Making sequels is never easy, but what if every game in a trilogy is better than its predecessor?
The answer comes from Gust, who with Atelier Lydie & Suelle it closes at its best what turned out to be one of his best sagas dedicated to alchemy.
In the last three years I have had the pleasure of playing Atelier's Mysterious saga and I could only love it for its simplicity and at the same time for the innovations brought to a series that is now 20 years old, with Lydie & Suelle being the sum of what we have seen in recent years.
To learn more:
Atelier Firis: The Alchemist and the Mysterious Journey
Version tested: PS4
The paintings of the mystery
As the title suggests, the game's storyline revolves around Lydie and Suelle Marlen, two twin sisters who live in the city of Melveille, capital of the kingdom of Adalett. The two help their father, an alchemist himself, with the family atelier, between often unsuccessful syntheses and jobs to keep the hut going. Things will change when, one day, Lydie hears a voice coming from the basement of the house, here together with her sister they will discover a mysterious painting and as if by magic they will find themselves catapulted inside them. This will mark the beginning of the adventures of the Marlen twins who will aim not only to explore these special paintings, but also to become first-rate alchemists.
As it is easy to guess from the title, the main plot of the game will revolve around the everyday life of the two sisters, but above all to discover what secrets the mysterious paintings are hidden.
With Lydie & Suelle the developers have made a considerable effort at the narrative level, in particular for what concerns the main plot, where there are some twists especially in the last chapters. Normally the Ateliers do not shine for complex stories, on the contrary they are often light and pleasant plots but in this chapter we will witness some events of particular emotional impact. What does not change, however, is the usual one care dedicated to the characterization of the characters, excellent for what concerns the new characters and even more in-depth for the cast of Atelier Sophie and Firis, which is very noticeable if you have played the two titles in question as it is immediately clear how the characters of the old chapters have really grown giving a perfect feeling of time flow. About this, a series of secondary events of some characters clearly refer to the events of Atelier Sophie. Nothing bad so far, but only for those who have played the whole trilogy: those who approach the saga for the first time with Lydie & Suelle or on Nintendo consoles, may have some problems in fully understanding all the events
Perfect alchemy
The word alchemy is the right one to describe Lydie & Suelle's gameplay, which manages to wisely manage battles, craft items and everything else that the game offers to affect other elements. The battle system is the one that has undergone notable changes, so much so that it is not excessive to call it among the best ever seen in an Atelier. As per tradition Lydie & Suelle is the classic turn-based JRPG, but this time we will be able to use up to six characters in battle including three main ones and three others in the rear ready to intervene at any time. Intervening is a fitting term as these three characters are able to perform actions on their own after one of the main three brings an attack and they bear the name of Follow up, they are closely related to the character and vary from serial or defensive offensive moves, heals and power-ups. Each character has their own unique abilities, for example Lydie is more suitable as a support member thanks to her skills that apply buffs to the party and debuffs to enemies (although it consists only in delaying the turn) while Suelle or Firis possess offensive skills to say the least devastating but not only, all the playable characters alchemists are able to use objects created in the course of the game, while others will be able to use only support objects. Another important novelty is the Battle Mix, which allows you to create objects through alchemy with the materials collected on the map and use them immediately in combat with effects to be discovered, in the advanced stages of the game it will also be possible to use the Battle Mix with objects created in the Atelier, in order to increase exponentially the power.
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Finally we have the inevitable finishing moves, but also in this case the system has been renewed thanks to the introduction of Combinations Art, these are special attacks made in pairs depending on the main character who fights and the one placed in his support and vary according to the combinations. To perform a Combinations Art, however, you will first have to fill the appropriate bar during the fight by using normal attacks and follow-up.
In essence, the battle system of Lydie & Suelle is very deep and at times varied, as has not been seen for some time
What does not change, but at the same time improves from year to year, is the crafting system of the items. This remains similar to what we saw in Atelier Firis, with the various bonuses to be obtained by filling the symbols present in the track according to our existing in order to unlock the most useful "traits" to the object we are looking for. To give an example, if we want to create a bomb that inflicts maximum damage, we will have to aim for the traits "Fire Damage L" and "Inflict Burn L" in order to have an object capable of taking away a high number of HP and at the time itself inflicting severe altered status on the enemy. To do all this obviously we will need the many materials scattered around both in the game world and in the paintings, hoping to find high quality ones in order to create better and better objects. New items to create will be unlocked through the story, books to be purchased in the game and by meeting certain requirements that we can check at any time in our recipe book, where we will see the list of everything that can be created with alchemy.
To learn more:
Atelier Sophie: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Book
Handyman twins
In the Atelier you don't live by alchemy and fighting alone, in fact we can choose to dedicate ourselves to the various sub quests and secondary events that the titles of the series present and also Lydie & Suelle is not far behind. The quests vary from eliminating specific monsters to the creation of certain objects, sometimes with particular traits, while other quests are unique throughout the game and ask to reach a certain goal, often quite difficult to achieve as they offer difficult fights or item crafting. requiring very rare materials. In these cases, however, the prize will not be the classic money, but new options for the Battle Mix, fundamental for the advanced phases of the game and the bosses. Excluding these special missions, the variety of quests is really meager and we will find ourselves doing the same things over and over again in no time, a step back from Firis where the same quest never happened more than times at most. Even from an exploratory point of view, a small deterioration must be recorded, as we return to the old classic map system of the saga: from the world map we will access individual maps divided into various very restricted areas to be explored in a few minutes. Different discord instead for the mysterious paintings, much more varied in terms of setting and above all areas and dimensions, certainly not comparable to Firis, but which still require some time to be fully explored. The feeling is that the developers wanted to put more effort into the worlds of the paintings, as they are the centerpiece of the title, and from this point of view there is no complain.
The return to the old map system is easily explained: goodbye drops in framerate
Well Gust was very smart. Firis had a vast world to explore, but in certain areas and weather conditions, the game suffered from very heavy drops in framerate, at times embarrassing for a PS4 production. Lydie & Suelle, instead, it makes up for this problem with smaller but richly detailed maps, with an always fluid framerate and almost imperceptible declines which nevertheless occur very rarely. Graphically, the game is very well taken care of, much more than Sophie and Firis especially for what concerns the characters. The environments are not far behind, from lush forests to dense woods, up to desolate deserts and snow-covered moors, and each area takes on an even more particular atmosphere when the weather changes: being in the mountains during a snowstorm will make the exhibition visible. zero, giving a strong feeling of immersion in that particular place. As for the audio part, the game features only the Japanese dubbing, excellent as always in these titles but is the soundtrack that shines for originality, with really beautiful songs, some of which also sung by important characters of Japanese music. The translation is good, although only in English, despite some forgetfulness of some letters in the description and names of some objects.
Atelier Lydie & Suelle: The Alchemists and the Mysterious Paintings - PlayStation 4On amazon: 51,99 € buy
Verdict 9/10 The real mystery is understanding why you haven't played it yet Comment Atelier Lydie & Suelle closes a splendid trilogy that has found its strengths in carefree and never banal plots and innovations in gameplay that have rejuvenated a twenty-year series . In some ways the title is not really suitable for newbies of the saga as the crafting system of the objects is much more complex and requires experience to be mastered, also some choices of the developers in terms of level design are questionable given the old games but this does not take away the fact that in this third chapter of the "Mystery" saga, Gust has taken the best he has learned from 20 years of Atelier and joined them to churn out a product that cannot and should not be underestimated or belittled for mere prejudice but that must be understood and above all played, because only by doing so will you discover that Lydie & Suelle is not a simple game, but an experience that must be lived in full like the whole Mysterious saga. Pros and cons ✓ Pleasant texture
✓ Great Cast
✓ Exciting battle system
✓ Lots of secondary activities
✓ Improved Item Crafting System ... x ... but not very open to beginners
x Some side events are related to past games
x Back to the old map system
