Trails Through Daybreak II brings improved combat, more perspectives, and fishing

When a JRPG series has been around as long as Trails, a sub-series to the even longer-running The Legend of Heroes, it can be intimidating for new players to figure out where to jump in. Fortunately, a new arc began earlier this year, continuing with its next chapter when the English version of The Legend of Heroes: Trails Through Daybreak II launches in early 2025.

It’s a direct sequel to The Legend of Heroes: Trails Through Daybreak, which the game’s producer and developer Falcom’s president, Toshihiro Kondo, would still recommend new players tackle first even if it didn’t end on a cliffhanger, as has been the case in previous arcs. “One of the fun aspects is seeing these characters that you’ve come to know and all the progress they have made as people in the first game, then seeing that reflected in the second game,” he said in an interview with the Epic Games Store. 

Still, having just one game to catch up on is certainly more manageable than 10. The first Daybreak was an especially approachable entry point, where its setting, the Republic of Calvard, mirrors multicultural Western societies and the socio-political tensions that can arise from that. In a way, the timing couldn’t have been better as Falcom’s audience outside of Japan has been growing in recent years thanks to improved localization efforts from publishing partner NIS America.

Set in a nation previously unexplored on the continent of Zemuria, Daybreak also focused on brand new characters, keeping callbacks to characters from past games to a relative minimum. New protagonist Van Arkride, meanwhile, made a refreshing break from past protagonists who could be described as idealistic teens fighting as ‘allies of justice.’ “Van’s occupation as a spriggan allows him to work in multiple avenues of society, whether that be on the good side or the bad,” explains Kondo. “That makes him a very unique new main character of the series, and I really enjoy that aspect of him.”

Daybreak II then continues the structure from its predecessor where you’ll take on various jobs around town, from exterminating monsters to handling delicate matters with discretion. Each request adds points to a morality system between three alignments: law (the good), chaos (the bad), and the gray. You also can’t max out all three in a single playthrough, which encourages replaying. But this isn’t simply a continuation of the Calvard arc, even if rich worldbuilding and character-driven stories are what Falcom fans expect from a Trails game. There’s also much more to do than ever before.

For starters, there’s a greater cast of characters, a mixture of familiar faces from the Arkride Solutions Office and characters from past Trails games, including assassin duo Swin and Nadia. But as Daybreak II takes place a few months after the previous game, Van’s party companions are also out on their own journeys, meaning you’ll be spending time getting the gang back together and in a different order. For instance, where the original Daybreak began with high schooler Agnès knocking on Van’s office door, this time it’s his childhood friend Elaine who wants him to investigate mysterious murders, reportedly the work of a threat known as the Crimson Grendel.

With more playable characters, Daybreak II’s story will also consist of multiple timelines and party compositions, so you’re not limited to Van’s perspective. But if that sounds like you’ll only get to spend time with your favorite characters during specific story chapters, you also have the Märchen Garten, an optional endless dungeon where you’re free to build up a party of whatever characters you want. “The Trails games have a lot of cool characters, so for players who do have a favorite character they really want to power up and use more, this allows them to delve into that,” Kondo explains.

Both of these elements were actually introduced in Trails from Reverie. But given that game essentially served as a feature-length epilogue to both the Crossbell and Erebonia arcs that came before, it’s smart to reintroduce these gameplay features to another title that doesn’t demand as much required reading.

Daybreak’s combat marked a radical shift with a hybrid system that enables players to switch between real-time action and turn-based combat, even during the same encounter. If the action side felt a bit simplistic compared to Falcom’s action-oriented Ys series, Kondo concedes that having so many playable characters (which you can also switch control of) means “we’re not able to go as deep into move sets for characters individually.”

Playing through an early chapter as well as the Märchen Garten, I could nonetheless feel how much slicker the action combat is in the sequel just by having more options. Instead of hacking and slashing, you can also cast ranged magic spells called Quick Arts. Using these requires charging by holding a button as well as Energy Points (EP), so while a great addition, you’ll want to take care to not spam arts.

While you can still switch between party members during real-time combat, Daybreak II has a cooler trick up its sleeve. Previously, performing a perfect dodge would fill up a bar you can use to deal a powerful charge attack to stun enemies, but now you also get a prompt that not only lets you switch party members but tags them in with a charge attack. Overall, it feels like a more dynamic and engaging action system. Even for traditionalists who favor turn-based combat, this installment has also revamped the UI so it’s easier to tell the turn order.

Perhaps the most welcome new feature that had been completely lacking in the original Daybreak is the inclusion of minigames. The most substantial of these that I was able to try is fishing, itself a staple of many classic JRPGs. Compared to past entries, there’s a great degree of freedom, as I didn’t just have to go to a fixed fishing spot but rather could cast a line from almost anywhere along a canal, provided there weren’t any high railings in the way. Besides that, Daybreak II also promises other activities, including a cyberhacking minigame, a card game, basketball, and even more.

As welcome as these activities will be, which always add more flavor to any RPG world, you can still count on Trails Through Daybreak II to provide plenty of character lore and backstory, especially through Connected Events, whether that’s to learn more about your favorite characters or to discover everything on subsequent playthroughs. It’s all this extra dialogue that accounts for the greater time and effort to localize these games, but given that this is why the series is viewed so fondly by its fans, it’s worth the wait.

The Legend of Heroes: Trails Through Daybreak II releases February 14, 2025, and you can wishlist it now on the Epic Games Store. If you’re new to the series, you can also buy The Legend of Heroes: Trails Through Daybreak now.