Atelier Sophie 2: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Dream
Gust seem to be on a roll at the moment with the sheer number of Atelier games being released, especially on the Nintendo Switch as Atelier Sophie 2: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Dream is the 14th entry in the series on the Switch.
Perhaps owing to the success of Atelier Ryza 2, Gust has now created a sequel to Atelier Sophie, which in my opinion, was the strongest entry in the Mysterious trilogy.
There’s an option on the title screen called ‘Story so far’, this is a short video summary that does a good job of filling the uninitiated in on all the details of the first game, but I would say you don’t even need to get caught up as the setting and story hold their own as a standalone title. There’s enough going on along with new characters that really make this game stand apart from the first Sophie game.
Atelier Sophie 2 does away with the setting of Kirchen Bell which means we can focus more on Sophie’s story instead of plodding through the old maps again.
Atelier Sophie 2 starts off with Sophie and Plachta (In her doll form) searching for a way to turn her back into her human self. As they approach a peculiar tree that Plachta has had a strange dream about, a portal cracks open sucking Plachta, along with Sophie through it.
Sophie wakes up in a dream world known as Erde Wiege with Plachta nowhere to be found. The inhabitants inform you that the world is controlled by a Goddess known as Elvira and you meet an Alchemist, also called Plachta who agrees to help you get to the bottom of the mystery.
I won’t say much more about the story or characters due to spoilers, but I will say the story is very good and does a great job of keeping you hooked!
Gameplay
Atelier Sophie 2 is superior in almost every single way from the original Sophie game, and I think this might just be the best Atelier game I have played so far.
As with all Atelier games, there’s a big emphasis on crafting here, the character Plachta is also an alchemist, and you can make good use of both of them throughout the game with Sophie acting as a mentor-type character to Plachta. Some recipes can only be made by Plachta and some by Sophie with each having their own separate Alchemy level. This adds a nice bit of variety to the alchemy system, although I have to admit, I did often start alchemy with the wrong character by mistake!
There’s no blacksmith this time around so armour and weapons are crafted with Alchemy and it works quite well. The alchemy system this time around is a little easier to navigate and it’s much clearer what types of items you should be looking out for and where to find them.
The main gameplay loop is as follows: You head to an area fighting monsters and gathering materials until you cannot progress any further due to an obstacle, then you have to think of a recipe and make an item to progress. An early example of this is some stones you can craft; these can control the weather. An area that is flooded by water and rain can be drained by making the weather sunny allowing you to traverse deeper into the maps. Each area almost acts like a puzzle in that regard, and it feels very satisfying to finally track down the correct items and make some progress.
The battle system is where Atelier Sophie 2 really shines, I had a ton of fun fighting enemies and bosses in this game, some of which actually posed a threat, which was refreshing as I usually tend to find the other Atelier games a little too easy, but here, I had to grind. Most Standard enemies were easy enough but some of the bosses did have me retrying fights a few times over.
Battles are turn-based and are welcoming for returning Atelier veterans and newcomers alike. There are element weaknesses, status and effects type moves and, my personal favourite, tag attacks, which allow two-part members to decimate the enemy.
The art and music have both been improved upon massively and I think this may be the best-looking Atelier game. There were numerous times why navigating myself through some of the more open areas where I found myself stopping and taking in the scenery. Character and enemy models are very vivid and well designed which is good because the world of Erde Wiege is actually quite large.
Areas are divided up into different motifs and are all quite visually distinctive. If you couple this with the aforementioned weather systems that change the map areas the game is massive. The map systems overhaul is clear and concise and shows you clearly if there’s a character interaction to be had denoted by the character’s icon next to the location, this makes it very easy to keep up to date with the story and character interactions.
The music and sound design overall are very good, each main character is voiced acted very well, but the music is definitely the star of the show, in fact, I’m actively humming some of it as I write this.
How does Atelier Sophie 2 perform on Nintendo Switch?
Within Atelier Sophie 2’s settings you’ll find the option labelled ‘Control Mode’ this will allow you to either prioritize either performance or the game’s graphics with the Quality option. By default, the option is set to Quality, and I must admit, the game does look great on the Switch both in handheld and docked, however, I did notice slowdown during battles in Quality mode. I promptly switched to Performance mode for the rest of my playthrough which ensured smooth and stable framerates with a very small visual sacrifice that makes some of the more distant models look a little fuzzy, but it’s no deal-breaker.
Apart from a less than stellar frame rate in Quality mode, Atelier Sophie 2 runs really well. I did notice throughout my playthrough that some of the icons in the recipe menus were corrupted, which I am sure will be fixed in a future update.
One last minor frustration I have with Atelier Sophie 2 is the menu system, well actually how they are controlled. There are a lot of different menus you’ll be dipping in and out of during your playtime, they are a big part of the game but for some reason, some options cannot be selected with the analogue stick. These options have to instead be chosen with the D-pad / Direction buttons, it’s such a minor issue, but it did annoy more on more than on occasion during my playthrough.
Conclusion
I would highly recommend picking up Atelier Sophie 2. This is the first Atelier game that I have found challenging and it’s a welcome change, everything from the battle system, crafting mechanics and world-building are vastly improved from the first Sophie game. There are far too many systems and mechanics to cover in this one review, you’ll have to pick it up for yourself but there’s easily 60+ hours of content here for you to sink your teeth into.
Sophie 2 is a fantastic game in the Atelier series and stands up on its own, not relying too heavily on the first game’s story or plot points. The dream world setting is a nice touch, it allows us to spend more time with the characters without slogging through the same maps over and over. The story is intriguing and the world of Erde Wiege is just a nice place to ‘hang out’.
I would go as far to say that Atelier Sophie 2 is my favourite out of all the Atelier games I have played, and I don’t know how Gust keep managing to output these games at such a high quality, but I am happy they do! I’m going to have to hunt down a physical copy myself.
9
Nintendo Switch review code kindly provided by Koei Tecmo
