My Thoughts On Shin Megami Tensei V

This has been a long time coming.
0:00 Intro
0:52 Gameplay
8:28 Fusion
11:49 Minor Gameplay Gripes
17:40 Music
18:26 Graphics
20:34 Story (SPOILER and Rant Warning)
28:07 "Characters"
30:25 Endings
42:11 Superficially Copying Nocturne
43:43 Outro

[@LinkSkywalker42]

The title card says it all It feels like they tried to tell a character driven story, but without the characters Gameplay is possibly the best in the series though. I miss the dungeons of past games, but the exploration is pretty satisfying

[@BigKlingy]

That's very true. I didn't mind the lack of dungeons, since every area of Da'at felt like a big dungeon. The two dungeons that do exist are kind of weird though. The demon castle was good but a bit too long imo, and the Empyrean was... bad. A large maze with most dead ends getting you nothing, and... apparently you're not supposed to fight the Chi Yous but I was strong enough to.

[@Kwang_Ko]

"Game Good, Plot Bad" Fates : This looks familiar. 1:23 I believe SMI IV also worked this way. 3:11 Pokemon base stats + Fire Emblem Growth Rates : Ahahahahahahaha. 4:39 Yeah this is definitely improved. 8:57 Mido : Hello! Inheriting resistances being a part of Essence was definitely a clever idea, given that there aren't any equipment that gives you that. 12:35 Note that this was the case in SMT IV as well. I mean, SMT is a game where you do NOT want to get attached to a Demon and constantly replacing it whenever you have a chance. One thing I'd like to add(at least in my opinion) regarding gameplay, is that a lot of boss fights in this game(not all, but a good chunk of it) isn't just your whole team vs 1 boss. There are quite a lot boss fights where boss brings up minions, which definitely makes the fight a lot more interesting. 38:23

[@BigKlingy]

3:11 I wish Pokemon base stats were actually in the games. They KIND OF are in the newer ones, but just as an abstract graph. (Also it gets confusing because "Base Stats" is the official name for what the fandom calls Effort Values) 8:57 Mido has some fun lines in 4.

[@heroicvileplume7184]

I hereby dub this game SMT Not-turne With that out of the way, totally agree with the Law thing. The only game (I think) that actually did Law convincingly was Devil Survivor 1, a game where I actually prefer Law to the Chaos and Neutral routes. Spoiler warning for that game: 3 2 1 Anyway, I don’t think what they did in Devil Survivor was even particularly hard to replicate. It essentially came down to 1. The angels you meet (namely Remiel) are actually well intentioned, and while they are using the protag to achieve their goals, they do it in a very non-condescending way (at least by SMT Law standards) and their argument isn’t “join us because you should serve god, and we are right” it’s “join us because you can see how terrible the world would be if the demons were to win” 2. The demons are actually mostly bad. There are some that aren’t, but there is enough damage done by the demons to make any alliance to get rid of them actually a really good shout. 3. The end of the route isn’t “kill everyone who doesn’t agree with you” it’s “disarm all the remaining rioters and save the world from Oukuninushi” 4. The ending actually includes the chaos rep! And not only does he not die, you actually get to learn more about him, and possibly help him get over his obsession with getting revenge. I far prefer the other alignment rep being important to “whoops, you have to kill them now” like with the SMT4 and apocalypse ones

[@BigKlingy]

The IGN review called it "Persona 5 without the heart", but I saw a someone else say the MUCH better summary is "Nocturne without the heart." I bought Devil Survivor 1 earlier this year, I'll get around to playing it soon. I've heard good things about the Law route and I'm eager to see that for myself. From other things I've heard, God and the Angels really don't WANT to destroy humanity or remove free will in that game, and the Law route is less about blindly submitting and more about restoring their faith in humanity.

[@alsaiduq4363]

@@BigKlingy Less about restoring faith and more like proving themselves. But you got the right idea.

[@nachohangover5104]

@@BigKlingy Devil Survivor 1 Law is better than most games' since YHVH, while still a narcissistic dick, isn't genocidal about it like he usually is.

[@chillstoneblakeblast3172]

I don't think the story is that bad but it's too vague with No character to root for. The main Protagonist and his demon is as much as a Blank state as it gets.

[@BigKlingy]

The story's less 'bad' and more' unfinished'. It's a rough outline that they probably planned to turn into a real story but they ran out of time.

[@SlyTF1]

I love the story. A race to the throne of Creation is the coolest story concept I've ever heard.

[@BigKlingy]

@@SlyTF1 I love that idea too, conceptually. I just think the game didn't execute it well, mainly it advertising the characters as important when most of them are flat as cardboard.

[@BerserkerRohan]

I have been waiting to talk about this game. So Christmas last year, I had the choice between this and BDSP. I went with SMT5 and I don't regret that decision and this was thanks to the help of my friends and who helped me come to my decision as well as built up my confidence. The gameplay is amazing but I think the most important things for me was the difficulty felt very balanced in my Normal mode playthrough so it wasn't too easy but wasn't too hard for me either. I also liked the fact that I got through pretty much the whole game without looking anything up thanks to the map showing me where items are and also where to progress and where I need to go for the sidequest. As a fan of fusion, I was very happy that the fusion system was easy to use and helped me make very powerful demons too. Probably my favourite fusion system I have used thus far. The demon of my playthrough was Muu Shuvuu who I fused in the Fairy Village and she stayed with me throughout the rest of the game thanks to how useful her debuffs were as well as her access to Accursed Poison too. I don't hate the plot although I think that is because I am not familiar with mainline SMT plots. My thoughts were I thought the characters were interesting but I felt like more could have been done with them and that is all because the story felt very basic other than that. Out of the three SMT games I have played which are P5R, SMT5 and P1 this might be my favourite due to how good the gameplay is although I do have a softspot for Persona 1's gameplay, characters and plot and I did like Persona 5 Royal even though it doesn't wow me as much as the other two games did.

[@JetblackJay]

The story is Smt3 but more cutscenes that are meaningless

[@BigKlingy]

It's not even SMT3's story. 3's plot actually made sense with the world building and the characters, while not amazing, at least had enough broad personality for what the game needed them to do. It certainly didn't have a character who's teased as important but does literally nothing outside of endgame sidequests.

[@JetblackJay]

@@BigKlingy fair the endgame so strange to do that

[@wolfherojohnson2766]

42:08 KONO DIO DA! ~~I’m sorry, I had to~~ Also, I was honestly caught off guard by you saying “Simp”

[@BigKlingy]

42:08 Ah, so that's what that line is in Japanese.

[@wolfherojohnson2766]

It was either that or “KONO DIO GA!”. Also, I’m surprised you’ve never heard the Japanese dub of JJBA

[@BigKlingy]

I've heard only Japanese footage, but I've never actually heard the Dio line in-context, I've only read it translated in memes. The only Jp footage I've seen is the OHHHHHHHH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO/OH MY GAAAAAAAAAA montage.

[@galladeforce]

Something I noticed about the Demon selection in this game is that it’s very heavy on Demons that we’re also Personas in Persona 5 althoigh I do very much like that they brought back a lot of the SMT IV Apocalypse and Strange Journey Redux crowd although I will admit that It’s partially because I’m getting a bit jaded in regards to series that heavily rely or push content thats just from the start of the series and pushes away or doesn’t bring back new characters or concepts. A lot of these newer Demons are also treated quite well with cases to Persona skills that would help incentivise using them over their old favourites, which is something That I tend to do like mainly using New Pokémon or in Legends Arecus case all new Hisuian Form Pokémon as well as just liking the designs of these new Demons in general. Something I did find myself liking about the Demons is that although nit every Demons has an excellent skill set I did find that most of them had quite good base skillsets that allowed them to be somewhat useful or has a good base to build. I do very much like this games version of Zeus, of the Bethel Leader his voice is the least modified and hence gives him a cool but more natural sounding voice, his cocky personality does make him somewhat entertaining to watch for me, I do very much like his design especially since I am familiar with its likely inspiration, the half marble statue/half demon look does stand out, he’s also gameplay wise so what easy to optimise, Thunderbird has Elec Pheloma and Demeter Absorb Wind. So you have a Demon who can stack damage boosting skills easily with a personal Electric skill that pierces backed up by a Charge skill and can get rid of his one weakness, that was fun I tell you. Also despite having Odin as one of my favourite Personas I do want this version of Zeus to be the Ultimate Emperor Persona in a later Persona game Nuwa and Yakumo although they are Neutral in this conflict it seems to be based on what I remember in a way that doesn’t reflect well on them, their not Neutral because their not as extreme in their ideology as those of Law and Chaos but are very extreme in their own right. Hence unlike most Neutral routes I find that they aren’t that more appealing to follow than Law and Chaos, Since I would agree with you in that I don’t really like the SMT Alignments since I really don’t like how extreme they are which mutates the benefits of those approaches into active problems, like no freedom on Law side or no order of protection for those who can’t protect themselves on Chaos, as well as the seeming bias for making Chaos the better side in most games. Which is something that I can give Nictrune credit with and SMT Apocalypse also, Nocrtune althoigh a lot of the Reasons can have shades of the Aligments, I know that Yogsuga is very Chaos esque they are both more interesting due to nit having way less of a binary design and Musubi is it’s less very unique due its every one gets their own perfect world end goal , and that Apocalypse despite being more of a straightforward hero story the fact that it doesn’t have that baggage for me and isn’t as focused on joining possible extreme Alignments makes it something that appeals more to my taste story wise. With Dazai, I would say that odd the human characters I find he is the most interesting by default since hes actually different between when he starts and ends even if his character and arc aren’t the most interesting. And another thing I found somewhat interesting about hin is that it seems the world is constantly mistreating yet he doesn’t become a rebel or becomes dedicated to ever g on those who wronged him, he instead joins a ideology and group that he prefers over his previous life, which I don’t see often as way a character goes in the present, most of the cases I remember are a characters backstory.

[@SSBBPOKEFAN]

Great timing. I'm going through SMt 4 right now. Currently in Blasted Tokyo, going for the White ending first to get to New Game + faster. And yeah, Magic build Flynn is stupid busted. Though I'm going for a magic-knight build (favoring Magic), but I'll stop boosting Strength once I hit 100. Gotta get that Neutral-route exclusive Plasma Knife at some point!

[@BigKlingy]

There's a few builds in 4 and 4A that are good, and all of them involve stacking all your points into one offensive stat. 5's kind of like that, but it's not as extreme, and I've noticed a lot of Nahobino builds are viable. (Early on people liked physical because of Murakumo, but I personally go for magic. Tried Agility first run and it was okay, but apparently people have done tests with hacked 999 Agility and early-game enemies can still hit them, so it's probably got big diminishing returns.)

[@leixalkvinay2729]

I think Dexterity is the most Op stat in IV, since you get a 1.4 stat boost, I saw some stupid damage outputs capable of two shot bosses with charge and buffs.

[@BigKlingy]

@@leixalkvinay2729 I've heard than in IV all physical damage scales off Dex instead of Strength, or that Dex matters more for it somehow. In Apocalypse I think only guns go off Dex, but a gun build is apparently pretty strong.

[@absoul112]

After hearing the description of the story, I’m morbidly curious about trying the game (the gameplay does sound fun though). Also reminds me to play Nocturne since I have that on steam.

[@BigKlingy]

I'd recommend it, it's a fun game. I'm morbidly curious to play Nocturne some time too. One thing I didn't mention here: this game is more accessible than most SMT because, while dying still boots you back to your last save, after the first boss you get the ability to warp back to your last used save point at any time. So any lost progress due to dying is usually on you.

[@SomeAsian]

Oh come on, the plot can't be THAT bad right? *40 minutes later* Ooooooooooooooooooooohhh nooooooooooooooooooooooooo...

[@starmaker75]

Well the story suffer from what called “2 gear pacing annoyance” where a story go too fast and too slow

[@bretginn1419]

Ah, SMT5. I really want to love this game. I really do. And gameplay wise, I can. I like it on that front. But the story and characters? That's a different matter. I get mainline SMT has always had a gameplay first, story second attitude, and that's fine. But why is 5 so barren? There's so many dropped plot points, if they even go anywhere, and just as many characters who feel wasted. And the big plot point of the Mandala System, the Throne, and Nahobinos really only fully adds up and you can logically connect if you play other SMTs, which is odd and I'd say not good, especially for a series moreso known for stand alone stories.

[@danielm.5078]

11:28 That's a genuinely nice sounding system. In general I'm glad the series has steadily started to give you more freedom in what demons you can use rather than stat gains being relatively worthless and every one of them having "expired" the second they learn their last skill. 19:04 That's ...honestly modern open-world(ish) games in general if they're not on the best hardware available. Looks pretty on-par with MHW in terms of jacking the framerate way down on distant monsters. 43:50 I said this earlier and this just further cements it for me (alongside the dev quote talking about the intended themes that never made it into the game): I think there was a far more intricate story planned that got thrown out/excised during development and the end result was something just thrown together using the character designs, setpieces, and worldbuilding from it. The mainline team already hated Isabeau and essentially just wanted to do Nocturne again with IV, and I think what happened is as the rough development dragged on the newer/younger team members got shut down or filtered out and the old guard just got to have their way. Where Japanese devs lately want to keep moving forward, evolving, and begin handing the reins over to the next gen, SMTV feels like an anomaly that resolutely turns away from that. And what's really funny is that, as mediocre as its writing more likely than not will be, Soul Hackers 2 looks more or less like what I expected a modern SMT game to look like (and the fact basically everybody from the spinoffs are involved kinda hammers it home to me that the mainline SMT team is stuck in the past and inflexible).

[@BigKlingy]

11:28 Case in point: Yoshitsune returns and has brought over Hasssou Tobi from the spinoffs, and it's even more broken here since it's now an auto-crit. (And there's a passive skill "Critical Zealot" that lowers non-crit damage but raises crit damage, which is obviously a perfect fit) But the twist is he's a Lv 45 Demon in this game. Meaning he CAN be endgame-viable, but you'll have to put in a lot of effort to get him there. 19:04 True, it's not unique to this. This game just has a great art style in theory so it's frustrating seeing it held back by hardware. (And it's the only game I've played so far that looks considerably better on smaller screens like KZbin than on my big screen TV) 43:50 With the fact that Dazai's arc gets thrown in the garbage in favour of making him a barely similar generic Law guy (it feels less like and him gaining confidence and more like him pre and post cap throw being written as two different people), I can see something like that happening. Nocturne was very innovative at the time, introducing the Press Turn system, bringing the series into 3D, and replacing alignments with 3 "reasons" that had some parts of Law/Chaos/Neutral but also weren't aligned with YHVH or Lucifer and let them experiment with reps (the angels are on the 'might makes right' side, the demons on the 'world of silence' one)... and then the Maniax re-release added a new ending route revealing (maybe, the fact all the exposition comes from Lucifer makes it kind of unreliable) all the original endings played into the Great Will's hands and the true ending was to side with Lucifer/traditional Chaos and destroy it all. 4 did try and modernize the formula, to varying degrees of success. (Walter and Jonathan were people you actually cared about, but Isabeau had a lot of moe pandering, Law/Chaos were still terrible and Neutral even more obviously good, except to get Neutral you have to flip-flop between Law and Chaos choices and pray you're in the tiny Neutral threshold by the route lock... and then it forces you to complete most sidequests.) Then 4A hit and angered fans by going too far at "modernizing", with a more Persona-esque "bonds" story with black-and-white morality and silly characters. (The YHVH fight is amazing though) So V feels kind of like a dialling back to tradition in an attempt to appease 4A's haters.

[@leixalkvinay2729]

About "the old staff keep SMT from changing", actually I think is the oposite, from what I have read SMT IV's plot was written by Kazuma Kaneko, the main artist of SMT until Strange Journey, the thing is, the old crew was the one with the most power on IV's story, while IV Apocalipse was made mainly by new comers to let them do their perspective. It feels way to barebones to even call it a finished story, but in my opinion SMT V feels like what a non SMT fan would think SMT is about. I doubt the old staff is what keept SMT V from having a good story because the old games have at the very least good or interesting stories, and new ones like Apocalipse, TMS or Deep Strange Journey aren't bad either, so the two main reasons for this story are, in my opinion: -Development hell and lack of time to build the game. -Lack of cohesion betwen old and new staff without their most important pilars like Kazuma Kaneko. Atlus is trying to keep what made SMT special, but lack a claer direction to aim for. As much as games like Strange Journey, IV or Nocturne are claimed as great stories in their own way, most of the writters aren't the same anymore, and if they try to imitate previous games they will need to truly understand what made them good and then modenize them, like Devil Survivor or SMT IV. I hope Soul Hackers is a SMT inspired story, with it's own identity and atmosphere, and not trying to force itself to be Nocturne or P5 for example. My only real complain would be how overdesined the MC are in relation to the dark story it seems to aim, but is something minor.

[@danielm.5078]

@@leixalkvinay2729 I'm more just observing commentary and trends-- people tend to like Strange Journey and the Devil Survivor games (with the latter I've seen specifically singled out as having the most fleshed-out characters in the series), whereas what I've seen said of IV it's a case where the characters get forced into extremism to line up with their alignments and interviews openly talked about the older devs pushing back against contemporary inclusions with Isabeau specifically singled out as a "sweet" female character that they did not want. IV:A is an extreme in the other direction, to be sure. Given everything I've seen about V and the mismatch between the worldbuilding and what the marketing presented VS what came out (alongside earlier comments about the story and that it would handle themes like job insecurity and terrorist attacks-- nothing of which showed up in the game itself), it's an easy enough assumption that something far more ambitious and cohesive was planned only to not get fully implemented. Soul Hackers 2 should be its own thing, but by embracing a character focus and more contemporary setting (while having headlining staff from the original Soul Hackers games, Devil Survivor Duology, and Strange Journey) it's shaping up to more closely resemble what I'd expect a modern SMT game to be. I think the mainline team should've earnestly looked at the spinoffs and what people liked about them and brought on some of those who'd worked on them, rather than this segregation that happened.

[@naotoueda2838]

I played SMT IV and Apocalypse recently There are normal fusion choosing 2 demons and fusing them. I didn't use the complex search mode because it was too hard to understand and isn't a obriglation, I just used the "if you want to fuse this demon, you have this possibility with your current party" and chose the result I liked.

[@BigKlingy]

The search mode is good in theory, but I feel like most people who'd do that would use online fusion calculators. The in-game version in Devil Survivor 2 was pretty awkward to use, I found. Good to know it's not the ONLY way to fuse in 4 though.

[@Bulkynemesis4534]

100% agree with you gameplay good, story bad. Well its not that bad but its really unimpressive and underwhelming. The boss fights pull it up for me. Especially Shiva and Demi Fiend. I have never seen the demon scamming me. Then i boot up SMT 4 and literally the first demon outside the tutorial scams me Its actually really fun to find all the Miiman and Glory Apples and i did it two times mainly for the essences set. The stat bonus fusion is absolutely broken. I had 100+ stat demons in around the third area The physical attacks costing MP is something they changed in SMT 4. Also Level scaling is annoying, people doing low level runs were skeptical whether it was possible or not Nvidia leaks say this game is coming to PC and it has gotten many right so far so who knows

[@BigKlingy]

I still haven't beaten Shiva yet. Though I've seen 2-turn kill setups. Fittingly, the one time I mentioned here where a Demon scammed me? It was Narcissus. But it's very, VERY rare, they pretty much have to keep asking for items you don't have. For some reason I'm at 199 Miman, I swear I've found them all in the last area (can't see any more on my map) so I don't know where the last one is. Yeah fusion stat boosts are silly, it's part of why in my no buffs challenge, I went for that Miracle as soon as possible. I feel like I'm the only one who didn't mind the level scaling, besides it making Idunn and Tao quickly fall off in the endgame. I never grinded, I just fully explored the world and did all quests and I ended the game in the high 80's. (With a Lv 96 Beelzebub because Law's exclusive Miracle lets you fuse above your level, which is fun. Chaos lets you overwrite a Demon's starting skills in fusion which is decent but seems less useful?)

[@Bulkynemesis4534]

@@BigKlingy You can just buy the locations from the Chironuppu in the areas which makes it very much bearable

[@BigKlingy]

@@Bulkynemesis4534 I did that for all 4 areas. I must still be missing one.

[@OptiiWave]

I think the problem with SMT plots is that they want to have morally grey choices, but then they make neutral the most appealing anyway. I haven't played SMT1, 2 or SJ but that was issue with SMT4 and I can see why they wanted to make it less appealing in 5 but it didn’t work since the fairy forest demons were proof that not every demon is evil. I still really enjoyed this game despite it's problems and the ost is amazing as well. The super boss, the 4th area and the 2nd phase final boss music are some the best Megami Tensei music I've heard.

[@BigKlingy]

At least from my outside knowledge of some past games: Megami Tensei II: Starting the alignments, although siding with Lucifer was more like the "true ending" and not doing so was a bad ending. SMT1: Neutral was treated as pretty dark here, only saved by the other two routes being worse. And SMT2 revealed that while Neutral was canon, things got messed up again soon after. SMT2: I don't know if there's bias in the fan translation, but for this one Chaos seems to be treated as exactly as much of a happy ending as Neutral. Ironically, the Law roure seems to be canon, going by later games and promo material, and its Law rep is one of the most well-received. SMT3: The Neutral ending is probably the best, but most of the fandom loves True Demon (officially "Destruction") because edginess I guess. Strange Journey: The vanilla version had pretty much the worst Law and Chaos treatment in the franchise with the most positive Neutral by far. Redux addresses this by giving Law and Chaos alternate, much better endings, while making the True Neutral ending more bittersweet. Devil Survivor 1: I hear this has the most balanced endings in the series by far, I bought it earlier this year so I have to play it to see. SMT4: This one's also pretty blatant Law/Chaos bad, Neutral obviously the best, but at least Walter and Jonathan are decent characters. SMT4A: Law and Chaos are now early bad endings, main endings are an overly-idealistic "bonds" Neutral, and an "edgy Neutral" where you kill everyone. Summary is the Neutral bias didn't really start until the later half of the series, and attempts at correcting it have been... iffy at best. The Da'at 4th area has a really good song, I agree.

[@starmaker75]

Also another problem(abiet some of it is cultural differences) with mortality choices is that law is the worst choice to side given that most mainline they go totalitarianism and massacre happy. I give smt 5 this, it made law less over the top evil.

[@OptiiWave]

Nocturne is the odd one out since it drops the traditional alignment system. You could fit Hikawa, Chiaki and Isamu into each one and I thought Isamu or Yuko could be stand ins for neutral. I forgot to mention the English voice acting and I think it's one of the best Atlus dubs. The highlights for me were Dazai and Aogami; they do well with material they were given. There's also a lot of FE Three Houses VAs as well. Chris Hackney (voice of Dimitri) voices Finn McCool and I instantly recognized him.

[@BigKlingy]

I actually liked Nocturne moving away from the traditional alignments, although Maniax (which is the only version we got) added TDE as traditional Chaos. It was also cool how they flipped some traditional Demon roles: the angels are on the "might makes right" side this time, while the fallen angels and demons support the no free will side since at least that way all of them can be equal to God.

[@kl4969]

4:40 XD Why does the SMT series always have the best meme pictures? I always appreciated that while SMT3 still had the gameplay>story thing, it didn't go overboard with too many characters, and what it had, they worked and had believable arcs that tied into why they created their Reasons. The story definitely wasn't Xenogears or golden age Final Fantasy, but it was competent for how little it got focused on. Shame that doesn't seem to be the case here.

[@BigKlingy]

4:40 I found that one in a Discord server I was in. It's pretty true of early SMT negotiation though. (I also find it morbidly hilarious watching the parts of SMT4 speedruns where they have to recruit specific Demons. Not only do you need to farm for specific enemy encounters, you also have to hope they don't be an ass in negotiation.) I think Nocturne did a minimalist, mostly lore-focused story well. The sad this is this game's world had great lore in theory and could've been really good if they'd focused on its strengths, but they instead decided to make it Nocturne-lite while forgetting WHY people liked Nocturne.

[@alsaiduq4363]

What you said about not being able to get your own Ending is pretty true. I completly forgot about that. It's funny because Devil survivor has so many ending and one of them is basicily your ending, where you refuse every oher route and you start to beat everyone into agreeing with you to create a new world.

[@BigKlingy]

There's no reason why the MC shouldn't be able to do that. By the end of the final dungeon, they're the only Nahobino left, meaning they're the only one who can recreate the world. Who's stopping them from making it however they like?

[@nikoladedic6623]

0:58 Of course, went with Naoto. 23:16 Now I am curious on what would ypu say about my story because I surely don't have the story planned out at all. Seriously, I didn't expect GBA exclusive dungeons to drag on as they have. 28:07 Wow, now I am curious on what I would do in rewriting the story. Shame I don't have the game. Maybe 1?

[@megarotom1590]

I actually felt like Law was one of the least offensive as its been in a while...but my interpretation is that in this universe god is merely like a guidance and someone who kinda rules the natural order of the world but doesn't touch individuals or anything...of course I'm also selectively ignoring whats said in the post final boss about rejecting endless possibilities etc. Like I feel like law was actually building up to not be pro genocide and pro tyrany...rather it seemed like god in this universe was merely just fallible rather than corrupt

[@BigKlingy]

I would've really liked the Law ending too if it didn't say things like "mankind need not think for themselves" and "it is a world that wholly rejects infinite possibility."

[@megarotom1590]

@@BigKlingy yah...it feels like they did well in not making any route feel extremist...only to throw it in at the end. Personally...I feel like given everything else, I interpret the first part is that mankind as a whole doesn't NEED to think for themselves bc they have a benevolent creator that is willing to give them a path, however said path is just an option for those who don't have their own. And the second part...yah, that kinda made me upset bc while I still wouldn't side with law over most the other endings (I as a person lean more towards chaos alignments if I had to choose...even when Law isn't blatantly evil), at least it felt like an ending people actually could side with up until that...unlike say smt4 where law's ending is literally genocide

[@BigKlingy]

That's how I wanted to interpret it too, like "you don't have to do anything, but anything you DO do is beneficial." SMT2's Law is also genocide, but is also the most likely canon route. (You still fight YHVH, turning on him after he commits genocide) Original Strange Journey has probably the most ridiculously extreme Law and Chaos routes, Law has everyone on earth either brainwashed or killed, Chaos has humans devolve into primal savagery and slaughter themselves (and you straight-up side with the final boss and cause the event you were sent there to stop). I tend to be biased against Chaos personally (I really hate social darwinism and the philosophy of "take what you want in life, even if you have to hurt other people"), which is why Law endings were better.

[@megarotom1590]

@@BigKlingy I think chaos is often, survival of the fittest and law is one enitity forcing their ideals onto everyone else...both are bad imo but generally in smt, the law sides are like put to an extreme point while the chaos routes end up being relatively lax. Though I also think smt law and chaos are often two sides of the same coin...the rule of law means nothing when someone has enough strength to ignore it and if you have enough power, you can implement your own law. I tend to be biased against law personally because its tyrannical usually and usually chaos endings allow people to act more neutrally, so long as you have the power or know someone who does, you can give the good sides of law still. On the flipside, the only way to introduce portions of chaos in law aligned stories is to rebel and practically overthrow it.

[@darkstarsta3]

Game good, story bad but Jack Frost keychain is godly (yes you get one with one of the special editions)

[@barryjims5883]

I wouldn't be surprised if some content had to be cut due to the Pandemic. The example that comes to mind is when Dazai changes. It begins with him saying "You can't lose, Abdiel!" It's almost like something happened immediately before that. It couldn't have been because of the fight you had with her, because that was quite a while before this scene, both in game and out. This game was probably going to be more story focused, but then some stuff was removed because they couldn't finish everything. I am not defending the story we got, but I am trying to consider why it is this way. If they release a version with a complete story, I would probably be pissed that they didn't do that in the first place, and it would render what we all bought as the incomplete version that was full priced. Not sure if I would buy it again, even with it being some of my favorite gameplay in the series.

[@BigKlingy]

That's my view too, on the one hand it feels like they could pull a Nocturne and do an updated re-release with expanded story/endings, but at the same time, that'd feel like a slap in the fact to people who bought this version, and I'm not sure if I'd end up getting it.

[@MikulOnIce85]

Hmm let's see with your thoughts here: First off, I'll always clap when someone throws shade at the sequel trilogy. It's so much fun to make fun of those movies. -To touch on the physical skills using mp instead of hp, there are skills that let your demons charge up other party members so they can stay focused on dealing damage. Although those skills are lategame options, they're available and I appreciate it. -In regards to the level scaling. in one aspect it made me feel when I entered the area where you can find Zeus/Odin/ Vasuki that I was in an area where the higher leveled demons can and did kill me if I wasn't careful. That area was my favourite because that experience made me think of xenoblade x and the creatures I had to respect or perish throughout that world. -It's funny that you mentioned Sahori was someone without enough time to make an emotional connection to. For me the mercy kill was a rare moment where I felt strong emotion for someone, someone I had pushed so hard to save only to fail her in the end. -I would have enjoyed taking missions on zeus and odin's behalf. So I agree that was a missed opportunity. -Yuzuru was indeed a wasted opportunity. The 'chaos' route could have been so much better done with some actual focus and screentime for the poor guy. -I must be odd, because Yumako and Nuwa ended up being my favourite characters of the game. I appreciated that he wasn't a nice person despite wanting humanity to be free of the conflict between demons and angels. I even found myself agreeing with him that the real scum are those who manipulate the naïve and gullible. I guess I liked going out of my way and hearing more of what he's done by exploring tokyo and discovering he gave someone a phone containing a demon summoning app. And watching his death scene made me feel genuinely bad for him. At that point I was tired of hearing about the gods saying they were going to take the throne of creation for themselves and I felt was being pushed/manipulated into taking the throne, so I wanted to take up his sword in his name and destroy the throne of creation so utterly that no one would ever fight over it again. -35:03 I wonder who might have acted in such a way... cougheddiecough -I agree that the demons weren't oppressing humans, but playing the game made me feel that demons were a clear danger to humanity whether they would hunt them down to reclaim their knowledge, consume them for food, or be so ambitious in their quest to claim the throne of creation for themselves. -Oh yeah on my first playthrough I progressed too far in the main story to take the secret ending by accident and I had to take the 'destroy the throne' path. -Abidel is another character I enjoyed despite your own frustration. I found it personally interesting to watch her struggle to uphold god's order as everything fell apart around her, and in the end she was willing to condemn herself in order to uphold what she felt was the only way to maintain order. And I think I could respect that on a personal level. When she told Ichiro that he was her knowledge, I instantly worried that she was going to take it from Ichiro by force in order to uphold god's order. But she didn't do that and let him be. I also agreed with Ichiro saying to Yuzuru that there would be war in a 'world of gods' because of their unchecked ambition. Even if his transformation towards the end of the game was so incredibly ridiculous. Speaking of Amanozako, smt V made me care more for her than Aogami by the end of the game. I felt I had properly earned her kindness at the end of her last quest, but with Aogami whenever he said he would do anything for me, I always asked why mentally. Outside of all this, one thing I want to bring up is the relationships between gods and humans in SMTV. I personally feel that the trope of gods who view humans as nothing but scum to be cleansed is way overdone, and I loved seeing the connection that Yumako and Nuwa shared along with Miyazu and Khonsu in their sidequest. The relationship between gods and humans feels more nuanced because of this, and I would like to see more in the future. Overall, I agree with most of what you say about smt V's story and gameplay, and I did enjoy hearing what you have to say.

[@BigKlingy]

I still think the prequel trilogy is objectively worse. The sequel trilogy just... don't fit together as a trilogy. I like Donum Gladi/Magici, I just often don't find the time to use them. I think the Magatsuhi skill that lets Charge effects last an entire turn has a lot of untapped potential though. I used it once and it let the same Demon get 3 Critical Aura attacks during a single Press Turn cycle. Those Orochis. The upside is you catch up pretty fast, and the Bethel bosses are all around Lv 70. I didn't end up caring for Sahori much, and I realized the reason why while editing this video: the cutscenes I showed here are the ONLY times she appears all game. I think if she'd been an NPC since the beginning it might have worked better. As a side note that I didn't get to mention in the video, her subplot is also the bog-standard "bully victim gains supernatural powers and gets revenge" plot with virtually nothing new done with it. The franchise already used this plot as the basis for AN ENTIRE GAME: SMT If. Amanozako was great, I really agree.

[@MikulOnIce85]

@@BigKlingy Oh, now I wouldn't mind listening to a video why you felt the prequel was objectively worse. Also Yes! I'm so glad you get it with the orochis in that area!

[@BigKlingy]

I remember dodging past a bunch of Orochis on a bridge to get to an Abscess... that turned out to be EVEN STRONGER OROCHIS.

[@perpetuallyconfused09]

Yakumo was definitely an interesting character I wish we saw more of him and nuwa

[@BigKlingy]

@@perpetuallyconfused09 I wish we got more of every aligment rep. Dazai's the only one to get focus, and they then drop his development off a cliff at the end.

[@kuraux56s59]

"Gameplay good, Story bad here." In other news, THE SUN IS WARM!!! The Nocturne shilling ant the fact that the game's development was ANYTHING but smooth is the reason why the story turned out like this. "I thought after Strange Journey Redux you should have learned your lesson!" Correction, they should have learnt it since DEVIL SURVIVOR 1!!! Do the writers at Atlus have a fucking Hate Boner for Law and Christianity!? As, well... Apparently the extra stuff added in Redux was outsourced to the creators of Tokyo Mirage Sessions. And Devil Survivor 1 in its entirety was made by a different company called Career Soft. UGH!!! I really wish that Dazai and Abdiel would have taken more notes from Amane, you also have a perfect recipe for a relatively wholesome Male Human x Female Angel romance! Fucking hell! Also, Yakumo is just a cheap knockoff of Raidou Kuzunoha The 14th. And I wanna see the Capital's Protector show that wannabe what the real deal is made off... And also Moh Shuvuu kicking Nuwa in the face. That too.

[@BigKlingy]

Yeah it's the pretty common opinion, but with how unanimous the fans are on this game's plot that's... not a good sign. Mainline SMT CAN have good stories, too. (This game made people re-evaluate SMTIV's story and realize it was a decent, if flawed, attempt at modernizing the formula and at least they made you CARE about Walter and Jonathan before they went full Chaos/Law) I don't get why they went so far in making this a "stealth remake" of Nocturne in the same year they released AN ACTUAL NOCTURNE REMAKE. I've heard really good things about Devil Survivor 1 and how it handles things (although I don't like the concept of the Silent Revolution ending), I need to play that. To be fair, Christianity is a very small minority in Japan. I kind of see SMT's take on it as equivalent to what Disney's Hercules is to Greek mythology. The creators of TMS did the extra Redux stuff? Huh, with how plot-light that game was I'm surprised. There's a lot of things about Redux I don't find that great (Alex feels, for lack of a better word, "fanfiction-y"), I appreciate how it made Law "humanity solves disputes via peaceful debate" and Chaos "freedom and possibility WITHOUT Social Darwinism." It's also kind of annoying how much "tell don't show" there is in their interactions, with it mostly being Dazai saying things like "she's so nice" or "her plan makes the most sense" without elaborating on WHY he thinks that.

[@starmaker75]

Yeah as a Christian it really annoying that law is always the religious extremism people. Like I get that abrahamic religions don’t have the best history with tolerance with different beliefs, but can have some nuance.

[@kuraux56s59]

@@BigKlingy Oh yeah, outside of Yuzu's original ending. Atsuro's ending is the ONLY ending in Devil Survivor 1 that rubs me off the wrong way. I can only be grateful that there are a LOT of better alternatives to it. And I may as well mention, Redux wasn't the first time they tried these more positive takes on Law and Chaos. Majin Tensei 2 and SMT NINE had their whole "Light Law" and "Light Chaos" alternate endings. I was also shocked upon finding out the involvement of the TMS Guys in Redux... Like, you see TMS... And then the Neutral Plus ending... And you mean to tell me that both of those things were made by the SAME people!?

[@kuraux56s59]

@@starmaker75 Like, I stopped being religious years ago. But I STILL want to see this series have a far gentler take on the Angels and the Capital G God!

[@kingsman5121]

22:44 applause

[@BigKlingy]

You might be surprised to hear then that I actually don't mind The Last Jedi as a film IN ISOLATION. If it wasn't part of a series, and it was trimmed down a bit, it'd be my favourite film in the franchise. (It helps that I am not a Star Wars fan and don't give a crap about the lore or characters. It only hit me why people hated TLJ so much when I saw someone compare it to Chrono Cross.) The problem for me is the sequel trilogy doesn't make sense as a trilogy, the plots don't flow into eachother and each film goes out of its way to defy the previous one instead of build on it. The best description I've seen was a common on Honest Trailers Rise of Skywalker saying it's like a group project where the group members don't talk or collaborate before they present their sections.

[@kingsman5121]

@@BigKlingy that’s fair I hated them because I WAS a Star Wars fan but I can definitely see that those films were not planed out and felt like films by committee Helps knowing that I can see those films as failures both from an objective standpoint and a personal one

[@BigKlingy]

I also feel like the prequel trilogy is far more objectively flawed, in areas like script writing and acting. (But I will never stop loving Phantom Menace semi-ironically) I thought TFA and TLJ were a lot better as films (ROS maybe not so much), their main flaws were how they fit together and what they did to existing lore, which tend to be more subjective. I haven't seen any of the full-on deconstructive video essays on them though, and I'm not an expert in film techniques.

[@kingsman5121]

@@BigKlingy fair enough

[@xenoinazuma7631]

Great thumbnail first off! Now I mostly agree with what you have said. Feel I should add things in. I feel why most people meme on the ‘It’s Persona 5 without the Heart’ is because it’s an implication that the whole game is literally a soulless clone when it’s really just the story and characters. Also I agree with yiur views on Yakumo but he is more of between Facist and Racist. Which is honestly worse if you can be viewed as both. I swear they tried to do a Nocturne so hard they tried to copy some of the beats and did it worse somehow. Which is impressive in the worst way. Also I swear I cannot even remember a Law ending I even liked. Like I literally can’t. The only ones I come up with I hate. Though at least the new demon designs are really cool. Loki. Also Fionn Maccumhail best character in the game even though he literally has less screen time than most characters and is practically the only viable physical Demon minus the Nahobino and possibly a certain swordsman. God now I’m feeling like I should run a. Tangent on how they somehow did an opposite of Nocturne in that way too. Funny considering a certain DLC

[@BigKlingy]

The thing for me with characters like Yakumo is: "try replacing "humanity" with "white people" in his dialogue and see how horrifying it becomes." I know there's a false equivalence with fantasy races that are more powerful than humans but I'm just not a fan of the rise in "human supremacist" stories. I'm glad we're moving away from "humans are evil they all must die" JRPG villains, but this is the opposite extreme. Something awkward I also realized: a Japanese soldier being the one with the Knowledge of a Chinese goddess. It's suspension of disbelief that everyone with a major deity's Knowledge happens to be in Tokyo, but this one in particular could have weird implications. I've heard Devil Survivor 1's Law route isn't that bad, and Strange Journey Redux's Law+ is also pretty good. I forgot to mention about Fionn: trailers made him out to be important. He shows up 3 times in the game. 1st is to fight you for no reason. 2nd is optional NPC dialogue that's easily missable. 3rd is the sidequest where you fight him again and unlock him for fusion. Chris Hackney deserved better.

[@halcyon9911]

I watched absolutely nothing of the SMT 5 trailers other than the OG reveal and the release data announcement trailer. So I'd have been waiting nearly 5 years for SMT 5. I came to SMT from persona because I just prefer how it goes about what it does. So I was really really hyped for SMT 5... It got to a point through the build up where I started getting legitimately scared. It all started when I was talking to my friend about smt4 and 4a, and how I absolutely hated the plot of 4a because they just slaughtered the tone completely and it's just a crap shoot. And he joked "what would you do if SMT 5s plot was like that". I couldn't answer that question... And then we get to the actual game release. Holy fuck the plot was awful... For the entire game I was excited to see where these would go, I was guessing alignments and everything, and it was just fucking terrible story wise. I got to the bethel alliance break part and was hyped first time playing. But it was soul crushing seeing that this went nowhere... I feel like there could have been so much potential for all of this and imagine how fucking amazing it could have been if there was a resemblance of a damn cohesive plot... Still with all of that, it's my favorite game in the series PURELY on the gameplay alone as it 11/10... I'm worried that Soul Hackers 2 is gonna suffer from shitty writing too... Because fuck me apocalypse and 5 have been AWFUL

[@BigKlingy]

Soul Hackers has always been more story and character focused than mainline (it was kind of SMT's first attempt at making a "mainstream JRPG", before they tried it again with Persona to much greater success), and doesn't have alignment-based endings. So I'm hoping it's better.

[@halcyon9911]

@@BigKlingy so is persona and I still feel the story gets incredibly cliche and tropey... It's not a bad thing, but they could do a hell of a lot better... And they have done (the extra bit in royal does a lot to salvage it's story for me) so I'm just a bit worried given the track record lately

[@BigKlingy]

I really hope Royal and Strikers' writers stay at Atlus, Royal was the most interesting story of the modern Persona games to me, while Strikers elevated an otherwise cliche plot to being better than it had any right to be through good dialogue and character writing.

[@halcyon9911]

@@BigKlingy I couldn't get through royal to actually get to the best bit with my copy (I've done it now, and it is great) because base persona 5 story is just ugh... I didn't play much of strikers, not a fan of the style of gameplay it has sadly, should probably watch the entire thing on KZbin at some point

[@BigKlingy]

That's why I wish Royal's 3rd semester worked like Future Connected in Xenoblade Definitive: letting you skip to it from the start of the game. I'm replaying P5R now in preparation for recording it, and I think its main story is fine. Not amazing, but it's a decent "conspiracy thriller" for what it is. Definitely has its flaws, and many characters are underused, but I'm still enjoying it.

[@nachohangover5104]

I think the human characters are pretty bad except for Dazai, but it makes up for it with Abdiel and Koshimizu. They're by far the most developed alignment deities the series has ever had. Their goals are well established, their reasons for following those goals are clear, and unlike basically every other alignment deity they aren't absolutely awful people (both want to protect humanity, neither want to kill a bunch of them). That's a big thing for the alignments this game, they made neutral not squeaky clean and made law and chaos absolutely awful (SMT4 was basically pick the good route or one of two genocidal maniacs). Chaos' ending I think was justified since the gods being unable to cooperate or not be power hungry... just flat out makes sense given their mythological characterization (come on it's Zeus, of course he would be a selfish basturd). Yakumo's philosophy is definitely more based on the series' history of demons manipulating and corrupting people rather than the events of V itself. To be fair they do have Zeus saying he sought out his knowledge to force the human to merge with him and Koshimizu warning Dazai that a demon may seek him out to force him to be their nahobino (he didn't know it was Abdiel's knowledge) so it does get referenced a bit. I still think V's law route is better than most SMT games'... but that's a low bar. Abdiel and Dazai genuinely care about keeping peace and protecting people and don't want to start a genocide like... basically every other law rep. Again, low bar but law is usually so awful that I still see this as an improvement over the usual. It helps that Nahobino becomes an explicitly kind and good god.

[@BigKlingy]

"I still think V's law route is better than most SMT games'... but that's a low bar. Abdiel and Dazai genuinely care about keeping peace and protecting people and don't want to start a genocide like... basically every other law rep. Again, low bar but law is usually so awful that I still see this as an improvement over the usual. It helps that Nahobino becomes an explicitly kind and good god." That is... basically my opinion too. It's actually not a terrible Law ending, it's just that they had to make Dazai and Abdiel get "evil makeovers" at the last minute as if to say "haha actually law still bad", and Koshimizu's route exists. And Koshimizu's route exists. I think he's... okay, but hardly a stellar character. He's still a billion times better than Yuzuru and probably one of the best characters in V, but that's a very, very low bar. (I like to say the only two human characters who are remotely interesting both turn out to be secretly gods) As a joke I was making headcanons about what kind of world Zeus would want if he took the Throne. It's probably one where he lives in luxury surrounded by women, and everyone else... exists I guess.

[@leixalkvinay2729]

I don't know where the generic law rep comes, the only law rep who tries to brainwash people is Zelenin. Jonathan only tries to keep Mikado clean while leaving everyone else on their misery (and eventually kills them), like some politicians and countries do, and Amane, well, she actually has the best law ending with the New Law from STJ, and Ronaldo from Desu 2 (I don't think this counts as brainwash, mainly because that's how the chaos side works too) I haven't played SMT 1 or 2, but I doubt those are literally that.

[@perpetuallyconfused09]

@@leixalkvinay2729 2 law ending is destroying the world

[@nachohangover5104]

@@BigKlingy To be fair, I think the demonic transformation for Abdiel makes sense to emphasize the weight of her choice to disobey God's law and become a fallen angel. If the transformation was very simple her decision wouldn't be as meaningful. Dazai's transformation though, yeah, that one's stupid.

[@nachohangover5104]

@@leixalkvinay2729 SMT1: Everyone is ruled by YHVH as a tyrant. SMT2: Genocide and the Law faction from the last game are literally the villains this time. SMTSJ: Brainwashing SMT4: Genocide again.

[@athorem]

Great video. An interesting thought... If a mainline SMT game came out that went 100% all in with an amazing plot and characters... would SMT fans be upset about that? Would they be like "Nooo why doesn't this game have a minimalist plot without a character focus!" I'm wondering if people just want things like a minimalist plot because of tradition's sake and not because they actually make the game better

[@BigKlingy]

I think mainline works better with minimalistic plots, I just feel like this game didn't go for that, it instead tried to do a character-driven story and didn't put enough effort into it. It doesn't feel like a real minimalist plot, just an unfinished character-based one.

[@athorem]

@@BigKlingy Yeah even though this game tries to be minimalist like nocturne story wise, the two games don't feel similar in that way. Nocturne was fine the way it did things, maybe not the most interesting, but it wasn't actively detrimental to the game like this game's story. If in the future they actually manage to recreate the feeling of experiencing Nocturne's plot then that would be an interesting direction for the series, but since they tried to do this and failed horrendously, I personally really REALLY hope they don't try it again.

[@leixalkvinay2729]

I wouldn't call IV minimalist, and is loved by a good chunk of the community just like Digital Devil Saga or Devil Survivor. Even Apocalipse wasn't hated due to having a character heavy story, instead it was hated because the story was too "anime" and characters felt out of place in the apocalipse.

[@EmperorSephirothII]

Chaos?! Did someone say Chaos?! (Playing Stranger of Paradise at the moment.) Also, I bust out laughing at the 5 second Klingy bleeped bit.

[@legodawg2001]

I'm not gonna disagree with any of your complaints about the execution of the story. I 100% agree with you. The game is a massive step back to some of the worst of the mainline. However, I would like to offer my personal thoughts. (Also physical skills have been costing MP since SMTIV and it SUCKSSSSSSSSSSSSSS. totally agree with you there, its just nothing new) First off, SMT has always been more about the themes and worldbuilding instead of the actual story and characters. A lot of the ideas at play are never really told to you, you just kinda have to feel them, by talking to people, going through the atmosphere, and the like. To those ends, I think SMTV succeeded at least in having themes. The inclusion of the book Paradise Lost and the Garden of Eden implies a kind of fall, which seemed to me that this game was a lot about temptation and how it can change people. And that is kind of what we have. The only people who don't really have strong temptation is the protagonist, because his "other half" is literally a robot (which kinda feels like a self-aware fact that the protagonist can never have any ideas of his own? That's just a theory though). Yuzuru talks to Tsukuyomi constantly (if you could call that temptation, Yuzuru is still the game's biggest failure imo) and most interestingly, instead of Dazai being what we would call the "Law Rep" being the human equivalent of you, it honestly kinda feels like Abdiel was the law rep, and Dazai was the divine sponsor. Its honestly an interesting twist and makes sense why Dazai was so 1 note at the end. Abdiel was literally tempted into going Nahobino. The game needs a LOT more of this, don't get me wrong, but there is something there. If you wanted my "rom hack" fixes to SMTV, I honestly wouldn't change that much. I would swap the final bosses of area 1 and 2 (I think the bullying arc would be more interesting as a worldbuilding piece of the intro act instead of a major pillar of the story, and Nuwa and Yakumo are more interesting the later you go anyways) and rewrite a lot of the filler dialogue. Just those things would help a lot. On the subject of the Bethel summit, I actually disagree on us knowing them before. They're a part of different branches. You are part of the Japan branch. There's no reason why you should meet other branch leaders when you're effectively Tsukuyomi's errand boy for a bit. But, I do think there should have been more of a presence of the other branches. in particular, I'm critical of the sudden introduction of plot elements like the invasion of the Demon Castle, but having other forces gear up or plan for a battle would be interesting. Likewise, its obvious they wanted to do this. There are 1-2 NPCs before the 3rd area that refer to their own branches, but it does need to be more On the subject of the endings, this is actually one of SMTV's greater strength imo. Each of the endings is a more ideological take on what the endings should be. Law emphasizes security over literal brainwashing and genocide, chaos advocates for instability and choice rather than survival of the fittest, Destroy the Throne is just the Demon Ending in Nocturne, which was a sign of weakness for the protagonist, and True Human is another take of the SMTIV Apocalypse Anarchy ending, which is a good thing. Its the "true ending" yes, and you are fair to criticize that, and its conditions are also dumb, but its also the one that ties into human importance in this story, and that's my next point. Law also plays an interesting role in this post conception world, because in Nocturne, it was impossible for there to be a law ending. All the law believers were killed off at the start of the game, and that's why you can't have a law ending. It's interesting here because it highlights not only the question of if a divine war can continue with the death of YHVH, but it also uses law as a way to highlight the hypocrisy of every ending. Every ending has an ideological flaw that arguably writes itself out. Law requires giving into evil. Chaos was meant to restore the gods to their own glory, but only highlights why their Nahobino forms were taken away. Destroy the throne was meant to prevent the control of any divine figure, but the demons just ate all of humanity anyways. True Human is meant to wipe away all the soul-altering components of the divine war, including gods, angels, and demons, yet there you are as an omnipotent figure watching over them all. Its an interesting bit of nuance to it all imo. These are probably the best "normal" alignments in the mainline series, and whether you consider that interesting or sad is really up to you. I think you put too much stock into demons being "characters." They're not really a fantasy race. In SMTIV and beyond, demons are the result of human belief systems, and are only manifest because of their belief. Everything in the game is reflected on how humans view myths and the divine. There's a line that describes that before YHVH, there was Baal, and before that was Ra. That's basically how the line of dominant civilization gods was in the Egypt-Israel side of the world. The second thing is that everyone is involved in the cosmic war between law and chaos. This is why every demon has their own alignment. Its meant to show you where in the cosmic war they rely on. Unless you're like the bottom rung of demons, in which case you're basically just citizens of a faction, you are actively fighting in the war in some way. Yes demons are the personality of the series, but they're not truly characters. If you want demons as characters, I would advise you to play Devil Summoner, but that's not how it works here. Lucifer is definitely tacked on in the end, but it is interesting to me because it kinda continues some of the grander multiverse stories SMT has been tackling for the last few games. We're learning a lot more about the Great Will, but its slow. I wonder if it will ever culminate. I fully agree that SMTV has a lackluster story, and objectively bad writing and storytelling, but it DOES have more depth and story CONTENT than you give credit for. Its hard to lay out my defenses because the storytelling is so bad, and maybe that should say something too, but I DO see something here. Personally, I don't think should have been a numbered entry. Its clear they were trying to bite off more than they could chew with their development time, and while it did go to the right place with its gameplay and setting, it definitely feels like its missing something to be a numbered entry in mainline. Its a good jumping off point at least for future HD mainline games at the very least

[@BigKlingy]

There's a lot of good points here, and I admit V's world building is good in theory (as I said, I loved the opening scene with the tree of knowledge), it just feels like it should've gone all-in on being a lore-driven, minimalistic story instead of attempting to be a character-driven story and ending up a watered down case of both. They clearly wanted all your classmates to be a big deal, given their nameplates, and having the two Atsutas be walking props makes it seem like something got rushed. I still disagree with you on demons though. Amanozako was the character the game succeeded the most in getting me attached to. She's really just a glorified Dowsing Machine, but her quips are pretty funny, she appears a lot, has fully voice acting and has symbolic connection to the MC if you know her mythology. Khonsu also got decent development, and it's hard not to love Fionn. The fact the ending that erases them from the world requires you to complete all their quests just doesn't feel right. They did admittedly promise we'd see Lucifer's "true form" someday. Is this the one they were teasing? Apparently it was supposed to be "a combination of all his other forms", and that doesn't describe this one, so maybe not. I still wish the other Bethel leaders at least showed up before the inevitably breakdown. My main issue was that the breakup of Bethel would've felt like a bigger deal if you actually KNEW the people the Japan branch was betraying.

[@jaredfayette2567]

Been waiting to share my thoughts in full like this as well, so it's going to be great hearing yours and giving mine as well. WARNING: There will be a few comments from from me depending on how long I go on for. 1:30- This is such an amazingly helpful change. I was tad worried it would make the game too easy, but if anything, it made the combat and how you use press turns a lot more impactful. A fair number of my strats against the game's tougher fights probably only worked because of this fact and giving me more wiggle room. 1:54- Eh. If you're playing on Hard, some of the fight did feel like they would drag a bit and if you were a tad under leveled, the level scaling (more on that rant later) could also make some fights a tad longer than needed. 2:25- In general the spy glass is an amazing item. Besides. Being able to scan bosses is really nice, but I much more love how they also have a great niche in identifying the randomly generated weaknesses of the mitama acting as this game's metal slime equivalents. 3:22- I'm 50-50 on that trial and error aspect of SMT. On one hand it can be utterly frustrating getting trounced on by a boss because you used the wrong element on them or something. On the other, I do like the motivation you get from a loss to figure out the best team to trounce them, which can be a very satisfying experience. 3:40- Ah, that line is great as well. One of the big things that made me love IV were the negotiation lines and how they could end up and V very much rivals some of my favorite ones as well. 7:05- You more or less said everything that makes exploration so great in SMTV. The amount of exploration versus the rewards you get are just perfect. Also for being a more 3D game that vouches for a more "open world" feel to it, I felt like it had the perfect amount of space in most areas to keep things from getting to large and made it so most areas have a purpose for existing. 7:25- SMTIV did, though I might want to say that Strange Journey also did it possibly first. It is in Redux, but it wouldn't surprise me if OG SJ did the item cap first. 7:40- I would say that a lot of items are also really good in general that encourage using them. Shard and Gems are great in this game, especially when your demons get Knowledge of Tools, Spy Glass is great for Mitama and bosses as previously stated, Spirit Drain gems are a decent source of MP and save room for your demon's competitive and limited spaced skill pools, and absorbers are great if you can predict a boss correctly. My only real complaints with items are they screwed over the amount MP recovery items (namely the chakra items), which is annoying. Also your only source of chakra drops being via a trade is annoying at times. 8:25/ - Not going to lie, I REALLY dislike how you can only carry one type of each demon essence as once. I understand it stops you from hoarding super powerful ones and use them more frequently, but I feel like the limit should have been slightly higher, maybe at three. Main reason I'm saying this is mainly how this limit makes it SUPER annoying when you're trying to optimize final teams for the game's hardest fights. ESPECIALLY true in the case of *THAT* DLC boss fight where you need highly specific builds and seeing how you need so many of the same skills for each demon, you either have to rely on really long fusion chains to get certain skills on your demons, or grind a ton of the same essences, reach your nearest leyline to use them, and then run back all over to the demons that can drop them. Or if you're relying on random level ups from demons to give them your sources, train up certain demons until you drop them. There's also the issue of how many ways you can acquire certain sources where if you find repeat ones, you either need to return to a leyline to use it up and return to whichever chest you couldn't claim before, or in the case of random level ups (or on occasion certain side quests) outright lose out on them. Love the essence system overall, but I do not like the hard one cap per essence. At least in SJ/SJR with D-Sources, you only get them once you fully analyze a demon and given how rare it is to get a second one of each type, it feels less frustrating when dealing with a special item you can only hold one of. 9:10- Okay, time to defend 4's fusion filter stuff. Getting the bad out of the way first it can be very overwhelming and occasionally slow at times if you dive right into the advance fusion filter options and I do dislike the lack of a simple fusion table that you see in Nocturne/other SMTs or the Persona games. HOWEVER, if you jump right into the filter and don't apply any filters, you can still see the options you have right at your disposal with your current demons like in any other game, so it can be still simple. The advance filter options help you when you're trying to create highly specific demons (Ex. I need to use X demon to make Y demon, but I also want skill Z on them as well), which saves A TON of time when making these highly specific demons without needing to consult a fusion calculator online. Even if you don't care about the super advance filters, they also have some generally helpful ones like include/exclude current demon in the party or apply the compendium when trying to make a certain demon. I will say V probably has the cleanest and quickest ways for a demon you want to make on the fly, but IV's fusion filter system is my preferred system when trying to fully optimize your demons without how time saving it can be (even with V's cleaner system, there were still times I had to spend a while planning out fusion paths to fully optimize my demons). Some people do complain about IV's fusion filters making fusing demons too easy, but honestly, I think it makes you more aware of the tools at your disposal and saves you a ton of time making them. 9:56- Kind of. I very much consider the D-Sources prototype essences, but they function much differently since you need to use them during initial fusions and couldn't apply them afterwards. However, D-Sources were still very important since they allowed you to bypass the annoying inheritance system and pick which skills you want to place on a demon, including skills they would not be even able to inherit if you did a normal fusion without using a D-Source. In addition, you can even replace base set skills from a demon if you really don't like a certain skill hogging up a space (especially when SJ/SJR only has 6 skill slots versus the usual 8). Also D-Sources are weird in that in addition to all of the skills they normally give, they have a "B" skill included which is dependent on the skills you gave that demon. I have no idea how it works at the moment and it's random to my knowledge for now, but it also means even the D-Source can vary on playthroughs and lead to fun results (like me now having two source of Luster Candy because of them becoming "B" skills on a demon's source). I also like how they're guaranteed once you have a demon be fully analyzed (either fighting or using them them) and once you have that demon in your party, they'll give it to one after one fight. Think essences work a tad better, but I honestly like the D-Sources. 10:31- Agreed, I do like how they utilize the essences for how you build up your Nahobino as well. Do you give the skills to your demons or yourself? Do you keep your current resistances or change them up? Such a cool idea. 12:08- I would honestly say that inheritance still matters since while demon essences can let you get whatever you want, they still are limited and making some demons inherit certain skills and pass them on saves a TON of time grinding for even more essences. 12:58- Eh, I'm kind of fine with physical demons using MP since IV got me into the habit of it. What does bother me are the jacked up costs of certain skills when it comes to MP wise. Even with some magical demons the costs for some skills were really annoying. 13:25- Screw the level scaling. It really makes some fights annoying to do without over leveling for the main story. 14:35- The level curve sucks for the final area so much since not only would I say the bigger issue because you're coming out of an area where you can range from being mid 50s to 60 to facing main bosses and side quest fights to help catch you up anywhere from 5-25 levels ahead of you. Really love the idea for that area, but the level jump combined with the placement of certain things makes it annoying to handle as soon as you get in. 16:00- While I was able to keep my main stays relevant like Idun and Yoshitsune relevant for the entire game, it was still a massive hole to climb out of when training them and the rest of my team up. 18:30- Agreed, V has some amazing music as well. I wish there were more normal battle themes, but this game has some great songs. There are sadly some songs I can't talk here due to spoilers, but know they're my favorites. 19:05- Yeah, the lag and low frames can be quite bad. I don't care much for graphics, but even V was testing my patience. And now time for me to pull a Golden Sun Dark Dawn and leave you with a cliff hanger as I have to go for a bit, but I wanted to share my thoughts as quickly as possible. Tune back in a few hours for my rippin- I mean thoughts on V's story. Also my In Other News section will either be there or a separate comment.

[@BerserkerRohan]

This was my first time using the Press Turn system and I liked it a lot. I felt like on Normal, most of the fights were a good length but of course, when I was underleveled, they could drag a bit. I am glad I took your advice to invest in the Spyglasses. I can see that being 50-50 too although I haven't tried any of the higher difficulties of any of the SMT games I have played. Those negotiation lines were quite great indeed. The map also made me like the exploration of the world and it did help that the game still felt linear like a Xenoblade game until the final area at least since I am not a fan of how non-linear Breath of the Wild is. Items were handled quite well in this game. The one limit didn't annoy me too much but I did wish that the limit was slightly higher at the end of the game to help make specific builds. Since I really like the fusion systems in all the games I have played so far, I probably would like how SMT4 and its fusion filters work too. Out of those games I have played SMT5, probably has the best. D-Sources do sound fun to make use out of. I did like how we also had different approaches to our Nahobinos even though we both went magic builds too. I prefer to get the skills through fusion if possible too. Restore really helped with the MP situation but without it like in the beginning, running out of MP in a boss can be a common occurrence. I do have mixed feelings on the level scaling too, to be honest, even if it didn't annoy me that much. I do appreciate the warning you gave me for the final area too. Muu Shuvuu stayed with me throughout the game once I fused her in the Fairy village and I am glad she did due to her debuffs and Accursed Poison, alongside Boon Boost. I really liked this soundtrack too. Again, wasn't too bothered by the graphics probably because most of my playthrough was in handheld mode. I will see you there again then.

[@jaredfayette2567]

Time for the exciting* continuation on my comment for this video! *Your milage may very. 20:45- There's a story in SMTV? /s (... Or maybe not /s ... Oh dear.) 20:50- Yikes, that's quite serious if that's a case. 21:20- Still absolutely hate the wording of that statement, but 21:37 pt. 1- And I would honestly say SMT I also has a good story too. When I was watching an associate of mine play through the game, I was honestly surprised how well the writing and story held up to this day. I thought the events of the game were interesting, it was easy to follow but still enjoyable, and I think that the Law and Chaos Heroes were both handled really well and I could see how each of them developed onto their paths (even if I didn't like their paths, I was fine with the character development that lead to those moments and it felt natural, especially when compared to some law/chaos reps who go a complete 180 as soon as they embrace their role). 21:37 pt. 2- IV's was enjoyable, though stumbled near the end in my opinion. I also enjoyed Nocturne's since while minimalistic and how it could have been done better in some places, I thought it was good enough. I've also been enjoying Strange Journey/ SJR's story as well so far. 22:45- Understatement, but I perfectly get what you mean. 23:54- "... a punchline without a joke." Well that perfectly encapsulates my issues with the plot of the game. I honestly think V DOES have some really cool ideas and concepts, but holy hell did they frikin fail MISERABLY executing them with no proper planning. 24:50- She's there as free healing! ... For only like 20% HP after each fight. Sorry Tao, but the random shiny crystals I find on the ground are a better source of healing than you. Temporary Sinnoh Partner who heals you fully after each fight you are not. 26:00- Yeah, despite the second arc of the game being probably my favorite, mainly for its set pieces, the game really starting to open up at that point, and meeting my favorite new demon introduced in this game via Mr. McCool, story wise... It was practically filler. Seriously, many of the game's arcs feel so much like filler that other filler arcs in games I've played, including Chapter 7 in Yo Kai Watch 2 (which before SMTV was what I considered to be the single most filler section in any game I played) felt more substantial to their respective games' plots. 26:45- Yeah, were it not for three specific pieces of media having promising trailers but then producing some of the greatest betrayals of what I have ever felt, SMTV would have easily taken the cake. I would looking forward to seeing what Bethel's international branches were like, but NOPE. Already broken up before we even get ten minutes with them. 26:55- Even more frustrated when you phrase it like that. SO. MUCH. Missed Potential with Bethel. 27:59- Yeah the whole Lucifer stuff was so frikin forced at the end. And much like Bethel, they also hyped him up in the trailers, only for the interesting thing he said in it be only for a flashback and barring one brief moment, never hear from him until final boss time. The only good to come of this was I got to beat the ever loving hell out of the Devil for the first time in SMT without having to side with him, so I consider that a major win in my book and the one aspect I hate about TDE if I want to do its final fight on my hard run of Nocturne I need to get back to at some point. 28:49- I think she stays with you if you go Law, but other than that, she seems to always leave. 28:52- Going to have to disagree with that slightly once we get to the character I think was the best of the core characters, at least for the humans. Also key word in that sentence being "slightly" because of one big issue... 29:35- So for Yuzuru's non-existing character, I saw someone do an edit of sorts where his face is replaced with Plank's from Ed Edd n Eddy (the board of wood the character Johny has as a best friend). I will say that edit is horribly wrong since Plank has FAR more character than Yuzuru and doesn't deserved being used as the piece of wood to show Yuzuru's lack of character. When you're being beaten out by a LITERAL PLANK OF WOOD in terms of character, you know you having effing nothing. 30:10- Yeah, you more or less stated my thoughts on Miyazu. How is she so unremarkable as a character? Does it just run in her family like with her big brother? Were it not for her cute design and the one sidequest, I would have completely forgotten about her. 30:59- Now I'm half tempted to get that meme templet of the one guy going "I had no expectations and yet I'm still disappointed" and just slap BigKlingy's channel icon on it. lol 31:52- Agreed. Love the demon characters in V. Amno is great and Fionn is in my top five of all time favorite SMT demons. 33:15- Honestly, kind of mixed, but leaning towards agreeing. I think they were cool idea-wise, but they felt so hollow. 34:40- Yeah, I've been taking great issue with that as well. 36:10- Yes, I fully agree with this. If you either had him either be like you said being the part of humanity constantly being attacked by demons and angels or be tied to an early event in IV where he could have lost loved ones that fueled his hatred for demons, he would have fit so naturally in that game. But here in V... Yeah he just doesn't work. 37:40- Pardon me for a moment, I need an appointment with my pillow. *Muffled Angry NJ Prick Noises* Stop making law route suck Atlus you absolute pricks! 38:24- Never once have I heard Klingy so much... The SMTV writers pressed the big red button on Klingy. 38:38- I will say that the common angels seemed nice enough. The one that finds Dazai brings him to a safe place, during the second arc they help save the students (though there is conflicting info since one NPC claimed they attacked them as well, but seeing how all of the students brought to the Fairy Village were fine, I'm dubious of that NPC's claim), the one time the considered killing an innocent was to stop Lahmu from gaining full power to stop more lives from dying. Even the one Power for the Camel sidequest actually treats the MC on equal terms by calling him "brother" (though that could simply be formalities). I'd say the common angels in this game were actually an improvement over the ones in IV who were literally mindless drones. Now, the higher angels on the other hand... Not so much. 39:00- Were my face not numbed days earlier from previous face palming on Law's treatment with Abdiel's transformation, I would have been in physical pain over V's treatment of law. It's that bad. (Also her bloody transformation does absolutely nothing and exists for NG+ stuff. Story wise she gets it and then either immediately gets rid of it to become a Nahobino or dies right after. That transformation purely exists to make Law look even worst). 40:30- I really want to see that arc explored, I really want to see that in a story. (Going out of order for a reason...) 39:36- Doubt this is much of a hot take, but I will die on the hill that Dazai was the best human character and character in general for SMTV until *THAT* damn scene. Though flawed, I honestly liked what they tried to do with him. He's a person with low self-confidence who questions his place in life. He wants to do something good with it, but feels powerless about it (his one line about his parents constantly fighting and being caught in the middle, while it would better shown rather than told, helps emphasize this). Like you said at 39:51 he gets the chance to be the hero he wants to be, only to fail miserably (side note, like how they deconstruct the trope of character getting some special power/tool and instantly being good at it), doubling down on his self-worth. I like how he then latches onto and becomes inspired by Abdiel, especially when she seems pleased by his genuineness to help others and gives him some aid (be it advice in Act 2 or powerful angels in Act 3), which helps him out. Come the post-summit where Abdiel is all alone, he comes to her own his own violation to try and help her out so they can help keep the world safe. This arc of his is clearly still rushed and would have been improved with better planning and some new additions (I agree with the common opinion that he should have gotten some wins after getting assistance from Abdiel and show his growth because of her, like killing a powerful demon at thee Demon King's Castle), but in a game with nothing characters, I actually enjoyed his arc and considered him the best character the game gives us. Well.. The best character until... 41:10- UNTIL THIS STUPID *CENSORED*ING HAT SCENE!!! *CENSORED* THIS ASININE SCENE!!! It feels like one rouge writer was actually doing a flawed, but good job of making a likable law character, only for the chaos (and/or neutral) biased/ anti-law people at Atlus decided to release Minotaur drugged up on Walter's Agi spells, had Minotaur massacre that writer, his entire family, their pet, and the guy they bought their takeout dinner from, and began to bastardize that now Labrys Stirke-Riddled Writer's work and made Dazai into the most overly evil law rep they could make. I was SO FURIOUS at what they had done, I repeated face palmed my self, and cursed out why Atlus has to make any character related to law, order, and Christianity into an irredeemable *CENSORED*er. If any hope I had left in the story wasn't dead yet, it was dead then. I swear, if Atlus decides to pull any more bs with this in the future I- *This comment has been put on a commercial break while the crew goes to keep the NJ Pirck in check. Please tune into the third and final part of this comment chain soon*

[@jaredfayette2567]

Last time with the NJ Prick... *Furious NJ Prick battle cries with sounds of destruction as the B2 Boss Theme from IV plays* And now back to the final part of the comment chain... 42:30- Very much agree. I think SMTV was way too hard at trying to copy Nocturne. 43:00 pt1.- Agreed. V is a Nocturne that has no clue on what made Nocturne worked. For all the crap Nocturne gets for how it decided to handle itself, it KNEW how to handle itself and told a good enough story that drew people in with its atmosphere and deadly world as you ponder how it should be rebuilt. V, while having good ideas, does not follow up on them at all by trying to copy Nocturne without understanding what made it work. 43:00 pt2.- It's also how scarily accurate your comparison of V having Nocturne pandering and how similar it is to Pokemon's Gen 1 Pandering. Not going to lie, I think the one thing I fear the most besides an outright butchery of a piece of media is when a media constantly panders one specific part of it. It's happening in SMTV and Pokemon like you've established, I see it happening a lot in Yugioh with the Duel Monsters-Era Pandering and/or the DM, Blue Eyes, and HEROs pandering, and FE typically panders its most recent games with Three Houses even breaking those previous levels of pandering. 43:56- Agreed. I really like that world building at the start. The whole idea about the throne is really cool, especially sincee it explains how all of these religions and legends existing all at once; They're all real, but major figures from each one got to rule and the rule shifted until the Abrahamic God got the throne and kept it for so long. It's honestly such a fascinating idea. 44:35- Unless I can remember a new game from 2021 I can't remember at the moment, I might even call SMTV my game of the year. 45:40- Despite all of my annoyance with its non-existent story, I still really like SMTV and maybe after I've trimmed down my backlog, I can return to it and just relax with it. In other news, made some great progress story wise with Strange Journey Redux as well as great progress with optional content. Overall a great pace I've been going... Though the pace is currently being killed by my hunt for the next Fiend. I suppose the game wanted to balance out my luck with White Rider, so now I'm taking forever to find Red. Not only have I not found him, but to spit in my face, the game gave me a very rare forma (material) drop... RED RIDER'S FORMA! This is just insulting. But that isn't the end of my extreme luck. So after defeating a section where you fight two optional bosses back to back, my White Rider has an "interesting" skill mutation... Their Maziodyne turned into VOID PHYSICAL! After some debating, I took it, figuring I can just pass the skill and buy back White with his skill set before... Except I made a frustrating mistake. So you know how in every other SMT game the first time you acquire a demon, including fusion, the game automatically records their joining status which includes skills? SJR is not like that and after making White Rider with one of my best formas, I forgot to, so I either had to get rid of void physical in order to save White or have a worst White Rider and wasted a good forma. Ultimately, I came to a decision. To not make White Rider a pure void physical skill fodder dispenser, I decided to "cheat." By cheat, I mean use the password generator and make White Rider before the skill mutation, that way I could have Void physical fodder and not screw over White Rider since password demons are recorded separately from your registered compendium demons.While the best solution, it does have its draw backs, namely was it only a bit shameful, but if I want to "update" White Rider 2, I can't update his log normally, but I instead have to reenter entirely new passwords to record his current strength. Overall, it's been some strange sessions with this game. Hopefully I can find that prick Red Rider soon before I'm trapped in full work mode soon.

[@jaredfayette2567]

@@BerserkerRohan The Press Turn system is really great. One of the best battle systems in any game series I've played. It really simple, but offers so much depth and only shows signs of improving with each installment. Even when not playing on higher difficulties, I still feel that the experience of facing this imposing challenge, getting knocked down, but then getting back up to knock back said challenge is another key way that makes SMT so enjoyable. It's a similar experience that draws people to the Souls/ soulsborne games. I fully agree with that comparison, though slightly leaning a bit more towards XC2 in that comparison since I felt XC2 had more filled areas when compared to XC1. A lot of why I loved SMTV's exploration was because how similar it was to the XC games'. A little bit hard to explain with words since I feel like you need to use the fusion filters in IV to get a good feel, but basically, while they're very daunting to use at first and once you have specific ideas in mind for what you want to make, the fusion filters become your best friends when making the strongest demons that you want. I'm honestly surprised how much I've been liking the D-Source system since I came into the mindset of them purely being prototype demon essences. Their subtle differences and the factors surrounding them makes them engaging in their own way. The level scaling was especially annoying during boss fights where I'm just *barely* a level short that then causes the scaling to get really bad or during the super boss when I had to experiment in finding the best level to do that fight without becoming too over leveled for the main story. Happy to see that warning pay off well for you since that jump into that last level is absolutely painful. Really like it when you can keep demons for the long term like that. Always feels so awarding and V makes that much more possible. I was in handheld mode too and the frames and other junk were still noticeable. Also the rest of the comments are in if you want to read them, just be sure to have some time to spare since the second one (The one that starts with "Time for") ended up longer than expected.

[@BigKlingy]

38:38 They're sort of alright, though I didn't like them telling you to kill any humans who'd been "tainted" by Demons in the invaded school arc. (Though given what happens to Sahori, they might have a point) 39:00 YES, this! "Story wise she gets it and then either immediately gets rid of it to become a Nahobino or dies right after." Also, I thought a consolation of going Law would be getting to fuse Fallen Abdiel, at least... and I screamed when I found out her Fallen form doesn't unlock for that route until NG+. I thought you'd get it after she died... (Meanwhile you get both Nuwa's forms for fusion after beating her, and I think on routes where you fight Abdiel you also unlock both her forms) 41:10 I'd agree there, Dazai's hat scene almost feels like one of the writers didn't approve of making a Law rep actually decent and so decided to scribble over his arc and start writing him as a generic Law asshole. I know he's supposed to have gained confidence, but it's more like hat and no-hat Dazai are written as completely different people.

[@StriderBlade7711]

One thing I give props to the story is how the nahobinos in the game parallel relationships The protagonist and Aogami have a strong friendship, while it's not overly deep they do support each other in various ways. Yakomo and Nuwa have a weird romantic relationship, they view each other as their other half to a point where one of them dies protecting the other Dazai and Abdeil are the definition of a toxic relationship, they became worse people due to each others influence and in a way became more chaos aligned than law Yuzuru and the prime minister are business relationship, they respect each other sure but that's about it and they don't an effect on one another. Also when the reps resonant with their demons their eyes glow yellow, with Yuzuru it only happens for a second before he fuses. SMT V is actually a sequel to nocturne with dialogue alluding to the events of that game and especially in the fiend DLC where the fiends comparing you to the demi-fiend and Sophia if I remember correctly confirms this just before you fight the demi-fiend Also from what I heard, the unreal engine runs not that well on the switch.

[@BigKlingy]

I agree with most of those, though I don't believe Abdiel and Dazai's relationship is entirely toxic. They're some of the more reasonable Law reps, that just isn't a high bar. I've seen "V is a sequel to Nocturne" said often, but I think it's more a fan theory than actually canon, at least for now. There's nothing indicating "Armageddon" in this game and Lucifer killing "the Creator" (who isn't even confirmed to be YHVH) are the True Demon Ending of Nocturne, and I see the references more as fanservice than continuity. Unless they explicitly confirm this and Nocturne are in the same universe, I'm personally taking that more as a theory.

[@firecraft7032]

...sometimes I feel that the best way to make these endings for SMT is you know, make them less extremist? Speaking of SMT5, I was thinking of SMT3 a bit. I found that part of me likes Isamu ending despite it being very unhealthy mentally wise, has no idea what to think about the adult guy in SMT3, and violently rejecting Chikaki's ideals with every fiber of my body. Yeah Chikaki, being weak really does suck, but you have ever considered not being an asshole to other weak people when you eventually become strong? I remember how fire emblem fans would classify Edelgard as chaos, Claude as netural, and Dimtiri as law, yet I am 99.9% sure Dimitri would reject AT LEAST half of the SMT LAW endings. Hell, Dimitri would probably defy the SMT definition of law by trying to create change in a lawful way.

[@BigKlingy]

I liked aspects of how Devil Survivor 2 handled the alignments, where the main reps were extremist, but each alignment had minor followers who were far more sympathetic. e.g while Ronaldo, the main Law rep, wants a semi-brainwashed world of forced equality and is an asshole to everyone who disagrees, the other party members who side with him just want to end poverty and have a more equal-opportunity society.

[@firecraft7032]

@@BigKlingy Tbh, I still don t like the idea of following the extremist. They are the ones that decide after all...

[@BigKlingy]

@@firecraft7032 I should have clarified: you don't have to. DS2 is one of the few games where you don't kill everyone on Neutral, the "minor" reps can always be recruited to your side after their fights, and the main reps can be convinced to join Neutral too, although it's difficult. Though if you go Neutral and don't or can't recruit everyone, you get locked into one of the worst endings.

[@nachohangover5104]

@@BigKlingy You actually don't get locked into the bad Neutral ending if you don't get everyone. Neutral on Devil Survivor 2 has three endings, the worst one which you get locked into if you don't see one event, one you can pick if you saw a specific event beforehand, and an extended version of that ending by also recruiting everyone.

[@BigKlingy]

@@nachohangover5104 Ah, right. To be honest, I think I forgot the "middle Neutral" ending because it felt more like a lead-in to New Game Plus than a proper end to the story. If I remember right, it just resets the world back to how it was at the start of the plot, while the extended version is the same but implies everyone kept enough of their memories and growth to avert the apocalypse. I think I read somewhere that "Triumphant" (the recruit all ending) still happens even if you pick or get the "Liberator" ending? (The "bad neutral")

[@starmaker75]

When you choose law in smt 5 or law in general: Abidal: I like you nanobino, you dot do things like have opinions. Going by smt 5, would that make byleth an nanobino l?

[@BigKlingy]

Byleth basically is a Nahobino, it's a common joke people have made.

[@megarotom1590]

I want an smt game that actually uses irl moral philosophies for alignments...feel like that would help alignments make more sense bc people actually have these ideologies

[@BigKlingy]

I feel like that could just open up a can of worms. The closest thing they have to that imo is Devil Survivor 2, where Law is practically Socialism/Communism and Chaos is extreme Capitalism.

[@megarotom1590]

@@BigKlingy I was talking moral philosophies not politcal alignments...for instance Utilitarianism and Kantism Honestly, law and chaos in general feel very much like an analogy to extreme socialism and extreme capitalism in general

[@wolfherojohnson2766]

37:53 Hey at least Law isn’t entirely evil to a SATAM degree. I do think they could use some extra work. In DnD standards, if they were written well, they could go like this Chaos: Chaotic Good Neutral: Neutral Evil TN: TN Law: Chaotic Evil/BBEG Though if law was changed, it maybe could be ACTUALLY lawful?

[@BigKlingy]

I think that's what bugs me the most about it here. They ALMOST fixed Law, and they had all the pieces they needed to (YHVH being dead was a good start), and there's times when Abdiel seems like she has good intentions, but then, like all things in this plot, they just go from 0 to 1000 in the last hour and suddenly Dazai and her look blatantly evil. I've seen some speculation that they were planning on doing something new with Law but there was last-minute pushback by the traditionalists on the dev team.

[@Delta_dragon.]

35:14 So basically, he treated demons as a monolith.

[@BigKlingy]

I randomly come back to this video, this is the first thing I see. I laugh.

[@TheJaredPunch]

Just got to Chapter 4 of XC2 and awakened a certain blade. Also got DLC.

[@carolbrokethewallagain]

I picked up SMT5 around the time it released and put it down just before Lahmu. Not because it was bad, but more because Hard Mode was kicking my ass and making things grueling. Choosing the hardest difficulty for your first SMT, even if it’s not the hardest SMT game and you’re good at JRPGs, is not a good idea. So going into this, I had little knowledge of the story apart from that it was bad. I definitely know why people don’t like it now. As someone who’s writing stories, I can sympathize with that structure of focusing on the big emotional or cool moments. Usually my own process is coming up with those on a whim after having some basic idea of everything. They’re already fun to come up with, but it’s also because those scenes with the twists, the big revelations, and the emotionality of stuff like character deaths generally stick with people. But what always tempers me is imagining the reaction of posting that individual scene or moment in isolation. Yeah it might look great, but so much of what makes those strong in your head is just lost on the people watching. This works when you have just a vague concept and little else, which seems to have happened in this game, but when you do have the general ideas of the characters and what happens. It shows what you need to establish and build up to make those scenes as punchy and intense as you want them to be. I can’t say that this method was the one used by the writers here. This seems more of just rushed development for the story. Still, SMT5 works great as an example of what happens when you just throw all those big show-stoppers out there and don’t get the proper connective tissue in there(or getting very unsubstantial and minimal connective tissue in there). Though there are a lot more issues than just that, if what’s been discussed in the video is true. I do want to go back and play this game though, and this did increase that. A few other runs of other games are getting in the way a bit, but I’d like to fit a run of this game in sometime.

[@BigKlingy]

I played on Normal the first time. I really don't recommend Hard for a first playthrough, it does some annoying things like lowering your accuracy and making ambushes MUCH more common. "SMT5 works great as an example of what happens when you just throw all those big show-stoppers out there and don’t get the proper connective tissue in there(or getting very unsubstantial and minimal connective tissue in there)." That basically sums it up. Apparently the game took a while because the developers spent a long time figuring out the Unreal Engine, so I'm guessing they just didn't have much time left to finish the story. The game is very fun, I'd definitely recommend going back to it. The pace quickens a bit after Lahmu imo, the next two areas aren't as big. Something I forgot to say here is I feel like Area 2 overstayed its welcome somewhat. It was already pretty long even before the Fairy Forest.

[@Wibiki43]

So, it's basically just like Conquest, lol.

[@BigKlingy]

Pretty much, in a lot of ways. Even down to it being very fun for challenge runs since you can just skip all the cutscenes and not miss much. As I always say though: I enjoy Conquest's story the most of Fates' 3 routes, because it's at least ENTERTAININGLY bad instead of boring like Birthright or convoluted like Revelation (and Garon is so dumb he wraps around to being hilarious), and the gameplay makes it easier to tolerate than Birthright's "Awakening but less sandbox fun" and Rev's "what were they thinking with these maps and join stats?" Birthright is actually my least favourite Fates story, because they just kill a bunch of characters for no reason in an attempt to make it "morally grey".

[@connorherron8607]

Are you interested in Soul Hackers 2?

[@BigKlingy]

I'm thinking of getting it.

[@AquaLantern]

22:00 In regards to the game's marketing, it feels like they were trying to piggyback off Persona 5's success and how much people loved those characters. If they had only marketed the world and gameplay, those who enjoyed P5 might not have picked this one up to try it.

[@BigKlingy]

The Japanese marketing with the Daily Demon Showcases was a much better indicator of what the game was, focusing on individual Demons, their mythology, and a short demo of what they're good at in combat. A shame the western marketing didn't get any of that. Regardless of marketing though, giving a character their own in-game nametag only to have them do NOTHING until an optional late-game sidequest is still unforgivable to me.

[@Paws42]

If you think the MP of physical demons was bad here, then hoo boy, just be glad you're not playing SMT IV (Vanilla), as physical demons had a downright pitiful amount of MP (barely enough for one charged physical skill). Luckily Apocalypse fixed this by increasing the MP pool of most demons Also, on the note of SMT IV, only the original game lacked a basic fusion option, as SMT IV A added it back in

[@BigKlingy]

In SMT4 though physical attacks cost HP. Imagine how bad it would've been for physical demons there if they cost MP.

[@nachohangover5104]

@@BigKlingy They did cost MP in 4.

[@BigKlingy]

@@nachohangover5104 Yeah I saw other comments to that effect. My mistake. I've never heard anyone complain about that in 4 though. 5 does have high MP costs all around (Debilitate and Luster Candy are over 100 without affinity), maybe they were lower in 4.

[@nachohangover5104]

@@BigKlingy I don't know if they were lower, but they were expensive relative to MP bars. Especially physical demons since MP was dependent on your magic stat. Even magic MCs and demons burn through their MP fast in 4. And unlike other games MP items are just as rare as ever but also way less effective (somas don't even restore your full MP). It's to the point where magic MCs in 4 end up running Energy Drain just to not dry up and be useless in long fights. I think people just didn't talk about it mich with 4 due to how broken magic builds were, so barely anybody ran a physical build (or rather a dex build since that's what physical skills were based on in 4).

[@BigKlingy]

Something I like about 4A speedruns is you use a different build depending on the difficulty. I can't remember the specifics but one uses magic, one physical and one gun.

[@rubenhernandez8784]

the music in smt 5 is good but nowhere near the level of smt 4 or 4a they are some of the best music in any video game ever. I just want more people to play 4 its such a good game with a much better story. I'm not saying it's the best video game story ever told but it looks like it in comparison to the smt 5.

[@BigKlingy]

4 has very good music. I agree 5's isn't as good, but I still found it decent. And a lot of people have re-evaluated 4's story in a better light after this game. For one, it actually makes you care about its alignment reps.

[@firecraft7032]

@@BigKlingy Also, the reps character arcs make sense.

[@BigKlingy]

@@firecraft7032 Some have argued that Jonathan going full Law was a bit out of nowhere, since he didn't act like he agreed with Blasted Tokyo. But other than that, I think they're the best rep arcs outside of DS1.

[@christhechilled]

SMT was never cared about the story? Biggest cap that I've ever heard.

[@BigKlingy]

I think this was actually part of my argument: there's some SMT games with really good stories, so excusing this game's plot because "mainline SMT was never about story" is something I don't agree with. SMT1 and 2 actually had really original and decent plots for their time.

[@Lucas17031]

If you need a good example of non first party games with amazing graphics for the switch. I have 2: Burnout Paradise Remastered. And 51 Worldwide games. Or Clubhouse Games: 51 Worldwide Classics. THESE LOOK SO GOOD. I'm surprised how meh this game looks in comparison Sorry for the random comment, I'm writing this while listening lol.

[@BigKlingy]

Clubhouse looks like one of those "Better than it has any right to be" games. I saw a bit of it at TRG Colosseum this year.

[@Lucas17031]

@@BigKlingy oh, it DEFENETLY is, and it's great! Especially the toy sports games (Curling, golf and Tennis in particular) are great imo. (It even applies to the OST, but not to the degree of Miitopia) Defenetly recommend it if it's on sale anywhere lol.

[@markgilberk6248]

Oh god yeah story is bad and characters aside from maybe slightly Dazai are not memorable.

[@raikasha8152]

27:00 - 27:38 - You entirely misunderstood the gods in that section. Koshimizu and Yuzuru are the "chaos" of this game but aren't the same survival of the fittest social Darwinist that others were. They advocate for myriad godhood as they believe that's the best way for the world to be governed rather than letting one almighty being do everything. (See Shirrako's Part 7 SMT V video at 1:33:36 for evidence). Khonsu literally wanted a world of equality and peace for all beings and the Hinduist wanted Shiva to destroy the world and let Brahma recreate the world. A.k.a literally just following Hinduism. (I would get on his Lucifer's plan and Mandala System thing but I already did that in a different portion of this comment section) 33:08 - 36:28 - Red herring into thinking their chaos? Nuwa and Yakumo literally say chaos demons are selfish beings who screw others over for their own desires. And they literally say in their first encounter after the boss fight with Nuwa. Not to mention you say Yakumo goes on "racist rants" against demons while also saying the game wants you to think they're chaos at the same time. Also your racism point is invalid. The whole reason why its an fool's ideology is because skin tone isn't going to change who you are as a person. But when you are dealing with fundamentally different beings the having reasons for not or being against them has a layer of a validity as they actually **are** fundamentally different. You also forgot the demons who broke into to kill random humans who had nothing to do with them in their daily lives. And the innocent people killed by the demons who broke though Tokyo (And when was Lahmu being his own demon that were different from the other chaos faction ever mentioned?) Not to mention if Yakumo hated **all** demons he would never care about Nuwa and would've killed Nahobino for existing. I have sympathy for what you've been through but you're projecting your personal experiences way too much. Also about your one person saying Yakumo was a man in the police force, and said man also mentioned that he hoped the world didn't beat him down too. Showing that Yakumo can be very kind when helping other humans but was just as liable to negative emotions due to his line of work. A disposition Yakumo has throughout the game. Not to mention him hating humans who hurt other due to their own weakness makes perfect sense as it fits his trauma with the game. His entire motive are his experiences and strong hatred. Also Amanazako is obviously a very bizzarre demon who doesn't perfectly understand human emotions/humans in general. You really shouldn't have taken her opinion as the game trying to spell something out for you. (Also not all chaos demons are hellspawns. They are a collection of spurned pantheons) 40:59 - to the end of the Endings Section. Dazai's character was subetly built up throughout the entirety of SMT V. Every time he tries something he fails and only succeeded upon following Abdiel, not to mention her rhetoric about believing in God falls in line with him wanting to be a follower. And I don't get how you see Dazai and Abdiel as "cartoonishly evil" when he didn't even want to kill Yuzuru after glasses-kun sided with Tsukuyomi. Not to mention Abdiel said she "May have had to" judge the MC instead of wanting to do it and thought about it before attacking him. A normal law villain would kill Yuzuru without a second thought for him rebelling. Not to mention Dazai/Abdiel never did/never seem like they want to commit genocide upon humans for them having a disagreement like others would if they wouldn't even kill a man who (in a sense) literally reached godhood to oppose them. Superficially copying Nocturne Section - He ca just decide to agree with an ideology because he wants to, not to mention he literally thinks about it and chooses for himself when someone asked. He doesn't **have** to rebel and go chaos mode like Demi-Fiend did. (Also Demi-Fiend recreated the universe in every reason ending even after said gods were dead. I mean look at Hikawa saying he was the true creator in their ending. So that's also wrong) Just going generic chaos would be the actual Nocturne copy instead of what they did here. Your entire suggestion is just talking in fanfiction rather than making a truly solid point cause at that point you need an entirely new ending. I think you're trying way too hard to find certain beats within this story. Like saying "Oh Yakumo and Nuwa are chaos!" (Despite them never saying anything like that) Or saying the fact Yuzuru wasn't what you initially thought is someone a subversion when the game never tried to sell you on that idea. Its like you want a generic SMT story and something different at the same time. This isn't a character focused game. Its a plot one as all these characters are highly built on their events in the plot and the history of the world. Like a good portion of the mainline games. You can dislike SMT V, its one of my least favorite games in the series. But if you do criticize it, criticize it for things it actually says and actually doesn't do. Like go calm down and review the game in a better state of mind. Cause this video was awful.

[@firecraft7032]

I’m not going to pretend that I understand the plot of SMT5, because I haven’t even finished the game. But if we are all going to agree that the plot is bad, can we be chill about it?

[@raikasha8152]

@@firecraft7032 You think I'm being "venomous" or something? And I never said it was bad

[@BigKlingy]

@Firecraft People are allowed to disagree with the views I expressed in this video, please don't attack them for it.

[@raikasha8152]

@@BigKlingy I don't feel personally attacked tbh

[@firecraft7032]

@Raikasha Sorry let me rephrase. There is nothing wrong with having opposing opinions to this video. What I took issue was the phrase “this video is awful”, which felt a little rude. Sorry if I came off as hostile by the way.