Just beat this.
Omggggggggggggggggggggggg
such
a
great
GAME
omggggggggggggggg
I don't even have any issues with the localization. It was simple and dry like a 16-bit rpg. Felt nostalgic and fitting since Ys is an old-school franchise anyways.
No problems with cutscenes, just tap*tap*tap and they take like 1 min to read and there aren't many. Story wasn't even that bad. Was serviceable to get you from one dungeon to another.
Pacing was fine by me. I know a lot of people feel it's too long for a Ys game. I don't feel that way at all. In fact I wanted MORE dungeons (even though I'm plenty satisfied with the number we got). I skipped all the sidequests and npc chatter and just blew from one dungeon to the next to the next and it was basically 16 hours of non-stop action with a few cutscenes spattered throughout. Felt great and the dungeons were really fun. Especially the last half of them which looked gorgeous and had more complex designs.
My only actual complaint is that after the first few bosses and until the last couple the game is too easy. Dungeons are never a threat ever, which I'm fine with. But the bosses in the middle are not really fearsome. Early on I was just guarding everything and for the final boss I was just guarding everything, but in the middle it seemed like why bother, just roll out of the way of most stuff and if you get hit here and there it's no big deal. I was also kind of glad it was like this because I felt a few of the boss designs were too chaotic and between 3 characters & 8 tentacles or other stuff it was hard to keep track of what was going on >_< But, there were some great bosses (the final part of the last boss is such a well designed fight. I got there with no items and after a few tries of learning the patterns I barely won and it felt great) and even the less than great ones were fun. But the dungeons were always a blast and it was real fun from start to finish. Didn't have to grind at all for anything, which was real nice. I tended to keep Geis with his xp up in the party so that probably helped. Finished it at lvl.61.
Music, as always for Ys, was absolutely stellar. Game controlled pretty darn well even on the PSP.
For Ys Eight, I'd like to see them ditch the party system because I think it'll let them balance it a little tighter towards Adol's stats and skills and make for a better, but still fair challenge. In the meantime I think I'll pick up Oath and replay it since it's been a few years since I played it on pc and supporting the series in the US seems like the right thing to do. Will also give Ys I&II another shot, though I've never been able to get into Ys I.
But yeah, darn good game. Would give it around a B+ solely because of the lack of balance in the middle, but otherwise everything else is fantastic. In fact, Ys' Seven was so enjoyable that I'm gonna take a chance on Zero no Kiseki because I'm curious to see what kind of traditional turn-based rpg Falcom can turn out, since they've been putting out such high quality work with Ys lately.
