Post by Primulus on Aug 12, 2016 16:24:25 GMT -5
I've mentioned it before, but I feel like it needs its own thread. The Ys series is a series I've been getting into a lot more recently, and I'm enjoying it a lot.
The Ys series spans nine main titles so far. Ys I through VIII and also a prequel, Origin. Depending on the era of the game, there is a clear evolution of gameplay, but we can say with certainty that Ys started in a place not too dissimilar from Zelda. Developed by the studio Nihon Falcom, the series goes back to the late 80s, predating even Final Fantasy in its origins.
I feel like it is relevant here because, well, I still suspect that the Ys series is something that users like Rathlion, @maxgalactica, DarknessLink7 and flameheadshero may enjoy a lot. So for this thread, I am going to go over Ys Seven (oddly, the 7 is typed this way in all versions of the game instead of being displayed as "VII" like the roman numeral conventions for the rest of the numbered games) and then I intend on posting my initial impressions of Ys: Memories of Celceta later in the thread when I get the chance.
Ys Seven is a game that enthralled me for the time I had with it. Coming off of XCX, I was hungry for something more than what XCX offered me, and in turn I found this game. Its aesthetic is very anime, with a cast of characters that definitely don't look out of place in a JRPG. The game knows what it is and revels in it, not only poking fun at its own plot, but celebrating it.
Ys Seven is a game that very experimental compared to its predecessors. While the previous games of this series featured only a single playable character, the red-haired Adol, this game decided to buck the trend by featuring numerous playable characters that form a party. In a familiar sight to Xenoblade Chronicles, it presents itself with three party members at a time, where you play as one and the other two are controlled by a rudimentary AI. Unlike the game we all know quite well however, Ys Seven does this in a matter where the extra characters feel a little bit more like "extra lives" than true companions. The party members do not have voiced lines quipping back and forth (and aside from basic grunts and a few lines here and there, you don't really get much voice acting either), and ally party members seem to deal half normal damage as well as taking half damage from enemies, though the AI is usually competent enough to guard most enemy attacks. With the press of a button, you can switch the controlled character to any of the others in the active party at any time, and when your current character hits 0 HP, the control shifts over to another party member in the rotation. Finishing a boss off with dead party members, naturally, results in them not getting the experience from the battle, so it is best to try to aim to keep everyone alive, switching out when characters are at low health and then trying another approach.
Between each of the party members of Ys Seven, there are a multitude of playstyles, and an encouragement to keep your party orientation fresh. Each party member has a damage type associated with their attacks - slashing, piercing and striking - to which various enemies in dungeons and on the world map have weaknesses and strengths to. Many flying enemies, for instance, are weak to piercing attacks, but striking attacks usually miss them. Hard-shelled enemies are typically strong against slashing or piercing, but are very weak to striking. There are at least two party members for each type of damage, and various party member configurations can specialize in the weakness of a particular boss or enemies that are especially numerous in the dungeon you're currently fighting in. Even across party members of the same type of damage, however, there is a greatly different feel to each character's normal attacks, let alone their skills. Skills, by the way, are set and used a tiny bit like Arts from Xenoblade Chronicles, although I'd find it most accurate to compare it to active skills in Dragon's Dogma.
Combat in Ys Seven is the main attraction, and it serves pretty well, aside from some minor annoyances. It is extremely fast-paced - essentially if they took something akin to Dark Souls or 3D Zeldas (basically, the traditional action RPG) and strapped some rockets and wheels onto it. Everything is lightning-fast, and overall I felt the controls were extremely tight. The dodge roll didn't seem to give many (if any at all) frames of immunity however, making "getting out the way" of attacks more important. There is also a parry/guard command, but there are a handful of problems I had with it - namely, due to button settings, parrying/guarding would often automatically activate your EXTRA skill (explained later) by accident, and that the timing it was a bit harsh. If you did it too late, you'd take the full force of an attack, but if you tried to block too soon, you'd find yourself in the same situation, except the attack you're taking is now a guaranteed critical hit. Parrying/guarding took me quite a bit of learning, and ultimately it was one particular boss which forced me to learn it solely because I was having too much trouble dodging his attacks. (I am happy to report that Memories of Celceta, the next game released in the series, resolved these problems 100%.)
Although there are multiple difficulty settings (and Easy and Normal both remove abilities from each boss's move list), bosses are monstrously difficult in this game, to the point where I was stuck for days on quite a few of them. Unlike something like Dark Souls, bosses are a very long and grueling (but very fun) process, where most of your attacks won't do much damage to the boss's health bar, but the boss doesn't deal quite so much damage either. Healing is still very limited (progressively more limited as you up the difficulty), however, and you are expected to make a minimum number of mistakes to survive the encounter. Bosses are most definitely one of the main attractions of the series, and a big objective of them is wearing down a boss's endurance with standard attacks until it is stunned, which then allows you to land your strongest attacks freely. This often (but not always) includes your "EXTRA" skill, which is basically equivalent to a character's talent gauge in Xenoblade Chronicles. Unfortunately, one of the buttons to perform a guard is the same as the EXTRA skill, so if you're not careful, you may end up wasting it before it's time to use it while the boss is stunned. There are quite a few bosses, and each one is (usually) quite a joy to fight, and sometimes almost like a puzzle to slowly figure out. You have to learn how the boss moves, reading its tells, and reacting accordingly - as well as figuring out where and how to hit to do the most damage. Each boss is a unique experience unto itself, and it's hard not to have favorites based on which you find most fun to fight against.
With all that out of the way, I'd like to address the overworld exploration. There isn't too much of an exploration focus in Ys Seven (although Memories of Celceta definitely ups the exploration focus a bit), and unfortunately many areas are pretty straight-forward and while not necessarily a straight line or a hallway, it's not often you get lost or feel like you're just going in circles trying to find a way through an area. The game wants you to rush through and fight things, feeling like a more combat-focused Zelda where the world navigation is concerned. You do eventually get access to fast travel, however, with numerous landmarks to travel to.
In terms of story, the game probably suffers the most here. While you won't get anything fantastic out of either the characters in the party (which aren't really all that developed compared to most JRPGs, but still have a bit of personality to them), the key attraction here are some of the twists. My expectations on where this game would end up going were defied at mostly every twist, and there are a number of delightful twists along the way. Even when the game shows you foreshadowing scenes meant to make you question the motives of certain characters, it is well constructed enough to keep you guessing (likely incorrectly) on what the truth of the matter is. All that said, the story kicks into high gear with perhaps one of my favorite "your main character is a total badass" scenes in any JRPG I've ever played - and its centerpiece is an extraordinarily challenging boss fight that fits the feeling perfectly. (Speaking of the main character, note he is largely mute, following an ancient JRPG tradition of mute protagonists. At this point, it might just be heresy to fans of the series to make Adol talk.)
The story itself, however, also presents itself in a way in which you need no prior knowledge of the previous games, but two of the party members are characters who were introduced in previous games, and so their development is actually progressed the least, largely because their stories were covered in past games. You don't need to know their stories to enjoy the main story here, of course, but after finishing Ys Seven, one can always go back and play the previous games, getting more information on both of these characters and who they are. There are a handful of other references to previous games, but for the most part, it's hardly necessary to understand them. As each game takes place in a different region, with its own self-contained story, there is no need to play them in any particular order (with exception to I before II).
Musically, I've posted and gushed enough about this game in the music sharing thread. If you're reading this, you've heard the music of Ys Seven already.
I'm not one for numbered ratings, but I will say that this was the perfect game for me to pick up after XCX. The Ys series is my second love after Xenoblade, and it is a fantastic home away from home. As a rating, simply "loved it" will have to suffice. I'm currently immersed in Memories of Celceta, the PSVita remake of Ys IV, which takes the gameplay of Ys Seven and refines it greatly. I'll do another post on it sooner or later, summarizing my early impressions of it. (I may also soon update this 'review' post with screenshots to illustrate many of my points in this post.)
The Ys series spans nine main titles so far. Ys I through VIII and also a prequel, Origin. Depending on the era of the game, there is a clear evolution of gameplay, but we can say with certainty that Ys started in a place not too dissimilar from Zelda. Developed by the studio Nihon Falcom, the series goes back to the late 80s, predating even Final Fantasy in its origins.
I feel like it is relevant here because, well, I still suspect that the Ys series is something that users like Rathlion, @maxgalactica, DarknessLink7 and flameheadshero may enjoy a lot. So for this thread, I am going to go over Ys Seven (oddly, the 7 is typed this way in all versions of the game instead of being displayed as "VII" like the roman numeral conventions for the rest of the numbered games) and then I intend on posting my initial impressions of Ys: Memories of Celceta later in the thread when I get the chance.
Ys Seven is a game that enthralled me for the time I had with it. Coming off of XCX, I was hungry for something more than what XCX offered me, and in turn I found this game. Its aesthetic is very anime, with a cast of characters that definitely don't look out of place in a JRPG. The game knows what it is and revels in it, not only poking fun at its own plot, but celebrating it.
Ys Seven is a game that very experimental compared to its predecessors. While the previous games of this series featured only a single playable character, the red-haired Adol, this game decided to buck the trend by featuring numerous playable characters that form a party. In a familiar sight to Xenoblade Chronicles, it presents itself with three party members at a time, where you play as one and the other two are controlled by a rudimentary AI. Unlike the game we all know quite well however, Ys Seven does this in a matter where the extra characters feel a little bit more like "extra lives" than true companions. The party members do not have voiced lines quipping back and forth (and aside from basic grunts and a few lines here and there, you don't really get much voice acting either), and ally party members seem to deal half normal damage as well as taking half damage from enemies, though the AI is usually competent enough to guard most enemy attacks. With the press of a button, you can switch the controlled character to any of the others in the active party at any time, and when your current character hits 0 HP, the control shifts over to another party member in the rotation. Finishing a boss off with dead party members, naturally, results in them not getting the experience from the battle, so it is best to try to aim to keep everyone alive, switching out when characters are at low health and then trying another approach.
Between each of the party members of Ys Seven, there are a multitude of playstyles, and an encouragement to keep your party orientation fresh. Each party member has a damage type associated with their attacks - slashing, piercing and striking - to which various enemies in dungeons and on the world map have weaknesses and strengths to. Many flying enemies, for instance, are weak to piercing attacks, but striking attacks usually miss them. Hard-shelled enemies are typically strong against slashing or piercing, but are very weak to striking. There are at least two party members for each type of damage, and various party member configurations can specialize in the weakness of a particular boss or enemies that are especially numerous in the dungeon you're currently fighting in. Even across party members of the same type of damage, however, there is a greatly different feel to each character's normal attacks, let alone their skills. Skills, by the way, are set and used a tiny bit like Arts from Xenoblade Chronicles, although I'd find it most accurate to compare it to active skills in Dragon's Dogma.
Combat in Ys Seven is the main attraction, and it serves pretty well, aside from some minor annoyances. It is extremely fast-paced - essentially if they took something akin to Dark Souls or 3D Zeldas (basically, the traditional action RPG) and strapped some rockets and wheels onto it. Everything is lightning-fast, and overall I felt the controls were extremely tight. The dodge roll didn't seem to give many (if any at all) frames of immunity however, making "getting out the way" of attacks more important. There is also a parry/guard command, but there are a handful of problems I had with it - namely, due to button settings, parrying/guarding would often automatically activate your EXTRA skill (explained later) by accident, and that the timing it was a bit harsh. If you did it too late, you'd take the full force of an attack, but if you tried to block too soon, you'd find yourself in the same situation, except the attack you're taking is now a guaranteed critical hit. Parrying/guarding took me quite a bit of learning, and ultimately it was one particular boss which forced me to learn it solely because I was having too much trouble dodging his attacks. (I am happy to report that Memories of Celceta, the next game released in the series, resolved these problems 100%.)
Although there are multiple difficulty settings (and Easy and Normal both remove abilities from each boss's move list), bosses are monstrously difficult in this game, to the point where I was stuck for days on quite a few of them. Unlike something like Dark Souls, bosses are a very long and grueling (but very fun) process, where most of your attacks won't do much damage to the boss's health bar, but the boss doesn't deal quite so much damage either. Healing is still very limited (progressively more limited as you up the difficulty), however, and you are expected to make a minimum number of mistakes to survive the encounter. Bosses are most definitely one of the main attractions of the series, and a big objective of them is wearing down a boss's endurance with standard attacks until it is stunned, which then allows you to land your strongest attacks freely. This often (but not always) includes your "EXTRA" skill, which is basically equivalent to a character's talent gauge in Xenoblade Chronicles. Unfortunately, one of the buttons to perform a guard is the same as the EXTRA skill, so if you're not careful, you may end up wasting it before it's time to use it while the boss is stunned. There are quite a few bosses, and each one is (usually) quite a joy to fight, and sometimes almost like a puzzle to slowly figure out. You have to learn how the boss moves, reading its tells, and reacting accordingly - as well as figuring out where and how to hit to do the most damage. Each boss is a unique experience unto itself, and it's hard not to have favorites based on which you find most fun to fight against.
With all that out of the way, I'd like to address the overworld exploration. There isn't too much of an exploration focus in Ys Seven (although Memories of Celceta definitely ups the exploration focus a bit), and unfortunately many areas are pretty straight-forward and while not necessarily a straight line or a hallway, it's not often you get lost or feel like you're just going in circles trying to find a way through an area. The game wants you to rush through and fight things, feeling like a more combat-focused Zelda where the world navigation is concerned. You do eventually get access to fast travel, however, with numerous landmarks to travel to.
In terms of story, the game probably suffers the most here. While you won't get anything fantastic out of either the characters in the party (which aren't really all that developed compared to most JRPGs, but still have a bit of personality to them), the key attraction here are some of the twists. My expectations on where this game would end up going were defied at mostly every twist, and there are a number of delightful twists along the way. Even when the game shows you foreshadowing scenes meant to make you question the motives of certain characters, it is well constructed enough to keep you guessing (likely incorrectly) on what the truth of the matter is. All that said, the story kicks into high gear with perhaps one of my favorite "your main character is a total badass" scenes in any JRPG I've ever played - and its centerpiece is an extraordinarily challenging boss fight that fits the feeling perfectly. (Speaking of the main character, note he is largely mute, following an ancient JRPG tradition of mute protagonists. At this point, it might just be heresy to fans of the series to make Adol talk.)
The story itself, however, also presents itself in a way in which you need no prior knowledge of the previous games, but two of the party members are characters who were introduced in previous games, and so their development is actually progressed the least, largely because their stories were covered in past games. You don't need to know their stories to enjoy the main story here, of course, but after finishing Ys Seven, one can always go back and play the previous games, getting more information on both of these characters and who they are. There are a handful of other references to previous games, but for the most part, it's hardly necessary to understand them. As each game takes place in a different region, with its own self-contained story, there is no need to play them in any particular order (with exception to I before II).
Musically, I've posted and gushed enough about this game in the music sharing thread. If you're reading this, you've heard the music of Ys Seven already.
I'm not one for numbered ratings, but I will say that this was the perfect game for me to pick up after XCX. The Ys series is my second love after Xenoblade, and it is a fantastic home away from home. As a rating, simply "loved it" will have to suffice. I'm currently immersed in Memories of Celceta, the PSVita remake of Ys IV, which takes the gameplay of Ys Seven and refines it greatly. I'll do another post on it sooner or later, summarizing my early impressions of it. (I may also soon update this 'review' post with screenshots to illustrate many of my points in this post.)