ys origins is a game that never stops. your objective is to find the goddesses that, after a demonic attack, suddenly disappeared and went into a mysterious tower. you are in a hurry so this fast paced action rpg translates very well the necessities of our protagonists! either playing as yunica or hugo, you are all-in for action, with a variety of enemies and very well design boss fights, either cutting them with your axe or shooting them as if you were in a shmup with your magic wand, both having this kingdom hearts 2 feeling when hitting enemies and turning the combat even more pleasant. also, very good level design that utilizes everything you have at your disposal to traverse the tower, as soon as you get the abilities and powers, in a very zelda dungeon way!

while the stories of both yunica and hugo are not totally canon and the true story is the secret character you unlock after beating both of their campaigns, you get to understand them and their relationships and, later, connect the dots when playing the true story. you get to known their insecurities and how they overcome them, how important the goddesses and all key people in the tower are in their life. it's actually amazing to think that the whole celeste's discourse of "climbing a mountain and growing as a person (both as char and player)" was actually kind of made here? being a dungeon crawler rpg with characters getting to known their places and purposes as they go up in the tower is a really good narrative of coming of age and self-discovering that utilizes its game design for it. also bang ost (those guitars man...) and i really love the little VN segments that tell stories outside of the tower -- it is a cool and stylish decision and very well paced between segments and floors. really amazing videogame!! excited to play more ys games in the future.

L2AGO #5

The more I play Ys Origin, the more convinced I become of its greatness.

Ys Origin takes place 700 years before the events of Ys I, and deals with events of desperation and devastation; the land of Ys has been flooded with torrents of disasters, and the Goddesses have gone missing overnight, leaving Solomon Shrine in danger and its denizens fearful. A search party has descended down to the land to try and make sense of the chaos, and in its wake stumble upon Darm Tower, where demons have suspiciously gathered. If you've played Ys I & II, many of the same bosses return here in Darm Tower from Ys I, only with Darm Tower serving as the whole ecosystem. The Tower itself has been greatly expanded and varied, with a plethora of different environments and enemies to keep you on your toes. And yet it's extremely thoughtful and condensed dungeon crawling; the levels are laid out neatly with virtually no labyrinths (I guess you could argue the Hall of Mirrors is one, though it's fairly short) and I never found myself getting lost due to the fairly straightforward layouts and helpful NPCs located at key points to give you hints if needbe. It also helps that you're encouraged to partake in this aggressive fast paced combat through an EXP multiplier that stays active as long as you keep throwing out successful hitboxes against enemies in levels; time flew by so quickly when traversing Darm Tower, and I enjoyed every moment of it.

Where I think Ys Origin really succeeds is allowing for extremely varied gameplay while keeping combat fast and engaging regardless of variation. You've got two starter protagonists and one unlockable "secret" protagonist, and they all play differently. Yunica's your midrange fighter; she's relatively fast and fights with an axe, but later on gains more options to expand her range such as a fast special spin attack and a fire bolt projectile, and thus balancing when to fight upfront vs fight from a distance is necessary to mastering her playstyle. Hugo's the slowest character but works by overwhelming his opponents with projectiles; his specials range from a quick shield to mines, and the key to mastering him is focusing on positioning to make sure he's always in the right place to dish out damage without becoming too susceptible to attacks. Finally, the secret character has some of the fastest and most spammable melee attacks in the game, but as a result he doesn't have much room for safety spacing; as a result, you'll need to know exactly when to go aggro on enemies and when/how to back off to dodge incoming attacks on the fly. Having completed runs with all three characters at this point, I'm happy to report that it didn't feel like there was an obvious "best" character and an obvious "worst" character; they all have their merits, and I would gladly recommend trying all of them out. You'll end up fighting some similar and some different bosses throughout each run, so it's not like the whole experience is just another character thrown into the same design after all.

Speaking of which, the bosses. One of my biggest complaints with Ys: The Oath in Felghana was that 80% of the bosses felt like an endurance test; you spend the vast majority of fights just dodging enemy attacks left and right until the boss decides that they're okay with letting you attack them, with the boss out of range or in an invulnerable state until then. Playing through Ys Origin is fortunately a much different experience. Almost every boss can be actively engaged with at all times; there's almost always an opportunity to deal damage or pressure to a boss to progress fights, and generally they will attempt to dissuade you from wailing on them by sending out hitboxes and dishing damage to overly aggressive players rather than entering invulnerability or leaving the arena. Even the two bosses that don't play by this rule (the centipede and the lava punchy boss) are constantly throwing themselves out there for you to strike back, giving you a stronger sense of player agency over the fight and allowing for significantly less "downtime" than many of the boss fights in Oath in Felghana. Understanding the push & pull of boss fights in Ys Origin is key to mastering the game; there's no dodge roll or shield to save you here, so you'll have to think fast on your feet and jump/dodge attacks manually while juggling in the necessary offense as your win condition.

Let's talk briefly about the story too. Ys Origin's narrative is very simply told; there's only about 10 minutes max of exposition and dialogue to set up the story near the beginning, and then you're more or less let loose to start your ascent up the tower. Throughout your run, you'll learn more about the state of affairs around you as well as the protagonist's backstory, and all three of the protagonists stand out in this regard. Yunica's dealing with the loss of her close parental figures and struggles to get through the shadow of her past. Hugo's constantly comparing himself to those around him, and wonders what more it's going to take for him to finally achieve recognition and self-actualization. And the secret character? Let's just say that he's dealing with his wavering beliefs, and he's stuck in the middle wondering what to do with those who remain. While combat remains the focus of Ys Origin, its tale told via three different timelines (of three different protagonists) definitely plays a huge part of the experience; it won't take up too much of your time, but the worldbuilding and characterization that Falcom's staked a reputation off of remains fairly solid here.

And finally, I've basically stated this with different words for every Falcom game review I've done, but the soundtrack is phenomenal. Ys Origin in particular has some of the best tunes that I think Falcom Sound Team jdk has ever produced. Just give them a listen and you'll see what I mean.

At the end of the day, Ys Origin is just a goddamn fun game to play. The combat feels so great to engage with, the controls are extremely responsive, there's tons of variety via different protagonists and different attacks, boss fights are super flashy and enthralling, the soundtrack is fire, and there's a solid story packaged with this phenomenal gameplay that doesn't feel intrusive whatsoever. If I really had to nitpick, there are some enemies near the end that can reverse your controls temporarily with confusion (that fortunately can be somewhat alleviated through buying upgrades in the statue) and you can grind to make some boss fights more trivial by dealing more damage while taking less, though it's not always necessary as long as you're constantly engaging with overworld enemies. And once you beat the game with all three protagonists, you'll also unlock an arena where you can just hack away at enemies all day to your pleasure to unlock more rewards in a bonus shop, or partake in the classic boss rush. This is one of the easiest recommendations I can give for tightly constructed action-adventure games, and in my opinion, Ys Origin should not just be known as one of the best hidden gems of the 2000s, but as one of the greatest games of all time. I keep meaning to put this down, but it just keeps getting better. For a game set at the apocalyptic beginning, Ys Origin just refuses to age.

The world is a cruel and unjust place.
There is no harmony in the universe.
The only constant is suffering.
Minutes later
OMG YUNICA, HI 🥰🥰🥰

2 minutes.
2 minutes is all it takes for Ys Origin to drag you straight into a flow state. Its unclear how much time passes as you rush room to room, keeping massive chains going as each little drop of xp creates the sensational dopamine rush needed to forget that a world still exists around you. Every moment expertly paced with tricky boss fights and a relatively engaging narrative.

It all builds to a climax as you finish a final boss and beat a singular route, only to dive right back in again like an adrenaline junky.

It's an incredible game, one I will likely revisit over and over again throughout my life. Could not recommend it enough

Ys Origins : A Blast from the Past

2006 marked the 20th anniversary of the Ys franchise, since then the series has gone through a lot, sometimes succeeding in living up to the legacy left by the first game and sometimes failing miserably at doing so. Nonetheless, in the minds of many Ys only really exist through the prism of its first 2 original entries, in fact, you could easily say that the only two games in the franchise worthy of the title of “Ys” were the first two games. Not only were these the only games actually set in the land of Ys and its surrounding area of Esteria but Ys II also happened to be “the final chapter” as if out of all of Adol’s Adventure and in spite this one being the first, it was the single most important adventure, the one which defined Ys as a franchise and the one where all things return to in the end.

In the Falcom community there seem to be this common consensus that Trails is the “story and lore” focused franchise while Ys is the “gameplay and action” franchise boiling down Ys as nothing more than just a simple past-time between two big episodes of the Trails series which have more meat to their bones while Ys has this much “rawer” approach to storytelling which doesn’t speak to the common youth of today. Ys stories aren’t worth analyzing because they’re not wordy enough, they’re not deep enough and they’re quite derivative of each other. In fact, the main storyline set by Ys 1 and 2 has been reused countless times throughout the series. Adol crashes on some island, has some adventure involving one or two girls with blue hair and it always ends up with him uncovering the mystery of an ancient civilization which fell to ruin because of the folly of man.

But why ? Why has Falcom tried to recapture the magic of Ys 1 and 2’s story either through re-releases or new games with similar premises if the story in those games were only meant to be a “motivator” for your quest and nothing more ? Well maybe it’s because Ys 1 and 2 in all of their 80’s sensibilities had something to stand out from the crowd and that something was its rich and interesting story as well as its lore ! Back in the first review, I said that Ys 1’s main objective was to make an accessible RPG for newcomers and while it was successfully done through its game mechanics, I also want to believe this was achieved through its storytelling even in the older version which had less memory for text and all that jazz.

In the 80’s most RPG’s would only have maybe like a text scroll to establish the setting and maybe some NPC trying to talk about some prophecies or wtv, Final Fantasy I will try to have more ambitious storytelling with the whole time-traveling which as iconic of a twist this was, it was a rather messy attempt even for the standard of the era. Falcom were different however, as far as Dragon Slayer and Xanadu they wanted to tell stories through the complex medium of video games and integrate that story inside of the game design loop. That’s how you end up with Ys which became the culmination of that philosophy, where by exploring the world, talking to NPC’s, reading the manual and watching the various attempts at cutscenes even in the older versions you would be experiencing a story and a world worth giving a shit about.

In the original Zelda for exemple, everything was very mechanical, there were no towns, only caves full of old men giving cryptic hint and monsters offering you rubies, the wonder of Zelda came mostly from its freeform explorative approach to game design while in comparison Ys was much more restrictive in the areas you explored and in which order you were supposed to explore them.
Ys 1 and 2 told a story, much more developed than those of the era, it had books that you can read and learn about the lore of this world, it had an on-going storyline about some guy stealing silver which culminated in a puzzle to the scale of the entire game and was the key to defeat the final boss, it had iconic characters with arcs some of which returned in the other titles.

Feena and Rheah from their design to the way you speak and interact with them have this aura of mystery surrounding them that makes you want to learn more about their circumstances and how tragic their fate ends up being in the end. It also had cutscenes to introduce the plot of the two half and Lillia fucking tilt her head in glorious 80’s animation and made every 10 year old boy wet their pants at how fucking impressive that was at the time that Lillia became the icon of the series all throughout the 80’s (she even had her own freaking song !!!!).

Everything about the original Ys 1 and 2 were iconic, for today’s standard it might be hard to understand the appeal or the magic of these few elements but combined together and you have a game with some of the most effective storytelling in the medium. It’s so iconic that Ys 1&2 iconography and characters are pretty much the one thing Falcom keeps reusing in all of the series promotional material. It even had an anime, a manga adaptation, an extended Korean remake of the 2nd game (that I wish I could play because it makes me very curious but alas I don’t speak Korean) and even to this very day when you look up at Ys tags on various websites, Feena is the one character to pop up the most in fanarts while you’d think more recent heroines from games which sold much better like Dana would dominate the leaderboard on the waifu wars.

With such cult classic status, it’s only natural that the new team at Falcom wanted to take their piece of the Ys pies by adding their own flavor and their own interpretation of it much like Hudson did in the 90’s when they got the opportunity to work on an original entry for the franchise. This started with “Ys 1&2 Eternal”, the latest version of the game at the time which set out to completely overhaul the script to fit Falcom’s modern standard of storytelling set by the Gagharv trilogy. A bigger emphasis was put on fleshing out the characters and especially fleshing out Adol and Feena relationship (Lillia was always kinda mid and Kondo basically erasing her relevance in the modern canon was the right decision imo) but also make the towns more alive and the world bigger much like they did with Oath in Felghana later down the line.

This was a first step towards (war) the modernization of the classic Ys tale with the new team releasing Ys VI two years later in 2003 which set out to do what Dawn did 10 years ago by creating a new yet familiar story set in a distant land which holds the answer to many of the unanswered mysteries of Ys 1&2 and whether or not you might prefer Hudson’s take or this one, today Ys VI and its story of ancient technologically advanced civilization and magic reality warping metal is now the current canon of the franchise even if we could be regretting that it kind of takes away a lot of the “mystic” of Feena’s and Rheah’s origins. Oath tied Ys III to the wider lore of the franchise and now to solidify the new lore once and for all, Falcom was going to go back to the origins of the franchise, for the first time in over 20 years, Ys was going back to Ys to explore the origins of this legendary tale in a game set 700 years before the event of the first game and that game which will end up as one of the most popular entry in the franchise for a while will be simply known as Ys Origins !
Ys Origins released in 2006 set to re-explore the mythical Origins of Ys, the game takes place roughly after the ancient city of Ys took off into the sky and the demons born from the Black Pearl built a Tower in order to try and reach it. The two Goddesses worried about what might be happening on the surface one day disappeared and thus an investigation team was set on the surface to retrieve them and explore the Demon Tower. Since the game takes place roughly 700 years before Adol’s birth you obviously won’t be playing as him for this adventure (though two different version of him is playable in the game boss rush mode) but rather as 3 different protagonists each taking turns in climbing the wretched tower each with their own gameplay style and differing storylines.

This is the main difference between this game and Oath when it comes to mechanics, since Oath pretty much perfected the Ark style of gameplay this one simply just builds on top of it by proposing different playable characters as its central main gimmick. The only real change from Oath to Origins is the addition of a shop in which you can spend points in order to buy upgrades for your equipment or helpful permanent perks for your character. So let’s go around and take a look at each of these characters, see how they play and analyze their storyline because for once, Origins script actually has a lot more meat to it than previous entries thanks in no small part to not having a mute protagonist as the main lead this time around.

Yunica Tovah is the daughter of Sage Tovah, every citizen of Ys have some affinity for magic but Yunica was born without any magical power which ostracized her from the rest of society and gave her severe anxiety over not being able to live up to her prestigious lineage. However she shared a deep friendship with the Twin Goddesses who pretty much served as close friend and surrogate mother to them and in spite of her inaptitude in wielding magic she still took the pledge to protect the two goddess by becoming a knight and likely lifting up massive amount of weight because this tiny woman sure can wield a big ass ax as her main weapon. When she heard that the goddesses left for the surface, she immediately joined the investigation team to find them and bring them back on the floating island to fulfill her promise to the two of them.

Yunica is the closest this game gets from classic Adol gameplay, she pretty much has almost all of the same moveset as Adol and her wielding an ax doesn’t seem to affect her swinging speed whatsoever, Yunica doesn’t have many options to deal with enemies at a distance and only gets a projectile near the end of the game with the trade-off being that she has to switch from using her ax to using a flaming greatsword making her damage output bigger but slowing down her movement significantly, this stance only slightly being compensated by being able to finally shoot projectiles.

Yunica is a character which doesn’t really stray away too far from classic Ys gameplay, even her two additional elemental magic power are a circular wind attack vaguely similar to the ones found in Oath, the fire spell we mentioned works like the fire sword in Napishtim and only her thunder spell is slightly different being a slam on the ground which create a vertical shockwave in front of her. However I still had fun playing as her because if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it and that’s how Yunica feels like as far as gameplay goes but what about her storyline ?


As you climb Darm’s Tower, Yunica comes to question her own abilities and even her reasons for going into the tower in the first place. She experiences self doubt and there’s some really touching moment where she wonders if she’s even fit to be a knight or be the goddesses protector when everyone around her is seemingly more capable than her at dealing with this situation. You can feel that Yunica’s reason for getting up the tower is mostly a personal one, it’s a reason for her to confront her fear and insecurities as well as reinforce her devotion to her cause ! I personally really love Yunica, I feel she’s pretty underrated as far as Ys heroine goes and it’s a shame she’s not talked about that much in the wider Falcom community as the only character equal to her in my mind is Estelle from Trails in the Sky and that’s high praise coming from me.

However, I do understand why most people don’t really feel for Yunica that much, it’s a classic journey of self discovery with the tower being a metaphor for overcoming a big obstacle in her life, it’s the classic shonen anime story of a character starting weak and full of insecurities but through trials and tribulation rise up from her condition to become a badass. It’s the type of story that works well in the context of an RPG or even a videogame because as much as you the player get stronger and become better at the game so does Yunica in her story, it’s a very easy way to have a bit of ludo-narrative in the game without thinking too much. But it’s also a story you’ve likely seen somewhere else, it’s still effective, it’s still well executed but it isn’t exactly novel either and whether you’ll find yourself inspired by Yunica or just think of it as just another story in the pile is really up to you.

The bigger issue with Yunica’s story other than its lack of originality is just that it’s super disconnected from the rest of the game for reasons we’ll get into when discussing the other two characters which happen to have a deeper relationship and to one another as far as the wider story goes. Yunica’s story just kinda feel isolated and probably the least canon or least worth experiencing if you’re here to mainly experience the story of the game (even if it’s not likely the reason why you’re playing an Ys game in the first place, but this one is kind of an exception to the rule and also deeply tied to the lore of the franchise). Combine that with her play style being really similar to Adol and the redundancy and irrelevance of the character becomes quite hard to ignore as much as it pains me to say this because Yunica is a pretty cool gal all things considered and my second favorite character to play as in the game.

But enough about women wielding axes, it’s time to talk about the man, the myth, the legend, mister Sigma Male incarnate himself Hugo Fact. Hugo is a descendent of the house of Fact, a prestigious family of mages which excels in all things magical and accept nothing less than perfection when it comes to their teaching. Each member of the Fact family is molded from birth to always strive to be better than everyone else even sacrificing your humanity if it means achieving greater power. As such Hugo is the polar opposite of Yunica, he’s confident to a fault, cocky, ambitious, abrasive, egotistical, he thinks of himself as better, smarter, stronger and superior to everyone else and he’s also the CEO of misogyny (seriously this guy level of women disrespect is OFF THE CHART). Heck, the guy really hasn’t any personal reason to join the investigation, he doesn’t do it out of moral obligation and he couldn’t care less about the well-being of the two goddesses which he has some r/atheism opinion about (despite them literally existing within the canon). The reason he decided to climb the tower was because he was given a mission to find and kill a man who happens to be on the surface on behalf of his father and he just sees this mission as just another fun way to pass the time and flex his skills.
And you will be flexing a lot because Hugo Fact is fucking BROKEN AS SHIT. Unlike Yunica, Hugo plays very differently from your typical Ys game. His gameplay mostly focus on shooting projectiles than dealing with enemies with close combat, it makes the gameplay of the game feel closer to that of a shmup than that of a typical action RPG, and by the end of his run you start to feel like someone who just got an absurdly good pool of power ups with the most perfect synergies in the Binding of Isaac.Instead of attacking with a regular weapon, Hugo has two orbiting artifacts known as the Eyes of Fact which constantly shoot little pellets as long as you keep mashing that attack button. To compensate with the absurd advantages of shooting a shit load of projectile at an incredibly fast rate, Hugo has to stop in his tracks whenever he’s shooting which makes it harder to dodge upcoming attacks, assuming the enemies would even get the luxury of counter attacking you (and even then, his lunge attack is a big fuck you thunder with a wider range and which even debuffs any enemies it touches like wow !).

And his three spells you obtain throughout the course of the game are nothing to shy on about either : His wind spell produce a shield around him which slows down his descend to clear huge gaps but most importantly can tank one or multiple hits before breaking depending on whether you charged it or not and even grants you the power of bump combat in case you missed that shit since 1993 ! His thunder spell are remote bombs which when fully charged deal so much fucking damage it kills pretty much any ennemies in one hit even when you’re underleveled, the charge time isn’t even that long actually so you can pretty melt freaking bosses faster than climate change melts the artics. And lastly his fire spell produce two orbiting fire orbs dealing damage around hugo at a really hit rate and when charged can even launch two big fuck you lasers. Add to this the fact that his boost mode doubles his fire rate by adding a second pair of Eyes and you have a recipe for disaster.

Look as much as I can see the fun in going “random bullshit go” and “Press X to win” type of gameplay, I feel Hugo is a bit fucking overkill in that department, you’re literally a freaking unstoppable god, even on higher difficulties Hugo’s run is a freaking walk in the park to the point that I found his gameplay to be mostly boring rather than fun. When the game presents to you any form of challenge it kinda goes against the purposes of an action rpg where you have to properly use your toolset to handle different situation and maxing your combat efficiency, here everything usually die so fast and your bonus gauge make you so strong and tanky that the gameplay becomes a formality and you really shouldn’t be feeling that when playing an Ys game. It’s one thing to make you feel powerful through the gameplay, but simply making you broken beyond belief isn’t really gonna cut it buster.

To compensate for his relatively lackluster gameplay, Hugo’s story is actually pretty damn good, I think I started to got a knack for absolutely chaotic protagonist which are the embodiment of problematic, an entire life-time of being raised on anime and manga where protagonist archetypes aren’t the most varied will do that to you but Hugo’s story feel like you’re playing as that rival character who succumbs to darkness before eventually getting his shit together and help the heroes. Hugo’s interaction with the rest of the cast whether they’re allies or foes are so thoroughly entertaining thanks to his snarky ass behavior and some well delivered punchline which will either make you scream “yoooo” or will make you punch his fucking face and I think it makes for some really interesting dynamics. He even has some sort of a will-they won’t-they romance with one of the antagonists and it’s pretty fun and strangely wholesome to see that relationship evolve and sadly end in tragedy…
Because the path to power comes with many sacrifices mostly of your own humanity, whereas Yunica’s quest is all about overcoming her shortcomings, Hugo’s quest is to learn how to empathize with other people again and breaking from the conditioning left by his father and become his own man free from the ambitions of the house of Fact. As you progress through the game Hugo loses himself more and more getting drunk on all the power he’s been accumulating until he realizes that he’s turning into more of a demon than the demons he’s fighting. Hugo’s story is really damn cool, if only to see a second more unique perspective on the different story segment covered in Yunica’s route but I have two issues with it imo.

One and this is linked to Yunica, I do think that both characters should’ve had more of a confrontation which is the entire purpose of a dual narrative like this. But sadly, it’s never the case, when you’re playing as Hugo, Yunica is a tertiary character at best and vice-versa and instead of their arc paralleling each other, they’re treated as just separate interpretations of the same events. And while I guess that works for the main series where the story is based on Adol’s diaries, here the story is just “how they remember it” and none of the two tales are even that canon.

My other problem with Hugo’s campaign is how it ends. I don’t think giving a last minute redemption arc to the guy was the best course of action. Everything in Hugo’s route leads me to believe the initial plan for his character was to completely lose himself to the power of his demon essence and become Dark Fact, the antagonist of the first game and with this game being a prequel it only makes sense that this was a possibility. Heck even one of his leitmotiv shares some similarities to Dark Fact’s theme so what was all that bait and switch all about. I would’ve absolutely pog out of my damn mind if they turned Hugo into Dark Fact and make him some sort of tragic victim of his own hubris as he was close to regaining his humanity and break from his father’s will, it would’ve make for quite the amazing tie to the first game in my opinion.

If you consider the wider story however it’s even messier. Because as cool and kino Hugo’s entire arc in this game is and it’s still a relatively ok conclusion in the end, making the entire point of Hugo’s story about breaking the traditional thirst for power of the house of Fact only for his direct descendent 700 years down the line to just undo all of his ancestor’s effort and just be a generic Dark Lord McDoucheBag is pretty freaking lame. Especially since now it leaves Dark Fact as this iconic villain but one which has no real layers to him, I mean his name is literally Dark Fact (not Sieg like in Dawn) probably because his parents fucking hated him or something and since the OVA’s aren’t canon, he doesn’t have the tragic villain schtick of that version of his story either. Dark Fact will forever remain dark and I do think it’s a fact that this entire thing is just a huge missed opportunity that could’ve given both Hugo and the main antagonist of Ys 1 a lot more layers even if retrospectively (à la Jack Garland from FF Strangers of Paradise).

But while Hugo doesn’t have much parallel to Yunica within the story, he has with the man he came to kill in the first place : Claw which will reveal to Hugo that the House of Fact definitely needs counseling more than any sage family on this goddamn island. Once you finish the story of both Yunica and Hugo, the surprise plot twist of the game is that a third playable character unlocks and this time it’s the actual main canon storyline of the game which ties deeper into the worldbuilding, lore and continuity with Ys 1&2.
The mysterious Claw is a recurring antagonist you fight throughout the course of Yunica and Hugo’s campaign but definitely has more ties to Hugo than he does Yunica (who sure as hell is starting to feel like a filler character the more lines I type). He used to be a man but chose the path of becoming a demon joining the Darklings a mysterious organization that you may or may have not heard of from a little game known as Ys VI but are also for the most part the generals of Darm from Ys II which is pretty neat. Now Claw’s story is perhaps the best part of this entire anthology story and there’s so many cool things they do with him and his connections to the goddess, specifically Rheah, who gets much more development in this game than she ever did originally. It’s also the only story chapter with a unique intro featuring our two favorite goddesses explaining why they’ve descended upon the surface in the first place.

Gameplay wise, Claw is pretty much a glass cannon, he hits hard but also takes a lot more of a beating. To compensate for his demonic power somehow giving him glass bones syndrome, he’s probably the most fast and agile character of the three in fact very early on his first spell is literally a dash that gives him a bit of invincibility and allows you to quickly get out of tough situations. In fact because he is the third playable character you’re probably familiar with the overall structure and level design of the game by now and the dash makes clearing areas much faster so Claws campaign is about half as short as the other two. But outside of his dash spell, the other two leaves kind of a lot to be desired : The Thunder spell is a powerful thunder punch which locks you into place and has a miserably small hitbox and the fire spell is just a tornado jump and let’s just that in a game where it’s impossible to juggle enemies into the air, it’s only situationally useful in terms of combat.

Claw is probably the character I like to play as the most out of all 3 characters mostly because dashing through the corridors of the Darm tower at Super speed dealing with enemies along the way brings that constant exhilarating sense of motion which has become titular of the Ys series core identity. And even tho the rest of his toolkit leaves a lot to be desired, I was more than satisfied with his base moveset as well as his boost mode which fully turns him into a demon dealing a truck load of damage but making you even more prone to ass-beating, an interesting risk vs reward mechanic in my opinion.

But the icing on the cake for me is definitely the story of Claw, if you played Hugo’s campaign there isn’t any mystery towards his identity as it is revealed right from the onset that he is Hugo’s brother who mysteriously disappeared after the demon invasion on Ys a couple of years before the events of the game. What led this man to shun his previous identity, his weapon and the pledge he gave to the goddess to join the demons in their relentless assault against the city of Ys ? And how does his story tie to the wider lore of the franchise up to that point ?

Well that’s for you to discover, I think Toal is perhaps one of the only story worth experiencing blind in this game especially if you’re familiar with the original two titles as its doing some pretty interesting thing with the continuity and tying up what you’re doing to stuff Adol will eventually interact with in the future game. The ending of that route is the type of ending to give a complete boomer who got hooked on playing Ys as a kid a complete full hard-on at how everything comes back together in the end and even though I’m not a boomer who played these games as a kid (I only discovered them in 2022), the ending of that route and the game as a whole gave so many fucking chills god I love Ys OG setting.
As you can probably guess by now, I think Ys Origins is one of the few Ys games with a remarkably well told and interesting story thanks in no small part to its tie to the original two games to which I have a lot of appreciation for especially its lore. The game often throws retro-active reference to the first two games either through its story moments, puzzles or even the items you come across which are artifacts Adol eventually uses himself in Ys 1&2 which just has a nice bit of continuity which reminded me a lot of what Dawn of Ys did. But whereas Dawn, as awesome as it was, could seem like fanfiction in the way it retcons a lot of stuff into its own plot, here the team at Falcom did a valiant effort to respect the sanctity and the mystic of the original game essence.

So many times prequel mostly exist to ruin the magic of the original title of which they’re supposed to pay homage to but not Ys Origins, Ys Origins is a fantastic companion piece to Ys 1&2, you could imagine they would’ve shoved more of the modern canon stuff into the main storyline but I’m glad they didn’t push it too hard especially if some people are just interested in these games. While the side-cast is kinda there for the ride with not many of them standing out, Feena and Rheah got some much needed amount of extra characterization and background added to them and It’s done in a way which only reinforced my love for these iconic characters rather than ruining them with pointless details or some stupidly subversive plot twist like it’s often the case in way too many productions. I should give a special shoutout to Rheah in particular who didn’t really have much as far as character goes in the original 2 games but here got a lot more presence in the narrative and even a pretty cute romance story with Claw which was surprising to see.

Setting the entire story inside of Darm’s Tower might probably sound like a bad idea as far as visual variety goes especially in a series which thrived on exploring varied and mysterious environments but I found that they did a really solid job reimagining one of the most iconic location in the series for the modern age. Which makes me realize that in all of my fanboyism, I forgot to talk about the overall level design of the game as well as the different bosses you confront throughout your ascension of the Darm Tower.

In my Oath in Felghana review, I’ve mentioned that one of the unfortunate side-effects of basing the game on a game which had a more rigid level-based structure kinda took away from the feeling of adventure and freedom that the previous game offered ! However, I’ve also said that such a level design had its place in the Ark Engine system which had more of an arcade vibe with the combo meters and the general faster flow of the game and that it wasn’t bad as much as it was restrictive. Well Ys Origins kinda falls right into those same trappings, diving head straight into them like an olympic swimmer. The game does have an upgrade system giving you new abilities and tool for your move set but unlike Oath in which it gave the world a sort of Metroidvania feel to it as it was often advised to go back to old areas to get items and complete side quest here in Ys Origins, these new abilities only serves as keys to open locks in the areas you got them with very little incentive to actually go back to previous areas.

Some people might think that it’s a good thing actually as it doesn’t needlessly waste your time with pointless detour but some people might also miss the pleasure of exploration the franchise is known for and thus while I don’t think it’s a flaw of the game, I could potentially understand how divisive this could be. But, on the other hand, Ys Origins was the most popular title series for a reason and its level design is perhaps the best in the entire series.
You may think that an entire game set in one place will eventually become boring but thankfully, this is a vastly overhauled version of the Tower from Ys 1&2 with each floor serving as its own dungeon so to speak complete with unique combat encounters, puzzles, platforming challenges, level design gimmick and themes to each of the 7 floors which compose your ascension of the wretched tower ! And I think they did a more than fantastic job with each of them in my opinion. Unlike Oath which felt the need to incorporate a lot of frankly questionable 2.5D sections to parallel the original Ys III, here the level designers took their stick out of their asses and made the most of the game 3D nature and the verticality that comes with setting your game inside a goddamn tower.

While none of the areas in the game reaches the same heights as Valestein Castle from Oath in my opinion, I think the level design here is a lot more consistent and a lot more creative with even some neat reinterpretation of Ys 1 plot beat like the demon corridor or the hall of mirror the later of which definitely is one of the highlights of the game in terms of set pieces. There’s a deeper sense of cinematography and flow to each dungeon and even if they all share some similar assets to keep the visuals consistent, the game always keep surprising us with some neat obstacles, also falling in this game rarely end up in you having to reclimb an entire area like in Ys VI or Oath to a lesser extend, making platformer that much more smoother in my opinion.

The only area I’m not too big on is the big desert area in the middle because while “Silent Sands” is a banger track I do think that the area by itself far overstays its welcome which isn’t helped by this being the area with most plot shit and backtracking happening slowing the game pace to a crawl for the duration of the floor especially in between two relatively good areas (one of which is an actual fun water level, I know crazy). Another issue that came to my attention while I was playing the game is that in the Swamp floor, the game stop having a natural level curve, the game isn’t super reliant on grinding as long as you don’t avoid enemies but once you reach the Mantis I always happened to be underleveled and doing piss damage to it and had to two a second run of the area to grind a bit, an unfortunate oversight which doesn’t ruin the game for me but is worth noting.

So the general level design is excellent and perhaps some of the best Falcom has ever put out but how about the bosses, well…

THEY’RE FREAKING AWESOME

Ys Origins easily has the best selection of bosses in the entire series only rivaled by Dawn of Ys in my opinion. They really nailed the balance this time between not having too long or annoying patterns while still giving the player the freedom to fight them on equal footing. The only “bad” boss is the plant in the desert area (yeah this area again… told you it was the black spot of the game) and maybe the final boss of Hugo and Yunica’s route for being way too damn easy but even then, they far outclass the selection of bosses seen in previous titles.

And I also think that’s quite amazing that each bosses you fight in this are for the most part reimagining of the ones from Ys 1&2 with even some continuity between how they look there and how they’ll eventually look in those games (like the big zombie head from II but this time it’s a big fire giant that’s not a putrefied corpse at all until you fuck his shit up).
On top of being really mechanically solid, the bosses this time around are also quite spectacular, much more than what Falcom is usually willing to do on their limited budget. The Centipede fight (perhaps THE most iconic boss of the game) is a great example of this, you might even confuse it for an Ys Origins original because of how lame its original incarnation was but here it’s such a freaking amazing set piece.

Your character enters the room and the Centipede is hiding in the wall then fucking boom it comes out and the arena is this Crash Bandicoot style circular arena and you have on top of the Centipede to break all of its individual parts or trying to get him from the ground with your thunder attack while dodging a million projectile which gets increasingly more and more overwhelming as the fight progresses. It’s so fucking kino and most of the big bosses in this game operates on the same logic like the Mantis which is this really cool boss which changes the game camera angle as he jumps and fucks around summoning a thousand minions. Suffice to say that the bosses in this game are not only super cool to figure out as boss fights but also freaking cool as just spectacle bosses in general. Like I said, while there’s one or two bosses that are weaker than others, most of them are actually quite excellent and superbly reimagine mechanics of the first game in the Ark Engine.

But the game doesn’t just have big bosses, it also has a lot of smaller bosses mostly against human opponents. I feel like Falcom saw the generally positive reception people had on the 2 Chester Fights in Oath in Felghana and wanted to capitalize on the hype it created. Mechanically speaking, I’d say that these are some of the most interesting bosses, mostly because you’re pretty much on equal footing with them and they feel less “Mario Bossy” if that makes sense ? Much like you they don’t have invincibility frames and can be hurt at any time, they have a burst mode and spells of their own, some of them are actually pretty damn challenging.

However, while I commend the effort, none of them reaches the climatic epicness of Chester 2 in terms of complexity or just raw hype because a lot of those boss fights are against pretty random and forgettable side-characters, I wish they kept the human bosses solely for rival fights between the three characters only, there’s a huge missed opportunity there for some pretty cool stuff but it’s not the main bulk of these human fights (you don’t get a single fight against Yunica like wow she’s so left out that’s crazy…).

So that’s it right ? We pretty much found the perfect Ys game? Excellent level design, excellent bosses, excellent variety in gameplay thanks to different playable characters and a deep respect for the series legacy that can be felt all throughout the work (did I also mention the game has great music too ?? I mean at this point it’s kinda redundant since they’ve been chaining home runs on that front for quite some time and I’m not really good at explaining why music is good, call my man MB for that, I’m sure he can cook up a better video essay on the subject than me !). So what’s the catch ?

Well, I think it’s time to address the big elephant in the room, which is this game's strange structure and how it affects its pacing. Because for how much good content there is there and even with the different characters switching up the gameplay…

You still have to play the game 3 separate times in order to get a full grasp on the story, and witnessing its true ending and to me that’s a big fucking issue !
See you don’t actually switch up characters, those are essentially 3 different routes much like Resident Evil with its Leon A, Clair B, Tofu Guy bullshit. And look, on one hand, can I really complain about the repeated playthroughs ? One of my favorite games of all time is Mega Man X4 which is the first time in the series that you can either play as X or Zero and in order to experience the full game, you essentially have to play it two times. It’s the same stages, mostly the same bosses but instead of playing as a guy who shoots lemons, you play as the hottest laser sword wielding robot the world has ever seen and he plays like a charm.

So technically speaking, I don’t fundamentally have an issue with but many people within the community do, if there’s one thing that Origins is unanimously criticized for is the 3 required playthroughs to reach the true ending, it was such a massive complain that on PC and on PC only, you only have to do 2 of the 3 routes and I mean by that point, you might as well do the third one amirite ?

But see, the main difference between MMX4, Resident Evil 2 and this game is the time commitment. Oath in Felghana and pretty much any Ys game up to that point except III an V last for about 10 to 12h and even if Falcom and their fans might disagree, this is the ideal length for an Ys game. Just a short, intense 10h adventure to occupy an afternoon and that’s what makes them so compelling and replayable because you can put it down and come back to it later on higher difficulty if you feel like killing some times. They might have a decent enough story to get interested in or at least an interesting narration to motivate yourself to keep going but once you experienced everything the game has to offer once, it’s not gonna change the second time through for your pretty eyes ! And it’s not a “change in perspective” or a slightly different gameplay that’s gonna change your mind about it.

And that 10 to 12h time commitment is alright for a single game… but what if I told you that it was also the average length of one route of this game ! And that’s when you slowly start to realize… oh shit really ? Look, I’m definitely making a mountain out of a molehill, but the reason why I love Oath so much is that it’s a one and done deal, all banger no filler game, but here it’s a bit more difficult to defend that position. A single run of RE2 will last you maybe 6 to 7h, a single run of MMX4 will last you like 4 to 5h and that game also doesn’t have like a huge amount of dialogues you have to sit through which interrupts the flow of the game.

And look as much as I’ve praised the story so far and it’s cool to see different perspectives, the main structure of it all stays the same ! You go through the same obstacles, the desert area is a slog for all characters with a shit load of cutscenes and dialogue slowing it down to a crawl, the same 2nd run of the swamp to get properly leveled for the mantis boss. All of them have to have a talk with Yunica’s ghost dad for some goddamn reasons when the dude only has any sort of relevance in her route. You may say that you could just play one of the routes and leave the rest for later but then you won’t be experiencing the full story which I believe is worth a damn this time around even though one is essentially filler (sorry Yunica…). I still think the actual content is good mind you, but it’s an odd-case of having so little of it that they have to spread it thin to make the most of it, I would’ve liked just a tad bit more variety in the level design and structure to accommodate to each character skills and arc to not make the entire process as redundant but hey, game is still fun in the end but I can definitely see how playing the same game 3 times would be a deal breaker to some people.
Asides from that and a couple of smaller complaint, I do think that Ys Origins deserves the cult status that it has today, it’s a fantastic companion piece to the original game that will greatly please fans of the original game without losing the initial magic of the duology and it’s also a fantastic entry point for anyone wanting to get into the series and who knows maybe the ending will make some who were more reluctant to try out the original two games as well as the rest of the franchise.

The New Team at Falcom has succeeded in creating a modern cult classic which many people remember as fondly as the original two games, adding to its legacy and ending the Ark Engine trilogy on a bang. The entire project just oozes from the passion of its developers composed mostly of older fans of Falcom finally getting the chance to finally have their piece of the puzzle and I think that Ys couldn’t dream of a better game to pay homage to its 20 years of legacy.

But all good things must come to an end and the developers weren’t going to keep improving on the formula, after all they already perfected it and as much as I enjoy the Ark Engine games, the series needs to move forward and diversify itself. Even if it was a pretty short lived but intense era, next time, we’re properly continuing Adol’s adventure and this adventure is about to be a party (system !) !

Kinda floored at how much I ended up loving this game. Having just come off of Ys I & II and reasonably enjoying them, this one has made me a real fan of the series and excited to play more.

Set hundreds of years before the first two games, Ys Origin takes place entirely within the Darm tower. Starting off with two characters to select; Yunica Tovah or Hugo Fact, your mission is for the most part identical. You climb the tower, meeting all manner of enemy monsters and friendly characters alike. The boss fights are varied and (most of them) are fun and challenging, and as you progress through the game you learn more special attacks and other various abilities to deal with them. Yunica is a light-hearted axe wielder (who reminds me of Estelle Bright from Trails in the Sky in a few ways) and has to get in close to effectively deal damage while having pretty good defence to compensate. Hugo on the other hand is an edgy, arrogant, and quite frankly complicated mage character who ended up stealing the show for me. In combat he is very squishy, but deals tons of ranged magical damage and has a shield to help compensate for his lack of defence.

I really do love how the game itself feels. Moving and attacking is quick and snappy, and I bet a really skilled player could blitz through the game in record time without taking much damage. You have a boost meter that is constantly filling up, and when you activate it you have better MP regen to spam your special attacks, attack faster, and do more damage. All the way back to Ys I & II, one of the little things I really appreciated was that level ups felt meaningful. When you levelled up, you immediately felt how much more efficiently you could defeat certain types of enemies which isn't as noticeable in other action RPGs. This feeling is still present in Ys Origin, and I hope that means the other games that came out before this one retained it too.

While the structure and many story beats are identical for both playable characters, their perspectives were polar opposites and it made for some nice contrast on a subsequent playthrough to play as the other and learn some new things. Upon completing the game with either, a hidden third playable character is unlocked and is considered the "canon" route, with a new play-style and some new scenes/backstory to fill in the rest of the blanks.

All in all, Ys Origin is an awesome action RPG that felt so good and had a gripping enough story that I did not mind playing through it 3 times to get the full experience. My total playtime judging off my save files is somewhere in the neighbourhood of 20 hours, and that felt just right. Really looking forward to continuing on with the series!

Ys Origin is now done with Toal's route. And with that I give the game a STRONG

10/10.

Characters:

Yunica was still my favorite of the bunch but I loved Toal and Hugo aswell. If I had to rank them by character it'd be

1. Yunica
2. Toal
3. Hugo

But all of them are still great with only little gaps between them. For Yunica, I loved her relationship with the Knights and Roy, Feena, and Reah especially. She's just so sweet what an absolute bean.

For Hugo I liked his brashness and felt given his family it was very justified; I almost can relate it a bit. I also LOVED his thing with Epona. It gave more light to the Darklings and well her as characters and Kishgal too. Made them feel like less of bosses for the sake of bosses and moreso just characters with their own goals, though misguided ones.

And Toal. He was just a fucking trip man I love the Anti-Hero role he played and the extra backstory on Reah and Feena he shed along with getting to know him, himself. What felt like a shitbag obstacle in the other routes turned into a genuinely respectable guy determined to do what he needed for his endgoal and I love that

Story:

Each route had a great story to accompany the characters, while Yunica is still my favorite character wise, I'm sorry I just can't see any way to say that Toal's wasn't absolutely goated. I loved everything about it. While Yunica's and Hugo's seemed to only focus On them respectively with Hugo's going a bit into Toal as a character. Toal's route I felt fleshed them out individually great, however it is much better having prior knowledge of them from their routes, so I'd suggest doing Toal's last.

Ranking:
1. Toal
2. Yunica
3. Hugo

Gameplay:

YUNICA IS SO FUCKING FUN MAN JUST LIKE WOOOOOOOOOOOO SPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEN!!

I loved using her wind skill to find a bunch of sequence breaks, and I did Yunica's route. Hell I skipped the Dragon Claw whatever's unknowingly using the Wind Skill and I ADORE this type of Freedom in games. I mean hell, there is a reason why I love Sonic 06 and it's for all the wrong ones. Toal's gameplay was also great. His wind skill was so fucking cool man like holy shit and don't get me started on the Thunder Claw and Fire Tornado shit so daMN RAWWWW. Toal had a decent amount of those sequence breaks and other cool tricks, tho not as much as Yunica which is pretty much what put him below her.

AAAAAAAND for Hugo. I'm gonna be blunt here and say his gameplay; BLEW ACTUAL ASS until the ladder half of the Guilty Fire. But after then it started picking up. I get he's supposed to appeal to a different audience which wasn't quite for me but in the end he still made up for it.

Conclusion:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/207350/Ys_Origin/

WHAT TOP 5 ARE YOU SMOKING KENDRICK

BECAUSE MY TOP 5

IS
TOAL
TOAL
TOAL
TOAL
TOAL

Being my first Ys title (and also the first chronological entry in the series), I now finally understand why fans of this series are so passionate about it.

I was most impressed by its combat, though. It plays more like a battle-oriented top-down Zelda, yet doesn't feel mash-y in the slightest. I absolutely adored the challenge that bosses and certain enemy types brought. Damage being so easy and quick to accumulate is the perfect deterrent to face-tanking strategies that would usually be encouraged in other ARPGs.

Progression is very balls-to-the-wall, too - and I say that as a very heartfelt compliment. There's no time-wasting here, it's a back-to-back volley of rushing through tightly-designed dungeons and whacking demons.

The music is phenomenal too. If you're not chilling out to Water Prison or head-bopping to Silent Desert, then I'm just gonna assume you're soulless.
Overall, I'm very impressed with this hidden gem of a game. Gonna start a second AND third playthrough soon enough, since there are even more characters I can mess around with - just gotta clear my backlog.

(Also, Yunica's a cutie.)

Ys Origin is (to date) my favorite Ys game and one of my favorite RPGs of all time. It's hard to explain and convey why I feel that way towards the game since it doesn't really offer anything earth-shattering in terms of gameplay and storyline but on a personal level I really enjoyed the setting, the character development in the game, the fast-paced action-based combat system, the soundtrack (best intro in Ys series) and how the game lays out the story for future Ys games.

Regarding character development, I really enjoyed how Yunica and Hugo turned out. Yunica starts as a sweet-loving and somewhat insecure scout group member due to her inability to use magic. However, as the journey of escalating Darm Tower's unfolds, she develops a strong will and determination that culminates with her confidence and overall character completely different to when she started this story. Hugo's character provides a good contrast to Yunica in the sense that he has a very "easy to hate" cocky and unpleasant personality that, someway-somehow, ends up growing on the player as his journey unfolds and you learn more about his past.

Despite the game only taking place at Darm Tower, I felt like the different levels offer as much variety as they can; and combined with different enemies, mild puzzles, and interesting (and challenging) boss battles, they make up for a fun journey full of surprises via the different plot changes that happen.

you know me hot and sexy marathoning 30 series at the same time because the god of gaming bestowed upon me the holy gift of adhd so that i would be able to pop my pussy off with all these games at the same time and it kind of is a damn surprise that i even manage to successfully complete at least some games all around maybe im not as bad as my impostor syndrome makes me believe

so gamefags told me ys 1 and 2 were absolutely necessary to play ys origin and that if i actually played it before the first duology all my family would be murderously killed so for all the people reading this who have no idea if ass one and two are actually essential to play this game i say yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees and noooooooooooooooooooooo theres some really good callbacks or callforwards ? this is a prequel so i have no idea but it was nice to see some recurring places items and plot elements completely recontextualised to the point that they felt like nothing more than cameos . theres some degree of story ties that you can make between this game and the others but at their core theyre basically two different beasts I DO ACTUALLY recommend playing ys chronicles first just because some of the stuff youre gonna see here are probably gonna hit harder if you know whats gonna happen in those games but again its not necessary and youre not gonna miss anything in particular if you decide to just start with this one (which wouldnt be something id judge you for because the bumpy dumpy installments are what they are)

so ys origin takes place a lot of time before ys 1 and 2 which means that adol was still not even an embryo that being said you can choose between 2 + 1 protagonists aka yunica hugo and ??? and all of them have different play styles and story beats and shit so the real question here is UMHHHHHHH is it actually worth it to play all the routes ??? i mean if you really want to i guess it IS necessary to understand the entirety of the story because the last playthrough is actually the canon one as much as i know which means that if you play only the yunica one for example you wont see the beefy hot man doing his shit and all but you can still get a self contained story nonetheless

but whatever youre gonna do i dont care because i did play all three of these fucking routes because this game is ADDICTING . AS . SHIT

ys origin actually has a pretty different action rpg gameplay from the ys duology which means that this is gonna get more hack and slashy than it previously was now theres not any bumb system or whatever but some button mashy and skill using and shit and tachycardia . not too bad . now for some reason though they actually mustve laced this game with some drugs because wow the fast paced gameplay is so fucking intoxicating theres a lot to the fighting system the attacks are super fast the skills actually add a lot to the quality of the movements and attacking and whatever and also a super attack mode theres something for everybody lets just say that

and again the fact that all three characters have some different playstyles mean that the replayability is off the roof ………. kinda

see the main gimmick of the game is just ascending this fucking tower and for every single set of stories youre gonna get some different biomes like idk theres the normal one the water one the fire one the sand one (which is the worst one dont get me started) theres something for everybody now the thing is that youre gonna do this for all three of the characters going through the same floors and watching the same kind of events over and over and over which isnt really too much of a problem for me who played nier replicant three times for all the endings but i guess it can actually be detrimental to somebody else

the enemies are the same the events are the same even the way you progress through the floors are the same most of the time even though there may be some events were you have to get a different item and shit but that just stops there like idk hugo is less of a fast paced guy because he likes to stick magic poles up his ass so he needs dragon claws to walk on the sandy passages and shit or like the fact that yunica just uses her harmonica to stop the devil's room music and instead hugo decides to SMASH the fucking pipes with an hammer insane

this is probably my main issue with this game since the gameplay is absolutely stellar the leveling progression is super satisfying the bosses (for once in ys) are good like really good so much so that they reused them 3 times and the tower is an intricate and interesting place to explore with lots of different loots nooks and crannies to get some new equipments or skill upgrades in and thats probably what drew me in so quickly

also its pretty funny cause i cant really say anything anymore about the gameplay my soliloquy ends here like thats basically it that's what you're gonna do in the game period . its not really that complicated but in its simplicity it gets you going and going and the way the routes dont last that long you can actually get a lot out of 8 or like 10 hours each playthrough

that being said the story is also pretty simple it has a good enough premise for whats gonna happen in ys 1 and 2 goddesses vanish the research team is looking for them a tower ascended from the decaying earth yada yada you already know this shit from ys chronicles so personally my favorite one is yunicas route which is such an heartbreaking beginning to this “trilogy” of stories and shes honestly such an amazing protagonist im in love in her and her interactions with the goddesses never failed to make me emotional her backstory is the one that resonated the most with me and since it was also the very first route of the bunch ive played its nuance obviously hit more then the next 2 routes and the fact that shes never gonna come back in any ys game cause they take place after like 700 years which means she's been under 3 feet of dirt for all this time is gonna drive me insane dont talk to me yunica my sweet baby I love you please be my gf

while i definitely enjoy hugos route i dont think hes my favorite character of the bunch and the rude cute boy with trauma isnt a trope im fond of so he definitely didnt tickle any part of my body BUT his story made me realise how much of a girlboss epona is she just skyrocketed to my favorite character top lisr like its nothing shes incredible absolutely jawdropping character development i kinda hated her in yunicas route but she just ended up being so much more than a nosy bitch AND hugos route is a huge introduction to the storyline that the game is gonna follow on the claws route which is probably not only the most complete and satisfying route of the bunch but is also the one that actually finishes in a way that really makes the entire 3 plays worth it and that final boss is INCREDIBLE

plus hes hot and his backstory is probably the most beautiful one of the bunch because umh I cant get into spoiler territory but its reaaaaaaaaaaaally heart-rending to see the lengths he went to protect what was important for him like when the main twist came in my mind exploded and I was a mess truly a mess im so sorry for the FBI people in my pc to see what happened to me

whatever only downside is that the other side characters are pretty monotonous and uneventful like theres the yunica love interest the hugo love interest some cunty cunty cunt huh magician a girlboss who probably scissors with the magician and a gay priest and thats the extent of the characters I remember if there's somebody else in here OH THE TWINK WHO UPGRADES YOUR WEAPONS yeah he's dope I guess but the goddesses really ended up serving the most cunt in the entire cast so the 2 measures are balanced and they're probably the most complex and sad characters of the bunch so OF COURSE i was gonna fall in love with them im not dumb also feena I still have my engagement ring with me please be my wife

last but not least the art direction reminded me of trails in the sky which is a game I replayed 10 times and never finished so that brought up some Afgh4nistan war flashbacks but that being said the art direction is pretty good the character portraits are portraiting and the ost IS FUCKING BOOMING UGHHHHHH WHAT THE FUCK DID THEY PUT IN THIS also the mirror ice palace somehow ended up being my favorite place in TWO games because of the incredible work of art that is the ost called dreaming im not joking whoever composed that shit deserves a kiss ON their mouths RIGHT now

I'm gonna skip this or else I'm gonna start embedding ost videos on here and never finishing the review so bye

i have surprisingly very little to say about this game after how much i enjoyed it but sometimes a feel good game requires no introduction to be made . godtier action rpg really good mystery type of story with a lot of interesting hints to what happens in the original ys and traversing the same places of those games was a joy and mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm i guess if youre crazy you can also extend this game to 30 hours or something so theres that

so umh this is probably the game that hooked me and made me realise that ys is actually good or better that ys CAN be good sometimes so im gonna continue this venture until i get to lacrimosa because i REALLY wanna play lacrimosa nothing is gonna stop me

play this game theres yunica . the end

hi kishgal im single and if you want im currently stretching my hole you know what that means

why the fuck did they have to make me cry at the end of yunicas route wow and BY THE WAY the fact that the final pose reah and feena make is the cover art of ys 2 is gonna keep me up at night

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.

Ys Origin, a fun romp up a tower with a story that doesn't overstay its welcome, and fast paced action that is fair and fun. Just make sure your properly leveled for each boss encounter, because being underleveled is a pain and a half. Thankfully leveling up is a quite quick and painless endeavor if needed. The music is also fantastic and fits right in with the rest of falcoms fantastic soundtracks. Of note its surprising how much this feels like a falcom game in its writing, style etc. having only played more of its recent titles eg. Ys 8,9. and some Trails games.

Note: This review stands only as a review of Yunica's route thus far. I'm giving myself a little break and I plan to go back for the other two routes fairly soon. I'll edit this review to reflect those experiences as well.

My exposure to Ys was brief and over a decade ago - if memory serves, I played the Famicom versions of the first three or four games and essentially forgot the experiences over time. A few friends of mine are fans of this series, and while I stall on starting Trails In The Sky over after losing like 20 hours' worth of save progress a year ago, I figure I might as well make an attempt to get back into Falcom's other big money-maker. And wow - what a way this has been to get me back into the franchise proper!

Being that I seem to enjoy action-adventure titles like this, if my mixed but mostly positive feelings upon returning to Link To The Past mean anything, this was everything I was looking for from a combat perspective. Ys Origin gets you right into the thick of it only a few minutes into the game, and its battles are tight, dynamic and interesting. Even level grinding, which as I understand it is a series "tradition" (read: plague, but more on that later) isn't as bad as it could be thanks to the addictive ebb and flow of controlling this game. You're offered a very simple toolkit while controlling Yunica, and the game more or less goes "alright, this is all you need - now figure out how to scale Devil's Tower". And for the most part, it succeeds. There were only a handful of moments I needed to look outside what the game gave me to work with - almost all of them facepalm "oh, duh" moments in retrospect.

Story in Yunica's route is light but enjoyable. Her ardent "friendship" (zesty as hell!) with the goddesses is really cute, and the supporting cast is pretty fun if mildly engaging beyond their moments. Shout out to Roy for rocking that fluoride stare like a motherfucker. I can't wait to check out what these two angsty twinks I'm gonna get to play as offer me in their time in the spotlight, too. Yunica in particular kind of reminds me of Estelle from Trails, but keep in mind that's based on my limited time with that character.

Addressing my few grievances, honestly, they're pretty simple fixes. Give this thing a rotating camera a la Trails In The Sky so I'm not caught behind higher-level textures without being able to see my character. More importantly, allow more leeway for bosses to be killed purely through skill as opposed to just needing to be the right fucking level to progress - make those low-level runs MEAN something! - and I think you've got basically a perfect game within this style. Looking forward to seeing how I feel on return visits, but my first climb through Devil's Tower was a ton of fun.

Ys Origin is easily one of the best condensed action RPGs I have played in recent years; there's a story but it's told simply, and your time isn't wasted whatsoever. It's extremely simple yet satisfying combat and dungeon traversal where you'll be constantly engaged driving your way through hordes of enemies in a variety of different environments without ever getting lost in a sprawling overworld yet remaining challenged. You can finish the game in a single day with one character, yet it is definitely worthwhile to do multiple runs with different characters (especially the hidden unlockable character... don't miss that run), and there's something to be said about it's difficulty, since Ys is a game that rewards you for playing aggressive but also playing well (the ability to feel like you're constantly fighting back and dealing damage as well as an XP multiplier that increases with successive hits definitely helps). All the boss fights are quite memorable too, with their own strategies and characteristics, and you'll definitely never get bored from how this game drives you to play better. Without a doubt, this is one of the best overlooked games from the 2000s, and even today it should garner so much attention despite increasing interest in the Ys series. Look no further if you want an engaging yet challenging game with tons of replay value.

Basically Oath in Felghana 2, at least gameplay wise. Hugo's inclusion makes for a really interesting, entirely new playstyle for the series, while Yunica plays mostly the same as Adol did with a few very minor differences. I really like the sense of scale that Dahm Tower gives off, thanks to the occasional outdoors section of the tower - as you go up, less of the land below is visible, and the weather becomes more violent. Recontextualizes Ys I's final dungeon in a really cool way.

Also, Yunica my beloved. Easily one of my favourite underdogs in a video game; I love her character growth.

Um ótimo jogo, em 6 horas de gameplay a história é interessante porém parece melhorar mais para o final, a parte gráfica não brilha muito porém também não deixa a desejar, é decente.

O fator que me fez deixar esse jogo para um futuro quem sabe até mesmo próximo foi a gameplay, o mapa é mau aproveitado por ser extremamente linear, com um combate simples porém de bom ritmo.

Sempre costumo querer jogar games no hard e esse não foi uma boa ideia...Chefes muito apelões, com dano altíssimo e sem healing nenhum para o personagem. Apenas o chefe da região de fogo eu derrotei de primeira, de resto, foram umas boas tentativas.

Até ai tudo bem, o grande problema é que na parte em que parei, é preciso derrotar 3 inimigos para armazenar energia amaldiçoada e meus ataques tiram 1 de vida( já upei o max da arma que dá até agora) depois de várias tentativas consegui, porém o anel não poderia estar equipado, o que resultou na minha morte...Portanto fica aqui meu protesto e meu intervalo para o jogo.

Edit: Passei da parte e parei no chefe planta, Infelizmente acabou a vontade de jogar, minha opinião continua a mesma e como o jogo não tem como mudar a dificuldade, terei que dropar, a gameplay com o protagonista Hugo acaba ficando extremamente repetitiva e a ausência de healings nas boss fights perde o sentido da dificuldade difícil e acaba virando injusto, esse é o primeiro game da minha vida que eu abandono por dificuldade, pois é algo que eu adoro em games, pena que é como eu disse, deveria ter jogado no normal, fica para um futuro distante recomeçar por em quanto.

this game really caught me by surprise!! there's a bunch of things it does as an isometric platforming action rpg(?) but all of them are seamed and paced together pretty perfectly.
exploration is fun, with level design working well enough that i discovered most of everything on my own while running through the game and made me feel constantly rewarded for observing different paths.

combat felt pretty great. very mashy with a few extra options sprinkled in to not make it noticeably boring. as i progressed and upgraded and leveled i found it bordering on power fantasy, tearing through enemies is incredibly satisfying and bosses are similarly fun to beat.

this game is just a really solid package and it's probably the most satisfied ive been after playing a falcom game, definitely want to check out the rest of the franchise