Atelier Iris 3

Atelier Iris 3 is a traditional 2D Japanese role-playing game that doesn’t actually involve selling clothes as the title implies. Clothing does factor into the game, however, as your protagonist Iris is a talented Alchemist who can stew up just about anything in her cauldron, including new sexy outfits. This is one of those puzzling adventuring worlds where the most powerful armor often comes in the form of a maid’s outfit or a “perilously thin leotard” or… well, I’ll let you imagine.

First Impressionsby Tanx - Video Game Reviews by a Very Busy Math Teacher

Iris, who comes equipped with straight-man follower dude Edge, is a ditz. My first impression: For those of you out there who, like me, are plagued with being engaged to a beautiful, smart and talented Fiancée, Atelier Iris 3 heroically steps up to provide the escapist fantasy of having an empty-headed flake in a mini-skirt as a girlfriend. And this is not to mention Nell, the cheerful tag-along youth with strangely exaggerated female anatomy… some kind of medical condition I suppose.

But as the game develops, it emerges that Iris actually does have more of a personality than expected. Alchemy, as popularized in the Anime Full-Metal-Alchemist and now apparently ubiquitous in Japan, is her saving grace. Iris is a quirky woman given to sudden spontaneous bouts of inspiration. As you wander around the game completing missions or what-not you come across little idea markers, and Iris thinks up something new to stew in her pot. Her ideas are often wacky, like, “say, that windmill would look great pocket-sized” which inspires her to make a motor fan. Or, my personal favorite, “wouldn’t it be great if we could talk to sea urchins (Uni in Japanese)” after which she creates Unirus Life forms, a species of sapient sea urchins… which she promptly tosses into the pot to make something else.

The great part about all this craziness is that Iris’s companions recognize it as so. Edge and Nell are often given to speculating on what makes Iris tick, or giving up in frustration at trying to follow her thinking. I really liked this goofy creative side to Iris, and my Fiancée began to approve as well. She had to give Iris credit for coming up with probably the best name for a healing item that either of us have ever seen in a game, the powerful Feudal Snackcastle. Man, if my D&D characters had a Feudal Snackcastle to regain hit points with, they’d be the talk of the town! Monsters and townsfolk alike… who wouldn’t want a piece of that?

Interestingly, if you can look past the obvious concessions to a young male audience, there is an actual appeal to women in this game. It should be said, some things are hard to overlook, such as the prevalence of women’s undergarments as alchemical items (yes, every time you defeat a female succubus demon Iris quickly nabs her knickers to be used as an alchemical reagent… it makes me think of perverse Japanese vending machines selling pre-worn panties… yes, they exist according to Ian Buruma.) But if you get past this, the characters and the town they live in have a lot of charm, and the many little dramas your party is embroiled in have an addictive story appeal.

Iris, Edge and Nell are Raiders, adventurers who specialize in entering little magical Alter worlds that are full of monsters and also kick you out after a certain time-limit expires. Raiders have a strange system in that they take a job before they know all the details about it, understanding that the guild would only post it if it were appropriate to their rank. This, I think, is a rather bad way to go about business, but it works out fine when most of the quests posted are as strangely domestic as the ones in this game: “Go find me this ingredient so I can make a hair-growth tonic!” or “my cat had kittens and they need new homes!” or even “I think she’s not interested in me because she loves someone else… find out who!”

I liked the variety of tasks, monsters, items and plotlines you see in Atelier Iris 3. The Alchemy system allows Iris to craft a seemingly endless list of new and strange trinkets, weapons and clothing. A lot of items only have use as reagents, such as dirt, worthless stones, various fish and so on. As a nice nod to the historical pursuit of Alchemy, one of the final items you make in the game is a brick of gold.

While traipsing through the same five Alter worlds over and over again is a bit dull, you can be guaranteed to run into new varieties of critters on a frequent basis. Even the lowly Puni, this game’s incarnation of the little globular slime so popular in JRPGs, comes in a lot of varieties… tiny puni, giant puni, puni riders, heal puni, red puni, puni brothers, and so on ( you can get gummy puni candy from them!) As one quest requires you to slay 200 puni, you’ll get to know the little fellas pretty damn well.

Atelier Iris 3 is one of the better JRPGs I’ve played, and I recommend it to anyone who enjoys this sort of thing. I believe the recently released Mana Khemia is the next in the series, so you can look there as well for crazy Alchemy fun. I know I will.

Played For: about 50 hours