Probably the best conversation piece in my collection, which is saying a lot, Terrifying 9/11 is a strange work of heated anti-imperialist schadenfreude gestating a surprisingly competent Metal Slug port for Game Boy Color that outdoes its Neo-Geo Pocket Color siblings in terms of faithfulness to the original game
Some speculate, based solely off the game's remarkable adherence to its source material, that this may have been an official port from Takara (who made numerous SNK ports for GBC) that got canceled, and I can definitely see that
The dialogue is incredibly tone-deaf, especially because this came out in 2002, but it's precisely its status as a cursed artifact that makes it interesting
It's the kind of thing that feels like it should only exist as deliberate satire, like somebody made a video game out of an article from The Onion, but yet this game bafflingly occupies the status of being naïve camp, and not deliberate
It's a weird sight as an American who lived through its cultural shockwaves in the haziest fog of early memory, who knows people who were personally impacted by this tragedy, to imagine the people who created this in 2002, a room full of people so far removed from the national trauma that shaped multiple generations that they found it fit to use our seismic cataclysm as gag gift wrapping for a (probably) laundered incomplete prototype game?
Who can forget Osama bin Laden himself telling GWB "I DIDN'T DO THE ATTACKS. NO EVIDENCE."? and then having that juxtaposed with a shockingly faithful rendition of one of the best run-n-gun games ever made, on a platform where it shouldn't exist, on top of knowing that this isn't some rom hack or another form of satire but rather a real commercial product somebody found fit to sell on store shelves?
Don't mean to be disrespectful towards people who were impacted by 9/11, rather, I think this game's existence makes some sort of point on just how quickly 9/11 entered a purgatorial state of existing as a cultural unreality. 9/11 became realer than real, for us it redefined the boundaries between private and public for the next century, the rest of us rebuilding our cities and psyches around the negative space the towers left, for them, they were so far removed from it that within a year they laughed at us, or, if you prefer, were so far removed from our psychic scars that 9/11 was just another brand to capitalize from them, either way, this game was immaculately conceived by the anonymous cultural subconscious in some twisted act of hyperreality, outside the mortal bounds of good taste, and copyright, trauma, and visible intent.
Worth 70 bucks to me, when faced with the financial choice between a new-in-box next gen game and...this, the choice is obvious, 4/5 would "buy off an obscure regional competitor to eBay in a country I don't live in" again
Limited Run wouldn't have the balls to reprint this lmao

This game's really good. You don't need me to tell you that. Anyway I wanna talk about something more tangentially related now.

So there's been this weird movement in the zoomer parts of our culture that goes by a lot of names. Weirdcore. Dreamcore. Nostalgiacore. Internetcore. Traumacore? Bunch of dumb names for what's essentially the same thing. It's a certain visual and auditory aesthetic thats supposed to evoke a general feeling of wistful nostalgia. I first became aware of this because of the weird resurgences of a bunch of indie acts that were relevant 10 years ago suddenly making a weird resurgence. I can safely say I would not have predicted zoomers getting really into shit like Roar, Crystal Castles, Nero's Day at Disneyland, Blank Banshee, Life Without Buildings, fucking Goreshit. All these random bands who peaked in relevance a decade ago all of a sudden are showing up on all your art hoe former-tumblr playlists along with Jack Stauber and Lemon Demon (and also spefically Falling Down from the Undertale OST, that song really captivates these people)

I mention this because somehow the Yume Nikki ost has been caught up in this entire "movement". Those feeling depressed for the first time zoomers sure do enjoy commenting weird stuff about how this song makes them want to "lay down in an open field in the rain" on the comments of the Snow World music in between whatever the fuck else they do all day. Go on TikTok, I guess? At first I was gonna call it mildly annoying, but the more I see this stuff the more I'm weirdly captivated by it. It's like watching a bunch of sea monkeys. Like a more earnest version of the amazing cultural touchstone that was Simpsonwave (Not the first time the zoomers cared about blank banshee, ho ho).

Anyway, I don't really know what I'm getting at here. Something something youth something something back in my day something gatekeep. I can't really say any of this really reflects back on yume nikki, since I'm almost certain the weirdcore zoomers aren't actually playing it, but I guess it's cool this game still lives on in our current cultural zeitgeist, even if it has to be through Youtube playlists made by people who misuse the word "liminal" all the time.

Super idol de xiào róng
都沒你的甜
dōu méi nǐ de tián
八月正午的陽光
bā yuè zhèng wǔ de yáng guāng
都沒你耀眼
dōu méi nǐ yào yǎn
熱愛 105 度的你
rè ài 105 dù de nǐ
滴滴清純的蒸餾水
dī dī qīng chún de zhēng liú shuǐ

I've written a rather long article, but after rereading it, I felt it was too long, so I've cut it down to just the conclusion and a quote. What you think of Atlus, Megami Tensei and its offshoot, Persona, is up to each individual.

Conclusion (summary)
Persona 3 is the savior of Atlus (brand). Without Persona 3, Atlus would be dead.
If we hadn't changed the course with Persona 3 and continued with the default Megami Tensei series, everything would have disappeared.
What Persona 3 did, it attracted a new audience. I don't know if this was the intention, but the way it was done was similar to that of Shonen Jump.
Because we died once with Persona 3, we are now Atlus.
*
https://www.4gamer.net/games/367/G036702/20170810127/
"A look back at the journey to Persona 3 by Katsura Hashino."

Katsura Hashino - "To sum up, Shin Megami Tensei III-NOCTURNE didn't give us a satisfactory result. To make the game more accessible to as many people as possible, we've added new elements, such as the ability to train devil, and created press-turn battles that take advantage of attribute compatibility.
It made the game itself not so bad.
It was so good that all the staff said, "This is really interesting, even though it's our own work", and they went crazy debugging it. And we were able to finish the master on schedule, which gave us a sense of satisfaction that we had done a good job.
But we didn't get the result. After that, "DIGITAL DEVIL SAGA Avatar Tuner" was in the same vein.
From that point on, I started thinking like a producer: "Of course it's important to make a good game, but we need to make it known to as many people as possible. What approach should we take to achieve this?”.
It was at this time that I was asked if I would like to be a producer for "P3".
One day, I was called in by the executive at the time and he told me that if things continued as they were, it would be difficult for Atlus to continue making games.

This was a time not only when I was struggling personally, but also when the company itself was struggling to expand its user base.
In the midst of this conversation, the chairman suddenly asked me, "Mr. Hashino, by the way, how old are you now?"
I was a little over 30 at the time, and I said, "About 30".
Then he said, "You know, Che Guevara succeeded in the Cuban Revolution when he was about 30 years old, just like you. ......" He suddenly changed the subject to Guevara. He went on to speak something like "one revolutionary can change a company".
So I had no choice but to say, "Well, why don't I try it?"
*
There are other interesting stories(God's curse and exorcism etc.), but I don't want to get caught up in the politics between old Megami Tensei fans and Persona fans, so I might write them on request.

I'm not going to write a review of the game itself.
Oh, but I would like to see a remake.