The Mysterious trilogy is my least favorite Atelier trilogy. I found the casts a tad bland and it just generally felt like a weird in-between period for the series where Gust games were having some growing pains, especially after the fantastic Dusk trilogy. When I heard Sophie would be getting a sequel, I was cautiously optimistic at their second chance with the main character, and the premise sounded interesting.

Well, I'm happy to say that I finally liked a Mysterious game! The characters especially are crazy good, I loved all of them, but especially the younger Plachta was much more interesting than I ever found Plachta herself. The turn based battles are fun and snappy, and there is a lot more care and variety put into every aspect of the game. I think some of the late game is a bit strangely balanced and it definitely feels like they pointed the game in a more Ryza-ish straight up JRPG direction, I'd like to see a liiiittle bit more of a return to the daily life shenanigans that the series used to frequent.

But overall this is definitely a top 5 in the series for me, maybe my new favorite! Maybe a Dusk sequel next? Please?