the man on the moon rules the infinite time

a few years ago i came across a youtube video; i don't remember the creator or i'd link it. anyway, it was a reflection on a figure and review. the figure in question was this one of ayesha from atelier ayesha, and the youtuber talked about how they'd had to scour sites online to get it many years after it came out. (for those not into figure collecting, most figures are only produced once at scale, and the aftermarket can get very expensive.)

anyway, i'd never played an atelier game, but i was intrigued that this youtuber had gone to such lengths for this figure in particular. i started looking into atelier ayesha, reading reviews, asking friends if they'd played it, even watching gameplay overviews. this is more deliberation than i usually do before i buy a game, but i wanted to be sure i'd enjoy it. shortly afterwards it went on sale for $20 and i picked it up. i played the first 30 minutes of the game, was not immediately compelled, and set it down.

as i mentioned in the last post, i finished clair obscur ahead of my so-called schedule for the year (one rpg per month). not wanting to dive into trails of cold steel right away and also wanting to save money, i picked atelier ayesha back up.

i am now about 5 hours in, and i don't like this game.

the story, which is what draws me to the vast majority of games, is thin. the characters are stock tropes with little to compel me about them. the alchemy part of the gameplay is fine, i suppose, but i'm following a guide since i get stressed out by timers in games, so it's much less natural and spontaneous. the battles are... fine. there's nothing particularly innovative about this particular turn-based rpg.

now, admittedly, i did just come off a very good game, so anything i played next was going to pale in comparison, but wow, i don't like this one! it's really the writing that's getting me: ayesha is not a strong enough character to base the story around. her writing lacks the spark that's drawn me to so many other characters. the stakes in this game aren't high, which i knew going in, but oof. it's not even that i dislike a low-stakes story — trails in the sky fc was like that, and i loved that aspect of the game. but ayesha simply has no presence, and the game really depends on you caring about her.

so now i'm at an impasse: do i continue the game and push through to see if i like it more, or do i accept the loss of my $20 and move on with my life? logic leans towards the latter, of course. but atelier ayesha is a 20-30 hour game, so i'm already through a decent chunk of it. i don't really have much else that's short that i could squeeze into the rest of this month. it's finish this, or move on to cold steel already.

i was hoping writing this post would help me decide, but it hasn't, LOL. honestly i might give atelier ayesha a few more play sessions to win me over... but i've been sitting down to play it and picking up final fantasy xiv instead, so that tells you how i feel about it right now, lol. i went to the diadem for an hour last night instead of playing ayesha. for those who don't play ffxiv, this means i voluntarily went to a zone where all you can do is fly in a circle and hit rocks to gather materials over and over again. that was more compelling to me than playing ayesha, so like, oof.

anyway, the title of this post is very intentional. i really try not to buy games i won't like, and i feel like i need to get my money's worth out of them regardless. but i know deep down it's a fallacy and i'm just digging the hole deeper. i just need to convince myself of it.