Atelier Iris: Eternal Mana

"Interesting Game- Comical and Simple"

This very unknown game caught my attention when two friends told me about it (my friends are twins) and we decided to swap games just for the holidays and we would swap back. Needless to say, I want to keep this game…. Atelier Iris: Eternal Mana is the 6th installment of a Japanese series, though the other five havn't come out yet in North America.. yet… and what it is says on the back of the game case is the truth: Alchemy can be so deadly.

Story: 9.5 /10

The game starts off with a VERY long flash back. Basically, similar to Final Fantasy X, you basically start off the game at the beginning, and see how everything is developed. So it starts off with your main character Klein, an alchemist , and the Mana of Wood- Popo (resembles quite a few characters later on..) They are in the woods and Klein has (supposedly) run out of Mana (magical material used for synthesis) and is being chased by a Falcon Hawk, this is how he meets Lita since she comes to his rescue. Their friendship starts out a little rocky but they become quite closer nearer to the end of the game. Besides having a very short-tempered Lita, the comical Popo and an confused Klein, your cast of characters expand. People like Delseus and Norn come in for the comical relief, when Popo isn't there. Overall, a pretty funny story.

Graphics: 10/10

This is were the quote “Never judge a book by it's cover” comes into play. The graphics are wonderfully drawn 2-dimensional graphics with an unique palette of colours. The characters are beautifully drawn with a few minor mis- colourations (Klein's hair for one- what colour is it?). The detail for these 2 dimensional graphics are excellent. The conversation graphics are excellent. Sometimes they have something like a comic strip conversation and the characters will switch in different poses while having a speech bubble for the text.

Sound: 9.5/10

The music is memorable and upbeat and beautifully put together. The sound effects are amazing, but it can be glitchy at times (Twice, when I was fighting the final boss, a sound effect started to skip and it got stuck on one sound, but it went away when I attacked.) The variety of music matches the many places in the game, while only making very few places having the same music.

Gameplay: 9.5 /10

The gameplay rocks. The commands for the map expand as you obtain more and more mana, which are the key to gameplay. The Mana comes in all different shapes and sizes, some which you will obtain automatically, others you have to search for them. They come with map abilities likes Barrier, Destruction Blast, Avoid Monster's etc. They also comes with the certain types of Mana that they are compatible with for synthesis. This affects the gameplay, since you need the many types of mana to create items- from healing potions to bombs to other protection accessories. You can obtain Mana by extracting map items, extracting certain items in your inventory and by making Klein dealing the final blow in battle using his basic “Attack” command.

The battle system is simple and fun. Pretty much self explanitory. The actions for the characters will appear above their heads during battle when it's their turn. Their stats will appear on the lower right hand corner. The battle system has a 3x3 battle grid for your characters, and some characters when they attack, will move up one square and when they cast magic/healing, they may move back one square. It also has an interesting turn system.

Let me use Lita as an example for the system:

Claw ATK: 0.5 turn
Jump Kick: 1 turn
Stone Blast: 2 turns

Lita's Claw ATK is 0.5 turn, meaning she has a chance to do it twice in a row (her turn). Lita's Jump kick is 1 turn, so she attacks once and that's her turn.
Lita's Stone Blast is a 2 turn move- She leaves the battle for one turn (no attack will hit her, can't heal her, if last surviving character and enemy attacks, immediate miss) and returns the next turn to attack.

Even K'O ed characters have options, if your party consists more than 3 characters, they have the option of switching places with another live/dead character. Switching only happens as soon as your party exceeds 3 characters. Switching DOESN'T use up a turn.

Overall- 9.5/10

This is a game for people who need a good laugh and need a good RPG to play. This is a game for the people who want something simple and fun.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 01/05/06