Crystal Project is a pretty good game, and extraordinarily impressive in the context of its creation; the entire thing was made by one person as a hobby. The sound and visuals are a perfect fit for a game that encourages fun and exploration over accomplishment. I had a blast with this for about the first half or two-thirds of the game.

Unfortunately, I can't talk about how great the exploration elements are without also mentioning how the difficulty spike in combat hinders exploration to a point that excitement and wonder are replaced by fear and anxiety as you realize that you are only free to explore the game's world if you are strong enough to kill the enemies you encounter as you wander around. I hated exploration in the last few ares of the game and was too afraid to go off the beaten path because I didn't want to get into a fight and have to start the entire dungeon over. I'm sure an argument can be made that the combat was simply too deep for me, and that by using a specific composition or strategy at specific points of the game, the mechanics break and it's remarkably easy. But why would this be an expectation in a game that encourages you to revel in your own style and methods, and encourages you to be casual and enjoy the journey and not the destination?

However, there is also good news with what is just about my one and only gripe with the game. You are free to adjust difficulty and convenience in a large number of ways, from a basic difficulty shift to adjusting the amount of rewards for battles and even eliminating the challenge of minigames if you can't or don't want to do races and stuff. If I had realized it was an option, I probably would have enjoyed the game more with a higher level cap and/or on the easy difficulty instead of normal, both of which are things you can change in the menu at any time to tune your experience exactly the way you want it to be.

Overall, this is an excellent game and at a great price even when it's not on sale. I highly recommend it to anyone who likes JRPGs or Metroidvanias.

Atelier Ryza 2 (Something Something Fairy) is the second game in a trilogy, and I want to start by saying that I highly recommend playing all three games. The Ryza trilogy is also part of a much larger franchise, yet its gameplay is a pretty drastic departure from the rest of the series. This is both a blessing and a curse, however, as it means that anyone familiar with other Atelier games will probably want to do some research into some streams or something to see if this looks like it's worth a try, but if you're like me and don't know or don't like most of the rest of the series, the accessible easy-to-learn crafting and the fast-paced real time battles might make this the best in the series (by far, IMO).

Never heard of this series? Then none of that context will help. Atelier Ryza is a game that focuses on storytelling in typical JRPG fashion; fight bad guys and get stronger to progress, but unlike Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy, your equipment is never found or earned, but always crafted. Story progress unlocks new areas, new areas have better stuff to craft with, better ingredients make better pizza.

The first Ryza game is strong on its own, but Ryza 2 is way better, and one of my favorite games ever made. I loved it so much, even after playing the first two on Switch I purchased all three on Steam just to get the achievements and give myself an excuse to thoroughly play them again.

If you haven't played the first Ryza, go get it, then hurry up and buy this, play this, and love this.