Welcome back to The Game Collection!
I am SuperDerek and this is Ys VIII!
Ys VIII is the latest in a long-running series of action RPGs that date back to the beginning
of the RPG genre.
Developed by Nihon Falcom and published by Nipon Ichi Software, YIII continues the tradition
of fast action-packed combat, and above all else, fun!
The game was originally released on the PS Vita and PS4, but has recently been brought
over to the Nintendo Switch, which is the version I'm playing for this review.
In Ys VIII you play as Adol Christen the Red-haired Swordsman.
The story of Ys VIII takes place between the events of Ys V and VI, but it's important
to note that you don't really have to have played any of the previous games to pick up
and play Y's VIII.
The game picks up with Adol and his best friend Dogi aboard the Lombardia, a passenger ship
headed for Eresia.
Unfortunately, misfortune upon the high seas sends the Lombardia to the bottom of the sea
after an attack from a giant squid.
Adol, Dogi, and the passengers aboard the Lombardia awaken upon a deserted island, a
cursed island, from which no person has ever returned.
It's up to Adol to try to gather the scattered castaways, fortify a settlement against the
wilderness of the island, and uncover the mystery of this bizarre land.
The concept of survival on a mysterious island is one I haven't seen play out too many times
in RPG form, and when it does it's usually only for a few short hours at most.
This trope lends itself well to the exploration aspect of RPGs that I've been missing for
a while.
I think that towards the second half of the game, the story started to feel a little drawn
out, relying to a disappointing degree the convenient amnesia trope to keep the player
in the dark, which felt a little tired.
Aside from that caveat, the story was well paced!
Aside from the unique setting for Ys VIII, a lot of the story of the game was stuff we've
seen and played a few times before.
And I'm not saying this is bad, but I wouldn't expect the game to be challenging anyone's
worldviews any time soon.
To put it simply, if this game was an anime, it would be a shonen, and there's nothing
wrong with that!
It's the kind of game where you can sit down, plug in a few hours, and put it down easily.
This in turn lends itself well to playing on the Nintendo Switch or PS Vita.
That said, the characters are lovable, the humor was hit and miss unless you're a glut
for flatulence jokes in which case it was a gas!
And there were definitely some sad moments in the game that reminds the player of what's
at stake, a kind of stark contrast to the upbeat story up to that point.
I think that the real draw for players of Ys VIII will be the solid, fluid action RPG
gameplay.
At any point, the player may have 3 party members active, each of whom deal piercing,
slashing or bludgeoning type damage.
Enemies tend to be weak to one of these damage types, and the player can switch the controlled
character mid-battle with the press of a button.
In addition to this, players may also hold the R button plus a face button to execute
skills that hit harder, at the cost of skill points.
Using the L2 and R2 buttons the player can dodge or parry, and with perfect timing, gain
skill-points and temporary invincibility.
While the player controls a single character, the CPU will auto-pilot your active companions
either defensively or offensively, which the player can easily toggle on the fly, and they
even seem to do a pretty good job of not dying all of the time, which is a breath of fresh
air for this style of game!
All in all the battle mechanics and exploration mechanics feel sublime and intuitive, once
you've got the hang of the controls.
Beyond combat, there are a ton of little objectives you can embark on.
You can defend your settlement against attacks from the local wildlife, or go on the offensive
to hunt down enemies on their own turf.
There are items to collect for crafting, materials for weapon improvement, and enemies to kill
for armor and food production, and a lot more!
I actually got a little addicted to looking for all of the treasures, trying to map the
island like a professional cartographer, and locating and recruiting castaways.
However, sometimes navigating your way to a specific point on the map can feel impossible.
The map can sometimes give you some information, but not enough to really make navigation easy.
One of the main objectives within the game is to locate the castaway passengers and crew
of the Lombardia, and this is an objective that works well for the story, not just because
it's a story about a hero doing heroic things, but also because the people aboard the ship
usually have a unique trade that allows them to be useful to you when you're at the castaway
village.
Certain villagers can be traded with, upgrade your equipment; create medicine, and the more
castaways you rescue, the more areas they can help you explore.
During Raid and Hunting events, castaways also provide support to your team members
during battle, by firing catapults dealing massive damage to your foes, providing healing
to your allies, restoring skill points, and so on.
Despite taking place on a deserted island, the world within Ys VIII still felt huge!
This isn't your typical deserted island, as it contains giant mountains, ancient gigantic
trees, a deep chasm bisecting the island, and ruins of a long-lost civilization.
The game has petrified forests, dank swamps, and "melyes" of gorgeous sandy beaches.
It's actually surprising the developers were able to cram this much diversity into a single
island that still felt mostly cohesive by the end of it all.
The music within Ys VIII is phenomenal!
I've even featured it in a few of my recent videos because these themes get stuck in my
head, and they rock so hard!
The dub for Ys VIII is also really great, but for fans of Japanese audio, NIS America
will be releasing an update mid-July that adds the option.
Visually, Y's is nothing to write home about in the current generation of 1080p 60fps gaming,
but aesthetically I think it's not too bad!
There were only a few times when I noticed any lowering of fidelity in some of the larger
areas, some areas where the grass and other flora looked pretty jagged, but the depth-of-field
camera within the game uses actually helps hide some of that.
The frame rate seems pretty consistent overall, even during the fast-paced combat; combos
and skills kick off without a hitch and look pretty great!
In comparing the game to the PS4 version, there doesn't seem to be much of a difference
between the two, all in all.
The game started off its live as a Vita title, and as such most of the graphics in both versions
are basically exactly that.
The overall aesthetic of the island of Seiren was beautiful and lush, and was a pleasure
to get lost in for hours.
While playing the game I did notice a couple instances of character dialog overlapping,
being played concurrently rather than consecutively, but nothing really game-breaking.
With that in mind, NIS has announced that a few updates are on the way to fix some minor
bugs, one of which already came out.
Ys VIII was a fun and and action-packed RPG that held my attention for hours on end!
And time just flew by!
And for all these reasons the game has easily earned itself a spot in The Game Collection!
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