Game:

The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky (2004)

Category:

Vlog

Duration: 3:07:03

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Originally recorded: May 2, 2022
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Not really sure what was going on with my voice during this session. My throat didn't feel sore or anything, but I felt like my voice was cracking a lot more than usual this time around. Maybe I was mistaken -- I don't typically rewatch these videos after I finish recording them -- but if I do sound weird during this session, I can't really explain why. I was running low on cough drops though, but I just got a fresh shipment, so I'm ready for Thursday.

Finishing up those last remaining sidequests I had left over from the previous session didn't take too long. Honestly, there are times when I just prefer doing the sidequests in a game over the main story, simply due to all of the world-building present. The fact that we ended up meeting up with a client from earlier in the game is exactly the kind of thing I'm thinking of. And while getting everything in this single playthrough is an impossibility at this point, it's just fun to experience as much as I can in this run. Maybe I'll replay this again someday and go for all the achievements... but considering how many more games in the Trails series alone I have left ahead of me, that'll be years away. Well, unless Cold Steel just doesn't appeal to me. Falcom's already got me on the hook all the way through Crossbell at this point though. Not to mention The Legend of Nayuta: Boundless Trails -- though, honestly, considering the fact that I've heard it referred to as effectively being "a solo Ys SEVEN" and "Zwei 3", I was pretty much always going to be playing it.

One thing I've noticed about the later games in the Trails in the Sky trilogy is that despite having twice as many chapters as "FC", they don't appear to be significantly longer. That makes me surmise that while the first part's chapters are clearly tied to Estelle and Joshua's adventures within each specific portion of the Liberl Kingdom, perhaps the chapters in the other two games will be shorter to an extent. Admittedly, the chapters I've played through thus far have felt pretty substantial... but I have to wonder if contending with more, shorter chapters will make me feel as if I'm making more progress than this game is.

Admittedly, I'd long been spoiled about one of the things that happened during Estelle and Joshua's tenure at the Jenis Royal Academy by interactions with the Trails fandom. I won't spoil it in this write-up for obvious reasons, but I do wonder if it was simply a one-off... or if it'll become a recurring gag throughout the remainder of the trilogy. All I can really say is that at eight episodes in, I can confidently say that if I were titling each separate playthrough in Back the Log Off... I would've finally stumbled upon what I would've called this one at this point.

I do have to wonder if I'm getting close to the end of Chapter 2 at this point. What I played through at this point felt like a significant turning point... almost like I'm reaching the climax of my time in Ruan. I was kind of hoping to at least get through the "second" (let's face it, it's actually the third) chapter of Trails in the Sky before I have to switch back to two weekly livestreams and drop down to a single recording for BtLO each week. I guess I'm kind of neutral to going back to live content, but I am definitely going to miss being able to dedicate as much time to Trails as I have been lately. The fact that my next livestream is a game that's generally accepted to be awful only stands to further dampen my enthusiasm. Fortunately, my assortment of bonus games doesn't appear to have any stinkers among them.

...maybe if I can manage to finish a bonus game on a Sunday stream, I can just toss that week's Thursday to BtLO, just to keep things even. Seems like a fair compromise to me, but I'll have to see how my schedule progresses. Some of these bonus games may be too long to afford me any spare time. Besides, once I'm done with livestreams for the year, I'm planning on using my usual stream times on BtLO... particular during my end-of-year hiatus. I'm beginning to think I may not be able to finish the entire Sky trilogy by year's end at this rate -- especially since I'm planning on taking a slight break between each of them to prevent burnout -- but I do hope I'll be able to wrap them up before I start 2023's livestreams.

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