• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim PC |OT| - Re-Release of the Far West Ocean

KHlover

Banned
I've created .bat files to rename the music files of the Ys VI games. Copy the music to a safe location (DON'T run these scripts in the game folders, the games depend on the music having the right name). Afterwards the tracks should have the correct names from their OST release. Way easier if you make playlists than to try and figure out which cryptic filename belongs to which song, especially since the songs aren't always in the same order as on the OST.

Already posted this in the community thread, but since this includes a .bat from Ys VI I thought I might as well also post it here.
 

womp

Member
Just snagged it on Steam yesterday. Put four hours into it today...having a ball. Tons of fun! I have Origins and Felghana in the backlog from the Steam winter sale still, so I will probably load them up after I finish off this.

Only other Ys games I've beaten are Ys III back in the SNES days, Ys I&II on the DS (Actually I couldn't slog my way through II, it broke me...), and Seven on PSP.

Hoping Celceta makes it over to Steam next since I sold my Vita and never actually put much time into it on there.
 

Jinfash

needs 2 extra inches
Bought it 50% off too cause I had free time and didn't feel like waiting.

The game itself is pretty solid, just as I expected. And it runs as good as Origin and Oath do. My only (sporadic) problem is a slight stutter/judder that sometimes occur when the screen is scrolling. At first I suspected I was dropping frames (even tho the game isn't demanding) but when I enabled the in-game frame counter, it showed a constant 60fps.

Any idea what might be causing this distracting issue?
 
Bought it 50% off too cause I had free time and didn't feel like waiting.

The game itself is pretty solid, just as I expected. And it runs as good as Origin and Oath do. My only (sporadic) problem is a slight stutter/judder that sometimes occur when the screen is scrolling. At first I suspected I was dropping frames (even tho the game isn't demanding) but when I enabled the in-game frame counter, it showed a constant 60fps.

Any idea what might be causing this distracting issue?

Could be native, as it is a really old game. Ask in the game's page on steam, Sara will answer eventually.
 

Usobuko

Banned
Do you need to max out to beat Majunun?

I'm Lv.50, hard mode, doing 1 dmg to it with all 3x Lv 10 sword and Bell of Silence don't seem to be the right item for it.
 
Do you need to max out to beat Majunun?

I'm Lv.50, hard mode, doing 1 dmg to it with all 3x Lv 10 sword and Bell of Silence don't seem to be the right item for it.

If you invested in STR and DEF seeds, then no. I'd recommend going to level 52 for it, at least.
 

Bebpo

Banned
Getting near the end of this after playing it for the first time finally. The dash jump controls are the stupidest thing ever in an arpg or platformer. WTF was Falcom thinking.

Otherwise some bad bosses, enemies, annoying layouts make me see why it's regarded as one of the weaker Ys' titles. It's still fun and a solid game, but there's a lot of bullshit.
 
Dash jump was only a hassle at the start until you learn the trick to executing it with ease.

I think the game's biggest weakness is the amount of grinding required.
 

Nyoro SF

Member
There's no trick though. The window for the dash attack by itself is ridiculously small, all there is to it. They widened its input range in Origin for a reason.
 
There's no trick though. The window for the dash attack by itself is ridiculously small, all there is to it. They widened its input range in Origin for a reason.

It's not ridiculously small. It was smaller than origin's, sure. Not by a large margin though. Also, you just have to look at the feet animation to get the timing right.

It might take a little getting used to, but once you get the hang of it, it's no issue at all.
 

Nyoro SF

Member
It's not ridiculously small. It was smaller than origin's, sure. Not by a large margin though. Also, you just have to look at the feet animation to get the timing right.

It might take a little getting used to, but once you get the hang of it, it's no issue at all.

If users are going to go that far to create custom input scripts just to reduce the annoyance of one technique, then maybe it's the technique that's the problem, not the user.

At least Falcom realized they made a big mistake and made it possible for regular people instead of Beatmania superhumans to do it 100% of the time.
 
If users are going to go that far to create custom input scripts just to reduce the annoyance of one technique, then maybe it's the technique that's the problem, not the user.

At least Falcom realized they made a big mistake and made it possible for regular people instead of Beatmania superhumans to do it 100% of the time.

I'm not disputing that the technique is the problem. It is a very troublesome way to implement it, certainly. And yeah, i'm glad they changed it, and then removed that mechanic altogether from later iterations.
 

Bebpo

Banned
It's just dumb. Yeah if I stand still and flick and then hit the buttons I can do it. But it's something I have to stop, point in the direction and think about doing it. It's not just a normal move that feels natural when you are running around. It's like some secret hidden trick move when it should just be part of your standard movement abilities like...every other arpg (even all the other ones by Falcom). Combine that with some of the bosses (most of the bosses?) and the game lacks polish compared to the later titles. And when you get jank in an arpg or platformer you end up with a lot of moments of frustration that bring the mood down overall.
 

Nyoro SF

Member
Well the dash jump was hardly critical in Ys VI but it is rather aggravating that they made it so hard to do on top of rewarding your failure by throwing you into huge pits that usually took a minute or more to make your way back from.

It's kind of a shame that in Origin, they made the dash attack much easier to do, but they didn't give me any chances to try *fair* dash jumps for style points. lol
 

Bebpo

Banned
Finished it tonight and kind of ok overall. I actually liked the final boss because of the shmup laser spam and the second halve's pattern was fun even if it was super easy.

I've always enjoyed and hated the leveling aspect of Ys. It's fun when you do a dungeon and at the start you're struggling to survive and taking on enemies one at a time, but by the end of the dungeon 5+ levels higher you're decimating those same enemies. The sense of character progression is wholly satisfying.

But the cost of that is that the boss battles often feel wrong. They're either too difficult where you're doing 0 damage or tedious when doing 1-5 damage per hit, or often they're too easy and you can just mash mash mash boss dead. It's really hard with the levels and stats and equipment to always be at that perfect sweet spot where the boss fights are challenging and fun like an action game. It especially gets worse towards the end because the game isn't balanced for all the optional equipment since some players might not get it. The end bosses were a joke, whereas the early bosses I was doing 0 damage until I leveled a bit more and upgraded my swords.

You see this in time attack where for the most part all of the fights are at that perfect sweet spot and a ton of fun. It really makes me wish they'd do a Ys game without any levels or stats and just pure skill and challenge.

That being said even the boss rush is kind of iffy in this one because about half of the bosses suck. Either there's some weird hitbox attacks or they spend 2/3rds of the time out of reach so you can't even hit them. Or the ones that you can hit but only with a single jump attack over and over, which isn't fun.

The dungeons are fun outside of the 2nd half of the Lost Ruins with the lava and razor blade throwing dudes which is super annoying the first time through. But the game needed far more dungeons. The game is super, super short. Mainly because there's only like 5 or 6 dungeons in the game total. Especially since a lot of the bosses are junk, the dungeons are the best part and unfortunately not only are there few of them but they tend to be fairly short. Maybe Ys works better with more games like Origin where it's just pure dungeon with story events since the dungeons are great in Ys.

*edit* yeah, actually hold up. If you don't count the small overworld connector and you don't count the totally not a dungeon fleet, there is intro dungeon which isn't really a dungeon, granvalle mountain being the first real dungeon, forgotten ruins being #2, limestone cave #3 and final dungeon being #4. So there's only four full length dungeons in the entire game...that's a little short.

The story was probably the best of the Ys games I've played, but I feel kind of bad for the writers in Ys games. No matter how good the story is or characters are, every minute that I'm not either A) In a dungeon fighting stuff or B) Fighting a boss, I'm always going to be a little annoyed that I'm not doing A or B so I always see the story as a chore and just push through it as quickly as possible to get to the next dungeon where the fun is at. I'm not sure how they can adjust that, since I usually like story and cutscenes in my rpgs, but to me Ys is more of a pure action game and the "high" of being in the groove and having a good time with Ys is dungeon crawling with great music and good fast combat and story just gets in the way. But that being said, I liked the plot of the Ark and the mysterious island surrounded by a vortex. I liked that the final boss was basically
Just fighting a giant big dumb talking computer.

Music had some good tunes and controls were a bit janky. It's definitely my least favorite of the Ys6 engine games. I still need to play Ys 1&2 along with 5 whenever it gets remade, but for me Oath>Origin>Ys7>Ark>>>Celceta. For whatever reason Celceta just really didin't click with me, I found the story extremely boring, the world uninteresting, the gameplay just average and the graphics muddy and ugly. Otherwise even with the jank and mainly bad boss fights, I still had a good time with Ys6. Hopefully Ys8 tries to find a good middle ground between the Ys6/Oath/Origin style and the Ys7/Celceta style. The 7/Celceta stuff is definitely inferior (although they have some good boss fights), but I think there's probably a way to bring the party system up to the quality of the solo combat games.



I found dash jump much easier when using a d-pad. Perhaps it'll help?

Yeah, it's definitely easier with a d-pad, but then it's tough jumping in any direction that's not 4-way with the d-pad. But I agree having done all the areas that you only need the jump a couple of times in the whole game. Still makes you wonder what the point of having a move you only need a couple of times in the whole game was for...
 
Most of the way through my first run of Napishtim. I'm doing Normal Catastrophe, it's my first Napishtim-engine Ys game (waited to get my 360 pad before getting into these), and overall it's very fun, a flawed gem. Now I need to speak up for the wall boss:
Poor visual indicators of what's going on, only a limited selection of (bad) ways to actually damage the boss, attacks that are poorly coordinated so that there's RNG chance of just getting damaged regardless of what you do. Plus an even worse jump-to-do-damage setup than the previous fights. Ugh.
Did you try
using the wind combo to slam into the missile enemies, redirecting them back at Orjugan
? I haven't seen any mention of that in this OT. I think that's what the designers had in mind, since you have to actually do any bit of damage to Orjugan for it to start using its hands.
Right from the start you're getting bombarded, and the key is to learn, to some degree, each missile launch pattern in order to get ideal timing for a four-spin wind combo. This works more consistently than an endurance match of jumping to hit the hands so you can grind fire magic, which is an okay strat but can exacerbate the boss's flaws (shoddy hand hitboxes (for hitting them and getting hit by their swipes), lack of visual telegraphing for missile waves and when missiles are going to explode, uncertainty over where the first ground-pound will land)
. Maybe the designers could have found a better way to illustrate to players that
you can redirect the missiles
, but the huge gap between you and Orjugan, plus the lack of damage upon the hands affecting the HP meter, should indicate room for observation.

I just don't see why this boss encounter needs to be crucified for the sake of discussing other things about Napishtim. Obviously it's got a lot of potential for improvement, but this and the bee in Canaan Plains are both good and, once you understand them better, even great. The one true folly on Falcom's part was using the dash jump, itself a badly-made mechanic (relies on you learning and using a sub-par lunge attack with strict timing, + how there's multiple animations and distances crossed for regular jump slashes...which the in-game manual never clarifies), to gate useful items and lore from players. After that I think Gran-Vallis's boss is pathetic, but quality-wise the bosses incline from that point forward; many of these encounters live up to Ys standards before Felghana, it seems, and the move into 3D was rough-going for Falcom re: bosses.
 
Did you try
using the wind combo to slam into the missile enemies, redirecting them back at Orjugan
?

I mean, I know how to beat the boss. There are a lot of boss fights (in other Ys games, even) that seem frustrating and stupid at first, but once you get the mechanic it's suddenly smooth. I didn't find that to be the case at all in this fight -- even once I knew exactly what to do it was irritating and uninteresting.

(That said, I played this in May so my ability to remember this really precisely is pretty limited.)

I just don't see why this boss encounter needs to be crucified for the sake of discussing other things about Napishtim.

Because it's crummy, and the vast majority of Ys boss battles are very well designed.
 

chaosblade

Unconfirmed Member
I think the boss would be better if there was a better visual cue for when to damage it, because there is a lot going on and it's hard to pay attention to the "background" while also dealing with the arms. And the hit/hurt boxes were poorly designed. Multiple bosses suffer in that regard, but those arms... it feels like they hit you from a mile away, and the hitboxes linger well after the attack appears to be over.
 
Missed that post. Whoops.

I think the boss would be better if there was a better visual cue for when to damage it, because there is a lot going on and it's hard to pay attention to the "background" while also dealing with the arms. And the hit/hurt boxes were poorly designed. Multiple bosses suffer in that regard, but those arms... it feels like they hit you from a mile away, and the hitboxes linger well after the attack appears to be over.
Key is to jump on the insides of the arm swipes to avoid the hands entirely, which makes the battle a little slower but reliable to beat. That's why I think slightly delaying the first ground-pound shockwave (visually you'd see earth stab out from the ground after being pounded, and then a shockwave releases along with boulder shards) would make that move easier to see coming. You're already staying as far away from the hands as possible without sacrificing missiles sent back per cycle, but the ground-pound move is cruel. It's a good thing you aren't hurt too badly from ground-pounds.

I just beat the game. The epilogue's barely there, but overall end-game was great. Apparently I was under-leveled for
Ernst
(max swords + equipment at level 50 w/o any healing items for the battle), but the revival accessory saved me. Falcom didn't account for something like Catastrophe Mode back when they made the game, but having quick warps around Canaan made it easy to do the side-quests and prepare for anything. Now Time Attack is ferociously hard and I already challenged my reflexes fighting the first Canaan Plains mini-boss under-leveled, so I'm going to revisit my save before that second-to-last boss, since
Ernst
is worth a fairer shot. The final boss was easy, but well-designed, and the stakes felt high enough. Majunun's not the worth grinding for hours to have a shot at defeating, so I'll be done with Napishtim in a bit (until a full replay).
 

chaosblade

Unconfirmed Member
Yeah, I tried to fight Majunun or whatever at the end of the game and I did 0 damage and still got killed in just a few hits. I noped out of that hard.
 

Orin GA

I wish I could hat you to death
With Resident Evil 7 done I decided to go back in my backlog and will be playing this next. Tho I'm gonna do things a little different. usually i kill every enemy I come across in these games but the amount of enemies on the screen is waaaaaaaaay more than any other Ys game I've ever played. So i am just skip the regular enemies and head straight for the bosses only leveling up if I'm not doing any/too little damage. Should be interesting.
 
Top Bottom