As I continue my journey across a variety of RPG's to try and see how they evolve over time, one of the more interesting cases of that has to be the Megami Tensei series. Everybody's like Persona 5 this, Persona 5 that, what about the 60 other games in this franchise? Persona 5 by itself intimidates me, because it looks like a product of 30 years worth of refined mechanics stacked on top of each other. So I thought, wouldn't it be cool to start with a simpler game in the series? See where it all began, and what sorts of things they'll improve on per each entry... and well, what could be simpler than an NES RPG?
Then you realize, there might be a reason why there's a whole lot of people who can't get into this franchise. In particular for those like me who like to do these things chronologically, figuring out a good starting point is its own puzzle. Just about everyone seems to not recommend the first game. But some say that you could start with this one. Ha ha. Some would tell you "don't play the NES ones, play the SNES remakes", but then others would say "No, those ones are still pretty bad. Also, NES games are better aesthetically." Alright, maybe I can start with the SMT SNES games instead? Reading opinions, it's a cacophany of voices, half of which say they're a fantastic starting point, and the other half say they're bloody annoying to play, even among MegaTen fans. If... is, well, Iffy... and not even the first Persona is seen in much of a positive light.
It took until Persona 2, that the consensus started to skeeve more towards a favorable reception. It took until 1999. 12 years after the first Megami Tensei game back in 1987, one finally released that people could agree on being good. And one could say that's not even a MegaTen, so if you only counted the mainline stuff, it took until Nocturne, 16 years after the first MegaTen for there to be one that the majority could recommend to a newcomer. What the fuck went on with this franchise?
But perhaps the better question is, is it worth stomaching 12 to 16 years of divisive entries just to get to the ones that received an overall warmer reception? Perhaps it's too early for me to answer such a loaded question, but I can tell you sure as shit, you don't start here. This should've been obvious. You don't go into an NES RPG and expect to have a nice comprehensive time, these types of games don't give a fuck.
The first problem comes down to the scarcity of information, on this game especially. Every YouTube guide appears to focus on the SNES remake, with only obscure livestreams of the original, most of which appear to have not beaten the game. Items and spells have no descriptions, though there is a wiki page that can help you out on this. Only catch is, not all the names here are the same as the ones used in the fan translation, so you're gonna have to compare the prices, or which gender can equip it, or if you're lucky, a name that sounds somewhat close to what you have, in order to estimate what the hell did you even get or if it's useful. GameFaqs contains one (1) singular lonely guide, which only really gives you the brush strokes on how to progress the story. While I appreciated it for the help it did give, it can only help you so much during the mazes and enemy encounters. If you're really starving for help though, there is a site with maps in it, but it requires translating it from japanese. For some reason, my browser's translation function did not work with this site at first, so I spent most of the game not being able to utilize it.
This does mean that I had to do some insane outside-the-box solutions in order to figure out how to progress. For example, where the hell is the boss of this dungeon? Well, let's look up the name of the area that this dungeon is in on the wiki, and then look over the list of enemies that's in this area. Each enemy has a listed floor that they appear on, and... ah-ha, says here, the boss is on the second floor! And that's gonna be my only clue. It's like I'm doing detective work, piecing together random shit from a wiki not even to figure out a solution, but just to narrow down the list of possible places to find progress.
The other problem comes down to NES difficulty. Of course, your enjoyment varies on what type of RPG guy are you. I'm the guy that has only just started really getting into the genre as of a year and a half ago. This should make it abundantly clear that I am simply not ready for this sort of RPG, but hey, maybe you like to get your shit kicked in? If so, Megami Tensei II's crushing difficulty will be just for you, but it is too demoralizing for me to put up with for the exhausting 30 to 50 hours that it demands out of you.
Moreso than Dragon Quest 2, this may be one of, if not THE hardest NES RPG that I've played. Save states and RNG manipulation only just barely got me across each dungeon I faced, with there being far too many instances where without these features, I would immediately die, or lose a valuable party member that without, It'd pretty much just be a slow ticking clock to the rest of my party members dying right after. It honestly seems like you're meant to run away from half the game's enemy encounters, but that's only if you get the lucky dice roll to do so, otherwise, you're halfway there to being screwed. I cannot wrap my head around how are you normally supposed to beat this.
The thing is, I really wish I could understand. Even when I kept persuading myself to stop playing, the atmospheric visuals & incredible soundtrack (especially for NES standards, this shit rocks) made me give this game 5 more chances. I tried every strategy I could think of, thought a refreshed mind would allow me to finally figure out the "trick" to being good at this game, and yet only felt stupider for each time it resulted in my death.
I think I fooled myself into thinking that by continuing to progress through the game, I'll be rewarded with more music and more story, when really, that's not the main point. The story may be interesting, but there's little of it. The music is incredible, but you'll be hearing it loop until it loses all luster, and you'll grow numb to it. Ultimately, you'll realize that you can't be here for just those two things, and next up, you'll have to ask yourself if you can enjoy playing a brutal and obtuse dungeon crawler with a 80's design mentality.
Because contrary to what my mind wanted to believe, you can't play this like a Final Fantasy, or a Dragon Quest. You may not even be able to force yourself into liking it. This is a MegaTen game that's so early, and so specific in its design, with so little left in approachability, that you will only like this if your mind was already engineered to do so from hour one. If it's hour two and you're hating yourself, be better than me with my many hours of suffering, and just try one of the later games. Sure, apparently they're pretty hard too, but at least they should be able to provide you with better tools to understand how to play them, right? I still have hope that I can "get" this franchise. It just can't happen by playing a game this old.
Update: Remember when I said I gave this game five chances? Well, now it's six. There's something genuinely wrong with me. But, I guess even through all the torment this game is giving me, I'm seeing something that makes me keep coming back...? Anyway, if I do manage to finish this game, I'll be updating this with thoughts about that. For now though, I'll just say that if you're like me, you should seriously consider if it's better to play the series chronologically and struggle, or play them out of order and have a better time for it.
Update 2: I did it. I stand here, on top of the mountainhill, with hundreds of save states, thousands of rewinds, and heavy cross-referencings of guides and wikis, and yet somehow I still have the gall to be proud of beating this monstrosity of a game. I fucking did it, oh my god.
In the end, I think I took something home from this, just by the sheer virtue of this being the first real dungeon crawler I've seen the beginning, middle, and end of. I took a good soundtrack out of it, I took some cool looking monster designs, and I actually started to have more and more moments by the end where I was winning more frequently than I was losing. New recruits, excellent grinding spots, and equipment started progressively tipping the scale in my favor, and all it took was about 20 hours of pain and suffering to something resembling a fun sense of power progression.
Ultimately, most of this game will forever stick out as being a spiteful ball of hatred that wanted to see me lost, fucked over, and dead at its every turn. Thus, spreading its virus and converting me into a spiteful ball of hatred that wants to see this game get destroyed like one of those old AVGN skits. This was not a good game. It was not fun, and I cursed it out too many times. And yet, it at least won in one aspect. It gave me an experience I'll never forget. So nice job, you absolute spawn of hell. Enjoy your permanent residence in my brain, your room is 409 at the very far end of the hallway, that way you're as far away from me as possible.
Then you realize, there might be a reason why there's a whole lot of people who can't get into this franchise. In particular for those like me who like to do these things chronologically, figuring out a good starting point is its own puzzle. Just about everyone seems to not recommend the first game. But some say that you could start with this one. Ha ha. Some would tell you "don't play the NES ones, play the SNES remakes", but then others would say "No, those ones are still pretty bad. Also, NES games are better aesthetically." Alright, maybe I can start with the SMT SNES games instead? Reading opinions, it's a cacophany of voices, half of which say they're a fantastic starting point, and the other half say they're bloody annoying to play, even among MegaTen fans. If... is, well, Iffy... and not even the first Persona is seen in much of a positive light.
It took until Persona 2, that the consensus started to skeeve more towards a favorable reception. It took until 1999. 12 years after the first Megami Tensei game back in 1987, one finally released that people could agree on being good. And one could say that's not even a MegaTen, so if you only counted the mainline stuff, it took until Nocturne, 16 years after the first MegaTen for there to be one that the majority could recommend to a newcomer. What the fuck went on with this franchise?
But perhaps the better question is, is it worth stomaching 12 to 16 years of divisive entries just to get to the ones that received an overall warmer reception? Perhaps it's too early for me to answer such a loaded question, but I can tell you sure as shit, you don't start here. This should've been obvious. You don't go into an NES RPG and expect to have a nice comprehensive time, these types of games don't give a fuck.
The first problem comes down to the scarcity of information, on this game especially. Every YouTube guide appears to focus on the SNES remake, with only obscure livestreams of the original, most of which appear to have not beaten the game. Items and spells have no descriptions, though there is a wiki page that can help you out on this. Only catch is, not all the names here are the same as the ones used in the fan translation, so you're gonna have to compare the prices, or which gender can equip it, or if you're lucky, a name that sounds somewhat close to what you have, in order to estimate what the hell did you even get or if it's useful. GameFaqs contains one (1) singular lonely guide, which only really gives you the brush strokes on how to progress the story. While I appreciated it for the help it did give, it can only help you so much during the mazes and enemy encounters. If you're really starving for help though, there is a site with maps in it, but it requires translating it from japanese. For some reason, my browser's translation function did not work with this site at first, so I spent most of the game not being able to utilize it.
This does mean that I had to do some insane outside-the-box solutions in order to figure out how to progress. For example, where the hell is the boss of this dungeon? Well, let's look up the name of the area that this dungeon is in on the wiki, and then look over the list of enemies that's in this area. Each enemy has a listed floor that they appear on, and... ah-ha, says here, the boss is on the second floor! And that's gonna be my only clue. It's like I'm doing detective work, piecing together random shit from a wiki not even to figure out a solution, but just to narrow down the list of possible places to find progress.
The other problem comes down to NES difficulty. Of course, your enjoyment varies on what type of RPG guy are you. I'm the guy that has only just started really getting into the genre as of a year and a half ago. This should make it abundantly clear that I am simply not ready for this sort of RPG, but hey, maybe you like to get your shit kicked in? If so, Megami Tensei II's crushing difficulty will be just for you, but it is too demoralizing for me to put up with for the exhausting 30 to 50 hours that it demands out of you.
Moreso than Dragon Quest 2, this may be one of, if not THE hardest NES RPG that I've played. Save states and RNG manipulation only just barely got me across each dungeon I faced, with there being far too many instances where without these features, I would immediately die, or lose a valuable party member that without, It'd pretty much just be a slow ticking clock to the rest of my party members dying right after. It honestly seems like you're meant to run away from half the game's enemy encounters, but that's only if you get the lucky dice roll to do so, otherwise, you're halfway there to being screwed. I cannot wrap my head around how are you normally supposed to beat this.
The thing is, I really wish I could understand. Even when I kept persuading myself to stop playing, the atmospheric visuals & incredible soundtrack (especially for NES standards, this shit rocks) made me give this game 5 more chances. I tried every strategy I could think of, thought a refreshed mind would allow me to finally figure out the "trick" to being good at this game, and yet only felt stupider for each time it resulted in my death.
I think I fooled myself into thinking that by continuing to progress through the game, I'll be rewarded with more music and more story, when really, that's not the main point. The story may be interesting, but there's little of it. The music is incredible, but you'll be hearing it loop until it loses all luster, and you'll grow numb to it. Ultimately, you'll realize that you can't be here for just those two things, and next up, you'll have to ask yourself if you can enjoy playing a brutal and obtuse dungeon crawler with a 80's design mentality.
Because contrary to what my mind wanted to believe, you can't play this like a Final Fantasy, or a Dragon Quest. You may not even be able to force yourself into liking it. This is a MegaTen game that's so early, and so specific in its design, with so little left in approachability, that you will only like this if your mind was already engineered to do so from hour one. If it's hour two and you're hating yourself, be better than me with my many hours of suffering, and just try one of the later games. Sure, apparently they're pretty hard too, but at least they should be able to provide you with better tools to understand how to play them, right? I still have hope that I can "get" this franchise. It just can't happen by playing a game this old.
Update: Remember when I said I gave this game five chances? Well, now it's six. There's something genuinely wrong with me. But, I guess even through all the torment this game is giving me, I'm seeing something that makes me keep coming back...? Anyway, if I do manage to finish this game, I'll be updating this with thoughts about that. For now though, I'll just say that if you're like me, you should seriously consider if it's better to play the series chronologically and struggle, or play them out of order and have a better time for it.
Update 2: I did it. I stand here, on top of the mountainhill, with hundreds of save states, thousands of rewinds, and heavy cross-referencings of guides and wikis, and yet somehow I still have the gall to be proud of beating this monstrosity of a game. I fucking did it, oh my god.
In the end, I think I took something home from this, just by the sheer virtue of this being the first real dungeon crawler I've seen the beginning, middle, and end of. I took a good soundtrack out of it, I took some cool looking monster designs, and I actually started to have more and more moments by the end where I was winning more frequently than I was losing. New recruits, excellent grinding spots, and equipment started progressively tipping the scale in my favor, and all it took was about 20 hours of pain and suffering to something resembling a fun sense of power progression.
Ultimately, most of this game will forever stick out as being a spiteful ball of hatred that wanted to see me lost, fucked over, and dead at its every turn. Thus, spreading its virus and converting me into a spiteful ball of hatred that wants to see this game get destroyed like one of those old AVGN skits. This was not a good game. It was not fun, and I cursed it out too many times. And yet, it at least won in one aspect. It gave me an experience I'll never forget. So nice job, you absolute spawn of hell. Enjoy your permanent residence in my brain, your room is 409 at the very far end of the hallway, that way you're as far away from me as possible.
3 Comments
@Schmliff0 That's a pretty good summary, thank you for laying it out for me. Though it's clear I've had a pretty miserable time with Megami Tensei II, the experience left me intrigued for the rest of the franchise, so I'll continue pushing onward with it chronologically. Though, I actually left Last Bible & Majin Tensei out of my backlog, I wasn't sure if those spinoffs are super worth pursuing. Shin Megami Tensei SNES is supposed to be next on my docket, but some of the blinking sprites in that game caused monitor burn-in issues... I'll have to find a way to circumvent that, or do the PS1 release instead.
The PS1 release has an English translation but only the Super Famicom release of SMT II and if... have translations. I wouldn't say the first two Last Bible games are necessary, but the third one is genuinely fantastic and on the SFC. If it ever was localized, I have no doubt it would be heiled alongside Final Fantasy VI, Chrono Trigger, Earthbound, or Terranigma. It has a great English patch.
Here's a quick guide list. It took me years to get through every single game, and I have a feeling I only enjoyed it because I've been playing the series since as far back as I can remember. https://www.backloggd.com/u/Schmliff0/list/important-megaten-titles/
Here's a quick guide list. It took me years to get through every single game, and I have a feeling I only enjoyed it because I've been playing the series since as far back as I can remember. https://www.backloggd.com/u/Schmliff0/list/important-megaten-titles/
Schmliff0
2 months ago
Then came the break from SMT. For now, ATLUS was done with it and wanted to experiment with the core concept. Devil Summoner was the first spinoff that fleshed out demons. Persona was a second spinoff that had the most drastic change on the formula. The battle system was completely different was focused more on a grid-based layout and the way you attained Personas was far different as well. The story was also delivered in a different way. If you want to start at the "beginning" for Persona 5, start with Persona 1. Shoji Meguro and Katsura Hashino both were involved since that game. If you want to see how their philosophy evolved, start with that one.
The reason why people recommend you start with Nocturne is because the older games were designed to be played with a strategy guide for hardcore gamers, and because none of them are officially translated aside from Jack Bros, Persona 1, and Persona 2, with only two of those being a complete game that wasn't completely butchered in localization, and one of those two is on a real system.
Additionally, Nocturne was the beginning of a new generation of ATLUS developers. The first generation ended during the late 90s, and new developers who studied under the old ones came in on Nocturne. Katsura Hashino, director of Persona 3, 4, and 5, got his second directorial start with Nocturne. The first game being Maken X, but that wasn't technically a MegaTen game. The generation of these new devs didn't end until Persona 5 released. Then the mantle was passed to the next understudies, who went on to make Shin Megami Tensei V, Soul Hackers 2, and Persona 3: Reload.
Overall, the generations go as follows.
Generation 1: Megami Tensei -> Shin Megami Tensei: Nine
Generation 2: Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne -> Persona 5
Generation 3: Persona 5 Scramble -> Present Day
Metaphor ReFantazio is to be the final game by the "old guard."
Honestly, if you want to get into Megami Tensei, just start with Shin Megami Tensei on the Super Famicom or the PS1 remake. Even ATLUS considers that to be the "true" start to the MegaTen franchise. Those first two games were more so adaptations of the novels.