Hajimari hasn't even officially launched in Japan yet but they've already started teasing information for the next game and Gu4n, floofy and I have been losing our collective minds over the possible implications of it. xD
The interview reiterates that the next game will be entirely separate and not 'Hajimari 2', and will focus on a new location, organization and characters. Previous characters will still return, he added. Nothing really surprising there. Kondo also said there will be hints in Hajimari that will point us in the right direction.
But the huge news is that Hajimari is going to be the last game to use the traditional AT Battle system. While he didn't provide details, Kondo said that the next game will feature a command system with real-time action. What the three of us are hoping this means is that Falcom is bringing back something similar to the Gagharv Trilogy's system. Because that would be insanely awesome.
Whaaaaat? That's unexpected. How do the Gagharv games play, anyway?
What the three of us are hoping this means is that Falcom is bringing back something similar to the Gagharv Trilogy's system. Because that would be insanely awesome.
I agree with you, but a lot of people are worried they're gonna turn Trails into an action-based series. Myself included as I don't really like most of the action games I've played. I don't think it's a bad idea to make it more like Gagharv (I also think that could be cool), but I don't want them to just change the genre of the series when so many enjoy it. Especially when so many RPGs have moved away from turn-base. It feels like there are so few great turn-based RPGs left with most RPGs having turned to action combat. Falcom specialize in action RPGs and have so many other series for that, I hope LoH stays turn-based.
I'm definitely not gonna get upset before seeing how it's executed though, and I trust Falcom. So I'm trying to be hopeful and positive, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't a little worried.
How do the Gagharv games play, anyway?
Realtime, but with the ability to direct your characters not unlike how Trails works. Here's a video floofy did a long while back showing the basics of A Tear of Vermillion's gameplay including how magic and special attacks worked. It also featured a prototype of the S-Break system but it's not seen that early in the game. And here's a video showing off one of the unique things Cagesong of the Ocean had called Ensemble Magic, which floofy discovered by accident during her full playthrough of the trilogy. By casting two spells on the same target at the same time, the effects combine into a new and more powerful spell. A little earlier in the same video is a bunch of short clips of floofy playing the three games so you can get a sense for other elements as well.
Not seen in either of these is Spirit Magic, which is sort of like a very early version of what Final Fantasy has been doing for summons recently. Instead of being flashy attacks, the user actually summons an additional character onto the battlefield with their own set of abilities to fight for you. Both Spirit and Ensemble Magic are things I've been hoping Falcom introduces to Kiseki some day.
Man, I don't know how to feel about this. I really like the battle system we've had, so I'm a little scared of change. I guess it depends on how action-y they end up making it. Not that I have a problem with action rpgs, but it was sorta nice that Trails stuck to the turn based style of old.
I'm getting a bit of a chuckle out of people dramatically declaring they're done with the series and it's dead to them, because of this heresy. I'm willing to keep an open mind and see what they cook up, at least!
No idea what exactly the battle system could be like with that description, seems like it could go in many directions. As time went on with Cold Steel the battles became less important with how easy you could steam roll all encounters, so perhaps a shift in game play could help balance things out. I could also see them wanting to change battle systems since each series always changes up how orbments work so a new battle system is what they want to do in order to show off how it's an improvement. Especially if the new game is Calvard and used the Ramda we saw in CS III.
The good thing about being a few games behind at all times is that I can focus on what's next (in this case CS IV then Hajimari), and by the time I am looking towards the next arc the game will have either already been released or we will have a lot more details instead of small info for wild speculation. My main thing is I hope they keep their promise of not having the arcs being so many games.
I trust it will be fun but they sure make it SOUND like something I dont want. For the record I absolutely hate the battle systems for modern Final Fantasy games where the party mostly acts in their own and you kind of steer their direction so I definitely do NOT want that at ALL.
If it is more action oriented, we have the Ys series, which I love... But... thats what the Ys series is for lol. Plus I prefer single party member Ys gameplay over multiparty and trails absolutely needs a party, larger than 3 too obviously.
Frankly I think cold steel has thr framework to be one of the best battle systems out there with its mechanics. The main issue is that brave orders and Sbreaks tend to break things with their power, would be better to tweak numbers rather than turn things upside down IMO.
I didnt see garghav mechanics yet though so no comment on that.
Never once did I think 'real time system' meant Ys. Ys is Ys and Falcom's pretty clear to show us that it will be that way. In all of their action RPGs, all of them are so varied in so many different ways. Xanadu Next, Nayuta, and Brandish are all completely different games from the Ys series.
Regardless, I updated the video that Yotaka talked about earlier. The original video used youtube annotations to explain a bunch of things happening in it, so I remade the video in an editor to drop the explanations into the video itself.
