I am a huge fan of the Ys games. In my opinion they are overlooked far too often, but I also have a soft spot for a good old hack n' slash so take that with a grain of salt if that isn't your thing. Ys Origin is a great addition to the Ys series, they don't try anything funny with going waaaay outside the mold but they do some new stuff as well. It's gameplay is very similar to Ys Seven. For those that haven't played that it is a pretty simplistic action RPG battle system. Step1: Hit with weapon and watch numbers pop out, Step 2: Wallop with magic and watch bigger number pop out, Step 3: Grab loot. This description, while accurate, does not do the game justice by any means as there are several other aspects to battles as well and it isn't always as simple as button mashing to stay alive.

The gameplay is fast paced and there is just enough story to keep you interrested in what is going on, but not so much that you are just mashing your keys to get through dialoge so you can get back to the action. As per ususal the music is very good and the environments are reminicent of a simpler 2D era of gaming.

Ys Origins is the first time (I think but I could be wrong) that a Ys game has had multiple playable characters. It is indeed worth it to play through the game with each of them. I say this because games will often slap an additional caracter on the roster just to extend playtime, but each of these characters plays so differently it feels like a new experience. Bosses that were a breeze with one person prove very challenging with another, some characters also have different bosses to fight by base.

The only complaints I have are that 1) Some of the achievements are not hard so much as incredibly time consuming, 2)While the gameplay is very different for each character the story itself does not stray much for each person, though there are subtle differences. 3) In order to experience all the game has to offer in the way of unlockable bonus content and achievements you will need to do a lot of grinding, and by a lot i mean several metric ****loads of grinding.

Play this game if you like: The rest of the Ys series, Hack n' slash, Metroidvania titles (somewhat), grinding, electric guitars in your RPG soundtracks.