Feel it on your body
Game Review: Ar Tonelico and Ar Tonelico 2
So, I've been playing Ar Tonelico and Ar Tonelico 2 lately and really amazingly getting into both of them. Yes, that up there is a battle quote. No, it's not a mistranslation. Yes, Japan.
But, if you can get past the Japan, it's got a surprisingly good storyline. First of all, multiple endings. This is one of the few RPG games that features *actual* multiple paths. I mean, sure there's some games out there that choices matter. It can be "You get this reward, or you don't." Then there's games that have the "You have to be here at this time frame in order to go down this path" which is *totally frustrating.*
Ar Tonelico doesn't do either of those. Each path is a seperate story in its own right, but yet it's obvious that once you pick that it's "wow, I'm picking another path." AT2 is more subtle with it (and arguably more infuriating) but still manages to have sideline stories going on.
It's also one of the few games I've played that doesn't seem to suffer as much from sequelitis. Granted, I played AT2 first, so I'm kind of in prequel mode, but looking at the two games as a package puts it into "wow, that makes sense" category. At least it did for me. Your mileage may vary.
Then there's the combat system. Bizarre, sometimes slow (but how many RPGs *don't* suffer from that a bit), but definitely strategic. 1 suffers a bit more than 2 with the slow pace, but 2 can get kind of monotonous near the end. I think I burnt myself out trying to get multiple playthroughs done all in one fell swoop. It increased the number of straight out repetitive battles I did, which didn't help much.
Let me emphasize, this is not a *hard* game. A lot of things that are available to "break the system" (and yes there's a lot) aren't really *needed*. Some of that can go into "How much overkill can I do?" And yes, the overkill stuff helps on the buggy bosses. Instant Kill (if it's high enough) takes away from the levelling tedium by killing off most enemies in one or two hits and I actually was able to play AT2 near end game without looking, but largely, you shouldn't *need* to level up (unless you're trying to break the game's gamebreaking bug, which is why I did it). Otherwise, it makes random encounters go so much smoother.
All in all, I'd recommend both of them. It's an interesting psychological experiment and a fun little romp in an interesting setting. That's full of innuendo and JAPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN! but what are you going to do?
So, I've been playing Ar Tonelico and Ar Tonelico 2 lately and really amazingly getting into both of them. Yes, that up there is a battle quote. No, it's not a mistranslation. Yes, Japan.
But, if you can get past the Japan, it's got a surprisingly good storyline. First of all, multiple endings. This is one of the few RPG games that features *actual* multiple paths. I mean, sure there's some games out there that choices matter. It can be "You get this reward, or you don't." Then there's games that have the "You have to be here at this time frame in order to go down this path" which is *totally frustrating.*
Ar Tonelico doesn't do either of those. Each path is a seperate story in its own right, but yet it's obvious that once you pick that it's "wow, I'm picking another path." AT2 is more subtle with it (and arguably more infuriating) but still manages to have sideline stories going on.
It's also one of the few games I've played that doesn't seem to suffer as much from sequelitis. Granted, I played AT2 first, so I'm kind of in prequel mode, but looking at the two games as a package puts it into "wow, that makes sense" category. At least it did for me. Your mileage may vary.
Then there's the combat system. Bizarre, sometimes slow (but how many RPGs *don't* suffer from that a bit), but definitely strategic. 1 suffers a bit more than 2 with the slow pace, but 2 can get kind of monotonous near the end. I think I burnt myself out trying to get multiple playthroughs done all in one fell swoop. It increased the number of straight out repetitive battles I did, which didn't help much.
Let me emphasize, this is not a *hard* game. A lot of things that are available to "break the system" (and yes there's a lot) aren't really *needed*. Some of that can go into "How much overkill can I do?" And yes, the overkill stuff helps on the buggy bosses. Instant Kill (if it's high enough) takes away from the levelling tedium by killing off most enemies in one or two hits and I actually was able to play AT2 near end game without looking, but largely, you shouldn't *need* to level up (unless you're trying to break the game's gamebreaking bug, which is why I did it). Otherwise, it makes random encounters go so much smoother.
All in all, I'd recommend both of them. It's an interesting psychological experiment and a fun little romp in an interesting setting. That's full of innuendo and JAPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN! but what are you going to do?