Ys Seven

Where has this franchise been all my life? Growing up with Ys alongside other beloved action adventure classics must have been magical. I know I’ve already gushed about the nostalgia and charm of the older Ys games in my previous reviews, but I just can’t help myself. There’s something special about the way these games make me feel—something few games can easily evoke. So at this point, it’s safe to say Ys has completely taken over my heart.
I already knew that Ys Seven would expand on the classic formula, and honestly, I couldn’t be happier with what they’ve created. While it introduces new elements, like the three-party system, it still retains the simple yet engaging core experience. The gameplay is still easy to pick up, effortless to enjoy and perfect for unwinding and getting lost in the adventure. And really, that’s all I ever want from Ys.
I think at this point, it’s practically a given that Falcom delivers yet another outstanding soundtrack for the Ys series. Their music never fails to enhance the experience, and this time is no exception. And while the story and characters are simple, they come to life with a warmth and nostalgia that make the adventure feel truly heartfelt and endlessly charming.
However, the bosses were probably the weakest I’ve encountered in any Ys game so far. They take longer to beat than in previous entries and the early ones feel like damage sponges. At times, it was more frustrating than fun to get through them.
But overall, I had an absolute blast with this game! As much as I would have adored Ys games in my childhood, I’m honestly grateful to experience them now as an adult.

It doesn't say, but Ys Seven does work on Steam Deck. Though it doesn't support the native resolution, so you'll have to be happy with 720p and having black bars on top and bottom. The game does run in 4K 60fps in you play in desktop mode.
This is an absolutely great game and I highlynrecommend it. It's a bit archaic and short, but it's pure simple fun.

Sideways thumb.
This was quite the disappointment. This is the first Ys game to start using party combat, and boy does that have me worried for the next games (I own Celceta & Ys VIII, so I'm going to try them eventually).
So Ys had a string of games that were pretty solid 8/10's (at least to me) with Naphistim, Felghana & Origin. If you've played one of those, the others were predictable, the gameplay would be pretty much the same.
With this game, Ys introduced the character swap mechanic in place of the fire/thunder/etc weapons, and this system just feels worse/more convoluted than the previous. It's not at all difficult to grasp or anything, but it just feels like you're swapping characters to the one most effective at dealing damage to specific enemy types. Regardless of whom you swap too, you're using your basic attack and occasionally your big attacks. Some of these basic attacks are slow, or ranged with a very limited range, they don't feel particularly great, whereas when you used your various weapon skills in the previous Ys games, they each had their place and felt more powerful/better to use. The combat system here does have more special attacks and things going on with it, but it feels like a downgrade from the previous games. I also felt more spammy with that attack button, almost like I was playing a beat'em up game.
Other changes that don't improve the gameplay, and in some ways made it worse:
Your jump has been replaced with a dash. Okay, so dashing out of the way of enemies is fine, but I enjoyed being able to jump and was missing it here, it also led to more interesting level design and platforming in the previous games.
You get different stat bonuses depending on which 3 characters you use, but this doesn't feel interesting or important to develop any kind of synergy.
They added crafting ingredients which you collect, which feels needless, though seemed at least be straightforward and mostly inoffensive.
Often enemies die and remain there to be whacked a few times to drop extra resources, it serves as a needless, minor nuisance.
Enemies respawn now after a period of time, even if you don't leave an area, like in an MMORPG. I'd prefer them not too, but whatever, okay.
On another note, a game is also more immersive to me when you feel like you're adventuring alone rather than with a jumble of characters on the screen, it makes you feel more isolated in your environments.
The game otherwise appears to follow most of the usual Ys formula, though feels a bit sparse/bland in its area design (probably in part due to jumping being taken away). The second half of the game is a big step up from the first, with larger dungeons and more interesting things going on, it does get better after the first 12 hours, but by that point I also felt like I had stockholm syndrome. This game went from being a dull 6/10 to something like a 7 or 7.5 and I eventually flipped this review to positive.
Apparently the next Ys games are doubling down on this party system, so yeah, this was disappointing, and the future looks bleak. Whilst the previous games had a streamlined machine going, they were quite repetitive and I agree with the decision to try and mix things up a bit, but this wasn't the sauce that the series needed, and in fact has led to the combat actually becoming more dull and repetitive. It's quite playable and fine, but just incredibly bland compared to the previous games, mid at best.
Other issues, mostly technical:
-The game doesn’t launch in full screen mode and I had to check the Steam discussion page to find a way to make Steam launch a configuration tool which then allowed me to fix that. Pretty shoddy, but easily remedied.
-The title screen has a portion of the screen cut off. This is fortunately only on this one screen, so it isn’t a big deal but again, shoddy.
-At the start of the game, I visited every possible location & NPC in the town and appeared to be stuck/trapped. Apparently the game relies on your entering one of the screens from a specific side in order to trigger a crucial cutscene, which I eventually stumbled upon running in circles around the place. Poor design.
-Sound effects were a little too loud in relation to the music, you can adjust that with the volume sliders in the game, but by default you’d expect that to get picked up during testing. I’ll add that some character sounds still sounded too loud.
-I was beating most of these bosses on the first try on Normal difficulty, but I don't think making them spongier by playing on harder would've made them more interesting encounters.

A really good Ys in terms of the gameplay who switch to a 3 party member versus the old school Adol only.
Better start with normal/hard for your first playthrough and suffer in nightmare afterwards. A great action pact adventure like usual to save the world.

If you want to finish the harder achievement grinding at the end (all lv 10 skills with Adol) while gathering materials and money so you have less back and forth to do.

This is such an underrated Ys game. I'm going through the whole series now and played in a weird order so I've played all but Oath and Memories of Celceta. I expected this to be a meh game based on everything I've read about Ys but this is easily one of my favorites. This is such a great Ys game, don't skip it
I wrote the above while I was in the final dungeon still. After the ending, this might be my favorite Ys game. Enjoy your depression after finishing Ys Seven

I rate Ys Seven very high as my second favourite of all the Ys games, it has the best soundtrack imo, really fun combat with a lot of playable character variety, solid plot and characters despite there being no voice acting, a landscape with tons of variety and exploration.

It however has one big issue, the balancing and difficulty.
On Normal you should have absolutely no issue, at worst bosses will overstay their welcome at times but nothing impossible or too frustrating.
Go any higher and it becomes a mess, Hard and Nightmare halve your healing if not worse, everything will 2 hit you and bosses like the one at the wind temple or the final boss will have you think to yourself if the game isn't broken as if the bosses are at 2x speed. Some bosses are doable without taking a single hit because they are so predictable and easy to read and then there are the 2 bosses I mentioned that have 20 attack moves without a second for the player to even attack.
What the game wants you to do is use the block feature which never got explained, the only way to find out is going in the keybind settings.

I'm trying to not make it seem like a skill issue but the main take away is that it seems like the difficulties didn't get enough playtesting, it's either too easy or it's really frustrating for the average player.
Don't bother going above the Normal difficulty with this one as a new player because you can't lower it in the settings later on.

A really fun ARPG
The combat is solid
The story while nothing amazing is pretty fun to follow and enjoyed the characters
The balancing is great and you cans till do most of the bosses if a bit underleveled
Loved how the map opens up as the game progressed
Liked the introduction of exploring powers and enjoyed finding more stuff
Its a really easy recommendation if you like ARPGs
I look forward to playing rest of the YS games