Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim PS2 Playthrough, Part 2 (Konami Cutscenes / JP Voices)
0Part 2 picks up technically more than halfway through the game, but I also missed plenty of stuff that warrants some backtracking.
One very important feature that is missing from early versions of Ys VI is full fast travel. The only fast travel included in the 200x releases is an "escape" function, which will take you from deeper within a dungeon back to its entrance waypoint. This means there's a lot more travel time involved whenever you want or need to backtrack. Fortunately, Ys VI feels somewhat akin to Ys V in terms of its overworld being rather compact.
And boy did I miss a bunch of stuff the first time through. I happened to be pretty thorough in Grana-Vallis, but not so much in the Ruins of Lost Time or the Limewater Cave. ...and then after revisiting both, an optional sidequest gives me another reason to revisit everything anyway.
I have to think Ys VI might have some of the most obscure level design of the entire series; it feels like Falcom may have reined it in for Oath and Origin.
Interestingly, my curiosity with refusing rewards during Alma's Trials paid off, and maybe even exhibited a UI bug, in that it's possible to end up with 2 Daylight Stones in the PS2 version, but the UI does not reflect having multiple. This initially led me to believe that the second one was just immediately discarded, but after accidentally using one in the endgame, I observed that I still had another remaining.
In addition to finishing the game, this video also includes looking at all of the available cutscenes across the Konami and Falcom versions, in both Japanese and English in the former case, which are all included in the PS2 version, directly accessible via the cheat room. (I still think they should've had actual menu entries for language selection, at least... it's kind of ridiculous that any playthrough using Japanese voices gets marked as "cheating".)
00:00 Part 2
10:26:55 Watching other versions of cutscenes/extras
11:06:33 Wrap-up and plans for future playthroughs