#oneaday Day 586: Dysfunctional

My favourite RPG casts are the ones that act as something of a dysfunctional family. And Ulrika's group in Mana Khemia 2: Fall of Alchemy is one of the finest groups of idiots I've ever had the pleasure to go adventuring with.

You've got Ulrika, who has enthusiasm and vigour aplenty, though it's often somewhat misdirected. There's her best friend Chloe, who is absolutely terrible at magic, and tends to end up cursing people when she's practising her "incantations". There's Pepperoni, a huge musclebound beastman who thinks he's a tiny fairy. There's Goto, who is… I have no idea, but he appears to possess a small red ball and/or an animal mascot costume. And there's Enna, who seems to be the most relatively normal of the group, but may or may not have been abused by his sister (who is a member of the game's other playable cast) to such a degree that she literally stole his name from him.

What a group. It's a delight to spend time with them, and something of a markedly different feel to what Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis provided. There was certainly dysfunction there, too, but most players would almost certainly find themselves gravitating towards a specific character that they particularly liked. You know, like liked. That's how I ended up going for Jess' ending.

In Mana Khemia 2: Fall of Alchemy — at least in the case of Ulrika's route, since I can't speak for Raze's yet — it's not quite that simple. None of these characters are particularly people I feel like I would want to "end up with" in the same way that Vayne and Jess getting together just felt "right", but all of them are absolutely fascinating in their own right, and I want to see their respective stories through to their conclusions.

Thankfully, Mana Khemia 2: Fall of Alchemy adopts a slightly different approach to its predecessor; in the first game, you could only complete the last "episode" of one character's personal quests in order to lock in their ending, whereas in Mana Khemia 2 you can complete all the quests, and the ending you get is determined by whoever you speak to first in the game's final chapter. That makes it much easier to make a save just before the final dungeon and be able to see everyone's conclusion.

Anyway, that's something to concern myself with a bit later; I still have a fair way to go. This one's going to take a little longer to cover fully than the previous Atelier games, but we'll take things as they come — no need to rush; I'm in this for the long haul!