E3 2015: The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel Hands On

JRPG fans have been kind of starved for a good game lately, and XSeed is ready to offer up The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel to PS3 and Vita owners this Fall. I got a brief look at the game's prologue which left me with more questions than answers, but it definitely had the ability to scratch that JRPG itch I've been feeling over the past few months.

I want to get this out of the way because I think it is one of the coolest aspects of Trails of Cold Steel. This game features Cross-Save functionality, meaning you can take your PS3 game on the go with your PSVita, which may not be a first for the genre, but it is nice to see a company other than Square Enix making an effort like this for gamers. 

Okay, back to the game proper, the prologue featured a quick intro of Class VII of Thors Military Academy, a school that places prestige and class above skill, that is until Class VII, students of this class can ignore their social standing and let their skills do the talking. This puts them in a political nightmare that is consuming the Erebonian Empire and during the prologue finds them standing on the brink of an all out war.

The gameplay of Trails of Cold steel features some classic JRPG tropes, meaning you've got skills, team-up attacks, and flashy super moves that will be used to decimate your foes. The Combat Link System will allow you to bond with party members on the battlefield, allowing you to gain the advantage against your enemies by buffing your combat capabilities. Combat felt really speedy, and thanks to a turn meter you can properly plot out your attacks to preempt your enemies whenever possible.

Visually this looked like a Nihon Falcom game, which means that the character models look great, but the surroundings can look a little flat. Considering that this game is also going to be for the Vita I expect there to be a little bit of a visual sacrifice. You can see from the screenshots below that there is also some high quality 2D art in there that goes along with some of the flashier attacks, and you'll be able to see it all in motion later this fall on the PS3 and PSVita.