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Play time is not accurate
Ys 8 is an open-world, action-rpg that sits somewhere between late-Final Fantasy and pre-BotW Zelda. The series' premise is that each game is an individual story from the life of the protagonist, Adol, and so they each serve as self-contained narratives with their own casts of characters. Some characters do show up between different games, and occasionally they reference each other, but in general it is not necessary nor particularly important to have played any of the previous games.
In Ys, you take on the role of Adol Christin, an explorer who traveled the world and saw all kinds of things. Ys 8 takes place in between some of the other games, and tells a story of when Adol and his friends were stranded on an island out in the sea, called Seiren. You're tasked with finding a way to escape the island, recover the other survivors, and eventually, uncover the weird mysteries of the island itself. Along the way, Adol experiences visions of Dana, who serves as the game's second protagonist. You'll travel through time to understand the history of the island and its people, and eventually work together to resolve its largest problems and get home.
The game begins as a straightforward action-RPG, with you going out into the wilderness to fight monsters, collect gear and materials, and map out the island. As you go, part of your quest is to rescue survivors, which live in a village you are continuously building. There isn't a lot to the village-building itself, but it does open up a lot of different systems for helping you progress through the game. A doctor can make you medicine, a tailor can make clothes, a blacksmith improves your weapons, so on and so forth. The village will periodically get raided by monsters, and it's up to you to build up fortifications and engage in a tower-defense-ish minigame to defend it. You'll be able to conduct night raids on various locations, for special items/materials/quest progression. You'll make campsites all along the island from which you do these expeditions. While the game lacks a day/night cycle in normal play, it provides enough opportunity to go places at night that it doesn't feel like a missing piece.
There's enough to it that you can pretty much always have something to do if you're not wanting to continue the story, and continuing the story only opens up more and more little details. You can purchase gifts to improve your relationships with the other castaways, and through that get stat bonuses. You can run quests from a bulletin board, to unlock further upgrades/items/functions. There really is a lot going on that gets revealed to you just steadily enough to remain engaging. Nothing you haven't seen before, but done well enough to stand on its own.
Moment to moment, you'll go through various places fighting monsters and big bosses. Combat plays similar to something like a late FF or even Devil May Cry, in that you move fast, hit fast, and can chain different moves together to pull off combos. You unlock new moves as you level, and can map them to the face buttons. Your party is always comprised of three characters, between whom you can switch at any time. Different characters have different weapons and movesets, with their own skills too. Depending on the enemy you're facing, you'll switch to a different character to overcome their resistances. One thing to note - combat is very melee focused. Magic exists, but not as a thing separate/distinct from other combat actions. It's worked into your skills. In that way all characters are the same - they each play like a different spin on a melee character from a game like DMC, Dragon's Dogma, etc. Skills are predetermined as are stats upon leveling.
As you make your way through dungeons, you'll find other survivors as well as specific tools to help you unlock more areas to explore. With castaways, the number in your village allows you to remove different obstacles on the map. Tools take the shape of things like gloves that let you climb vines, or boots that let you run in the swamp. They're not iconic in the way something like the Hookshot is, but it's the same sort of thing as what you'd do in Zelda - find the tool, the tool allows you new access, you go and find more tools that let you get that much further.
One standout aspect is the soundtrack, which is true of just about all the Ys games. It's an interesting mix of what you'd probably expect and a lot of prog rock/speed metal. The first open area in particular has a great track that really serves to give you an impression of what the rest of the soundtrack will be. It's on spotify too, so if you're curious you can always go give it a listen.
I really enjoyed my time with Ys VIII. Each of the game's systems tends to give you *just enough*. As in, you'll uncover something new, do some tasks, and open up a new function/ability/system, and from there there is usually a way to upgrade or improve whatever that is once or twice. There's a lot you can do to build out and improve your fortifications for raids. Primarily this is all done by gathering materials, which you get from defeating enemies and destroying objects out in the world. They're automatically gathered as you approach them, so it can be very easy/satisfying to go out and grind out some materials for something.
The game had its localization re-done and it's a huge improvement. I won't share much because it's not really doable to play the original localization anymore. Characters come off distinct, they're consistent in how they speak, it's all solid. Not many moments of awkward phrasing, and definitely no egregious shit like "archeozoic big hole" (an example of something from the original localization).
Overall I would totally recommend this game. It being the eighth in the series really doesn't matter, it's a self-contained story that comes to a satisfying conclusion in the end. The story is told well, and I especially liked how time functions in how you're getting information conveyed to you. There's a *really* cool setup where someone in the past is aware of what you're doing, and you play as them to set up better circumstances for yourself in the present. The game will last you a good while too - if you are exploring and just seeing what's around, it's as meaty as any other RPG, clocking in probably around 40-60 hours. If you're more "eye on the prize" you can cut that in half, just about. Either way, you're in for a big adventure, with lots of nice characters, in a colorful and fun space that holds tons of little secrets and bonuses.