Ys: Book 1&2

I loved Y's 1, 2, 3, 4 on the Turbo Duo (PC Engine in Japan) by NEC. Y's 4 was all Japanese though, so never completed it. Y's 1&2 were by far the best of the Y's series. 4 was more like 1&2, but all Japanese, so was hard to play and enjoy as much. I know there is a Y's for the PS2 now and I really want to try it.

Dragon Slayer is also another awesome RPG on the Turbo Duo.

Playstation 1's Alundra (not Aludra 2 though) and Vagrant Story are two more awesome RPGs.

I have yet to find an RPG that I can say really stands out on the PS2. Final Fantasy lost me with FF7 and up. Though I mostly liked FF1-4 If anyone knows of any great RPGs for the PS2, I may check them out. But so far I haven't really enjoyed any of them. Hated "Kingdom hearts", ICO was too slow.

Really, I think the only 3D RPG I have really liked so far is Vagrant Story on the PS1.

Some of you may have played the original Ys on the Sega Master System, or Ys 3 on the Genesis, SNES, or The Ark of Napishtim on the PS2, PSP (technically the 6th in the series), but the best - and sadly underplayed - release in the West was Ys Book I & II on the first console to use a CD-ROM - the TurboGrafx-16/CD. Ys originally appeared as a 2 part/2 game story for Japanese PC back in the 80s. The game itself is actually a remake of those first two Ys games merged into one narrative (it works well, since the first game basically ends "to be continued") While at its heart, the game is basically a Zelda-style game, what set this particular version apart was its groundbreaking presentation.

Strange as it sounds, what defines Ys more then anything is the music, but not because the rest of it isn't up to par - the music actually enhances the whole experience - it TELLS the game's story and gives the whole quest this evocative quality. Perhaps it was the shock of going from NES music to REAL music that made such an impression on me, but even many latter-day J-RPG soundtracks don't even compare (as good as the compositions in Final Fantasy VII are, for example, the sound quality still sounds like a goofy wavetable set for Sound Blaster 16 by comparison). The only music in Ys that could be called "ordinary" would be the town music. To fit both games on one CD-ROM, the designers opted to give the towns standard TG synth music. It actually works well, strangely, enough, since you feel safe when you are not being bombarded with violins and electric guitars. The original music was composed by Yuzo Koshiro, of Actraiser and Streets of Rage fame. His original compositions were re-arranged for this version, but you can still hear his style in the pieces. Ys music is so popular in Japan, that the amount of arranged soundtracks and OSTs for the games easily rivals Final Fantasy's catalog.

On top of the epic music, you get a voice cast consisting of Alan Oppenheimer, Jim Cummings, and Michael Bell - all of whom have done voice acting for countless cartoons, video games, and movies (He-Man, Neverending Story, Lost Odyssey, you name it) - and even Thomas Haden Church (Sideways, Spider-Man 3). Story-wise, don't expect the bloated philosophical pondering of Xenogears, but it does go beyond the standard kill-the-evil-demon plot. You essentially play part hero/part archaeologist as you investigate the legends surrounding an Atlantis-esqe civilization known as Ys (pronounced "ease"). The "uncovering" part actually gives the game some of its mystique (captured greatly by the music as well) since you feel like you are doing much more then simply killing a bad guy.

The only part of the game that might considered detracting to some is the combat system. It's real-time like Zelda, but what sets apart is its lack of an attack button. Basically, you equip a sword and you literally ram into the enemies. Depending on the your stats, equipment, and the angle of attack, you will either damage the enemy and send it reeling back or it will do the same to you. While I've noticed its been an initial turn-off to some gamers since we're all weened to strike our sword with an attack button, it actually feels very succinct and intuitive once you get used to it. The boss battles usually require trickier strategies and you'll eventually be introduced to magic attacks, but the combat system is rather unique. The actual in-game graphics stray somewhere between 8-bit and 16-bit. They're effective and do the job, but I get the impression the designers let the cut-scenes and music "tell the story". Its effective in that it you really don't "notice" the in-game graphics being rather mundane.

To those who have never played Ys in 1990 and were to do so now, I imagine it may not instill the same amount of awe and wonder that it did for a 12 year old gamer just weened off of the NES. Even the series' contemporary remakes and sequels can only add so much more polish to a formula that looks pretty run-of-the-mill by today's standards. However, to those who download it, I think most can appreciate that it represented something unique back in 1990, at least. Today's games may have pushed cinematic quality and narration far beyond Ys, but when I experienced this game for the first time, it was a shocking revelation. It was a fortune-teller showing me that games would soon no longer consist of contrived settings and mindless hand-eye coordination tests. You could convey emotion and grandeur in a video game on a level every bit as good as cinema. To me, many aspects of modern games - certainly Japanese games - owe a debt paved by Ys on the Turbo. Seeing it re-emerge after so many years of obscurity has really helped me appreciate what it showed me all those years ago.

(Small Note: One reviewer mentioned that "Book II" is actually a more challenging version of "Book I". This incorrect. II is a direct sequel to I.)

...and I am wondering what took me so long. Okay, I do know, it was not exactly something that was heavily advertised for the NES and I am not one hundred percent sure it came out in the United States on the NES. Another reason I did not play it is because while it was released here on the Turbo Duo CD this system flew under the radar here. Not sure why, as playing the system it blows both the NES and Master System out of the water and holds up well against the Genesis and SNES. I mean, look at Castlevania: Rondo of Blood and is better than the version released on the SNES (I like the SNES version btw) and looks better than Bloodlines on the Genesis. I am sure Ys looks immensely better on this system than the NES and the music is amazing and it has animated cut scenes!

The story has an adventurer named Adol arriving at a port and immediately being thrust into an adventure which will have him collecting the books of Ys, saving the people of the land and learning the mysteries of the land! There are many dungeons to explore and a good amount of people to talk to and who offer you help as an evil plan unfolds.

This game consist of the first two Ys games. The game play for each game has about the same mechanics with the addition of magic during the second game being the main difference. The combat consists of bump combat which you get used to and solving some mysteries. The first game is pretty straightforward; however, book II was a bit harder as the dungeons were very large and some of the clues vague. Still, very winnable without help and rewarding when I finished the game.

So it looks pretty good and the music is outstanding. The voices during some of the cut scenes is sometimes hard to hear due to the music, but overall understandable. Thankful for emulation so I could play the Turbo Graphics version as I am finding so many of the games on it super fun. This one is one of the best ones I've played and I am looking forward to playing part 3!

My problem is this is the first video game RPG I've ever played. See, that's a huge bias with me because it totally blew me away. I borrowed a TurboGrafx 16 with a CD player and a ton of games for a week in high school and the whole experience totally excited me. This system was not popular, so me and my few friends were probably the only kids in the entire school who even saw it. This is back in the days of SNES and Genesis, 16-bit gaming. Back then, there was no such thing (to console gamers) as voice in video games or CD quality music.

So enter the Turbo CD games. It was expensive so no one had it. It had tons of anime games but nobody knew what anime was back then! Can you kids imagine? I had never seen a narrated intro anime movie (movie!!) for a video game. That didn't exist back then. There were cut-scenes with graphics and text on the SNES and Genesis, but not animated with orchestrated music and with a real narrator. This game was years beyond what I expected to see video games do and only a few of us saw it, the few people who had TurboGrafx.

Combine that crazy stuff with the fact that this was my first RPG makes it amazing to me. Also be aware that I was a huge cartoon and anime geek at the time, and the fact that well-known voice actors from all my favorite cartoons were in this game almost made me die of happiness. See, these hobbies are very acceptable and popular now, but back then nobody knew about them and certainly didn't think it was cool.

So I'll try to rate this game looking back at it without letting too much of my feelings mess with it. Although it's bound to happen, so don't hold your breath.

The game has a perfect difficulty. You don't have to spend too much time leveling up but you do have to do a little. However, the exploring you do while you are trying to figure out how to get through the game will level you up at a nice pace. This game also has quite a wonderful atmosphere. The incredible music definitely sets the tone brilliantly, but also the story and environments certainly take you away. The game play is great. It's an accelerated RPG, which means instead of wasting your time with random encounters and battle screens, you simply run your character into the enemies and the game immediately takes into account your stats and the angle in which you approached the enemy and reacts accordingly with damage. So if you're the impatient type like me it's a great game. It's a nice long game, it took me a week to get through playing after school for about 3-5 hours a night. It might be too short for you if you have lots of time on your hands. There's a reason EGM magazine gave this game a perfect 10 score when it was released. It's a tight game in most respects.

Playing it now, you'd probably think it was just a 16 bit game with awesome music, and you'd be right. It is fairly straightforward, no real side quests and linear, but that's how games were back then. You also might think the cut-scene animations are primitive, but again, that was the technology back then. You have to remember that full screen images of people on screen and talking were literally something no console gamer ever saw before. Also, this is one of those 'main character doesn't talk or have any emotions' type games, which were extremely popular back then. The idea was for you the gamer to take the full brunt of the emotions and situations presented to you (kind of like some first person shooters like Half-Life) and the character on screen was just an extension of you, instead of you controlling a person on an adventure who you may or may not agree with. This game pulls it off nicely, although there is still a bit of disconnection, especially now with games being so complex.

Anyway, if you consider yourself a gaming nut and you think you need to know and play all old legendary games to make yourself an expert in the history of gaming, this is a must-play. Play it alongside the popular SNES and Genesis games released in 1991 and see for yourself why all the people (look at all the comments here in IMDb so far) get all teary-eyed when they think back about it. That's the only way to see what people were seeing and expecting of video games and how far the Turbografx and Y's were beyond those expectations. It really was an amazing experience for us

"Ys Book I & II" in many ways is your standard RPG (Role-Playing Game) about a boy who would be hero (Adol), out to destroy the "great ancient evil" (Dark Fact) which has blighted his homeland for generations from atop Darm Tower. The story is as strait forward a cliché as it sounds and the graphics are standard late 80's simplicity, but as one of the earliest CD-ROM games it blazed some brilliant new trails in its use of fill in cinematic story telling and true voice narrations. It also shocks the first time player with the revelation that just when you think it's over, that's only "Book I". In a stylish revolution stolen by every "Zelda" game since, the first challenge (Book I) is followed immediately by a longer, harder challenge (Book II).