neko's thinkbox

Jakuri almost won me over with her bikini.

Jakuri almost won me over with her bikini. Image by Kimchi.

The mediocre stuff:

• The cosmospheres. Not only did they have one level less (the Extra levels from AT1), but they were limited. What the hell? I can’t go past level 5 unless I commit myself to that girl? Hey, ever heard of common sense??? …well, on the other hand, that is what makes this system a lot more reasonable. Having a harem is fine, but polygamism is kinshi’d, huh. That’s why, so-so. All the more since now it forces me to play it again for the other two routes.
• Dualstalling. It’s original in a way, and allowed for very interesting and suggestive moments (especially with the crackling bathpowder, Jakuri was pretty ecstatic x3), but it was pretty frustating to get all of them swimming over the crystals meant for them. After lots of trial and error, I kind of figured out the best way to setup the crystal/attraction layout, and yet the girls still never really did what I wanted them to do.
• Dive Therapy. It’s fun at first, but soon enough it gets a little weird, because the replies often don’t match the mood/character/question at all. Actually, it’s just a bunch of random guesses, and trial and error for some.

The dislikes:

1. I didn’t like a lot of stuff at first, because I was used to AT1 style and colors, field exploring, etc. so it was a little difficult to adapt. But they could at least have made the menu colors a little more soothing for the eye. I mean, purple highlights on blue background… and a very small, white font in item descriptions and stuff. Hey, I still use CRTs, those small characters flicker a lot and are sometimes pretty unreadable!
2. Leveling system for the Reyvateils. I mean, at first I thought I couldn’t level my Reyvateils at the same time as my vanguard characters, but as I collected the crystals… I soon noticed the imbalance. Eventually, the girls were at level 99, while the others were lagging behind at level 53. =/ They never ran out of MP ever since. Not even for that 3.8M% run. (Without a single Care.)
3. The lacking difficulty, again. You see, it was a little challenging at first, getting used to the new battle system and stuff, but once you get the hang of it, it’s pretty easy. The thing that I have a gripe with though, is in the Defense Phase. It’s fine to be able to block everything with the right timing, and it takes a lot of skill and practice. Especially with stronger enemies as Lv 09 IPDs and faster attacks, it’s crucial to hit Perfects, fine. But by equipping an IPD with the Guard ++++ or more effect, it’s near impossible to miss a guard. In other words, you’re invincible. Of course, I tried to stay away from it, but… so tempting. (Actually, I only found out a couple of minutes ago that there was actually a difficulty setting in the options, Easy and Normal! What, could this have been any easier than THIS?? Wow.)
4. DP/SP distribution. When I finished the Infelsphere, I had 40k SP left. When I finished Luca’s Cosmosphere, I had 20k left. Now they all peaked at 99999… At least AT1 managed to recycle those points for more song uses…
5. Once again, no difficult/secret bosses. Going for Lv 09 Reyvateils was very challenging for my lv 40 characters, but in the end the tactic was to just get that healing song to 100k% then switch to a red magic, Replekia, overkill. The 09 seemed to suggest that there would be a 10, but no. Apart from IPDs, there were no bosses that required grinding. (Then again, perhaps that’s because I had the strongest weapons, max replekia and shit. Guess that’s grinding, in a sense. Still, I wish to fight an Ozma/Penance-like character outside of Square Enix titles too, once in a while.)
   Raki was a great exception and surprise though. Getting stronger and stronger after each fight, it was fun! But.
6. WHY ONLY TWO AREAS AWAY FROM THE LAST BOSS?? That’s stupid. I’d have enjoyed fighting her a lot earlier in the game, but at that stage of the game it was just too late. Only managed 10 fights, then I got impatient to see the end. If at least the last battle had been as difficult as Raki’s current level… Same criticism for Frelia’s Cosmosphere. Why so late in the game? It only serves to consciously postpone that inevitable end only a one-two hours further…
7. Loading times. Hate them, waste so much time. Especially during battles, where TIMING is crucial for blocking multiple attacks, there are often some mini-lags because the game needs to access and play two soundfiles every time I block an attack. And then, timing is off, and I miss the block. So frustrating.
8. And finally, the obvious rant about the English localization of this game by NIS America. It was frankly disappointing. “they” instead of “they’re” and vice versa, “wanted buy – wanted by”, “dilution – delusion”, you get the point. Stuff that can’t be picked up by basic spellcheckers. Although, is “earningings” a word? I think not, says the spy. Stuff like that happens CONSTANTLY throughout the entire game. Don’t they have some kind of Quality Control before releasing their games? (Plus, their translation often made little sense, and was too liberal for what was said by the characters. That’s just me nitpicking, but I wonder how much of the original have they borked for the non-voiced parts…)
9. Woops, I almost forgot. NEEDS MORE AURICA. For Frelia’s sake.
10. AND WHERE IS MY KISS ASDFGSAHJFGASKJAHDSKJALDKJHASD

Small side note, I am still missing 14 convo topics for Luca. Especially for lvls 4-6, but I guess those are the topics I’d pick up in Cloche’s Gaea.

Shit. I really can’t wait for Ar Tonelico 3… whenever it will come out. But I am sure it will. After all, there are 3 towers… and Jakuri’s epilogue with Cocona was pretty unequivocal. It would most probably be for PS3 too, but until then I probably will have upgraded too. After all, it took them 1 year to localize AT1 (resp. 1 1/2 year for AT2), add half a year to it for the European market… I suppose once AT3 is out, I’ll have to wait 2 years before I can play it here. Although, if it’s to get another typo-filled game courtesy of NISA, I’d rather play the Japanese version then.

Time to get some Kitty Candy, and cry myself into sleep with the Drama CDs. Hope I can let go soon enough to watch some anime, and perhaps start playing Persona 3 in the (near) future. No fucking way, I’m going to resume from my savegame tomorrow and try to see all the other routes.

(Oh and, enjoy Wave Theory.)