Ys: Memories of Celceta is a reimagining of the fourth entry in the series, a new official canon entry that replaces both previous games titled Ys IV in the series’s chronology. See, back in the early 90s, Ys publisher Nihon Falcom decided to outsource development of Ys IV to two different companies, each of which produced what are widely considered subpar entries in the series today. During the start of the modern Ys renaissance, when Falcom was pumping out new games and remakes for PC and handhelds at a rapid pace, they decided to give Ys IV a shot themselves, and the reworked Memories of Celceta feels right at home alongside the other modern entries I’ve played, Origin and The Oath in Felghana.
Unlike those entries, however, Celceta is more of a fleshed-out RPG. Origin’s almost a pure dungeon crawler; Oath adds a few non-dungeon locations and quests, but Celceta boasts a full-blown world with towns, deep worldbuilding and lore, and robust quest and party systems. Of course, like in all Ys games, you explore one small region of the world, not the full globe, but that’s one of the things I love most about this series—it follows Adol’s adventures in detail, each game taking him to a new location and spending the time to flesh it out. Not many other series do this; it’s a hallmark that helps Nihon Falcom stand out for sure.
Another touch I appreciate is the geography and region design’s close resemblance to Earth. Surprisingly few fantasy JRPGs — and RPGs in general — do this. Games tend to be based in what’s supposed to be our Earth or an alternate reality of it, or in a completely original land. The world of Ys has regions named Ispani, Alp, Britai, a continent called Afroca, heck there’s a region named Europa, complete with the city of Romn filled with Romuns. Dragon Quest III is one of the few other JRPGs I can think of that do this, which is pretty cool.
Ispani, as it turns out, is where the land of Celceta lies, and within in the Great Forest, which, through various events, Adol and his new companion Duren are tasked with exploring and mapping, for it’s too dangerous for anyone else. On top of that, Adol’s got amnesia and doesn’t remember who he is, though it’s evident he’s been in the Great Forest before. This had me thinking Celceta might be Adol’s birthplace, and we’d get a bunch of his backstory and see him reconnect with his family and childhood life. I was really thinking that’s where things were heading once Adol started recollecting memories of his father, and especially when he meets a suspiciously red-headed young girl who I was sure had to be his sister or something. But, none of that comes to be.
Instead, the party discovers Celceta is actually a fallen kingdom of an ancient people, few of whom survive today. Adol, Duren, and other characters they’ve recruited along the way get drawn into an ancient conflict involving magical masks used to restrain gods. It’s a decent story for this kind of action game — not more interesting lore-wise than Ys I, II, and Origins, but there’s way more here than what Felghana had to offer, and while I don’t mind a lack of story, I appreciate when it’s good, or at least good enough to not want to skip through. Memories of Celceta fits that bill, dishing out lore about the world beyond the forgotten land of Ys that, in my opinion, was sorely needed for the series going forward. We’ve now got a new set of demigods, ancient races, and mythical artifacts to deal with, and I’d bet most regions of the yet unexplored world will feature their own versions of these.
Gameplay-wise, you’ve now got up to two party members you can swap between on the fly during combat. It’s basically Trials of Mana in 3D, which is funny—it makes the Trials of Mana remake feel like an Ys ripoff. There’s differences, though—Ys has six total characters to choose from, it puts a greater emphasis on dodging and blocking, and it’s, of course, harder. Not too hard, though. In fact, it’s an absolute joke on Normal; I wish I’d bumped the difficulty up. Hell, I forgot about the super attack you build up with that gauge—never used it once and did fine. I still had a ton of fun; it’s not like the harder difficulties make the battles much tougher; they just require more endurance.
That aside, Memories of Celceta is still too easy. I’m replaying on Hard mode now, and it’s about on par with Oath in Felghana’s Normal mode, if not a little easier still. Most bosses have relatively short-range or small AOE attacks, easily dodged, or they follow simple patterns that go too long without changing. I avoided all the final boss’s attacks by dodging in a circle around the perimeter of the arena, jumping in to hit back whenever it stopped to rest. It’s pretty braindead, but thankfully other bosses offer a bit more challenge. To be real though, the only time I struggled even slightly was when I chose the more difficult of two branching paths near the beginning of the game. After that, I steamrolled through the intended first area since I was over-leveled for it (whoops) and stayed that way for most of the game. I like doing sidequests, and a good chunk of those involve killing strong monsters.
Memories of Celceta might have too many side quests for me, though. It’s not like there’s an insane amount, and the game’s under 30 hours if you do them all. Sounds good, right? Well, if you skip them all, the game’s only around 12 to 15 hours. Now, that’s a fine ratio for most RPGs, but for a fast-paced action game like this, running across the same locations over and over wears thin after a while. The world map isn’t very big, and there’s also not a ton of dungeons, which I’m all OK with; the game just didn’t need so many sidequests to add to the run time. Of course, they’re all optional; I only did them ‘cuz I’m a weirdo completionist with this kind of game, but I would have been equally as happy with a 20- or 22-hour experience instead of one that pushes 30. If the story were longer and there were more map to explore, then 30 hours would be great—I like a fine balance of this sort of thing in my JRPGs, and Memories of Celceta doesn’t quite hit the mark.
That’s a minor complaint, though, one the super tight combat helps make up for. Every character is a joy to use, even the ones I thought looked lame at first, like Ozma. OK, he may be one of the worst characters, but only because he gets outclassed later. I had a blast using him until then, due to his range. Range is everything in this game—so much so that I benched Adol early on, leaving him out of my party for most of the game. (and I’m the guy who usually plays action RPGs as the main character the whole time!) Ozma’s spear has plenty of range, giving you a killer early alternative to Adol’s short-range sword and Duren’s up-close punches. Once I got Karna, however, I didn’t look back. She’s a full on ranged attacker with her throwing knives, and she’s also way faster than the other units. That makes her easily the best option to quickly wearing down boss HP for most of the game—at least, it was the fastest method I found.
Celceta uses an SP system, which powers your skills in combat. You get small amounts of SP by constantly attacking, or you can pause for a few seconds to get a lot of SP on your next normal attack. That means you can’t use your strongest, SP-chugging skills continuously, which is no fun. So, I gave my Karna one accessory that makes her skills cost less and another accessory one that makes her gain SP faster, then spammed her weak but cheap cost attacks to tear through everything the game could throw at me. Eventually, I got bored with that and spent a good chunk playing as Frieda and Celilica, both of whom have unique styles and are equally fun to play as. There’s a lot of variety here, and at least on Normal and Hard, plenty of strategies work.
Party AI is pretty bad, but here that’s a good thing. You can set them to either rush in and attack or hang back and evade, but generally in the overworld, your character runs ahead of the others, and you’ll kill most enemies before your companions catch up. I prefer doing it all myself, so I’m content with this, and the AI is pretty decent at helping out against bosses. My only complaint is that party members rarely get a chance to use their skills, so if you want everyone in your party to level up appropriately, you have to play as them yourself. This ain’t bad since they’re all fun to use, but it would be nice to be able to level multiple skills faster somehow, as a convenience.
Another significant flaw is that the ending feels rushed. As mentioned, the final boss is a pushover, but it’s not the end — not quite. Soon after, there’s a one-on-one battle you should easily win. Once I got through that, I was expecting another boss, a true final boss that would provide some challenge. Yet, nothing. The game was ending before a satisfying resolution had been reached. Maybe I missed something, maybe the game was rushed, whatever the case, it was a bit of a letdown after what had been a strong buildup. Ah, well.
Like its predecessors, I spent most of my time with the new Ys IV in combat, but there’s more to do outside of it than ever. Felghana’s crafting system has been greatly expanded, and it’s … kind of a pain. Look, I know this type of crafting system was relatively new to the genre in 2012, but it’s nothing more than a time-sink. You’ve gotta collect crappy versions of items, like Wilted Flowers, to turn into better versions, like Marl Flowers, to turn into even better versions, like the Ancient Ys-Land Flower or whatever it’s called. I don’t know about you, but this got boring for me years ago. Thankfully, it’s not too extensive, and you never need to collect too many of any one item at a time.
Items can also be used to power up your weapons and armor, a feature I imagine is a godsend on the higher difficulties yet only served to make my playthrough even easier. Ultimately, I didn’t hate the crafting system, but I would have rather spent my time fighting more optional bosses or something like that instead of trekking through the same maps over and over. It’s one of those features that would lower Memories of Celceta in a ranking of the Ys games if I were to make one, despite the game otherwise having more fun mechanics than, say, Oath in Felghana. On the other hand, if I were playing on a higher difficulty, I might have appreciated Celceta’s sidequest rewards more.
RPGs truly are all about finding the right balance, and that’s a good way to sum up this game. Compared to Origin, I & II, and Felghana, Memories of Celceta’s got gameplay and worldbuilding that’s overall more satisfying, but its bloat holds it back from being one of my favorites so far. At least I can happily say that the music is as good, if not better than ever. Celceta’s soundtrack is incredible, but I don’t have anything to say about it that I haven’t already covered in previous Ys reviews. (Go listen to it!) Overall, Memories of Celceta’s got me most excited about jumping into Ys VIII when I get to it, since I’ve heard it further expands on the party-based formula — I can’t wait.
That’s all for March’s entry. It’s been a great 2023 for the JRPG Journey so far; I hope you’ve found some fun new games to play this year as well. Join me next month when I’ll discuss the latest entry in a storied series: Final Fantasy XV.
