Post by Legerdemain on Oct 25, 2005 8:20:12 GMT -5
...was really what started it all.
Although I owned a Nintendo I had always been interested in the SEGA Master System. Some few games caught my attention early, but living in Sweden most people had already made up their minds making the Nintendo Entertainment System the console of their choice. Not that there really were any other options than the NES or the SMS, but in the end it was the NES that I too settled with, mainly because of games such as Kid Icarus, The Legend Of Zelda, Super Mario Bros and Punch Out!. Well, anyways, like I said, some few SMS games caught my attention and Ys were one of them. Along with Phantasy Star and the Alex Kidd series Ys were the game I played the most. I didn't really know why... and I didn't really know what I was doing since I wasn't that good at english at the time, but anyhow I played it, over and over and over until I finally managed to beat the game. Something had me hooked. However, since I didn't own a SMS myself, and the NES was my priority, the game somewhere along the road somehow got a bit forgotten. I moved on to the AMiGA, later the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, even the Playstation and the Nintendo 64... but then suddenliy...
...sometime in the midst of the 90's, when emulators started appearing, I played around with them quite much on my AMiGA, but unfortunately for me it was DOS that offered most of the fun when it came to emulators. Yet another move to another platform/computer along the road. And then I stumbled across the emulator called Magic Engine. I don't know how... but for some reason I had gotten hold of an image of Ys Book I & II for the PC-Engine, and with some fiddling around me and a friend got the emulator up and running, and there it was. Ys, in all it's glory. I had not known of anything else than Ys for the SMS until then, so this was quite an experience, to relive that old classic with much nicer graphics, much nicer music and much nicer everything, and if that wasn't all, it didn't end when defeating the final boss... it wen't on presenting the conclusion of the story! If some moments can be described as magical, this was one of them.
It didn't take long until I had researched Ys a little further and found out that Ys was quite a thing in Japan, with many sequels, tons of different versions for all kind of different systems. I initially completely missed out on Ys Eternal, though, but found out about it in time... and shortly thereafter Ys II Eternal were announced. Luckily for me and two of my friends that also had gotten the Ys hysteria, I had another friend in Japan at the time who got hold of both games for us and sent them to Sweden. And them all hell broke lose. A desperate hunt for soundtracks, different versions of the games, the OVA of Ys I and Ys II, even Ys IV (which never made it, though), information, information and yet more information began and in the midst of it, behold... the announcement of Ys VI. I couldn't believe it. All these years I had missed out on something so extremely interesting that I hardly could believe it. I was in heaven. The Ys hysteria spread amongst me and my friends like an epedemic, and really... that was how it all began.
Maybe I am not as hysterical, as of today... but my interest in the phenomena Ys has not faded the slightest. Today I do realise that probably the main reason for me playing the game over and over some 15 years ago on the SMS was due to the music. Even though I never realised why, I even recorded game music on cassettes back in the days... with my friends thinking I was crazy, but nowadays game music is nothing strange to listen to. And, furthermore, the hysteria that appeared was probably due to the fact that me and my friends had missed out so much... we had to go through over 10 years of Ys history in such a short time to catch up with everything. But now there isn't really any more catching up to do, besides if one feels like it, collecting Ys related stuff. Life has gone back to normal, but with some new ingredients added.
Well. That's about it. In a short form. Long form to be presented some other time at some other place.
Although I owned a Nintendo I had always been interested in the SEGA Master System. Some few games caught my attention early, but living in Sweden most people had already made up their minds making the Nintendo Entertainment System the console of their choice. Not that there really were any other options than the NES or the SMS, but in the end it was the NES that I too settled with, mainly because of games such as Kid Icarus, The Legend Of Zelda, Super Mario Bros and Punch Out!. Well, anyways, like I said, some few SMS games caught my attention and Ys were one of them. Along with Phantasy Star and the Alex Kidd series Ys were the game I played the most. I didn't really know why... and I didn't really know what I was doing since I wasn't that good at english at the time, but anyhow I played it, over and over and over until I finally managed to beat the game. Something had me hooked. However, since I didn't own a SMS myself, and the NES was my priority, the game somewhere along the road somehow got a bit forgotten. I moved on to the AMiGA, later the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, even the Playstation and the Nintendo 64... but then suddenliy...
...sometime in the midst of the 90's, when emulators started appearing, I played around with them quite much on my AMiGA, but unfortunately for me it was DOS that offered most of the fun when it came to emulators. Yet another move to another platform/computer along the road. And then I stumbled across the emulator called Magic Engine. I don't know how... but for some reason I had gotten hold of an image of Ys Book I & II for the PC-Engine, and with some fiddling around me and a friend got the emulator up and running, and there it was. Ys, in all it's glory. I had not known of anything else than Ys for the SMS until then, so this was quite an experience, to relive that old classic with much nicer graphics, much nicer music and much nicer everything, and if that wasn't all, it didn't end when defeating the final boss... it wen't on presenting the conclusion of the story! If some moments can be described as magical, this was one of them.
It didn't take long until I had researched Ys a little further and found out that Ys was quite a thing in Japan, with many sequels, tons of different versions for all kind of different systems. I initially completely missed out on Ys Eternal, though, but found out about it in time... and shortly thereafter Ys II Eternal were announced. Luckily for me and two of my friends that also had gotten the Ys hysteria, I had another friend in Japan at the time who got hold of both games for us and sent them to Sweden. And them all hell broke lose. A desperate hunt for soundtracks, different versions of the games, the OVA of Ys I and Ys II, even Ys IV (which never made it, though), information, information and yet more information began and in the midst of it, behold... the announcement of Ys VI. I couldn't believe it. All these years I had missed out on something so extremely interesting that I hardly could believe it. I was in heaven. The Ys hysteria spread amongst me and my friends like an epedemic, and really... that was how it all began.
Maybe I am not as hysterical, as of today... but my interest in the phenomena Ys has not faded the slightest. Today I do realise that probably the main reason for me playing the game over and over some 15 years ago on the SMS was due to the music. Even though I never realised why, I even recorded game music on cassettes back in the days... with my friends thinking I was crazy, but nowadays game music is nothing strange to listen to. And, furthermore, the hysteria that appeared was probably due to the fact that me and my friends had missed out so much... we had to go through over 10 years of Ys history in such a short time to catch up with everything. But now there isn't really any more catching up to do, besides if one feels like it, collecting Ys related stuff. Life has gone back to normal, but with some new ingredients added.
Well. That's about it. In a short form. Long form to be presented some other time at some other place.
