Introduction

Previous Ys LPs:
Ys I & II Chronicles
Ys III: Wanderers from Ys
Ys: The Oath in Felghana

Ys IV as an entry into the series was a concept Falcom, following the poor reception worldwide of Ys III: Wanderers from Ys, never thought would see the light of day. The two original releases, Dawn of Ys for the PC Engine CD and Mask of the Sun for the Super Famicom, both released in 1993, weren't even directly developed by Falcom. Instead they licensed the music, titular characters from Ys I & II (Adol, Dogi, the Priestesses, Lilia, etc.) to different developers. Aside from some main locations and the games' soundtracks, both of these games are vastly different from each other in both stage progression and story development.
A third release was rumored for the Mega Drive, but nothing further than that was mentioned.
A fourth release titled Mask of the Sun: A New Theory, was developed and released for the PS2 in 2005 by Taito, but no current translation exists for this release.
The most recent (and assumed final) version was released late last year for the PlaystationVita as Ys: Memories of Celceta. It's neat and cool and really fun to play and I can't record it never ever so instead we're going to play the other entry that doesn't suck.



Ys IV: The Dawn of Ys is a Japan-only release published and developed by HudsonSoft in late 1993 for the PC-Engine; known in the states as the TurboGrafx-CD or the TurboDuo. It is set a short time after the events of Ys II but before the events of Ys III: Wanderers from Ys. Dogi and Adol head home after some undisclosed adventure (maybe that weird spinoff for Java phones that disappeared in the mists of time). Tired from their journey they decide to get shit-faced and crash at former head of the thieves' guild, Goban's, house. Adol had earlier visited the fortune teller, Sara, who had told him something terrible had occurred on the continent of Celceta. Adol sneaks out onto the next boat there in the dead of night while his pals are sleeping, leaving them in the dust as he heads out on his next big adventure.

As you may or may not know, Hudson has had some experience dealing with the Ys series. They did that ass horrible port of Wanderers from Ys but they also released Ys Book I & II that was an impressive port boasting great arranged music and being the only version of Ys I & II that seamlessly joins the two games together.
With knowledge and experience of both good and bad releases under their belt they went ahead to develop this gem. Using rich and detailed 16-bit graphics combined with unique environments, challenging bosses and detailed voiced cutscenes they put together what is possibly the most detailed traditional Ys game in the series.
The game also heavily borrows from Ys II's mechanics, using a very similar magic system bringing back fan favorites such as the fire and alter magic.
The soundtrack for this game in particular is the best in the series, in my opinion. It's just amazing, I can't even begin to explain. All three volumes of the edited redbook audio are available on iTunes so check out all three volumes.

This LP will be assembling two different patches in order to make the game watchable by an English-literate audience. I'll be using the translation patch by NightWolve, Shimarisu, Deuce & team to translate the game dialogue, and this thing to translate the voice-acting. The VA patch was done almost entirely by random voices pulled off some forum, however the voice of Darm in the patch is apparently Alan Oppenheimer: the original voice-over in Ys Book I & II for the TurboDuo and the voice of fucking Skeletor!

I made an attempt at LP'ing both this game and Mask of the Sun in late 2012 to drive some hype for Memories of Celceta, but Mask of the Sun is balls and I hate LP'ing games I dislike so after a break from the series I'm back to give it another shot.

This game is a direct sequel to Ys II, but don't worry about being left behind! I'll get you back up to speed in a jiffy! Just watch

and you should be up to speed in no time. If you're still confused at any point about what's going on in the game have no second thoughts about asking here - it's a bloody forum, we discuss and talk about the stuff here.
Also feel free to talk about the other Ys games here, there's also a Falcom Discussion thread in Games that covers a bunch of related stuff that may interest you if you like what you see.

You scrolled right through all of that, didn't you? Alright have some videos then.


A cool easter egg that happens when the wrong system card is installed in the console.