Spring, once the video game industry’s dumping ground, has of late become the landing ground of holiday blockbusters that couldn’t be finished in time for the Christmas shopping season. But, amid this transformed treasure trove, one old tradition remains: the Spring Sleeper. The official Spring Sleeper of 2011, “The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky,” fits the format to a T. It’s a Japanese role-playing game chock-full of charming characters; it has a long, two-part name (last year’s Spring Sleeper was the perfectly titled “Fragile Dreams: Farewell Ruins of the Moon”); it creates “fantasy” words by taking ordinary words and changing them slightly, giving us the Liberl Kingdom, a young boy named Radford, and something called the Orbal Revolution; and most importantly, it flies under the radar despite being the perfect game to snuggle up to on a rainy day.
When not exploring quaint towns and gleaming airships, “Trails” tasks you with fighting various monsters on 17-by-17 grids. The battles are kind of like chess, except instead of a ordering nameless, faceless bands of rooks and pawns, you command a group of people you come to care about, with well-realized, intertwining personal histories involving everything from romance to betrayal. And unlike chess pieces, whose abilities are static, your characters improve over time as you customize their attacks, help them craft new magic spells, and even collect recipes to cook special items to aid you in battle.
It’s a compelling formula, one that will charm newcomers and stir nostalgia in fans of the “Tactics Ogre” series, and “Trails” envelopes it in music and graphics that will warm your heart faster than a cannibal’s cookpot.
| ‘The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky’ |
| » System: PSP |
| » Price: $29.99 |
| » Rating: 4 out of 5 stars |
One twist “Trails” introduces is bonuses depending on turn order. A display at the side of the screen shows the order of the next five characters, on your side and the other, who get the chance to act, and some turn slots are better than others, giving characters, say, extra health. This matters because you can cast spells and other special abilities to interrupt the order, stealing these bonuses from the baddies. This may not sound like much, but it adds a nice layer of strategy on top of all the other things you have to be mindful of.
If “Trails” has a fault, and I’m afraid it does, it’s that this is the only twist it offers. Spells in particular disappoint due to a lack of diversity. Beyond basics like elemental attacks and healing spells, there’s really nothing to see here.
Still, whether they’re new to the genre or old pros, people who buy “Trails” find themselves looking forward to rainy days.
