The early Ys games rarely seem to get much recognition in the western wing of the world. It's understandable why; the original personal computer iterations from the late 1980s were entirely incompatible with western Operating Systems, and the PC Engine bombed internationally, so their primary home console ports never reached a broad English-speaking audience. From an American's perspective, it might be tempting to think that the Action RPG genre got good with Secret of Mana—but there's so much more behind history's curtain. In the context of 1989, Ys I & II must have seemed overwhelming. It was among the earliest of the PCE/TurboGrafx's RPG library, preceded only by the first Tengai Makyō game, Necromancer, and Dungeon Explorer. While sales numbers for PC Engine software seem lost to time, it's clear from the prominent featuring of Ys in Gekkan PC Engine and other gaming magazines that this was a very significant title in its moment, and we know from Falcom's PC Engine-exclusives that all of the company's games performed well on the console. The PC Engine was something like the Vita of its day, and Falcom was still Falcom, producing games well into 1995 for a system that was abandoned by its own manufacturer in '92. Without this Ys port, we'd have never arrived at Legend of Xanadu or The Legend of Heroes.

[...] The disc that first went out to retailers some thirty years ago wasn't just the proof of concept for the format, it was the state-of-the-art. Director and main programmer Iwasaki Hiromasa later remarked in The Untold History of Japanese Game Developers Vol. 2 that before Ys, everyone believed the CD-ROM format was slow; after Ys, "only a bad developer would make a really, really slow game."

This is the first Surival Arc, and it is a seminal moment in the history of Role-Playing Games for also being the genre's first grind. It is not meaningless, no matter how it unconscionable it may be. The Survival Arc establishes the hostility of the world and how unwelcome the protagonist is inside of it; the hero's job is to perform a role fighting monsters, but at the outset of their adventure they can do so only inside a limited space in which the conditions are right for them to thrive.

The hero of Dragon Quest can only survive fighting Slimes and the occasional Red Slimes until he reaches level 3, Alis of Phantasy Star can only profit from fighting Sworms on the outskirts of Camineet--and encountering nearly anything else is a death sentence until her first level-up. The Warriors of Light in Final Fantasy are stopped cold if they try to fight Gigas Worms before Goblins, and Ninten of MOTHER/EarthBound Beginnings won't get far against Alligators if he doesn't stop to beat up some Hippies first. Each and every one of these games follows a delicate but soul-crushing sense of balance in which the player must slowly acquire strength in a hostile world where power rules absolute over all else. So it goes for Courageous Perseus, Mugen no Shinzou, and Xanadu.

Over the course of a traditional Japanese Role-Playing Game the stat paradigm governing the Survival Arc shifts. The oppressor-oppressed relationship between the monstrous world and the player character transforms into one of predator and prey. The endgame of any RPG has the player hunting down rare monsters rather than hiding from them; chasing Grand Kuwagamon parties in the Destroyed Belt of Digimon Story for that maximized 4000+ XP, or hunting the Jachol Cave Skull Eaters in Final Fantasy V for 5~10 Ability Points. This curve reflects the development of the party into a functional and destructive force in the world.

Machining Stag Beetle AUTO [Vanguard/Rearguard Circle]: When placed from hand, choose up to 2 cards from soul and call them to Rearguard Circle as Rest, and if this unit is on Vanguard Circle, it gets the combined power of all units called by this effect until end of turn.

Machining Spark Hercules ACT [Vanguard Circle ] Once per turn: [Cost: Counterblast 2] Choose 5 of your rearguards, Stand them, and they get Power +5000 until end of turn. Rest all of your opponent's units, and until the end of your opponent's next turn, they get Power -5000.

ACT [Vanguard Circle]: Once per turn: [Cost: Put 1 of your grade 2 or greater rearguards put into your soul] This unit gets Power +5000 for each of your opponent's Rested units until end of turn..