Atelier Ryza: Ever Darkness & the Secret Hideout launched in 2019 to explosive success and stellar reviews. Within months, Atelier Ryza became the highest-selling game in the series. As expected with sequels, Atelier Ryza 2 and 3 sold less than their predecessor, yet still eclipsed the sales of previous Atelier titles. As of August 2025, the trilogy has sold over 2.5 million copies, far and above any others in the series’ history. To celebrate, Gust has released deluxe (DX) versions of the Secret trilogy, thus bringing the titles to more players with new features, improvements, and content.
In 2018, Gust released Atelier Rorona: The Alchemist of Arland DX, and has since steadily ported and remastered older titles. To date, every title in the Arland, Dusk, and Mysterious series is playable on PlayStation 4/5, Nintendo Switch 1/2, and PC. By expanding the audience, the series has seen notable growth in popularity, and with the Secret series’ success, that has drastically increased. So, what better option than to create a DX pack of the best-selling series? At first, the Secret DX packs may seem like little more than ports to newer consoles, such as Nintendo Switch 2 and PS5, yet these new versions come with exclusive content that isn’t accessible elsewhere.
Atelier Ryza 1 DX features many visual improvements, most notably in the performance department. On PS5 Pro, the game runs at a steady 60 fps and looks absolutely gorgeous both still and in motion. The game’s large, lush, and vivid world was a step forward for the series in 2019, and seeing it run on PS5 Pro now makes it feel like experiencing the game for the first time. I poked around nooks and crannies in town, taking slower paths through fields, and spending more time than I should just looking out at the ocean. It felt like returning to your hometown, only to find it better than you left it years prior.
The game comes packed with DLC, including music from older Atelier games and other Gust titles, such as Nights of Azure and Blue Reflection. The package also includes several costumes, and while Ryza gets the lion’s share of the outfits, each character has a handful of alternates. Another draw is additional episodes for Ryza, Klaudia, Tao, and Lent, as well as post-game episodes for Empel and Lilia. The former are more mid-game episodes, while the latter serve as an epilogue for Empel and Lilia and focus on their adventures after the credits roll. The island’s secondary cast also gets a post-game story that bridges the gap between Atelier Ryza 1 and 2, taking place one year after Atelier Ryza 1. This episode focuses on Ryza’s transition from a fledgling alchemist to a teacher.
Atelier Ryza 2: Lost Legends & the Secret Fairy DX features similar improvements, yet its biggest upgrade is PS5 performance. When the game first launched, the PS5 version had horrendous blurring and dismal performance when running at 4K. The solution to the problem was frustrating: play the PS4 version on PS5. I, however, opted to play the PS5 version at 1080p while turning off the aggressive motion blur (which rivaled Final Fantasy Type-0 HD’s nauseating initial implementation), and found the experience to be perfectly fine. Yet, with a bigger, fancier OLED TV, I had to experience Atelier Ryza 2 in 4K with a smoother frame rate (60fps targeted) and a bigger, better picture. Thankfully, I got what I wanted.
While Atelier Ryza 1 has many additional episodes, the sequel features only one, which focuses on Empel and Lilia once again. As the duo of underworld gate hunters was largely absent from the story and unplayable in the original Atelier Ryza 2, this episode shows players precisely what they were up to and how their actions affected the overarching storyline and the key cast. With a new zone to explore, players can expect to spend between one and two hours in this additional content.
Like Atelier Ryza 1, the sequel is loaded with extra costumes and bonus music galore. Atelier Ryza 2 is the most mechanically ambitious of the trilogy, with its focus on exploration and delving into ruins. Uncovering secrets of the past and piecing together fragments of history makes Ryza feel like a part-time spelunker. Forgive my re-use of a terrible pun, but with all the dungeon crawling, ruin diving, and trekking through the long-lost remnants of ancient civilizations, a proper title for this game could easily have been Ryza the Tomb Raider. I’ll see myself out.
Ryza 2’s shift to a more kinetic, fast-paced battle system ensures combat is fun and flashy. Newfound fans of Atelier Yumia: The Alchemist of Memories & the Envisioned Land’s frantic battles can enjoy the equally rewarding chaos in this entry and its sequel. The synthesis system is deep, yet it’s a touch simpler than Atelier Yumia’s resonance system. Atelier Ryza 2 (and by extension 3) has an incredibly satisfying loop between making new gear and seeing the results in real time. Unleashing hell with Tao’s rapid combo hits, each applying chances for stacking status effects, is incredibly pleasing. Having the chance to experience the new battle system with Empel and Lilia feels equally rewarding and opens the door for a dizzying array of party compositions.
When Atelier Ryza 3: Alchemist of the End & the Secret Key launched, I praised it for its story, mechanics, characters, and world. Yet, the most notable part of Atelier Ryza 3 was the seamless integration of the original series map into the world, allowing players to run from one corner to the next without a single loading screen. As a fan of Kurken Island and the surrounding areas, the world appeared far more alive due to how connected everything felt. Not only did the game essentially level up with battles and synthesis, but the world itself did too, and to this day, it remains incredibly impressive as a fan who spent almost a hundred hours crossing the fields and clashing with foes in the first game.
On launch, Atelier Ryza 3 ran quite smooth for me on PS5, regardless of what was happening. Sprinting at full speed past packs of enemies, dropping blinding high-powered explosives on sheep who very much deserved it, and riding on pets across both land and sea while exploring the vast new islands remained a smooth and solid experience. Now, doing so at 4K grants the world a touch more life, once more bringing the already impressive map into a new light.
Much like Atelier Ryza 2, the additional episodes are limited to just one; however, the scale and presentation greatly eclipses the added Atelier Ryza 1 character episodes. In this episode, two of Atelier Ryza 2’s main cast—Cliff and Serri, who weren’t present or playable in 3—find their paths converging as they set off on a new, albeit much smaller adventure. The clash of two wildly different personalities is amusing, often leading to comedic situations that land the emotionally muted Serri acting as the straight man to Cliff’s antics.
Although enhanced DX ports of Atelier games are unsurprising these days, the lack of an upgrade path for owners of the originals is wholly disappointing. The new episodes and characters in this collection are exclusive to the DX versions, ensuring players need to repurchase the games if they want to experience the new content. Save data also doesn’t carry over, so anyone sitting on a half-finished Atelier Ryza 1 will have to start from scratch. There are bonuses for having save data for both the original and the DX versions, however.
The improvements found in the DX ports/remasters are impressive if you play on PS5, PS5 Pro, or a fairly beefy PC. The Switch versions still run at 30fps, even on Switch 2, and the Steam version has its fair share of issues. However, my experience on PC was smoother, given my rig is a bit more high-end. That said, Steam Deck users are already familiar with settings tinkering to squeeze out a few more frames or smooth out performance and customize their experience, so the out-of-the-box expectations on that front are lower than on Nintendo’s platforms. With how poorly Atelier Ryza 1 looked and ran on Switch 1, the Switch 2 improvements are notable despite the lack of 60fps support.
The Secret Trilogy DX pack is the best way to experience the Atelier Ryza games if you don’t already own the originals. Beyond the bundled additional content and performance improvements, the DX pack leaves many of the subseries’ issues unresolved. The lack of an English dub is disappointing, as is the missed opportunity to remix enemy variety. However, having all difficulties unlocked (Very Easy, Easy, Normal, Hard, Very Hard, Charismatic, and Legendary) is greatly appreciated, as the devs previously locked harder difficulties behind a new game+ file (something I lamented in prior reviews). As Atelier battle systems are often mechanically ambitious and deep, playing the games on Hard or higher can ensure the right mixture of fun, challenge, and power.
If you own all three games but never got around to them, this collection is not worth the extra money for a few new playable characters and additional episodes. It’s difficult to justify the full price when YouTube has the character episodes and added characters are playable in other Ryza games (e.g., Serri in 2, playable in 3 via DLC), and the episodes themselves only add up to a half-dozen hours. For people who have yet to dive into the games, or stopped midway through Ryza 1, the proposition is much more attractive. Mercifully, the Atelier series went from rarely ever having sales to being on sale frequently as part of publisher sales on Steam and seasonal sales, so fans and newcomers won’t have to wait long if they want to save some cash on the definitive versions of three of the best Atelier games to date.
