Though Ys is a storied franchise dating back to the NES, it has never had a large following in the West. Despite that history, the series is light on lore—making it easy to pick up and play even in the eighth installment. Adol and his friend Dogi date back to the original game, but you don't need to know more than they are friends who go on adventures. This time around they are working on a ship ferrying some passengers.

My elevator pitch is that Ys VIII is Lost written as an Anime. After meeting the crew and passengers in a dinner, with a brief aside to lore dump a cursed island, Adol battles a giant sea monster that drags the boat beneath the sea. After washing up on the island, the real Lost comparisons begin. You’ll start rescuing other castaways, adding them to your village. Once you find dinosaurs, ahem...Primordials, everything starts getting weird.

Adol starts dreaming of Dana, a Maiden Of The Great Tree. It takes a bit, but you figure out that her scenes are all set in the past. Her connection to Adol and the island becomes the central plot of the game. It has a weird sort of anime logic that doesn't make sense if you spend too much time thinking about it. Because all of the characters are given some nice flourishes, even when the main plot is a little slow you’re engaged. Everything is gloriously pulpy, and if you’re into JRPGs or Anime, it’ll be a fun ride.

The combat is simple and straightforward. You control one of the characters in your party while the other two are run by the AI. This is definitely more focused on button mashing than a strategic approach. This is where playing this game on the switch can actually give you a bit of trouble. Some of the more crowded battle scenes plod, with huge slowdowns. The game features segments where you defend the castaway village from hordes of enemies, as well as a few where you do a similar battle in another part of the island. The high difficulty endgame versions of these missions have vast amounts of enemies, and the game starts dropping its frame rate significantly. I'm not really all that worried about it, but I know that it's a deal breaker for some players.

I think that my only real complaint about this game is that it has a lot of the same bad tropes that you see in most RPGs. The female characters are in outfits that range from oddly impractical to glorified gauze. It's a shame as the characters are written well, and it doesn't suffer the "boning as a climax before the boss fight" mechanic that western RPGs seem to all have. It's not a deal breaker, but it does make me a bit hesitant to recommend the game to everyone. Unless you're used to handwaving some of the pervier anime tropes, it might be off-putting.

That said, I really enjoyed this game. It had a great story that was engaging, albeit a bit by the numbers. When the plot slows, there are some great character moments to fill the gap. I couldn't really find a great way to explain my issue with the female characters. I sat on this review for almost a month and a half after finishing the game. (Oh the joys of working without a deadline, but that's why only three of you still read this stupid thing.) That said, don't let that put you off what is a fun game. If you don't like hack and slash though, I can't help you there.