The Cold Steel collection of role-playing games — published by the developer Falcom across the past ten years — was an large-scale endeavor, considering the quantity of characters and storylines involved. It needed the developer five games to mature these protagonists. Emma Millstein's narrative journey is revealed in tandem with the series' central narrative, but it's via the progressive shift in her powers that we fully understand the significance of her personal transformation.
Warning: Our discussion includes light plot details for the primary narrative of the Trails of Cold Steel series.
In The Legend of Heroes: Cold Steel, Emma is a regular young woman, like the fellow pupils of the academy's her class. As the student leader, she's friendly to each person and aims to avert any disagreements between her peers. Although Emma treats her academy duties very earnestly, she has a secret identity. She's actually a practitioner of magic, a initiate of the Clan of Witches. Joining the academy is a component of her underlying objective of assisting Rean Schwarzer, the key individual of her class, who is meant to call forth a powerful mech.
In every Trails installment, most characters have at least one special technique, a powerful move that requires you to have a minimum amount of CP to use. These ultimate abilities are intended to be your key advantage in each battle. S-Crafts are additionally a method for the game to depict the transformations the cast are going through. They can symbolize the refinement of a character’s technique, like Rean's special ability the skill Breaking Dawn in Cold Steel 4, which he acquires after reaching the designation of Divine Blade. In different instances, like Emma’s, Falcom uses ultimate abilities to communicate the internal transformations a character goes through.
When the war in the empire begins in the first game, the character's approach to the events is the idealistic but logical belief that fighting means striking. The war spills over to the sequel in the saga, where the dual special abilities she has are her first S-Craft and her second S-Craft. These two are attack-oriented moves that target all opponents on the field.
When we have the opportunity to encounter Emma again a second time in Trails of Cold Steel III, we witness a transformed young woman. She has moved on from the academy, and after honing her skills with her family, the protagonist appears to have realized an crucial truth about who she is. While she evolves into a formidable sorceress, Emma understands that, primarily, Emma is a guardian. She’s prepared to put others first to ensure the group — but particularly Rean Schwarzer — secure. Her wish to occupy this position is hinted at by her S-Craft, which in Cold Steel 3 transforms into Eregion.
When you use the ultimate ability Emma's new skill, Emma summons four translucent pillars of magic, and barriers form connecting them and surrounding the combat area. The allies affected by this skill obtain several charges of total reflection, a effect that negates harm of any kind. She had at no point been a combative person, so she shifts to a defensive strategy, echoing the nurturing look she had always extended to her companions.
It’s intriguing to see how Nihon Falcom employs a character’s skill set to complement the series' narrative. JRPGs typically rely on storytelling or cutscenes to inform players what a persona is thinking. But Emma Millstein proves that even a ability can contribute another layer of significance.
