El juego hace muy bien su trabajo de ser un JRPG completamente hijo de puta siendo un juego muy bueno. Me encanta el estilo, los gráficos, la historia y la estética en general, es de lejos lo mejor del juego; el gameplay, pues bueno, está algo viejuno a ratos, tiene muchas cosas que alargan el juego un poco de más, como el concepto en sí de las terminales pequeñas, básicamente cosas que en su época tenían sentido tanto como limitaciones como para alargar el juego, pero hoy en día solo se sienten una molestia. El juego es largo de más, sobre todo si te quieres hacer el 'true ending' porque tiene mucho jefe que te obliga a prácticamente reestructurar tu equipo por completo y quieras que no te quema muchas horas, por no hablar de que yo he jugado en difícil y me arrepiento un montón, porque he acabado con 47h de partida y 87h en steam, casi tanto tiempo repitiendo como jugando. Es un absoluto clásico que lo hace todo demasiado bien para su época, pero hoy en día está un poco viejete para el género, aún así, lo recomiendo, por supuesto, jugándolo en normal.

After beating this game for the first time, can I recommend it.
HOLY HELL YES.

The Story is amazing. Though so far I only saw one ending (the hardest one to get) which was
...well interesting. (I don't want to spoiler so I keep the name out of it)
On my path of glory I killed major 50 Bosses, a lot of them optional, and 8 Mini-Bosses.

On the story: If you expect something nice and friendly like in Persona, forget it.
This game is dark and gritty to the core. It has 6 possible endings which can be influnenced by
how you answer specific questions in the game. Well at least 5 of them. The 6th one requires you to basically beat every boss and solve an optional dungeon that will test your abilities to the maximum.

Gamplay: I love the press turn system. For people who don't know it. If you or the enemy hit a weakness or land a crit you (or them) get an extra turn. For every missed, Blocked, Absorbed or repelled attack you (or them) loose an additional turn. (on top of the turn you just used) It makes the game certainly harder than most modern JRPG's but is also very rewarding and enganging.
Also to draw the line between Persona and mainline SMT its much more exploration and dungeon crawling
focused. You barely interact with other humans just occasionally souls or demons standing around.
The recruit system might be a little random but I never had major problems recruiting most demons to my party. The fusion system is magnificent but also much more unforgiving and expensive compared to Persona.

Music: A dark rock/industrial soundtrack (with occasionally some lighthearted) creates a fitting atmosphere.
Note: The soundtrack in the game is still heavily compressed but there are mods changing that.
But even in compressed form (I listened to both so I have a reference) the soundtrack still slaps hard.

The demon and level design, while limited, is still interesting.
The atmosphere is constantly dreadful because you need to reach save points and aside from a few rooms and areas its not safe anywhere. Wuick travel between save points is nice.
The game can be pretty grindy (at least without using center of conception and where the demi-fiend was born dlc's) and frustrating for new players. (I recommend using at least a guide for enemy weaknesses)

Note: The time steams shows is not the actual time I beat the game in. I took a little over 50 hours because the game goes on full pause when you alt-tab. And I talked a lot on discord while playing.

Summary: If you like pokemon-esque gameplay with more depth and interesting demon design I would give this a shot. The story keeps one going and makes you want to see it through to the end.
I recommend against the Merciful difficult except you only want to enjoy the story because it makes the game extreme easy. (I played on normal and maybe will replay it on hard at some point)

Verdict: 8.5/10

Shin Megami Tense III: Nocturne, the modern masterpiece that every western fan still sings great praises of to this day. While I think it is slightly too deified, it's not without great reason. The atmosphere is perfect, the gameplay thoroughly fun and engaging unlike past SMT titles, and the art direction is impeccable. I think the story is alright, though it could be brought up to the players face more often rather than having npcs stitch it together. The characters are also pretty underwhelming. If you can stomach a lack of modern QOL, high encounter rate, and fair challenge (on normal at least), Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne is one of the greatest rpgs on PS2 and a favorite for many fans.

I really enjoyed my time with this one, but even for a remaster, really shows the test of time. Most of the problems that I have with this game are acceptable for a game released in 2003, but not a remaster released in 2020. My MAIN problem being that the enemy ai is really stupid. The game has a fantastic press turn battle system and it feels really cool to use it, but I don't feel as if the enemy ai is smart enough to use it as strategically as the developers intended. It feels really cool as a player using it to manipulate the turn order, but the enemy is constantly either failing to use it, or even going as far to hinder themselves. It doesn't make me as the player feel smart or satisfied when the enemy is constantly screwing themselves over rather than me winning by being smart. It seems to me that they could have updated the ai before this modern day release. And theres just other little things like being unable to read what skills do in game, and having to look them up online. That is the most barbaric thing I could imagine in a jrpg like this, and I could not believe they didn't add that into this remaster. But overall the gameplay loop, story, and customization are all pretty great for a 2003 game I have to admit. I just wish they remastered more than the graphics here.

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.

This is a game that is definitely an acquired taste. It took me quite a bit of persistently coming back to it before I finally got past the "filter" and enjoyed myself once I unlocked the compendium. I did okay past here.

The story has little dialogue compared to most JRPGs I feel, the main story suffices in getting the point across but if you want a bit of a bigger picture you should talk to NPCs a lot (Why are you playing a JRPG and not doing this anyways?). DEFINITELY use a guide if you get stuck in some dungeons though, though your patience level may be better than mine.

I went for the Musubi ending and was very satisfied with the ending I got and I'm already looking forward to my eventual replay so I can do True Demon Ending or something. That means a lot considering I am VERY flippant about watching and playing stuff, so the fact I'm so eager to replay it despite this should speak volumes.

Fantastic game overall, though my personal recommendation? Play whatever difficulty you want, and go for whatever Reason you want for the ending. A lot of the appeal of SMT is seeing where your choices take you ending wise, at least imo. This game sold me more on the MegaTen franchise than any video essay ever has, I see the light now.

I finally beat an SMT game and all it took was like 55 hours (including the 7 hour playthrough I abandoned after realising the PC version did not automatically include the Chronicles DLC pack which adds a significant amount of content, to the point where I'd say the game feels incomplete without it).

Overall, pretty good in terms of tone, aesthetics and gameplay, I just wish the stories of these games were a bit meatier and didn't run entirely on vibes.

Also, this is a walkthrough game for me, easy. Played as far as I could without it, but a walkthrough saved me from being completely unsure where to go next to progress the story, as well as how to aim for the True Demon Ending.

That said, despite TDE being often suggested online as being the "best" ending, I found it underwhelming. I'm glad I went for it and beat the route, but I don't know that it was ultimately worth the 7 hours of grinding, fusing demons and struggling that it added on to the end of my play experience.

I'm rating this 4/5 on the basis that this is my first experience with SMT3. I didn't mind how cronchy the music was, because the compositions shone through the awful sound quality. I didn't even mind that this was running at 30FPS because when combined with the heavy motion blur it really gave me authentic PS2 vibes. For anyone looking for a true remaster experience out of the box (1080/60 out of the box without modding) I can understand why some were disappointed with this.

Played without the Maniax version initially, I didn't know any better. Story is OK, I just felt like the teacher route was the obvious way to go. The magatama system was a little exhausting, it just felt needlessly complicated. The mazes in the game make me want to kill myself. They're pretty dreadful.

... Otherwise, the art direction is cool. I like the demon designs and how they look in the game. The difficulty proved to be a challenge and it gives a very accomplished feeling when the enemy fades away when they lose. The experience is charming, but not enough for me to so strongly recommend this over another title in the Shin Megami Tensei series.