Trails Through Daybreak is summer’s must-play RPG

They don’t make RPGs like Trails through Daybreak anymore. That’s not just some nostalgia-fueled statement, either. Larger studios such as Bandai Namco are shifting to AAA-style production styles and cycles, where it takes several years to see any new efforts come to life, and the indie RPG scene is still insistent on imitating SNES-era games after almost a decade of doing that same thing over and over again. The story-driven, mid-budget RPG field is pretty empty as a result, and into that gap steps Nihon Falcom’s Trails through Daybreak. Despite being the 11th game in a 20-year-old series, Daybreak is a proper fresh start, a standalone adventure with new ideas, new ways of communicating those ideas, and a better sense of what it wants to be. It’s easily one of the series’ best games and a strong RPG in its own right, even if it is a little rough around the edges compared to its fancier competitors. First up is a bit of stage setting. Trails through Daybreak takes place in a country called Calvard, two years