Ys Origin

Lore & Background

Ys Origin takes place seven centuries before the adventures of Adol Christin. The kingdom of Ys, governed by twin goddesses Feena and Reah and six priestly families, is invaded by demons. The goddesses raise Solomon Shrine into the sky, but later disappear to the surface. A search party of knights and sorcerers, including Yunica Tovah and Hugo Fact, is sent to find them. The game's story is told through three parallel campaigns: Yunica's, Hugo's, and the unlockable Toal Fact route, which Falcom identifies as the direct lead-in to Ys I and Ys II.

Reader's Guide

Ys Origin refines the fast action framework from Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim and Ys: The Oath in Felghana. Its gameplay is concentrated within Darm Tower, combining real-time combat, platforming, puzzles, character progression, and boss encounters. Each of the three protagonists offers distinct combat styles: Yunica uses close-range melee, Hugo attacks from a distance with magical devices, and Toal emphasizes speed and mobility. The game received generally favorable reviews, with critics praising its combat, boss design, soundtrack, and distinct characters, while noting repetition across campaigns and dated visuals. Its English release by Xseed Games in 2012 added widescreen rendering and Steamworks features, and later ports by Dotemu expanded its availability to multiple consoles.

Did You Know?

• Ys Origin is the first major Ys installment not centered on Adol Christin.
• The game's three campaigns present parallel versions of the story, not simultaneous journeys.
• Toal Fact's route is identified by Falcom as the version that leads directly into Ys I and Ys II.
• Adol Christin is playable only in Arena and Time Attack modes, not in the story campaign.

A Pioneering Showcase of Optical-Disc Technology

The PC Engine CD-ROM² version of Ys I & II stands as one of the earliest and most prominent demonstrations of what optical-disc storage could deliver on a home console. Rather than simply porting the two original PC titles, the adaptation was designed to exploit the medium's expanded capacity. Recorded music arranged by Ryo Yonemitsu, voiced dialogue, and newly produced animated cutscenes all leveraged the disc's larger storage to elevate the experience beyond what the original computer releases could offer. Hudson Soft licensed the games and commissioned Alfa System to build this combined adaptation, with Hiromasa Iwasaki—himself a veteran of Falcom's original productions—participating in the negotiations and production. The result was a package that felt genuinely different from its predecessors, proving to a console audience that a CD could carry a full role-playing experience with cinematic production values. NEC Technologies brought the title to North America in 1990 under the TurboGrafx-CD banner, complete with English-language localization and dubbed dialogue, and it was later bundled as a pack-in title with the TurboDuo console.

Bump Combat and the Rhythm of Real-Time Exploration

At the heart of Ys I & II lies a combat system that became synonymous with the series: contact-based, real-time bump combat. Adol Christin does not press an attack button; he strikes an enemy simply by moving into it. The angle of contact matters enormously—hitting an opponent off-center or from the side is both safer and more effective than colliding head-on with its front, creating a positional layer of strategy within what is otherwise a straightforward action loop. Enemies are not summoned by random encounter tables but are placed directly in the environment, so the player must navigate towns, fields, mines, towers, and temples with constant awareness. Defeating foes yields experience points and currency; leveling up raises Adol's combat statistics, while money funds purchases of weapons, armor, shields, and other gear. Health regenerates slowly when Adol stands still in safe outdoor areas, but indoor zones and boss fights demand reliance on existing HP, equipment, or restorative items. In Ys II the system expands with magic: fireballs, illumination, teleportation, communication with supernatural entities, and a transformation spell that lets Adol disguise himself as a monster and draw out dialogue, clues, and humor from creatures he could not otherwise engage.

A Two-Part Myth of Storms, Sealed Powers, and Twin Goddesses

The narrative unfolds as a single continuous campaign spanning two distinct settings. Adol Christin, a young adventurer, washes ashore on Esteria, an island cut off from the world by a supernatural barrier called the Stormwall. Monsters have erupted across the land and silver objects are vanishing. Guided by the fortune-teller Sara, Adol sets out to recover the six Books of Ys, which chronicle an ancient kingdom that prospered through a magical metal called Cleria—a substance whose use was linked to the emergence of demons and was ultimately sealed away by the people of Ys. After rescuing the amnesiac Feena, confronting Dark Fact in Darm Tower, and assembling the complete set of books, Adol is transported to the floating land of Ys itself, raised into the sky seven hundred years earlier to escape a demon invasion. There he learns magic, returns the books to statues of the six priests, and discovers that Feena and Reah are the twin goddesses of the kingdom. The Black Pearl, source of both the kingdom's magic and the demons' existence, manifests as the sentient being Darm. With the aid of the goddesses and the priests' descendants, Adol destroys the Pearl's power, the demons vanish, and Ys descends to reunite with Esteria.

Critical Acclaim and a Long Line of Remakes

The TurboGrafx-CD compilation earned strong contemporary reviews, with critics singling out its music, audiovisual presentation, and the seamless role-playing structure that carried the player from the end of Ys I directly into Ys II without a break. It is frequently cited as one of the defining releases for the TurboGrafx-CD platform, and its pack-in inclusion with the TurboDuo console further cemented its visibility among North American players in 1990. The game's influence did not end with that initial release. Nihon Falcom returned to the material with new remakes for Windows: Ys Eternal in 1997 and Ys II Eternal in 2000. Those versions became the foundation for Ys I & II Complete, Ys I & II Chronicles, and Ys I & II Chronicles+, each iteration adding revised graphics, updated music arrangements, redesigned interfaces, adjustable difficulty settings, and broader compatibility features. The latest entry, Chronicles+, offers four difficulty levels, a boss-rush mode, widescreen support, selectable character-art styles, and multiple soundtrack options, ensuring that the bump-combat formula and the twin-island myth remain accessible to new generations of players.