Sometimes there is beauty in simplicity and that definitely holds true for this game. Ys I took me back to a time when games were all about the simple joy of exploring and adventuring. Going out into the wilds with barely so much as a vague direction while fighting your way through hordes of goblins, wolfs and evil knights clad in dark armor. It is a game that doesn't really follow a well-defined linear narrative thread but lets you go and seek out your own adventure in the wilds until you hit a road block. It is only then when you have to retrace your steps and ask yourself what you might have missed. It's a game that doesn't guide you. You will have to visit towns, ask around for information and talk to specific NPCs multiple times to learn where you have to go next. Sometimes, an item-description might have some clue that will help you find the solution to some puzzle that kept you from progressing. It's old school and I'm all here for it.

Once you're out in the open, you'll start bumping into enemies to fight them. Yeah, the combat system doesn't require you to swing your sword or block manually, you just bump into stuff and hope that the enemy takes more damage than you. At first, I didn't quite get it :D I was dying constantly and I was sure that I hadn't fully understood the combat mechanics. But no, I was just underleveled and had to upgrade my gear. So I started grinding for a few minutes, gathered some gold and experience, bought new equipment and tried again. And it made a huge difference. Gear and levels really matter in this game. At fixed intervals, I would have to take some time to grind. It wasn't unbearable but since the combat is so simplistic in nature, it got old really fast. All in all though, the bump system was pretty fun. It's just satisfying as hell to bump into enemies and trap them in corners where they are squashed to bloody bits :D

Graphically, the game has its charme. As with many other aspects of the game, the visuals are rather simplistic but the art direction and love for detail that the devs poured into it, really make Ys shine. Even though the game offers only simple sprites for enemies, they were so distinct, that I could easily tell them apart. I felt that each design had personality and character. Same goes for the environmental design. Seeing the shadows of clouds that are passing by overhead may just be a small detail but it shows that the developers cared. I love stuff like this. The character portraits of special NPCs you talk to are absolutely gorgeous just as the cutscenes that are composed of beautiful hand-drawn images.

So far the review has mainly touched on positive aspects of the game and if you've read up until this point, you're probably wondering why I've given the game such a mediocre rating. Well, I did have some issues with the game. First of, navigation in dungeons, especially in the final dungeon of the game, can be a real pain. You have no map and no idea of where to go most of the time. Sometimes you are even surrounded by darkness which makes it extra hard to get your bearings. There are sections in the game where you have to traverse through multiple levels of a dungeon back and forth which confused the living hell out of me.
On top of that there's the boss battles. Some are ok, they mostly feel like wars of attrition. However, for most of them, there is a great deal of luck and randomness involved. I'm not going to spoil anything but there were 2 bosses that made me almost drop the game for they committed mutliple cardinal sins of bad boss design :D The final boss in particular was a disaster design-wise.

Nonetheless, I had a good time with Ys I. It's a charming, simplistic and short Action RPG which is still very playable today. I loved the character art, music and level of detail. For me, it was my first Ys experience and I'm looking forward to playing more games of the series in the future.