Developer – Nihon Falcom

Publisher – Xseed Games

Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PS4/5 (Reviewed)

Review code Provided By Publisher

Ys The Oath in Felghana is typically rated one of the best Ys games of the series so I was really excited for the opportunity to give it a shot after playing Ys X: Nordics. I wanted to get an understanding of the older games in the series and see how it has evolved to bring us what Ys is today. Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana was the perfect chance to experience this! It has updated graphics, Adol has a voice now, and an added turbo mode, it keeps the core experience true to the original version.

Ys: The Oath in Felghana follows the adventures of our hero, Adol Christin, and his companion, Dogi, as they arrive by boat in Felghana—Dogi’s homeland, which he hasn’t visited in many years. Their arrival is anything but uneventful, as they immediately come across a villager under attack by wild monsters. After swiftly defeating the creatures, the grateful villager recognizes Dogi as her childhood friend. It takes Dogi a moment to recall who she is, as she was just a young girl when he left. Following this reunion, the pair makes their way to the village of Redmont, where Dogi grew up, and their adventure begins in earnest.

As Adol ventures through the land, players will explore a variety of locations, including a sprawling quarry, ancient ruins, the depths of a lava-filled cavern, a towering castle, and more. Despite its original release years ago, does Ys still hold up as an exceptional game in this remastered form? Without a doubt!

There is something to be said about the simple nature of the older Ys games. While there any many great advances made in the later entries, I quiet enjoy the simple nature of Ys: The Oath in Felghana. The gameplay loop is as follows. There is a brief story section where you are given some information about the most pressing matter at hand in the story and then you are free to go around the town and talk to the villages, purchase upgrades to your equipment, and take on a few side quests. After you are finished talking with everyone you want to talk to, you can then exit the town and go to the area of your current objective. When you get to the area you can explore that zone all while fighting monsters and collecting timed power-up potions and experience. Each zone has a few different platforming sections and occasionally a hidden chest or two. After navigating the section for a while you will find yourself face to face with the area boss. These fights start of as simple hack and slash fights and are typically easy to overcome without much thought, but as you progress and gain different abilities these bosses will require different strategies to defeat. Upon defeating the area boss, you will be awarded with a massive boost to your experience and can head back to town to find out your next objective.

In terms of treasure and loot that you can collect, Adol can equip magically bracelets, a sword, a shield, and an armor set. The different bracelets allow Adol to use different abilities such as throwing a fire ball which can be used to attack enemies from a distance, or charging into an enemy and blocking a few attacks along the way. Not only are these types of abilities used in combat, they are also used to help you access areas that are previously unreachable. This will allow you to explore previous areas and find new treasure to help you conquer your foes. You can also find gems that will upgrade these bracelets, unlocking stronger versions of the abilities but takes a longer time to charge. Each area typically has a sword, shield, and armor as well which you can upgrade a few times each with a currency that you find in your travels called Ravel Ore. This metal can be used along with some gold at the local blacksmith to increase the stats of the equipment that you are wearing. I always tried to take my time to make sure that I found all available upgrades for Adol to make the fights that much easier, especially closer to the end of the game when the bosses and even some of the monsters can do a lot of damage to your limited health pool if you aren’t prepared. These simple but effective upgrade systems work and provides a way to make Adol feel much stronger and you progress.

In terms of story, there are a few twists and turns that you discover along your journey. It starts as a simple save the villagers type of affair, but quickly evolves into a much deeper mission to collect 4 statues. These statues are also being sought after by a White Knight known as Chester. His story will come to light over the course of the game and it is not as black and white as it may seem. At the start, I wasn’t really invested in the story but as it progressed it became more interesting and I was eager to see how the story would unfold. The villagers also are interesting and can provide insights, side quests, and help you with rewards as well. I made sure that every time I came back to town after beating a boss to talk to all the people just to make sure that I go as much as I could from them. You can’t necessarily buy a lot of items that will help you out, outside of a few buff items that can block damage or revive you after death, there aren’t potions that can heal you mid-fight or anything like that to keep you alive. The only way to heal is by stopping by a save point, or when you kill a monster they can potentially drop healing herbs which will heal a varied amount of health. Monsters can also drop timed buff potions that increase your strength, defense, and experience gain which can help in a pinch.

Overall, Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana is an excellent experience. It is easy to see why so many rate this as one of the best Ys games of the series. There is a lot to enjoy through the game with multiple tiers of difficulty, challenging boss fights, and it is rather streamlined. Unlike the later entries which tend to be around 30+ hours, Oath is around 10-11 hours on normal difficulty which actually felt like the perfect amount of time for this type of game. Long enough to be engaging and provide new aspects to the game without overstaying its welcome and feel repetitive. I think any Ys fan should definitely give this latest edition a try and action RPG fans will find a lot to enjoy with The Oath in Felghana as it is clearly one of the best entries in the series.