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.
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.