My prediction for how this game will do.

[Walrus Beard]

Atelier Yumia looks fantastic. Music, gameplay, character design, art, it's all at Gust's typical high levels. I would say the game looks orders of magnitude better than anything we've seen from them in the past. Clearly they have been putting the revenue from the increased sales in recent years to good use, expanding the scope of their ambitions.

Although this game seems to have caught the attention of many, I believe that after an initial rush of sales, enthusiasm will wane, and the hype will fall flat.

This is not because the Atelier games are bad. It's because they are inherently self limiting. Reason? The crafting system. I bounced off of Ryza twice before sticking with it and beating it on my third attempt. The crafting is extremely confusing and complex. After that, I played the first Sophie game. Characters cap out at level 20, at which point the final boss still will wipe the floor with you. At that point you NEED to exploit the crafting to your advantage, or there's no hope.

I gave up and went online. Someone said put Well Rounded, God's Gift, and Dragon Soul on the weapons. What followed was a brain melting two days trying to figure out how to get those traits onto a Zettel so I could duplicate the Zettel and use it in crafting my ingots. Ultimately I did succeed, but it wasn't easy. I learned a lot about alchemy in the process. In spite of the ever evolving crafting systems, I have observed that there are multiple, series spanning commonalities which once you become familiar with, it makes subsequent games easier to play. I now find these games to be VERY rewarding, but the journey has not been easy, and at times it has been frustrating.

I am not saying that Gust should decrease the difficulty of this system to appeal to more people. Nothing good comes of abandoning a franchise's core identity to chase that phantom global audience. These games appeal to a very specific kind of person. Yumia may pull in some new fans to the series, but I believe the franchise will remain niche.

[Melodia]

Funny enough, a good percentage of people consider Ryza to be easy mode.

[Walrus Beard]

Originally posted by Melodia:

Funny enough, a good percentage of people consider Ryza to be easy mode.

Yes I've heard that. I found Sophie to be more challenging.

[Melodia]

Originally posted by Walrus Beard:

Yes I've heard that. I found Sophie to be more challenging.

Sophie is more complex for sure. They both have a couple weird difficulty spikes, battle-wise, but I don't think Sophie is particularly harder once you understand its system (but I really like the Mysterious sereis' system so that could be why). Just my humble opinion though.

[Legendary Mr. Tiddles]

Originally posted by Melodia:

Funny enough, a good percentage of people consider Ryza to be easy mode.

I struggled with Ryza 1's crafting, and I gave up entirely when I couldn't figure out the combat system and got owned in the face by regular mooks... on very easy difficulty.

Sophie 2 was just fine though!

Hopefully this one is not TOO MUCH like Ryza 1.

[Walrus Beard]

Originally posted by Legendary Mr. Tiddles:

Originally posted by Melodia:

Funny enough, a good percentage of people consider Ryza to be easy mode.

I struggled with Ryza 1's crafting, and I gave up entirely when I couldn't figure out the combat system and got owned in the face by regular mooks... on very easy difficulty.

Sophie 2 was just fine though!

Hopefully this one is not TOO MUCH like Ryza 1.

What about Ryza's crafting stumped you? Maybe I can give some input.

[General Plastro]

Sophie is already easy mode due to no time pressure.

The old guard had to figure out the recipes, what worked and what didint and plan ahead of time because you had limited time to explore and gather supplies before one or other quest failed.

But your right, i think you got that "magic moment" when you figure out that a lot of the games lean on each other and you can make other games easier by relying on previous knowledge of what works or not.

I am not part of said "old guard", i started with Sophie, but the system really only "clicked" with me midway through Firis and from there, i felt confident to try to older games and beat them.

[Legendary Mr. Tiddles]

Originally posted by Walrus Beard:

Originally posted by Legendary Mr. Tiddles:

I struggled with Ryza 1's crafting, and I gave up entirely when I couldn't figure out the combat system and got owned in the face by regular mooks... on very easy difficulty.

Sophie 2 was just fine though!

Hopefully this one is not TOO MUCH like Ryza 1.

What about Ryza's crafting stumped you? Maybe I can give some input.

It's been a bit of time, but if I recall there were gates, slots or whatever they were that seemed unaccessible and I didn't know why. It was frustrating. That and the layout of the "game board" didn't make sense to me. I guess if you want to see it like a developer it was a problem with the UI design, kinda-sorta? And the unaccessible parts maybe something about teaching the player how to play? I can assume they were to be explained later in the game but I never got to that part, or somehow I missed it (though I never skip dialog except by mistake).

All the running cross-country back and forth between my house and the adventure zone got tiresome really quickly but that's another matter.

[Walrus Beard]

Originally posted by Legendary Mr. Tiddles:

Originally posted by Walrus Beard:

What about Ryza's crafting stumped you? Maybe I can give some input.

It's been a bit of time, but if I recall there were gates, slots or whatever they were that seemed unaccessible and I didn't know why. It was frustrating. That and the layout of the "game board" didn't make sense to me. I guess if you want to see it like a developer it was a problem with the UI design, kinda-sorta? And the unaccessible parts maybe something about teaching the player how to play? I can assume they were to be explained later in the game but I never got to that part, or somehow I missed it (though I never skip dialog except by mistake).

All the running cross-country back and forth between my house and the adventure zone got tiresome really quickly but that's another matter.

I beat the first game. You're right. Many things are poorly explained, or even not explained. I had to do a lot of googling. Finding ingredients could be the most tiresome aspect aspect, because the game might tell you what area to look in and what tool to use, but the specific ingredient you're looking for could be anywhere. Kind of frustrating.

[Rono]

WIthout the crafting it wouldn't be Atelier at all in fact is one of the things I enjoy the most but I understand people that like more traditional Jrpgs wouldn't like it Still it's what makes this series IMO

[Walrus Beard]

Originally posted by Rono:

WIthout the crafting it wouldn't be Atelier at all in fact is one of the things I enjoy the most but I understand people that like more traditional Jrpgs wouldn't like it Still it's what makes this series IMO

You are quite right. I struggled with it a lot at first because it is so complex, but once you start to get the hang of it, it's super satisfying and rewarding. I wouldn't want this series to change, ever.