So, how do Ys X: Proud Nordics' additions actually impact the game?

While Ys X: Proud Nordics recently was confirmed for a western release via NIS America earlier this week for Nintendo Switch 2 and PC, earlier this month I played through the Japanese release that dropped at the end of July. Now, I enjoyed Ys X more than I feel most players did, even with all its faults - yet I was still curious exactly how much Ys X would be improved by those new changes. Crucially, for anyone who deliberately waited for this release, would it have been worth it?

I struggled on how I wanted to cover Proud Nordics. For years now I've made it a point of covering the Japanese release of Falcom games prior to their western release, which may be coming to an end sooner than later. I didn't want to do a full review of the upgraded release, especially since my prior import impressions were essentially an unscored review on their own, and we have our official review for the game that dropped alongside the western release of the basegame. Ultimately, much like with the new content itself, it felt appropriate to talk about it mostly separate from the rest of Ys X as a whole.

The changes and additions for Ys X: Proud Nordics can be separated into two camps; quality of life or visual upgrades, and bespoke new content designed from the ground-up with the Nintendo Switch 2 hardware as a new baseline. As Falcom themselves have stated, the original Ys X was designed from the ground-up for Nintendo Switch, which may explain the shift in level design philosophy from Ys VIII, and especially Ys IX. The linear, more restrictive levels were a primary complaint with the basegame alongside a distinct lack of visual variety. The other main issue with Ys X revolved around the sailing system.

Both problems have been alleviated by Proud Nordics to varying degrees. While the sailing remains a core element of the game, every region of the Obelia Gulf has now been dotted with over a dozen naval battles that will spawn a new wind current upon completion - denoted by a golden light. Especially early on, this drastically reduces the travel time while exploring the sea. It's still not going to be for everyone, and I have soured a bit on the feature on my replay, but the streamlining of the feature does far more good than harm - even if as a consequence it does highlight just how much padding the sailing added to the game in the first place.

By far the more important new feature is Öland Island, a brand new island which players return to multiple times throughout the game, and which includes a parallel storyline with new characters Canute and Astrid. This island's scope and level design is a clear shift from the rest of the game, which is especially noticeable when playing the game on the 120FPS mode on Switch 2. The basegame mostly hits that 120FPS target, but players would be better suited sticking to the quality mode here; obvious CPU limitations of the much larger maps that make full use of the player's upgrades cause the Switch 2 to struggle, where the framerate difference between the performance and quality modes aren't significant enough to justify the former over the greatly increased fidelity at 60FPS of the latter.

Visually, the fidelity of these new areas on the island are a night and day difference. Falcom implemented a new global illumination system that makes the areas look markedly less flat in terms of presentation, and they even make great use of it for gameplay purposes. New abilities deal with physics puzzles, and puzzles that reevaluate Adol and Karja's existing abilities in new ways, help reduce some of the sting of what were otherwise rather basic utilizations of those same abilities in the basegame. The new story is incredibly simple, but does add some interesting backstory to what already existed in Ys X, and tees up a few questions that future games are likely to answer. The new additional final boss is truly something special.

Finally, players have access to a few tertiary additions. Öland Island includes an arena, where either Adol, Karja or the pair can face off against a number of enemies in a timed bout; depending on how quickly you defeat an enemy, you'll be rewarded. Players also have access to Gullinboard races across the island, which also will grade you depending on both your speed, finesse and how many mana stones you managed to pick up along the track. Finally, a post-game timed dungeon in Muspelheim challenges players to race through a figurative hell to decode a final message as your reward; players can also find pieces of a mural scattered about, which can be viewed in a shack back on Öland Island.

That being said - while these additions are welcome, they aren't exactly transformative. Instead of it feeling like Ys X itself has been improved, it feels more like a taste of things to come with Ys XI or whatever is up next. It's a very promising preview, especially with level design that brings to mind Ys VIII and IX in the best ways, but it feels distinctly removed from Ys X. That makes sense for something that was otherwise bolted on, but it does make me wonder why it couldn't have been a DLC for the existing PlayStation 5 and PC versions of the game, rather than a separate SKU. It's a bit of a tricky situation.

While there are some slight basic system upgrades revolving around upgrading the player's abilities like the Mana String, Gullinboard and more - they feel separate enough that on their own it's not like Falcom couldn't have made the new content an upgrade. What may be a problem however, is that it seems clear that the game was rebalanced around the expectation that players would tackle the new content. Players can now master their skills more than once, and semi-randomly islands will have tougher versions of enemies spawn with massively inflated HP, that upon defeat will drop a currency that can be expended for skill XP.

Similarly, enemy and boss levels have been rebalanced around the addition of the new content and the assumption that players will have engaged with it; the final boss of basegame Ys X was level 85, while it is now 87. Just a small example, but it does show that even if the integration doesn't feel significant, the entire game has seen an impact due to the new content added. Even if it's not immediately noticeable, the entire game has been rebalanced, which makes a simple DLC a trickier endeavor.

It's rough. On one hand, Ys X: Proud Nordics is undoubtedly the better game, and improves the experience to varying degrees; yet at the same time it's hard to justify the lack of an upgrade path, and especially the lack of a PlayStation 5 release of the new version. I can understand why it existed as a Switch 2 exclusive in Japan; I'd wager it was a means of attaining a Switch 2 devkit early, and as a technical showcase it can only be described as glowing. If you haven't played Ys X as of yet, the Switch 2 version of Proud Nordics is an easy recommendation; it's just when it comes to players who have already purchased the game, whether or not they have played it, where things get sour. Ys X: Proud Nordics is the best version of what was already a good game, I just wish that those who had purchased the original weren't being left out in the cold.