I had my PS2 set up last two weeks to play Y1 and Y2, so I was like, 'Why not finish the other games?' Since I have no idea when the memory card or controller may fail, and I'm awfully curious about the ending, I decided to finish it.
The Ar tonelico series is a JRPG mixed with dating sim elements. Developed by the Gust of Atelier fame, you can also bet there is some side activities involving synthesis. Apart from that it's a fanservice-y rpg to its core. I bought AT2 waaaaaaay back when I got my PS2 and I was bored with only a few JPRG titles. I browsed through the catalogs and picked the most anime-looking one - which incidentally happened to be Ar tonelico 2. I have to be honest, the gameplay sucked when I first played it. I was unfamiliar with it, nothing made sense, the assets were wonky as all getout, and I was not pleased. That is until I looked it up on the internet and HOLY SHIT do not judge the game by its gameplay, cause the whole of the Ar tonelico series has more lore than Harry mofo Potter!
Bonus points if you're a computer programming nerd of some sort, cause the series is just science fiction cloaked as fantasy. It's all about sound science babey! The gist of it is that the planet is uninhabitable due to a catastrophe 700 years ago, brought around by the foolishness of humans angering the Will of the planet. Thankfully the humans and a dragon race called the Teru developed a one-gender artificial life form capable of converting sound into energy - Reyvateils. Reyvateils operate like computers, so they built 'servers' known as the Towers of Ar tonelico. The reyvateils assigned to these towers are known as Reyvateil Origins and they are the administrators of the towers. There are three towers, based on different regions of the planet. The population live on the towers now, since they're the only structures high enough above the sea of death.
Aaaaaaaanyway, the story parts are too complicated to explain in detail, so let's get into the SCIENCE! The planet featured in the Ar tonelico series is called Ar Ciel, located in a universe overseen by a Will named EXA_PICO. The humans of Ar Ciel figured a way to utilize sound as energy in the form of reyvateils. Reyvateils are computers in a broad sense. They have a hymn code (model name), a cosmosphere (memory space), they are linked to the towers and their lives depend on it (servers/power source), have varied lifespans depending on type (RAM), they can even download songs from the servers, and that's the official term! Their minds could get hacked and there's a tattoo on each reyvateil which is the installer port for all kinds of things, including life extending agents and song crystals. When they download a song, they have to go through a similar procedure irl, like a basic program setup. Then there's also the whole thing about singing a song and dying, which is similar to an overload, in this case, instead of working poorly, the reyvateil dies. Each downloadable song has its own frequency requirements and so when an incompatible reyvateil sings the song, there may be no affects, or you know. Death. There is genuinely no other game which can compare lore-wise. Maaaaaybe expect Ivalice, because world building is dope.
The battle system is complicated and it takes some time to get used to, early in the game you have to rely heavily on song magic to deal damage, but once you get the hang of the controls and harmonics, you won't even need song magic to beat most bosses into submission. Late game I beat three bosses with only the vanguards. That's insane. The other aspects include dating sim to level up the party's reyvateils, complete with sexy CG and voice acting. Overall the game is good. The series as a whole is mind-blowingly awesome, they have their own language, the songs are phenomenal, the lore is second to none. We're talking about science-based fantasy lore. It's a shame that Gust isn't developing any new entries with their last release in the EXA_PICO universe being the Surge Concerto series.
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