TGS2020] Report on the LINE KONG Stage, where the appeal of the smartphone version of Nihon Falcom's masterpiece "Ys VIII" was concentrated!

Tokyo Game Show 2020 ONLINE (hereafter TGS2020) is being held online for the first time ever for four days from September 24 (Thursday) to September 27 (Sunday), 2020. This is a report on the stage of Nihon Falcom's smartphone version of "Ys VIII," which was broadcast from 11:00 a.m. on the fourth day of the event.

Ys VIII" is the eighth title in the "Ys" series of RPGs released by Nihon Falcom. The game gained popularity for its scenario featuring two main characters, the adventurer Adol and the mysterious girl Dana, as well as the "drifter village" where players explore an isolated island and develop their base of operations in cooperation with castaways. This title was first released on PS Vita, and later ported to PS4 and Switch. Ys VIII," which will be distributed this time, is the smartphone version.

Game writer Mafia Kajita (left) and YouTuber chunii (right) acted as MCs for the distribution.

The program began with a look back at the history of the "Ys" series, from the first title released in 1987 to "Ys IX" in 2019, including the main visuals of each title and an introduction to the heroines. chunii is a fan of the "Ys" series and is a fan of the heroines. series, and he spoke passionately about the heroines' personalities and backgrounds.

The first "Ys" and the latest "Ys IX

Heroines of the series

Adol Christine, the heroine of the "Ys" series

A teaser PV for the smartphone version of "Ys VIII" was shown, followed by new information about the game. A video showed the "Temple of the Great Tree," which appears in the story, in the middle of development. Although the general structure of the temple had been established, the map was white. There were also human-shaped objects that appeared to be NPCs. In addition, movies of the game were shown, including event scenes of characters such as Adol, Dana, and Raksha, as well as glimpses of their actions during battles. When the sunset on the coastline was shown, Mr. Kajita and Ms. chunii were surprised at the beauty of the depiction, which was hard to believe that it was a smartphone game.

The video did not stop there, as motion footage of the smartphone version's original character, "Lucco," was also shown. His small body is characterized by powerful actions, swinging an axe nearly twice his height. Rukko is a young girl raised by bandits, who is a spoiled brat and a crybaby, and once she starts crying, she is said to be a powerful force to be reckoned with.

Raksha's skill motion

Rukko's skill motion

Finally, comments from Toshihiro Kondo, president of Nihon Falcom and producer of the "Locus" and "Ys" series, were revealed. He was looking forward to the fact that this work will be based on "Ys VIII" and was impressed by the fact that some scenarios have been optimized for inclusion in the smartphone version. Mr. Kondo himself, while working on the development of "Ys VIII," thought that "Ys VIII is also suitable for an online game," and it seems that LINEKONG is extracting such aspects and brushing up the game even further.

For more details on the distribution, please check out the following.