The story sees Adol shipwrecked (again), but this time, he’s trapped on the mysterious Seiren Island with several other survivors. As they explore and learn more about the island, they discover ancient beasts and the remnants of a mysterious civilization. For more details, check out our review here, but long story short, it’s an incredible action RPG with a surprisingly good plot.

The PS5 version offers various improvements to the textures, shadow detail and draw distance while pop-in has been eliminated. Load times are also shorter, and along with 4K/60 FPS, there’s a 120 FPS mode at 1080p resolution. If that weren’t enough, several cosmetic packs with accessories, alternate costumes, and more are included. Head here for more details.

Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana will launch for PS5 in North America on November 15, and in Europe on November 18. It will include all previously released cosmetic DLC for the game, though there’s no mention whatsoever of any technical or visual upgrades.

Ys 9: Monstrum Nox doesn’t have a native PS5 version, but it did get an update last year that enabled support for 4K resolution on the current-gen console. It remains to be seen whether Ys 8’s PS5 version will feature 4K support as well.

You can check out a new trailer below. Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana is currently available for PS Vita, PS4, Nintendo Switch, PC, and Stadia.

NIS America’s official tweet contains some gameplay footage but aside from running at 60 frames per second, it’s unclear what the PS5 version will offer. At the very least, it should be akin to Ys 9: Monstrum Nox which received an update to run at 4K resolution on the console. Time will tell so stay tuned for more details.

Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana follows adventurer Adol Christin as he and his long-time friend Dogi end up shipwrecked on the mysterious Isle of Seiren. Teaming up with other passengers, including playable characters like Laxia and Sahad, Adol explores the island to find a way off. In the meantime, the fate of a mysterious maiden named Dana also plays out and ties into the island’s history. For more details, check out our review here.

Embark on an exciting Ys adventure with Adol the Red and discover the mysteries behind the mystical maiden Dana in Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of DANA! Sailing onto the PS5 this Fall!#YsVIIIPS5 pic.twitter.com/qOsEcRJkWJ

— NISAmerica (@NISAmerica) March 31, 2022

Kingdom Hearts 3: ReMind

As a series, Kingdom Hearts has its fair share of cryptic secret endings that required an extraordinary amount of effort to unlock. Kingdom Hearts 3’s Remind DLC is no different – in order to unlock the Secret Episode and receive the “true” ending, you first had to defeat all 13 bosses in the Limit Cut. That means being level 99 with the best equipment and dealing with high damage unblockable attacks. Once that’s done, you face Yozora from Verum Rex in a much tougher fight than anything before. Depending on whether you win or lose, the ending will be slightly different but the scene with Yozora, waking from a dream while in a vehicle is a dead ringer for Final Fantasy Versus 13. How? Why? No one but Nomura can answer that question.

]]> https://gamingbolt.com/12-awful-endings-that-were-difficult-to-achieve/feed 0 486326 https://gamingbolt.com/15-terrible-things-single-player-games-had-to-go-through https://gamingbolt.com/15-terrible-things-single-player-games-had-to-go-through#respond Fri, 12 Mar 2021 07:38:51 +0000 https://gamingbolt.com/?p=472160 In a world of live service games, microtransactions and yearly sequels, there are still plenty of fun single-player experiences to be had. That doesn’t mean they’re all exempt from issues. Let’s take a look at some of the miserable things that have happened to certain titles.

Microtransactions in Assassin’s Creed Unity

Before the in-game store in Assassin’s Creed games became what it is today (read: selling more armor sets than are actually acquirable in-game), it was obnoxious. Assassin’s Creed Unity was perhaps the most egregious example since you could purchase $100 worth of premium currency…but there weren’t even that many items to spend it on. This only served to further fuel anger towards the game’s broken launch. Ubisoft has made the store less obtrusive in subsequent games but also stuffed it with items, because the buck does not indeed stop at $60.

NIS America announced recently that The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel 3 would be coming to PC. Though it ran well on PS4, there were still concerns as to how the PC port could fare, especially given how poorly optimized Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana was at launch. Thankfully, the publisher announced that PH3 Games, whose co-founder Durante created the renowned DSfix for Dark Souls on PC, would be collaborating on the port.

Not only that but PH3 Games has also worked on a major new PC update for Ys 8 that’s available now. The update improves the PC version’s performance and addresses several bugs. It also adds a new local co-op mode, which is currently in the experimental phase. Among the many improvements include better frame-pacing and animation sync accuracy across all frame rates.

Monitors with high-refresh rates are also supported and the previous anti-aliasing solution has been replaced with a high-quality screenspace anti-aliasing. Video memory leaks, crashes, etc. have also been fixed. Check out some of the patch notes below. Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana is currently 50 percent off on Steam so if you’ve been putting off playing it, now is finally the time.

Graphics and Performance

• Arbitrary main rendering resolution enabled.
• Improved frame-pacing and animation sync accuracy at all frame rates.
• Improved menu opening / closing behavior.
• Character and enemy animations now correctly timed at 100-plus frames per second.
• Support for high-refresh monitors and over 60 Hz V-sync
• Replaced ineffective anti-aliasing blur filter with high-quality screenspace anti-aliasing.
• Bloom, refraction, and glare post-processing effects now scale with resolution.
• Minimap rendering resolution now adapts to rendering resolution, preventing pixelated map at high resolution.
• Greatly improved quality of menu backgrounds (replacing low-res screen capture).
• Improved standard shadow filtering without performance loss, plus two new, higher quality filter options.
• Added option for rendering additional environment shadows.
• Added supersampling / subsampling option (which also affects secondary 3D rendering).
• Improved shadow rendering performance by preventing unnecessary memory traffic.
• Fixed animation speed of HUD elements at over 30 frames per second (e.g. full health bar).
• Improved the quality of volumetric lighting.
• Implemented HBAO+ ambient occlusion as alternative higher-quality SSAO option.
• Added a draw distance setting which applies to grass / clutter, monsters and NPCs.
• Implemented anisotropic filtering setting.
• Added high-quality texture pack (generated from original sources, partially with AI upsampling, and full mipmaps).
• Character poses in the equip menu now update at over 30 FPS.

Input and User Interface

• Improved camera mouse controls, replacing joystick emulation with direct 1:1 control.
• Movement keys are now individually bindable.
• Added keybinding for walking (slow movement) with keyboard / mouse controls.
• Changed default bindings to fit common usage by PC gamers.

Stability

• Fixed multiple video memory leaks.
• Fixed potential crash when switching between languages.
• Switched to 64-bit build to prevent address space fragmentation issues in long sessions.
• Improved render thread synchronization to prevent specific types of race condition crashes.
• Removed superfluous asset encryption.

Ys has traditionally been a very niche series, even within Japan, but it looks like the newest game in the franchise has managed to break out wider than any previous title has. Developer (and publisher, at least in Japan) Falcom announced that the action RPG has now hit 500,000 units in sales worldwide.

To be clear, this includes sales from the PS4 version, as well as the PS Vita version (available only in Japan), the PC version (available only in the west), and from the Nintendo Switch version. Being available on a wider range of platforms probably contributed to the game selling higher than previous titles have managed, which have typically been exclusive to only one system,

Falcom also announced that a Christmas Gift Package for the PS4 version of the game will be available in Japan to commemorate this success. It will come with a special PS4 theme, with Christmas style Ys music, as well as two cards.

Check out our review for the game if you haven’t bought it yet and are curious about whether to jump in.

Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana will be the first entry in the storied Japanese action RPG series to hit a Nintendo platform in a very long time, and it looks like publishers NIS America are going all out to make the occasion a memorable one. For instance, as per the latest announcement they have made, the Switch version of the game will come with Adol’s silver-red armor available for everyone out fo the gate.

This is notable because the silver-red armor was available exclusively a a pre-order incentive to customers on the PS4, and it is yet another way that NISA is going out of the way to sweeten the pot for potential Switch owners with the new game a bit.

As for the armor itself, while it is a throwback to classic, older Ys games (and looks super cool), it doesn’t actually influence Adol’s stats in the slightest, so you’re not forced to use it (or aren’t actually missing on much if you don’t have it already). Ys 8 is available now on PS4, PS Vita, and PC, with the Switch version due out on June 26.

The Ys series will be returning to Nintendo after a very long time, with last year’s excellent Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana, which launched for PS4 and PS Vita, with a PC version also announced, confirmed for Nintendo Switch earlier this year, courtesy of NIS America. At that time, all we knew was that the game would be out some time during the Summer.

Now, however, we know when exactly to expect it- and it will be a shorter wait than you might have imagined. Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana will launch on the Nintendo Switch on June 26 in North America, and on June 29 in Europe. If you need more convincing that this is cause for excitement, there’s also a brand new trailer for the game’s Switch version, which announces the release date, that you can see for yourself below.

Ys 8 launched on PS4 and PS Vita last year, and in spite of severe localization issues (subsequently patched out), it was a great game. A PC version of the game, long delayed, is scheduled for April in addition to the Switch version. Both versions will launch with the fixed localization.

Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana marks the first Ys game to launch on a Nintendo platform in over a decade. Being brought to the platform courtesy of NIS America, the Switch version of the game is due to launch later this year, over the Summer. And NIS is making this occasion special for fans by letting them vote on the reversible cover art for the Switch version of the title.

There are six options available to fans to choose from, and you will either need to share NISA’s social media posts, or watch a YouTube video to enter. You can also vote multiple times, so if you really like a cover, you can push for it multiple times. The contest itself is open until March 18- so you have almost two weeks to do so, too.

Ys 8: Lacrimosa of Dana launched last year for the PS4 and PS Vita; a PC version of the game is due out later this year, and the Nintendo Switch version will come this Summer.