Trails in the Sky 2nd Chapter Review: The Payoff Was Worth 80 Hours

I finished the 1st Chapter remake last year on a cliffhanger that genuinely annoyed me. Trails in the Sky 2nd Chapter is the answer to that annoyance: a full remake of the 2006 sequel from Nihon Falcom, published in the West by GungHo, out since 17 September on PS5, Switch, Switch 2 and PC via Steam. It costs $59.99, with the Switch 2 Edition at $64.99 and a $4.99 upgrade pack for owners of the Switch version.

What it is

A direct continuation. Estelle Bright picks up exactly where the first game left her, and the story assumes you know every name, town and grudge in the kingdom of Liberl. This is not a sequel you can walk into cold, and I would not try. If you did play the first one, this is where the slow burn finally catches fire: the villains get faces, the cosy road trip gets stakes, and Estelle becomes one of the best-written leads the genre has.

How it plays

The hybrid combat from the first remake returns. You can hack at enemies in real time on the field, then flip into turn-based command battles whenever a fight deserves actual thought. Weak mobs take seconds, bosses take a plan - it is the most respectful solution to JRPG grind I know. New this time are the Brave Rush team attacks, more crafts and arts, and an orbment system expanded to seven slots, which gives you real room to build characters rather than just filling sockets. The difficulty is better tuned as well; the first remake was too easy for too long, this one bites back sooner.

The highs

- The writing. Even the NPCs change their dialogue after every story beat, and it still feels like a small miracle. - The English voice cast is excellent, with Japanese audio available too. - Presentation: colourful, clean, and it runs well. On Switch 2 you choose between a 4K/30 graphics mode and a 1080p/60 performance mode when docked, and I would take 60 every time. - Quality-of-life touches such as better quest tracking mean far fewer missed side quests than in the original.

The lows

- Dungeons go on too long. Several late ones are corridor after corridor of the same tiles, and Falcom was clearly too faithful to the 2006 layout. A braver edit would have helped. - At roughly 80 hours it asks a lot, and the first act revisits regions you already walked across in the previous game. - The entry price is really two games. Locally that is a serious amount of money for one story, so newcomers should grab the 1st Chapter on sale first and see if it clicks.

Who it is for

Anyone who finished the first chapter - for you this is mandatory. Patient JRPG fans who value character and world over spectacle should start with part one and come here next. If you want a punchy 20-hour adventure, look elsewhere; this game has no interest in being short.

Verdict

This is how you remake a classic: keep the heart, modernise the hands. The combat is smarter, the story lands harder than almost anything released this year, and only the bloated dungeons and sheer length stop me from going higher. One of the best RPGs of 2026, with homework attached.

Score: 9/10

Image: Crisco 1492 / CC BY-SA 4.0, source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nintendo_Switch_2_in_Docking_Console.jpg