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<blockquote data-quote="Dai" data-source="post: 607647" data-attributes="member: 9636">Atelier Ryza 2Unsurprisingly, this plays a lot like the first Ryza game; it has the same synthesis and combat systems with only minor tweaks.&nbsp; The main addition is a handful of new traversal options.&nbsp; There's a giant squirrel thing that you can ride around on.&nbsp; Ryza can swim, opening up underwater exploration in a couple of areas, which is fine, but not quite Tomb Raider.&nbsp; There's also a rope for swinging across gaps, but that just involves pressing X on particular spots to execute a canned animation, which was disappointing.The other main difference from the previous game is the emphasis placed on exploring ruins.&nbsp; This feeds into an interesting system where you hunt around for fragments of old documents, and then piece them together to make sense of that location's past.I don't know if it was because I was already familiar with the synthesis system, but it felt a lot quicker and easier to craft overpowered gear than in Ryza 1.&nbsp; Combined with enemies dropping so much experience that my party was levelling up every battle or two throughout the game, and the whole thing was a cakewalk.&nbsp; The final boss was so easy and underwhelming that after beating it I immediately checked online to see if I'd missed a quest to unlock a true final boss, but no, that was it.&nbsp; Not that this was a problem, really; I play Atelier games to relax, so I don't want hair-tearing difficulty.Overall, I enjoyed this one about as much as Ryza 1 (which is to say a lot).&nbsp; I like the synthesis system in the Ryza games, but I think I preferred the story and structure in Atelier Firis for sticking with its more lighthearted tone throughout.&nbsp; It looks like the theme for the Ryza sub-series is going to keep veering back to a stock defeat-the-ancient-evil plotline.&nbsp; While I'd prefer it didn't, it has enough of the core Atelier experience still going on too, so I'm looking forward to the almost inevitable Ryza trilogy-ender, if one gets made.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Dai, post: 607647, member: 9636"] [B]Atelier Ryza 2[/B] Unsurprisingly, this plays a lot like the first Ryza game; it has the same synthesis and combat systems with only minor tweaks. The main addition is a handful of new traversal options. There's a giant squirrel thing that you can ride around on. Ryza can swim, opening up underwater exploration in a couple of areas, which is fine, but not quite Tomb Raider. There's also a rope for swinging across gaps, but that just involves pressing X on particular spots to execute a canned animation, which was disappointing. The other main difference from the previous game is the emphasis placed on exploring ruins. This feeds into an interesting system where you hunt around for fragments of old documents, and then piece them together to make sense of that location's past. I don't know if it was because I was already familiar with the synthesis system, but it felt a lot quicker and easier to craft overpowered gear than in Ryza 1. Combined with enemies dropping so much experience that my party was levelling up every battle or two throughout the game, and the whole thing was a cakewalk. The final boss was so easy and underwhelming that after beating it I immediately checked online to see if I'd missed a quest to unlock a true final boss, but no, that was it. Not that this was a problem, really; I play Atelier games to relax, so I don't want hair-tearing difficulty. Overall, I enjoyed this one about as much as Ryza 1 (which is to say a lot). I like the synthesis system in the Ryza games, but I think I preferred the story and structure in Atelier Firis for sticking with its more lighthearted tone throughout. It looks like the theme for the Ryza sub-series is going to keep veering back to a stock defeat-the-ancient-evil plotline. While I'd prefer it didn't, it has enough of the core Atelier experience still going on too, so I'm looking forward to the almost inevitable Ryza trilogy-ender, if one gets made. [/QUOTE]

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