Atelier Lydie and Suelle Guide

Like most Atelier titles, much of Lydie & Suelle centers around alchemy. While there is combat, and the game doesn’t hesitate to provide powerful allies as the story unfolds, the two girls are not the greatest fighters in their own right. Instead, they gradually become better alchemists, gaining access to limited-use items that dramatically impact battles. It goes against the JRPG grain in the sense that these are not chosen one characters with the ability to do everything well, and it’s a deft hand that sees it become a great addition to the title rather than something of a nuisance. Chucking bombs at enemies is extremely satisfying, as is coming up with a recipe for an even cooler elemental bomb later. Alchemy is the core of the game, and it’s lucky then that it’s also the most compelling. I spent hours hunting down specific creatures to unlock new recipes, even if they were, on the surface, largely useless ones. Later, the game unlocks an ability to automatically refill the best bombs and other items you make, so you don’t even need to worry about running out of them so long as you leave one left in your inventory once an adventure is done. Creating higher quality versions of items is also strangely satisfying, alongside the weird, Tetris-like sub-game that comes along with it. It’s a grind, but it’s a lovely one. The gameplay for the title here is similarly breezy and casual- you have turn based battles where you can use you standard attacks or your skills, with wrinkles thrown in thanks to a “positioning system”, where characters in battle pair up, with the front character acting as a wall, and the back character acting as support. It never actually gets too complicated, and the enemies never pose much of a challenge- really, the game’s battles are in keeping with the easygoing nature of the rest of it all- but battles make for a nice change of pace from the rest of it all, with slightly more engagement required than most of the rest of the game. Other gameplay elements include alchemy (which involves gathering materials in the world and then throwing them together in a minigame to craft items), completing quests, and managing your time- because, as a slice of life game, Atelier Lydie and Suelle has a constant clock going on, and everything you do costs you time. Again, managing time never gets as stressful as it can in something like Persona, but it is an element to be mindful of.All these elements come together to create a rather open ended experience, giving players the option to decide how their story unfolds. In fact, there are are even multiple ending paths in the story, based on what you emphasize the most in your playthrough, which can potentially lead to more replayability.

The Atelier games have settled into an easygoing routine and formula by now, and they’re comfortable in just staying in their niche. As such, if the previous games were up your alley, so will this new one be. If the older games failed to win you over, Lydie & Suelle won’t convert you. The story is as low stakes as the previous titles in the series: Lydie and Suelle are twin sisters who live with their father in the capital city of their kingdom, running an atelier. However, the girls are inexperienced, and their father, who seems to be the eccentric artist type, isn’t much better, and their atelier isn’t doing all that well. The girls mostly have to fend for themselves (including making and managing money and feeding themselves), but they harbor a hope to have the best atelier in the kingdom- a hope founded in a promise they made to their mother, whose whereabouts are unknown. The story unfolds from there along two convergent paths- one is when their kingdom institutes an atelier ranking system to invite more alchemists to it, which causes the girls to start making efforts to get better at what they do; the other is when they discover they can escape into paintings. Inside these paintings, they conveniently find more materials that they can use for their alchemy to achieve great results that otherwise seem to be out of their reach. The story here, as I am sure you have realized, is quite different from other JRPGs, other RPGs, or really, any other story in games- rather than focusing on a central conflict where you have to come of age and save the world, or overcome some obstacle, this is a breezy and relaxed tale that keeps things mostly stress free. It’s a cheerful world with likeable characters, and it even acts as a stress buster after, say, a particularly intense bout of Fortnite or Monster Hunter. As for those characters, they are, very largely, tropes- Lydie is the “older twin”, who’s meek, submissive, and doesn’t like confrontation, while Sue is the “younger” one, who’s vivacious, tomboyish, and mischievous.

Apart from that, you have the absent minded father who can’t get his life together, the young prodigy, the childhood rival, and so on and on and on. The characters never truly grow beyond these archetypes, which can get grating, but at the very least, I can say that the tropes are done well- as long as you don’t hate stereotypes by definition, you might even like what is here for what it is. The gameplay for the title here is similarly breezy and casual- you have turn based battles where you can use you standard attacks or your skills, with wrinkles thrown in thanks to a “positioning system”, where characters in battle pair up, with the front character acting as a wall, and the back character acting as support. It never actually gets too complicated, and the enemies never pose much of a challenge really, the game’s battles are in keeping with the easygoing nature of the rest of it all- but battles make for a nice change of pace from the rest of it all, with slightly more engagement required than most of the rest of the game. Other gameplay elements include alchemy (which involves gathering materials in the world and then throwing them together in a minigame to craft items), completing quests, and managing your time- because, as a slice of life game, Atelier Lydie and Suelle has a constant clock going on, and everything you do costs you time. Again, managing time never gets as stressful as it can in something like Persona, but it is an element to be mindful of.It’s easy to take a step away from the main quests and spend time doing side-missions and chatting with NPCs. Completing tasks for people actually follows separate little stories for each person. You can help your dad with his silly inventions, get ahead of your rival, and learn from other alchemists. Okay, so it’s nothing overly deep, but there’s much more motivation in getting to know people through an ongoing tale, rather than simply doing odd-jobs for a few experience points. Anyway, you can’t be the best alchemist around without doing anything, so we better get to work.

Firstly, we need to gather materials. This means going out into the world picking up items from bushes, hitting rocks, catching bugs, and fishing. My favorite places to explore were undoubtedly the mysterious paintings. These themed environments are wonderfully unique, from a pumpkin filled spooky forest, to a seaside adventure with a skeleton pirate. They all have their own little story, which would be awesome if they were any good. Short, and often completely meaningless, it’s such a missed opportunity for some fantasy-styled adventures. Once enough materials have been gathered, though, it’s time to go back home for some alchemy. New players can rest assured that it sounds more complicated than it is. Everything is taught at a good pace, as well; you’re never expected to read through crazy walls of text explanations. On a basic level it follows the same formula as previous Atelier games. Gathered materials have their own quality and stats which affect the finished product. In other words, if you want a decent sword, you first need good metal to make it out of.

Each material is then represented by its own particular shape and color. How you choose to place these on a crafting grid dictates how the final product will enhance. For example, filling the grid with materials of the same color is one of the easiest ways to gain benefits. Later, you can also use a catalyst material to change up the grid itself. Things get pretty customizable as you can change up the size and available buffs from the particular catalyst used. I will say, if you’re not super invested in the alchemy, Atelier Lydie & Suelle isn’t for you. The crafting can be quite slow, especially if you’ve got a lot to make. And the game doesn’t remember past grid combinations, so things must be re-made every single time. You can’t ignore it either, as most battles rely on you having decent quality items. About halfway through the game, a boss stopped me in my tracks for about 2 hours. It wasn’t because I hadn’t grinded for levels, but due to not paying enough attention to crafting better equipment.

The game was clearly wagging a disappointed finger at me for skimping on alchemy practice. Battles themselves use a turn-based system which mostly compromises of the standard line-up of an ‘attack, special move, item’ menu. In a new addition for Atelier Lydie & Suelle, you can also perform some quick alchemy for extra damage. After meeting certain conditions, such as catching an enemy by surprise, Lydie and Suelle can use gathered materials in the inventory to perform a ‘battle mix’. It’s an interesting concept, but I tended not to have the right items on-hand to really make the most of it. Your party of six is set up in two lines of three. While those in-front attack, the back line can add supporting damage, healing, or buffs, dependent on their specialty. The front and back rows can also switch around during battle. This is especially useful against strong foes, thanks to those in the back regaining health over time. Similar to the alchemy section, new mechanics are slowly added to help keep fighting fresh, such as being able to pull off an extra powerful combo attack.World-building in Lydie & Suelle is one of its greatest strengths. The main quest hub city, the outskirts of the region it occupies, and the insides of character homes are all vibrant and ooze personality. While much of these visuals take cues from the one or two things that make each character different, the simplicity does nothing to prevent it from popping off the screen. Alt, the dark-and-brooding-type of the game’s protagonist crew, has a home that is overflowing with dusty tomes and tools of the occult. Just outside, the town bustles with the energy of a fairy tale, the notion that perhaps around one corner there might be a witch, around another, one of the girls’ Prince Charming. All of this sets the stage for the best aesthetic of all, however, in the form of the titular Mysterious Paintings. Lydie & Suelle discover early in the narrative that there are certain paintings, created by fellow alchemists, that house entire worlds inside them. A huge part of the game’s narrative centers around restoring and then exploring these paintings, and they allow for a lot of variance in what kind of environments the game can logically present. The very first world is reminiscent of Halloweentown, and the watercolor paints that dot the edges of the screen whenever the party enters a painting just adds to the feeling that you might be playing through art.