"I'm Too Angry to Think of a Witty Title."
by Drew Chrisman

The first paragraphs of our reviews here at Save Point are usually comprised of a bit of amusing banter that leads into a general statement on what we thought of the game. I sat at my computer for some time, trying to figure out how to start this review. My ideas ranged from dreams of glory irrevocably shattered to maybe just writing a suicide note, but in the end I decided to skip it and just state this: Ar tonelico 2 is easily one of the worst games I have ever played.

Reyvateils: Women who control magic through songs. They have been a blessing to the world of Ar Ciel for as long as people can remember, until an epidemic known as I.P.D., Infel Phira Dependency, causes them to go berserk. You play as Croix Bartel, an extremely effeminate knight in the Grand Bell Church, whose duty is to contain I.P.D. Well, that was supposed to be his duty, but then Grand Bell's Maiden, Cloche, is attacked, and it's up to Croix to protect her with the aid of his little sister and girlfriend.

Surprisingly, the combat of Ar tonelico 2 can be pretty amazing. You have two frontline characters protecting two Reyvateils in the back. At the start of battle, you choose which song you want your Reyvateils to sing, and it's up to your other characters to defend them long enough to get their heavy hitting song magic off. Battle is split into two sections: defend mode and attack mode. In defend mode, enemies will attack your Reyvateils, and you must protect them by pressing the appropriate button at the right time. In attack mode, your frontline characters have a few different kinds of attacks they can perform, which are chosen by pressing a direction on the D-pad along with the character's assigned attack button. A gauge at the bottom of the screen displays the Reyvateils emotions, corresponding to the directions on the D-pad, and by using the appropriate attack, you can build your sync ratio, allowing them to charge their spells faster.

Obviously, the more battles you fight, the more experience you gain and the more powerful you become. Except your Reyvateils. They gain absolutely nothing from battle save Dive Points, which I'll go into later. No, Reyvateils gain levels by – and I SHIT you not – bathing each other. Read that again, I know I had to. Reyvateils gain levels by bathing one another. FUCK YOU, AR TONELICO. Throughout the game, you gather Dualstall crystals, which you place in the bathtub with the Reyvateils, along with bath salts and toys, should you so desire. Different crystals have different effects, which could have easily been made into a really cool leveling system IF THEY DIDN'T FUCKING DO IT IN THE BATH. And this is where Ar tonelico 2 really starts to piss me the fuck off.

During battle, Reyvateils gain Dive Points instead of experience, which can be used when you Dive into them. Wait, what the fuck? Some towns have Dive Shops, which allow you to Dive into a Reyvateil's mind, where you can get them to open up to you and craft more powerful song magic. Various levels of the mind exist, called Cosmospheres, and each one is represented by a map with various locations on them, each requiring Dive Points, or as it likes to display itself, DP, to enter. I once spent 10 DP to go to Cherry Town. The more you get the Reyvateil to open up, the deeper and deeper you can plunge, allowing for various costumes to be unlocked for the Reyvateil to wear during combat. God-FUCKING-dammit.

Grathmelding, the game's item creation system, makes its return, horribly maimed. Your Reyvateils can assist you in crafting items, but most of the time they fuck everything up and end up making bathtoys instead of bombs. Except at the restaurant. They can actually craft food, but come on, they're women. They're used to the kitchen.

The graphics in Ar tonelico 2 are unforgivably poor and reminiscent of early PS2 days. Your character retains his size no matter how far from the camera he gets, causing him to shift oddly from midget to monstrosity. The music, thankfully, is actually quite beautiful – that is, if you ignore the little girl who intermittently whispers the game's title as if we had managed to forget what it was we were playing.

You may be wondering why I hate this game as much as I do. (EDITOR’S NOTE: HEY, DREW! WHY DO YOU HATE THIS GAME AS MUCH AS YOU DO?) Sure, I haven't given it a great review, but nothing here has really backed up my claim. So, behold:

It's the innuendo.

For fuck's sake, the promotional display lists innuendo as one of its main selling points! 10 DP to go to Cherry Town, “She took your ‘virginity’ right in front of me,” and claims of “it’s too big, be more gentle” are just the tip of the fucking iceberg. The developers spent all their time taking what should be an M rated game and dressing it up to get a T rating and the entire game suffered for it.

I could tell you to not play this game. Maybe my review has turned you away. Maybe you think I'm full of shit and innuendo alone can't ruin a game. Go ahead and try it. Drop forty bucks and pick this up. I give you eight hours before you finally drop your controller and realize that asshole online was right, and then maybe you'll FUCKING listen to me next time. Now trade this piece of shit in and pick up Atelier Iris.

Overall Rating: 2 out of 10