ys chronicles encore kind of goated but also really damn flawed I'm conflicted

hi im once again marathoning an entire series for the purpose to play a single game in that same series but I do love going in chronological order when there's some kind of story or lore involved and all of this just to play lacrimosa of dana but whatever im enjoying this run

so ys 2 what can I say its basically ys 1 part 2 with all the same praises and gripes that I had with the very first one I think as a remake this is absolutely gorgeous I've seen videos of the original installment and lemme tell you I wouldve NOT played ys 1 + 2 if the only available one wouldve been the fucking turbografx whatever version so im actually glad they polished the OG king to this extent to make a really old and dated vidya kinda modern it has that charm of a low budget rpgmaker game I don't know I really like this

so umh as I was saying this shit is the same the combat is the same bump into enemies and see them explode before your eyes get some items and equipments yada yada BUT !!! they spiced things up with new spells (even though the actual combat spell is only the fireball one but its so fucking fun to use for no actual reason) and in general there's a lot of different useful and or interesting spells to use like the light spell or the morph one theres something for everybody (furries) let's just say that

and yknow the main issue I had with the first one kind of vanished because for some reason in ys 1 the leveling stopped right at level 10 so that I wouldnt be able to grind my way to the bosses which actually made the bosses HARDER because why the fuck would you not make me grind for levels to make the bosses easier thats like the main rpg philosophy fuck you falcom

anyhow this game is not the case you can level up stupidly fast by targeting strong enemies in the solomon shrine and the game kiiiiiiind of becomes easier but its still ys so the bosses are still tough as shit if you don't know what you're doing or you're getting all the danmaku balls in your face and stuff

mind you it gets more unbearable as you go but it's still pretty accessible if you want to grind a little bit more in the longrun that being said the gameplay department got better but at the same time the map and dungeon designs got so much fucking worse now why would you put as the very first dungeon of the game a cave with so many different exits like I'm not gonna rage quit this fucking game ASAP literally lost so much time in there I was getting crazy now not gonna talk badly about the volcano or the sewers they're fine BUT THE SOLOMON SHRINE ???????? you must be joking screens and screens of labyrinth where you have to go from one point to the opposite one and then back again for the story to progress I don't wanna see that shit anymore in my entire life love to see it

so yeah this is what mainly confused me about this stuff there's a lot of innovations in this new installment for better or for worse the combat is tighter and you get more than one fucking item at a time theres a lot of “customization” (practically it's like X item needs to be equipped in Y situation) with a ton and I say A TON of different items but then youre left with these weird game design decision and youre like mmmmm okay

gotta say the story completely blew me away the story of the first installment was simple and it was good it had a nice little mystery element in it and this is the game that actually answers all the questions you couldve had in the first game kind of like higurashi/umineko question/answer arcs you feel me some different plot twists here and there that made me tear my hair out and a more interesting conflict and villain than the one we had in ys 1 and feena and reah in this one are stellar I love them I almost cried in the ending ALMOST don't get me started

unfortunately most of the characters still feel one note and uneventful I only remember the main trio and thats basically it Keith was actually a nice pal and lilia was l my little sweet angel I loved her so much she meant the world to me in the first 10 minutes of the game and then I completely ignored her bye

soooooo I don't know guys its still the same praises I gave ys 1 nice presentation for a remake of a game so fucking old the ost is bombing absolutely timeless and pumping in my ears like its ** pumping in my *** the combat is still pretty fun and with the new additions it's even more enjoyable I have no idea what the fuck they smoked in the falcom headquarters because those map designs should be illegal and punishable yada yada whatever I don't care anymore I just want to move on to ys origin thank you these 2 games were good but now I can move on to installments that hopefully won't take the soul out of me thanks see you soon

I want WANT feena you don't get me