Whereas the Atelier collection has been steadily evolving and tweaking its profitable JRPG/craft-’em-up system throughout 30 years and 20-plus video games, Atelier Yumia: The Alchemist of Recollections & the Envisioned Land maybe represents essentially the most radical shift but. However that does not imply current followers ought to be anxious: for all the modifications, Yumia remains to be an Atelier recreation at coronary heart, solely greater, extra action-focused, and just a little darker than earlier than.
Atelier Yumia takes place in a land ravaged by a previous cataclysm. The world was almost ended a few years in the past by the powers of alchemy, and so now the follow is deemed taboo, reviled by many, and outright outlawed in some locations. Yumia is a candy younger alchemist sporting killer — actually — excessive heels and wielding a magical employees that doubles up as a rifle. She discovered alchemy from her late mom, and lives in seclusion atop a hill with solely her floating, speaking lamp Flammi for firm.
When she’s approached by a analysis group to assist examine the ruins of the Aladissian Empire she sees a possibility to be taught extra about why the empire fell, whether or not alchemy was really answerable for the calamity way back, and to maybe rehabilitate the picture of her craft. Initially, she’s met with scepticism by a few of her new comrades and the individuals she meets, however over time hearts are warmed, classes are discovered, and the facility of friendship trumps prejudice.
It is a darker story, and has greater stakes than is typical for an Atelier recreation. However you should not go into this anticipating one thing like Metaphor: ReFantazio. There’s just a little little bit of identify calling and side-eyeing in the direction of Yumia and her craft, but it surely would not get a lot nastier than that. The tone of the sport is generally charming and optimistic, with the darker components of the story performing as seasoning for the narrative moderately than the dominating flavour of it.
All through the journey you will discover an expansive open world. There are 4 massive areas within the recreation which can be unlocked by following the principle questline, however every locale is full of a plethora of facet quests, treasures to seek out, monsters to slay, and gadgets to gather. Facet quests are largely throwaway fare: go over there, kill a factor, come again, and so forth. However the open world is enjoyable to discover, with secrets and techniques lurking in each nook and cranny of the map.
We often took day without work between story beats to peruse the map, heading to every query mark in flip simply to see what was there and principally felt rewarded by what we discovered. It helps that Yumia is an agile protagonist with the power to triple bounce up partitions making getting over obstacles simpler than it has any proper to be. Later she will get a sleek motorbike to additional pace up the proceedings. There’s additionally an array of ziplines strewn all through the world that after discovered and repaired could make getting throughout the map a breeze.
Whereas traversing the world of Atelier Yumia you will run afoul of all method of nasty beasties to do battle with. Fight is extra action-focused than in earlier Atelier titles, and whereas it is maybe just a little on the straightforward facet, some good design choices cease it from changing into tedious throughout the 40 or 50 hours it’s going to take to complete the principle storyline of the sport.
Throughout battle you management one character — Yumia by default — and her assaults are mapped to the 4 face buttons. Every assault has a set variety of makes use of and a cooldown connected to it and so the concept is to make use of a ability after which as soon as it is recharging use totally different ones. You may as well freely strafe Yumia from right-to-left throughout fight, and when an enemy telegraphs an upcoming assault you may modify your place to remain out of the highlighted space on the bottom to keep away from harm.
Tapping down on the d-pad strikes Yumia away from her opponent, and as soon as at vary all of her assaults change to lengthy distance magical abilities. Enemies are weak to both magical or bodily assaults, and so you have to transfer between the entrance and the again rows to use that weak spot, stun your foe, after which unleash massive harm. As you progress by way of the sport you will unlock dodges, tag-team assaults with a squad-mate, and the extremely highly effective Mana Surge talents that may flip the tide of battle right away.
On regular problem fight towards the rank and file enemies is mostly straightforward and battles are sometimes over in a heartbeat with only a few faucets of a face button so it by no means turns into irritating battling monsters both for expertise or when farming for sources. Boss encounters are the place the fight shines, with extra sophisticated assault patterns out of your enemies, and a few mid-battle cut-scenes so as to add to the drama. Plus, one of many bosses is voiced by Takaya Kuroda, well-known for voicing the best man that ever lived Kiryu Kazuma from the Yakuza collection. In order that’s good.
You possibly can farm as a lot expertise as you want in fight however that’ll solely get you to this point. Even in the event you’ve hit the extent cap of 100 you may rapidly end up outmatched by decrease degree foes in case your gear is less than snuff and that is the place alchemy is available in. At Yumia’s workshop you may unlock the recipes you’ve got discovered in your adventures so long as you’ve got received the requisite gadgets to take action, and you then’ll synthesize a recipe utilizing collected sources in your backpack.
Higher high quality sources within the pot yield higher rewards, usually, however when you get the dangle of the method you may alter the recipe to supply gadgets that may be of upper high quality, or ones that include further results. So you would make a sword that is received greater base stats, or one which specialises in elevating one stat specifically, or one which does extra harm towards a selected sort of enemy. It is just a little daunting at first however pretty straight ahead as soon as you’ve got completed it a couple of instances, and you may all the time automate the entire course of if recipe micromanagement is simply not your factor.
You may as well create constructing supplies akin to partitions, rooves, flooring, and decorations. Whilst you’re exploring the world of Atelier Yumia you will discover constructing websites to arrange secondary bases of operations and design them the way you see match. It is a pretty rudimentary set of constructing choices, however welcome nonetheless. A few tents and a sleeping bag simply will not lower the mustard when you may knock up a small cottage with cherry blossom timber within the backyard for a pit-stop between missions.
Conclusion
Atelier Yumia: The Alchemist of Recollections & the Envisioned Land is a splendidly charming addition to the long-running JRPG collection. It is a improbable leaping in level to the franchise for brand new gamers, and has sufficient tweaks to the established system to supply a breath of contemporary air for current followers. The story is just a little slight, however the interesting characters, streamlined but sturdy crafting system, and rewarding exploration make this a recipe for an excellent time.