May Millennials 12: Atelier Rorona: The Alchemist of Arland (Outro)

I'm starting to suspect "HowLongToBeat" isn't always the most accurate source for average run-times. To wit, they suggested Atelier Rorona is somewhere in the region of a 30 hour runtime but I predict I'll need thrice that before I'm done. Of course, I am trying to utilize every day to its fullest - carpe diem, and whatnot - so maybe that's dragging the playthrough a little. At any rate, I've decided to temporarily wrap things up at the dawn of the second year, one third through the game's three year cycle, at a spot where I can pick it up later in June once I've gone back and concluded a few other in-progress playthroughs (primarily Graces F, which I've been chipping away at this whole month).

I didn't get into the nitty-gritty of how Atelier Rorona plays in a moment-to-moment sense last time. I'm sure enough of these Atelier games have popped up in new release schedules to be of curiosity to someone somewhere, so I'll go through what a normal loop looks like. I should clarify that later games seem to ease the draconian time limits of Rorona - including Rorona's own remasters Plus and DX - but given the main source of conflict in these games is completing alchemy assignments within a deadline I can't imagine that's not a factor in later games.

As the owner of an alchemical workshop, or atelier, Rorona is required to complete any assignments she is given. First there are the major assignments by the local government, each of which is handed out in sequence and has a three month time limit, and all of which are absolutely essential to progress. Failing to meet their targets leads to an instant game over, though the lengthy time limit means it'd be difficult to screw them up unless you completely forget about them. Secondary to those are Friend Requests, which when completed will boost your friendship score with their related NPCs. NPCs are either hirelings - having a higher friendship total reduces their hiring costs - or they're local merchants, in which case higher friendship totals leads to other benefits including a "wholesale" item registration feature I've read a lot about and can't wait to unlock. After those are Front Desk Requests assigned by the palace, which are a random group of minor fetch quests generated anew every day; each one of those completed gives you reputation points with the town, which is apparently connected to which ending you receive. Suffice it to say, all these assignments also reward cash too. Sometimes you can buy the items you need for less than the reward value and hand them in for a small profit, which is ideal because it won't spend any in-game time (it also feels like cheating but hey, what is retail if not a system of buying low and selling high?).

The time management is where Atelier Rorona gets a bit more harrowing. Running around town, trading items, talking to people, and accepting tasks doesn't advance time at all. Synthesis can take anywhere between fractions of days to possibly weeks, but will always round up to the closest full day; thus, if you're crafting an item that takes 0.2 days to generate, it's more efficient to synthesize five of them at a time. Dungeoneering can also take a chunk out of your calendar: you have to reach the location first, which takes a day or more, and then each zone within the dungeon takes a certain amount of time to complete. Once you're in a zone, you can fight and forage without worrying about how long you're taking: the time taken is already predetermined and added on as soon as you leave. Branches in dungeons can lead to little dead end areas full of a single material or enemy type, which can make farming particular resources that much easier. You then walk back to town once you're done. A trip to a dungeon, exploring two or more of its zones, and then coming home again might take over a week depending on the circumstances; however, it is the easiest and cheapest way to get a full basket of materials for future synthesis and assignment targets. Sadly, said basket can only hold 60 items initially, so a single dungeon excursion is somewhat limited in that regard too.

All that said... playing more of the game and coming to grips with its pace and demands has made it a little easier to manage, even if new assignment periods also introduce more wrinkles. These wrinkles are the natural result of the game's burgeoning complexity: an aspect of the learning curve which should always be present in RPGs of this length if a playthrough's going to stay compelling throughout. So far that has included the introduction of: equipment synthesis (previously I only had the option to buy new gear at great expense, but the enemies hadn't been strong enough to bother), bonus criteria for Front Desk requests like same-day delivery or a certain quality threshold for extra rewards, being more judicious with ingredient quality and beneficial item traits to pass onto the final synthesis product (which come in especially handy for equipment), realizing which Friend and Front Desk requests are going to be the more cost- and time-intensive and maybe avoid those - friends are now requesting items that I can't even make due to a strange hiccup in the game's progression (basically, if you have the recipe to make it, they can request it; even if its ingredients are in a dungeon I can't visit yet), considering whom from a growing pool of recruitable hirelings to take along contingent on the enemy strength at the locations I intend to visit (the knight Sterk is the most reliable fighter but also the most expensive, so I don't really need him for ingredient runs in early dungeons), and whether to focus on exploring new zones in dungeons or stick to side-areas already shown to have lucrative spoils.

It's a lot to consider, and I can't imagine I'll see everything the game has to offer in a single playthrough (NG+ apparently has some major boons to help completionist types, similar to Persona NG+ where your end-game social stats are carried over), but perhaps I can afford it some more of my own precious time - perhaps in smaller increments, as the game's calendar system lends itself to shorter sessions a la Stardew Valley and the like - once May comes to an end and the anticipation of E3 begins in June. Speaking of which, that's going to draw 2021's May Millennials to a close. I'm definitely going to have to consider a thematic shift for next year; unless I go on a spending spree on GOG I don't think I'll have enough turn-of-the-millennium games to fill another 31 days. (I have a few ideas, but that can all wait until next year.) My thanks for being witness to another of these annual "spring cleaning" sessions and I'll be back with something new next month.

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