Review for Ys Origin. Game for PC, PlayStation Vita, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, the video game was released on 21/12/2006 The version for PC came out on 31/05/2012 The version for Nintendo Switch came out on 01/10/2020 The version for PlayStation 4 came out on 21/02/2017 The version for Xbox One came out on 11/04/2018
Ys Origin, part of the famous JRPG saga, was published for the first time in 2006 by Nihon Falcom only in Japanese and then resumed, translated and exported in 2012 by XSEED Games. Despite being the seventh game in the series, Ys Origin ranks temporally ahead of all the others being in fact a prequel.
Today Ys Origin lands on Nintendo Switch thanks to publishers - Nihon Falcom, DotEmu, Marvelous USA and Typhoon Games - who brush up on this videogame pearl by creating a port that despite being affected by the weight of the years is still able to fascinate and entertain.
The plot, however sketched and already seen, is nevertheless complete and interested: in the country of YS, a land ruled by the twin goddesses Feena and Reah, life flows pleasantly and quietly thanks to the use of magic that permeates everyday life. This is made possible by a powerful magical artifact: the black pearl, which in the hands of the goddesses releases an almost infinite magical power to the entire population. Six are the families of Ys in charge of serving and protecting the goddesses and the magical jewel, when the demons begin to invade the nation.
The six families and the goddesses use the power of magic to elevate and thus take their land away from demons, but unfortunately this trick is not enough. The mephitic demonic hordes raise a gigantic tower that points to the sky and the earth of Ys. The country, although temporarily still safe, finds itself with a tangible threat looming; to complicate matters is added the sudden disappearance of the goddesses and the artifact, which fortunately, at least for the moment, maintains its magical power unchanged. The task of the family delegates is therefore to find the goddesses and the pearl and bring them back home, at any cost.
We will then be called to impersonate one of the representatives of the six clans in charge of defending the goddesses. In this case we can choose between: Yunica Tovah, a young knight apprentice, or Hugo Fact, an apprentice wizard prodigy son of the High Priest. With the end of the adventure we will also have the opportunity to impersonate The Claw, older brother of Hugo, renegade by the clan and apparently allied with the enemy.
Our task will obviously be to climb the mephitic tower and face every enemy that will appear in front of us along the way.
The gameplay, while being quite simple, is effective: you have to go up the tower by recovering artifacts and leveling up in order to overcome otherwise inaccessible areas. Every few levels we will meet fearsome bosses to face and hordes of monsters that will await us in every section of the game. As we advance we will find ourselves discovering fragments of history pigeonholed into decidedly suggestive cutscenes.
Each character, being well characterized, develops that much empathy necessary for the player to become passionate about the story. The combat system is brutally simple and almost devoted to unbridled smash and, although each character has peculiar move-sets and types of combat, in Ys Origin we always find ourselves constantly pressing the attack button.
Unfortunately, the level of growth of the characters is limited to giving them greater power and number of artifacts to equip, thus debasing the RPG component, which could certainly be more varied. On the other hand, the action component is instead well represented: each character has, as mentioned above, different attack styles that make it pleasant to face a second run even though it involves the boring practice of camping.
If you are not familiar with this term, just know that you can leave a room and re-enter immediately afterwards to find all the enemies killed previously: it goes without saying that, once you have found a congenial room, you just have to re-enter it often to level the character and increase your attack stats in no time. Despite the small flaws, the gameplay of Ys Origin ultimately holds up even if it could in the long run seem monotonous and repetitive, since it takes very little to understand how to deal with low-level monsters.
Different speech for the bosses, who are immediately challenging and fun to deal with, without being too frustrating. Some of them will require a lot of effort and several attempts before they are defeated, but the beauty of the game is that too.
From the graphic point of view, the production of Ys Origin is affected by the weight of the passing years. Poor schemes with repeated patterns - but fortunately rich in details - unfortunately quickly become monotonous and lose points when compared with more recent titles; the pixelated vintage graphics, however, live a moment of glory managing to dampen the graphic defects, resulting particularly effective in this porting. What is not forgivable, not even on limited hardware like that of Nintendo Switch, are the hesitation during the cutscenes, which could definitely be more curated and better optimized. Even a resize in the initial cutscenes, which remain cut in 4: 3 with annoying black bands on the sides of the screen, was a finesse that was expected but which was not achieved.
Apart from the defects listed the port of Ys Origin can however be said to be pleasantly successful. The loadings are so stripped down that they seem non-existent, both when switching from one pattern to another and when incurring an untimely demise resulting in respawn to the nearest rescue statue. Likewise, the adventure holds up and engages thanks to solid and fast-paced gameplay.
The soundtrack, unchanged, still maintains its evergreen charm. In general, the title ages well, making it attractive to both nostalgics and novices who rediscover pearls of the past. All while remaining consistent with the porting and with the titles of the Ys Origin era, which unfortunately are starting to feel a bit the weight of the years. Perhaps a major restyling would have been appreciated, even if we can say that the game keeps its charm unchanged over time and still manages to involve the player and thrill him.
Ys Origin arrives on the Nintendo laptop thanks to the work of the Nihon Falcom team, and it does it practically unchanged over time and as pleasant today as then. After all, we are talking about an important series with solid foundations and a success consecrated over the years. Although a faithful porting is appreciable, we would have preferred to see a more marked restyling of some elements. Having said that, in our opinion the title is promoted, since despite the passage of time the pleasure of following the adventure of the search for the goddesses remains exciting.
► Ys Origin is a JRPG-Adventure type game developed by Nihon Falcom Corporation and published by Nihon Falcom Corporation DotEmu Marvelous USA for PC, PlayStation Vita, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, the game was released on 21/12/2006 The version for PC came out on 31/05/2012 The version for Nintendo Switch came out on 01/10/2020 The version for PlayStation 4 came out on 21/02/2017 The version for Xbox One came out on 11/04/2018
