So it's been ~2.5 months since Atelier Rorona was released and I still haven't given much input on it. Sorry...I decided to play Agarest Senki ZERO first, then got wrapped up in moving, then got stuck on BlazBlue. Just to note, the order I played the games in is not a reflection of the quality of each. Zero was an actual prequel in the timeline of the Agarest series, so I was really interested to see how everything all began and BlazBlue...well...I haven't enjoyed a 2D FTG so much since SF2 turbo so that got me hooked.
Anyhow, I know a number of you have been interested in this game so here's some meat for you guys to chew on
For some introductory info on the Atelier series of games, please visit:
http://www.psu.com/forums/showthread.php?t=195430Intro
The Atelier games have, for the most part, been very different from your traditional JRPGs. While most require you to control an angsty teenage male that wears clothing with a **** ton of buckles, more belts than all your digits combined, and wields a 2h-sword that is longer than him and probably weighs 2x as much as him in order to save the world from some heretic demon lord that, in reality, appears as though it could stamp you out like an elephant would do to an ant, GUST, the developers of this game series took a markedly different route.
All protagonists in the series has been of the female sex, and it wasn't until Iris and Mana Khemia, that the game became more RPG heavy than sticking to its crafting and synthesis roots. The original catchphrase project A-1, Atelier Marie, was "I'm tired of saving the world", and indeed, the game wasn't about saving the world, though there was a demon-slaying "save the town" type story path depending on how you progressed.
So what's this all have to do with Atelier Rorona? Atelier Rorona heralds back to Atelier's roots. It's not about a linear storyline, it's not about the world going to shambles, and it's not about some angsty teen saving the world. Most westerner's introduction to the Atelier series was with Iris, which was a marked departure from the installments before that, so what you're expecting and what the game gives you may be significantly different. For those that experienced the Salburg and Gramnart Atelier games, this is more along those lines.
The Game (overall)
The first thing that one most likely will notice when firing up the game is how light hearted and "cute" this game feels with a touch of elegance and sexiness (Pamela & Lionela...if you're into flatchested girls, then there's always Cuderia and Astrid). The 2D artwork is, imho, very nicely done and gives a strong sense of warmth about this game. The 2D character designs are equally as nice with the major downside being the static nature of the characters. It would have been nice to see use of something like MotionPortrait from ToraDora, but it's note a huge ding.
The 3D modeling isn't a good emulation of the 2D artwork when it comes to the character. While the models are "cute", the difference between the 2 is somewhat disappointing. The simplicity of the towns themselves and the 3D character modelling works very well, however, and the problem here, really, is just the disparity between 2D and 3D. Had the 2D designs been a bit more "anime-esque" or the 3D modelling been a bit more true to their 2D designs, I don't think I would be complaining at all.
The BGM isn't grandiose like your run of the mill save-the-world RPG. Again, it's a blend of "cute" and "elegant" just like everything else up to this point. While generally not material one would listen to as a standalone album, GUST has usually been known to produce music that's extremely well matched to its world design, and that holds true from the get go.
What to do
So now that the initial aesthetics are out of the way, we come to the heart of the game; what to do? While freedom within a sandbox has been thought of as a trait unique to WRPGs, it's actually one of the central aspects of this game. Let's start off with what you're required to do first:
-Complete tasks assigned to you by the kingdom
And...that's really about all you're required to do, believe it or not. There's also a game-over trophy, so in one play scenario, you don't even have to do any tasks assigned to you from the kingdom. That said, the set of tasks you're required to complete are given to you in succession. You're given a task every 3 months for 3 years, so you will have 4 tasks to complete over the course of the year for...well...3 years. The story behind why is rather quite simple. A kingdom official wants to revoke Astrid's Atelier license and initially plans to have her go through the series of tasks, but Astrid renames the Atelier to be Rorona's...thus, Rorona's stuck completing these tasks.
Aside from this, you're able to:
-Complete other quests issued by the kingdom to increase your town rep
-help out friends and acquaintances
-earn money
-craft to your heart's content
-sleep on the couch, etc.
It's really all up to you, but the decisions you make determine what events you see and what endings you reach as well. There's a True, Good, Normal, and Bad end in addition to multiple character endings to keep you entertained for a very long time.
Time Progression
So I mentioned that you get 3months to complete each task issued by the kingdom. Time in Atelier doesn't progress automatically when you talk to NPCs or what not like in most RPGs. Rather, this is affected by your actions. Moving around a 3D map takes place on the same day, but crafting, moving to various locales, sleeping, etc all consume up this valuable commodity. When you craft something, it takes a minimum of 1 calendar day. If you craft multiple of the same items, this can take multiple days depending on your crafting skill and what you're crafting.
Likewise, moving from the town to another locale to harvest mats consumes time; not just going to the map, but also the return trip. So if it takes 2 days to go to a particular locale, you're already burning 4 days. In addition, moving between the sub-areas of a particular locale consume time as well...anywhere from 1~3 days. So if you don't plan well, this can be quite devastating, especially when the kingdom quest's deadline is approaching, you're still collecting mats, you haven't even started crafting for the task, and you have a number of quests about to expire as well.
So then, why would you even consider sleeping? Crafting consumes HP and while you can always use health recovery items to recover HP, at the beginning, they're rather expensive and valuable. Thus, Rorona sleeps on the couch (not a bed) to recover her spent HP.
Crafting
Crafting is everything in this game. While you can buy various items, all of them from the vendors are in limited supply, so you can see where this is going, right?
Most recipes use generic ingredients. For example:
-Vegetables
-Fiber
-Oil
As long as the mats fall into those categories, you can use them to make the same item. There aren't too many recipes that require a specific item, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
What does matter in the synthesis is the quality, traits, and effects the starting materials have on the final product. The quality is the numerical value given to the items...the higher the better...and meeting a certain quality or higher is a requirement for tasks and quests for some quests. The traits are a bit hard to explain, but include "cute", "cool", "twink", etc. The effects include "rots quickly", "valuable", "skill cost -1", etc. Some traits become a requirement to craft equipment or turn in items for quests, but generally speaking, effects are more geared towards Rorona and friends, as this would apply to items she would use and/or equip.
As mentioned above, every time you craft, you end up consuming time. However, as the game progresses, you'll end up with a sibling which you can have craft items for you or go to gather mats. Balancing your time and making the best use of your sibling is key to getting quests done promptly even with a heavy work load.
Add to that, crafted items can be very powerful. Bombs created by Rorona at the start of the game is almost game breaking (in terms of battle system) because it's so powerful...the balancing coming primarily from the time and farming required to make them. Crafted items are also required to gain access to some sub-areas of each farming locale, so if time allows, there's no reason to skimp.
And finally, sometimes crafting can fail resulting in largely useless items...this particularly sucks when you're crafting something valuable and time consuming, so save often.
Locales and Battle System
There's one town, Arland, where Rorona's Atelier is located. From here, there are multiple locales that will become revealed over time that you will be able to goto. As mentioned above, travelling to and from each locale takes time, and moving between each subarea of a locale also consumes time. When you travel from Arland to a particular locale, this takes place automatically on a 2D map, from which a new 2D map of the locale appears. Only areas that you can visit are shown...other areas need to be discovered. Once you select a subarea of a locale, you're transported to a 3D map. All monster encounters are symbol encounters so no random mobs popping up.
Each area is simple in design compared to most "current gen" games. However, the simplicity and color palette exude warmth and fits well with the game. While it's no White Knight Chronicles environment, for a GUST game, it's extremely well done, especially since their previous installments were 2.5D at best. There's some slowdown when there's a lot being drawn, but nothing too horrible...haven't noticed screen tearing at all.
The turn based battle system is quick and simple. If there's one aspect that's traditional RPG-like, it's the menu. Attack, Special, Item, Block, Run. Unlike traditional RPGs, though, while attacks incur no character penalty, using specials consume HP unlike MP or what not in most RPGs. Even healing specials incur a penalty for use so when you're starting off, if you're low on healing items, it can be quite brutal as you're trying to decide if you can kill a monster with a special or if it's better to use a normal attack and take a hit (or 2) and not take the special use penalty.
There's also a nice "assist" feature, that becomes active after a certain number of actions are taken. Assists can only be used by Rorona for Rorona and come in the form of either a followup attack by a character, or blocking an attack aimed at Rorona. Who assists (if you use it at all) is selected by R1 or L1 during a small time window when the UI indicates that the assists are available.
While the battle system is quick, you can't skip the motions for attacks and what not, and unfortunately the system does get a little repetetive after a while. It's not the best I've seen out of GUST, but it's not the worst out of RPGs I've played either...middle of the road. Using items, though, is fun...unfortunately I haven't crafted too many battle based items so my experience with this is limited.
Events
The event scenes are great fun. Cute, hilarious, touching, and somewhat toilet-humor risque in a few instances. There are quite a few events throughout the game...atleast a handful during every kingdom task timeframe. Quite a few stack on top of each other, so after returning home from gathering mats, you might encounter quite a few laughs. Events also aren't limited to just the Atelier so be sure to meander around town frequently.
The voice acting is solid but a bit annoying...Rorona's voice is a bit high pitched and kinda obnoxiously loud from time to time (not always). You know when you're at the mall and some blonde bimbo is yapping away on her cellphone and you can hear it from 50 feet away because it pierces through everything? It's a little bit like that. The VAing itself isn't bad at all...emoting is done very well due to the subtleties being expressed well. /twothumbsup for Esty's (castle receptionist) VAing. That alone more than makes up for some of the cons of Rorona's VAing. Still, I'm very happy with the overall quality that's in Atelier Rorona. Not the best, but I'd rank it in the 70th percentile or higher in the games that I've played.
Issues
The UI is clunky at times with batch item selection being missing...this was a letdown since you'll be transferring stuff in and out of your basket from your storage quite a bit. Also, when you're turning in quests, all items need to be in your basket, so sometimes you end up going back and forth between the quest turn-in and your Atelier to manage
To give some scores out of 10 (10 being highest):
Graphics (3D): 6.5 on an absolute scale with other games, 8.5 when compared to previous GUST games
Graphics (2D): 9.5, gorgeous artwork...slight ding for static character images
Crafting: 9, simple yet complex...can spend hours trying various things
Battle System: 6.5~7, a little lackluster for a core RPG fan
Music: 8 ~ 8.5, nothing hummable at this point, but exceptional job fitting in with the world
Story: N/A, I'm going to score events in lieu of story
Events: 9, lovable, funny, touching...very well done
Overall: 8.5~9, a lot of replayability, fun world design coupled with very well fitting music, great crafting system, and beautiful artwork. The major ding from my perspective is the huge disparity between the 2D artwork and 3D modelling. This really is a very fun game...off to pick up ToV, but I will be back to revisit this further Note, if you're new to GUST or unfamiliar/didn't enjoy the original Atelier games, adjust downwards by 1pt as a suggestion
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