In fact, if it wasn’t for the fact that alchemy is still heavily rationed in Atelier Firis, I would even raise my early evaluation to “Great!” I’m not sure how many hours I’ve played so far, but it should be more than 10. I just arrived in Flussheim, for those who are familiar with the game. But because of the open-world nature of the game, a lot depends on how many detours you take so it’s hard to estimate the time.
ANYWAY, there are four reasons why I’m so happy with Atelier Firis.
1. The game world is much, much bigger than in Sophie. Sophie was this one tiny town and then a bunch of tiny dungeons all over the game. That game was such a piece of garbage… Firis has the starting town and then a lot of space for running around and exploration. It’s no Xenoblade, but it’s still very open and spacious, which is great for me. It’s doubly great because the enemies are much slower and less densely packed than before so you can explore without too much harrassment.
2. There’s very little railroading. You have your grand objective, which is to get three recommendations and take the alchemist licensing exam in Reisenberg. Apart from the few quests directly related to that, which are usually found in towns along the way, everything else is up to you. You want forage all day? You want to fight to exhaustion? You want to waste resources on alchemy? You just want to head straight to your destination? It’s all up to you.
3. The alchemy requirements aren’t as obscure or as onerous as before. This time you get clearer hints about what will unlock new recipes, and a lot of them have to do with things you would do anyway, like beating certain monsters or foraging certain items.
More importantly, you don’t need to make most of them to progress with the story. So far there hasn’t been any of that “make this item with X obscure trait that you have to carry over from Y item via Z item” nonsense, but I know it will pop up eventually. I’ve been ignoring catalysts as well, but I know I won’t get away with it forever.
4. The battle system isn’t absymal any more. Doesn’t mean battles are fun now, but I don’t feel as frustrated and bored as I did before. I haven’t felt like tinkering with the difficulty level either. I like having the bosses clearly marked on the map so I can decide whether I want to challenge them or not and when.
My expectations after Sophie were rock bottom, which is why I’m gloriously happy that Atelier Firis isn’t completely junk. That doesn’t mean it’s perfect or anywhere near that, mind you.
For one thing, I’m very worried about what will happen once I pass the alchemist exam and get an extension. If they set me free to explore, I don’t know if I want that because exploration and battling isn’t that fun and they won’t let me synthesize as much as I want. At the same time I don’t want them to give me any tight objectives either. A set of loose goals after the first year and a maximum length of 3 years would be perfect.
Also I haven’t found any characters I like so far, so as the game drags on I might get tired of following them. Firis’s squeaky voice, childish attitude and blatant disrespect to her parents pisses me off. And seriously, another ditzy alchemist protagonist? What is this, the 10th? Liane’s Firis obsession is creepy and annoying. Revy, Tiana, Kald and Ilmeria just showed up recently so I haven’t dug under their skins yet.
TL;DR I just started Atelier Firis and I like it a lot, but I’m concerned about the future of the game. I’ll be back to report once I pass the licensing exam and see what direction Gust took with the rest of the game. See you then!
Oh? What a surprise! 😀 After your scathing review of Atelier Sophie, I didn’t think you’d give the Marvellous subseries another chance. Good things you did! ^__^
Lydie & Suelle is also pretty clear when it comes to alchemy requirements; as for progressing the story, it’s linked to a wide variety of objectives, along which alchemic ones. But there are also a number of foraging, battling and relationship objectives, and you only have to clear a number of them to progress. This nicely accommodates all playing styles.
After reading this, I’m quite convinced you’d love Lydie & Suelle. It doesn’t have an open world, sure; but it boasts a good number of dungeons with sub-areas. And the colours are really something; as a fellow bright colours lover, I guarantee you’ll just LOVE them. ^__^ And if you’re getting bored of the ditzy alchemist trope, Lydie and Suelle have cheekiness and sassiness in spades (while remaining very adorkable).
Anyway, the question is: should I get Atelier Firis after all, despite disliking open worlds? If the map has markers, that could be a deal. But the english version is digital only, hum… Tough decision! I’ll wait for more posts about the game, I guess. I’d also be curious to know your final playing time once you finish the game. ^^
I’ve always been favorably inclined to Atelier games, so it doesn’t take much for me to like one. If anything, Shallie and Sophie were anomalies. I’ll see about L&S once I’m done with this.
That said, it’s way too soon for me to give a blanket recommendation for Atelier Firis. I’m not sure how to check my playing time…? but it’s very early days. The map does have markers so you can warp around areas fairly easily, but you should still be prepared to do a lot of walking regardless. Plus if you’re not careful, you will fall into the same trap as with L&S and spend too much time exploring/questing and not enough on the main quest, which has a very generous deadline but a deadline nevertheless. I’m inclined to say “don’t bother” and just stick to L&S.
If Firis is like L&S, you should be able to check your playing time when saving.
“I’m inclined to say “don’t bother” and just stick to L&S”: heck, maybe I should do just that. I’m too greedy, that’s my problem! 😛 But I doubt there’s anything in Firis that cannot be found in L&S, possibly in a more refined form. And Firis herself appears in L&S, along with her obsessed sister. So what am I losing by not playing Firis? Probably not much, indeed. Still, I’ll wait for more run reports from you, and I’ll let my gaming instinct run the show as always.
If you end up really liking L&S and want more of the same, then you can get Firis. Otherwise it boils down to how bored you are and how obsessed you are about collecting everything in a series. That said, I’m a lot further in the game and still enjoying it so I’m happy at least.