Atelier Lydie & Suelle: The Alchemists and the Mysterious Paintings is the nineteenth main entry in Gust’s Atelier series, and the third and final game in the Mysterious storyline. It first released in Japan for PlayStation Vita and PlayStation 4 in December 2017, then went worldwide in March 2018 on PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch and Microsoft Windows. It celebrates 20 years of the franchise. An IGDB critic aggregate of 7.4/10 from six outlets is the published score.
Trailer, via ガストチャンネル.
Two Sisters in Merveille
The story opens in a small atelier in Merveille, capital of the Adalet Kingdom, where twin sisters Lydie and Suelle Marlen study alchemy and help their father run the family shop. Lydie is reserved but caring; Suelle is eccentric and carefree. Their dream is to run the best atelier in the country.
Their father’s inexperience in alchemy means customers rarely come. The gap between the twins’ abilities and their ambition drives the whole game, and it is a modest, honest engine. Then they find a painting. Inside it waits a world packed with rare materials made for alchemy.
Crafting Inside the Painting World
The painting world is the best idea here. It gives the twins a reason to travel, fight and gather, and it ties exploration directly to the Synthesis system rather than bolting it on. Enchanting Agents expand that system further.
Combat is turn-based, with up to six characters fighting at once in three pairs. Each pair is an attacker plus a supporter. The attacker always acts on their turn; the supporter only responds to what the attacker does. Pairs can swap mid-battle, and some have combination attacks. You can craft items while fighting.
Quests and Puzzle Mini-Games
Between battles, the player takes quests from NPCs to raise the atelier’s reputation, and unlocks secrets about the paintings. Magical reagents are bought and processed into potions, crystals and food for townspeople. Puzzle-based mini-games let the player provide for those townspeople.
It is a lot of systems, and the game asks patience of anyone who wants all of them mastered.
What the Twins Are Worth
The Mysterious trilogy ends here, eight years after Atelier Sophie and four years after Atelier Firis, and it ends on the series’ warmest note. The twins are the reason. Lydie and Suelle carry the game’s everyday scenes and its stranger ones with equal ease, and their inexperience is treated as a real obstacle rather than a joke.
Thus begins the twin’s mutual adventure to run a successful atelier, but their inexperience and young age will prove this to be a difficult task.
That difficulty is the point, and it is what separates this entry from a dozen prettier crafting games.
Where the Series Stands Now
An enhanced version, Atelier Lydie & Suelle: The Alchemists and the Mysterious Paintings DX, came to PlayStation 4, Windows and Nintendo Switch on April 22, 2021.
Atelier Lydie & Suelle does not reinvent the Atelier formula, and it does not try to. What it does is refine it: the pair-based combat adds real decisions, the painting world gives gathering a purpose, and the twins give the whole thing a heart the previous Mysterious games only approached. The systems can overwhelm, and the pacing sags when quests pile up.
Still, as a capstone for the series’ 20th anniversary, it earns its place. 7.4/10.
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