What is SMT? The Franchise Explained

What is and isn't SMT is a pretty simple question with a simple answer.
If you were to just simply look at all the games that use Shin Megami Tensei in the title then it's SMT.
So mainline, Shin Megami Tensei Persona 3, Shin Megami Tensei Persona 4, Shin Megami Tensei Devil Survivor, Shin Megami Tensei Devil Children, Shin Megami Tensei Card Summoner, Shin Megami Tensei Devil Summoner Raidiou Kuzunoha 1, Shin Megami Tensei Devil Summoner Raidou Kuzunoha 2, Shin Megami Tensei Soul Hackers and Shin Megami Tensei Digital Devil Saga.
Well if you look at the Japanese titles then things change significantly.
DDS is actually just Digital Devil Saga Avatar Tuner, Raidou is the same but without SMT, the first Devil Survivor is Megami ibunroku, so is the first Persona, Soul Hackers is Devil Summoner Soul Hackers but the first Devil Summoner is Shin Megami Tensei Devil Summoner and Card Summoner is Shin Megami Tensei Card Summoner and Devil Children is Shin Megami Tensei Devil Children.
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[@XWingToast]

Heads up for those playing the PS3 versions of the PS2 games he recommends: for the non-persona games, open up the ps menu while in the game, hold L1, R1, left d-pad, and square for 15 seconds, release then hit the ps button again. It should bring up 2 more menu options, choose debug, then turn off v-sync. V-sync made the game run slower than usual so this should fix that. I am not sure about DDS or SMT 3, but it brought Raidou from moving at 1/3 speed to regular speed, so I think this might fix the audio-sync issues in the other games.

[@XWingToast]

Correction: the final button sequence is the start button, not the PlayStation button. Sorry

[@JohneAwesome]

SMT: Combat Evolved needs to be a real game

[@carlyl2032]

Cool to see you here!

[@darkhorse744]

With the Shwarzvelt Doomguy as lead of course.

[@Tostadora_anti-sombras]

How I wish I had seen this video years ago when I was super lost on how to start with this franchise and I still had trouble understanding some dialogues

[@brappycap6084]

There's taking inspiration and then there's taking A LOT of inspiration I consider catherine a megaten game cause you play as a normal dude getting dragged into a supernatural mystery involving demons, having to choose between law and chaos and eventually having to defeat a malicious god for humanity. The game just fits really perfectly into the devil summoner/persona universe

[@Larrue]

I get the reasoning but I prefer just using whatever atlus uses

[@spamserket5066]

Great vid, hair, lighting, setup, and editing🤩 Subscribed!!

[@DragonKingX78]

I love the DDS games....wish we got more of those.

[@4KGamingSMT]

Thanks Larrue, great video👍

[@polyman6859]

It’s Megaten to me if it has the same demons and spells.

[@julianrobertson1869]

This really is the unifying factor. Like seriously if you have a Jackfrost throwing Bufula at your face you're definitely in some kind of SMT

[@Larrue]

That means last bible and Majin Tensei aren't megaten

[@julianrobertson1869]

o.0

[@ellagage1256]

SMT IV has been one of the best experiences I've had with the series, and the world really helps with that. I'd recommend emulating DS and 3DS games on a phone if you can, feels way more in line with how the games were meant to be experienced

[@fionn_mac_ribs]

Here’s the thing though: I’m not smart enough to do that.

[@hoppy8008]

The PSP Megaten games are all recommended, PSP emulation is great; they all can be played on 3-5x resolution with little to no issue depending on your PC. Also, if you want to play the first Devil Summoner, the PSP version is strongly recommended if you don't own a Saturn or don't want to deal with Saturn emulation.

[@nr2676]

But in Devil Summoner PSP version they ruined soundtrack.

[@KatsuyaTheFuuk]

15:25 It really is unfortunate that Digital Devil Saga is so inaccessible in it's true form. It's one of the first Megaten games I think of to recommend, but it's hard to do that unless whoever I'm recommending already has a PS2. PCSX2 has so many issues with it. They really deserve proper modern ports

[@alieremainsalie6469]

I'm halfway through DDS2 on pcsx2 and finding it emulates great! turbo speed and save states have been essential, can't imagine subjecting myself to this stuff without hacks. great with em, though!

[@Ronin-kk4bt]

Really learned a lot thanks you know your stuff 👍

[@JackThunder67]

Great video!

[@TheMidnightChannel]

Great vid 👍

[@nr2676]

5:02 Rondo is so based that it is not even known why Majin Tensei III is not in game title :D

[@jakeiswayblack3377]

Modded my PS2 last year and downloaded a bunch of games. One of the first games I played on it was Persona 4, and I'm hooked! Got a couple smt titles on my SFC, smt 3 nocturne and just bought a mint copy of Persona 5 collectors edition with the metal case, both on ps4. Thanks for explaining a lot of the oddities of the series! It's an extremely intimidating series to get in to for the average gamer, but definitely worth it

[@DragonKingX78]

It would be nice to get some SMT games during the SMT 30th anniversary.

[@TrvisXXIII]

To add even more confusion, I saw from another channel “shin” was supposed to mean new, so when the first SMT game came out, that was a reimagining of megami tensei, which everyone throws around today as MegaTen for the whole franchise lol

[@Larrue]

Yeah that's the literal translation but the main concept is its just an evolution on the original duology

[@GoBeyond4Balls]

Smt4 is nuts has probably the best narrative twist I’ve ever experienced in a video game best rpg on the ds and that system had so many good rps.

[@ulysses-san7525]

Hey brother I dig the shirt, where did ya buy it???

[@Larrue]

Target a few years ago 😁

[@AbelMusa]

While SMT IV is pretty excellent, as a newcomer to the series, I found the battle system pretty flawed. Just a battle of who can outcheese the other the hardest and normal battles boil down to equipping the main char with a high dmg Almighty or Phys multi target spell. This game for me though, has one of my top 10 video game ost of all time, and for that I'm super glad to have played it.

[@MortimerZabi]

Anyone played Goketsuji Ichizoku 3: Groove On Fight? It's an obscure Atlus fighting game where the last boss is a devil summoner. I can't quite place it there's an intent to establish a connection or not.

[@Larrue]

Ah I had been researching the design of that character because people say it's a megaten reference, so far I haven't found anything to indicate it's in anyway related

[@MortimerZabi]

@@Larrue I've seen videos of the boss fight where he does summon Beelzebub and Succubus. But the designs are off. I think it's just a cheeky reference.

[@Larrue]

@@MortimerZabi It's just a reference for sure, the designs for the demons in Groove on Fight are directly from the dictionaire infernal iirc

[@DeepWeeb]

Long-winded way to tell us that Metaphor: ReFantazio isn't a Megaten game

[@Larrue]

Watch the famitsu article explain it is megaten

[@nifftbatuff676]

I want the remake of Persona 6.

[@WarFox7012]

?

[@oriongear2499]

That game isn’t even out, dude.

[@alsaiduq4363]

FUMI ON THE THUMBNAIL. LETS GO

[@UltimateGenosyko]

Is SMT kinda of like Final Fantasy?

[@PrizmKing_EditZ]

this is wild

[@funkmastaC]

A miserable little pile of secrets? Wait you said no translation shenanigans.

[@sufffthing]

lets go, ronde content coming soon (within the next few decades)

[@Larrue]

With how little information exists, I suspect my ronde video will be like 15 minutes max

[@sufffthing]

any kind of ronde content will do in order to rope more poor souls into playing the game in all honestly, i do hope there's some neat info about ronde since i think the game has some interesting ideas and that it isn't as bad as everyone makes it out (it's still not the best thing in the world though lol)

[@GrayFoxHound9]

It has Jack Frost -> it's megami tensei

[@Larrue]

That means snow board kids, puri kura pocket, purikura daisakusen, choro q are all megaten for you?

[@GrayFoxHound9]

@@Larrue yes. Questions?

[@Larrue]

That was my question lol

[@GrayFoxHound9]

@@Larrue by "questions?" i meant "got any problems with that?"

[@Larrue]

Uh people can have whatever headcanons they want

[@fancyman847]

If your into action rpgs play the raidou games

[@dongodongo12]

To me everuthing is not persona is smt, i gotta keep my precious underrated games together to keep them safe

[@hikariaijou7348]

Jewel summoner needs another game or at least reboot

[@Xeper616]

I have an IOS that bought SMT I, it’s possible to play it on new software?

[@KazShiro]

It's not unfortunately

[@Xeper616]

@@KazShiro what was Larrue going on about then?

[@KazShiro]

@@Xeper616 You can use an emulator but as of now current phones or tablets cannot support the IOS version of SMT 1 officially as it was made for older systems and they never updated it after its release.

[@Xeper616]

@@KazShiro that’s a shame, can’t complain though since the PSX version is pretty great

[@Larrue]

You can play it if it wasn't updated is what I was referring to, I have two friends who have them installed and it still works

[@mathewweeks9069]

Your awesome

[@Mr_Meo]

You could of just said that any mainline SMT game is a good starting point >:) - Colimeo

[@Larrue]

Colimeo....

[@julianrobertson1869]

If there's a hee ho it's SMT.

[@Larrue]

So, not last bible or Majin Tensei

[@julianrobertson1869]

@@Larrue 🤔 I didn't say it needed to have one. Just that's one way to tell if it is. If there's no hee ho then if it is SMT there will be another indicator.

[@nr2676]

@@Larrue And Giten

[@kohphran]

What about Dx2? 💀💀💀

[@Larrue]

lol

[@GrayFoxHound9]

SMTV can be emulated without much problem if you have decent PC. If you can run Elden Ring without CPU/GPU/RAM bottleneck - you can probably run SMTV. It wouldn't be great (or would. Depends how decent pc is), but it would be playable.

[@DeepWeeb]

Rather wait for the port (taking their sweet time for that one compared to every other 3rd-party UE4-made Switch "exclusive")

[@Galaxy-du9qj]

@@DeepWeebwill there be a port tho? I gotta feeling nintendo now a days would fight to not make it happen

[@DeepWeeb]

@@Galaxy-du9qj I see Switch copies of SMTV being put on clearance more often than any other exclusive, don't believe Nintendo sees a lot of value in that game 2 years later (especially not since the Persona ports are much more popular)

[@Galaxy-du9qj]

@@DeepWeeb u gotta point yeah

[@christianm7250]

Megami Tensei is a franchise for 14 year olds who dislike religion because their parents made them go to church. But that doesn’t mean it’s bad 😌

[@niilohjerppe4076]

love youuyuyyyy baby

[@ffxiikd1426]

Larrue

[@themanboycave122]

Great video!

[@Larrue]

Thank you!