Where do I even begin with this game?

Over the past year, I''ve started playing the Trails series and I have some...unpopular opinions on the series, with Zero being my favorite so far and CS1 being my least favorite (my ranking is Zero > Azure > SC > 3rd > FC > CS1, but since this review is for CS2 I won't get too much into that). Despite CS1 being my overall least favorite game in the series, however, its ending did a great job setting up for CS2, and I decided to immediately jump into the game. I was super excited to play this game after what I had seen at the end of CS1, and while this game certainly delivered in some aspects, it absolutely failed in others.

Let's start with the gameplay. It's mostly the same as its predecessors (particularly CS1), with a few minor changes. The biggest of these changes is the addition of Overdrive, effectively a rebalanced version of Azure's Burst system that is only activated between two party members and only lasts for three turns, while in exchange you get two charges of it that can be used separately and it charges much faster than Burst did. I like this system as a rebalancing of Burst-the change to it only being between 2 party members can often be a blessing rather than a curse, and you'll use it in battle a lot more often than Burst which was often just saved for particularly major boss fights.

Unfortunately, it's also tied to a really stupid mechanic, which is that when every party member in the game first joins, they can only use Overdrive if they're linked to Rean. To change this, you have to find specific "Trial Chests" in the overworld and participate in a battle with 2 (sometimes 4) characters so those party members can also use Overdrive with one another. It gets annoying and repetitive and by the end of the game when you have 11 party members I just got tired of doing them all.

Overall, the combat is the mainly the same as CS1's with a few good and a few bad changes. It's still balanced extremely poorly and most bosses can be cleared easily with Laura and the Domination/Tauros quartz, but I still mostly had fun with the game.

I actually enjoyed Class VII more than I expected to in this game, Jusis and Fie are easily the highlights from this game but I liked their overall group dynamic as well. The main problem the main cast has as a whole, however, is that their dynamic is based on assumptions of character development in CS1 that just... didn't really exist in that game, so I can't exactly say that CS2 saved Class VII for me, and they're still easily the worst main party in the series so far. I vastly prefer Estelle and Joshua's groups as well as the SSS.

The villains were a mixed bag in my opinion. Crow is easily the best of them, I really enjoyed his character throughout both this game and CS1, but he absolutely suffers from a lack of screentime compared to what he got in CS1. Vita was okay, she also doesn't get a ton but I did enjoy her scenes in finale decently. As for the side villains, Duvalie is entertaining but doesn't get much in this game, Bleublanc is better than in SC but still not super interesting, Altina is okay but obviously a CS3/4 character put in CS2, and Xeno/Leonidas/McBurn were all kinda boring. Scarlet and Vulcan also felt really out of place in this game, which is kinda the point but their resolutions felt really rushed after barely appearing throughout CS2. In general, characters are definitely better than in CS1 but I felt like most of them were still not as fleshed out as they could have been.

The story is where most of my complaints with this game arise, with it feeling formulaic half the time and padded the other half. Act 1 (and the prologue by extension) starts right where CS1 left off, with Rean being separated from the rest of the party and being forced to travel across Erebonia to reunite with the rest of them. This ends up being as formulaic as you'd expect: You go to <region from CS1>, meet 3 party members, go to some random place in that region, and then fight one of the new side villains in some unwinnable battle and get bailed out by a new guest party member. It's the same thing every time with little variation until the end of the act, where you only get Laura and Emma in Legram before having to go to Bareahard and fight Jusis there for him to join the party. Act 1 ends on a strong note, with Rean being taken aboard the enemy airship, but overall this act is middling in quality to me.

Intermission fares better to me, focusing on Rean's actions on the noble flagship, as he tries to make an escape with Alfin. It does have one very rushed and dumb character moment with Rean, but other than that the scenes with all the minor villains are very good and the end with the one-on-one fight against Crow was awesome.

Act 2, unfortunately, drops the ball even harder than Act 1 did. You're given access to the Courageous which allows you to fast travel across the whole map, but the problem is that now that the game is spread across the whole map, it takes even longer to do quests that otherwise would only take a few moments to complete, since they now take place across many regions. In addition, this act introduces the mechanic of recruiting students to unlock new facilities on the Courageous, most of which have their own quests that must be completed to welcome them aboard, which, in addition to the standard quests you also get, pads the runtime of the act exponentially.

The story events themselves in Act 2 are also hit or miss. The first event, rescuing Elliot's sister from the Twin Dragon Bridge, feels like blatant padding just to reintroduce the 4th Armored division from earlier and give the party an excuse to return to Celdic later. The next two story objectives, which involve Marquis Rogner and Duke Albarea, are both good, with the latter section giving Jusis a lot of great moments and the former making Angelica surprisingly tolerable, though they are brought down by the aforementioned Scarlet/Vulcan resolutions happening just so we have an excuse for a mech fight to happen.

Speaking of mech fights, the entire second half of the act is about revisiting all the OPTIONAL shrines from the first act. Why? Well, for no reason other than collecting a bunch of ore to make Rean a new sword for Valimar. That's right. There are FOUR dungeons all with the same theming that you have to revisit and fight random faceless bosses in just so you can get Rean a new sword. Oh, and you know how many mech fights there are after getting this new sword? THREE. That's right, all this effort in making a new sword is spent on THREE boss fights. The Tetracyclic Tower revisits in SC were also repetitive, but those at least fleshed out the enforcers and Schera/Zin, whereas Emma is the only character who gets any semblance of character moments in these shrines. Also, to add insult to injury, all four dungeons play the same opera song, which, while nice when you hear it on the first visit to each shrine in Act 1, is extremely tiriing to listen to at all times.

The act ends with the moment that has been hyped up for the entire act, out main story objective so far: Retaking Thors Military Academy from the clutches of the Noble Alliance. This is it, the moment you've all been waiting for aaaaaaaaaaaaaand it's over in two boss fights. And then the act just ends. Great job, Falcom. The game makes Towa playable for this section so I can't say it's all bad, but it is still a single boss fight she's usable for so on the other hand it's not that big of a positive.

The finale, on the other hand, is amazing. After spending 80% of the game meandering randomly throughout the map, the game finally gives you clear objectives. Your first mission is to rescue the Imperial family and Elise from their villa in Heimdallr, which, while good, is not really the main event here. Immediately after this objective is completed, Valflame Palace in the capital is transformed by Vita into the Infernal Castle, which serves as the final dungeon for the game. This dungeon ends up being very similar in structure to both the Axis Pillar in Sky SC and the Azure Tree in Azure: you climb a floor, fight a minor villain, have a scene with them, then move on to the next floor. In perhaps the chapter's only low point, all of these encounters end with the party being bailed out by guests from earlier in the game. Once you reach the end of the dungeon, the real story of the finale starts. After fighting Crow twice, Duke Cayenne reveals his (admittedly lame) motivations and the final boss fight, against a mech controlled by an unwilling Prince Cedric, begins. After this final boss, however, is when the true high points of the finale lie. Crow's death scene and Rufus's reveal as a still-living Chancellor Osborne's protege are both very well done, and Rean's personal confrontation with Osborne and his reveal as Rean's father, leading into Rean's role in the annexation of Crossbell, are awesome. After that, the title card and the game's ending theme play. However, for some reason, the game is not yet over.

Instead, you start the Divertissement, a short chapter returning the perspective of the series to that of Lloyd and the SSS in an Imperial-occupied Crossbell. This section is fairly inoffensive on its own, and I love the fight against Rean and Altina, but it leaves me wondering: Why does this exist in the first place? Finale would have been a great end to the game, so why must this section of the story be there at all? But, unfortunately, it gets worse.

The game ends with the epilogue, in which I am forced to play a CS1 free day again for literally zero reason. The final boss was 5 hours ago at this point. Why am I still playing? Why should I go through one of the most boring gameplay loops in the series again? Why did I decide to do a 100% AP run as my first playthrough? What is the point of anything anymore? After completing the usual required quests in classic CS1 fashion, all the guest party members who were available earlier in the game come back, and you're introduced to the true final dungeon, which is, you guessed it, the old schoolhouse. WHAT IS THE POINT OF THIS? The dungeon, called the Reverie Corridor, is randomly generated, meaning there is no reason to do literally anything there. The only positive I can say about this section of the game is the mirror accessories you can buy, which allow you to play as Crow, Vita, Altina, Lloyd, and Rixia for this dungeon (mainly the first 3 since Lloyd and Rixia were playable earlier anyways). Anyway, you reach the end of the dungeon, fight a recolor of the shadow dude from CS1, and then the game just ends. Class VII says their goodbyes, and the game is just over. This section put a VERY sour taste in my mouth and is easily the worst part of the game.

So, overall, CS2 has decent gameplay, a middling cast with a few standouts, and a plot that fluctuates HEAVILY in quality. I definitely think it's better than CS1, but I can't say it's better than any of the Sky/Crossbell games due to its padding somehow being even worse than the padding in SC. Overall, I'd probably give it a 5.5/10 just for how bad the epilogue is, but it could definitely be higher or lower depending on how I feel about the game after CS3.