Damn the time limit in this one is brutal

[Chibi Life]

Plus it makes you waste half a month running around just to catch character dialogue events with no teleportation items as far as I could tell. I played the entire Arland Trilogy and didn't have problems with the time limit, this one I straight up failed just before I was ready to track down where the (thing) was that's got (spoiler). I was so damn close. Worse is, I was just shy of completing the final alchemy quest.

I'll just start over, I got the whole Dusk trilogy but a warning to people to plan every move you make very carefully. Save often. If you click somewhere by mistake and waste a day, reload lol. I think the time limit in this game is on par with Totori's true ending in terms of brutal difficult.

Or maybe it's cuz I put it on hard and had to use a lot of extra time crafting items to take out the enemies. One other thing that particularly bothers me is having to get equipment through drops fighting enemies. It's really time you don't have to waste considering the random drop rate can waste unknown amounts of time, I definitely preferred the blacksmith.

Don't mistake me for hating on the game, on the contrary the game is absolutely fantastic, but compared to Arland, I found the time limit in this one something to take very seriously even if you aren't going for the true ending. I was just derping around and got super screwed over it, while I was able to beat Arland time limits while derping around no problem.

[Tiasmoon]

Totori's timelimit is worse. It gives no head up that you have to complete the ship ASAP. (even suggesting that you should instead prepare well before finishing it)

Considering all the endings in that game have special requirements (IE: need adventurer level at 50 for Mimi ending) its pretty hard to even get a regular ending on a blind first playthrough when you dont know or have the time to figure out what the requirements are. Nevermind the true ending which is impossible to get on a first blind playthrough. (but that much is normal for games with true endings)

Events themselves are also hard to find because no icons on the map.

For Ayesha events show up on the map now, which is very helpful so there's no running around figuring out where events are even at.

I agree that this game's time limit is pretty limited too if you arent always pushing the latest areas and progressing the story. But in terms of total time there's more available. In Totori the timelimits are split. Before building the ship there's a lot of spare time you cant really use on anything. Then after building the ship you suddenly have to rush again.

For Ayesha if you push the story all the time you end up with a good amount of time left over. Problem is that means players who want to do more alchemy first, get screwed over by the timelimit.

In case of both games tho, the final timelimit really shouldnt have existed. It adds nothing to the game and only makes you redo 10+ hours of gameplay. After saving Nio the timelimit should have been removed, same with Totori and finding the grave.

Originally posted by Cute Totori:

while I was able to beat Arland time limits while derping around no problem.

What ending did you get for Totori? If its the ''normal'' ending, thats basically the consolation ending for pretty much failing the game.

[Chibi Life]

Originally posted by Tiasmoon:

What ending did you get for Totori? If its the ''normal'' ending, thats basically the consolation ending for pretty much failing the game.

I just looked at the achievement unlock time and date and confirmed I got Normal, Bad and Rorona endings on my first playthrough. I did 100% the game eventually but the true ending in Totori is the worst gaming experience I've ever had in my life. The sheer volume of dialogue you can miss by not being in the right place at the right time, not doing a certain thing like having Mimi with you when setting off on the boat for the first time is incredible and bad game design in every way.

I had to actually follow a guide 100% to avoid missing stuff and I still missed something the guide forgot to mention and had to reload 5 hours of progress. And this is coming from someone who has the name Cute Totori, I like the character but her game sucks if you're trying to 100% it.

I'm not sure if I want to start a new Ayesha playthrough. I regret all the time I wasted derping around in it. The thing that really bothers me the most is the events on the map. Like you gotta waste half a month just to visit Tanya then another half a month walking back. You can't do newgame+ with hard mode eh... well if I was able to get the true end for Totori I can do it with this one, just gotta take the time limit more seriously.

[Tiasmoon]

I used a guide as well for that one, and I rarely use guides. I failed getting Mimi's ending first time because I didnt have adventurer level at 50 >_>. Bruh.

For Ayesha, you really want to do story asap. Some time is needed after saving Nio to do her events and the final character events too. Now if the game actually hinted at that, im sure more people (myself first time included~) would rush to save her instead of preparing well first.

You can save some time by creating the overland items asap too. I think one was from the glass ruins and the other the village to the south with the Keith fight.

Teleport item is gained after beating the final boss. (yeah, really )

What I can say is the endings are worth getting. Try to get the Keith ending atleast. (best ending) For that one make sure you do his events at the thingy place in the sky, before fighting final boss.

For combat if you use Ophelia you should need less items since she can heal pretty well. I always build for infinite MP so I can just use skills instead of having to make bombs etc every time. I think Wilbert also has some healing? I forget.

[Chibi Life]

Does Ayesha even have any skills? She's useless without items

[Sephilar]

Originally posted by Cute Totori:

Does Ayesha even have any skills? She's useless without items

That's the whole point of playing Atelier games, at least when it comes to the old ones when they had an actual purpose and were different to other JRPG games. Alchemists are not as strong as other characters and don't have skills or if they do have, they are again skills that are not as strong, but to compensate that, they are the only ones that can use items. And Ayesha with good items is a lot more stronger than any other character, which is part of the reward you get in Atelier after learning how to synthesize in said game.

[NobakeGaming]

My experience was total opposite, though on the normal difficulty. Ran mostly blind - other than checking that there was an ending for failure, as well as NG+ info. Had around 9 months to kill at the end - mostly spent trying to wrap my head the alchemy and getting the right properties on gear for NG+. Had to reload once because I accidentally killed the end boss while exploring the end area. Seemed like if you were to fail, you had to do it on purpose. Not sure about True ending though. I'm working on it now, but on NG+ with all the money and gear it's a totally different experience.

Totori was much more brutal. On PS3 I failed to get the true ending two or three times while following a walkthrough. Pretty sure I failed my first blind run as well, but its hard to remember that far back. Rorona was also much stricter than Ayesha, but not on nearly the same level as Totori.

[Tiasmoon]

Originally posted by Cute Totori:

Does Ayesha even have any skills? She's useless without items

I forget if she does. I know I used waifubot and majochan for most of the game but Ayesha was probably third in the lineup. I dont recall her skillset at all tho.

Originally posted by The Rollback Carnival:

That's the whole point of playing Atelier games, at least when it comes to the old ones when they had an actual purpose and were different to other JRPG games. Alchemists are not as strong as other characters and don't have skills or if they do have, they are again skills that are not as strong, but to compensate that, they are the only ones that can use items.

Rorona and Logy were very good at actual combat. I forget if the shallies were. In Rorona's case her skills did comparable damage to her items. (but without knockback cheese) So its not like all Alchemists are weak.

Some of them just become useless if you dont have any items left.

OT: Logy still best looking alchemist:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1984148681

Originally posted by NobakeGaming:

My experience was total opposite, though on the normal difficulty. Ran mostly blind - other than checking that there was an ending for failure, as well as NG+ info. Had around 9 months to kill at the end - mostly spent trying to wrap my head the alchemy and getting the right properties on gear for NG+. Had to reload once because I accidentally killed the end boss while exploring the end area. Seemed like if you were to fail, you had to do it on purpose. Not sure about True ending though. I'm working on it now, but on NG+ with all the money and gear it's a totally different experience.

Totori was much more brutal. On PS3 I failed to get the true ending two or three times while following a walkthrough. Pretty sure I failed my first blind run as well, but its hard to remember that far back. Rorona was also much stricter than Ayesha, but not on nearly the same level as Totori.

On Hard you have to craft stuff a good amount to beat bosses. Once you get into alchemy you will lose a lot of time just having fun doing alchemy. That is how most people that fail the timelimit end up failing it: by doing alchemy too much and leaving the story hanging for a while.

If you focus on story above all you end up with a lot more time.

Rorona has a very strict time limit but only if you want true end or do it all. Getting most character endings is very easy in that game. On the other hand on NG+ you can do true ending even without a guide. (there are one or two hard to find conditions, so would help if you know atleast those but the rest can be figured out easily enough)

Its also much easier to manage the timelimit when you get clear deadlines and goals.
Getting a satisfying conclusion is easier. In that respect it has one of the easiest timelimits around.

Totori is considered to have the most brutal time limit by most people.

[NobakeGaming]

Originally posted by Tiasmoon:

On Hard you have to craft stuff a good amount to beat bosses. Once you get into alchemy you will lose a lot of time just having fun doing alchemy. That is how most people that fail the timelimit end up failing it: by doing alchemy too much and leaving the story hanging for a while.

Fair enough. I suppose after playing Rorona and Totori I was just more conscious of the time limit and made sure to stay on top on my quests.

I kind of wish I'd started Ayesha on Hard. I didn't look through the achievements to see the one that required it, and I really have no desire to play through again.

Off to the next one. Maybe I can finish this trilogy before Mysterious DX comes out, and if not I'll go to Arland and see what's new in the DX versions.

[Chibi Life]

Originally posted by NobakeGaming:

Originally posted by Tiasmoon:

On Hard you have to craft stuff a good amount to beat bosses. Once you get into alchemy you will lose a lot of time just having fun doing alchemy. That is how most people that fail the timelimit end up failing it: by doing alchemy too much and leaving the story hanging for a while.

Fair enough. I suppose after playing Rorona and Totori I was just more conscious of the time limit and made sure to stay on top on my quests.

I kind of wish I'd started Ayesha on Hard. I didn't look through the achievements to see the one that required it, and I really have no desire to play through again.

Off to the next one. Maybe I can finish this trilogy before Mysterious DX comes out, and if not I'll go to Arland and see what's new in the DX versions.

Yeah like, I just did too much alchemy because battles were irritating. Having to clear many places of all enemies without leaving or the enemies respawn. Certain boss fights as well.

I was using Bell and Linca however this time around I may get rid of Bell in favor of Ophelia for the healing and that will hopefully remove my need to craft excessive healing items.

It's also worth rushing the story so you can quickly unlock the adventure items to help gathering/movement not take up so much time.

Oh well, I've decided to suck it up and start another playthrough and it's already going a lot better lol. I'm a perfectionist so it's hard for me to accept it and move on to the next game so I'll have to suffer through this once more.

[NobakeGaming]

Originally posted by Cute Totori:

Oh well, I've decided to suck it up and start another playthrough and it's already going a lot better lol. I'm a perfectionist so it's hard for me to accept it and move on to the next game so I'll have to suffer through this once more.

I understand that feeling all too well. Really the only reason I never played Meruru was that I hadn't gotten the true end for Totori.

I used to be big on 100%'ing every game I played. Like getting max levels/jobs in various FFs for no good reason, or (trying, and admittedly failing) getting all the in-game trophies on Star Ocean 4. Well past the point of having fun, I was turning games into work.

As I've gotten older its become much easier for me to say "I've done everything I care about, I'm done." Usually that means I've seen all the endings and extra scenes, but I don't worry too much about optional bosses or achievements unless I'm still really enjoying the game or they seem quick and easy enough that I can just knock them out quickly.

[Tiasmoon]

Originally posted by Cute Totori:

Oh well, I've decided to suck it up and start another playthrough and it's already going a lot better lol. I'm a perfectionist so it's hard for me to accept it and move on to the next game so I'll have to suffer through this once more.

Good luck and have fun!

[Chibi Life]

All I gotta say is Yggdrasil music is incredible. If Dusk continues to be like Ayesha it may surpass Arland for my favorite trilogy. Although the more I play this the sadder I feel about the end of the Atelier franchise. Ryza killed it. I 100% Ryza but it didn't give me the same feels as Arland and now Dusk. Fantastic music, characters, crafting system. I'm on month 9 of the last year and rescued Nio so this one went well and got the hard mode achievement.

Wow

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVcc16o0SaY

[Tiasmoon]

You havent played Mysterious yet? That series is the one that really started the decline even if it improves the series in some aspects like having 3d models and larger maps and a more consistent soundtrack.
The quality of the character interactions and writing really dropped with that series. The 2D art quality dropped hard. Since the 3D models are based on the 2D art, despite having better quality 3D models they didnt look great either.

Ryza is still better then L&S (third mysterious) for me. But not as enjoyable as Lulua (despite its story issues) or Nelke. (the anniversary game) Despite their faults I still enjoyed both Sophie and Firis a lot.

My favorite Atelier games are Nelke, Ayesha, Totori and Shallie.

For the next Dusk games: Escha to logy is a good game but it has the weakest soundtrack. Logy the male alchemist surprisingly works very well for the story. The escha & Logy dynamic is very good.

Shallie ran into issues when it was first made (I guess you could argue the decline really started with that game) with some stuff later being added to the story via the Plus version.
The final version of the game is good, tho.

Like Escha it has 2 protagonists you can choose from, but unlike in Escha it doesnt work as well. In Escha it doesnt really matter storywise who you choose, but that also means you get the full experience (minus some endings/ smallscenes available to one side).

In Shallie the 2 alchemists have way different personality and goals (altho they will end up with both joining together) and green haired shallie makes the story a lot less interesting.

My tip for playing that game is pick Shallistera if you care more about story. Shallotte if you prefer a genkibaka alchemist personality. (more genki then Rorona, but not as endearing)

For Escha to logy, if you do all the story events you get an extra chapter to finish the optional objectives you didnt complete yet. So dont worry about having to complete all the side objectives each period. (but if you have extra time definately do them, as early on you cant do that much anyways)

True end for that one is locked behind completing the game as both Escha & Logy. So 2 playthroughs min.

Okay that was a bit more then I planned on writing, ahaha.

Anyway, have fun while it lasts. You still have 2 more games in Dusk to play atleast. I would advice playing Nelke too if you havent yet. Despite being a city sim anniversery spinoff its actually pretty good.

[Chibi Life]

Originally posted by Tiasmoon:

You havent played Mysterious yet? That series is the one that really started the decline even if it improves the series in some aspects like having 3d models and larger maps and a more consistent soundtrack.
The quality of the character interactions and writing really dropped with that series. The 2D art quality dropped hard. Since the 3D models are based on the 2D art, despite having better quality 3D models they didnt look great either.

Ryza is still better then L&S (third mysterious) for me. But not as enjoyable as Lulua (despite its story issues) or Nelke. (the anniversary game) Despite their faults I still enjoyed both Sophie and Firis a lot.

My favorite Atelier games are Nelke, Ayesha, Totori and Shallie.

For the next Dusk games: Escha to logy is a good game but it has the weakest soundtrack. Logy the male alchemist surprisingly works very well for the story. The escha & Logy dynamic is very good.

Shallie ran into issues when it was first made (I guess you could argue the decline really started with that game) with some stuff later being added to the story via the Plus version.
The final version of the game is good, tho.

Like Escha it has 2 protagonists you can choose from, but unlike in Escha it doesnt work as well. In Escha it doesnt really matter storywise who you choose, but that also means you get the full experience (minus some endings/ smallscenes available to one side).

In Shallie the 2 alchemists have way different personality and goals (altho they will end up with both joining together) and green haired shallie makes the story a lot less interesting.

My tip for playing that game is pick Shallistera if you care more about story. Shallotte if you prefer a genkibaka alchemist personality. (more genki then Rorona, but not as endearing)

For Escha to logy, if you do all the story events you get an extra chapter to finish the optional objectives you didnt complete yet. So dont worry about having to complete all the side objectives each period. (but if you have extra time definately do them, as early on you cant do that much anyways)

True end for that one is locked behind completing the game as both Escha & Logy. So 2 playthroughs min.

Okay that was a bit more then I planned on writing, ahaha. :ys_dana:

Anyway, have fun while it lasts. You still have 2 more games in Dusk to play atleast. I would advice playing Nelke too if you havent yet. Despite being a city sim anniversery spinoff its actually pretty good.

I played Sophie but I found the system to unlock new crafting recipes to be a recipe in frustration. I basically cleared the game and put what's her name into the doll body but I didn't enjoy it as much overall as Arland + Lulua so the $50 price tags + DLC on the next 2 mysterious games weren't looking very tempting to me.

I have Nelke but the time limit was stressing me out and I really really dislike the main character I was literally auto skipping all dialogue with her, not cuz she irritates me, but because she was boring me. I unlocked the Arland girls and it was entertaining but the stressful time limit and the thought of having to play through this time consuming city builder game multiple times was too much. I may go back to it at some point though lol.

I gave Thyza (Ryza) a good playthrough, 100% achievements it. The story was amazingly boring, all the girls look like thots, Ryza's personality isn't very wholesome, she's like a tsundere without the fun part. The crafting system was dumbed down to such a degree that I didn't even need to think much about anything. The only thing I liked about Ryza was the cameo with Pamela, but to even unlock that cameo required doing ALL quests in town which sucked. And lastly, but sadly, the music for Ryza was so boring I had to drink coffee to prevent myself from falling asleep.

I decided not to bother with Ryza 2, it's obvious they are just going to, pardon the pun, milk her boobs and ass to sell games to 24/7 horny 14 year olds while reducing overall game quality everywhere until the franchise goes the way of Neptunia and nobody cares about it anymore.

Overall, Arland, Lulua and Ayesha have been great experiences for me. The game is really losing its identity the more they try to make the crafting system easier. Did they fire their music artist or did the guy die? How did we go from the music I linked above to Ryza?

Dude I'm literally an avid Atelier fan but I am super bummed that the franchise's golden days are over.

[Tiasmoon]

They do use somewhat different people for the music, tho I havent looked into the specifics and my memory sucks.
Someone else would be more detailed to that.

One quick google leads to this:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Atelier/comments/aei2q8/nakagawa_ken_returns_for_atelier_lulua/

and:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Atelier/comments/5xsm67/whose_behind_gust_music/

Oh yeah, I remember that now.

Overall they use like half a dozen different composers for Ryza so the style and quality are all over the place. Compared to Arland and Dusk where they had fewer composers and the tracks were thus more consistent.

There's still a few really good tracks here and there tho, some are hidden around in a few places.

For example, the item shop track in Ryza 1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyVDf6ft_gA
(Kazuki Yanagawa)

Underworld theme(?):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veHwpQWLWkk
(Asami Mitake)

The red tree forest theme:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0R3QOuKtDdw
(Asami Mitake)
(there's another version of that, one for the day the other for the night)

Vocal tracks like the one you used as example arent that common in Atelier games to begin with, tho.