[[Blogroll]] Quick thoughts after finishing the **Ys X** demo. Tl;dr: I went ahead and grabbed the full game because I'm cautiously optimistic! # What I Liked ## The Combat It took some time to get used to it but by the end I was pretty into how **Ys X** plays. The Duo system is a nice change of pace from the party system in the past few **Ys** games, and it feels...deliberately paced, might be the best way to describe it? The controls were a bit complex to start with, but I started to get the flow of it: swap between characters to build up meter and hit skills, then go to Duo mode when you're fighting a big thing or need to stagger an enemy. That plus the sort-of sphere grid mean that I like the moment to moment gameplay quite a lot. ## The Port It's magical. If every PC game was ported like this I would be ecstatic. Durante is a computer God as far as I'm concerned. You can just fast boot into your most recent save y'all. He's putting AAA studios to shame. Runs like butter on the Steam Deck too let's go. ## The Music It's banging like it should be. # What I Didn't Like ## The Pacing The slow *Trailsification* of **Ys** continues. The first few hours of this game are *brutal*, and I was *this* 🤏🏾 close to giving up entirely. It took till halfway through chapter 3 before I felt like I was finally playing a **Ys** game. So much boring exposition and yapping. That's what you made **Trails** for man! Please just curbstomp Adol into a dungeon five minutes into **Ys IX** I can't take it anymore. Luckily I was cruising afterwards but goddamn. ## The Sailing It's...fine. I guess I shouldn't say I didn't like it but I didn't care about it at all. Guess it'll be nice in-between stuff after dungeons and exploring. Can't be worse than another cutscene LOL. Also the boat is way too slow but it looks like you can upgrade it. --- I'm intrigued enough. The plot seems less likely to get into politics it shouldn't like a certain other **Ys** game[^1], but we'll see if it falls apart the same way. I can never stay away from **Ys** though. Still some of the best Action-RPG combat on the market. [^1]: *cough cough* **Ys IX** *cough cough*