Nihon Falcom’s long-running Japanese role-playing game (JRPG) series Legend of Heroes has recently experienced a surge in popularity in the West, with more and more titles receiving an official English-language release. The latest game to receive this treatment was announced to be 2018’s The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel IV, which will be coming to PlayStation 4 on October 27, 2020, and Nintendo Switch and PC sometime in 2021.
The Trails sub-series (known as Kiseki in Japan) currently consists of nine games, with both the Sky and Cold Steel arcs receiving Western releases. Cold Steel tells the story of a group of students studying at a specialized military academy and their adventures and battles throughout the Erebonian Empire. Trails of Cold Steel IV is the final game in the Cold Steel arc, although more Trails games may be coming in the future.
The series has become popular among both Japanese and Western audiences due to its rich worldbuilding, combining interesting stories and character arcs with classic RPG mechanics. Fans have generally responded to this announcement with excitement, especially as IV is seeing a worldwide release a full year after the debut of Trails of Cold Steel III, which hit Western markets in 2019. Unfortunately, two other Trails titles, Trails to Zero and Trails to Azure, have not yet received an official worldwide release.
If you can’t wait until October, the previous three Trails of Cold Steel games along with all three Trails in the Sky titles are available in English. The Sky games saw a release for Windows and the PlayStation Portable and the Cold Steel games for the PlayStation 4, with Cold Steel III also coming to the Switch worldwide on June 30, 2020.
Are you excited to experience a classic of the Japanese role-playing game genre with Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel IV? Let us know!
