Still good for the series, though it does fall somewhat into the 'worldbuilding' situation that plagues FC which means that the first 25 hours of my 42 hour playthrough was basically spent introducing the key players and the city-state of Crossbell. I don't dislike the worldbuilding that Trails is renowned for but I much prefer the followups to the first entries in each Trails Saga where the plot is generally driving the game from the 1st or 2nd chapter. I don't think that the twist at the end of the game is super well pulled off, even if I can't necessarily think of anything wrong with the revelations it spills out, I just think that the reveal at the end of FC was far more surprising and well done. Like I'm gonna play the next game but Zero's story just sort of ends and goes 'hmm what about this and this plot thread?' and you're like 'yeah i guess', while FC ended and enthralled me enough to immediately buy and start playing SC.
Combat is basically an improved version of 3rd, which up to this point had the best combat in the system. They re-did the entire quartz system to try and stop every character from spamming Black Gehanna, by heavily nerfing your "higher element quartz" which was good. EP Cut has had it's effect halved meaning so your 40-50% EP reduction has turned into a 15-20% by games end - sounds worse on paper but it also theoretically increases the number of quartz you have by 1, because you don't need to dedicate a slot to EP Cut. The "gem" quartz that you start acquiring in end-game aren't just better versions of the normal quartz anymore either. They're weird, game-changing effects that fundamentally change how you might approach some fights. It's great! By the end of the game I had a pretty eclectic mix of builds as a result. Good stuff.
Combat is basically an improved version of 3rd, which up to this point had the best combat in the system. They re-did the entire quartz system to try and stop every character from spamming Black Gehanna, by heavily nerfing your "higher element quartz" which was good. EP Cut has had it's effect halved meaning so your 40-50% EP reduction has turned into a 15-20% by games end - sounds worse on paper but it also theoretically increases the number of quartz you have by 1, because you don't need to dedicate a slot to EP Cut. The "gem" quartz that you start acquiring in end-game aren't just better versions of the normal quartz anymore either. They're weird, game-changing effects that fundamentally change how you might approach some fights. It's great! By the end of the game I had a pretty eclectic mix of builds as a result. Good stuff.