SMT V Vengeance Story Discussion (Heavy Spoilers obviously)

[@aquasis995]

You should've been route-locked at Shakan, and gotten your associated goddess there. Yoko ghosting during the 4th (and biggest) area before reappearing hours later in the point of no return was an avoidable issue. They also refrained from having other Nahobino in CoV, even though those bonds between human and demon were a strong concept in CoC, with alot of potential. Generally CoV avoids most of the cool ideas CoC started introducing near the end of the story, while keeping some of the weaker things from earlier. I do like that the 3 previous alignment reps have all been locked into roles of hero, villain, and something in-between respectively. It's smarter to have them as idealogues rather than idealogues you're supposed to end up siding with.

[@declibsed]

I really like the idea of having the alignment lock at Shakan already, but you still need to get the opposing alignment rep more involved into the last part of the game, otherwise it's just the same issue but with Tao ghosting instead. Maybe you could have a sort of "soft lock" at Shakan which determines if Yoko or Tao accompanies you. You encounter the other alignment rep one or two times still trying to sway you and if you try hard enough you can still change alignment until the hard lock at the empyrean. I agree, the Nahobino fight's were pretty great in CoC. I think they didn't come up in CoV because the devs wanted the focus to solely be on the Revenge theme. Would've still liked to have a Nahobino fight somewhere since Nahobino are still a central part of the narrative. Yeah it's nice that they found ways to use the old reps which doesn't seem unnatural, although I would've liked them to not kill off Atsuta so quickly after he changed his mindset about his sister.

[@f.i.d.m6392]

Sorta disagree. Would've liked interacting more with Yoko in the endgame. But it's only fair with Tao being abscent on the first arc, so she deserved more focus on a later arc

[@KatelynS0209]

Apparently this was sort of what they were originally gonna do, you would have been locked at the rooftop scene with either Tao or Yoko appearing

[@theabsurdityseries5597]

This new version somehow still feels unfinished

[@declibsed]

Agreed, but I think most of that feeling stems from the narrative and characters. The gameplay itself feels very polished to me even though the two dungeons are pretty uninspired.

[@shadowmaster452]

​@@declibsedthat's what happens when the team cares more about pretty girls. Been that way since apocalypse and I'm starting to think that the good narrative ain't coming back lol And on a more personal note, I'm not a fan of the nocturne universe, I still prefer demon summoning programs, COMPS and guns tbh

[@declibsed]

@@shadowmaster452 I'm curious about what happened inside the team for the radical shift in narrative and characters between IV and Apocalypse. I'm also starting to lose a bit of hope regarding the narrative, but you never know, maybe SMT VI in 2035 will have great story and characters lol

[@partyethtoon]

Its all good give it 3 years for smt 5 revengeance

[@ltb1345]

It's funny that the story is even more vague than the original from the beginning of Taito up until the Throne. No context for the Bethel infighting, you don't see Abdiel's transformation, etc.

[@ltb1345]

Thumbnail is the gem that saved the netherworld.

[@porkhill6665]

Craziest part is we got probably over 80 demons from the mobile game still not in the latest game

[@declibsed]

I don't play Dx2 so I have no clue which demons did or did not make Vengeance. Maybe a few more level 70 and above demons wouldn't have hurt, but I don't think that every game should have every demon ever in it. Differing demon rosters give the games a bit more identity.

[@emperortoho]

plus dx2 is developed by sega and is a mobile game, so just porting the models would be messy and might need approval from sega and arrangements to compensate the original modelers

[@Calliemakescontent]

8:24 that mastema shroomjak made me laugh so hard

[@declibsed]

Happy to hear that my video actually makes people laugh

[@Calliemakescontent]

@@declibsedi love your smt soyjacks they make my day

[@Linoli_salt]

I replay strange journey only because of the story. They handled it so well there

[@renren47618]

Most Megaten youtubers are acting like they completely redeemed the original story but frankly i think that's far from it there are still a lot of issues with how they handled it especially at the end and it has a lot of missed opportunities I will comment some of the things i'd to to change CoV without changing too much: First, Mastema would've been introduced earlier and he would integrate himself with Bethel and then starting to manipulate both Dazai and Abdiel from the background, we'd slowly see Dazai's behavior changing untill he went edgy mode Yoko would have an arc that justified better the MC joining her, it makes absolutely no sense for him to side with her, i think that Yoko could start being edgier (like she kind of is) but slowly warm up to her friends and when the Qadistu try to sacrifice Nahobino, she would stand up and try to prevent it maybe offering herself but it ultimately not working because ya know, they need to sacrifice a Nahobino and Yoko doesn't have one, then Aogami would sacrifice himself. Shakan would be the alligment lock if you sided with Yoko more with your choices Nahobino would chase her after beating Abdiel and find her in a new scenario where she would apologize to the protagonist for what she did and etc. Etc. Then the dialogue choices would state that the Nahobino agrees more with her goals, Yoko would thank you for it, then you would team up with her to fight against a Bethel attack because they were sent on by Abdiel (or Mastema) to kill Tiamat AND the Nahobino, then you would need to go after each one of them before they reached the Empyrean where Yoko would awaken Tiamat and start resetting everything, after all that happens you would fight against Tao but then Mastema would appear and you would fight his normal form, after beating him he would laugh and say that he was buying time to get in control of Tiamat through his powers (which Mastema has in his actual lore), then Mastema fused with Tiamat would've been the final boss. For Law, things would go similiarly but you would have more dialogue with Tao before the final area and the Bethel members would also be chasing you in this route for the same reason but this time in Tao's side. I would also make Dazai become a Nahobino with Abdiel when you fight against them on CoV, and Aogami would not return but you would have a scene where Nahobino passes out but Aogami speaks with him while he's between life and death then Nahobino would get up with Koshimitzu and then they would fuse again and give the one flashy move on Tiamat Yoko and Nahobino would also have their duo anime special move on MastemaTiamat too I would change a bit the alligments because i think it's too law biased or maybe that's not even *that* necessary After beating each final boss Lucifer would appear and start speaking about Mandala System so you can consume his knowledge In Law he would mention that your desire of using the Throne has more chances of bringing Mandala System back because of Marduk's influence on it, in Chaos Lucifer would confirm/be very assertive on the fact that the Mandala System will not come back Personally i would also make Lucifer's True Form be in every route without having to do the CoC True Neutral Quests to get it, or at least give him a New Form that is weaker than his True One but somewhat of a challenging fight so his fight is less underwhelming. Thus: Law = You create a perfect Utopia, but in a more unstable system that can bring all the issues back Chaos = Starting everything from the scratch and see if a better (or worse) system will arise from it This would make for better nuance for your choices than what they did here. Edit: I forgot to mention why Bethel would be together this time instead of them splitting against each other, the final chapter would start with a new version of the Bethel Council scene, where they would be discussing about Tiamat, when things seen to be going to shit and everyone is going to go on their own way to get to the Throne, Mastema would get in the middle and lie about some sort or way where all of them could get to use the Throne or something like that, thing that Abdiel would protest against but Mastema would find a way to convince her that this is "The Lord's Will" and he would also use Dazai to convince her of that, she'd still be skeptical of Mastema but accept it so that the situation doesn't get worse and all of them together have a chance to beat Tiamat and the Nahobino if he gets on their way, thus adding more context to the final area and my new scenario, while also making Mastema a more important villain to the overall story and displaying how insidious he can be.

[@declibsed]

You have some nice ideas, if you were to flesh it out a bit you could easily make a video yourself or post it on reddit to spark some discussion.

[@renren47618]

@@declibsed I could make a video about it but i don't live alone and i feel embarassed of doing it for some reason. Maybe i could post something on Reddit but i might consider both things

[@RollingBobbyJones]

Dazai was pretty good before the Quadistu battle then some of the worst law rep almost instantly for no reason.

[@partyethtoon]

Also im pretty sure there is a plot hole tsukuyomi says without yuzuru he cant ascend the throne anymore but the second tao reappears again all of a sudden he can randomly get the throne now with out mc

[@declibsed]

That's because the Protag's soul is malleable and can be changed to fit multiple deities, Zeus and Baal also state that during their quest lines

[@partyethtoon]

@@declibsed so why did tsukuyomi say that

[@ltb1345]

@@partyethtoon The protagonist's Nahobino forms have the human in the "driver's seat", so to speak, so the god he fuses with can't technically become the ruler. Whereas with the other Nahobinos, it's the reverse.

[@partyethtoon]

​@@ltb1345 alright that makes sense and it also explains my other question on why the protagonist doesnt sound like aogami

[@littlebabyman8494]

So basically we need to combine traits from both to have a more satisfying story?

[@declibsed]

Wasn't the narrative I was going for. The only things the original does better is Sahori's death scene, maybe even death scenes in general and having the Nahobino boss battles which were pretty sick. Otherwise I think that Vengeance would've been better off being less similar to CoC and do it's own thing more often.

[@littlebabyman8494]

@@declibsed Eh, agree to disagree on the conclusions. I most think about this due to the lack of covering the race to the throne EVEN THOUGH it’s necessary to understand the narrative.

[@pear63_]

Shin Megami Tensei. That's it, that's the comment

[@declibsed]

Best comment I've read so far (it's the first one)

[@sora5061]

while i am still disappointed that bits of the story still feel unfinished, ive still managed to sink 200 hours into this game. i genuinely love its gameplay loop and godborn making demons way easier to min max makes me come back to the game so i can do funny shenanigans it's also funny how despite the new story still lacking in some areas it's still a hell of a lot more entertaining to the point where it's also another reason why i come back to this game a lot overall it's probably the best 7/10 game I've played lmao

[@solo8324]

Marduk's name doesn't mean "bull". To be more specific, his name literally means "The Shining Young Man", or just "The Sun Boy". The words for "Bull", "Chick" and "Youth" are the same in Akkadian. The "Bull God" idea came from ATLUS misreading his name and trying to introduce a new reason that characters fight (which makes sense; Lilith/Mankind, Samael & Lucifer / YHVH, Marduk/Tiamat, Marduk/Anzu, etc.). It just doesn't make much sense. The biggest issue I have with this is that it makes Tsukiyomi look really dumb when he explains that the demons had always warred with each other before YHVH took the throne, so the only reason they were mad at YHVH was because he took their Knowledge from them (hence why Lucifer wanted to be free from the cycle of perpetual fighting to be "king"); in Vengeance, Mandala doesn't really matter, since the idea of "breaking a cycle" doesn't come up until the end. Thanks to Satan, there's no real meaning to the Nahobino's actions anyway.

[@declibsed]

Yeah I read on Wikipedia that his name is derived from "bull-calf of Utu", so I wrote that it's derived from the word "bull". But in hindsight I have no clue why I didn't just copy-paste the whole thing in the first place. I have to disagree, I think the Mandala System does matter in Vengeance. Mandala is the reason why most of the event's in the story take place, it's basically V's version of Nocturnes conception and all of the beings who are actually aware of the system push you to break it. The primary motivation for the Quadistu's actions is to break that cycle as a form of revenge towards Marduk and breaking the Mandala cycle is also Lucifer's primary motivation, which also get's teased a bit this time around. Although I agree that the Idea of breaking the Mandala System could've explored earlier and more thoroughly.

[@solo8324]

More literally, it means "shining". It's not really an odd thing for ATLUS to do, as they categorised Zeus as a bull god due to him transforming into one with Europa. Maybe I misunderstood the Mandala System. I understand it to be the system established by the Throne existing, which Tiamat utilised anyway. Hence why true neutral was about annihilating it and wiping all demons - all competition - from the world. Marduk's curse was merely to continue the cycle of violence and competition for it. If that is the Mandala System, then it really confuses me; Lucifer's knowledge isn't very relevant for destroying Mandala, as the plan is merely to wipe everything out without his inclusion. If they are the same system, then I apologise for the mix-up. The build-up is fine, if the systems are the same and I just misunderstood them. Had they included the Serpent King and other side quests in the main story, it'd be a lot easier to completely understand.

[@BlackfangDragon]

Atlus uses mythology books for these kinds of things.They don’t make it up wholesale, but the Mythology Books in question? Oh you bet they did!.Barbara Walker is a blight upon existence. Heck they use syncretism in the story how you get Susanoo as a Horned God which the game makes the point are the actual archetype, but is typically associated with Bulls. Baal = Beelzebub= Gozu-Tenno= Susanoo is how you get Susanoo as a Horned God. Also Mandala does matter because it was Mandala that created the Throne to begin with. They consistently talk about the Throne, How Mandala the System allowed Marduks Curse to define the world, , Mastema SERVES his True Lord in ensuring the Mandala System continues and manipulates things, while those who seek to defy the system seek to upend the world. Mandala manipulates things from the shadows to perpetuate the cycle, and it was Mandala that creates the Goddesses of Creation to serve their purpose. Yokos entire existence is based around how she was created and discarded by Mandala and the curse of the Horned God Mandala allowed to control the cycle.

[@declibsed]

@@solo8324 Yeah the way the Mandala System is explained in Vengeance is kind of a headache with all of the different dialogue from different quests. I haven't read up everything relating to the Mandala System yet, so I wouldn't take my word as gospel.

[@punkapunk9917]

ok first of all Eisheth is hot & everyone just doesnt understand her I think everyone can agree that the True Neutral ending is ideal, but in my opinion Law (CoC) & Chaos (CoV) are second best, & I believe Tao's infinite worlds is meaningless creation In a world absent of God's order where demons cause an endless cycle of struggle & chaos, I find it best to see that entire world gone, & do with human life one meaningful thing; return all to nothing & allow the universe itself to create once again, rather than arrogantly sitting upon the throne of God, & creating another flawed world

[@CosmicChris]

What would you say your favorite Megaten game is?

[@declibsed]

My favourite is Nocturne with SMT IV as a pretty close second. I love Nocturne's gameplay and I like it's story, despite it being a bit bare bones. I don't like IV's gameplay as much, that's why it's bellow Nocturne for me even though IV's story is better.

[@CosmicChris]

@@declibsed I think that is a good tier list honestly. I like all SMTs. But mechanically, I think 4 has the best ways of building the MC up build wise. "Demon Whispers." and all that. But I love Nocturne's mechanics in a lot of ways that you just don't see in most SMTs. Like if an enemy is shocked, or Frozen, it is a FREE crit, I love that. (I think one for Wind or Fire would be nice too. That, or just a DoT effect from them.) But Vengeance is probably tied for me purely based on it's battle systems. That, and it's soundtrack. I like how we can determine the turn order here and not having to spec as much around that. "Because I like being able to not get hit if I can avoid it. But I also want to do good damage."

[@declibsed]

@@CosmicChris Yeah Whispers were really convenient way to customize the MC. It's a nice change of pace from having to plan out the level ups in Nocturne, although it can break the game sometimes with how easy it is to transfer powerful skills to your MC. I also miss the status effects Nocturne magic could inflict, you could easily make fire inflict burn as an effect and wind inflict mirage so the playing field is more even between the magic types. But I guess SMT V already has enough status effect fuckery. I also agree with your take on Vengeance's battle system, it's far more flexible than what came before it and it accommodates a lot of different playstyles.

[@CosmicChris]

@@declibsed I hope their next entry takes some creativity from Nocturne with how it allows for unique combos with the "Stun" states. I just love synergy like that.

[@ogueyratogeyrat7448]

story is bad gameplay is good

[@declibsed]

something along those lines