Lost legends and the secret fairy

Summer in the city

Ryza’s Workshop: Always darkness and secret hiding it was my long-term introduction Workshop series. And, while I certainly liked it, it didn’t make enough of an impact for me to run with it and check out the rest of the millions of other games in the series. This is an important commitment and this kind of thing terrifies me.

However, it left me thirsty enough for a sequel that has now come into form Ryza Workshop 2: Lost Legends and the Secret Fairy. It’s time to hit the boiler again and take on an adventure and also find out if anyone has gained any fashion sense since the last game. Spoiler: They didn’t.

Ryza’s Workshop: Always darkness and secret hiding (PC, switch [reviewed], PS4, PS5)
Developer: Gust Co. Ltd.
Editor: Koei Tecmo
Released: January 26, 2021
RRP: $ 59.99

It’s been 3 years since the first events Atelier RyzaAnd the prey of Reisalin “Ryza” Stout will not give up yet. She spent the last three years practicing her own alchemy, since her friends abandoned her to go to the capital. She is asked by the rich local guy to investigate some beautiful stones and she is not sure that her experience is enough to realize, so she decides to stay in the city to join her friends.

Atelier Ryza 2 it is somewhat more immediate than its predecessor. Your first fight is on the way and you have your workshop before the prologue ends. Then you’re ready to find some bombs in your apartment.

Like the first game, though, the narrative is a bit of a slow boil. You want adventure, so going on an adventure pretty much sums up the character’s motivation. Things are developing from there. There are a number of ruins around the capital and they seem to be the perfect place to kill yourself, so it’s time to reveal their secrets and figure out how to connect your flying pet hamster, Fi.

If you’re new to the series, you’re probably wondering if you need to play first Atelier Ryza to enjoy the second, and the answer is: yes, probably. Much of the game involves meeting old friends, and a ton of dialogue addresses how much everyone has changed in the years since. I’m not saying you couldn’t figure it out in context, it might not have the same impact.

If you are unfamiliar, Workshop the games are JRPGs with in-depth craft mechanics. Alchemy, they call it, is apparently the art of throwing specific ingredients in a pot to create a deck. While this may only sound like an excessive complication of your typical equipment system, it actually adds a layer of progression to the game. As you travel, you will have access to more ingredients that can be used to produce better weapons and equipment. It’s important because even though you can buy things in stores, nothing compares to what you whip in the workshop.

I had a problem with the evolution of the previous game; I felt like there are a lot of starts and stops as you travel until you hit a wall, then return to the workshop to upgrade your equipment or create a key element. That hasn’t changed exactly, but I think the progress of the game is a bit more involved. You still go on adventures and then come back to make a more beautiful shirt, but there is a firmer division between the two activities and that seems to work better.

The ruins do not necessarily unlock in a linear manner. If you focus on side missions along with the simple beating of modest wildlife, you may find that you gain access to new areas without necessarily having to complete the previous one. This can give you access to new sources of ingredients that allow you to improve your alchemy in tandem with adventure. Discovering new areas makes it all the more exciting as you not only progress your narrative, but also your skills.

There is a dizzying amount of depth up to Atelier Ryza 2, some of them are disposable. For some reason, you can decorate your workshop, but I don’t know why you would do it. You can also create ingredients and improve stores by selling items, but the crafts throw the earth and can be found in the bottom of each monster. They offer alternative ways to access some items that you wouldn’t otherwise get later, but it’s up to you if it’s worth the extra effort.

Creating itself can take you a while to understand small niches. Some of this is due to the fact that it is not well explained. For example, it has several terms for healing, and for the longest time, I thought the only healing object I had access to was grass beans. Near the end of the game, they stopped doing the work and had to experiment to discover that the “healing taste” was analogous. Subsequently, I created the most amazing desserts ever designed by man and I reached the end by frequently feeding them to my teammates’ donuts.

The advantage is that you get out of alchemy what you put in it. If you take the time to find the right ingredients, learn the mechanics and discover new recipes, you can turn your party into a truly fast-paced force. However, if you ignore them, you may find it difficult to wake up.

While Atelier Ryza I had some difficulty getting started, I didn’t have the same problem with the sequel. I would spend hours wiping out side missions and shaking the boiler, sometimes neglecting the critical path. However, this failed at the end of the game, because I was seriously tired of his absolutely inan dialogue.

Like its predecessor, Atelier Ryza 2 it is irrepressibly cheerful, tending to be a breath of fresh air in an industry full of gloomy protagonists, with dark pasts fighting unambiguously evil. Optimism was something that helped Atelier Ryza to come to mind, but here I just got absolutely sick.

There is so much wasteful dialogue, it is dizzying. Many of them revolve around Fi and how much he loves everyone and loves everyone. I don’t need a deeper perspective on why someone’s head is hunched over. For each scene that actually includes a significant character or narrative development, there are about a dozen characters in which they talk about the cafe food. Even the parts that go into the characters’ heads play shyly for too long before offering anything of value. It tends to run in circles, passing over information that is either obvious or has already been provided.

It’s getting crazy. I went from listening to the dialogue to going through it to giving me important advice. When the text in the final scenes of the game became unstoppable, I actually got annoyed because I had to look at each member of the group saying how important this fight was to them. Rescue Me.

As much as I may be saddened by the inevitable whirlwind of dialogue that lurks in every stage transition, I will still admit that I enjoyed the real game a little more than the first one when I wasn’t talking. Maybe not for narrative reasons, but progression and mechanics clicked much harder for me this time. I ended up with the clock around 50 hours going through the game, but I probably could have reduced that if I hadn’t spent so much time refining the tastiest donut. However, I probably would have enjoyed that much less.

I’m kind of in the same position as last time: I liked the experience, but I’m in no hurry to go out and take the rest of the series. If anything, I’ll wait until the next opportunity to sneak into Ryza’s incredibly tight shorts. Given the typical pace of the series, it will probably be in another year or so.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

Ryza Workshop 2: Lost Legends and the Secret Fairy reviewed by Adzuken