The cooler autumn weather brings a different mood to every aspect of life, and to counteract the oncoming gloom of winter’s shorter days and my disappointment about having to actually put on pants to go outside, there are some good things about it, too. I get to bust out my trusty old leather jacket, myriad delicious Oktoberfest beers appear on store shelves (especially here in Wisconsin), and my dogs love running through the leaves and, eventually, the snow.

Along with all the bundling-up and hunkering-down comes a change in my gaming mood, too. Yes, ’tis the season of RPGs, when a nice, long quest to save some crystals or prevent the destruction of the world or some such nonsense is just what the doctor ordered to get us through the months that end in “-ber” and “-uary.”

Lately, after doing some thinking about it and with no new games catching my interest, I’ve wandered back to the Ys series.