Ever since I dived fully into the Trails franchise the last couple of years, Ys is another series from developer Nihon Falcom that I always wanted to get into, so what better time than now with Ys X: Proud Nordics, a re-release of 2024’s Ys X: Nordics. I thought going in that the almost four decades of a rich history of Ys games, with the latest release, was going to be intimidating, with callbacks that went over my head. Reviewing Ys X: Proud Nordics for over 71 hours, I didn’t feel any of that.
Instead, Ys X: Proud Nordics is more of a standalone story than I was expecting, and as a newcomer myself, honestly felt like the best one I could have picked up as my first Ys game. With the series hitting double digits in its numbered entries, rather than going forward, Ys X: Proud Nordics takes the story to the earlier days of series protagonist Adol Christin’s adventures. Set after Ys II, 17-year-old Adol, alongside his two companions, Dogi and Dr. Flair Rall, travels across the sea on a passenger ship to Celceta.
Take to the Sea with New Powers In Ys X: Proud Nordics
Adol’s journey takes an unexpected detour and stops at Obelia Gulf, an archipelago in the northern sea and the main setting of this entry. Their ship is raided by Normans, Viking-like warriors part of the Balta Seaforce, where Adol briefly fights the Norman pirate princess, Karja Balta. Adol, his friends, and the other passengers arrive in Carnac, a coastal town, where our hero meets a cast of characters. After walking around town and finding a mysterious seashell that gives him the mysterious Mana powers. Not too long after, our hero runs into Karja again for round two with his new powers, later “cuffing” them together and unable to leave each other’s side, forcing them to work together.
An invasion of the town, orchestrated by malicious immortal beings known as the Griegr and one of their Trident leaders, blindsided the duo while they were adjusting to their new circumstances in Carnac. Even though Mana users are the only ones who kill these undying creatures, the two realize they are out of their depth. Adol, Karja, and Grenn, a member of Carnac’s local Militia, escape to the open sea on a decrepit ship, the Sandras, to figure out their next steps to get back at the Griegr and save the kidnapped town folk.
Together, Adol and Karja take on the threat while growing stronger through their literal bond, bringing them closer as a team and Shield Siblings as they unravel the plot behind the Griegr and the Norman history. For those who picked up the original, the game’s main story isn’t delivering anything new and remains unchanged.
Obviously, this tale is all new to me. Ys X: Proud Nordics delivers a more remarkable core story than I was expecting, with its own share of twists along the way, and it was honestly one of my favourite parts of the game, with Karja doing most of the legwork as the lead character of the narrative. Karja comes off as a cold, stereotypical angry tomboy, but she really comes into her own as that literal bond with Adol, alongside the game’s strong cast, develops into something special.
Explore a Massive Map in a New Side Campaign
That’s not to say there is nothing new, as Ys X: Proud Nordics adds side content with a massive area, Öland Island. We are introduced to two new Norman characters, Canute and Astrid, from the Kingdom of Danmerk, who delve further into the Normans’ history and face a new threat. The island you get to explore in Ys X: Proud Nordics are easy to explore but Öland Island is truly a massive map with tons of items to find, almost feeling like an open world in the initial area with more paths to other areas and fun puzzles I had fun figuring out.
The layout of the new area is probably one of the most unique-looking areas in the whole game and unlocks in the early chapters, and more is explorable as you discover new Mana actions that open new paths while progressing the main story. Canute, while Karja’s cousin, comes off as an antagonistic force in the side story and gives more lore of Karja during her earlier days in the Balta Seaforce. We get more context on the Norman tribe as a whole and more history of Karja’s family that isn’t covered in the main campaign.
At the end, and no spoilers, the side content does some interesting things narratively, but I will say that was the moment the game went over my head, as what I saw as some greater implications on the world of Ys. Öland Island offers a coliseum mode, so you fight the game’s lesser bosses again for a reward, plus after beating Öland Island’s side story, you can race Karja and Canute in Gullinboard races.
The new side content in Ys X: Proud Nordics is not the sole reason to pick up the second release of the tenth entry. Although it is the definitive way to play the game, with a bevy of visual improvements, gameplay enhancements, and quality-of-life additions to the core game. Ys X: Proud Nordics also adds new powerful optional bosses, a post-game dungeon, some voiced lines for the franchise’s mostly silent protagonist, and a new mana action. New currencies are available in the re-release with Sparkling Whitesand, enhancing your mana actions and Elding Fragments to help speed up the mastering level of your Mana skills.
Freely Switch and Dishout Mana Attacks
Unlike Trails, Ys is much more on the action side of the JRPG coin, but in Ys X: Proud Nordics, rather than playing as a full JRPG party, you’ll play just as Adol and Karja. The Griegr are an undying supernatural force, that is, unless you have the power of Mana at your beck and call to wipe out their existence. The gameplay of Ys X: Proud Nordics lets you immediately switch to either character in and out of combat. Alongside normal attacks, you can unleash Mana skills to dish out major damage, and the more you use these attacks in battle, the closer you are to mastering them, which helps unlock even stronger ones.
Depending on the Mana skill, each one uses up a certain amount of each character’s SP gauge, which replenishes over time and thankfully can be upgraded through items you find throughout the game. Both Adol and Karja have a different feel in combat, with our red-headed sword-wielding silent boy more focused on rogue-like speed to get his hits in and out. Meanwhile, Karja is definitely the tank of the duo, smashing down her axe to enemies no matter what tries to stop her. Both have an element alignment in their Mana skills, with Adol using fire to burn his enemies and obstacles, and Karja using ice to freeze her enemies into submission, and water too to help with platforming.
Just like in the latest Trails game, the other character that you aren’t controlling will fight alongside you as the computer AI, at least tries to do a little more damage. You can control either character individually, but where they shine the most is as a team. By holding the Duo button, both characters will stand side by side, letting you block attacks from enemies, but together they also unleash their duo mana skills, depleting their SP at the same time. These attacks do a lot of damage, but you can deal more damage thanks to the revenge mechanic that stacks up the multiplier to your base damage, which goes up to 5.0 times.
Traversing Has Never Been More of a Breeze
To accumulate multipliers, you simply have to block, which incentivized me to block more. You can improve your stats by not just equipping new weapons, armour, and accessories but by using Mana seeds in your Mana release line tp get the most put of your characters. Unlocking new slots becomes more available as you level your characters, giving you Mana points to redeem in the submenu; finding travel points gives you bonus Mana points for either Adol or Karja. Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii tried to replicate Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag’s naval combat, I felt it fumbles the ball, but I was much more of a fan of the ship combat in Ys X: Proud Nordics.
It feels more arcade-y in the best way possible, and I loved it all the more for it with an upgrade system that takes a fragile to a naval beast on the open sea. Actually, travelling on water is slow, but thankfully, Ys X: Proud Nordics gives players plenty of options to speed things up. Sure, you have Mana boosts that you get slowly more of, but the wait time is a little long. Thankfully, the game has wind paths that easily push your ship across the ocean, by entering a golden light you can battle Griegr ships and after defeating them unlock new wind paths giving you more options to get to your destination faster.
It takes more than your “linked” characters to manage the Sandras, as you’ll slowly find them throughout the game as you slowly build up a crew that helps manage shops and quests that pop up on the ship. Taking a cue from the Calvard Trails games, the 3D anime visuals of Ys X: Proud Nordics are beautiful in cut scenes and are always a treat. In actual gameplay, it’s not much of a downgrade, as the game is visually enhanced with improved graphics, better lighting, and increased draw distances.
Even in gameplay, the character art and landscapes are still striking, but in terms of design, most of the islands in the base game feel the same and are less distinct when jumping from one to the next. Nihon Falcom released the original at 30 FPS in 2024, but thankfully, they took performance criticism to heart and focused on improving performance in the re-release. Ys X: Proud Nordics out of the box at default runs at 60 FPS in quality mode and can even run at 120 FPS in performance mode, which devices like the Nintendo Switch 2 can benefit from. That doesn’t mean it ran perfectly, as I ran into some annoying glitches.
Verdict
Ys X: Proud Nordics is the definitive way to play Adol’s seafaring adventure with a great story alongside a strong, memorable cast and even better re-balanced combat. Enhancements, improvements, and new game modes make the latest release feel like a total package that the original should have been, but it’s a hard game to recommend to those who picked up the original, as a couple of extra hours of content is hard to justify.
Ship gameplay is surprisingly fun, arcade-y and easier to explore, so much it is the best adaptation of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag’s naval combat. Extra side content adds a new campaign to the base game that gives more context to the Norman lore, with a huge map to explore that makes the base game’s other islands feel much more generic.
[The publisher provided a copy of the game for review purposes.]
Reviewed on: PlayStation 5
