Jogo bom.
Tive pouco problemas aqui, o negocio mais merda são as dungeons com teleporte, grande parte delas tem isso, fica chato, principalmente lá no final.
Se repete bastante o estilo das dungeons pelo final do game, apesar de legais, uma hora cansa.
OST boa pra porra, vindo do Meguro eu ja esperava ser quente.
E o sistema de combate se pá é o mais legal que tem.

This game was cursed for me for the longest time. It took seven years, across multiple save files, across multiple platforms, to finally sit down and finish a playthrough. I don't know why (I do, for some reason if I take a break from a game for an extended period of time, I always feel compelled to restart) it took me this long, because what is here is an extremely unique experience. You have press turn combat here in it's purest, rawest form, and it's still fantastic. Building your protagonist is alright, I like the Magatama system but it feels very unforgiving, with how you only get once chance to learn each of the skills when you're prompted. If you plan ahead this isn't an issue, but compared to whispering/essences from 4/5, it's just not as good. Building demons here is just fine too, although I found myself getting annoyed with Fiends clogging up the fusion charts. The dungeons here are also the best compared to the JRPGs I've played so far. Granted, I haven't played many dungeon crawlers, but the dungeons in this game are great, especially the Diet Building and Tower of Kagutsuchi. Exploring the Vortex World is a blast, although it can be a bit slow at times. Also fuck Puzzle Boy.

Tied to that is a minimalistic story, which lends itself well to this games lonely atmosphere. The story here is pretty alright, although the characters do end up being a bit on the weaker side. Dante/Raidou's inclusion to the story here is basically seamless, as they only show up for one boss fight, and after they're exclusively in the Labyrinth of Amala. I much prefer this approach compared to the other rerelease characters in Atlus games.

Lastly, it isn't as much of an issue nowadays but this port is atrocious, especially on the Switch. The new lighting here is a huge downgrade, and it honestly ends up looking worse than the original release on the PS2. Even more damning though is the performance, as it also runs worse than on the PS2, at least on the Nintendo Switch. Even looking past the performance, there's basically zero effort to actually update this game to modern standards, asides from Skill Inheritance (which wasn't even in the Japanese release of the game at launch lol). If you can, get this game on sale on PC and install some mods, I'll link some below.

Graphics Configurator

HD Audio

HD Cutscenes

Display Buffs

Minimap over Compass

During the few hours I've played of the PC release, I've had zero issues with these mods. There's some other QoL mods listed there, so it's definitely worth taking a look and seeing if there's more you want to install.

This game is a masterpiece among JRPGs. If you like the genre in any capacity, you should try this game out. If you don't, still give it a shot. SMT3 doesn't fall into many of the more common trappings of JRPGs, and it's a very unique, worthwhile experience.

i found this game for like 14 bucks at my work and since it had been recommended to me by a friend a while ago, i decided to pick it up and finally give it a shot. i was then sucked into a rabbit hole that culminated in me getting into the SMT series as a whole and playing this game for 115 hours on my first playthrough. oops

SMT:N is probably one of the best rpgs ive ever played. of course, the story is phenomenal and is a heart wrenching tale of friends turning against each other in the wake of a colossal disaster, and the struggles of those at the bottom of the food chain vs the people who are at the top because they were just born that way. but also, nocturne has probably the most interesting system mechanics out of any rpg ive ever played. in a genre where it feels like a lot of the gameplay is just window dressing for a story, nocturne really hits it out of the park with its magatamas and press turn system, letting you customize your character to be literally anything you want, and letting you play off of your game knowledge to sweep the enemy team if you know what you're doing. the game also looks phenomenal for a 2003 PS2 game. (i did play a portion of the ps2 version to confirm this, but my main playthrough was done on the switch version, which suffered from some pretty bad frame drops at times)

of course, the thing SMT is known for (besides its younger brother, persona) is the demon summoning and negotiation, and nocturne does... an alright job with this. it gets the job done, but it feels somewhat frustrating even if you know what you're doing, and monsters can just deny you because they feel like it. there's also not THAT much interesting dialog to make up for this, and by about halfway through the game i just gave up on negotiations all together and resorted to the compendium and fusion to get all the demons i wanted. SMT3 also suffers from "i'm a 20 year old JRPG" syndrome and doesn't make it super clear where to go sometimes. i found myself wandering around feeling very lost sometimes, especially near the beginning of the game. the game is also famously REALLY fucking brutal. i recall at one point near the beginning, i spent an entire day of playing just grinding to be able to beat Matador, and that shit sucked. i ended up shelling out a couple bucks to get the shitty grinding DLC, which is really dumb, but i was struggling so much and i just wanted to start having fun again. that being said, i do eventually want to do a playthrough of hard mode (without using the DLC areas, of course) and i can respect the game's difficulty. the press turn system does somewhat make up for that as well, since if you know what you're doing you can totally sweep an enemy just by using the right combo of moves. still doesn't make up for puzzle boy though, i spent like 3 hours on that shit and then i gave up and use a guide. i admit it, im weak

one last point before we move to the conclusion, this game's soundtrack fucking owns. if you haven't listened to it, please, i beg you, do yourself a favor and listen to the whole thing. that shit rocks, my favorite tracks are mystery, ikebukuro, pretty much all the battle themes, the kalpa music, and puzzle boy. such a good blend of aggressive rock with synthesized voices and ominous, droning synths that really just resonates with me

alright, now for the conclusion. nocturne is a phenomenal game that i cannot recommend enough. but is the MSRP of 50 fucking dollars worth seeing the game in widescreen and a larger resolution with full voice acting and a couple other things? iiiii dunno man. i got my copy preowned for a steal, so i would say 15 dollars was no doubt worth it for me, but the full price is kind of a ripoff, especially considering the ps2 version was like 10 bucks on the ps3 as a ps2 classic. phenomenal game with a couple of minor issues, if you plan on getting the HD remaster, wait for it to go on sale or try to find it pre owned at a gamestop or something.

This playthrough was three years in the making. I played off and on for those three years, but mainly in two big chunks, with the first being during the two week period between when I got this game and when I bought SMT IV, and the second being the past few weeks. SMT IV is a game that has extreme personal significance to me, and while I don't think Nocturne will ever mean that much to me, I still absolutely love everything about it. The world, the music, the tone, the atmosphere, the gameplay. It's incredibly well crafted. I hope I get to play through it again, someday.

My history with Megami Tensei started with Shin Megami Tensei IV back on the 3DS and it took me while to break through the game's incredibly difficult prologue. My history with RPGs had taught me to worry more about levelling up and grinding rather than in depth strategy, so SMT IV really forced me to learn a very tough lesson. Once I finally broke through this barrier, I found that SMT offered some of the most complex and engaging turn-based and RPG systems I had ever used, and I was hooked. Fast forward to now, and I am finally getting to finish SMT III, an absolutely fantastic game that I love, marred by some minor blemishes.

Shin Megami Tensei III's primary draw is seen right after its fantastic prologue. The Vortex World is hauntingly lonely, you rarely feel safe, and are given several mysteries as you wander the barren wastes. The storyline is rather shallow, but finds complexity through its atmosphere, themes, and lore. Between the lingering souls of the dead, the shambling manikins, and the hostile demons; the world keeps you invested even through some predictable events. The characters are also thin, but their purpose is more as a vessel for the Reasons, this game's replacement for the alignment system. As is series tradition, each of the characters become caricatures of extreme ideology, but their turn into this does not feel nearly as engaging as we would see in SMT IV. That said, the ideologies they represent (with one exception) all feel unique in comparison to the series' staple of Law, Chaos, Neutral. While we don't see much of these characters during their descent into their extremism, it isn't unreasonable to believe that while suffering through the Vortex World they would be compelled by these viewpoints for survival. This only works so well because of just how oppressive and unforgiving the atmosphere is, something that I think SMT III does better than almost any game I have played.

The gameplay may not be peak SMT (Sorry, that belongs to IV Apocalypse and V), but it is still more engaging than almost anything else in the genre. SMT III was the introduction of the Press Turn system seen in future games, and it is amazing to see how much they nailed it on their first attempt. Having to focus on exploiting enemy weaknesses, while also having a large focus on status effects and buffs/debuffs lead to even simple random encounters being engaging and potentially dangerous. The series staple demon fusion continues to be some of the most satisfying party customization, and I can (and did) spend hours in the Cathedral of Shadows creating the perfect demon team.

I don't want to bash this game too much for not having features introduced into the series later on, but the lack of some quality of life does make a few things frustrating. Not being able to see demon abilities when trying to swap in battle, a lack of combat information (such as current buffs/debuffs), and the special fusions add some friction that I don't think is necessary to maintain its difficulty and atmosphere. Additionally, several bosses try to use gimmicks to mix up the challenge, but just make for prolonged encounters after learning the pattern and chipping away at their HP before they change phases or die.

My last issues are with the specific version I played, none of which were game breaking, but infuriating for a rerelease of a game from 2003. Slowdown, and resolution drops were CONSTANT on the Switch, something that was incredibly baffling though it was less prevalent in handheld mode. It is infuriating that 4 years later this is still an issue. Additionally, there were several places that this failed as an "HD Remaster". Any cutscenes that were not real-time would be displayed in 4:3 at something close to 480p with awful encoding, this can be seen as early as the OPENING MOVIE AND TITLE SCREEN. While this did not ruin the experience, it is simply unacceptable for something like this to occur. Not only this, but all of the music is still incredibly compressed like it was on the PS2 despite there being high quality versions of this music. All of this says to me that several pieces of source code and files were lost, and Atlus was unwilling to put resources into resolving these issues and instead put resources into creating paid DLC for easy grinding EXP and Macca.

While these issues are huge, the fact remains that the underlying game is absolutely fantastic. I often worry when playing "cult classics" or "masterpieces" that it will be something where I just don't get it like the diehard fans, or it was a "you had to be there" kind of thing. I am happy to say that was not my experience. Despite its rough edges, Shin Megami Tensei III is one of the greatest RPGs I have ever played.