Falcom published more Ys IX: Monstrum Nox screenshots on the game's official site and on Twitter, revealing more gameplay mechanics. We learned more about some of the Skills and Extra Skills used by the Monstrum party members, the Boost mechanic, and the Grimwald Night survival mode-like event.

Party members in Ys IX can use Skills by consuming Skill Points. You get SPs back by hitting enemies with normal attacks. Not attacking at all will make SPs recover much faster. Five different skills were revealed with screenshots:

The first Skill shown is White Cat's Wild Scratch. It's a 2-hit Skill which can easily be chained with normal attacks. When activating this Skill, White Cat immediately closes in on the enemy, making it a good way to approach enemies fast.

The second skill is Hawk's Carnage Lancer. It's a powerful, laser-like thrust attack which can hit enemies from far away.

The third skill is Doll's Illusion Dance. Doll uses her stretchable sweep sword to attack continuously and ends the combo with a large-scale explosion. It's a Skill suitable for boss battles and fights against multiple enemies.

The fourth skill is Raging Bull's Stampede. Raging Bull charges in into the enemy and blows them away with the shockwave. It has a short-range but it's very powerful, and it can knock down small enemies.

The fifth skill is Renegade's Dark Inferno. Renegade launches a dark sphere which attracts enemies and deal continuous damage. Renegade can keep moving when using this Skill, meaning it's a good way to escape if you're in a pinch or to deal massive damage while the enemy is immobilized by the sphere.

Each party member has many different Skills besides those. As a reminder, Ys IX: Monstrum Nox follows the same Slash, Pierce, Strike weakness mechanic as in recent Ys games. Red King aka Adol and Doll deal Slash damage. White Cat and Raging Bull deal Strike damage. Hawk and Renegade deal Pierce damage.

Falcom also explained Ys IX has a familiar Boost mechanic. Boost is activated when pressing R1 and L1 in battle. It triggers a damage dealt increase, a damage received decrease, and also increases movement speed, attack speed, and the number of normal attacks you can chain.

When in Boost state, you can press R1+L1 again to activate the character's Extra Skill. As usual, Extra Skills are extremely powerful finishing moves.

White Cat's Extra Skill is Albion Strike. White Cat concentrates all her energy in her right fist and punches straight ahead while rotating at high speed. Her Extra Skill generates shockwaves which will damage the other enemies near her target.

Doll's Extra Skill is Carnaval Maiden. Doll raises her sweepsword high above and then unleashes countless slashes in front of her. It includes up and down slashes, making it very useful against fast, flying enemies.

Lastly, Falcom explained on Twitter how the Nox Gauge works. The Nox Gauge fills as you clear "Grimwald Night" quests and "Larva Battles" They didn't explain yet what those quests and battles are though. When the Nox Gauge goes over 100 points, the "Grimwald Night" event occurs. Adol/Red King and the five other Monstrum are then transported to another dimension. There, you need to defeat waves of monsters called Larva and defend certain characters and positions, wave after wave. It sounds similar to the base defense battles in Ys VIII: Lacirmosa of Dana.

Falcom also published the August 2019 Falcom Calendar. you can find different resolutions on this page.

You can read more about the latest revealed characters appearing in Ys IX here. We also covered the latest trailer and the Dengeki Live stream where it was revealed, along with a bunch of other things like Ys IX OST samples. You can also take a look at the Limited Edition and some gameplay videos. Falcom most notably keeps hinting at how Ys IX: Monstrum Nox's mysterious female character, Aprilis, doesn't have a name which ends with the "A" sound. Meaning she'll be very different from Feena, Lilia, Elena, etc who have a romantic-like relationship with Adol.

Ys IX: Monstrum Nox launches on September 26 in Japan, on PS4. The game isn't scheduled to come west for now as Falcom is focusing on releasing it in Japan first. You can read more in our interview with Toshihiro Kondo.