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The eighth installment of a long loved franchise is one that is highly regarded, to the point it is arguably one of the best in the entire series. A series that has built its reputation on adventure, intrigue, storytelling and character creation making anybody who’s played any of the previous installments will know exactly what to expect from the off. It has a whole host of a returning cast that players will find familiarity with but they are also characters that anyone who has never played a previous title will get to know throughout the course of the game. The game doesn’t require you to know anything about previous titles either, making this a nice entry that may lead to exploring the rest of the previous games, as I did!
So, to that cast then, your adventure starts with Adol aboard the great ship Lombardia travelling the Gaete sea to his next adventure where he is soon met by his well known friend dogi when talk soon turns to this particular passage being a dangerous trip where people mysteriously vanish never to be seen again, swept away by the giant sea creature of myth and legend. It doesn’t take long for Adol to encounter this creature who subsequently sinks the Lombardia and leaves Adol stranded on the isle of Seiren.
This is where adventure really kicks in, the whole island is explorable and is full of wonder, excitement and danger giving you that sense of openness and intrigue that a deserted island would give you. The game thrives on this, giving the player that option to explore and search everything the island has to offer and rewarding you for doing so. The premise is that the passengers on the ship are now stranded on the island and you, as the lead role, are in charge of finding them and somehow finding a way back off the island and back home. As you find your stranded passengers they begin to make a village on the island, somewhere you can resupply and have a base of operations. It offers everything you would imagine in an RPG game, item and weapons shops, cooking and notice boards for side quests and later in the game you can unlock raid quests where you battle waves upon waves of enemies, with the help of the villagers themselves, in order to protect the village from danger and theres up to 5 of them that will join you in battles across the island that are playable and come with their own unique skills and damage sets. The added bonus to the village is you can build your relationship with the people you rescue in order to unlock better gear, character specific side missions and grant them extra abilities when in raids to help you get through some of the tougher ones later in the game. The more survivors you find the more you can explore, you do reach certain locations that need a certain amount of survivors in order to move an obstacle in the way, a fallen tree or a landslide for instance. The island is vast and the game does really well to take you from one environment to another to showcase the different habitats on the island, each giving their own enemies and resources that you can use to further strengthen your team.
Ya8 Lacrimosa of Dana has a lot going for it, the battle system is simple and you will pick it up quickly as it excels in its simplicity of allowing you to attack enemies on the open map using one button to attack, another to dodge, one to jump while allowing you to shortcut your skills to the shoulder buttons makes the battle system really engaging and allows greater exploration without needing to enter a battle stage. It also rewards you if you time your dodge perfectly by slowing the enemies down or giving you higher critical chances.
This foundation allows the game to slowly introduce the player through the story as very early on it doesn’t give anything away, it focuses on the core basics of the game at first before introducing the main storyline beat. This could put people off as it can feel a bit repetitive with the constant back and forth between finding passengers and introducing them to the community to see what they unlock as it tries to attempt character building that can sometimes feel like it gets in the way, especially if you are looking to progress the story to the next chapter. On that, the story can be confusing at times but it does have some nice pay off moments as you go through it. It’s based around the titular character Dana who you don’t find out too much about until a few chapters into the game. She is introduced as Adol starts having strange dreams about a mysterious blue haired girl when you sleep at camps. The more you progress the more the two characters intertwine, enabling you to switch between the two worlds and play as Dana who has a new set of abilities,quests and locations to explore plus clues as to the origins of primordials, monsters that Adol meets that are impenetrable by normal weapons. Dana’s actions actually affect the map around Adol further unlocking new areas to explore as you progress through the game.
Ys8 Lacrimosa of Dana is a completionists dream, not only does it have post game dungeons to explore, a secret ending (true ending) that is linked to the relationship between Adol and the villagers, every single item and treasure in journal form so you can keep track of what you’ve collected, and get rewarded for doing so, it also has rewards for completing 100% of each area that includes the aforementioned collectibles and how much of it you’ve explored. This is the eighth installment of the Ys series and developer, Falcom, knows exactly what their fan base wants and they delivered with this title. If you want a game that feels very old school and nostalgic, one that will introduce you to a franchise that no matter which entry you play you know exactly what you will get then you need to play this.
