As always, these blurbs are mainly about the video games I’m currently playing, this time about Alchemy in Atelier Ryza. Unedited thoughts spring up in my mind, mostly game-related, sometimes not. Or a random train of thoughts starting with the game and ending somewhere completely different!
If you like these bits of gaming thoughts, you can find the previous ones here.
Moving to a New Home
How many times have you moved house? We stayed put for 30 years and lived in the same home. A lot of memories have happened; we got married and had our daughter. We enjoyed our time here, but last Spring, we found a new house. One that is brand new and with all the means to make it a very sustainable house, with a much smaller garden too. As the years went on, maintaining a large garden wasn’t all the fun it seemed at first! And for the first time in my life, I’m moving away from the big city to a smaller town.
It’s all good to look forward to, but the road to getting there is one filled with hurdles, and the move is just at Christmas time. I had no idea how much clutter one can gather in 30 years. We have been clearing and cleaning for weeks now, and the end is not in sight. Not that we are busy with that nonstop, but we do tackle several boxes during the weekends. We also try to get rid of unwanted furniture by making someone else happy with it.
Busy, Busy, Busy
This week we finally got the key to our new home, which has to be made move-in ready. It also means our attention is now divided, and our usual daytime job doesn’t stop either. You can understand why I’ve been busy, though I’m not complaining: it’s a very exciting time too! And we are fortunate to even get the opportunity. But why am I going into this? Because it occurred to me how much easier all of this had been using Alchemy!
With everything going on I felt the need to re-visit an old friend, aka a game series I love. I jumped back into Atelier Ryza 3: Alchemist of the End and the Secret Key! It might be that not many people understand how Atelier Ryza can be a truly relaxing experience with the rather hectic fighting going on. But for me, being busy with alchemy, synthesizing items of the highest quality and the best effects, is something I really love. Added to that the soundtrack of Atelier Ryza is one I play most while out and about, so hearing the familiar tunes immediately gets me in the mood to get busy at the cauldron.
Deep Synthesizing System
Over the years, the Alchemy side of the Atelier games has become more and more elaborate. The synthesis system changes for every series, and the one for Atelier Ryza is one of the best (or so I think). Of course, there’s synthesizing, but there’s also a cauldron for item duplication and a forge to make your existing weapons and armour better by adding items to it.
All you really have to keep in mind is that you fill in the slots in the core of the recipe, let’s say, the main branch of a recipe tree. You can also add materials to the “side branches” as they will give extra quality, traits or effects. Of course, you want to get those effects and quality as high as you can, which, for me, is the challenge. And in the third game, adding synthesis keys makes it even more interesting.
Playing around with filters, looking for specific elements and trying to get the materials with the highest element numbers is so fun. It feels a bit like organizing things, which is another thing I really love in games. Finding new recipes hidden in the recipes I already have is great as well. It’s called a recipe morph.
The recipes you have already show, with a little + to the name, if there’s a recipe lurking beneath the one you already have. A red + means you don’t have the materials or requirements yet to make it, and a yellow + shows that you can indeed make the item. So, making as many of the recipes as possible is such fun.
Practical Uses for Alchemy
There is one thing in Atelier Ryza 3 that Ryza can do that I would love to be able to do in real life, too: making her new Atelier by Alchemy. In my case, getting the new house fully in order for us to just move in. And how cool would it be if I could just make all the moving boxes fill themselves?
It would even make the upcoming Christmas a more festive time! As it is now, it will be filled with moving boxes instead of Christmas decorations!
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