It may not have the same structure of the previous two games, but this is Trails at its best when it comes to the writing, gameplay, and music. Especially the music. Don't skip this one. This game acts as a story bridge between the more self-contained FC / SC and the larger world seen in later Trails entries, giving a lot of welcome backstory and epilogue to all your favourite characters and some you didn't think about much, as well as a decent amount of foreshadowing. It's not nearly as long as the previous games, and a lot of it is technically optional, so it doesn't overstay its welcome.
To be honest, if you aren't willing to put up with the ancient gameplay quirks that come from 2D sprites representing 3D objects in space that you're supposed to be aiming at while travelling and turning at a speed dependent on how many objects are in your view range (getting down to a pitiful fraction of the full speed in many encounters), the first game might need to be passed over. But parts of its presentation are impressive even today, and the storytelling of the series is a great focus from the start. There are several possible branching paths for the story and the missions to go depending on how good or bad you do, with cutscenes and chats among the pilots for it all. This game is incredibly hard if you want to stay on the "best" path, but quite fun if you can look past its age. The second game improves on the first in almost every way except story branches, and makes the gameplay much smoother, so it's easier to start with. Way more (good) cutscenes and story. Still stupid hard though, if not harder. If you want to taste the beginnings of the genre, it's still ready for you, but less dedicated gamers will probably enjoy the third game or later classics like Tie-Fighter and Freespace 2 infinitely more.
As much as I love Rayman 2 with a similar nostalgia to this game, thinking on it now I can say 3 has much better combat and enemy design, and is generally less frustrating in the platforming department due to a better camera and no instant death water/pits. This game is also notably harder than 2 to my memory, though in a fair way, with much more complex fights, and a tough struggle to get a high "score" through a combination of collectible gems and enemy kill combos. There's a lot of variation in the levels, and each section generally has its own gimmicks not seen elsewhere which add rather than detract from the game so long as you're paying attention to how they work. This time around there is a focus on humour with the introduction of voiced dialogue, and it generally is actually funny in a sarcastic way with no fourth wall, but of course that's going to be subjective. The music in this game is excellent, to cap it off. I think the main game was a little too short though, even if as a kid it took me ages to complete (especially that beautiful devil of a last boss--perhaps the most satisfying action finale I've played, but man was it hard the first time around). Sadly, the tutorial guide character lies when he promises that he will "see you in Rayman 4"...
This game surprised me with how much depth it offered and how much I liked the characters, even if it isn't quite "amazing" at anything. Perhaps the greatest strength of this game is in it's high attention to detail in its world and setup for future mysteries (and sequels) without feeling the need to make a big deal of it. Nearly every NPC in the game will have a name, and will change their dialogue over time or act as recurring extras you can get a small story from if you pay attention. The overall story was also well done, if a bit too cliche and predictable at times, with an excellent build-up in scale. It's no Final Fantasy VI, but it tries hard. The protagonist is basically the daughter of a previous (non-existant) story's legendary hero, but doesn't know it, and sets out to fill his shoes while he's away, which is a premise I really like. The combat was enjoyable, often required actual thought, and rarely required grinding if you did sidequests, with the XP gains from particular monsters scaling down relative to your level till it becomes worthless. I definitely liked it more than the classic Final Fantasy style, but it has its weaknesses when it comes to the lack of variety in ways to counter spells and effects. I felt like I abused the powers the game gave me to make the final boss a cakewalk by simply spamming the completely impervious "Stone Wall" spell each round which negates an attack on each party member. Plus some fights (notably one of the last bosses) were heavily dependent on a particular status effect to be challenging, and so were either a nigh-unwinnable nightmare or rather simple with the right equipment. Some enemies *always* try to stop you from casting a spell if you are doing so, which is easily abusable to prevent bad attacks. New equipment was almost always a linear upgrade rather than an interesting choice, with accessories being the exception. Spell animations also were painfully long, but there is a turbo button. Solid 8/10 for me.
This game is fun and beloved for a reason, don't get me wrong, but it has major flaws once you get familiar with it enough. On the gameplay side there are huge disparities between the power of different stats and classes as the game goes on due to how underutilized many of the systems are. For instance, a force-power-focused character (especially dark-siders) built right will start a little weak but go on to become death incarnate to a degree that honestly makes combat boring with few exceptions. The reason for this is huge area-of-effect powers with no risk of friendly fire, whereas everyone else is stuck dealing with a single enemy at a time. Furthermore, only Persuade is an important skill for the player to have (some Repair helps with one companion though), since everything else can either be done by your easily-swapped companions or simply ignored due to its trivial benefits. Another major issue has to do with the fact that the main character doesn't gain force points or powers retroactively, meaning that it is usually best to simply never level up your character for the first few hours until you change to a Jedi class, due to the level cap. Not fun. The gameplay UI is truly awful, too, since you need to constantly cycle through items and powers one at a time with no quickbar. Story wise things are better, but often still a little basic and cliche. Dialogue is nothing to write home about, and only a few quests really stand out. Your dialogue choices tend to be painfully basic and binary, with the dark side options being cartoon-villainy with no hint of cunning or tact. One of the companions is really great and lampshades these sorts of things, but he is contrasted by mostly-shallow alternatives. The plot involves some interesting elements and a famous twist, but again it's really lacking in complexity, especially compared to KOTOR 2. Alas, this game is outdone in almost every way by its flawed masterpiece of a sequel (given community patches).
Among Beamdog's "Enhanced" versions of classic cRPGs, this one should be the most uncontroversial and praised. Perhaps there were issues with earlier versions, but in 2022 it was a straight upgrade for the resolution and modern lighting updates. However, one major issue I did have is that there is no in-game vsync option, and this led to my computer running at full throttle until I noticed a smell like something burning while the game was running. This was fixed by simply enabling vsync for the game in my Nvidia control panel. The in-game frame-limit option did not work the same, and made the game stutter like crazy. The number of added options and mod possibilities is wonderful, and the UI scaling is a lifesaver. I played Diamond Edition for a while, and the UI was really getting to me even after I tried a mod that simply doubled its resolution. This version also adds a much nicer menu for selecting which module to play, as well as some curated community modules (forget the original campaign, play the Aielund Saga) with automatic handling of their extra resource downloads. Likewise with multiplayer servers.
If you are looking for decent stealth and robbery gameplay, this is a pretty good iteration on the genre, though only if you are going for stealth. The story is pretty good, and the dialogue and detail you can miss is great (even heartrending at times). The atmosphere and acting is perfect. Ultimately this is a tale of how a loyal bodyguard and an innocent girl who may as well be his daughter are used and discarded by power-hungry people while an empire's people suffer amid their squabbles. Trying to avoid having to kill everyone is an interesting challenge, though. Unlike Thief, you could easily kill anyone in sight if you wanted to, but doing so will make the game a bit harder and lead to worse outcomes. My first playthrough I went all in for a non-lethal run, and I failed a lot and needed to save-scum at times, but it wouldn't be nearly as tough or long if you could allow for a few fatalities. The supernatural powers make everything much easier (almost too easy), but there's no incentive to limit their use in the game. I give 5 stars because I think it does almost everything it tries to do with great quality, but it's not the best game of this type if you want something where the player is limited more in ability and has to be stealthy out of necessity.
This game could easily be the best in the series were it not for one thing: missiles. The story with its cutscenes is so good I found myself simply wanting to get on with the story instead of enduring the devilishly-punishing gameplay on anything higher than the lowest difficulty. Big-name actors with good-quality sets bring characters to life whom you can quickly care about, even if it is slightly cheesy at times. But I could never recommend the gameplay to your average person because it fails one crucial test: it does not feel fair. I'm no ace, but I managed to beat WC1 just fine and most of WC2. WC3 was a blast most of the way on the default "Ace" difficulty, with only a few long missions I lost patience on and used a lower difficulty level or invincibility for a moment. This time, I found myself replaying the THIRD mission so many times I went down to the lowest difficulty and only increased it to "Veteran" on missions without heavy fighter combat. The reason for this terrible dive in ability? Almost entirely the fact that missiles are a one-hit-kill on nigh anything, and they get used CONSTANTLY. In great contrast to previous titles, you can be in the most heavily-armoured craft in the game and still be killed by a single missile--sometimes so fast that you could not reasonably react. This goes for wingmen too. In WC3 you could generally leave your wingman to do their own thing and have them dance around their enemies for a while even if heavily outnumbered, but in this one you will regularly see the Confederation's best heroes shot out of the sky like nothing. On the lowest difficulty no enemies will use missiles, but unfortunately it also makes their craft crumple like paper, gives you auto-aim, and has them all fly stupidly in straight lines. To add to this pain, a few of the missions felt very cheap, and I encountered a few frustrating bugs that should have been obvious problems to the devs. But all that aside, it's WC3 goodness with better cutscenes.
There is so much about this game that is impressive, and only minor problems. To get the latter out of the way, this IS an adventure game from 1992, so there will probably be times where you are banging your head against the desk trying to find what you're supposed to be doing to continue if you choose the puzzle path. That said, this game somehow managed to have branching paths based on gameplay preference! You can brawl your way through the game or have no combat at all, and the puzzles are usually pretty decent and not too obscure. The art in this game is wonderful and holds up well, as does the music, voice acting, and dialogue, but the best part is the story with its grand adventure alongside your partner. It very much feels like an Indiana Jones movie with its starting race to beat the Nazis growing into mystery and dread, especially when it comes to the end. This is perhaps the best example of the adventure game genre when you consider it as a whole. Other games are funnier (though there are good jokes here), but this game screams epic adventure like few others.
With a small side of collectathon, Rayman 2 is a great early 3D platformer and one of the few on PC, but does show its age at points I am loathe to admit as a lifelong fan of this game. It features wonderful art and music, as well as a great amount of gameplay variety despite usually not changing the controls at all. Some of the more fast-paced levels will definitely get your blood pumping and give you that satisfaction of victory. And despite being a very linear game, there are plenty of secrets to be found if you pay attention--some of which hide whole levels of content. On to the bad. The camera is not great at times, and the actual platforming can be a bit painful on occasion due to depth perception issues and almost too-responsive movement (especially in the gimmick gameplay modes). You will probably fall off a small platform you were riding on because you went from 0 to 60 a few times. By far the worst part of the game is the boring combat, which is almost always very basic and easy so long as you hold the strafe button, but occasionally will feature enemy attacks that instantly send you back to the last checkpoint due to bad luck. The boss battles can be good, though there's really only three of them, and you will likely find one part of the final boss absolutely rage-inducing for how it requires near-perfect play with a relatively new mechanic for several minutes lest you die instantly and redo that phase (the depth perception issue is in full effect there too).
