Over the past few months, the Ys series has found itself quickly moving up the ranks of my favorite video game series. Considering how much I feel nostalgia plays a role in my preferences and biases, the fact that this series of games have been so increasingly on my mind is remarkable - even moreso when you consider that before Ys Origin, I had played Ys VIII, which has become one of my favorite games, but... also Ys I through III, which can only really be described as "aged quite poorly".
I'm not honestly sure why I chose to start with the series with the first two games. Even though I admire them far more than the likes of Dragon Quest and Hydlide, they still have their shortcomings. There's much I could write about the two games, but this is a Ys Origins writeup, isn't it?
I think the most relevant point to address is that for the story that the entire series is named after, Ys I and II have fairly underwhelming, rudimentary storytelling that completely undermines its significance. Foreshadowing the two retellings that would come after (Oath at Felghana and Memories of Celceta), Falcom decided to expand on the story and scope of Ys by...
Making a prequel? I'm honestly very torn as to how I feel about it. On one hand, I really would have liked to see the original duo of games fully reimagined like the two aforementioned retellings, with their story expanded, taking into account what came after, bridging some things and setting up others, and... I won't lie, I would have liked to see Adol get more time with Reah, Feena and Lilia.
On the other hand, I can't really complain about what they did end up doing! The expanded story of the land of Ys really helps contextualize basically every single thing that happened in the first two games (it doesn't hurt that Origin is drenched in tribute and homage to them), and having protagonists who actually talk leads to a lot of room for charming character development that resolves (...in each of their playthroughs, at least) their own self-contained story arcs, told and completed through the course of one game.
It's something that the numbered Ys games understandably shy away from, because Adol's story arc is deliberately unfinished, and considering the premise that we've only seen nine out of what might be a hundred of his travelogues so far, I assume Falcom would be hesitant about this kind of active character-based storytelling for him. Still, it's a refreshing change of pace! I was engaged by every second of Ys Origin's storytelling, enough to go through three whole trips of the tower.
Right. The tower. The location that the entirety of the game is set in, the one that you can't leave as any character at any circumstance. I think this design affects Ys Origin heavily, influencing every part of its design and progression.
I've honestly found myself questioning at times whether the Ys series count as RPGs, given their heavy differences from what I'm familiar with from the genre (mainly because I need to be sure if I can include them in my RPG rankings list). Ys Origin stretches that definition of ARPG so far that it starts to encroach into straight up arcade action dungeon crawler status.
Ys Origin employs an EXP multiplier system based on whether you can keep a combo of hits going, which leads to a sort of rush of "okay, defeat this enemy, now move onto the next ASAP" going throughout the entire game as you try and keep this momentum going. Between that and the extremely linear ascension up the tower (although progression does involve some backtracking and exploration sometimes), the game explicitly presents players not with a world, nor a locale, but a location, whose progression is honestly not very much unlike games like The Tower of Druaga (down to the feeling of being on a timer, albeit not one that threatens death), just on turbocharge.
I can't honestly say it's for me. The constant sense of momentum gets fairly exhausting, and I liked the illusion of freedom and openness that Ys VIII provided by comparison, just by opening up its environments, providing some trivial map interconnectivity and letting the player take more detours while exploring.
The more I play RPGs, the more I find myself craving spending time in worlds - even if fairly small, cheesy, often contrived ones - and Ys Origin is decidedly not that.
And that's okay. Ys Origin doesn't have to be the game of my dreams - no game really has to be, and by that metric, no game probably ever will be. Perhaps there's a small part of me that wishes it was something different, both in terms of its narrative and premise, and in terms of its game design. But Ys Origin knows what it wants to be, excels at it and manages to confidently love itself and its forebears at every single step of the way.
I'm not honestly sure why I chose to start with the series with the first two games. Even though I admire them far more than the likes of Dragon Quest and Hydlide, they still have their shortcomings. There's much I could write about the two games, but this is a Ys Origins writeup, isn't it?
I think the most relevant point to address is that for the story that the entire series is named after, Ys I and II have fairly underwhelming, rudimentary storytelling that completely undermines its significance. Foreshadowing the two retellings that would come after (Oath at Felghana and Memories of Celceta), Falcom decided to expand on the story and scope of Ys by...
Making a prequel? I'm honestly very torn as to how I feel about it. On one hand, I really would have liked to see the original duo of games fully reimagined like the two aforementioned retellings, with their story expanded, taking into account what came after, bridging some things and setting up others, and... I won't lie, I would have liked to see Adol get more time with Reah, Feena and Lilia.
On the other hand, I can't really complain about what they did end up doing! The expanded story of the land of Ys really helps contextualize basically every single thing that happened in the first two games (it doesn't hurt that Origin is drenched in tribute and homage to them), and having protagonists who actually talk leads to a lot of room for charming character development that resolves (...in each of their playthroughs, at least) their own self-contained story arcs, told and completed through the course of one game.
It's something that the numbered Ys games understandably shy away from, because Adol's story arc is deliberately unfinished, and considering the premise that we've only seen nine out of what might be a hundred of his travelogues so far, I assume Falcom would be hesitant about this kind of active character-based storytelling for him. Still, it's a refreshing change of pace! I was engaged by every second of Ys Origin's storytelling, enough to go through three whole trips of the tower.
Right. The tower. The location that the entirety of the game is set in, the one that you can't leave as any character at any circumstance. I think this design affects Ys Origin heavily, influencing every part of its design and progression.
I've honestly found myself questioning at times whether the Ys series count as RPGs, given their heavy differences from what I'm familiar with from the genre (mainly because I need to be sure if I can include them in my RPG rankings list). Ys Origin stretches that definition of ARPG so far that it starts to encroach into straight up arcade action dungeon crawler status.
Ys Origin employs an EXP multiplier system based on whether you can keep a combo of hits going, which leads to a sort of rush of "okay, defeat this enemy, now move onto the next ASAP" going throughout the entire game as you try and keep this momentum going. Between that and the extremely linear ascension up the tower (although progression does involve some backtracking and exploration sometimes), the game explicitly presents players not with a world, nor a locale, but a location, whose progression is honestly not very much unlike games like The Tower of Druaga (down to the feeling of being on a timer, albeit not one that threatens death), just on turbocharge.
I can't honestly say it's for me. The constant sense of momentum gets fairly exhausting, and I liked the illusion of freedom and openness that Ys VIII provided by comparison, just by opening up its environments, providing some trivial map interconnectivity and letting the player take more detours while exploring.
The more I play RPGs, the more I find myself craving spending time in worlds - even if fairly small, cheesy, often contrived ones - and Ys Origin is decidedly not that.
And that's okay. Ys Origin doesn't have to be the game of my dreams - no game really has to be, and by that metric, no game probably ever will be. Perhaps there's a small part of me that wishes it was something different, both in terms of its narrative and premise, and in terms of its game design. But Ys Origin knows what it wants to be, excels at it and manages to confidently love itself and its forebears at every single step of the way.