Type Game
Date 2009-07-16
Platform
  • Windows
Tags compilation

Ys I & II Chronicles+

Ys

Redone artwork and interface.

On linux, the game crashes if you run it on a different display after running the configuration tool (e.g. run the tool, tell it to run on a certain display, then disable a display and try to run the game). This happens even if you have only a single enabled display. The fix is simple, though: just re-run the config tool.

Ys I

A good game, for its age, but very frustrating in parts. I was at max level with maxed gear before I completed the very first quest to retrieve the first book from the shrine. I couldn't figure out how to open the locked boxes, which is necessary to progress. The answer turned out to be that the key to the boxes was in a chest that was already open, so all my running around everywhere checking every closed chest was not helping me. A great waste of time.

The second big waste of time was trying to get the sword. You are told to talk to the trees, but doing so doesn't help. You must do it after retrieving the harmonica for Reah--which isn't hinted at anywhere, as far as I could tell. They send you off to talk to the trees before the harmonica quest is completed--or even started--and so it wasn't until I gave up on it and went to do other things that I was actually able to complete the quest and proceed.

Both of those were my fault, in that there was nothing stopping me from succeeding, but without any guidance from the game, how was I to know?

The bosses weren't generally very interesting to fight.

Vagullion, the bat boss, took ages to kill. There wasn't any real skill involved--just kite him around until he becomes vulnerable, strike, and repeat.

Khonsclard shoots projectiles, making it seem like beating him should be a matter of dodging carefully, but I didn't have much luck with that. In the end, I beat him by just running in a circle on top of him, ignoring his projectiles, which took care of him in short order.

The final boss, Dark Fact, I defeated with a similar strategy. I just lined myself up where he would be going by, and ran along with him to get as many hits in as possible. Not great.

The other bosses just took dashing in to hit, and dodging back to avoid attacks. No special strategies needed.

I played on Normal difficulty, so perhaps it would have been harder on a higher difficulty... but it would probably have just made the fights more annoying, not more interesting, so I don't think I'll be going back and playing on a higher difficulty.

The dungeons, and particularly the higher floors in the tower, are basically mazes. They're not that difficult to get through, but it's good that mazes have fallen out of fashion in modern games.

Name Role
Nihon Falcom Corp. Developer / Publisher

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