Again with a vengeance.
When Shin Megami Tensei Vengeance was introduced, I assumed it was going to be one thing alongside the strains of Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse. Apocalypse—a follow-up to the unique Shin Megami Tensei IV—was a model new story that served as a companion to its predecessor relatively than being a full substitute. This perception was bolstered by the truth that Vengeance permits the participant to decide on between the unique recreation’s story (“The Canon of Creation”) and the brand new story (“The Canon of Vengeance”) at first of a playthrough. Upon getting hands-on with the sport, I found that Vengeance shouldn’t be a completely new story in any respect, and as an alternative serves a job much like re-releases within the Persona franchise similar to Persona 4 Golden and Persona 5 Royal.
Our demo started in a scene I acknowledged from the unique Shin Megami Tensei V: the introduction of the Bethel Japanese Department after the opening act within the recreation’s Minato area. Except for the presence of a model new character—a pupil named Yoko Hiromine—this scene performed out precisely the identical as I remembered, and when listening rigorously I might hear the delicate variations within the audio high quality of dialogue indicating newly-recorded strains each time somebody was acknowledging Yoko. The story would proceed into the story arc on the protagonist’s college that includes the demon Lahmu, and except for Yoko sometimes chiming in to supply her ideas on a narrative that was already written with out her presence the story remained the identical as the unique recreation.
The one exception is a brand new scene that happens proper in the course of this arc that includes a boss combat towards one other new character, Naamah. Naamah had no clear connection to the occasions occurring within the story and I didn’t have any context for her transient look, however primarily based on current promotional materials I do know she is a member of the sport’s new group of antagonists known as the Qadištu. After the combat with Naamah ended, the college arc continued with no additional adjustments till it was time to change to the following a part of our demo.
The second a part of the demo befell in a model new space within the Shinjuku area. These occasions have been all new and completely distinct from the unique recreation’s story, however we weren’t given any actual rationalization for what was occurring. It wasn’t clear when these occasions happen within the recreation story, however given the save file we began from featured a Stage 40 social gathering it was considerably later than the occasions we had seen to date. From right here we have been allowed to discover the brand new Shinjuku area, which was filled with its personal side-quests and non-compulsory goals to search out. It gave the impression to be a full-sized space on par with these within the unique SMTV, however within the restricted time we needed to play I couldn’t come anyplace near exploring all of it.
Not a lot has modified in what gamers can anticipate from Vengeance’s gameplay. Clearly there are some high quality of life enhancements on par with these discovered within the Persona re-releases; the participant can now freely save anyplace and menus have been retooled to be smoother to navigate. Atlus has promised some substantial additions similar to extra recruitable demons and possibilities to see new non-compulsory scenes with allies, however these have been robust to essentially get a really feel for within the restricted time we had for the demo. Outdoors of the brand new story probably the most vital change to Vengeance is its launch on extra highly effective {hardware}, which meant our demo was working on the PlayStation 5. The sport was working considerably higher than I remembered it at full 4K with a rock-solid 60fps, although the Atlus consultant working our demo sheepishly clarified that these graphical enhancements wouldn’t apply to the Swap model.
Shin Megami Tensei Vengeance guarantees extra SMTV, and that seems to be precisely what it’s. At its core this is identical recreation that was launched three years in the past, and the addition of latest story eventualities has an apparent attraction for followers of that unique recreation. Sadly it’s additionally the newest in what seems to be a brand new custom for Atlus: to re-release a flagship title a pair after a few years with substantial story additions that make the unique model of the sport out of date. In the event you’ve been holding out on taking part in SMTV till now then that endurance has clearly been rewarded as Vengeance options every part the unique recreation has and extra, bringing every part to all-new platforms on the similar time. Nevertheless, for anybody that’s had their fill of SMTV, you’re most likely higher off ready to see simply how substantial that “and extra” is earlier than getting too enthusiastic about this one.