I went back and read over the last post I made about Nora. It wasn’t exactly inaccurate, but I realized I’d done the equivalent of calling a girl “Gorgeous” and then quickly adding, “But her nose is too big, and her teeth are a bit crooked, and her face is kinda spotty, and she smells funny, and OMG, that hair!…” etc. By the end of it nobody remembers I said she was beautiful in the first place.
So in the interest of fairness I wanted my very final post about Nora to Toki no Koubou
Said true ending is identical to the normal one until the part where you fix the statue. This time Nora succeeds in fixing it. However she was supposed to keep her powers secret, so she assumes she’s failed her training, even though the townspeople kindly try to pretend they didn’t see anything. That’s where Keke steps in and informs us all that the true purpose of the training was to learn to trust people and be trusted, so Nora has passed after all. *cough* BULLSHIT *cough* And everything works out in the end. Yeah, that totally wasn’t worth the effort, thought at least this round only took 6 hours.
Back to my initial point, I went over my criticisms in the previous post, and to be honest, most of them were fair.The only thing I’d like to take back is the replay value part, because Nora to Toki no Koubou is no different from the other DS Atelier games in that respect. Sure, every run of Nora feels the same. If you want to avoid the worst endings you have to play nice with the townspeople and you have to please Aira, which severely limits your freedom to just explore or fool around. Without getting lucky or checking a FAQ, the player has no way of knowing that either befriending Aira or traveling constantly with one adventurer are the only ways to avoid a bad ending. Anything and everything else you do makes absolutely no difference.
Plus the game feels really short. Just when you’re starting to get into the groove of things, it ends. I’m going to liken this to a completely unrelated game called Recettear. In that game you can go sell things in a store, go adventuring, fuse items, make friends in town, etc., but the first few weeks are consumed by a hectic debt repayment program that makes everything about money, money, money. It’s only after you pass this that you get the freedom to either restart the game with your money and items or continue to play forever – which is the only time you’ll have the freedom to explore, fuse and sell at leisure. If you’ve played Recettear, imagine a Recettear where the game ended automatically after repaying your debt and you’ll know exactly what I’m complaining about (and if you haven’t you should totally try it).
BUT in spite of all that, I played it three times in a row, and that’s the same number of times I’ve played Ateliers Lise, Annie and Lina. So for better or worse, it has the same amount of replayability as the other games do, and shouldn’t be knocked down solely for that.
Another thing I said was that I wouldn’t be looking back fondly on the game in years to come, but there’s no way for me to judge that accurately until those years have passed, so I take that particular line back as well.
All the other things I wrote still apply, but some are a little on the petty side. For example, only being able to save in your room and only being able to sell specific items to specific places. It’s really inconvenient, but hardly a deal breaker. The messy room was irritating, but I resolved that in my final run by putting almost all the tools upstairs and doing my alchemy from the main station. I’m used to messy rooms from Shepherd’s Crossing 2 anyway.
Everything else I wrote? Yeah, it still holds. The items need better sorting. The characters are cliched. The bad ends are unforgivable. I hate being forced to play a certain way every time. Time moves too fast when foraging. New Game+ is more like Same Old Game+. However a sequel that fixes these things and adds a story worth caring about should be a real treat to play. With a little plastic surgery, that “gorgeous” girl will be Miss World in no time.
Thank you so much for your detailed insight to this game! It answers a lot of questions for me, but creates a lot of new ones as well! ๐ I keep on getting the bad ending no matter what I do. It’s great to know that you have to stick with one traveling companion the whole time. Does that mean I can travel with Keke until Karuna shows up, and then I just drop Keke and stick her in my roster for the entire rest of the game? I just want to make sure I understand what you meant.
The furthest I went was to where I was supposed to give Lotta a dog. I haven’t seen a dog anywhere, but I guess I must have missed it where it was explained about keeping pets. I had no idea you could do that! I saw Yuka mentioning something about luring one with jerky, but he seems pretty obsessed with jerky anyway, so…Not sure if that was a cue to leave some jerky somewhere to attract a dog. XD
Another place I’m really stuck is with the green forested area in the north. I cannot seem to trigger the boss of that area – there’s always a yellow bubble with dots, and Lutts is always saying his thing about knowing something’s there, but the toughest enemy I try to beat in that area are those dark blue bubbles, or slime balls – whatever they are. I cannot even get close to beating them, and they just waste my party every time. Is there some kind of item I need to use on them? I’ll have to try it again and see what works, and just hope I’ll hear from you! ๐
I’d love to know where you got your FAQ! I’m thinking of buying the guide book, but fear that because I’m still learning kanji, I’ll have the same problems I do with the game itself. Is there an online FAQ?
I really apologize for asking so many questions. I can scarcely find anyone else talking about this in English, and I’ve exhausted my Japanese skill with the game already, so I’m really desperate for a few hints from someone who has played and beat the game. I will definitely take the tips you’ve already mentioned and continue from there! Thanks for writing up such a thorough critique!
Dug up my DS and the game. I’ll try and answer your questions as best as I can.
1. Stick to a party member: You can have three party members, so you don’t necessarily have to bench Keke. There’s no Keke End either, so keeping him in your party won’t interfere with another adventurer’s ending. But yes, if you want Karuna’s ending you have to get her into your party, keep her there, adventure with her often, get her affection high (give her flowers in October, don’t get wiped out) and do all her events, which involve killing a bunch of thieves and rogues.
The other characters have their own specific events as well, but since time is so tight the most you’ll be able to manage is one character ending per playthrough.
2. Lotta and the dog: I never did get Lotta her dog. It’s a sidequest and you can get good endings without doing it. Anyway, according to Japanese FAQs, you need to get Kito learn the “็ฎๅฉใ” skill to get Kokko to sell them in his store. So be sure to put Kito in your party and take him around a few places. It seems you can also get them to show up in your garden by dropping “Delicious-looking meat” (ใใใใใใช่) after the “A dog has appeared in your garden” message appears, but I’ve never gotten that message before so I wouldn’t know.
3. The green forest area in the north? You mean ใขใญใฎๆจนๆตท? There’s no boss there IIRC. After you visit the place 4 times, you get access to the inner area. That’s probably what Keke means by there’s something there. There might also be some quest involved that you haven’t fulfilled, but apart from the one involving Lotta and 4 Kilshika fruits, I can’t remember any.
4. To avoid the being run out of town, you have to befriend Aira, making sure to complete her doll event, and then either raise your alchemy level to 18 or higher (Traveler End) or befriend the townspeople until it can’t go any higher (Normal End). A complete list of all endings can be found here: http://www16.atwiki.jp/noora-wiki/pages/32.html
Hope that helps!
Thanks so much, all of this information, including your reviews helps a lot! I really appreciate it very much! I’ve started again, focusing on Karuna, so let’s see if I can’t manage to at least get a normal ending this time. ๐
Karuna’s route has some really tough battles, so be sure to make lots of buffing, healing and attack items. Good luck!
I think karna’s route after battle with shiebuki she will have two weapons are painava and daibustiva.
Those two are good for her yay I mean karna
I never did her route (I just heard it was really tough), but that’s good to know.