REVIEW

Ys Memories of Celceta (PS4) Review

by Rob Pritchard, June 23rd, 2020

Although some of the gaming community consider the abundance of remakes and remasters of previously released games to be a waste of time, there are many good reasons for a game to be revisited, as seen by the enhanced editions of Wii U games which have seen new life on the Nintendo Switch. This remastered version of Ys Memories of Celceta, which was originally released in 2014 for the PlayStation Vita and 2018 for PC via Steam, brings this top down JRPG to the PS4 with several enhancements.

The game begins with the series primary protagonist, Adol Christin, wandering into a city named Casnan with absolutely no memories. After he reunites with a muscular individual named Duren, the two men go on a journey to rebuild Adol’s memories, as well as chart the depths of the mysterious forests of Celceta for the area’s government officials. The amnesia trope is played to its full extent during the story, used for both comedic and traumatic purposes throughout. Along the way, Adol is joined by various guest characters such as a young village chief named Ozma and a disciple named Calilica, who convince Adol to help them with their town’s problems, as Adol appears to have met them before the onset of his amnesia.

Like the other titles in the Ys series, Memories of Celceta features a real time action battle system. As well as attacking your foes, you can roll out of their way, and run out of the encounters at any point during battle. The two main types of attack, light and heavy, are split between the triangle and square face buttons, whilst Special Moves that drain the EXTRA bar can be used by pressing the R1 alongside one of the four directions on the D-Pad. These moves charge with the successful defeat of enemies and more powerful moves are obtained as your gain experience. The additional power of the PS4 allows for the battles to flow faster, thanks to the stable 60 frames per second frame rate that persists outside of cutscenes.

Alongside the battle system, Ys Memories of Celceta features a crafting system. By finding the necessary materials scattered around the forest areas, caves, and villages, you can forge them into new items at the Blacksmiths, which allow you to increase the strength and defence of your weapons and armour. The number of new weapons and armours you obtain during the game can sometimes render it unnecessary, but it does make the gaps between obtaining more powerful items shorter, and selling upgraded weapons will gain you a higher amount of money from each sale.

The touch features which were intrinsic to the PlayStation Vita are absent in this release, with the zoom feature now mapped to the Right Analog Stick. This is a wise choice, as using an on-screen pointer for interacting with the environment can be cumbersome when using the Left Analog Stick. In a similar manner to the Kingdom Hearts spell shortcut system, the special moves can be assigned freely to any direction via the in-game menu, so you don’t have to sacrifice a favourite attack in lieu of a more powerful alternative.

The graphical upgrades on display in this remastered port are clear, with the higher resolution textures, additional visual effects and increased frame rate making the world of Memories of Celceta to be one of the best-looking PS Vita remasters of recent times. Fans of the original Japanese dub will be pleased to learn that both vocal tracks from the PS Vita original have been included in the remaster, as well as the uplifting orchestral soundtrack which captivates the player and allows us to empathise with the cast when the need arises.

Overall, the remastered port of Ys Memories of Celceta is a welcome addition to the PlayStation 4 library. The action-based RPG battles feel more responsive thanks to the improved frame rate, and the higher quality HD graphics breath fresh life into a game that certainly deserves your time and attention. If you have never played Memories of Celceta or have forgotten your time with the game from the PlayStation Vita release, this is a remastered JRPG that deserves to be remembered.