I Finally Bought Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana (Any Spoiler-Free Advice Would be Appreciated)

[vanguard333]

One thing I should get out of the way is that I have been wanting this game since it was announced for the Switch in... was it 2017 or 2018? I can't remember. Anyway; the premise seemed really interesting and I saw a lot of people praising the game's story, which naturally caught my eye. I After a bunch of research online and asking others about this series (including on this forum), I decided I would get the PS4 version. However, the series is so, for lack of a better word, niche, that when I went to the EB Games that I usually went to to buy games, the store staff (who are usually very knowledgeable about new releases) had never even heard of it. Eventually, other games caught my eye, though I never forgot it. 

Then, I saw it was 67% off on the playstation store yesterday and I finally got it. I have made very little progress in the game; having just gotten to the part where you find the captain and set up a base. So far, the game is... interesting. 

Gameplay-wise, when I saw it was real-time action combat, I was concerned it would be a lot like Xenoblade, with the combat being built around auto-attack and cooldown-based abilities like an MMO. Mercifully, it is not that at all; attacks require manual input and the skill system uses skill points that are refilled by landing fully-charged attacks. That's great, and I like how different party members have different types of attacks that are more effective against specific types of creatures. However, there are a few things about the combat that I'm initially finding a bit awkward:

Immediately, the lack of a block button threw me off. There's only roll and dodge. Mercifully, roll is just roll out of the way and isn't like Dark Souls combat where it's all about i-frames, but the lack of a block took some getting used to. Then there was switching between party members. In FF7 Remake, for example, when you switch to controlling a different party member during combat, the party member you switch to is where they were before the switch, and I can honestly say I never found that unintuitive. In this game, however, when you switch, the characters swap places. I can't tell you how many times I swapped from Adol to Laxia or vice-versa and was looking at where the other person was, expecting to end up there, only to still be where I was before. I'm sure this has its advantages, but it is taking some getting used to.

I should probably stress that I have very limited experience with JRPGs. It was basically just Fire Emblem for the longest time, and now it's Fire Emblem, Xenoblade Chronicles (1 & X), Valkyria Chronicles 4, Final Fantasy 7 Remake (which I'm only halfway through), a demo for Dragon Quest 11, and that's it. 

So... yeah; any advice for a complete newbie to the series with limited understanding of how JRPGs work? Any helpful tips?

Edited January 7, 2021 by vanguard333

[Etria]

Oooooh, I love that game. One of the best of the Y's series. It's also the prettiest.

Hm, what tips could I give... Do try to do all character quests. They're generally worth it.

Try to save often. You can walk into some higher level areas by accident. It's relatively easy to run away, but better safe than sorry.

I'm not sure if characters leave for some time, but it's always worth it to level all characters relatively evenly.

Always gather/ forage stuff. You can exchange it for good stuff in the base, especially healing items. Fishing isn't that important but getting one of each type gets you rewards.

[vanguard333]

@Sweet Summer Tana Thanks. Yeah; the game definitely has good presentation and art style. 

Okay, I'll try to do all the character quests. Yeah; I already figured out to save often and gather/forage stuff. Thanks for the levelling advice; one thing that has always annoyed me about games with party-based systems is that, while some games have it that all characters get experience, the majority of the ones I've played don't. It's a bit of a shame to hear that this game goes for the latter option of making the player have to go out of their way to level everyone evenly. 

By the way, does this game have multiple endings or anything like that?

Also, regarding the story, I must admit that I haven't gotten very far at all, but first impressions are overall pretty good. The game does start strongly with the time spent on the ship; some clunky exposition aside, and the first few minutes on the island has been alright. However, there is one small thing:

When I first saw this game, I thought it looked like it had an interesting story to tell, but I also thought it looked very... anime (this was before I actually started watching anime). Today there's a fair bit of anime that I enjoy, though there are some recurring tropes I do find annoying, and Ys VIII managed to have one of them in the first thirty minutes of me playing it: a mistaken-for-pervert scene where the protagonist accidentally walks in on a girl bathing and is mistaken for a pervert. In this case, Adol wakes up on the island and looks for survivors, the first one he finds is Laxia, and then the scene happens as I just described.

I know these scenes are supposed to be funny, but I honestly just find them annoying, and it didn't help that this is the first time Adol runs into one of the other castaways. I suspect that it was also there to introduce an aspect of her character: she assumes the worst about the men in her life or something like that, but honestly all that scene did was leave me wondering: "She couldn't have been on this island much longer than Adol; where did she find a clean white towel?"

Edited December 1, 2020 by vanguard333

[Etria]

Oh no, characters that are not active in battle do get experience as well, just less than the active party. You can also find and exchange material for exp booster. So it's not bad. You should still swap characters because you need to use skills to level them and get new skills. All the characters are fun to play though.

It's been some time since my last playthrough but that scene is pretty much the most anime. I thought it was horrible as well but I don't remember any other scenes like that. Dana and her friends' outfits are pretty eyeroll-worthy but I don't think you've reached that point yet.

[vanguard333]

8 minutes ago, Sweet Summer Tana said:

Oh no, characters that are not active in battle do get experience as well, just less than the active party. You can also find and exchange material for exp booster. So it's not bad. You should still swap characters because you need to use skills to level them and get new skills. All the characters are fun to play though.

It's been some time since my last playthrough but that scene is pretty much the most anime. I thought it was horrible as well but I don't remember any other scenes like that. Dana and her friends' outfits are pretty eyeroll-worthy but I don't think you've reached that point yet.

I see. Thanks for letting me know. 

Okay. I haven't reached that point yet. By the way, is it ever explained where she found a clean, white, dry towel on a tropical deserted island? Or is that just something we're not supposed to think about?

Also, I think I read somewhere about the game having multiple endings. Is that true?

Edited December 1, 2020 by vanguard333

[Interdimensional Observer]

28 minutes ago, vanguard333 said:

Also, I think I read somewhere about the game having multiple endings. Is that true?

Correct, each ending is better than the prior ones. To get the true ending, you need over 200 Approval (or Reputation, whatever it's called) Points before you fight the final-if-you-don't-get-the-true-ending boss.

Edited December 1, 2020 by Interdimensional Observer

[Shrimpica]

Oh yes, my fav. game released in the last decade, and my #3 Game of all time!

5 hours ago, vanguard333 said:

mmediately, the lack of a block button threw me off.

There's a guard button though. Flash guarding it's called. Although the timing is kinda tight iirc. check you controller configuration!

 

[vanguard333]

Just now, Shrimperor said:

Oh yes, my fav. game released in the last decade, and my #3 Game of all time!

There's a guard button though. Flash guarding it's called. Although the timing is kinda tight iirc. check you controller configuration!

I think flash-guarding gets introduced at a point in the game that I'm not at yet.

 

4 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Correct, each ending is better than the prior ones. To get the true ending, you need over 200 Approval (or Reputation, whatever it's called) Points before you fight the final-if-you-don't-get-the-true-ending boss.

I see. Thanks for letting me know.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Well, I can use this thread to get myself into this game. I have tried playing this game multiple times, but for some reason I lost motivation early on because I got confused by the map very only on. I ran into circles and made no progress which made me to quit this game.

I switched over to Tokyo Xanadu Ex+ which was a way easier to play for me simply because of the clear map layout (and being identic as Trails of Cold Steel I and II).

I would give YsVIII a try again, so I'll read the posts here to give myself an easier time in my next playthrough attempt.

[vanguard333]

10 hours ago, Kasumi Yoshizawa said:

Well, I can use this thread to get myself into this game. I have tried playing this game multiple times, but for some reason I lost motivation early on because I got confused by the map very only on. I ran into circles and made no progress which made me to quit this game.

I honestly have found the map a lot more linear than I expected so far (in the sense of only having one way to go with all the other ways blocked off), but that could be because I just started chapter 2 yesterday.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Actually I haven't come to chapter 2 yet.

I stopped played a bit after the first quests had been introduced.

[vanguard333]

So, I'm at this place that's basically made of coral and is full of creatures that I can't tell if they're supposed to resemble spiders or crabs. I found a fat obnoxious noble that in typical "stranded somewhere deserted" stories would get killed early on, and a doctor whose presence is suspicious (gameplay/plot-wise) simply because everyone goes on about how useful he will be, but I as a player know I can treat any wound by brewing the right item, so he clearly can't provide much that would be integrated into the gameplay. 

Anyway, I have to say that I'm finding the game surprisingly more linear than I was expecting. I certainly was expecting every section to open up gradually, but even the sections are surprisingly linear: I enter this coral dungeon, for example, and there you can immediately go left or right, except left is immediately a dead end before you've even taken maybe ten in-game steps, so the only way is right. Left ends up turning out to be an unlockable shortcut. I'm not saying it's a bad thing; I'm just saying it's a bit surprising for a game that takes place on an island and has a protagonist that's an explorer. 

I am getting a lot more used to the combat, though I'm still finding it just a bit unintuitive. I'm not sure what it is really. I'm certainly enjoying it a lot more than I did Xenoblade Chronicles 1 and X's combat, though less than I did FF7 Remake's combat. 

Edited December 21, 2020 by vanguard333