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The Cold Steel saga of role-playing games — developed by the developer Falcom during the last decade — was an large-scale endeavor, accounting for the number of individuals and events featured. It needed the developer several games to fully develop these protagonists. Emma's personal character development is revealed in parallel with the series' main story, but it's via the progressive shift in her abilities that we comprehend the extent of her inner growth.

Warning: This article includes light plot details for the central plot of the Cold Steel series.

In The Legend of Heroes: Cold Steel, Emma is a typical young woman, like the other members of Thors Academy's her class. As the class president, she's friendly to each person and works to avert any disputes between her fellow students. Even though Emma treats her academy duties really seriously, she lives a double life. She is in fact a sorceress, a initiate of the Hexen Clan. Attending Thors is a component of her real mission of guiding the protagonist Rean, the leader figure of the group, who is destined to unleash a powerful mech.

In all Trails series title, the majority of playable personas have at least one S-Craft, a powerful move that requires you to have a minimum amount of Craft Points to activate. These supreme skills are meant to be your key advantage in every encounter. These ultimate skills are also a mechanism for the developers to illustrate the changes the cast are undergoing. They can symbolize the refinement of a persona's combat prowess, for example Rean's S-Craft the skill Breaking Dawn in Cold Steel 4, which he gains after earning the rank of Divine Blade. In other cases, such as Emma’s, the developers uses S-Crafts to convey the internal transformations a persona goes through.

When the conflict in the empire starts in Trails of Cold Steel I, Emma’s response to the situation is the inexperienced but understandable belief that fighting means engaging offensively. The war continues to the second game in the series, where the dual ultimate skills she possesses are Albireon and Zodiac Rain. These two are offensive techniques that affect every opponents on the battlefield.

After we have the chance to encounter the character Emma again in the third game, we witness a transformed girl. She has moved on from Thors, and after practicing with her clan, the protagonist clearly to have understood an vital insight about who she is. While she grows into a impressive magic user, she comprehends that, most importantly, Emma is a protector. Emma is prepared to sacrifice herself to keep the group — but particularly Rean — secure. Her wish to fulfill this role is subtly indicated by her special ability, which in Cold Steel 3 changes to Eregion.

When you execute the ultimate ability Emma's new skill, Emma conjures four translucent pillars of magic, and shields form joining them and enclosing the battlefield. The party members under the influence of this technique receive a few instances of total reflection, a effect that prevents harm of any kind. The character had never been a combative individual, so she shifts to a protective style, reflecting the nurturing attitude she had always demonstrated to her companions.

It’s fascinating to see how the developers utilizes a protagonist's abilities to enrich the game’s narrative. JRPGs often employ written text or cutscenes to tell us what a persona is thinking. But Emma Millstein shows that including a skill can contribute an extra dimension of insight.