Topic: Nihon Falcom games on NS2

@xenobladexfan,

"on the hardest difficulty"

So there's difficulty options then (in at least some of the games)? That's brilliant. I like games that offer that sort of thing.

@Nep-Nep-Freak Yup, all the games have at least four difficulties iirc. Easy, normal, hard, and nightmare are in all games. Later games add in Very Easy and Abyss.

IIRC, all Falcom games have offered multiple difficulty modes since the early 2000s.

@Nep-Nep-Freak yes trails azure and zero are actually very challenging on the hardest difficulty levels, the final boss in azure is very tough.

Also falcom are announcing a new game this month:

https://www.pushsquare.com/news/2026/02/trails-ys-developer-f...

One more question about Trails games on Switch: I've been looking at all of them on GAMEYE (my game collection tracking app), and it seems like some of them include DLC on the cartridge, but not all of them. If I get games on physical cartridges (which is my favorite way to get games, though I do also get digital games sometimes), I usually prefer them to include all of the game content, including any potential DLC, on the cartridge, though I am willing to make a few exceptions to that here and there. So I was wondering... does anyone here know exactly which physical Trails games on Switch have DLC on the cartridge and which ones don't?

@Nep-Nep-Freak as far as I know, none of them have DLC on cart, but keep in mind I play Trails on Steam Deck. However, throughout the 13 game franchise, a grand total of one piece of DLC has added any content aside from cosmetics, and even then it adds nothing to the game story-wise, in that it's a beach episode.
Don't worry about DLC, in Trails it doesn't matter at all

@Bluelink45, thanks for the information, and I knew it was mostly cosmetics already, but I still prefer having as much game content on the cartridge as possible. Definitely something to look into more 😀.

@Nep-Nep-Freak the ones that I have played that include dlc for free are:

Trails cold steel iv

Trails into reverie

Additionally, in both Trails daybreak ii and trails beyond the horizon players can unlock the dlc outfits for free from the previous game:

For example in Trails beyond the Horizon, this dlc pack players can unlock for free:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/trails-through-day...

https://www.neoseeker.com/the-legend-of-heroes-trails-beyond-...

My advice for new players would be, don't buy any dlc for the previous games in the series because the items/cosmetics are made free in future entries,

Personally, the one time I found DLC useful in a Trails game was in Cold Steel 2, because Fie's default outfit was an embarassing case of "forgot to put on clothes. ahem But yes, basically, don't worry about DLC. None of it is meaningful content.

@metaphysician its kinda funny, I bought Fie's casuals in Cold Steel I since I didn't like how the default Class VII uniform looked on her, but I kept her outfit in Cold Steel II because I disliked the rest of it, but the cloak and goggles suited her so well I couldn't bring myself to remove them

Kyoto xanadu just announced this year for switch 2

@xenobladexfan, it didn't look like a full on JRPG to me. Is Tokyo Xanadu different?

@Nep-Nep-Freak its a jrpg but an action jrpg, I played the original and it was excellent, gameplay is similar to kiseki trails and ys.
It had character bonding in it too.

@xenobladexfan, sounds great, I'll check it out on GAMEYE, and probably add it to my wishlist of games to get... eventually... 😅

@Nep-Nep-Freak I actually enjoyed it more than persona, it is more fast paced and lighthearted.

I really enjoyed me some Tokyo Xanadu, combat felt like the precursor to the modern (VIII onwards) Ys games and the additions to it they made in EX+ really improved the combat over the Vita original.

Direct was neat overall, between this and other interesting ports such as Time stranger and seeing that FFVII rebirth is sooner than expected and looking to be hopefully another great port like Remake.

There's a reason Tokyo Xanadu feels like a "precursor to the modern Ys games": that is exactly what the game is. Falcom created the game specifically as a tech demo for doing action combat in the Cold Steel 1 engine, before going on to use it for actual Ys games. This is also why Tokyo Xanadu uses a lot of borrowed/repurposed assets from the Cold Steel games- it was knowingly done on a small budget.

And put me down as another person who really likes Tokyo Xanadu, and specifically more than the Persona games. Like, the Persona games are good, don't get me wrong; and they definitely have better artistic production values and a deeper combat engine. However, Tokyo Xanadu has better writing, both in the sense that its world feels more authentically lived in; and in the sense that the story doesn't revolve around a single MC to the same indulgent and narcissistic extent as in Persona.

@metaphysician
yeah was getting that kind of vibe, though definitely had an absolute blast with the game especially the EX+ version due to combat improvements, i enjoyed the new skills and mechanics and having items on a cool-down on higher difficulties did add some tension which was missing on the vita one since it mad it harder to brute force with items (and having said limitation in game added to said tension since you had to work with what you had rather than self-limitation)

A funny thing is, while I am not usually a fan of time limits and speedrunning, I found it largely fine in TX. With only a few exceptions, the dungeons felt like they were actually properly designed for fast play.

@metaphysician, wait, Tokyo Xanadu has a time limit during exploration? Or are you just referring to regular speedrunning?

I'm just making sure, because time-limited exploration is the reason that I'm skipping the DLC for Pokémon Legends Z-A.