Video Game / Atelier Lydie & Suelle: The Alchemists and the Mysterious Paintings

Our heroines: Lydie (lower right) and Suelle (Top left)

Atelier Lydie and Suelle: The Alchemists And The Mysterious Paintings is the nineteenth game in the Atelier Series and the third entry of the Mysterious subseries. In Merveille, the capital city of the Adalet Kingdom, twin sisters Lydie and Suelle Malen struggle to make ends meet while working in their father's small atelier. One day, they are called by a strange voice to a painting in their basement. The painting acts as a portal to another world containing unique alchemy materials, which the sisters plan to use to give the father's atelier an edge in the business.

Unlike Escha & Logy and Shallie, the two protagonists do not each have a separate route: it is possible to switch between the lead alchemists at any time. In combat, the party is split into three pairs, with one member of each pair being in the front line and the other in the back: the back-liner acts automatically while the front-liner is controlled by the player. This game also features the return of the ability to synthesize items during combat.

An Updated Re-release featuring a new explorable painting based on Nelke and the Legendary Alchemists: Ateliers of the New World came out on April 22, 2021 as part of a Compilation Re-release of the Mysterious trilogy.

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Tropes featured in this game:

• Achilles' Heel: Falgior stops being practically invincible if you draw from the power of the painting world to weaken him, allowing the twins to finally take him down.
• Alliterative Family: Siblings Mathias and Mireille, the prince and princess of Adalet.
• All Your Powers Combined: Making the item required to unlock the true ending, the pastel crayons that'll allow Honnete to retain her form, requires collecting recipes from all the major alchemists in the story.
• Anti-Frustration Features: An odd one where an old mechanic serves as one. Starting with Atelier Escha & Logy, "event markers" would indicate any new events at a given location so that the player wouldn't have to visit every place in town to check for one. Sophie and Firis had done away with these in favor of simply showing where each character is at each location, but this had the side effect of still forcing the player to stab at every location because there would be uncommon occasions where characters would have events even in their usual locations. This game uses both, showing where all the characters are in town but also indicating if there's an event at any particular location.
• Art Initiates Life:
  • Characters like Fuoco and the painting demons were created within the painting worlds. Lydie and Suelle can also bring rare materials they find within the paintings into the real world.
  • The twins meet the alchemist Neige Chintreuil in her painting, whose spirit had persisted inside the painting as a "soul fragment" after her death 300 years prior; apparently, anyone who's been inside a mysterious painting can have this happen to them. It also happened to the twins' mother Honnete, and by the end of the game they eventually manage to give her a proper form so she can join them even outside it.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Roger, feeling in a particularly experimental mood, gives Corneria a potion to make her taller...and quickly causes her to become big enough to break a huge hole in the house. It reverses fairly quickly, but the twins remain unamused.
• Awesome, but Impractical:
  • Combination Arts have hefty effects, flashy animations, and even songs that go along with them, but in practice they take so long to trigger that they can't be relied on for consistent buffs/heals/damage; it's instead more important to prioritize front-line and support pairs that can work efficiently during battle, even if they don't have any corresponding Combination Arts.
  • So you finally made your 999 quality N/A and are ready to wreck bosses with it? Have fun grinding for cash in a game that doesn't even offer much of it easily, since Corneria factors item quality into her price for refills, and she can easily wipe out your entire wallet after only one or two uses. Considering that the process of recovering the money involves fighting the same bosses you're likely trying to use the items on in the first place, it's more economical to not rely on the best-of-the-best and to simply concentrate on getting consistent damage with party member skills and moderately high-level items.
  • Subverted with an area of effect item that has Consume Soul, One-Hit Kill, and potentially Bargain reducing costs to refill them. (A single trait, the critical combination trait, and Low Price combination trait respectively) A single run of basic enemies on the highest difficulty nets ton of Cole. Limited to enemies around your level, but extremely effective. Adding on Lucky Coins for your party boosts this even further. This makes Suelle's Money Ending trivial. Anything that isn't a major boss is vulnerable, even Dragons. Though at that point only the bosses are a threat.
• Awesome Moment of Crowning: It's not an actual coronation ceremony, but Mathias and Mireille's final event CG culminates in them putting on the Adalet kingdom crowns and doing a "secret" coronation involving Mirelle becoming "the king in shadow" under Mathias.
• Background Music Override:
  • Combination Attacks now have their own musical theme that override the battle music, the first time such has happened since Sophie got rid of special finishers.
  • The mysterious painting Heavenly Flower Garden has its own theme which plays throughout exploring it, including the battle and victory screens.
• Beach Episode: The traditional Atelier beach/bath CG returns — although like in Sophie, everyone's just wearing their normal outfits in the water, with only jackets removed.
• Become a Real Boy:
  • Sophie's still on her continuing quest to make Plachta human. She eventually achieves it near the end of the game.
  • Prior to the events of the game, the Artificial Human Meklet and Atomina accidentally fell into the cauldron and re-formed as Luard, gaining a real human body in the process.
• Big Damn Heroes: Sophie and Plachta make their entrance into the game this way, saving the party from being flattened dead by Falgior.
• Bleak Level: The Black Horizon, the final (non-optional) painting. It's the home of the Remplir, and the whole environment is Deliberately Monochrome.
• Book Ends: Alt reconciles with Plachta using a bottle of fertilizer made using the first recipe they'd ever created together, the same one that Sophie and Plachta had used to try to appeal to him back in Sophie.
• Buffy Speak: An optional cut-scene with Lydie and Sue involves Sue entering the atelier to discover that Lydie has synthesized a bomb. She calls it a "burning boom boom" and then Lydie shows her an ice bomb which she says should be called a "Freezy McFreezeboom," and a lightning bomb a "Shocking Blasto." Lydie says that she's losing her, as there's not even a logic to her naming conventions. She worries that Sue is taking after their father, but Roger says that's wrong, and there's a flashback of Honnete suggesting to Roger that a bomb should be named a "Hottie Boomster" and a craft an "Uni Buster." After the flashback ends, Sue pulls out a craft and suggests the exact same name. Lydie actually likes that one, and Roger realizes that Honnete's spirit lives on his daughters. "Some of the weirdest parts of it, anyway."
• But Now I Must Go:
  • In the true ending, the twins decide to depart from Merveille for a while with Sophie, Plachta, Firis, and Liane (although given that Firis is still using the portal she made Ilmeria's atelier to visit her every so often and the twins are still doing the same with Lucia, there's nothing stopping them from doing the same; it's just that they won't be living with their parents for the time being).
  • After getting the family back together, Drossel decides to travel the world in order to fulfill her dream of making the world's best puppet show, leaving her parents behind in Merveille as Grace is now committed to her duties as a nun.
  • Plachta, of all people, tries to pull this on Sophie when she finally completes the alchemy needed to restore her body, causing them to get into an argument where Sophie outright admits she doesn't want to ever lose Plachta, and they reconcile and decide to live together for the rest of their natural lives.
• Call-Back:
  • Mathias and Alt's Combination Art is Einzelkampf, a recurring name for attacks in the Atelier series which has previously been used by Vayne Aurelius of Mana Khemia, Gio of Rorona, Mimi and Gino of Totori (with the slightly different name Einzelkampfer), and Logy of Escha & Logy (through his strongest item, the Tauzent Blitz).
  • Like with Totori, the twins are motivated largely by the memory of their Missing Mom, although this time they actually witnessed her passing away on her deathbed. Doesn't stop them from bringing her back in the true ending anyway.
  • We get to see what happens when Sophie drinks too much alcohol, as Horst wouldn't let her in Atelier Sophie. It basically consists of her having a complete meltdown of doting over Firis and Plachta to Corneria.
  • At the end of the Sophie extra episode DLC, Sophie says that if Meklet and Atomina start using Ablation Alchemy again, she'll "beat them up without any mercy". In this game, upon learning that they've turned back into Luard despite their promise not to do so, she makes the same threat that she'll beat him up if he does anything bad.
  • The final assignment of the game is to simply turn in the best item that you can, the same as the final assignment in Rorona.
• Combination Attack: Paired party members can perform Combination Arts once the Combination Gauge is full, which have powerful effects and cause a Background Music Override. Different combinations of front and back-liners result in different Arts.
• Demoted to Extra:
  • The series is no stranger to former party members losing their playable status in future games, but this game is particularly notable in that it has only six party members, meaning that even Plachta and Liane, who were major characters in their debut games to the point of receiving cover billing, are simply NPCs with their events tied to Sophie and Firis, respectively.
  • Inverted with Lucia, who's introduced as a childhood friend of the twins and notably appears in nearly every journey inside a painting the party goes on...but, outside of DLC, isn't actually playable.
• Denied Food as Punishment: As a comical Running Gag, Lydie and Sue regularly deny, or at least threaten to deny their father, "dummy daddy" Roger, food as punishment for his outrageous behavior or statements.
  Sue: Gaaah! I'm mad now! I'm vetoing your dinner tonight! No dessert for you, either!
  Roger: No! I'm sorry! I can't subsist on just dry bread! Sue! Sue!
• Disappeared Dad: Corneria returns from Sophie hoping to finally find him. She does eventually and catches up with him, although it's offscreen. Turns out, nothing wrong had happened; it's just that overworking yourself when the source of your powers comes from your body size carries the risk of shrinking you to miniature size and getting you labelled as missing.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?:
  • At one point, Firis and Ilmeria end up going out to drink and getting completely hammered; the experience is described as going off to "experience adulthood together"...
  • The twins shove a potion down Lucia's throat in a scene that decidedly resembles shoving something entirely else into someone's mouth...
• Equivalent Exchange: As it did in Sophie, Corneria's abilities allow her to duplicate items at the cost of temporarily shrinking her body size.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Lydie is the responsible one, while Suelle is more energetic and mischievous. This is only in terms of comparison with each other, though, considering that Lydie is not without her moments, and perfectly willing to play along with Suelle's antics and pranks.
• "Freaky Friday" Flip: The twins end up making a potion that does this and end up cramming it down Lucia's throat to get a better glimpse of her life. It backfires terribly when the attempt at invading her privacy reveals that Lucia cared a lot more about them that they gave her credit for...
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • Many of the character events don't actually involve Lydie or Suelle, but triggering them requires navigating to the area where they take place. This creates the odd effect of whichever twin the player is controlling appearing in the location of the event after it's over, even though it's obvious neither of them were in the vicinity at the time.
  • On the other hand, the events in the Heavenly Flower Garden mysterious painting do very much involve Lydie and Suelle, as well as their father, Roger. There is no cut-scene evidence indicating that any of the other playable characters enter the painting with them, yet all are still present for battles.
  • The stated requirement for the test to earn S Rank is for the twins to pour their passion into a single item of amazing quality to turn in to Mireille. However, all you're actually required to do is turn in an item that's good enough to pass the first line, and if it doesn't, you can just deliver two or three crappy D-level items until you pass the line and then choose the "report" option. Mireille will tell you that just barely passed and to do better next time (though there isn't one) and everything else will play out exactly the same, with Mireille praising Lydie and Sue for successfully reaching S Rank and saying how proud she is of them.
• Golden Age: The alchemists turn their era into one in the Golden Ending, creating a time when dreams, miracles, and happiness were plenty.
• Guide Dang It!:
  • Some recipes have hidden triggers for appearing rather than showing up in the recipe book telling the player what the trigger is. While some the player is likely to gain by complete accident just doing their regular routine, others are more obscure and non-indicative. The troublesome part is that some of these hidden recipes are story required.
  • The ending requirements are rather obtuse even for Atelier standards.
    • For the shop ending: getting 100,000 coll in the end is not that hard; the problem is that triggering one of the events to incur it requires dipping under 10,000 during the last chapter, and it's very possible that a sufficiently savvy player would never allow their savings to get that low. The game gives you no indication that this is a requirement. Furthermore, the game doesn't give you a goal in the menu once you've hit 50,000 coll, and therefore you'd have no idea that 100,000 is the actual number required to trigger it.
    • For the painter's ending: triggering the first event for it requires synthesizing all the environment-changing paints and another of the restoration paints...even though up until then the restoration paints had all been story items used only once, so there'd be no need to make another one.
    • The requirements for the true ending are still rather obscure, because it's difficult to determine whether it requires unlocking all the endings, fulfilling all ambition notes, or getting maximum score on all the assignments — the only consensus is that there's some connection, and yet people have unlocked the true ending by not doing one or more of these.
• Heir Club for Men: Averted; it seems like the line of succession doesn't particularly mind whether Mireille (older sister) or Mathias (younger brother) becomes ruler if the other one so desires. As a result, the fact that neither of them want the crown becomes an issue.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: Firis and Ilmeria seem to have turned into this since the previous game, while Sophie and Plachta seem to have sailed fully into Pseudo-Romantic Friendship territory. (Of course, this being Atelier, how much you want to interpret this as "heterosexual" is up to you.)
• Hopeless Boss Fight:
  • You can't win against Falgior the first time; the only option is to get beaten down before Sophie and Plachta come to save the party. (You can actually beat him if you're strong enough and on a New Game+, but he'll just get back up and flatten the party again.)
  • When you first see Fran Pfeil, the game very obviously doesn't want you to fight it right then and there, as his stats are way too high to handle for a player at that point in the game. The "correct" route is to go the other way and craft an item to drive him away. It is possible for an extremely savvy player to beat him, in which the game will acknowledge your win but hand you the recipe without explanation.
• Humanity Ensues: It's still ultimately considered the preferable option, but as it turns out, getting a human body after being an Artificial Human for too long requires re-adjusting to certain things like the need to eat food, the potential of getting fat after eating too much, and motor skills. Just ask Plachta and Luard/Alt.
• Inconsistent Dub: Names of recurring items changing between games is par for the course for Atelier localizations, and much of the inconsistency for this game can likely be traced to Koei Tecmo switching to a new localization firm unfamiliar with past standards for translation:
  • The currency is called "Coll", despite the past thirteen games spelling it "Cole".
  • Alt's name is eventually revealed to have been derived from Plachta and Luard's disciple, who had been mentioned earlier in Firis — but in that game, it had been written "Ald".
  • Ablation Alchemy has been changed to Elimination Alchemy.
• Internal Reveal: The game doesn't really try to hide that Grace is Fritz's wife and Drossel's mother, but it's only later in the game that the characters figure it out and the family is reunited.
• In-Universe Game Clock: Although the game has no time limit, in addition to keeping track of day/night cycles and request deadlines, the UI does in fact denote the current "date" in game.
• I Hate Past Me: The Etel Nepica painting shows people memories from their past, and the party gets to witness all of their embarrassing memories of their childhood...in front of everyone else. Later used more dramatically when Alt has to face his more uncomfortable memories of being Luard, leading to him directly summoning a copy of his past self (his final boss form from Sophie) for the party to beat up.
• Legacy Character: Hagel reclaims his position as the returning Atelier blacksmith, as bald as ever and with his good ol' monk sounds. Pamela makes a return, as well.
• Multiple Endings: The game strikes a balance between the single ending of Sophie and the large amount of endings from Firis, having five story endings that are unlocked by achieving certain conditions.
  • If no other conditions are fulfilled, the twins successfully get their atelier to S Rank, but Honnete's spirit finally disappears completely.
  • If the twins reach level 50 alchemy, after Honnete's spirit disappears, they decide to push their goal from having the best atelier in the "country" to the best in the "world".
  • If the twins manage to get together enough money to expand their atelier, they open a large shop with the funds they've made.
  • If the twins learn the art of making mysterious paintings from Neige, the two of them start to train their painting skills.
  • And finally, if the twins achieve all the conditions for the Golden Ending, they effectively restore Honnete to life by allowing her spirit to fully materialize in the real world, then go off on a journey with Sophie, Plachta, Firis, and Liane in the hopes of helping the world with alchemy.
• My Greatest Failure: Roger is in fact a licensed alchemist and was originally a dedicated and motivated alchemist, but he was never able to forgive himself for being unable to save Honnete from her death, and thereafter could never bring himself to do alchemy after that.
• Mythology Gag: Hagel feels a connection between himself and Pamela, and they quickly become friends. Hagel and Pamela are the most frequently recurring characters in the Atelier franchise.
• Perpetual Poverty: The Malen family is extremely poor, and the game makes a point of this; they're apparently barely making do at a rent of a measly 500 cole a month for rent, and even after the twins start ranking up their atelier and producing natural law-shattering objects, the furthest they get is a possibility of having a more profitable shop in some of the endings. Tellingly, while in the last game to feature such an ending, Atelier Totori, unlocking a "rich" ending required half a million cole, Lydie & Suelle requires only a fifth of that amount (total 100,000) for the twins to consider themselves rich. (Of course, there's nothing stopping a savvy player from going far beyond that, but the family will still be portrayed like they're in the dumps.)
• Portal Picture: The game centers around "Mysterious Paintings", paintings made with alchemy that create worlds that people can jump into.
• The Promise:
  • The motivator in Lydie and Suelle's desire to make their atelier the "best in the country" is that they'd made this promise to their mother on her deathbed. They later add another one: "to do alchemy for everyone".
  • Roger had made two promises to Honnete after their marriage: the same one as the twins (to make their atelier the best in the country), and one where he would "make [Honnete] happy". However, her untimely death had caused him to give up on those dreams. When he reunite with Honnete in the world of his painting, confirming with Honnete that she does indeed believe that he kept his promise to make her happy gives him renewed confidence.
• Rank Up: The main story and gameplay is based around the Atelier Ranking System, which is established in the kingdom of Merveille in order to encourage the rise of alchemy within the kingdom. (And secretly in order to train up alchemists to defeat a monster which is threatening the kingdom.) Throughout the game, the player's role is to control Lydie and Suelle as they complete objectives and tests to advance in this ranking system with the goal of becoming the best atelier in the kingdom. You start at Rank G and the final task of the game is to take the test for Rank S. Completing it locks you into the game's ending.
• Really 700 Years Old:
  • Neige actually died 300 years prior to the start of the game, but because she believes Growing Up Sucks, her spirit in the world of her painting appears to be a young girl even though she'd lived a proper adult life while alive.
  • As with the previous game, although her doll body gives her the appearance of a 16-year-old girl, Plachta is actually over 500 years old. This prompts Suelle to call her an old lady, to which Plachta is most definitely not amused. Alt is too, since he's actually Luard, Plachta's childhood friend, and unlike Plachta who's been spending most of that time dormant as a book, he's lived through every single one of those years, yet looks like a teenage boy.
• The Reveal: During a trip into Etel Nepica, a painting that has the power to show flashbacks, the twins are presented with...the fight between Luard — the Final Boss of Sophie — and Plachta, which led to the events of that game. But Etel Nepica only shows the past of people in the vicinity, and Plachta isn't with the party; aside from the twins, the only other person there is a very depressed-looking Alt...
• Rose-Tinted Narrative: In-universe; when the twins ask her what kind of person Luard was like, Plachta showers him with praise, calling him a talented man devoted to his studies, kinder than anyone else, extremely reliable, and a friend she treasures dearly...completely omitting the part where he became ambitious enough to start swallowing up the world's resources For Science!. Never mind the fact that in Sophie she thought she'd have to kill him because of how far she'd considered him beyond the Moral Event Horizon; according to her, the disagreement that led to her sealing him into Meklet and Atomina was "just a spat", and in her mind, he always has been and will be her friend. It's hearing this that makes Alt realize Plachta is doing a much better job at moving on than he is.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: Mireille works as a receptionist at the castle, while her brother Mathias works as a knight. They're perfectly happy to run their day jobs in service to the country like anyone else, despite being the crown princess and prince of Adalet.
• Running Gag: Sue's fear of ghosts and dislike/fear of bugs.
• Shipper on Deck: As soon as they hear Sophie starting to use more familiar language on Alt, the twins quickly start entertaining ideas of it blossoming into a heated romance. (Alt advises Sophie to take her leave, advice she's all too happy to take, before the two start getting caught up in their own delusions.)
• Ship Tease:
  • Sophie and Plachta are pretty much all but stated to be a couple by the end of the game. Their event ends after Plachta realizes she wants to be with Sophie. The two affirm that they are each other's happiness, and promise to grow old together. And Everyone Can See It, with Lydie, Sue, and Firis conspicuously giving them time alone together after Plachta gets her body back. You can think about the implication of that on your own.
  • There's some hints that Ilmeria might be in love with Firis, complete with almost mumbling out a drunken Love Confession to her. There's nothing on Firis' side to suggest it's mutual.
• Sibling Yin-Yang:
  • Lydie and Suelle, with Lydie having a more kind and calm temperament while Suelle is more outgoing and brash.
  • Mathias and Mireille, with Mathias being a soft-hearted Butt-Monkey while Mireille is a comparatively strict, task-oriented lady. It's eventually due to this that Mathias decides he'd be a more effective king if she's there to support him.
• Slice of Life: The game's genre is specifically described as "slice-of life RPG" and the packaging of the U.S. version states that it is "A slice-of-life RPG featuring mysterious worlds within paintings."
• Something Only They Would Say: Fritz identifies Alt as Luard because he calls Fritz a "pervert" in exactly the same way Atomina did. Alt comments that Fritz being able to figure that out is perverted in itself.
• Spell My Name With An S: When the game was first announced, Suelle's name was officially romanized as Soeur before being changed to its current spelling, probably because Gust may have realized at the last minute "soeur" is French for "sister". Interestingly, the change even went as far as the logo, suggesting a change late in development.
• Spiritual Successor: While it's technically a sequel to both Sophie and Firis, Atelier games tend to change up the format and themes of each work even when they're set in the same universe; however, this one parallels Sophie in multiple ways. The game has no time limit and instead progresses the story in distinct chapters, allowing the player to progress their plot at their own pace, and many of the subplots are specifically dedicated to tying up loose ends from Sophie (getting Plachta a real human body, completing Luard's Heel–Face Turn, reuniting Corneria with her father). In addition, a huge part of the latter half of the game is about "doing alchemy for other people's sake", much like how Sophie's central theme was about using alchemy to help people.
• Succession Crisis: Mireille and Mathias are currently in dispute over who gets to have the throne, but rather than wanting the throne for themselves, they actually want the other to have it; Mathias is convinced Mireille is far more capable, while Mireille believes Mathias has more of the necessary disposition to make the country happy. Eventually, Mireille ends up getting her wish when Mathias takes on the job, but because he feels uncomfortable working without her support, he enlists her to be a second "king" working under him.
• Superboss: Other than optional rematches with various game bosses, Palmyra returns from Firis, along with another boss named Termina. As with before, the two of them increase in level with every defeat until they hit 200. Other bosses include rematches with Fran Pfeil, Falgior, Firis, and the illusory Luard, along with an added battle with Sophie.
• Surpassed the Teacher: A major theme of the game.
  • When the twins tell Alt that they want to be like him, he tells them that they should shoot for something much higher...before subjecting them to Training from Hell to help them along their way.
  • Sophie eventually surpasses Plachta in alchemy skill by giving her a proper human body. This causes Plachta to momentarily have a crisis in which she worries she might be holding Sophie back by staying with her, before they work it out by reaffirming that their relationship is far more important.
  • A late-game conversation between Plachta and Alt has them discuss their feelings on the matter, in which Plachta says that although in the past she would have been upset about Sophie overtaking her, she's nothing but happy about it. The two of them conclude that it's a good thing that new alchemists are surpassing their accomplishments, and that their job is to help them grow.
  • The twins manage to surpass their father, a licensed alchemist when they both create and understand the spirit pastels.
• Talking in Your Sleep:
  • Once again, using the rest function in the atelier (which is now useless for anything other than passing time, since healing is provided freely upon returning to the atelier) will result in sleep-talking if you choose to rest for long enough. It's double the fun this time since you have two playable characters. Lydie comments include "...Oh! I haven't written in my diary today! I should do it now, before I forget...!" and "N-No.. Mom, no... *Sob*... No, don't go..." Sue comments include "...Huh? Wait a minute. What's that on the ceiling...? Is it a ghost? No... Ohh, what is it?" and "...What's that sound? ...It's a bug! Aarghh! Getitout getitout getitout! Get it out of here!", both references to running gags involving her character.
  • During the "Weak Drinkers" trophy event, Ilmeria will get so drunk that she falls asleep and tells Firis to never leave her side in her sleep.
  Firis: Hahaha! Ilmeria is talking in her sleep! Poke, poke! Hahaha!
• Time Skip: The epilogue for the Golden Ending takes place a year after the events of the game, during which the twins manage to bring their mother back into the real world and presumably start preparations for their journey with the previous protagonists.
• Title Theme Drop: Although this is standard practice for an Atelier game, this game in particular uses it everywhere to the point it practically becomes a Leitmotif; in fact, it's comprised of the twins' respective Leitmotifs.
• Trailers Always Spoil: The main promotional material prior to the game's release displayed Plachta in a new outfit and even pointed out the drastic change in appearance — but this corresponds to the event where Plachta gains a new human body, near the end of the game.
• T-Word Euphemism: After you synthesize a water bag for the first time, you get a scene in which Suelle suggests that it's a "portable toilet," although every time she tries to say "toilet," she gets cut off by Lydie. Eventually, the screen goes dark and you get Lydie warning her to not say the "t word," with a sound of Suelle being kicked and crying out in pain.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: Falgior represents a massive jump in difficulty that requires a rather thorough understanding of the games mechanics to beat, both hitting hard, having a lot of HP, and is littered with various nasty attacks including a counter.
• Your Days Are Numbered: Honnete's spirit is being kept alive by the painting it's in, but it's only going to last so long because the painting is incomplete. The twins eventually manage to give her a proper form in the true ending.