A New Performance Patch For Ys IX: Monstrum Nox Is A Great Reminder For You To Try A Ys Game

A surprise patch has appeared for the PC version of the action RPG that many missed last year, Ys IX : Monstrum Noxwhich makes it a great time to get acquainted with the series.

While working on the localization of Trails From Zero (another Falcom game to watch), Peter “Durante” Thoman, developer of PH3, discovered how to increase CPU performance in this game. After finding promising results in Trails From Zero, he transposed this technique to Ys IX . He saw an impressive increase in frame rate with the same implementation, with a 25% increase in parts of the game where the CPU can throttle performance. The update was found to be stable enough in testing to go live for all players on the Steam version.

Here are the full PC performance patch notes:

• Improved CPU related performance. The degree to which you will notice this depends on the specific game scene, settings, and GPU/CPU balance of your hardware.
• Adjusted the refresh rate selection algorithm to more reliably choose the closest available refresh rate to the desired one.
• The game executables are now signed. This should help reduce the antivirus false positives that sometimes appear with some players.
• Fixed the Holy Sword Hilt attachment description in English to correctly reflect its abilities.

While you’re here and reading these patch notes, now is a great time to go on and learn a bit more about Ys, and maybe I can convince you to try one. .

Most Ys games (pronounced as “geese” without the G) follow an adventurer named Adol who finds himself in all sorts of dangerous situations that he and the friends he makes along the way must heroically extricate themselves from. It was while playing a handful of titles from this prolific series that I fell in love with it, and now I can’t help but sing its praises and wonder why it isn’t talked about more.

My introduction to Ys was Ys Origin, a PC game from 2006 that has now been updated and released on playstation4, Xbox One and Switch. Origin is set 700 years before the first Ys and tells the story of your choice between Yunica and Hugo, who have different weapons and playstyles, as they climb Devil’s Tower in search of two twin goddesses who abandoned their disciples in the land of Ys. The gameplay is reminiscent of a mixture of Zelda, a fast-paced dungeon crawler where the camera is placed in a fixed aerial perspective, and Castlevania, a game of exploration and progression. The instant combat is fun and challenging, and the boss fights help develop these tenants further. If you like old-school action games, Ys Origin is a great time and definitely worth playing with all the characters available.

YsVIII: Lacrimosa of Dana, which joins the series’ protagonists, Adol and Dogi, aboard a ship that runs aground on an uncharted island. After discovering that he is still alive, Adol collects the survivors from the wreckage, and together they explore the island in search of a way to return home or, at the very least, to survive a little. Longer. Ys VIII’s narrative is filled with memorable characters, gripping mysteries, and grand adventures as you explore the island. The whole is completed by a double story, that of a mystical girl named Dana, of which you take control occasionally. Unlike Origin, Ys VIII adopts a lively and colorful art style and takes place in a 3D world full of amazing places to visit. Adol is not alone when he goes on an adventure on the island and he is joined on the ground by two other castaways who you can swap at any time to take advantage of the quality of their weapons, in order to quickly eliminate creatures in nature. It’s been one of my favorite action games for years and it’s available on PlayStation 4, Switch, PC, and PS Vita if you have one lying around.

After the events of Ys VIII (and Ys VI and VII, which also take place after the island excursion), the adventures ofAdol and Dogi continue in Ys IX: Monstrum Nox. In the prison town of Balduq, they meet and ally themselves with a band of outlaws with supernatural powers, the Monstrum. These powers, which are also given to Adol, allow new mobility options like gliding, teleportation, and wall climbing to move around the large open environments introduced in Ys IX. Everything here is an evolution of the action and combat from Ys VIII, with the Victorian town of Balduq providing a refreshing change of scenery after spending hours on a tropical island and bringing a darker tone aesthetically. and narrative. Once again, the characters are an attraction to play Monstrum Nox, with each member of the Robin Hood-like Monstrum cast having a complex story worth uncovering and a mystery within. prison walls, centered on Adol himself, which fuels the plot. Ys IX: Monstrum Nox is available on PlayStation 4 (with a very nice patch for 4K resolution on PS5), Switch, and the new patch applied makes the PC version even better.

If you still haven’t tried Ys, you’re doing yourself a disservice. It deserves to be considered one of the great action series of all time, alongside big names like Zelda, Metroid, Castlevania and Devil May Cry. I hope this little rant has turned a few heads and convinced some of you to give one of these great games or one of the more than six other titles in the series a shot the next time you looking for something to spend time in. If you’re like me, you’ll be very glad you did.