by Jason Young, staff editor, Inside AX- Anime Expo

Lately, it seems as though the RPG genre has seen a dramatic shift in the way gamers think about it. With a huge emphasis on trying to ‘wow’ gamers with the latest high-def graphics and expansive open-ended titles such as Oblivion and Mass Effect, there’s been a huge change in the landscape. Where the territory used to belong to Japanese developers like Hironobu Sakaguchi and Yuji Hori with linear story-centric titles such as Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest in the pre-high definition era, there’s been a huge revolution in the industry to try to appeal to fans with Western tastes. You know the ones who prefer exploration and action-oriented gameplay above all else. While this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as I truly love the Mass Effect series, as a gamer that grew up with the likes of Xenogears and Chrono Trigger, this generation of RPGs has left me nostalgic and longing for yesteryear; or at least limited to playing games on handheld devices. Thankfully, NIS America has listened to the call of me as well as other fellow RPG enthusiasts and has been focusing on bringing over quality niche titles such as Disgaea 4 and of course, the Atelier series to fans overseas.

As the second entry in the Arland series, the recently released PlayStation 3 exclusive title Atelier Totori: the Adventurer of Arland represents the best of both worlds as it combines exploration and a unique open-ended style of gameplay with well-developed characters. Just like its predecessor, Atelier Rorona, Atelier Totori is a fun lighthearted affair that is a relaxing joy to play that tells a sweet coming-of-age story about the titular protagonist, Totori. So if you’re looking for any end of the world plots or villains trying to summon meteors, it’s probably best to look elsewhere as what we have here is a simple plot about a girl who is trying to chase after her mother’s shadow.

Like many of the other games in the Atelier series, Totori places an emphasis on character development and interaction. With a storyline that will make you smile, Atelier Totori is the perfect way to spend a lazy afternoon as its characters, graphics and presentation are all charming. Often giving you a sense of accomplishment, even if you choose just to pick up the game for half an hour. Make no mistake though, unlike the previous title, there are plenty of melodramatic moments to be had in the game that places its narrative years ahead of its predecessor.

Where Rorona centered on keeping her workshop afloat and building her popularity, the core of Atelier Totori is to help Totori level up her adventurer rank using the game’s highly addictive achievement system. Complete quests, create a certain item or defeat a boss and you gain adventurer points. No specific assignments, nothing. The game gives you the freedom to progress in any way you want without being limited, like in Rorona, as literally doing almost anything in the game will net you adventure points.

As you rank up, gamers get access to new places to visit where you can fight monsters, gather materials for synthesizing and explore over the game’s three and a half years, with a possibility of more if you fulfill the in-game requirements. Now, you might think that the game’s length of time is awfully long, but each in-game action takes up a certain amount of time to complete so time management is essential.

Want to fight a monster or synthesize an item for use in battle? That’ll take time, and possibly days to complete. Need to traverse between Arland and Alanya, the game’s two primary hubs? That’ll take you up to twenty plus days in the beginning, and you’ll be doing this a lot. Even crafting the items that you will need in battle will take time as nothing is handed to you. Unfortunately, it isn’t until late in the game when you finally get access to items that let you slow down time. It’s this, rather than combat, along with the game’s rather in-depth alchemy system that the series has been famous for and Totori certainly doesn’t disappoint in this regard.

Aside from a more open-ended style approach, Totori takes a lot of the aspects from the previous titles and improves upon them making the title more accessible than its predecessor. For one, synthesizing traits into specific items has never been easier. Where previous entries such as Mana Khemia used a wheel and in Atelier Rorona where traits were randomly chosen amongst your parent items, you can now choose which characteristics you want your items to inherent making the synthesis system deeper than ever before.

Just as improved is the game’s turn-based combat system, which while still very basic, still manages to get the job done although it doesn’t strive to do anything special. As in Rorona, you can bring two additional characters with you into battle who can help assist Totori with both attacking and guarding. While only the game’s alchemists, Rorona and Totori have access to items, each character has his or her own set of skills that makes them unique. The biggest and most welcomed change in battle, however, is that skills and HP no longer share the same bar. Characters now have three separate bars (HP, MP and LP) that players have to manage throughout battles with different items for restoration, which means more synthesizing!

Since it takes a long time to craft everything, Totori thankfully has a few helpers called Chims to help her gather and synthesize in her workshop. The only catch? You need to have pie in your inventory to have access to this form of manual labor. Genius. While it does take time to synthesize the pies that you will need, you can still register the items you craft in the game’s shops to help reduce the amount of time you spend synthesizing. This begets yet another problem. You need money to purchase the items you register, and unlike Rorona, it’s pretty damn hard to get money this time around. This makes it even harder to get the game’s true ending where you’ll need to save up over 500,000 cole, in addition to fulfilling a bunch of other requirements.

If you’re not following a guide, it’s ridiculously easy to fall off the path when you’re trying to reach the true or a specific character ending. With tons of missable events and requirements needed to reach the game’s eleven different endings, it’s easy to reach the game’s bad or normal ending. On my first go around, I was personally hoping to have been on the tsundere Mimi’s path, but instead got a normal ending which was a surprise. Unsatisfied, I went to go play through the game’s new game plus (equipment and cole both carry over) with a guide. While this is in no way bad, especially since it adds tons of replay value to the game, it’s best to be prepared.

Visually, the game is also an improvement over Rorona. Not only does the game look absolutely fantastic in high-def, but the in-game character sprites match their 2D illustrated portraits proportionally now instead of relying on a chibi character style. Gamers who played Rorona will get a kick out of seeing older versions of their favorite characters including Sterk and Cordelia, who are both playable in the game as well. Still, it uses a moe-inspired anime design and if that’s not your thing then the game more than likely isn’t for you.

One last thing that I need to mention is that the game’s fantastic soundtrack composed by Ken Nakagawa and Kazuki Yanagawa is evocative and is in every way superior to GUST’s recent work with Atelier Rorona and Ar Tonelico Qoga. With a soundtrack that fully integrates textured sounds to help paint the scenery in the game, there are tons of memorable tracks with the opening theme, “Pilgrimage,” standing out the most and being the perfect introduction to the game. As someone who poured over one hundred hours into Atelier Rorona, I clearly can’t remember being pumped up by any of Ken Nakagawa’s experimental choices, but in Totori, each and every theme is fantastic. Kudos to GUST for returning to form with this fantastic soundtrack, and thank you to NIS America for including it in the limited edition package. And for anyone who is feeling nostalgic for the battle themes from the earlier Atelier titles, NIS America has brought over the DLC music packs to appeal to audiophiles everywhere. You can also replace the workshop themes to both Atelier Totori and Atelier Rorona, which is welcomed after listening to Rorona’s theme for hours in the first game.

With a strong presentation, deep synthesis system and well-written characters, Atelier Totori is a great deal for anyone pining for a classic-style RPG experience with some modern conventions thrown into it. While it certainly isn’t for everyone, those who don’t mind a lighthearted and sometimes overly melodramatic storyline may definitely want to look into investing some time and money into the game. Personally, Atelier Totori is easily one of my favorite games of the year so far, despite its blatant flaws. I for one am easily looking forward to NIS America’s inevitable future Atelier Meruru announcement.

Pros:

• Fantastic, evocative soundtrack that ranks up there with some of the best, including Nobuo Uematsu and Yasunori Mitsuda
• Better than Atelier Rorona in nearly every aspect from battle to graphics
• Very well-written characters with interesting backstories
• Open-ended style of gameplay with a fun synthesis system
• Cameos from the previous game helps to neatly tie-in Totori with Rorona
• Lots of quests

Cons:

• Despite its improvement, the turn-based battle system for Atelier Totori is still very basic and fails to innovate like Ar Tonelico 2’s did back on the PlayStation 2
• Some people may be turned off by the primarily female (and very under-aged) cast, as well as the ‘cutesy’ anime style graphics
• Unless you’re following a guide, there’s a lot of missable events which might frustrate gamers who are looking for a specific character ending
• No sense of urgency or “big baddie” in the storyline may turn off the storyline to some gamers

Tags: Atelier Totori, NIS America, PlayStation 3, review