Within the late Nineties and early 2000s, Nintendo dominated the hand-held gaming landscape with its Gameboy and DS hardware lines. Sony entered the fray with the formidable PlayStation Portable in 2004. The hand held received robust first-party and third-party support during its lifespan, and its power meant it could handle games that Nintendo couldn’t.
Amid that development craze, Sony’s handhelds received a handful of games that were surprisingly crucial spinoffs to larger franchises. Imagine playing Final Fantasy VII Remake, seeing the black-haired Zack Fair, and never knowing who he’s since you never played the unique PlayStation Portable game where he was the protagonist, Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core. With the PSP long dead, leaving so many games stuck on unsupported hardware, essential pieces of franchise history have been lost to time.
Thankfully, that’s changing. In recent times, many Japanese developers have been porting their old PSP games to modern platforms. That included a remaster of Crisis Core that bridged the gap between Remake and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. This 12 months, the PSP revival will proceed with multiple ports, but a giant one for RPG fans kicks off 2025. Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana brings a PSP remake of a classic action-RPG back to modern consoles. It’s not only a win for fans of Falcom’s area of interest series; it’s a approach to keep one other chapter of a long-running story from getting lost.
The Ys impact
Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana follows a young man named Adol Cristin who journeys the world over seeking recent adventures. Other than the primary two games within the series, that are direct continuations of one another, the opposite Ys games are self-contained and scattered out of chronological order. For instance, The Oath in Felghana is the third game within the Ys series, however the sixth chronologically (out of 11 to this point). It sits between Ys IV: Memories of Celceta and Ys V: Kefin, the Lost Kingdom of Sand.
While it’s not too essential to play the Ys games in chronological order, it’s still helpful to know the timeline for other details. For instance, Adol’s friend, Dogi, accompanies him on most of his adventures. But he’s not present in Ys V. Why? Well, the ending of The Oath in Felghana explains that exact context. In truth, Ys V is the one game within the series that hasn’t gotten an official localization to this point. If it ever gets one, then that makes Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana much more essential as a remaster to all fans, each old and recent.
One other certainly one of Falcom’s franchises, Trails, previously suffered from a timeline issue. The Crossbell Duology was integral to the series canon, as characters from it appeared in later entries, and recent players were often confused as to who they were. Falcom finally remastered the 2 games 11 years after the unique PSP’s release date. Now, Trails players don’t must miss any story context as they play subsequent entries within the series.
The Ys series is commonly credited for pioneering the action-RPG genre in Japan back within the Nineteen Eighties. But how come it doesn’t have the identical amount of recognition as other franchises that debuted back then, like Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest? Considered one of the various explanations is the franchise’s fragmented platform distribution, especially on consoles and handhelds.
Modern mainline Final Fantasy games have all the time found their homes on PlayStation and Xbox consoles, while Ys games jump in all places. All of them are on PC, while some are on PSP, Vita, PS4, PS5, and Switch. The one Ys game that the Xbox has is the prequel. For individuals who wish to get into the Ys series, you’ll need a chart, which will be intimidating for brand new fans.
By releasing remasters of older games onto more platforms, that increases the accessibility of the series and lessens the confusion over which games can be found on which platform. The PSP digital storefront was shut down in 2021, and only a number of select digital PSP games are backward compatible on the Vita. So the convenience of access that Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana provides can’t be understated.
Greater than a recent coat of paint
Together with providing extra story context to an ongoing series, the remasters of those PSP games are one other probability to add recent gameplay features, quality-of-life changes, and accessibility features.
Considered one of the explanation why I used to be excited for Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana and other PSP ports like Crisis Core Reunion was the inclusion of Trophies on PlayStation. PSP games don’t have Trophy support, in order that’s why once I played the unique, I used to be superb with only a single playthrough. I saw the story to the tip, and there was nothing left for me to experience. The Memoire version, nevertheless, adds difficulty-related Trophies for me to unlock, encouraging me to do multiple playthroughs.
While the Trophy list is just similar to the PC achievements list on Steam, Memoire also adds a recent “Turbo Mode” which dramatically accelerates the sport in order that I can blaze through dungeons I’ve already accomplished during my first playthrough, decreasing the time needed to finish subsequent runs.
The PSP era was a time where larger developers could create smaller and more creative spinoff games of their iconic console franchises. But for smaller developers like Falcom, it was a house where they might cultivate an audience for his or her games that didn’t necessarily fit anywhere else. But in the trendy era, PSP games serve a distinct purpose as they’re essential to know the lore of fabled franchises, thus facilitating their remasters.
With the discharge of Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana, I’m hoping the opposite Ys games on PSP will get the Memoire Treatment as well. I’d like to play Ys Seven with Trophy support, and I definitely don’t wish to shell out exorbitant eBay prices for a UMD (universal media disc) of Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim.
Ys Memoire: The Oath in Felghana launches on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and Nintendo Activate January 7.