tell me how Nihon can publish its games so fast? I mean Cold Steel 3 and 4 are only one year apart an Hajimari no Kiseki was published last year and the next game, Kuro no Kiseki is meant to be published this year. Other jrpg franchises need significant more time to develop their. I am just really curios how Nihon is so fast.

[@Tchud]

They have been at this particular series since 2004. If you play through Trails in the Sky, you will see how well developed every, and I mean, EVERY organization is, all the way into Erebonia itself. So a huge chunk of the story has already been written. Falcom obviously has several dev teams working on each game in segments, although I admit they dropped the ball on localizing the Crossbell arc, which has the best storytelling and characters in the series (to me) which is mentioned quite often in the Cold Steel arc. These will finally be released in 2023. This is why they are releasing their games so quickly, and will be releasing their Calvard Republic series in the next two years.

[@SizzlingOne]

The book sets are the single most important reason that made me backtrack to previously visited locations during every chapter. At least insofar as the game allowed. Also; you dared put *her* picture at the end of the video? Well played....

[@shibaarmy4385]

I've collected all the book notes in Trails of Cold Steel 1 and after watching this I think I'll go back to the game and read those books. Same for Trails of Cold Steel 2 once I get all the books on that

[@EddyGein]

I've quite literally booted up some of the old Trails games, loaded my endgame saves, and just spent time re-reading the books and newspapers in the games. I love the attention to detail, and the almost absurd level of worldbuilding in this franchise.

[@muhammadeggy2129]

Im surprise with this video, because how important every reading material in this game, and i just pass it. Damn, i need to read them in my next playthrough, thanks for the video.

[@Tnu1138]

Carnelia, and The Saint and the White Wolf both play a role in the Ring of Judgement manga as well.

[@ernestcolemantheking]

I really liked "If you say Goodbye"in Trails of Cold Steel 4 .

[@nikoladedic6623]

Kitty Talk For Dummies is cannonicly correct. If you use to translate Antoine's talk (cat in Zeiss Central Factory), you actually get different responses from him like for every other NPC. Edit: Oh, Bigklingy already posted this.

[@Ruko]

This is part of why i haven't fully dedicated myselft to go trough the games, i actually wanna find and read everything, but i'm getting there, i try to play Trails in the Sky at least a bit everyday now since i got Trails of Cold Steel and feels like a reminder that i have such a great game just waiting to catch up to it.

[@shil4720]

If you're okay with using a guide, I highly recommend using the gamefaqs guides written by Zoelius. They're spoiler free (some even hide boss names), and are almost necessary to find everything.

[@user-sb5fm1gk7l]

12:37 You say that, but Kiseki Wiki still has only two chapters of Agnes in a Sunny Place/Sunshine Agnes. I missed a few volumes in Azure, so didn't bother to read it. It doesn't appear in any way in Cold Steel. I was going to say that i'm still waiting for it to reappear, but i just found a YT video with the text of the book, so i'm gonna watch it. By the way, i didn't fully collect any of long book series in any of the games up to Cold Steel, where i actually had no trouble with it.

[@princeveggetta]

Its irony, that I found this story cause I'm playing ps4 version and was wondering what the books was for cause I only read cowboy Jack series for ps3

[@MrSasukeSusanoo]

Well I suppose I'll start reading the novel books in the game, I read the news and other relevant information but not the novel books, I was mainly focused in the main story and trying to find that damn secret missions literally talking to EVERYONE in the map thrice. Though I still got them for the sake of 100% completion

[@freddyvidz]

Anything related to these games is alright with me.

[@thejonbrownshow8470]

I think with trails of cold steel 3 and upwards, least they mark the hidden books on the mini map

[@borkozdravkovic4746]

I played FC and was pretty disappointed in the villain reveal. And then I read the newspapers and realized that foreshadowing was phenomenal. Estelle and Joshua are so insignificant in the grand scope of things that the villain didn't even bother with them until they became a genuine threat. No wonder we only see him once or twice before the endgame.

[@anhhuyhuynh3878]

yup is irony that we use games to escape mundane things like reading and now here we are play video game series that primarily reading.🤣(sorry if my english is bad)

[@MrSasukeSusanoo]

Yeah, when I had to actually study from the library to the exams in game I was struck by laziness all of a sudden. I did it nontheless, and it granted a little realistic feeling of you really being in an academy, a small but nice detail

[@drowningin]

Can you do a series where you read the collectable books from each game? Maybe have like 3-5 per video. I like to be read to

[@otgrey3927]

Huh....I didn't read the books or the newspapers in my playthrough of Cold Steel #1...time for a replay...

[@rindou97]

>tfw I gave up on getting books in FC because Carnelia chapter 3

[@jeffersonjjohnson]

How do these stack up to books in the Elder Scrolls series? I used to love finding lore and notes scattered about (see Resident Evil's early days) until Elder Scrolls.

[@justanotherrandomontheyout4791]

There on par with books in the Elder scrolls imo there's so much lore in each book and some of them have really cool fiction

[@themexdaniel]

Can you turn the books in the game into audiobooks? Wouldn't mind listening while driving in traffic

[@PuchimonExtreme]

I don't read the newspaper. But I read stuff like Liberl News. Thats how much I value the newspaper of a fictional world more than real life events!

[@whm_w8833]

if you don't read the newspaper you will feel out of the world. Like most of the characters I interact with are news reporter. If I met the author in-game for fictional books, I might read them too. But they are so long (for a slow reader and a guy who grinds like crazy).

[@arpanpatel9918]

Came to comment on that thumbnail.

[@barganon1321]

In my first playthrough of sky, when I read the first newspaper I thought it was so cool that you can get info about the world through it and you get recognized in the news when you continue to play the game. When I delved to the rest of the books, some of the fictional, some of the POV books, I thought they were very important and contain a great amount of details about the world and specific characters we met down the road (like in 3rd chapter and steel). Falcom us genius now please make a video about the music of this series!!!!

[@MasterLee2011]

I be honest, I'm not a fan of reading. Sometimes it can be boring and tedious to me. It's hard enough that I got to read and check every npc to make sure that I don't miss any items or side quests, so I be too burned out to read books in the game, and would rather move on to the story when I got everything else out of the way. I collected the books in Trails of Cold Steel 1, but never bother reading them. I tried reading them in the beginning of the game for lore and exam studying in the library but after that I got bored. I couldn't even get into Red Moon Rose because it didn't interest me. But if it makes you feel better I'm currently playing through Trails of Cold Steel 2 and have been reading some of gambler jack books, and I think I like it.

[@KillScottKill]

Listen, I wasn't going to say anything about it in the video because I tried to be objective... But Red Moon Rose is kinda mid. It's a less interesting version of Carnelia.

[@MasterLee2011]

@@KillScottKill Yeah, I guess that's the beauty of book genres, there maybe some you dislike, but there can also be some you might like. Just like with Gambler Jack, I like Jack's nonchalant personality especially the part when he went to the movies. 😆

[@thejonbrownshow8470]

Hope kitty talk for dummies get published in erobonia eventually even in trails of the creation(from what I heard the 10th game translate to), tho I just got all 3 sky games on steam sale, so least there's that lol

[@ashchisalleh1454]

Yesss towa!! Loli president. Worth the paper!!

[@hendrass9716]

I do actually likes to read, but there is too much to read and I just want to see how the story goes. Well ye there goes my excuse for not collecting rare books nor reading it.

[@anime-girlfriend]

Its kind of rude walking into someones home and start reading their books so i dont know how i will overcome this...

[@heavymetalmixer91]

I really love these games, yet I hate reading, I 'm a very lazzy person. Hey, I guess these games are so good I can make exceptions, right?

[@megabyte5726]

Optional sure but you wont get good grades in Cold steel 1 without reading the books

[@walktroughman1952]

No. (jk i love the daylights out of them)

[@EekChocolate]

Carnelia was great. Red Moon Rose was total bunk.

[@Captain_Chaz86]

Not willing to start a two decade long series that’s all connected. Will they ever release a collection at a cheaper price for all on one system? if not, fuck the developers and publishers. Spreading a niche title across multiple systems with little to zero promotion is a very bad move.

[@andrigames1818]

As a fan of the series.. I am currently playing cold steel 3 and I can't say I feel like all the material they added in those books interests me at all.. not a huge fan of reading anyway but I feel like if they truly want to give them importance they'd make it as if Rean was reading inside his head and let us hear it, making all this bore-fest tolerable, I get it.. it's more expensive but I think most people would be touched by their world by being exposed to more content they'd otherwise skip.

[@KingShresthaManffs]

like one piece haha