Do your choices actually matter?

[Echo]

In Trails in the Sky you are able to make choices in the story missions for example the first choice is if you want to rush in to save the children or proceed with cation. I know that the cutscene after you make a choice is influenced by the choice you make but does your choice matter in the overall story? Does it change anything besides the cutscene after?

[Berahlen]

They don't do anything dramatically game changing, but they change how much BP you get at the end of the mission, and may change a few fight mechanics.

For instance if you approach the children correctly you wipe out a couple of the monsters in a cutscene and get bonus BP for being smart, but if you charge in wrong you fight all of them and the monsters start with initiative. A couple other situations, a poorly chosen approach might get you surrounded and sneak attacked, etc.

The story isn't altered by anything. If you choose a wrong dialogue option one of your party members will railroad it back on track -- but again, the choice may be worth BP if Estelle gets it right the first time.

There are a few choices that are just dialogue flavor and don't matter at all. There's also the occasional mission like replacing the road lamp where it doesn't matter which role you choose as long as you do it correctly.

[Stabbey]

Technically, not a lot changes story-wise. Choices only have a limited local impact. But each correct choice increases your Bracer Points, which increases how quickly your rank increases, which can matter, because you get rewarded with a special item at each rank up.

Also, if you manage to miss practically every single optional quest and/or bonus BP opportunity and aren't at Bracer Rank 5 (or 6?) at the end, you get "you kinda suck" variation on a cutscene, insted of something more badass if you're higher. But you almost have to be trying to intentionally fail to get that scene.

[Oguzhan]

Its more about how competent of a bracer you are. The only major event that changes is during the end. If you have the lowest score possible (no side quests and all of the false answers), you get a different cutscene.

I recommend paying attention your choices though not just for rewards but also the dialogue changes too and considering how great the NPCs are in this series, yeah.

[Hat8]

Originally posted by Black Wolf:

In Trails in the Sky you are able to make choices in the story missions for example the first choice is if you want to rush in to save the children or proceed with cation. I know that the cutscene after you make a choice is influenced by the choice you make but does your choice matter in the overall story? Does it change anything besides the cutscene after?

No, the game has a clear story. All it does is change some dialogue and lower your BP score.

Your BP score basically decides what reward you get for the second game and has an achievement attached to it.

[Dragon]

One thing your choices matter about a lot is when you do the side quests. If you don't do them as soon as you get them, and instead do the main quests first, then your side quests become permanently blocked off and you have no possibility to complete them any more (unless you reload a saved game from before they became blocked off, or start a new game).

And a lot of times this can happen by accident; the main story progresses even though you weren't trying to make that happen.

[Gambio]

Originally posted by Stabbey:

Technically, not a lot changes story-wise. Choices only have a limited local impact. But each correct choice increases your Bracer Points, which increases how quickly your rank increases, which can matter, because you get rewarded with a special item at each rank up.

Also, if you manage to miss practically every single optional quest and/or bonus BP opportunity and aren't at Bracer Rank 5 (or 6?) at the end, you get "you kinda suck" variation on a cutscene, insted of something more badass if you're higher. But you almost have to be trying to intentionally fail to get that scene.

funny enough the "you kinda suck" cutscene feels more like a reward, which is fitting, its way harder to get the lowest Bracer Rank compared to the highest

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by Gambio:

Originally posted by Stabbey:

Technically, not a lot changes story-wise. Choices only have a limited local impact. But each correct choice increases your Bracer Points, which increases how quickly your rank increases, which can matter, because you get rewarded with a special item at each rank up.

Also, if you manage to miss practically every single optional quest and/or bonus BP opportunity and aren't at Bracer Rank 5 (or 6?) at the end, you get "you kinda suck" variation on a cutscene, insted of something more badass if you're higher. But you almost have to be trying to intentionally fail to get that scene.

funny enough the "you kinda suck" cutscene feels more like a reward, which is fitting, its way harder to get the lowest Bracer Rank compared to the highest

Yeah. You are not getting any of the rewards, only the base stuff you get by yourself. You also have to deal with harder versions of certain situations etc etc... That cutscene is like the biggest reward in the game when you are going for it.

[Stabbey]

Originally posted by Dragon:

One thing your choices matter about a lot is when you do the side quests. If you don't do them as soon as you get them, and instead do the main quests first, then your side quests become permanently blocked off and you have no possibility to complete them any more (unless you reload a saved game from before they became blocked off, or start a new game).

And a lot of times this can happen by accident; the main story progresses even though you weren't trying to make that happen.

This is true. Makes sure you know what your main quest objective is, and check your bracer notebook to see the duration of quests. "Short" means that the quest will expire after the next main plot update, "Medium" means you can advance the main quest at least one step, and "Long" means you can advance the main quest two or more steps. In Sky FC, it's always good to do sidequests as soon as possible.

Unfortunately Sky SC can mess with this by sometimes making it harder to get bonus AP if you immediately do the quest. (Looking at you photography quest!). Save often.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by Stabbey:

Originally posted by Dragon:

One thing your choices matter about a lot is when you do the side quests. If you don't do them as soon as you get them, and instead do the main quests first, then your side quests become permanently blocked off and you have no possibility to complete them any more (unless you reload a saved game from before they became blocked off, or start a new game).

And a lot of times this can happen by accident; the main story progresses even though you weren't trying to make that happen.

This is true. Makes sure you know what your main quest objective is, and check your bracer notebook to see the duration of quests. "Short" means that the quest will expire after the next main plot update, "Medium" means you can advance the main quest at least one step, and "Long" means you can advance the main quest two or more steps. In Sky FC, it's always good to do sidequests as soon as possible.

Unfortunately Sky SC can mess with this by sometimes making it harder to get bonus AP if you immediately do the quest. (Looking at you photography quest!). Save often.

That only happens once in SC. Aside from that photo quest I don't remember a single time where leaving the mandatory quest at last is a detriment and I played these games a lot.

[Stabbey]

Originally posted by Oguzhan:

That only happens once in SC. Aside from that photo quest I don't remember a single time where leaving the mandatory quest at last is a detriment and I played these games a lot.

There is another one I can think of, in either Chapter 5 or Chapter 8 - someone at the Anterose resturaunt in Bose wants a bunch of ingredients. If you immediately turn them in, you miss the chance for bonus BP. You're supposed to talk to Orvid and hook him up with the resturaunt.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by Stabbey:

Originally posted by Oguzhan:

That only happens once in SC. Aside from that photo quest I don't remember a single time where leaving the mandatory quest at last is a detriment and I played these games a lot.

There is another one I can think of, in either Chapter 5 or Chapter 8 - someone at the Anterose resturaunt in Bose wants a bunch of ingredients. If you immediately turn them in, you miss the chance for bonus BP. You're supposed to talk to Orvid and hook him up with the resturaunt.

But that is a side quest extra thing. That is to be expected. By that logic the light tower quest in FC is a ♥♥♥♥ move too. But its not, trails ALWAYS trains you to explore and talk to people. The only time doing a mandatory quest last is a detriment is for the photo quest.

[Berahlen]

I'm not even going to try and play apologist for the dickery going on with the ultimate weapons and some of the bonus BP in this series. Like, I love this game to pieces but once you look at optional content there is some PS1 era Buy The Prima Guide ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ going on in places and even I have limits.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by Waypoint:

I'm not even going to try and play apologist for the dickery going on with the ultimate weapons and some of the bonus BP in this series. Like, I love this game to pieces but once you look at optional content there is some PS1 era Buy The Prima Guide ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ going on in places and even I have limits.

Its talk to everyone at a given point. They put in a lot of effort to the NPCs, so they will of course expect you to talk to them. Also those are the optional stuff for the ultimate weapons.