It would take me an unreasonable amount of time to explain all of the reasons I love this game, so I won't even try to do so for the time being. The long and short of it is that I see it as this sort of theoretical maximum amount of purpose you can wring out of modernist game design. The basic concept of the story is clearly informed by the need to Make A Shin Megami Tensei Game, ie it must 1) be conducive to brutally difficult boss fights, 2) be highly allegorical and religious, 3) be exceedingly dark, and 4) contain at least 3 philosophically distinct story routes.

This boxes the game in to some extent, but beyond the basics it sets out the game becomes this genuinely insane story pulling together Mahayana sutras and the book of Job into this profoundly depressing psychological challenge addressing a unique range of topics (themes that jump out to me personally include fascism, sexuality, the need for metanarratives, and powerlessness). Since these ideas were already set up to work within traditional game design, you get some of the most playable JRPG battles I've ever seen and some of the tightest balance between those and the dungeon crawling out there to totally reinforce it the whole way through. The boss fights in particular are a highlight, with each one having some immediately interesting strategy they run on you which you can only get past by keeping your wits about you.

It's a slick game with writing better than most novels I've read, cutscenes more stylish and expressive than many movies I've seen, and design more meticulously balanced than essentially anything else in the medium. On a meta level, it also speaks to the limits of the SMT franchise, the requirements I listed out earlier in this review of being "the next Shin Megami Tensei game". It fundamentally tries to show the player that these can only go so far, even seeming to tacitly encourage them to want to essentially destroy them. However, even in that ending, the game ultimately puts its faith back into it. It's like when I'm playing this game I'm hearing rumblings of something which would finally make me less than embarrassed to admit my love of games, that I might live to see a game which is self-aware enough to deconstruct its own mechanics and build them up into something greater than the sum of its parts. Nocturne stops just barely shy of this; it's an anticipation of a masterpiece that I hope to play someday.

"Man Shadow Okumura sucks ass."

"Oh wow look at the little Persona baby getting mad over a hard boss. Play nocturne and then we'll talk, okay?"

"Okay I played Nocturne, Shadow Okumura still sucks ass."

Nocturne is such an immersive experience, I always feel a strong sense of isolation and danger at every moment and like I'm really fending for myself in that treacherous ruined world. It has my favorite turn based combat system of all time, which has so many possibilties that it makes every other JRPG I play feel slightly disappointing. With the way buffs work there's rarely ever a need to truly grind, if you bring a good strategy you can win, at least when doing the normal endings. There are countless memorable and epic boss battles with easily the most consistent lineup in the Megatens I've played. Everything about the game from aesthetics to concepts to soundtrack is just so metal and brutal and raw. Even when it's really putting me through my paces or beating me down again and again, I'm never too frustrated for long because another idea occurs to me and something awesome happens again. I first completed it on the remaster on TDE, and it probably goes without saying that this PS2 version has better moodier lighting. This run I skipped the Amala Labyrinth entirely and felt the vanilla content had a much better flow and variety to it, but TDE has some of the best boss fights and extreme difficulty too so it's worth trying it once. I just adore this game :)

First, we wanted to draw attention to the fact that this game is a true successor to the Shin Megami Tensei series. III, however, is not only a continuation, but also a new Shin Megami Tensei, completely different from its predecessors, so we added the subtitle to imply that this is the beginning of a new Shin Megami Tensei.
- Okadu Kouji, on the title of Nocturne

It's interesting how much of the perception of the Shin Megami Tensei stems from Nocturne. When you ask the average JRPG fan what they think SMT is like, they'll usually bring up a lot of tropes from nocturne. Ideas like “the games don’t really have a story”, or “the characters aren’t important”, and potentially most infamously, “megaten so hard matador red capote dante lol”. The last one isn’t really important right now, but the first two are curious (and I think, detrimental) statements because they just aren’t true.
For all intents and purposes, Nocturne is a black sheep within the mainline smt pantheon. That’s not to say it’s a bad game, far from it, but what I mean is that it’s pretty far removed from its peers in a lot of ways. It really was a new Shin Megami Tensei, tearing down what was before in order to be reborn. It was the franchise’s own conception.


So, Kouji and Kaneko were not lying, Nocturne really is a whole different beast from its predecessors. Everything you knew about the series with demon recruitment, alignment, non fantasy setting, throw it all out. Nocturne instead takes the franchise in a bold new direction as a puzzle game. An odd choice, but not a bad one.
Instead of a human main character, you play as a demon. You’re trapped in a maze in which you need to push blocks around and into holes in order to escape. The graphics couldn’t be simpler, but they’re a great adaptation of the super nintendo game’s aesthetic in 3D. While the premise couldn’t be more simple, the puzzles become quite taxing very quickly, with many citing the game’s difficulty as one of the core parts of its identity. I think the difficulty is an artistic decision, with the playable Jack O’ Lantern’s unfailing determination serves almost to the player. He cannot ever die, and he can always rewind his mistakes. Though wordless, it is a powerful story about the unshakable will of life, and how it will always prevail in one way or another. No matter how difficult, Jack O’ Lantern’s, and by extension, the player’s victory is only a matter of time.
There’s also a weird minigame that’s some turn based crap but I don’t think anyone really cares about that. I barely played it lol.

The Good:
+ Press turn is amazing. Easily one of the best systems regarding Turn-based combat
+ Haunting atmosphere that suits perfectly the game. It's one of a kind.
+ Organic tutorials: you learn while have fun and don't really notice that you're playing a tutorial.
+ Good world-building through gameplay aspects like demon negotiating
+ Dante from DMC series (lol)
+ Difficulty on point
+ Mostly contemplative and sophisticated storytelling
+ Phenomenal art direction and expressive art direction. Nocturne has impressive and unorthodox framings to a PS2 video game. The character design as a whole is outstanding thanks to Kaneko Kazuma's art.
+ Many optional bosses with interesting mechanics
+ The soundtrack suits perfectly
+ Huge cast of fiends and a customizable party
+ You can customize the attributes and skills of the MC
+ Extremely fair challenge that rewards the players who learn to exploit it
+ There's no "right ending". Just different philosophical approaches on the subject
+ Varied dungeons. They are never the same and always differ on the the needed mechanics to beat them. Also, different hazards
+ If your main character dies it's Game Over. This makes sense from a narrative point of view, but can be seen as a flaw


The Bad:
- Lack of Quality of Life aspects regarding Fusion inheritance (It's a pain. You can't manually select the skills you want to pass on)
- The sound quality sometimes drop to garbage-levels.
- Nothing really happens storywise until halfway through
- Lack of good characterization: You don't really see characters growing on screen. Most of the development happens offscreen
- Random encounters are annoying on certain dungeons and Estoma should be more effective in this regard
- There aren't many remarkable places inside dungeons making it easier to get lost and less interesting. The map helps, but doesn't eliminates the problem.
- It lacks voice acting
- Evasion can easilly break most of the boss fights

The Ugly:
Demi-fiend's bermuda.

Esse jogo é o cúmulo do bullshit. Sério, se você analisar o design de muitas dungeons (especialmente subterrâneas e kalpas) dá pra perceber o quão mal feito esse design é.

Ainda assim, eu sou viciado nesse jogo que nem mosca em merda.

E quem pode me culpar? Nocturne é definitivamente um jogo único, mesmo entre os outros Megaten. Seja a escrita inteligente baseada em conceitos existencialistas de Nietzsche (e eu argumentaria de Sartré mas como não estudei o suficiente não entrarei em tais méritos) ou por seu gameplay profundo e revolucionário, o famoso sistema Press Turn, conhecido por te torturar psicologicamente e te fazer chorar até ser #filtrado.

Agora, isso não é uma análise filosófica de Nocturne, e eu tenho vários motivos para não tentar uma. O principal deles é que sou um símio e não captei tudo do jogo, apenas partes. Por isso, não espere um review na questão simbólica do jogo.

A premissa de Nocturne é bem simples... O protagonista é um moleque de 18 anos que vai visitar sua professora doente no hospital. Ele descobre então que ela, junto com um parceiro chamado Hikawa realizarão um negocio chamado "Conception", em que o mundo literalmente acaba. O protagonista é encontrado pelo Mochila de Criança que o transforma em um ser meio humano e meio demonio, chamado Demifiend.

Okay, isso abre portas para muitas coisas, mas o principal chamativo do jogo no quesito apresentação é a atmosfera, que é a coisa mais próxima no nosso universo de ser o sexo 2. O jogo em TODOS os momentos lhe transmite uma sensação desoladora, de solidão o que é condizente com a situação do Demifiend. Há uma certa mistura de terror com isolamento que casa totalmente com a OST que varia de rock pesado a músicas mais calmas e melancólicas. Até mesmo os bosses ajudam em tal sentimento, te causando vontade de se suicidar a cada vez que você leva um insta-kill!

Piadas a parte, todos devem saber que Nocturne é conhecido por ser um jogo difícil, e eu concordo. Não só difícil como desbalanceado muitas das vezes. Porém, a dificuldade faz parte do jogo. Lembre-se, você está num mundo pós apocalíptico infestado de demonios, é normal que você seja sacaneado e passe dificuldade, é uma batalha por ideais que significa a vida para muitos dos seus inimigos. A dificuldade é parte da experiência e da atmosfera desoladora do jogo, é inesperadamente imersivo e casa bem com o jogo.

As dungeons entretanto... Olha, eu gosto da maioria das dungeons do jogo. ADOREI Obelisco, Mifunashiro, Kabukicho, Assembly, Amala Temple (apesar das bullshits) e outros também. MAS NÃO HÁ EXPLICAÇÃO PLAUSÍVEL PRAS DUNGEONS SUBTERRÂNEAS! Isso também acontece em outros jogos, como DDS mas aqui é numa escala retardada de alta. O fato de elas serem tão baseada na sorte me irrita muito, o backtracking é insuportável também...

A história... é algo complicado de falar sobre. Um bom exemplo de porquê disso são os personagens. Nocturne não tem personagens per se, todos eles são conceitos humanizados, então falar da história seria entrar no aspecto metafísico da coisa e eu não planejo fazer isso.

A gameplay é perfeita. Sem mais nem menos. O sistema de turnos foi o primeiro a usar o Press Turn, mecânica punitiva e isso torna Nocturne tão divertido. Diferente de Pokémon, por exemplo, você deve pensar em cada ação e em cada membro da sua party, na sua build e nos ataques também. O jogo pede que você use seus neurônios e isso torna-o extremamente divertido. O sistema é bem profundo e dá para usar muitas estratégias diferentes.

Concluindo, esse jogo é foda pra caralho. Não é perfeito mas tem um lugar muito especial no meu coração.

(This review is my old take on Nocturne. It’s a very negative view of the game but I actually like Nocturne now. I completed the HD port and this is my more recent review for it.)

I want to like this game but I can't. This is one of the worst designed JRPGs I have ever played.

First let's start with this game's so-called "Difficulty". The only difficult thing I had to do in this game was use an insta kill shield before going back to auto battling. 90 percent of the boss fights in this game are an absolute joke. This is mostly due to evasion buffs being one of the most broken things in the game.

One of this games stand out mechanics is its "Press Turn System" which essentially allows you to transfer a turn to the next party member. Here's the catch though. If you get a crit you get another turn, but, if you miss your attack you lose 2 turns out of the 4 it gives you per player phase. This also applies to enemies which includes boss fights. This system is extremely abusable due to evasion buffs and debuffs. I was literally just using evasion up over and over again for every boss fight and then the bosses would miss their attack and not get a chance to do anything so I could continue auto battling with no repercussions. The good thing is sometimes they will have moves to remove debuffs on themselves or remove your buffs. I've barely seen these moves used though and most of the time the bosses were at the end of the game. Even still, the bosses are super unbalanced and extremely easy to beat. Oh, but there's also the bosses which have gimmicks like being immune to physical damage. So you can sit there for 10 minutes trying to use magic moves (which are very weak in this game) in a stall match waiting for enough turns to use the weak spells as the boss does 2 damage to you and wastes their turns because of the evasion buffs you have.

Now, my biggest problem with this game is the dungeon design. They decided to resort to picking a random path in dungeons for progression. It's super cool when the final dungeon in the game's gimmick is picking a path. If you pick the wrong one you get sent back to the beginning, which is really fun because of the random encounter rate! I swear any time this game has puzzles it's just hoping you went in the right door or area and hope you don't have to start over (which you will).

If you want to fight the fiends then I hope you remembered you probably should go back to the starting area halfway through the game for no apparent reason with no NPC in areas but the place mentioned having any hints or info on the subject. Every time I had to fight a fiend I was literally just going down the checklist of every area in the game including all of the little rooms scattered about in the towns.

The Demon Fusion system is really cool in concept but I wish it made some semblance of sense. It's not touched on beyond the fusion room guy telling you very basic info. It is basically just throwing shit at a wall and hoping it sticks. Hope you can fuse whatever you need from luck alone. I can't help but think that there are ways to make this system more understandable for a blind player, like possibly a graph displaying possible fusions and filling in with the fusions you've already created.

The story is not very good too, which sucks because the concept is actually very interesting. The world is wiped and there is a battle of reasons to determine how the new world will be run. The problem is that the characters have very unrealistic motivations (save for Futomimi) and are barely given any time for me to care about them, or maybe understand where they are coming from.

This is just the surface of this game's issues, there are plenty more but, I would be here all day. But, besides that I will say that I do like the art and world design in this game. It gives off a very unique feel I've never experienced before in a video game. That alone, was the only thing I can take away from this experience that I appreciated, along with some of the songs in the soundtrack.

On the final boss my demon trumpeter used the move holy melody, which is a move that fully heals the mp and hp of the lowest health person in the battle, enemies included. I assumed the final boss was still around above half health and I needed to heal someone below a quarter health. The move targeted the final boss and somehow missed, just not doing anything. I think that moment alone took 10 years off of my life for the pure shock of almost healing the final boss to full. I killed him on that run and I think about that moment a lot. I was streaming the fight and I think everyone else was equally as confused. This game rocks.

the world dies. but it doesn’t stop existing. its post-mortem is a decaying place, where demons full of different desires and wandering souls full of regrets roam around. the world is the way it is because a conception occurred. it’s on stand-by, waiting for someone with strong will to create a new world based on their reasons. “reason” is an individual’s inner philosophy. it’s not the first time that an individual with a “reason” creates a new world. it will not be the last. someone will always want to change the status quo. so the cycle continues, a new world dies and a new world is reborn, as god intended.

shin megami tensei: nocturne is a videogame about cycles.

it follows this idea to its core: kagutsuchi, the center of this universe, probably “god”, follows the cycle of the moon. it starts as a new phase, until it becomes “full” and goes down until it becomes new again, thus continuing the cycle. this translates to in-game events that vary according to kagutsuchi phases, as enemies becoming stronger or specific items being acquired once the it is in its “full” phase.

the concept of “reason” to continue the samsara is also something very important in-game. it is the mechanic of “alignments” from shin megami tensei but contextualized to nocturne’s setting, where your choices affect the course of the game’s narrative and leads you to a specific ending. each character represents a “reason” and is very interesting to see how each reason has its own implications on society (and i assume that early 2000s japanese society is the biggest parameter) and character’s motivations, as well some political ones (hikawa wants a world of peace where humanity will cease to desire. thus, there will be no evil. still he drops the equivalent of a nuclear bomb in a place to achieve his goals). as the game goes, the characters progressively get deeper into their ideals until abandoning their humanities (philo-phsyi-cally) and becoming ideas themselves.

you don’t have to go further, you can go back.

in the middle of all of this, there is a single character that is the most interesting one for me: yuko takao. she’s your school teacher that you visit in the hospital at the beginning of the game and, together with hikawa, she triggers the conception in order to create a new world. however, she regrets what she did: she does not believe in the reason of shijima. she believes in something else. what? well, she doesn’t know. still, she lives searching for her truth. what enchants me about her is how she doesn't sink into ideology, becoming only a vessel for a “reason”, but keeps struggling, searching for her own truth with hope in her heart that she will create a better world. she’s the most human character in this game.

and, while you have to be a human to create a new world, you must summon a god and become one with them in order to conceive a new world. believing in someone that keeps struggling the way she is to achieve her goals is the true way to break the status quo? or perhaps you are just regressing to the old world? is the old world really that bad?

you don’t have to follow the cycle. you can break it.

there’s also the enigmatic figure of a blonde boy/oldman with an old/young lady in black, who gives you “magatama” in order for you to become the demi-fiend and has its own views on the situation. following their path will lead you to the labyrinth of amala, where you commit the worst sin: search for knowledge. suffering through the most head-wrenching dungeons will lead you to the truth, even if you have to follow a dark path. the blonde wants to break the cycle, but instead of having hope, he is full of hate for being submitted to the eternal cycle of life and death of the universe. maybe it is the time for the oppressed to go against the oppressor, breaking the status quo, defying the great will and starting a new world where they are the ones that rule.

shin megami tensei: nocturne is a videogame about cycles.

it does not blame you for following the cycle and choosing a reason and does not blame you for the reason you choose. however, it presents you with the choice of breaking the cycle and following a different path. it does not matter which path you follow anyway.

someone will always want to kill the world you created.

Atmosphere and mood are a considerable part of what draws us to games. A lot of people I know love Klonoa because of the lighter atmospheres those games tend to have - their fantastical landscapes and projected imagination create an inviting tone with impossible geometry that reminds one of their own restless dreams. Bad things happen in the Klonoa games, sure, but the tone doesn't often linger on them for too long. They're largely whimsical fun, and possibly the definition of the adorable mascot platformer to me.

I've recently found myself more and more attracted to games with heavier atmospheres. I played Silent Hill 2 and Disco Elysium for the first game, both games with a heavy fog on them - one literal and one metaphorical, but both present all the same. They were incredibly harrowing and depressing works to play through, to the point that I couldn't bring myself to finish Disco Elysium. It was simply too real. The muted colors, the failed aspirations of a more optimistic era, the sad horns that play every time you're outside. It all came together beautifully.

This wasn't my first time experiencing Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, nor would I say that its atmosphere is particularly oppressive. I only bring those two games up because I'm not sure what else to compare it to. Nocturne feels very gritty in all its aspects, a game full of grim imagery and nihilistic wit, but it all comes together in a very playful way. Where something like Final Fantasy VI tries to frame its nihilistic worldview in a more serious manner, Nocturne revels in absurdity. Demon dogs will talk about how they wish they weren't so scary looking. Another devil named after a Norse God will be embarrassed at the prospect of you going in his room. It's all having a lot of fun with itself - it's hard for me to think of a moment in what little I've played that doesn't have some form of humor injected into it.

This is also incredibly clear in its combat system and how it does not care if you're up to speed on how it works in any respect. The game operates on the press-turn system, in which the act of hitting a weakness or getting a critical hit gets you more turns. However, the weaknesses are not particularly easy to memorize due to the non-conventional type system - It's the reason why I decided not to continue playing in 2021. I simply did not have the time to memorize the entire type matchup. This time around, I watched my boyfriend, who is an expert on this game, try to continue from my save file to the best of his ability.

It was through this that I saw the true potential of this atmosphere. Even though he claimed victory after victory throughout the course of the game, it all fell short because of one boss.

The Matador.

Much has been said of Matador, and much more will be said of him in the future. I know that he's easily defeated once you know the strategy, but there's something to be said for the impression he makes on the player. I didn't know anything about him before I watched my boyfriend play just a few days ago, and seeing this skeleton with a rapier come out of nowhere to absolutely body someone I had seen decimate the game with ease up until this point perfectly encapsulated my own experience with the game. Pointless and full of failure, but never cynical. Always full of life and passion. That's Nocturne, a silly, cackling skeleton waving his red cape to make the player run into it before pulling it away.

It's a wonderful dark joke of a game.

SMT Nocturne is the JRPG from Hell. At times it feels like the game is sentient and hates you. Once you accept this, however, it's surprisingly fun.

So yes, this game is difficult. But now that I've actually PLAYED it rather than just watched boss fights and consumed memes, I realize it's also surprisingly well-designed. Yes, you will die a lot. But save points are fairly frequent and reasonably-placed, as are heal points. I rarely lost enough progress from dying to be frustrated. Dungeons are also fairly short, so tend not to overstay their welcome. And it's not ALL dungeons, there some towns with NPCs to speak to, and said NPC dialogue is pretty good at giving gameplay tips to newcomers along with guidance on where to go next.

Speaking of newcomers, this was the first Shin Megami Tensei game to introduce the now-standard (and beloved) Press Turn system. Hitting an enemy weakness turns one of your turns into a half-turn, effectively granting you another action. (You can also "pass" your turn for the same effect) While hitting an immunity or missing an attack consumes 2 tuns. And in classic SMT fashion, mechanics work the exact same way for both sides. Minus Beast Eye and Dragon Eye, anything the enemy can do, you can do too.

If you haven't played a Shin Megami Tensei game before, you'll quickly find that buffs and debuffs are your friend. Status ailments are deadly, but they're also part of the element system, letting you punish the enemy for using them with the right Demon allies.

Aside from the customizable "Demi-Fiend" protagonist, you'll be making your party out of the Demons you battle, like a twisted version of Pokemon. Demons always have the same weaknesses and resistances on your side as they do as enemies, and this is... a little hit-or-miss in Nocturne. A surprising number of Demons, even early ones, have no weaknesses at all, forcing you to rely on physical critical hits to gain turn advantage. And then these same Demons, once recruited, essentially let you forget about enemies gaining turns off YOUR weaknesses, which kinda saps some of the fun. The Fiends are especially notable here. Optional bosses added in the "Maniax" version, they all lack weaknesses and nullify ailments (therefor robbing the enemy of turns for attempting them), AND tend to have overpowered skills, so can trivialize gameplay once you unlock them.

Most Demons are obtained via Fusion (which should be familiar to those who played Persona) or the dreaded negotiation. Some Demons can also evolve, Pokemon-style, though this is left as a fun "easter egg" to discover. I was surprised at how little I minded negotiation though. As long as you're not too stingy with money and items, you'll get the demons you want eventually through sheer persistence. There are skills that make it easier, but I was fine embracing the randomness most of the time. Once you unlock the Compendium you can re-summon any Demon you've had before, which helps.

Having played through the whole game, even the difficult optional dungeon, my main criticism is Evasion buffs and debuffs are actually pretty broken. As missing means you take no damage AND the enemy loses turns, Fog Breath on the foe and some Sukukajas on the party can make you practically invincible. Only late-game bosses carry buff/debuff cancel skills, and some don't even have both.

Being an older SMT game, Nocturne has its fair share of jank you'll have to live with. The protagonist learns skills from Magatamas (think equipped armour), but if you refuse a skill you never get a chance to re-learn it, and only the next skill a Magatama learns is visible, meaning it's easy to give up skills you later realize you need if you don't have a guide, or give up on a Magatama too soon.
Hard Mode is what the bosses are designed around (Normal is secretly an Easy mode, halving damage taken), but it also triples shop prices and prevents running from random encounters. If that sounds annoying to you, I'd recommend playing on Normal for exploration, and switching to Hard for bosses. (Difficulty can be changed from the menu at any time, at least in the remaster) The HD Remaster at least lets you select inherited skills in fusion (after a patch), while keeping the option of randomized inheritance if you prefer that.

I haven't even talked about the story yet. If you're playing Nocturne, you're likely doing it for the gameplay. It has less "story" and more "lore" and "atmosphere", but both are very good. You'll be exploring some of the most unique and creative-looking locations in any JPRG, with an excellent soundtrack by the legendary Shoji Meguro setting the mood. The difficult gameplay enhances the atmosphere, making you feel like you're struggling to survive in a post-apocalyptic world where everything wants you dead. The characters are all varying degrees of unlikable, but that's kind of the point.

My only real criticism isn't to do with the plot itself, but how one of the Maniax additions impacts it. The original story had multiple endings, all shades of grey, but Maniax added a new ending with far more content that essentially invalidates all the others. As a result, you don't see the original 5 (yes, FIVE) endings discussed or considered much, which is a shame as they're all conceptually interesting.

Overall, do not go into Nocturne unless you have some experience with Shin Megami Tensei and/or Persona already and are looking for a challenge. But if you do, you'll find some of the best gameplay, boss fights and atmosphere in the JRPG genre.

confident and self-assured, nocturne takes a risk and diverges from the style established in the classic, genre-defining SNES games and gives up the cyberpunk flair for unsettling, contemporary atmosphere laced in a rich hard rock sound. instead of demon summoning programs and makeshift blade runner-esque technology, demi-fiend finds himself injected and violated by lucifer himself, given nothing but a vague motive to direct the vortex world as an ubermensch-type figure. the protagonist has biological ties to this new world now, and he can't just look away from it -- the marks of a demon are all over his body.

nocturne's difficulty and unforgiving nature redefined the perception of shin megami tensei as a whole: since nocturne, this is a series with high risk-reward combat that paints desolate scenarios the player will find themselves barely scraping by through. the original SMT presented this well through plot, but nocturne was the first to utilize gameplay mechanics to reinforce the series' brutality.

nocturne isn't a joyless, humorless edgelord game either. throughout my entire replay, the main thing that stood out were all of the unique NPCs and optional bits of dialogue that helped flesh out the world. whether it's just hearing random lost souls talk about tangentially related subjects or demons with genuinely clever quips and jokes, nocturne's world is by no means devoid of personality and charm.

i stand by the game being a bit too unforgiving to first-time players that don't know what they're doing. there's no way to know which way is "correct" for a good demi-fiend build, and which magatamas you should be grinding out until it's too late. you can end up making the game as a whole significantly harder for yourself if you put too many stats into ag or lu. demon fusion discourages experimentation because of how damn pricy it is early/mid game, forcing a player to stick with potentially very suboptimal demons or grind their ass off for money.

but with a little nudge in the right direction, nocturne is a perfectly manageable and rewarding experience that respects the player's intelligence and feels great to progress in. every boss, every dungeon, every tough random encounter makes you feel fucking incredible, and that's a feeling that nothing quite nails but this series.

This is one of the few games I find hard to talk about without getting a bit rambly and abstract, as I think this game elevates the medium to an artistic marvel that remains unparalleled in its atmosphere, storytelling, setting and ideas. I could write an entire essay about this game. There are going to be minor spoilers ahead, so be notified.

When we think of JRPGs, we often think about saving the world, good versus evil, power of friendship and fantasy settings. This game ignores all of these tropes that we've come accustomed to. Instead of saving the world, the world ends within the first ten minutes of the game, there's no good or bad, instead of a party the protagonist is alone and instead of a fantasy setting it's set in modern Tokyo. Shin Megami Tensei games have a system known as the allignment system. There's no scale that measures choices between good and evil, but rather between law and chaos, which are extreme opposites of ideals.

At the beginning of the game you meet with your friends at Shinjuku Hospital. Upon arrival, your teacher seems to be missing. Your friends tell you that there's something off about this hospital and suggest to look for her. At some point while exploring the hospital, you meet this creepy dude in a chair, a cult leader. His name is Hikawa. He tells you about the inevitable rebirth of the world and attempts to kill you but is interrupted by your teacher who suddenly showed up. She takes you up to the rooftop to witness the spectacle called The Conception, which means the end of the world. She tells you that everything outside the hospital will be destroyed. Here you're about to witness the end of the world (which is a sight to behold). After The Conception occured you wake up in the same hospital, but not as the same kid you once were, but as the Demi-Fiend (half demon half human). Once you leave the hospital you learn that you're now in a chaotic post-apocalyptic limbo state called The Vortex World inhabited by demons. Within the Shin Megami Tensei universe exists a multiverse with billions of worlds that all go through a cycle of rebirth after a certain point. My guess is that this happens when a world runs out of steam, so to say. When on a collective and spiritual level the world somehow runs against a wall and needs to be reborn in and endless cycle of reincarnation (the title Shin Megami Tensei translates to Reincarnation of the Goddess after all). After The Conception occurs, everything about the world as you knew it is gone, with the exception of the few survivors in Shinjuku Hospital. You, your friends Chiaki and Isamu, as well as your teacher and the cult leader Hikawa are the only survivors left. There's one more guy who survived (there are theories going around that he is the reincarnation of Aleph from Shin Megami Tensei II, but I'm not going into that here as it's not relevent for this review).

Let's get the obvious out of the way first, the atmosphere. Without a doubt the most unique, eerie, dreamy, mysterious, lonely and yet beautiful atmosphere I've seen in a game. What's so odd about this isolated atmosphere is that instead of it being scary or claustrophobic like in a lot of survival horror games, here I find myself strangely attracted to this chaotic and isolated world. It makes me feel calm and happy. Why is that? I think there are multiple factors that make this possible. One very important factor is the story and characters.

In this game, there's a thing called Reason. A Reason is essentially an inner philosophy or ideology for how the world should be reshaped. With a strong Reason and enough power, one can summon a demonic sponsor to create a world with the laws they wish for. Since demons and even semi-demons are forbidden to have a Reason, you, the protagonist can't have a Reason. However, the idea here is that you can side with a Reason. The characters you can side with are Chiaki, Isamu or Hikawa, each with a different ideology. These characters are not there to be sympathised with, but they represent ideas. Yosuga is the Reason of Chiaki. It is a Reason based on elitism and survival of the fittest. Those who are useless and weak do not deserve to live and would be purged from society. Only those who are strong may rule, and power is acknowledged as the only thing of value. The weak will forever serve the strong. Musubi is the reason of Isamu. It is based on solitude and isolation. The self is absolute, and every living being would live in an independent world, completely separate from all other living beings. The individual could use their mind to shape their world at will into their own personal paradise, without consequences or unwelcome interference of others. Shijima is the Reason of Hikawa. It is based on stillness and oneness. It is a world of perfect harmony, without self, without passion, without conflict, without destruction. Individuality is eradicated and there is simply a collective inner peace in which everyone is equal to God. This collective functions as cogs in the giant, stable machine that is the universe.

What comes to mind when you read these philosophies? Well, they all have a theme in common: the world as it was... kinda sucked. The game never explicitly tells you the backstories of these characters, but it's exactly this subtlety and attention to detail that makes this game so brilliant in its way of storytelling. You rarely meet these characters after The Conception, but when you do, every single dialogue matters. No unnecessary chit-chat here. Let's take Chiaki as an example to illustrate how this game handles its story. The first time you meet her after The Conception, she will tell you that she's scared and sick to the stomach because she lost everything. The second time you meet her she will tell you that's she's tired of having to look over her shoulder all the time. When she finally realises her Reason and shares it with you for the first time, you're presented with one of the most beautiful cutscenes I've ever seen in a game. We are suddenly in a white space in where Chiaki is standing in front of what looks like a teacher's table where she's looking over a classroom with red silhouettes of chairs, tables and people. She tells you that the previous world 'was filled with unnecessary things' while the silhouettes disappear and the chairs and tables slowly fall down and fade away, as if the ground disappeared. Until all that's left is Chiaki sitting on a table in the middle of an empty white space. Her dialogue itself makes little sense in this cutscene, however there's something deeper going on. Something that's not visible in her lines. She says she wants to shape a world in which only the strong rule, but actually her Reason is based on fear and paranoia. If you pay attention to the little information that the game gives you about her you can see right through her reasoning. The classroom setting makes me think she felt weak and lonely in the world and The Vortex World made her feel even weaker, which probably affected her reasoning. These character's ideologies are mostly based on their greatest fears. Which really made me think that psychology and philosophy aren't that far apart from each other.

Back to why this game makes me feel happy and calm rather than anxious or depressed and why I think the story and characters are important to understand what The Vortex World is. This isolated world of limbo feels like an escape from reality. You get to see how The Vortex World shapes these characters and how they basically become mad. I think the concept of isolation is also being explored here, what complete isolation does to the mind. What all of these characters have in common is that they were unsatisfied with the world in one way or another, but mostly with themselves. As depressing as that may sound, I think it's beautiful how it is not afraid to convey this existential ennui that has always been an essential part of the human condition ever since we could express ourselves, but in today's modern western societies it seems like these kind of subjects are not being explored that often anymore. I'm always happy whenever I stumble across a work of fiction like this that breaks these taboos to reveal something that's so universally human. Isolation may or may not be a modernity problem, but people do lack some sort of collective and spiritual meaning. Without getting too sidetracked here, this game makes you think about your own spirituality and what kind of world you want to live in. Are you satisfied with the way it is?

The Vortex World feels like home to me. It's a world I know all too well. I think it's a world we all know. It's a dreamy, absurdist world without meaning or purpose. It makes me relativate the world we live in. Almost as if you were watching it from above. This game is also sprinkled with dark humour that enhances the feeling of relativation even more. For example, when you talk or negotiate with demons, they can be opportunistic, sexist, unreasonable and downright assholes, which I find fitting in a chaotic world where demons are motivated by desire and don’t care about conscience or justice.

I'm aware that this review is messy. I didn’t even get to talk about the gameplay, battle system, demon fusion, demon negotiation and more. There are a lot of things I missed. Like I mentioned at the beginning of this review, I can't talk about this game without getting rambly (and somewhat pretentious). Again, I could write an entire essay about it.

On a final note, I'm glad to see that this game has risen in popularity over the years and gets the recognition it deserves. It's rich with lore, it has a great battle system, interesting mythological and religious references, great minimalistic story, thought-provoking ideas and themes, heady subjects, awesome soundtrack, unique atmosphere, humour, compelling dialogues — I can go on and on why I think this game stands to me as the very best, not only within its respective genre, but in the entire medium.

Features Dante from the Devil May Cry series.