20 search results for "shin megami tensei"

It took several months—nearly half a year, actually—to get through Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne start to finish. While this can be largely attributed to real-life factors (namely, moving to and resettling on the opposite side of the contiguous United States), there’s still the matter of the game itself. After all, during that same timeframe, I beat one game, started and beat two others, and started and logged over ninety hours into a fourth. Why was I dragging my heels with Nocturne specifically?

The game itself certainly had something to do with it. Nocturne is a slog at times, made all the more dull by overly simplistic dungeons for most of the game, a peculiar enemy distribution setup, and the auto attack feature. The bare-bones story—Tokyo is destroyed during a ritual, and a new world is going to be born from its ruins—doesn’t help much either, nor does the fact that a good portion of the game’s small cast is made up of bastards. Meanwhile, the NPC human spirits floating around are largely blazé about the horror that has befallen their city; one would think there’d be a bit more panic, or a sense of dread, rather than your typical NPC banter on what various important characters are up to these days. On the other hand, the NPC demons behave in a somewhat more believable manner, given the context.

The meat of the gameplay revolves around the battle and demon recruitment/fusion systems. The turn-based battle system is the same as the one in the later, and superior, Digital Devil Saga games, complete with its potential for unfairness. However, it also shares its auto battle option, which I used as frequently in Nocturne as I did sparingly in DDS. Thanks to an uneven demon distribution in a handful of locations—resulting in some low-level enemies regularly showing up in what should be higher-level areas—I found myself pressing the Triangle button quite often, in order to get the stupidly easy battles over and done with. However, I turned on Auto Mode in more evenly matched bouts as well, the faster to grind my way through dungeons that were, more often than not, the same three corridors (or even worse, the same one or two tiles) over and over again.

As for demon recruitment and fusion, it is a neat idea, but the system is set up to force the player to constantly “upgrade” to better demons. How this is accomplished is simple: all the game’s demons level slower than the main character. Thusly, unlike other RPGs with monster recruitment elements, you cannot develop a fondness for any particular demon, lest you be left behind. This, I believe, is overlooking a crucial element in what makes a good monster recruitment system. Demons are not companions, but mere weapons; they are utterly disposable, and must constantly be replaced with (or fused into) something better.

The smaller touches sprinkled throughout the game aren’t much better. There is a peaceful race of beings in the game, the Manikins, who are all right for the most part, but the vast majority of the Manikin shopkeepers are gay stereotypes who give the Jamaican accent of Digital Devil Saga‘s Cielo a run for its eyeroll-inducing money. A neat puzzle-based minigame is marred by its length and the lack of a way of quitting without saving your progress. There is an optional area called the Labyrinth of Amala, but by the point in the game where I could first access it, I had already decided that I didn’t want to run around even more boring dungeons when I didn’t have to. Devil May Cry star Dante appears in the game, but I only saw him once, and I wasn’t compelled to go looking for him again. As for the aesthetics, the graphics are typical of an early PS2 game, if more washed out, and the music is nothing special.

So in short, I found Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne mediocre and dry. That said, I don’t understand the love that Nocturne commands from many gamers on the Internet. Perhaps it garners such affection because it was the first main-series MegaTen game to be localized in English and contained themes and imagery unlike any other JRPG previously released in the West. Maybe it’s that an M-rated JRPG was unique in 2004—hell, it’s still a novelty to this day—and the Nocturne world has plenty of dark imagery to back up that ESRB designation, not to mention swear words and, it could be said, the aforementioned gay stereotypes, too. Many tout the deep demon fusion system, which is the best thing Nocturne has going for it, but this is not as interesting or enjoyable as similar party management features in other, better games (Pokemon comes to mind, as does Disgaea).

Whatever it is, I don’t think Nocturne has held up very well over the years, and I’m unsure if I would’ve liked it even back when it was first released. While appearing to be polished, in reality it’s rough around the edges, not to mention flawed, and lacks any sort of charisma to make up for its deficiencies. It wasn’t so bad or boring that I quit halfway through, but neither was I driven to find out what happens next in the story, or to see the next dungeon or set of enemies. Nocturne is a game that is the true definition of average.

Once upon a time, there was a dystopia called the Junkyard. The people of this land were divided into six factions, each one designated by a specific color, and their never-ending fight for the right to enter Nirvana was overseen by a seventh entity, the Karma Temple. One day, life in the Junkyard changes when a strange girl emerges from a cocoon, and all of the residents receive the powers of demons. The battle is ratcheted up a notch as the presence of these demons, or Atma, require the residents to start eating each other to remain sane.

Right from the outset, Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga is not your typical JRPG, and the plot only gets more complicated from there. By the time the game ends, you are left with a cliffhanger and many unanswered questions, all of which are addressed (in a sometimes sloppy manner) in Digital Devil Saga 2. Throughout their journey, Serph and the other characters grow and change, find old emotions and uncover pasts and events which they had forgotten or never even known. They’re the types of characters one can get attached to, and even the most unlikable of all, the volatile Heat, ends up being more than he seems.

While the story may be a refreshing departure from the anime fantasies of most JRPGs, the battle and character growth systems are quite familiar. Here, the biggest outside influence on the Digital Devil Saga duology seems to be Final Fantasy X. Not only is one able to swap characters in and out during the midst of battle, but the ability systems in both games take forms that resemble the Sphere Grid. By spending in-game currency at save points, characters can unlock different ability sets, called Mantras, for their Atma to learn. In Digital Devil Saga, Mantras are arranged in a clear, mostly linear map, but in the sequel, this is replaced by a hexagonal grid that not only allows more freedom, but is also tougher to navigate. Once a Mantra has been paid for and set, Atma Points, which are used to master said abilities, can be earned by defeating and/or devouring enemies during battle. It’s a straightforward, elegant system that, while not being quite as complex as the Sphere Grid, does its inspiration proud.

Going back to battles: one of the game’s most distinctive features is the “Press Turn” system, which makes what would otherwise be a staid turn-based affair into something more dynamic. At the beginning of each round in battle, every character and enemy present receives a turn. These turns can be added to or subtracted from by pulling off certain moves. For instance, attacking a monster with a spell type it’s weak against, or with a critical hit, will add a turn to your party’s current round. However, if you miss in your attack, or cast a spell that an enemy can block or absorb, a turn or two can be lost. Skipping a character will cost half a turn, combo attacks cost two or three, and there are other, specific ways to manipulate the number of turns per round, especially in the second game. It’s the type of system that requires careful strategizing and can also get your party into trouble very quickly, especially in the later dungeons. There have been times when I enter a random battle and the enemy goes first—only to be completely wiped out by them without doing anything, because they attacked with spells my party were weak against, or happened to pull off a completely successful instant-death move on everyone. Fortunately, these occurrences were infrequent enough to be merely annoying rather than frustrating, but at the same time, they’re a notable flaw in this otherwise ingenious system.

The game’s general aesthetic is another notable feature. The character designs have a unique style to them, and the world eschews the Judeo-Christian and Buddhist themes of many other JRPGs for Hinduism—from the concept of Nirvana, to enemies visually based on the likes of Vishnu and Ganesha, to the simple mandala designs found throughout both games. Voice acting ranges from tolerable to excellent, leaning more towards the latter overall; unfortunately, the sound mix for the battles nearly drown out any present voice snippets entirely. The guitar-driven soundtracks are decent, and DDS2’s is especially good, with heavy electronica leanings and an engaging, beat-infused main battle theme that trumps the first game’s more sluggish one.

When I first began fleshing out my PS2 RPG collection, it took me quite awhile to find these two games at a decent price (I eventually snagged them off of eBay in a single lot for $100). Despite the occasional annoyances with instant-death battles and having to grind late in both games in order to take down some particularly tricky bosses, I greatly enjoyed them. They were each a good length—roughly 35-40 hours apiece—and although some bits of the story ended up being vague and nonsensical in DDS2, I liked the world and the characters. There’s more about the DDS duology to enjoy than I’ve discussed here, but in general, if you’d like to play a dark, mature RPG with large, complex dungeons and challenging battles, these two games are worth looking into.