Topic: 真女神転生 — Shin Megami Tensei

[Quemaqua]

So I could have sworn we had a thread for this somewhere, and I guess we don't. So we do now.

I've always been fond of what these games were trying to do, but I still haven't given enough time to any of them, mostly because when I really started to get into them was when I really didn't have a lot of time for gaming. Lately I've been playing Bravely Default and Mario Golf: World Tour a bit, but made the mistake of booting up the iOS port of the original Shin Megami Tensei; or, more accurately, the first-ever English port of the game in any of its numerous forms, which comes specifically from the Japanese iOS release which is itself a port of the GBA version of the game (and THAT one was taken mostly from the PS1 port, which was derived from the original SNES game).

Why the hell did Atlus release the first-ever official English translation on iOS? Because it's really the only place they had to do it. There really weren't any other active markets to release it into where a product in Japanese existed for Atlus USA to localize. This pissed off a lot of people. I decided to give it a whirl, and man, it's really good stuff. It's archaic, rough around the edges, controls awkwardly, and looks as dated as you might gather, but I'll be damned if I'm not totally hooked. I've basically forgotten all my other games in favor of this one.

A review at Siliconera
Fun interview about the localization process

( I'm actually more fond of the PS1 soundtrack than the SNES, unlike the reviewer above, though, so here you go:

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My interest in the series has been set ablaze again, and I may devote a little more time to it this summer than I'd planned. I might also try to pick up a couple of the PS2 releases that I don't have. I found a cheap copy of the 3DS release of Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers and also Strange Journey. So I'm pretty pumped. I never did get to invest the time into Persona 3 Portable on my PSP after I lost P3 and P4 in the divorce (it's totally fine, Julia was a huge fan of both games), so I'm hoping I'll be able to get to that again as well. Hopefully when I get back to California and trek all my games back across the country (long story short: mom's moving, it's time to take back everything I've been storing there), I'll also boot up SMT: Nocturne.

What interests me most, though, is that I never realized SMT was as big as it is. I was aware it was popular in Japan, but entirely unaware that it was considered one of the big RPG franchises, right alongside Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest. There are more entries in the series than I was aware of, and some of the ones I'd written off before I took a new look at and have become interested in.

I've been out of the loop with gaming for a while. Feeling disconnected, like most games were appealing to a different audience than me, and like I just didn't have the time or interest to devote any longer. The 3DS, of all things, started to change that, along with the time I spent with Diablo 3 (again, of all things) after the big patch and the expansion. My resurgence of interest in classic games as well as a desire to get back into SMT has changed things a bit for me too. My other goals are all still getting time devoted to them, but I find myself able to set aside time for gaming too without feeling guilty, and that's been really nice. I've been far too stressed for the last several years, and it's reminding me that it's okay to take a break when you need one.

Anyway ... just thought I'd share. Will post further thoughts on the original as I go.

[TheOtherBelmont]

Awesome! Glad to see someone else here besides me get into the SMT games. I still have several of them to finish myself, but I loved the hell out of Nocturne. I wish there would be some kind of physical or digital release for the first SMT game besides iOS.  I would like it if they did that with SMT 2 as well but it will probably never happen and the fact that the first game got released here at all surprised me.  I played a fan translation of the first two SMT games right before playing Nocturne and they were pretty fun.

For anyone else that has any interest in the games, the two SMT:Digital Devil Saga games, SMT: Nocturne, and I think one of the Devil Summoner games for the PS2 have all been released on PSN for $10, but I would suggest reading up or watching some videos on any of them first before you want to jump in.

[Quemaqua]

I've been tempted to grab Nocturne for PS3 even though I have my PS2 back in Cali which I'll be picking up this month. I don't have a good setup for the PS2 even though we have a tube TV hooked up for it. It's just in the living room, which has sort of turned into the dogs' room. Then I also thought of just playing it on an emulator, since it'd probably be easier to play in here rather than in the bedroom, even. And less jaggies. We'll see! Got so much else to finish first.

Things going well on SMT1 so far. Just managed a tough boss fight that wasn't actually a boss fight but just a demon gangbang. Had to fuse up some new dudes and try out some different strategies to manage it, but I got through on my third try. First I didn't realize it was happening, second I tried using better guys, but third I was more successful in exploiting weaknesses and had guys that could soak a little more damage. I also got lucky and got an extra turn on each round because I surprised the enemy (which I guess is just as random there as in any fight ... sort of funny since they were the ones who jumped ME).

[nickclone]

I've played a lot of the Devil games on the DS, I liked them, but eventually got tired of the extreme grinding and stopped playing. When I had my PSP, I got one of the early PS Shin Megami Tensei games ( I think it was number two), but I didn't like it too much. Like you said, it was quite archaic and I found it frustrating.

Then I played Persona 3 Portable (P3P), I have to say it's one of my favorite RPGs of all time. I have very fond memories of laying in bed playing P3P for hours with some random junk playing on tv. I loved the fact that I cared about all of my characters and felt responsible for all the monsters I created. I love turn based RPGs, but without a portable system, they're really hard to find these days.

I would love to play Persona 4 for the Vita, but I can't justify buying a Vita for just one game.

[Quemaqua]

There's always the PS2 version. You won't get some of the extra content they added, but it's still a good and good-looking game.

[gpw11]

I would love to play Persona 4 for the Vita, but I can't justify buying a Vita for just one game.

I couldn't think of a single reason to buy a Vita except that I had access to some free games for it.  I now play it more than I should.   It really is a great platform for all those indie games I just seem to ignore on the bigger consoles/platforms.

Edit:

Forgot the meat of the post:   I have a love hate relationship with the SMT series.    I haven't played the originals at all, but a few of the Persona games (one of the P2 games, P3, and P4), as well as the DS games.   I found the P2 game to be pretty lame, although I loved the concept/setting.  P3 and P4 were great, but like Nick, found the DS games relied on too much grinding and stat sperging (which I CAN get into, but don't always want to). 

Where do these ones fall in?

[nickclone]

Unfortunately I don't have and never had a PS2, I guess I could emulate it, but I don't even have a controller. Sad, I know.

In P3P you have to reach the top of a tower that has a lot of floors (tried to look up the answer, but no one seems to want to tell), it will take a long time. Personally, I didn't grind too much and I didn't do it because I had to. When I did grind is was just to level certain team members to the same levels as everyone else because I didn't use them as much or they missed a boss battle. Also, I tend to explore every inch of an area when I play, so I kinda grind without grinding. I'll just say that I never came across anything too hard.

[Quemaqua]

My experience is obviously limited, but I've never found grinding to be much of a thing in these games because usually grinding doesn't help as much as fusing/recruiting better demons. If I've ever done any "grinding", it wasn't really grinding, but just attempting to get a few more demons in the stable or whatever. I haven't done any grinding at all in SMT1, though I did just go through a section where I wandered around a little bit getting new demons and trying new fusions since I lost two characters and gained one that doesn't have any of the spell or attack power I was relying on. I'm pretty much going to need demons for anything significant at this stage of the story.

I find that this is more fun than most RPG grinding since it isn't just "kill shit, level up". It's pretty entertaining dealing with the demon recruitment situation, and fun to then go experiment and fuse stuff. I did grind out one or two levels when there was a demon I wanted I needed to be a level higher to get, but that took all of like 10 minutes or something, was never a big thing. Dustin could speak more to this since he's played through Nocturne and DDS, etc.

[Quemaqua]

So I put about 10 hours into SMT1, and I really have been enjoying it. The only problem is I'm just not feeling playing it on the iPod, and I got antsy wanting it to be over just so I could stop playing a game on my stupid iPod. Then I found a nice copy of SMTIV on 3DS at a local game store. I popped it in out of curiosity. Before I knew it, I was 10 hours in.

God damn, I am so into this game. It's so good. So, so good.

[nickclone]

A couple of years ago I ran into a lump sum of money, I decided to buy myself a gaming system because I didn't have one. I got it down to either a 360 or a 3DS...sometime I regret not getting the 3DS. I'm jealous that you get to play traditional RPGS, let alone on the go...so jealous.

[Quemaqua]

I think honestly there are more games I want on 3DS already than out of the whole 360 library. Since my 360 redringed I seriously regret the money I wasted on that. Though I'll probably be putting up all or nearly all of my 360 games for sale because of that at some point, hopefully that'll take at least a bit of the sting out of it. I wonder if anybody still buys broken ones to fix. My guess would be no, or for almost nothing.

[nickclone]

I bought a controller and I've been playing Persona 4 with a PS2 emulator. I like the game so far, but there is way too much talking going on right now. I'm over four hours in and I've only done 2 battles, I feel like I'm reading/watching a game rather than playing it.

[TheOtherBelmont]

I bought a controller and I've been playing Persona 4 with a PS2 emulator. I like the game so far, but there is way too much talking going on right now. I'm over four hours in and I've only done 2 battles, I feel like I'm reading/watching a game rather than playing it.

It's a bit of a slow burn and a lot of set up at the beginning, but once you get out of the first dungeon and beat the first boss the dialogue heavy parts are spread out a lot more evenly.

[nickclone]

Its a lot better now, a bit harder than Persona 3. I like it.