And straight away I declare Shin Rorona no Atelier the best of the trilogy by simple virtue of the fact that it let me watch all the endings I qualified for in a single playthrough without forcing me to replay.

In Atelier Meruru Plus I’m sure I unlocked an ending for getting 100,000 people in Arls Kingdom and another ending for beating Airshatter in Mt. Velus (I know because the game told me) but since I reached alchemy level 50 and made the True Potion of Youth, I got the ending where Rorona is restored to normal. I reloaded from an older save, slept till 4/1 Year 5 and got another ending where Rorona is restored to age 14 with partial amnesia. I guess the Rorona endings take priority over everything else.

This is the way it’s always been in Atelier games, so if I hadn’t played Shin Rorona I probably wouldn’t notice or care. Now it’s like, eh, Rorona end was very nice and happy but I wanted to see the other stuff. But I don’t want to play Atelier Meruru again, so it’s Youtube for me! In any case I don’t immediately replay Atelier games unless I got a bad ending (like in Lise, or Lina, or Lilie, hmm I’m seeing a pattern here) so a replay would have to wait several years. I’m off to do some research, but first a few thoughts about the game and the Arland trilogy as a whole.

Story

Atelier games don’t have stories so much as they have premises, or, these days, excuses to make cute girls run around doing cute stuff. The excuse in Atelier Meruru Plus is that the tiny kingdom of Arls is going to merge with the Arland Republic in five years and Princess Merurulince wants to be an alchemist. Somehow the two things come together and she uses alchemy to develop the country as much as she can in 5 years. Totori, Rorona (now reduced to child form due to an alchemy “accident”) and some other characters from previous games show up to help Meruru and Arls through this transitional period.

Characters

Did you know I really don’t like the “spunky princess who wants to live a free life instead of being bound by tradition” cliche in stories? You probably don’t because they aren’t too common in JRPGs. And even if they were I wouldn’t play them because, as I said, I don’t like it. It annoys the little girl in me. Like, why even have a princess if she’s not going to be princess-y at all? Where are the ballgowns? The white gloves? The state banquets? The handsome princes? Atelier Meruru doesn’t have any of that, just a spoiled little brat who complains all day about stuff she isn’t even going to do. Stupid, ungrateful brat. If you’re going to eat, drink and travel at taxpayer’s expense, at least have the decency to enjoy it, damn you.

Actually I didn’t mind Meruru herself all that much. But the “princess” setting was definitely unnecessary. It created far too many annoying scenes like Rufus lecturing Meruru or Lias whining about his duties or Meruru rebelling against hers, etc etc. I just want to get on with my alchemy, please thanks.

The rest of the new cast… Didn’t like any of them. I turfed Keina and Lias out of my party super-quick. Though somehow Keina still ended up with 100 affection for Meruru within a year or two anyway. One-note characters like those really bore me. Keina is all Meruru, Meruru, Meruru. Lias is all Rufus oniichan please notice me. I started skipping all their events after a while so I don’t know how they resolved all that in the end.

For Rufus, in an otome game I wouldn’t leave him alone, but here he’s always pissing on my fun left and right. Ignore as much as possible, was my approach. Unforunately the game is set up so I can’t do any development quests without his approval. Then what’s the point of the strong, independent princess character?

Hanna, I had her pegged from the start as the game’s token Ms. Fanservice. It didn’t help that I got a random naked scene in a forest for no good reason at all. But I threw her in my party late game and her hit-all boomerang is actually super-helpful at clearing up mobs. Huh, who knew. That said, I don’t remember much about her personality besides her running a shop and occasionally giving me freebies. Did she even have a personality? Or just a skimpy top?

For the returning characters from Atelier Totori and Atelier Rorona, I ignored Gino and Mimi like I’d wanted to do all along. I’d also had enough of Rorona and Sterk, so I didn’t use them either. However I did add Esty to my party and discovered she’s not as mean and manipulative as she was in Rorona. In fact, she’s downright nice. What happened? Maybe getting her away from the receptionist’s desk was the cause. Less stress, less opportunities to flaunt your puny power over hapless adventurers, that sort of thing. You know how certain people get when they get a taste of power.

Astrid also got hit with the not-so-nasty stick in Meruru, dunno whether it’s the localization making her softer or her just chilling out with time, either way she’s just capricious here and not outright cruel and malicious like in Rorona. But she’s still not forgiven. No matter how hard Gust tries to humanize her, she will always be Ass-trid to me.

All in all, I’d say Atelier Totori had the most appealing cast in the Arland trilogy. No Ass-trid is a huge part of that, but it’s also true that by Atelier Meruru many of the jokes and quirks have gotten old. Even the stuff that isn’t old feels old. Like there’s a weak attempt to make Meruru a fan of mushrooms, but it doesn’t really go anywhere and it’s just like yeah, yeah, Rorona and her pies all over again. And Viorate with her carrots, but that’s a different universe. Don’t force yourself, Gust.

Gameplay

Meruru collects and synthesizes helpful stuff to help the kingdom develop. Things like quality lumber and steel and weapons, that kind of thing. If there’s an enemy around, she defeats it. For her efforts she gets Development Points which she can use to construct new facilities. New facilities increase the population and also have side effects like cheaper merchandise, easier alchemy, that sort of thing.

I like the system well enough. It’s easy to understand and fairly logical. The development system also adds a number of new synthesis items I’ve never seen before, which is great. I don’t know if this feature was there in the earlier games, but in Meruru Plus, if you can’t make an item because you lack a synthesized ingredient, it lets you go straight to that recipe and make it. You can also select the exact trait you need from a list instead of scrolling through all the items/googling to find out what item tends to have what trait. It’s amazingly convenient.

I just have two little problems with the gameplay.

Problem 1: Unlike Atelier Viorate, which has a similar town development gimmick, you don’t see many tangible changes from developing the city. Sure there are some new buildings on the world map, but you can’t visit any of them. There are more NPCs loitering around, but they’re just that – NPCs. They don’t even move from their spots and they don’t dress any better when the country becomes more prosperous. The castle looks the same, your cottage looks the same, the townscape looks the same whether you have 100 citizens or 100,000.

Problem 2: The schedule is rather tight in the first two years, so you can’t make what you want or go where you want for fear of getting a bad end. The second to fourth years are great, with a good balance of stuff you must do versus stuff you want to do. Especially the fourth after I was free of obligations. However by early Year 5 I was almost out of stuff to do. Killed Airshatter, gotten 100,000 citizens, synthesized almost everything, development quests slowed to a crawl. There was a long boring stretch until I grinded up to Alchemy level 50 on Elixirs and discovered the hot springs at the same time, then I was busy to the end. Some better pacing would have been appreciated.

Battles

For most of the game I ran a team of Totori, Meruru and Esty, which worked out swell. It’s awesome that I could go beyond level 50. Might be my imagination, but the battle system feels a lot faster and less sluggish than in the previous two games. Easier too. If there are bonus dungeons and DLC, those might be tough, but I beat almost all regular bosses in one try. Healing items like Healing Bells and Elixirs are just too handy. Powerful attack items are super easy to make and replicate. And thanks to development quests you’ll get to try a lot of them out. It’s like the game is pointing a bit fat sign to those items: “Use These For Easy Mode.”

I also had a much easier time getting the traits I wanted onto my equipment. Didn’t even have to check any FAQs. There are so many useful traits even on low-level items. Plus since I don’t have to spend money on adventurers and alchemy tools and there are so few books to buy in Atelier Meruru, I was flush with cash from beginning to end. I even finished the game with almost 200,000 cole.

How do I feel about all this easiness? It’s great! I’ve already paid my dues in other Atelier games. I don’t have to prove quién es más macho to anyone, especially not to myself. And double especially since I “quit” Dragon Quest VII for punishing me for not having a particular skill. Bring on the easy games! …But I’ll be playing Atelier Ayesha on Hard Mode when I get round to it.

Overall

Hmmm… I didn’t dislike it. In fact I really enjoyed the gameplay side of Atelier Meruru Plus but wasn’t so crazy about the cast and the little interactions. I have a bit of an issue with the Arland series being too moe, too “cute girls doing cute stuff” versus being “cute alchemists who sometimes do stuff that might be considered cute but mostly just pursue alchemy and other goals” like the older games. Right from the start when I saw Meruru’s frilly little bloomers I was just like “Ughhh, who asked for this…”

So yeah, the gaming parts were great, the visual novel parts were crap because I didn’t like the characters very much. Of course, blazing through the game in record time exacerbated some of the problems. For example Rufus probably wouldn’t be so irritating if I only saw him lecture Meruru once a week instead of several times a day…

Pros
+Bright, happy colors.
+Easy and largely stress-free.
+Large selection of new items to synthesize.
+Lots to do but there’s still time to do your own thing.
+The alchemy system is smooth and highly polished, very easy to work with.
+You can unlock most locations and recipes by playing normally, no need for a FAQ.
+This is the most powerful I’ve ever felt in an Atelier game.
+Later on you can skip easy battles by whacking enemies with a stick. It’s about time.
+If the music annoys you, you can replace it with music from older games. You can do it in other games too, but this is the first time I’ve bothered.

Cons
-Too many skits and cutscenes.
-I don’t like the new characters.
-I’m tired of the old characters.
-Game froze on me more than once, but nothing catastrophic.
-Rorona sits by my alchemy pot so I’m always talking to her by accident.
-Replay value is even lower than for the other games because you’re so constrained early on.
-The kingdom development setting is hollow if you can’t see any actual development.
-The comments the characters make when you start the game piss me off. Today Meruru said, “Don’t you have anything better to do with your weekend?” Shut up, brat. If I did, would I be here? >:-[
-All this fuss about the Potion of Youth is super ageist. Thanks to Princess Maker 5 I’ve already accepted that a woman can’t be sexy if she’s not a size zero or has less than a D cup bust, but now you have to be under 20 as well? Farewell, cruel world!

TL;DR – Atelier Meruru Plus was fun but tiresome so I wouldn’t want to play it again. Now on to Demon Gaze!