Same old Recipe but it works

Ever since the series took a new turn with Atelier Rorona on ps3, mixing the RPG elements of Atelier Iris and the less known scenario/craft only ateliers in Japan such as Atelier Marie, the basic recipe for these games hasn’t changed much. It’s always the same but evolves (in a good way) with each episode. Graphics got better and better, battle systems evolved back towards what they were like in the old days, even the OSTs got better each time in my opinion, bringing back some epicness in battles. While it has always been at the center of the stories and worlds of the Atelier games, alchemy has started to become more and more important and the alchemy crafting system has evolved and changed with every single game, becoming more complex and adding new customization possibilities (too many for someone like me not too much into crafting but that’s objectively a good thing so i’m not gonna complain too much about it xD).

Storywise, the series has also changed a lot since the PS2 era. While you pretty much had to save the world from alchemic disasters or villains back in the days, the series took on a much more casual and friendly approach. Instead of exploring the whole world and fighting evil antagonists and vicious monsters in a classic J-RPG fashion like before, you now casually go about doing errands for friendly NPCs in a peaceful little village as a clumsy apprentice alchemist. Sure, you still fight battles to go get ingredients and perform some monster slaying quests but the whole thing is focused on rather easy battles you need to go through to perform alchemy in your atelier to make a living helping villagers and triggering events and raising flags for endings. Most fights can be handled easlisy as long as you keep crafting good items, and the harder fights that require top gear and items are usually optional only. A “time limit” has also been introduced in the series (and I really don’t like time limits in RPGs…) meaning your actions were pretty limited (going to any place would take days, fighting took time, gathering ingredients took time, crafting took time, literally anything…) and you had deadlines to honor item orders (make x bombs of x quality rating with x trait before 3 months for instance), as well as time limited events, meaning you could easily miss some endings, especially the true ones. The total alloted time for a playthrough was generally 3 years, which sounds like a lot but when crafting a single item can take several days and going back and forth some areas can take 15 days… Add the time lost when fighting monsters and gathering and it’s not much in the end and you have to carefully plan your actions when going for some endings.

The concept of Time

While this game retains most of what I mentionned about the other Atelier games since the Ps3 era, a number of improvements were made in my opinion. First of all, there’s no time limit anymore! That alone is a huge plus for me and allows me to play as I wish without wondering if I should refrain from doing something or not. Errands still have a deadline but they’re all optional and unlimited. There is still time passing when you perform actions, travel, etc… But without a limit, it becomes a pleasant game mechanic allowing for certain events/enemies/items to appear only at certain times (ghosts coming out at night for instance) giving life to the game with a day/night cycle as before but without the inconvenience of missing out on lots of stuff. I do love hardcore mechanics and potentially missable stuff to pose a challenge, but not much while playing a nice turn based J-RPG. In that type of game, I love being able to explore and battle as I please. What I mean is that I have nothing against missable events, bosses and the like even in RPGs, but not when it means I can’t even backtrack somewhere to see if I missed something or to battle an optional boss otherwise I’m gonna miss a deadline to give candy to someone… (yes there are quests like that xD).

Let’s have a look at the alchemy and battle systems next.

Alchemic battles

The battles in this game are done in the traditional turn-based J-RPG fashion, with a few additional elements. A turn bar shows in which order units will be able to play and when attacks are going to be unleashed. Performing a basic attack will not place you on the same spot on the bar as if you try to unleash a devastating skill, forcing you to be strategic about your commands. A big spell or attack might force you to let the enemy play twice in a row while if you just use an item or do a normal attack you can play yourself twice in a row. It is also possible to delay enemy turns (or be delayed yourself) with status ailments and stuns.

The other strategic aspect of battles is the stance system. You get to choose each character’s stance when you begin a new turn, defensive or offensive. While it doesn’t change the actions you can perform (you can attack in defensive stance or defend in offensive stance) it affects how much damage characters take or deal, as well as which assist moves are gonna occur. Characters in defense stance will take some blows for others or trigger special defensive buffs with enough assist gauge, while characters in offensive stance are able to perform follow-up attacks and trigger special attacks under the right conditions. Eventually some super moves become available for each character and are triggered through this assist system. My only regret with this system is that while you can trigger them pretty consistently by gathering the right conditions it still happens with some RNG involved.

Of course, it is also possible to use many kinds of alchemy items to turn battles around, but their efficiency entirely depends on how dedicated you were at making them through crafting.