Ys: Oath in Felghana
All right, so it's fair to say I've retreated into my comfort zone after the near-misses of the past few days. Still, if anything gave me a perfect opportunity to jump into another of Falcom's Ys games, May Mastery was it. I can definitely say that I adore these silly, uncomplicated, over-the-top action RPGs.
Ys: Oath in Felghana, until recently exclusive to the PSP in regions outside of Japan, is a remake of Ys III: Wanderers from Ys, best known to US audiences via its SNES port, and built with Ys VI: Ark of Napishtim's engine. I believe Ys Origin, which I only beat a couple of months ago, also uses the same engine or at least a modified version of it. Most modern Falcom games tend to look the same, both Ys and The Legend of Heroes alike: most of the characters and enemies, excepting some polygonal bosses, are pre-rendered sprites (like those in Donkey Kong Country) in a polygonal environment and usually have anime portraits whenever they're talking. The effect is passable enough, and Falcom's art tends to show in its detailed backgrounds and portraits. It would also be fair to say that Falcom doesn't really consider the graphics to be as valuable to the core of the JRPG experience as a company like Square-Enix and the always state-of-the-art affairs from Final Fantasy. Falcom's more concerned with delivering what their fans want: fast action, comfortably predictable JRPG plots and insane guitar riffs. I'd be the first to decry a lack of innovation in a long-running series, but formula can work too if that formula is competent enough to have little need for improvement.
Ys: Oath in Felghana follows the plot of the original Ys III to the letter: Ys "permatagonist" Adol Christin joins Dogi on a trip to Dogi's home town of Redmont in the country of Felghana. Dogi left the area some eight long years ago, having established himself as the loveable thief that Adol eventually meets and befriends in the initial Ys after he busts down the wall to Adol's cell (Dogi breaks down a lot of walls, as Ys fans can attest). We find out that Dogi and Adol have been brought to Redmont due to various rumors of it falling on hard times, and right away the player and Adol is dragged into a conflict at the mines which then begets a whole adventure concerning evil statues, the local despotic ruler installed by the frequently antagonistic Romun Empire - the game is based on a fantasy version of Europe - and a pair of siblings seemingly at the core of the troubles.
In truth, any or all of those can be used to describe pretty much every Ys game ever, but the strength of Ys tends to lie outside of its story. If anything, the fans of this series tend to view the plot as a contrivance for fighting a lot of immense, powerful bosses and maintaining a steady feed of new upgrades and level-ups. It's not a whole lot removed from other action RPGs in that respect - Diablo, Souls, the IGAVanias, and so on. What has always been remarkable about the Ys series is its alacrity: you attack with quick combos, you dodge and dash out of the way to avoid damage and you jump and spin around to traverse areas with lightning speed. Staying still gets you hit, and Adol takes hits like an anime fan on prom night a wet paper bag.
Speaking of which, the challenge level of Oath in Felghana in particular is no joke. I can't tell whether or not it's because the original got a lot of flak at the time for being too easy, but the bosses are nightmares in this game even on the middle difficulty level. In particular, a certain early part of the game has the antagonist toss Adol in a pit after a boss encounter, and Adol has to fight two more bosses before he can make his way out. There's some truth to the fact that Oath in Felghana has that common RPG mechanical issue of simply being a game of numbers at times: if your numbers are too low, it'll be almost impossible to beat a boss unless you manage to whittle its health down with your limited damage output while avoiding the handful of hits it'll take to kill you, though if you've grinded a bit and upgraded your equipment you might end up steamrolling the very same boss that seemed indomitable just moments ago. With three bosses in a row (including the fight pre-getting hurled off a cliff) and no means to return to Redmont to improve your equipment, this part of the game is a baptism of fire. Literally, I suppose, given that you're running around the caldera of a volcano and have to wade through lava at one point. Shortly after that you've given an item that lets you teleport to any save point, and the danger of ever being stuck in the same predicament dissipates for (I presume) the rest of the game.
There was no way I wasn't going to like Ys: Oath of Felghana, ridiculous difficulty curves aside. The pace of the action is intoxicating, the music is trashy guitar rockin the absolutebest way possible, the bosses rival Dark Souls for how tough they can be and how rewarding it is to defeat one (even if they don't quite have the same level of strategic complexity), and I tend to find Falcom's stories and presentations charming in their guilelessness. It's JRPG comfort food, and I needed something breezy that offers pure, visceral enjoyment to end this exhausting month. Well, the type of breezy that kills you a lot until you git gud.
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