The hero of Ys is an adventurous young swordsman named Adol Christin. As the story begins, he has just arrived at the Town of Minea, in the land of Esteria. He is called upon by Sara, a fortuneteller, who tells him of a great evil that is sweeping the land. Adol is informed that he must seek out the six Books of Ys. These books contain the history of the ancient land of Ys, and will give him the knowledge he needs to defeat the evil forces. Sara gives Adol a crystal for identification and instructs him to find her aunt in Zepik Village, who holds the key to retrieving one of the Books. With that, his quest begins.
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This is a game I want to like more than I do, but I just can't on board with "bumper" combat. It's not even that it's difficult or necessarily bad, but rather that it just feels stupid. Just let me swing my sword, man.
That complaint aside, Ys actually bothers with a story, good music, and dispenses with a lot of the mechanics that made something like Super Hydlide such a frustrating experience. The mechanics that it does retain are relatively straightforward (including the novel combat) which makes it pretty easy to get through.
Though the overall fidelity of the visuals is stronger than something like the first Zelda, the world and dungeons are unfortunately pretty sparse in the look department which makes playing through this feel somewhat dull.
All in all I think you can clearly see that Ys is a stepping stone a refined action RPG genre that just wasn't there yet, but earnestly trying nonetheless.
That complaint aside, Ys actually bothers with a story, good music, and dispenses with a lot of the mechanics that made something like Super Hydlide such a frustrating experience. The mechanics that it does retain are relatively straightforward (including the novel combat) which makes it pretty easy to get through.
Though the overall fidelity of the visuals is stronger than something like the first Zelda, the world and dungeons are unfortunately pretty sparse in the look department which makes playing through this feel somewhat dull.
All in all I think you can clearly see that Ys is a stepping stone a refined action RPG genre that just wasn't there yet, but earnestly trying nonetheless.
Played this as part of Ys Book 1 & 2 but I don't have the desire to finish 2 right now :/
At a time when every RPG was simulating the grand adventures, rag-tag parties and obtuse mechanisms of table-top games, Ys is shockingly homely, meditative and streamlined. A short jog through the woods hiding in your backyard. It's just two towns, a couple adjacently-connected mini-dungeons, and a back-half set inside a giant tower. Although it has to commit to the 'monsters are becoming more dangerous lately' bit to justify the natural aggression of enemies, the conflict is archival instead of actively present; an ancient evil you seal for good, rather than a ravenous and militant force. Conversations are up-close and intimate with detailed character portraits, the menu-hopping grind is substituted for raw movement that Falcom themselves described as 'popping bubbles', and the game ends with Adol being forcibly teleported out of Esteria, his visiting time no more than a fleeting vision. These trendsetting quirks make this a tender and seminal must-play. But these same strengths are a mask to unfortunately bad dungeon design, bosses that range from punching bags to torture, and deathly repetitive sprites and tilemaps.
At a time when every RPG was simulating the grand adventures, rag-tag parties and obtuse mechanisms of table-top games, Ys is shockingly homely, meditative and streamlined. A short jog through the woods hiding in your backyard. It's just two towns, a couple adjacently-connected mini-dungeons, and a back-half set inside a giant tower. Although it has to commit to the 'monsters are becoming more dangerous lately' bit to justify the natural aggression of enemies, the conflict is archival instead of actively present; an ancient evil you seal for good, rather than a ravenous and militant force. Conversations are up-close and intimate with detailed character portraits, the menu-hopping grind is substituted for raw movement that Falcom themselves described as 'popping bubbles', and the game ends with Adol being forcibly teleported out of Esteria, his visiting time no more than a fleeting vision. These trendsetting quirks make this a tender and seminal must-play. But these same strengths are a mask to unfortunately bad dungeon design, bosses that range from punching bags to torture, and deathly repetitive sprites and tilemaps.
Game Review - originally written by Spinner 8
Yet another of the 21352346 ports of Ys. And I can say with some authority that this is definitely NOT the best of them. The graphics look really old, the music’s not great, but the gameplay is still the good ol’ Ys oldskewl that’s kept us coming back for twenty-some years. If you didn’t know, combat in Ys involves running into your enemy. The only way that you can attack the enemy and not get hurt in return is if you are a half-tile off in either direction. Or, if the enemy’s not facing you, of course. It’ll make sense when you play, I hope.
Yet another of the 21352346 ports of Ys. And I can say with some authority that this is definitely NOT the best of them. The graphics look really old, the music’s not great, but the gameplay is still the good ol’ Ys oldskewl that’s kept us coming back for twenty-some years. If you didn’t know, combat in Ys involves running into your enemy. The only way that you can attack the enemy and not get hurt in return is if you are a half-tile off in either direction. Or, if the enemy’s not facing you, of course. It’ll make sense when you play, I hope.
It's the late 80s right? Like, almost the 90s really. The Legend of Zelda, and other Nintendo and Nintendo adjacent titles, are thriving on an aesthetic of minimal abstraction, which gives them a certain absurdist charm and a kind of timeless and ageless quality. Like, Mario is a plumber that jumps on turtles and stuff, and no one even knows what the hell Link is doing. In the world of Nintendo-aesthetics there's no space for logic or urbanism, there's just a dude living in a cave that's like "here, have a sword", and that is, and has always been, kinda beautiful.
On the other end of the spectrum, PC RPGs and dungeon crawlers were presenting aesthetics deeply rooted in fantasy novels and D&D, with the latter connection made stronger by their mechanical density. These were clearly aimed at a vaguely more mature audience, and every character looked like either Conan the Barbarian or Gandalf.
The original Ys kind of lived in between those aesthetics. Way more concrete and "realistic" than TLoZ, but way more streamlined and simplistic than most PC RPGs of the time. Its aesthetics and tone are naive and direct in a way that almost lays bare the absurd framings that make the foundations of the RPG genre. Like, where TLoZ is the rich inner world of a child playing pretend, Ys: The Vanished Omens is a passerby looking at that child and only seeing an idiot who's waving a stick around. You play it and you can't help but think that it's kind of weird that most RPGs, no matter how mature and complex, are fundamentally built on a foundation of us playing pretend that we're warriors on some silly quest.
I'm not really going anywhere with this really, but yeah. I don't know why we're so obsessed with medieval times honestly.
Anyhow, this is a pretty fun RPG with fairly streamlined mechanics. It has nothing too obtuse on it, and the progression is quite satisfying. Honestly, it has aged quite well. Someone could have released it in the 2010s as an Indie game (capital I indie), with some obnoxious tagline like "Finally we're streamlining boring RPGs with the innovative mechanic of bumping into things", and it would have been a modern critical darling.
(Ok, the level design of the dungeons is a bit ass, but that was sort of the style at the time)
On the other end of the spectrum, PC RPGs and dungeon crawlers were presenting aesthetics deeply rooted in fantasy novels and D&D, with the latter connection made stronger by their mechanical density. These were clearly aimed at a vaguely more mature audience, and every character looked like either Conan the Barbarian or Gandalf.
The original Ys kind of lived in between those aesthetics. Way more concrete and "realistic" than TLoZ, but way more streamlined and simplistic than most PC RPGs of the time. Its aesthetics and tone are naive and direct in a way that almost lays bare the absurd framings that make the foundations of the RPG genre. Like, where TLoZ is the rich inner world of a child playing pretend, Ys: The Vanished Omens is a passerby looking at that child and only seeing an idiot who's waving a stick around. You play it and you can't help but think that it's kind of weird that most RPGs, no matter how mature and complex, are fundamentally built on a foundation of us playing pretend that we're warriors on some silly quest.
I'm not really going anywhere with this really, but yeah. I don't know why we're so obsessed with medieval times honestly.
Anyhow, this is a pretty fun RPG with fairly streamlined mechanics. It has nothing too obtuse on it, and the progression is quite satisfying. Honestly, it has aged quite well. Someone could have released it in the 2010s as an Indie game (capital I indie), with some obnoxious tagline like "Finally we're streamlining boring RPGs with the innovative mechanic of bumping into things", and it would have been a modern critical darling.
(Ok, the level design of the dungeons is a bit ass, but that was sort of the style at the time)
Boas músicas, bons visuais, boa história e excelentes chefes, porém, a gameplay é um tanto falha em alguns quesitos:
1: A limitação de 10 níveis é péssima, você demora para evoluir e para de evoluir varias horas antes do fim do jogo, pareceu muito mais um recurso colocado por conveniência do que realmente uma mecânica positiva.
2: O inventario truncado e sem poder vender itens é algo bem incomodo, ainda mais considerando que meses antes havia o Dragon Quest 2 que tinha um gerenciamento de inventario bom.
Conclusão: Os chefes são o destaque do jogo, realmente gostei de vários. Eram desafiadores mas não impossíveis, foram muito bem pensados. A história é interessante, tem um worldbuilding acima da média e um bom final. Só é 6 por causa daquelas falhas na gameplay.
1: A limitação de 10 níveis é péssima, você demora para evoluir e para de evoluir varias horas antes do fim do jogo, pareceu muito mais um recurso colocado por conveniência do que realmente uma mecânica positiva.
2: O inventario truncado e sem poder vender itens é algo bem incomodo, ainda mais considerando que meses antes havia o Dragon Quest 2 que tinha um gerenciamento de inventario bom.
Conclusão: Os chefes são o destaque do jogo, realmente gostei de vários. Eram desafiadores mas não impossíveis, foram muito bem pensados. A história é interessante, tem um worldbuilding acima da média e um bom final. Só é 6 por causa daquelas falhas na gameplay.
Playing this with having more appreciation for where the Ys series would ultimate go honestly helped me enjoy this game a good bit more. It also helps that the Chronicles remake on PSP is actually playable (unlike the DS version I originally played), even if it feels a bit zoomed in.
It's a very no frills game that really benefits from you talking to everyone. Combat's simple. The story's simple, although it feels just like a setup to Ys II. It's really short. Underneath that, it still has this charm that comes with being one of the first action RPG's/JRPG's (yeah it technically ticks both boxes). With the only three games I've beaten being 1,2, and 8 (though I don't count 2 yet because I played it in such a godawful way), it's surreal to see where Ys started.
Also this game has some of the most obnoxious boss design I have ever seen. The only two bosses that were decent were the centipede and the mantis, and the centipede was just overly simple. The vampire was a painful fight due to its ungodly small window of vulnerability, and Dark Fact is just purely bullshit. I cannot understate how terrible that fight is when you actually play it on decent hardware. The other three bosses kinda suck, but are nowhere near as egregious.
I've warmed up to Ys 1. It's nothing special, and it has some awful bosses, but it's a really solid foundation to build up from.
It's a very no frills game that really benefits from you talking to everyone. Combat's simple. The story's simple, although it feels just like a setup to Ys II. It's really short. Underneath that, it still has this charm that comes with being one of the first action RPG's/JRPG's (yeah it technically ticks both boxes). With the only three games I've beaten being 1,2, and 8 (though I don't count 2 yet because I played it in such a godawful way), it's surreal to see where Ys started.
Also this game has some of the most obnoxious boss design I have ever seen. The only two bosses that were decent were the centipede and the mantis, and the centipede was just overly simple. The vampire was a painful fight due to its ungodly small window of vulnerability, and Dark Fact is just purely bullshit. I cannot understate how terrible that fight is when you actually play it on decent hardware. The other three bosses kinda suck, but are nowhere near as egregious.
I've warmed up to Ys 1. It's nothing special, and it has some awful bosses, but it's a really solid foundation to build up from.