Atelier Yumia the Alchemist of Memories & the Envisioned Land - Review

Genre: RPG.

Developer/publisher: Gust/Koei.

Platform: PS4,switch.
Official Site: N/A.

Release date: 21-3-2025

 

Honestly I was kinda excited for this one because it had a new heroine and world.

I tried the demo just to tip my toes in it while suffering through Tsukihime and I kinda liked it

however i'll say that this series is starting to feel more RPG-like with every new entry.

 

 

I like the OP but near the end of the game I started skipping it...

 

Pro's

- Interesting and decent story.

- Great cast of characters & fun interactions.

- Exploring is fun, its always nice finding chests.

- Character models are gorgeous, prettier than the environments even.

Grey area

- Due to the amount of content it is easy to get overwhelmed and  as an

atelier game this might've been the one where I spend synthesizing the least.

 

Con's

- Combat is too easy as long as you make good gear and items.

- Graphics are decent but... it can feel like it lacks a layer of polish.

- Ingame lightning either works in the games favor or against it.

- Shrines of prayers are too repetitive.

- Some bugs.

 

 I liked Yumia as a character, she definitely has her wits about her but is also a little timid

 and can come across as indecisive, the key theme is trying to do the right thing

but that isn't always easy. Describing her as a character isn't easy either.

Also seems she is well aware that alchemy isn't accepted so I couldn't help but noticed

she was anxious around folks but she'd be more open with people she knew. In terms of design

she kind of reminds me of Sophie or atleast in the artwork, sadly I didn't really like the design

since Yumia looks like a classy office lady with a jacket of someone

who's gonna do some outdoor camping or that's the impression I got. 😅

 

Other main characters were all GREAT and I LOVED their interactions with each other!

Story was pretty decent, I have no complaints, I absolutely loved how we slowly

got to learn more about everyone and whatever happened in the past.

I did think the ending fell a bit flat and it felt more like a beginning to something

Once I knew more about Yumia's past I liked her a lot more than right at the beginning.

Some villains are threatening, one of them is even like a dragon just not as fleshed out.

Garurumon was a weird character, was he friend or foe? he is shown to be a villain

from the get go, unfortunately like Vesper they lack depth but its done in such a way

like what else was there to tell? Lili was the more fleshed out of the bunch.

Final boss sure had build up but I thought he was just an asshole.

Due to the story being decent and the main characters having such great chemistry

I wanted to keep playing I could care less about the clunky combat

because it was fun to explore the lands of aladiss. Sadly there were still caveats.

He's like a dragon, unfortunately he wasn't as well developed.

In terms of graphics is erm... the models look great but while Ligneus region

looked fine to me, the Sivash region is where it started to look all washed up and soapy...

Graphics literally go from good to...

 

I see what you're trying to do but did you miss a layer of polish?

Sivash did look better at night, not sure if this was intended but it seems they forgot something.

The Auruma region looked okay I guess you get used to it.

It honestly baffles me how the models look great and are animated well

but the environments looks like they missed a layer of polish. 

Music was honestly fine, I don't really have any complaints, it had a good battle theme

and the atelier/synth music makes me forget the time so yea music's good. 

 

The character models look so good they look out of place with the rest.

 

In short; I liked atelier Yumia BUT I think this game needed a bit more time in the oven

because the straw that broke the camel's back for me was the Licht quest at the end of the game.

It literally tells you where to go next but for some reason the quest doesn't progress into the next

and at that point the only other things to do is the main story of which not much is left

or plain completionism which for some may not be their cup of tea. Its just poor design

and that wasn't the worst of it, I also had the bug where a side quest NPC will disappear

if you talk to it twice before killing the monsters making it unable to be completed.

This is also one of the few games that I ended up falling through the floor......

it usually ends up other people showing off their out of bound skills. This time it was me.💀

''...''

Like holy shit did they even QA this game?! Anyways I did like the characters and the story itself

was decent, for the first time ever I completely understood the alchemy system while

in dusk/mysterious I'd barely get it. Sadly I don't think this game was that cozy because

all the ''?'' marks and completion percentages did everything in its power to make it not cozy.

Its hard to recommend Yumia, maybe if you like easy games with lovable characters & lots to do?

7/10

''It was still enjoyable in terms of story/chara's but... its simply half-baked.

For all it did right, it did some wrongs. Its not perfect it just lacks polish.''

 

More rambles after the jump, I probably rambled on too much so you can stop reading here.