The Atelier Series - Addictive alchemy RPG

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About Ryza....since there are no plans for a collection of all three....which one is the best one to get? I heard 2 and 3 are great. Idk what to choose....
 
Scarlett Johansson said:
About Ryza....since there are no plans for a collection of all three....which one is the best one to get? I heard 2 and 3 are great. Idk what to choose....
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I'm sure they'll release a Ryza DX trilogy partway through the next trilogy like they have for the last few. If you're willing to wait.
Ryza trilogy overall has pretty easy alchemy with the ability to rebuild items and duplicate them. The stories are more serious and they're overall less goofy than other Ateliers.

3 is okay,I'm like 35 hours in. The world is kinda empty, there's too many goddamn enemies and not enough ways to avoid them, and all fights suck because of level scaling making them pointless. I don't think there's really a best Ryza game.
 
Right now I decided to start my Attelier adventuras with Rorona. Taking it veeeery slow though, mostly when I want to play something very chill (though the dime management does trigger my ocd a bit). I'm playing blind since I rather not feel like I'm just following a guide. I certainly like the atmosphere and ambience. Music is nice as well. Half of the synthesising I'm probably not understanding but for now I'm surviving (barely at the start of the second big request though).

Do have to ask, does Atelier turn into borderline smut with Ryza or is it just the impression it gives off with how her thickness is plastered everywhere?
 
ShitLurker said:
Do have to ask, does Atelier turn into borderline smut with Ryza or is it just the impression it gives off with how her thickness is plastered everywhere?
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Played the third game for quite some time, and little is said about Ryza's physical appearance. Beyond that, there are movement actions such as crawling where you get a clear view of buttocks for example, but the game doesn't go beyond that, and compared to the earlier two games, the third game seems to be the least fanservice-y of the trilogy.

For comparison, gacha games are far more blatant with their fanservice than the Ryza Trilogy. In fact, the developer -- Gust -- recently received criticisms regarding bait-and-switch fanservice; releasing patches post-launch that covers up potential flashes of women's panties, and restricting model viewer features where girls would completely disappear should you try to look up their skirts.

Overall, most of the Gust catalog purchasable on PC is relatively tame, which some exceptions such as Blue Reflection and Night of Azure. I don't think they pull some sort of ambush fanservice beyond the game box art and preview screenshots.
 
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I never finished Escha when I was younger so I double backed and decided to beat it now and man, this is probably the worst the time limit has ever been in atelier. And I mean that in the opposite way, you pretty much finish everything with more than half your time remaining so you end up spending a lot of time just dicking around waiting for time to pass. It's probably the number one thing I'd consider holding down the installment.

Now that I've finally made my way through more than half of the franchise, my favorite moment so far has actually not been from an atelier game at all. Despite various flaws in gameplay and easily the worst story I've ever had from Gust, Mana Khemia 2's elixir assignment is still among the most satisfying moments in the series for me.
 
A Repopulated Embassy said:
Played the third game for quite some time, and little is said about Ryza's physical appearance. Beyond that, there are movement actions such as crawling where you get a clear view of buttocks for example, but the game doesn't go beyond that, and compared to the earlier two games, the third game seems to be the least fanservice-y of the trilogy.

For comparison, gacha games are far more blatant with their fanservice than the Ryza Trilogy. In fact, the developer -- Gust -- recently received criticisms regarding bait-and-switch fanservice; releasing patches post-launch that covers up potential flashes of women's panties, and restricting model viewer features where girls would completely disappear should you try to look up their skirts.

Overall, most of the Gust catalog purchasable on PC is relatively tame, which some exceptions such as Blue Reflection and Night of Azure. I don't think they pull some sort of ambush fanservice beyond the game box art and preview screenshots.
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OK, thanks for the clarification. I'm not against fanservice, but Rorona is tame as fuck and I was wondering if Gust went full "let them thirst for her thickness!" and there was a shift or not.
 
ShitLurker said:
Right now I decided to start my Attelier adventuras with Rorona. Taking it veeeery slow though, mostly when I want to play something very chill (though the dime management does trigger my ocd a bit). I'm playing blind since I rather not feel like I'm just following a guide. I certainly like the atmosphere and ambience. Music is nice as well. Half of the synthesising I'm probably not understanding but for now I'm surviving (barely at the start of the second big request though).
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You may have already encountered those huge boulders in the Forest as well in the Cave, which prevent you from reaching other parts of the map zones. Early-game, it's impossible to break those rocks as you lack the proper materials (that enable better traits) and/or recipes of stronger bombs.

Synthesizing in Atelier Rorona works under different types of criteria:
-The quality of your materials can affect the major traits in your alchemy items, thus considerably strengthening their effects.
For example, the quality of water can heavily change the taste of the black tea I'm trying to make, from しぶい - bitter to あまい - delicious.
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-Not all materials can procure the same desired effects, even if sharing the same range of quality, and they may have random bonus traits that can be applied on the synthesized result.
obs64_M61Kx4XOaE.jpg obs64_x3WeZWzUSa.jpg
In this case, the dynamite recipe has a negative default trait which reduce the range of effect (範囲縮小), namely for battles, but the burnt soil negates that issue. On the other hand, the chains in my inventory can give me a bonus trait (破壊力増加Lv 1) that increase the destructive power for the dynamite, or of any bomb item on that matter.

ShitLurker said:
Do have to ask, does Atelier turn into borderline smut with Ryza or is it just the impression it gives off with how her thickness is plastered everywhere?
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Atelier Ryza is ironically very tame compared to the older Atelier Arland titles (Rorona/Totori/Meruru) which actually had risqué CGs in-game, unlocked by events upon completing certain conditions. This is even taking account that Atelier Arland aimed for a female audience, as Totori was considered at some point the best vidya for women from a japanese magazine.

I was disappointed by Ryza 1 as an Atelier game itself, and it seems that neither sequel is remotely better by looking at some posts from other kiwi users. Atelier Sophie 2 was much enjoyable by comparison, and I'm looking forward to Atelier Marie remake.
 
ShitLurker said:
OK, thanks for the clarification. I'm not against fanservice, but Rorona is tame as fuck and I was wondering if Gust went full "let them thirst for her thickness!" and there was a shift or not.
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The interview seemed really suspect and I think the "fanservice" they meant was literally "service to the fans", like references and inside jokes for the series. My only real basis is that the producer was praising Xenoblade in the interview, which has way more lewd fanservice than any atelier after Iris.
 
instant said:
The interview seemed really suspect and I think the "fanservice" they meant was literally "service to the fans", like references and inside jokes for the series. My only real basis is that the producer was praising Xenoblade in the interview, which has way more lewd fanservice than any atelier after Iris.
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If you mean this interview (from Nintendolife) in particular, then Hosoi actually said this:
gotcha question.png
Western game journalists are so miserable and desperate that they need to make misleading headlines to generate clicks.
 
If you like bishounen they gave us a decent Bos in R3. Tao is also at his best but he still wears dumb goggles so no cute blonde guy. (:_(

I'm also looking forward to Marie, but the next new game they make I'll wait to hear if they dump this level scaling BS and crusty-ass open world. R3 on the switch runs but it unironically has GameCube graphics. (I'm not kidding) Quality/Performance mode basically toggles minor stutters. I'm not a graphics fag but it borders on ugly sometimes. I don't think the open world contributes much of anything anyway.

Blah blah,I'm whining but I am still enjoying it for what it is. I am pretty easy to please. Gimme an autistic Jarpig to play while I binge podcasts and I'm happy.
 
I got burned too hard on how much of a letdown 2 was to play 3. Also the series already tried to make an open world game in Firis and it went pretty terribly. The issue is that nobody really wants the feature, since the whole alchemy system is based on gradual progression, so areas are locked out anyways. It's the illusion of freedom while everything is railroaded linearly anyways.

I miss the more plot based RPGs the series did on the ps2, though the alchemy in most of them was an afterthought (though I always felt it was a shame the Devs didn't make the leveling based on alchemy progression like in Mana Khemia).
 
Gotta be honest I struggled a lot with Ayesha and E/L. The time limit stressed me out too much and I know I fucked up a lot so it is frustrating. I'm going back to Ayesha to see if I can beat it. From the beginning. But still....its just.....its the alchemy that's tricky.

I heard to prioritize the * marked entries first and also make shoes and lens items to help?
 
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Scarlett Johansson said:
Gotta be honest I struggled a lot with Ayesha and E/L. The time limit stressed me out too much and I know I fucked up a lot so it is frustrating. I'm going back to Ayesha to see if I can beat it. From the beginning. But still....its just.....its the alchemy that's tricky.

I heard to prioritize the * marked entries first and also make shoes and lens items to help?
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Ayesha actually was the game where the time limit became a joke because the game let you recycle item charges on the hometown, meaning that you could spam attack items rather than be dependent on equipment on most fights.
 
Atelier Marie Remake comes out in about a week and I also realized I never talked about finishing Ryza 3. (I'm pre-ordering Marie Remake because I'm a retard, lol. Hope they can't fuck up a remake too badly.)

TL;DR I wouldn't recommend Ryza 3. I had my fun with it but it was mediocre and had more flaws than positives. If you don't like real-time battles avoid it like the plague because it's the worst of them yet. If you let yourself be easily pleased because then what else do you have in life you can probably sill better spend your money.
Anyway...

I'm not going to buy another fucking real-time battle JRPG again. I just don't like them and I don't understand the point of them in the first place. From what I can gather it's basically just normie appeal since zoomers are too retarded to "wait and watch the character do what you tell them." (this is what every single video game is by the way. You just don't spam buttons in turn-based games. Sophie 2 legitimately played faster if you used 2X speed.)
Anyway, what really stopped Ryza 3 from being good was...
  1. Enemies level scaling. Up to a point oddly enough. Look at the map details, enemy levels will say 1-50 or thereabouts. Makes battles and upgrading feel pointless and enemies won't stop chasing you.
  2. Amount of enemies on the map. The amount of times I was deciding what to gather with when an enemy dropped on me was far too many. At a point The game gives you keys with the stealth skill to not make enemies notice you but it's not enough when you still have to walk around them. This is not on the level of sacrosanct bottles in Tales of Hearts R. (I got the keys regularly at Dragon Srine (sic).
  3. Open world. Atelier games' alchemy is necessarily based around linear progress. This isn't Zelda or Skyrim and it somehow still plays linear anyway because you're always following the main quest then doing sidequest cleanup before you move on.
  4. Dunno about other consoles but on Switch this games' textures are legit Wii-level. This game is UGLY and the Kark Isles are is the worst yet it's also the first new area and what they advertised the game with. R3 also has much less load times than Sophie 2 so I wondered if they lowered the graphics quality to placate people who complained about that. I didn't care about the load, just poke your phone for a minute until it's done.
  5. The new characters sucked. Some loli, some shota, and some boring girl name FEDerica. At some point I literally just stopped reading the cutscenes and lost track of what was happening. My own fault I admit. Around Sardonica a lot of the main quest becomes 1. Get item to make something. 2. Make thing. 3. Deliver thing. and it just felt so recycled and I hated the newbs.
  6. The village in the underworld was stupidly laid out and hard to navigate. It's a bunch of interconnected treehouses but you don't know what ladder really leads where on the map until you climb up and see you wasted time.
What I liked about Ryza 3...
  1. Alchemy itself was better done. Ryza series has weak alchemy but this felt like the best of the trilogy. There was more items to craft too. I thought the super traits were poorly done but overall alchemy was fine.
  2. I liked the keys. Less randomness would be ideal but I did like it overall because they were a reason to interact with the overworld rather than blasting by on your ride between waypoints. They enhanced alchemy too.
  3. It's not BoTW but it was fun and comfy to run around.
  4. Character models did look good. If you want to ogle booty butt they cut down on that. If this sounds like a crime against humanity then skip. If you're bikinifag from the 4chan /vrpg/ thread then kill yourself.
  5. Decent music, but they recycle the songs over the 4 areas of the world. Extensive BGM customizing is recommended.
  6. Varied 4 sections of the world were not bad. Underworld was my favorite and where I spent the most time. Sardonica was nice too but the city was too big for its own good.
  7. Customizing minor functions of the Atelier to your needs. Big ups, please do this again, Gust.
 
Started playing the older games a while back and had a good time just chilling and making shit. Decent change of pace from all the, "WE NEED TO STOP THE THING"
 
I finished one run of Marie, approx. ten hours as somebody estimated before, and I can definitely say that if you think you'd only play the game once it's not worth the price.
 
Does she got a plasma gun? Ryza may not be sending their best, but certainly their thiccest.
 
I wish I didn't hate crafting so much, these games seem good otherwise. Maybe I'll see if I can stomach it one of these days...
 
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