Finally got around to finishing the followup to Ys I, and while it took longer than expected, it was honestly a pretty pleasant experience. I won't go into too much detail about the core mechanics, but I will list some of the big differences:
+ Bump combat feels a lot more consistent. You just have to run diagonally at enemies regardless of their orientation, and they will take damage. Moreover, knockback depends on your damage output, and the less damage you do, the more knockback you will take (while dealing more damage allows you to knock enemies back without getting bumped yourself). As a result, you can just keep running into most enemies diagonally and wipe them out with no frills attached, so combat and grinding is much easier and feels more fair.
+ I didn't mention this before, but there were pros and cons to having a level 10 level cap in Ys I that you could reach before the final dungeon. On one hand, there's no real reason to fight most of the standard mobs in Ys I in the final dungeon because by that time, you've already hit the level cap and can't spend the gold anywhere. That is fortunately not the case in Ys II; the level cap is much higher, and as a result there are still incentives to wipe out overworld mobs throughout the game. However...
- Ys I's early level cap meant that you can't just grind your way to absurd stats to suffocate bosses in a few hits. That is, however, something you can do in Ys II. It wouldn't be as problematic if there wasn't a high level, high EXP giving mob (that's still very easy to defeat since you can just run at them in a corner) that can be farmed to have an absurd level gap in the mid-late period of the final dungeon. As a result, a few of the last bosses felt like absolute jokes.
+ Magic is introduced in this game, and most of the bosses must be defeated with magic instead. It's a welcome change from the original Ys, and now a lot of the boss fights feel like fast paced bullet hells as well.
- There's one very shitty boss fight in the middle of the game where you have to wait for the boss to open its mouth while dodging a worm that will block all your shots (and often blocks shots while the mouth is open). It's a similar problem to what I had with most of the boss fights in Oath in Felghana, but thankfully it's just one very annoying boss fight in the middle instead of a pattern, as the rest of the boss fights felt much more engaging.
- The final dungeon is this labyrinthean nightmare, and it's super easy to forget where you need to go next, especially with no map. It's a bit of a shame too, because Ys II is otherwise a fairly straightforward game in comparison to its predecessor, and lays out its narrative and framework very organically.
Thus, I've decided to give it more or less the same rating as the first game, as it has quite a few downfalls not present in the original though having significant improvements elsewhere. I will say that there's at least no absurdly rough final boss fight this time, and I had a good time in general wrapping up the tale of the original Ys games.
+ Bump combat feels a lot more consistent. You just have to run diagonally at enemies regardless of their orientation, and they will take damage. Moreover, knockback depends on your damage output, and the less damage you do, the more knockback you will take (while dealing more damage allows you to knock enemies back without getting bumped yourself). As a result, you can just keep running into most enemies diagonally and wipe them out with no frills attached, so combat and grinding is much easier and feels more fair.
+ I didn't mention this before, but there were pros and cons to having a level 10 level cap in Ys I that you could reach before the final dungeon. On one hand, there's no real reason to fight most of the standard mobs in Ys I in the final dungeon because by that time, you've already hit the level cap and can't spend the gold anywhere. That is fortunately not the case in Ys II; the level cap is much higher, and as a result there are still incentives to wipe out overworld mobs throughout the game. However...
- Ys I's early level cap meant that you can't just grind your way to absurd stats to suffocate bosses in a few hits. That is, however, something you can do in Ys II. It wouldn't be as problematic if there wasn't a high level, high EXP giving mob (that's still very easy to defeat since you can just run at them in a corner) that can be farmed to have an absurd level gap in the mid-late period of the final dungeon. As a result, a few of the last bosses felt like absolute jokes.
+ Magic is introduced in this game, and most of the bosses must be defeated with magic instead. It's a welcome change from the original Ys, and now a lot of the boss fights feel like fast paced bullet hells as well.
- There's one very shitty boss fight in the middle of the game where you have to wait for the boss to open its mouth while dodging a worm that will block all your shots (and often blocks shots while the mouth is open). It's a similar problem to what I had with most of the boss fights in Oath in Felghana, but thankfully it's just one very annoying boss fight in the middle instead of a pattern, as the rest of the boss fights felt much more engaging.
- The final dungeon is this labyrinthean nightmare, and it's super easy to forget where you need to go next, especially with no map. It's a bit of a shame too, because Ys II is otherwise a fairly straightforward game in comparison to its predecessor, and lays out its narrative and framework very organically.
Thus, I've decided to give it more or less the same rating as the first game, as it has quite a few downfalls not present in the original though having significant improvements elsewhere. I will say that there's at least no absurdly rough final boss fight this time, and I had a good time in general wrapping up the tale of the original Ys games.