Atelier Sophie: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Book (PS4) Review

by Aly Hand

Atelier Sophie: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Book is the latest game to join the prestigious Atelier series.  The seventeenth iteration of the series, Atelier Sophie works extremely well as a stand-alone title.  If you have never played any of the Atelier games before, this one is a really good one to start with.  The game begins with Sophie, a young girl who is looking to fill her deceased grandmother's role as an alchemist.  She takes advantage of her grandmother's legacy and in the process discovers a magical talking book named Plachta who remembers nothing of her past.  From there the story progresses as Sophie works to restore Plachta's memories and improve her alchemy skills.  Throughout this process she makes friends and helps the townspeople.  Unlike most story-driven RPGs, there is no immediate opponent, no "bad guy" to defeat.  Though there is a "final boss", there is no in-game pressure to defeat it.  Unlike many of the previous Atelier games, there is no hard time limit.

Perhaps one of the more interesting things about the game is how Sophie learns new recipes.  Previously in Atelier games, recipes were organized by type, in a giant list, and the alchemist learned new ones by either discovering them or by substituting different ingredients in existing recipes.  This time around, recipes are organized in trees, and Sophie learns new ones based off of different methods of inspiration.  In other words, what she does effects what she learns.  While this can be an easier way of discovering recipes, there are some instances where the "clues" the player is given are difficult to interpret, making it hard to complete a recipe tree without turning to sources outside the game for assistance.

The battle system is another area where things have been tweaked from previous games.  Though there are many similarities, the addition of a synch meter and the ability to switch between defensive and offensive modes gives a player more options for keeping characters alive.  As the synch meter percentage rises, the in-battle characters perform automatic actions: in offensive mode, they will perform assist attacks, and the higher the percentage the more characters will assist, culminating in a unique attack for the fourth character to assist once the gauge is at 300%; in defensive mode it is much the same, with characters defending each other with a unique defensive move per character when the gauge is maxed out.  Mastering the gauge becomes essential as the player progresses through the game, as battles become more and more difficult.

There is one aspect of the game that is moderately confusing, and it harkens back to Atelier Shallie.  Once a character hits level 20, they cease to gain levels and instead gain "adventure points".  These points can then be spent on stat bonuses, skill upgrades, and special abilities.  On the down side, however, the characters no longer gain these things naturally.  In both games it was an oddity, to switch between natural level progression and player-controlled level progression after a certain point in gameplay.  The question at hand is why, if this is such an integral part of the game, this feature isn't available the entire time.  It is as if the developer is saying "we'll trust you to control your character's level ups, but only after you've proven you can play the game".  While it isn't something game-breaking or even particularly unique, it definitely takes the player time to adjust.  Like someone learning to drive in America and then suddenly having to drive in the UK, a player has to constantly remind him- or herself to pay attention and distribute points, lest characters fall behind and become a liability.

Overall, however, the game was a well-crafted addition to the Atelier brand, with pleasant characters and a clear and understandable story.  It was fun to play, and definitely one I would recommend for anyone new to RPGs, or to the Atelier games.

(Review code for Atelier Sophie was provided by the publisher)

Dynasty Warriors 7 Empires (Japanese Demo Impressions)

Being a big fan of Koei's -Warriors games, you had to know I would be looking forward to trying this.  I was hoping that it wouldn't be too hard to figure out, since it isn't in English (yet?).  I can read enough Japanese to muddle through most of the menus, but some of them were way beyond me.  It took me a bit to figure out English is written on the back of the menu icons, so that should help people with even less skill at the Japanese language than myself.

The menu starts on character edit, which is perfect since that's what I wanted to try first.  There are lots of options to make a character, but I still wanted more.  If more are purchasable/ unlockable in game, I would be very happy.  If more were released as DLC...I'd be less happy, but I might still bite on them.  I ended up making my character look like Miles Edgeworth from the Phoenix Wright games, and named him "Edgey".  You can change the character input to the English alphabet, so I actually named him that, not just an approximation.  I also tried to give him posh-looking robes to match his personality, since I couldn't get 'the ruffles' his suit is so famous for.

I fiddled with the stats, but wasn't sure what I set the growth type as.  At least it seemed like the growth type, but since it's a demo, it's not as important.  Next was picking a primary weapon type.  After looking through them all, I decided to try new ones, since I know what most of the others are like.  First up was the rapier with a dagger on a wire attached.  It was ok, I just seemed to drop the combos a lot.  Next up was a giant ring blade (which my buddy DTJAAAAM informs me is Ding Feng's new weapon) and it was ok, but didn't seem that good compared to the numerous others offered.  Third was a pool cue...which I think I tried in Warriors Orochi 3, I can't remember.  It was gimmicky since you could get multiple balls and it would make the attacks stronger/better.  It's ok, but not one I would be itching to use.  Last one I tried was....a canoe.  Seriously, it was a canoe.  My friend tells me it's Huang Gai's new weapon...and surprisingly, it rocks.  Several charge moves throw out a big wave and then ride it, meaning big areas of damage.  It was also stronger than I thought it would be, and hit big groups, so it's really good.  It looks ridiculous, but I'm probably going to put it on a character I make.  Seriously.

The hardest part of the demo was figuring out how to actually enter a battle.  When on the edit character select screen, press the Square Button and you can do the mock battle to try them out.  Sadly, I failed this mission the first time, since I wasn't paying attention to the time limit.  Good musous will help you kill the officers, but you have to know lots of kanji to figure out what each is without using it.  I just randomly assigned two each time.  When the NA version releases in a month or so, it will be much easier.  It's harder for me to play those games with Japanese dialogue, but I'll easily live with it if it means we get the game.  I'm hoping to review it too, so here's hoping Koei helps me out!

Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage 2 (Japanese Demo Impressions)

I've had some time since downloading the Japanese demo of Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage 2 (I believe it's Shin Hokuto Musou in Japanese).  So let's take a look at it and how it compares to the first one.

Off the bat, the game looks really similar.  The biggest difference is the new manga-like cut scenes, which are pretty neat.  I wish more of the cut scenes used it, though.  Any cut scenes in mid-level will just be regular cut scenes, which doesn't look as nice.  Granted, the manga ones look strange since they don't move, but it fits the origin of Fist of the North Star, so I'd like it most of the scenes were in the manga style.

If you've played the first Fist of the North Star or any of the Warriors games, you know how this will play.  Thankfully, they have made this one play more like the Warriors games and less like the first FotNS.  Yes, they are similar, but Ken's Rage 1 was a lot slower and most characters were good at 1 on 1 fighting, so fighting groups took way to long.  Kenshiro, who I felt was one of the worst characters in the first game is now really good.  His combos have been changed to have him hit larger groups of enemies.  Also, the game just plays faster and the musou attacks, which have sadly lost the kanji and name of the move at the end of the animation, are also faster, leading to a more action friendly game experience.  I can't wait to try the rest of the characters.

As mentioned before, the musou attacks have lost the kanji at the end, which was very Fist of the North Star.  It does make the fights faster, which is good, and they are still present at the end of the level, when it really matters (because it looks cool).  Also at the end of the level, the button sequence is now gone.  The only QTE is a single button press at the end.  I'm kind of glad they are gone, because it added stress to some of the harder fights.

There's a few other minor changes, such as you now open food and drink boxes instead of smashing them.  Characters cannot jump anymore, you get a dodge move that is hopefully better than the one in the first game.  The level up screen is different, but being in all Japanese, I'm not sure what I'm doing, so I'll have to wait until the domestic release.  Lastly, you only get one musou attack in the demo, so I don't know if you can still equip up to 4 of them, which was really nice.  I hope that stays.

As a fan of the Warriors games, I'm very much looking forward to Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage 2 being released next month.  I enjoyed the first, but not as much as most of the rest of Koei's games.  Just seeing how they changed Kenshiro makes me excited to play the finished product.