The 3rd Ryza game has been announced, officially called
Atelier Ryza 3: The Alchemist of the End & the Secret Key
Oddly, it was first confirmed in a Nintendo Direct before a statement from KT and Gust. I waited a few days before posting anything, since there were some streams that were to present more game information.
This is just a quick post of some features shown and my thoughts. I won’t cover everything revealed, since there’s a lot and not all of them were noteworthy to put in here. Anything else more detailed would probably be in a game review…
Information so far
One interesting fact is that the reveal mentioned the “final summer” is about to begin. “Summer adventure” has been a theme of the Secret series, so this implies that the series is coming to an end. It sound unlikely to me, considering how much bigger the franchise has become thanks to Ryza selling well. However, this is all just speculation in the end.
Release Date
Ryza 3 is planned to release on February 24, 2023; just about 5 months from the date this article is published. As the previous titles have done so, the JP version releases a day early but it’s close enough to be a truly synchronized global launch. Coincidentally, the launch date is also exactly one year after Sophie 2 came out.
Quasi-open world
This is likely one of the biggest features that I’m excited to see. In my Sophie 2 review, one of my wishes was that the fields were connected to remove the sense of disconnection when moving between areas.
By “quasi-open world”, I mean that the game map isn’t truly one giant field where you can explore like Breath of the Wild, but sub-areas of locations (a lake, mountain range, fields, etc.) are all connected. In other words, up to Sophie 2, you would have an area like X field which contained sub-areas (X field 1, 2, 3, etc.) that weren’t seamlessly connected. In Ryza 3, those sub-areas are all connected, so you’ll only see loading screens while moving between vastly different areas.
This feature isn’t anything game breaking or fundamentally altering, but is a nice touch that is hard to go back on after trying. It’ll make the game world feel more immersive, which I like.
Inherited QoL
The information given so far says Ryza 3 will feature seamless battles like Sophie 2 did. This is great, the seamless transition was a very subtle but appreciable feature. In general, lots of features and QoL from previous games seem to have transitioned over. I’m hoping the facial expression variety from Sophie 2 also made it, since it makes a difference in immersion and Ryza 2 didn’t have that.
11 party members
This was another big surprise. 11 playable characters is a lot in the Atelier series where typically the cap has been around 6-7 members. An image with silhouettes of the playable characters was posted; four of them, excluding Ryza, have officially been revealed.
So far Lent, Tao, Klaudia, and Bos have been confirmed. The first three are expected, so I’m happy Bos is now a member. His entry was teased very hard at the end of Ryza 2 and would have caused an outrage if he wasn’t playable again. It’ll be fun to see how his character arc develops in this game.
The silhouettes clearly imply that Lila and Empel will rejoin, which is great news. I found their absence in Ryza 2 to be a bit disappointing considering their story significance. Another shadow resembles Patty, but has a little uncertainty. I would expect her return, since she seemed pretty popular among players.
The remaining three characters don’t resemble anyone from Ryza 1 and 2, so I assume they are new. It makes me a little sad that some Ryza 2 characters didn’t make it, but this also gives the chance of having some Ryza 1 NPCs to become playable. Overall, I’m curious who the others will be. Or who knows, perhaps the rest of the Ryza 2 cast will somehow return.
What I want from the game
Story
The Atelier series has their games in self-contained trilogies, so this should mark the end of Ryza’s trilogy. I highly doubt this though, because of how profitable her character is and several ’trilogies’ have extra titles now. Regardless, assuming that Ryza’s story should conclude in this game, I hope that the game’s story is brought to a definite conclusion.
Ryza 1 and 2 left some characters with potential stories for the future, so it would be great to see their arcs all be resolved. Not just characters, but entire worlds from the previous games also have a lot of uncertainty; lots of unanswered questions linger. It would be disappointing to see these abandoned.
Graphics and game engine
Besides story, my biggest concern is the game engine’s future. I don’t judge Atelier games for their graphics, but I have my own standards. The games are a little deceptive; just wander around and the saturated colours and bloom make the game pretty. Stand still and look at the foliage, and suddenly the game resembles something from the early 2010s.
The games also don’t run well. Despite being graphically inferior to virtually all modern AAA titles, Atelier games cannot reach high FPS even with a beefy PC or on the PS5. The game engine does weird things, one part explained by this Github repo.
Another quirk is that the game engine is hardcoded to poll for a controller. The game will constantly check if a controller is connected and if you play on PC without one, then this causes a lot of stuttering. Plugging in a controller, or even spoofing one, will instantly stop the stuttering. It’s hilarious that this bug hasn’t been patched.
Gust keeps developing cool features on their engine and the longer they stay with it, the worse the games will run over time. Migrating all of their development to a new engine will ruin their workflow, considering they release games at a blistering rate of one title per year. This presents a dilemma where switching engines provides a scalable future, but the cost of changing is very tough to accept.
All I can do is pray that the next series uses something different, or Gust somehow optimizes their engine to actually run well. The current engine seems to be reaching its limits and the performances worsens every year.
Final words
I don’t want to bash on the Atelier series. It’s one of my favourite series so far and it’s going strong. The games have become much better products objectively, and even the stingey publisher is recognizing its success.
I’m looking forward to February of next year, just as I was for February of this year. Time flew past, it’s funny to think that the next Atelier game is already approaching.
I’ll also be waiting to hear what comes after this one. I’m not sure if Gust would do a Ryza 4, which means they might revisit an older title or even introduce a brand new series. Something new is always good to see, so if that’s the Atelier title for 2024, so be it.