The combat loop in this game is so addictive - you beat up enemies, which gets you boosts to your stats and exp gain, which makes beating up more enemies more rewarding, which gives you more boosts, repeat ad infinitum. This was my introduction to Ys games, and the bosses were tough, out of the 20 or so bosses, there were only a couple that I beat on the first try - but learning their patterns was extremely rewarding, so (with one exception) I didn't mind redoing the battle a couple times. The remaster makes the graphics look great and timeless, and like any Ys game, the soundtrack is fantastic.
So, my journey through the Ys series continues with The Oath in Felghana and let me say, I liked it quite a bit. Having played Ark of Napishtim right before this one, the changes become apparent rather quickly. Some of them really put the game onto another level quality-wise whereas other changes may have been somewhat….ill-considered? But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
The first thing that immediately caught my attention was of course the voice acting. Yes, that was my first Ys game that had this feature since I didn’t play the PS2 release of Napishtim but the PC version. So, for me personally, the voice acting was hit or miss. Some voices were really high quality whereas others were ok and some were actually really awful. I would say that all of the most important recurring characters like Elena and Dogi have good voice actors and actresses. However, there are a few characters, whose lines I had to skip whenever they had a scene (Margo was probably the worst of them all^^). Still, it was a nice addition to the game and it made the world feel livelier. Having the narrator voice all of Adol’s actions was kind of weird and unnecessary though.
Another thing that I noticed right off the bat was the music. Yeah, I know, this is a Falcom game and the music always slaps but, in this game, I thought it was particularly great. There are some really beautiful melancholic tunes that I will definitely put on my playlist. In the older Ys games, some of the more action-focused tracks could get a bit annoying for me. However, in this one, they were actually so good that they managed to pull me into the action of a fight and kept pushing me to keep going even if a fight would drag on.
That’s another change that set this game apart quite a bit from Napishtim. The bosses are hard, like really really friggin hard. There’s an achievement for dying to a single boss at least 10 times and I’m really proud that it wasn’t triggered until late game :D Because, let me tell you, fighting bosses in this game is very different from older Ys titles where I mostly beat them on the first or second try. Here, I had to focus and learn the enemy’s moves. I had to observe and slowly develop a strategy that would work. I had to use different skills and switch between them mid-battle for different situations which was honestly kind of cool. There were some bs mechanics in some of the later boss battles but for the most part, I appreciated the challenge.
The thing is, though, that you have to get through a dungeon before you can fight cool bosses. Well, dungeons have always been the bread and butter of a good Ys game and I gotta say, Oath in Felghana has some great dungeons. I liked the overall layout of each dungeon. There was always a clear direction of where the “main path” was for me and where I could find optional stuff. Mostly, there was a sort of logical progression from left to right or right to left with some side areas along the way. I liked that a lot since one major complain I had with pretty much every other Ys game so far was that at some point in the game, I would get totally lost in a dungeon. Here, that was never the case. So, dungeons = good yes? Well….technically yes but there is a major flaw and that is the placement of checkpoints/save points. I don’t know why they thought this was necessary but there are huge stretches of way between checkpoints and it frustrated me so hard. I don’t know how much time I lost by dying in a dungeon and then having to redo everything from a 30 minutes old save point all over again. They really blew it with this. It’s ok if there are harsh consequences for player failure but sometimes (especially in the last dungeon), the game just throws random stuff at you. Hordes of enemies that keep blasting you with nearly undodgeable attacks and traps that are just straight up mean really tested my tolerance for frustration. And even if you can avoid being killed by something along the way to your destination, there may be unskippable cutscenes that you have to sit through again and again and it’s just so tedious. So, even though the dungeon design itself is better than ever, there is still lots of backtracking and sometimes it feels like you’re not making any progress for a long time.
There were some changes to the gameplay that I really appreciated. First off, the super convoluted dash move from Napishtim was scratched. Thank the Goddess for that. Instead, Adol gets some movement skills throughout the game that help him overcome Metroidvania-like obstacles in the world. On top of that, magic is back and I am very happy for that. The magic system is super straightforward and is super fun to use in battles and puzzles in the world. There’s also a new “hyper mode” that unlocks after beating up enough enemies that lets you beat up enemies even faster and it just feels so good. In general, fighting feels so responsive and fluid that I just had a blast blasting through one wave of monsters after another. I already mentioned the backtracking and let me tell you, if it hadn’t been for the fun fighting, I would have put the game down way earlier. All in all, the gameplay is quite similar to Napishtim. You fight, you explore, you do some platforming, solve some simple puzzles and move on. It’s cool, it’s fast and it’s fun. And hey, there are no more annoying status effects like in the older games and that’s a huge relief.
So, how about the story? Well, traditionally, the story in Ys is more grounded, self-contained and not as epic as they come in most other JRPGs. And I like that. In Oath in Felghana, I feel like the writers were going for something grander and more JRPG-typical than they used to. There’s twists and turns, characters hungering for revenge for ill deeds of the past, personal drama, evil magicians who plot in the darkness and of course the fate of the world that is at stake. Honestly, it was all a bit much for me. I don’t mind generic fantasy storytelling but I was really fond of the way other Ys games kept their stories simple, subtle, and focused on the important stuff. Oath in Felghana strays from that path a bit and it lost me along the way. It was nice to learn more about Dogi’s past but the main plot was just a tiny bit too stereotypical for me.
And there we have it, another Ys game in the can. I had a good time with this game overall. There’s just a level of quality and polishing that I haven’t seen in other Ys games so far. Small details like the visible changes in Adol’s sprite depending on the armor set he wears just speak for the higher production value of this game. Yes, there’s still some annoyances (like the settings resetting every time I restart the game) and some changes that felt like they were going into a wrong direction (like storytelling and presentation), but overall, it’s still Ys and it’s as fun as it’s ever been.
The first thing that immediately caught my attention was of course the voice acting. Yes, that was my first Ys game that had this feature since I didn’t play the PS2 release of Napishtim but the PC version. So, for me personally, the voice acting was hit or miss. Some voices were really high quality whereas others were ok and some were actually really awful. I would say that all of the most important recurring characters like Elena and Dogi have good voice actors and actresses. However, there are a few characters, whose lines I had to skip whenever they had a scene (Margo was probably the worst of them all^^). Still, it was a nice addition to the game and it made the world feel livelier. Having the narrator voice all of Adol’s actions was kind of weird and unnecessary though.
Another thing that I noticed right off the bat was the music. Yeah, I know, this is a Falcom game and the music always slaps but, in this game, I thought it was particularly great. There are some really beautiful melancholic tunes that I will definitely put on my playlist. In the older Ys games, some of the more action-focused tracks could get a bit annoying for me. However, in this one, they were actually so good that they managed to pull me into the action of a fight and kept pushing me to keep going even if a fight would drag on.
That’s another change that set this game apart quite a bit from Napishtim. The bosses are hard, like really really friggin hard. There’s an achievement for dying to a single boss at least 10 times and I’m really proud that it wasn’t triggered until late game :D Because, let me tell you, fighting bosses in this game is very different from older Ys titles where I mostly beat them on the first or second try. Here, I had to focus and learn the enemy’s moves. I had to observe and slowly develop a strategy that would work. I had to use different skills and switch between them mid-battle for different situations which was honestly kind of cool. There were some bs mechanics in some of the later boss battles but for the most part, I appreciated the challenge.
The thing is, though, that you have to get through a dungeon before you can fight cool bosses. Well, dungeons have always been the bread and butter of a good Ys game and I gotta say, Oath in Felghana has some great dungeons. I liked the overall layout of each dungeon. There was always a clear direction of where the “main path” was for me and where I could find optional stuff. Mostly, there was a sort of logical progression from left to right or right to left with some side areas along the way. I liked that a lot since one major complain I had with pretty much every other Ys game so far was that at some point in the game, I would get totally lost in a dungeon. Here, that was never the case. So, dungeons = good yes? Well….technically yes but there is a major flaw and that is the placement of checkpoints/save points. I don’t know why they thought this was necessary but there are huge stretches of way between checkpoints and it frustrated me so hard. I don’t know how much time I lost by dying in a dungeon and then having to redo everything from a 30 minutes old save point all over again. They really blew it with this. It’s ok if there are harsh consequences for player failure but sometimes (especially in the last dungeon), the game just throws random stuff at you. Hordes of enemies that keep blasting you with nearly undodgeable attacks and traps that are just straight up mean really tested my tolerance for frustration. And even if you can avoid being killed by something along the way to your destination, there may be unskippable cutscenes that you have to sit through again and again and it’s just so tedious. So, even though the dungeon design itself is better than ever, there is still lots of backtracking and sometimes it feels like you’re not making any progress for a long time.
There were some changes to the gameplay that I really appreciated. First off, the super convoluted dash move from Napishtim was scratched. Thank the Goddess for that. Instead, Adol gets some movement skills throughout the game that help him overcome Metroidvania-like obstacles in the world. On top of that, magic is back and I am very happy for that. The magic system is super straightforward and is super fun to use in battles and puzzles in the world. There’s also a new “hyper mode” that unlocks after beating up enough enemies that lets you beat up enemies even faster and it just feels so good. In general, fighting feels so responsive and fluid that I just had a blast blasting through one wave of monsters after another. I already mentioned the backtracking and let me tell you, if it hadn’t been for the fun fighting, I would have put the game down way earlier. All in all, the gameplay is quite similar to Napishtim. You fight, you explore, you do some platforming, solve some simple puzzles and move on. It’s cool, it’s fast and it’s fun. And hey, there are no more annoying status effects like in the older games and that’s a huge relief.
So, how about the story? Well, traditionally, the story in Ys is more grounded, self-contained and not as epic as they come in most other JRPGs. And I like that. In Oath in Felghana, I feel like the writers were going for something grander and more JRPG-typical than they used to. There’s twists and turns, characters hungering for revenge for ill deeds of the past, personal drama, evil magicians who plot in the darkness and of course the fate of the world that is at stake. Honestly, it was all a bit much for me. I don’t mind generic fantasy storytelling but I was really fond of the way other Ys games kept their stories simple, subtle, and focused on the important stuff. Oath in Felghana strays from that path a bit and it lost me along the way. It was nice to learn more about Dogi’s past but the main plot was just a tiny bit too stereotypical for me.
And there we have it, another Ys game in the can. I had a good time with this game overall. There’s just a level of quality and polishing that I haven’t seen in other Ys games so far. Small details like the visible changes in Adol’s sprite depending on the armor set he wears just speak for the higher production value of this game. Yes, there’s still some annoyances (like the settings resetting every time I restart the game) and some changes that felt like they were going into a wrong direction (like storytelling and presentation), but overall, it’s still Ys and it’s as fun as it’s ever been.
Once again old YS games too hoard & I have shamed myself in the attempt. Hopefully I'll give it the old college try eventually but I'd rather just plat Nordics when it comes out...
When I started this game, I thought it was a lesser version of Origin in the gameplay department...only to find out this game predates Ys Origin. It would explain why the gameplay feels...less refined than Origin was, like how I feel the drop rate of things was lower. Unlike Origin, though, you don't need 3 playthroughs to get the full story. The story is a bit on the simple side, and there was a plot twist that did catch me by surprise, but otherwise it's fairly straightforward.
One critique of Memories of Celceta's ending I had was that it felt the game just ends after the final boss. This game actually lets you go around and talk to the NPCs in town and see how they're moving forward, which was something I liked about the ending.
In the gameplay department, using the wind magic did take a bit of getting used to, but once you have it down, it's very reliable for both platforming and fighting. Fire magic did feel a bit hard to aim at time and I did whiff a number of shots in my playthrough, and earth magic honestly didn't feel all that useful aside from the brief invincibility the dash gives you. As for bosses, while some were easy, a lot of them felt more like "learn their moves to win, with one notable exception, who just feels like he throws a flurry of annoying moves that do tons of damage even with fully upgraded equipment.
While fairly short, I did enjoy my time in Felghana. Would play tennis against a demon again. He must've been tennis friends with the various incarnations of Ganondorf.
One critique of Memories of Celceta's ending I had was that it felt the game just ends after the final boss. This game actually lets you go around and talk to the NPCs in town and see how they're moving forward, which was something I liked about the ending.
In the gameplay department, using the wind magic did take a bit of getting used to, but once you have it down, it's very reliable for both platforming and fighting. Fire magic did feel a bit hard to aim at time and I did whiff a number of shots in my playthrough, and earth magic honestly didn't feel all that useful aside from the brief invincibility the dash gives you. As for bosses, while some were easy, a lot of them felt more like "learn their moves to win, with one notable exception, who just feels like he throws a flurry of annoying moves that do tons of damage even with fully upgraded equipment.
While fairly short, I did enjoy my time in Felghana. Would play tennis against a demon again. He must've been tennis friends with the various incarnations of Ganondorf.