SMT 5: Vengeance Trailer Teases New Enemies, Dungeons, and More

Loved it on the Switch but had to stop due to the glaring performance issues. After starting Persona 3, excited to jump back into more SMT with upgraded everything.

@Orochilocka P3R has been my first Persona game, and as I was looking into it I learned that it was an offshoot of SMT. I’m kind of confused though, why are they different series? What are the differences between the games?

I still don't know if we need to play the first campaign to fully understand the second one. If so then I'm not playing the game practically twice.

@AccessibleDaydream SMT games are more streamlined, less to do outside of dungeon crawling whereas in Persona you get to roam the maps, do activities and raise social links. Also there's no "Persona's" in SMT just the demons that you go around collecting kinda like pokemon, the games have the same moves and weaknesses for the demons though. Also in my opinion the stories in Persona games are better and more fleshed out and a lot of character building whereas in SMT it's always the same about some Higher up Demons wanting to cause havoc and not much character building. Finally dungeons are more bleak in SMT with an apocalyptic feel such as ruined buildings and dessert biomes but they are open so you can spend ages roaming the area and doing side activities like you would in a ubisoft game whilst Persona games have more varied colourful fun linear dungeons.

Also SMT games don't have the whole school life sim aspect than Persona games are famous for.

The new content all looks awesome. I feel like I'm getting a new SMT game.

Guess I'm buying it a third time!

@UltimateOtaku91 No, they're different story routes. Nothing has indicated understanding one is conditional on playing the other.

@AccessibleDaydream Persona and SMT share similar spell names, monsters (although they're called demons in SMT), fusion mechanics, etc. Persona games tend to split the focus between social simulation gameplay and more streamlined JRPG gameplay, whereas SMT games ARE combat and exploration-focused the entire time.

Persona games feature a larger emphasis on humor and character development in magical realist contemporary settings, whereas SMT games tend to be either apocalyptic fantasy (III and V in particular) or have more of a science-fiction/dark future setting (I, II, the IV duology, and Strange Journey), which is also generally apocalyptic. SMT games also tend to focus more on questions of morality, through the filter of a tabletop RPG-like Order/Chaos dichotomy, with characters taking sides in ideological conflicts where their factions are typically supported by different Gods.

As a result of this, unlike Persona, SMT games have stories that change depending on the choices that characters make, typically leading to some wildly different in-game scenarios and endings depending on which faction they support.

SMT games also tend to have a very Abrahamic religious bent to them. You're typically mixed up in a supernatural war of some sort between Heaven and Hell.

Persona games feature more... casual friendly gameplay, whereas SMT is more hardcore and combat-focused.

SMT also have a laser focus on more explicitly supernatural themes. The demons in SMT are explicitly drawn from world mythology. Any similarities in Persona are because they're reflections of the collective unconscious in that series. That said, you'll have a stricter focus on actual mythological entities in SMT.

SMT, especially SMT V, is also much more of a monster-collector. In Persona, your monsters tend to act as equipment for your cast of characters, but in SMT, you're actually fighting alongside your demons. A comparison to Pokemon comes up a lot. As a result, you tend to have a lot more freedom in terms of party experimentation and builds, like in a Pokemon game.

So basically: one series is more casual-friendly and has the social simulation/wish fulfillment/dating sim Japanese teenager elements (Persona), and one series is more hardcore, speculative, and focused on challenging combat and exploration (SMT).

And also, they have different development teams within Atlus. So different people are making these games.

@Ralizah @AccessibleDaydream FWIW SMT is actually the series Pokemon is based on. Game Freak was a magazine originally and when Taijiri was reviewing SMT1 decided he could make a "better" RPG, and that became Pokemon. IDK if it's a "better" game but it certainly makes a lot more money. So the similarities are more than coincidental, Pokemon is a streamlined simplification of the systems of SMT with a child-friendly skin by design. Though demon negotiation is more interesting than throwing pokeballs but just as random. Selling stygian harpy plushies to kids is definitely harder though.

I'm just looking forward to seeing how it plays at above 20fps for a change. I tried on Switch and just, couldn't do it. Though it's going to go very deep on the backlog behind probably thousands of hours of games at this point. I still haven't finished Soul Hackers 2

Looks amazing, Day 1 for me. Already a bit in on Switch, so I know I love the gameplay.

Took the risk and stopped playing it on Switch (I could not handle the jaggy/shimmering mess) hopping it would come to PC at a minimum.

@NEStalgia Megami Tensei is pretty much the OG monster collecting franchise, yeah, even going back to the original games on the Famicom.

The lack of that element in Soul Hackers 2 is a big reason I didn't stick with that game, I think.

I've already played SMT V all the way through on Normal and halfway through on Hard. Going for another full playthrough of the new route when this comes out. It was flawed, but I LOVED SMT V.

@MikeOrator I'd go with a palette cleanser, for sure. All the SMT games have enough in common with the elemental weakness/One More battle system that playing them back to back starts to make it feel a little samey.

I'm actually going through that with P3R coming off my ongoing on and off SH2 play, then binging P5R last Summer/Fall, and a bit of P3 remaster last year before they announced P3R....it feels too much like more of the same after months on P5 so I'm not as into it as I ought to be.

So I ended up starting FFXVI in the mean-time, but then also used the XB launch of FFXIV to give it yet one more 4th attempt at trying to get into it and like it....and this time I think it may have finally clicked....so there goes the next 3000-5500 hours of my gaming life, I guess? While also trying to do P3R.

Well, if you're looking for SMT games for Vita, then your life will not be complete without the Dancing collection.

@Ralizah SH2 is just a weird game. It doesn't LOOK like a Soul Hackers sequel. It doesn't really play like a Soul Hackers sequel. And yet it does actually feel like a Soul Hackers sequel. I think SH1 might remain my favorite of all Megaten games though. Something about it was just special. It is for me what Nocturne is for much of the fandom. Nocturne ALMOST is really special until you get in the the horrible unending labyrinthine maze dungeons that are a product of its time and all fun ceases.

SH2 still has monster collecting though. And basically still has demon negotiation, it's just that you locate the negotiable demons like treasure chests instead of every encounter . It's not like P3/P4 where there's basically no monster collecting at all.

I absolutely could not get into SMTV at all. I don't think I ever even made it to Tokyo Tower, I'd try and just go "meh" give up and go onto something fun. I have more hours in SH2 than SMTV though I'm a long long way from done it. But I think a lot of that has to do with how it looks and performs on Switch.

The one inexplicable thing to me is that Soul Hackers 2 design is so very completely clearly designed as a perfect handheld game. That should have been a Switch exclusive. Feels like a Vita exclusive to me. Actually even a 3DS exclusive maybe most of all. It feels like it's a handheld game by design (and indeed I'm playing it via remote play on handheld, my retroid, almost exclusively, P3R as well, which is, of course, a remake of P3P - meant for handheld.)

Meanwhile SMTV is SCREAMING to be a console/PC game, and one built around more power than Switch has to offer. It "runs" on Switch but IMO runs about as well as Hogwarts does...I.E. if you have no better option it's ok enough.

Why they chose SMTV as a Switch exclusive and SH2 to be exclusive of Switch I will never, ever, ever understand. But that's ok, because I will never, ever understand 90% of the decisions Atlus ever makes.

@NEStalgia I actually totally agree. Soul Hackers 2 seems like a perfect hybrid game. Designed, even, by the Tokyo Mirage Sessions people. Environments are small, dungeons are labyrinths, etc. Yet the dummies seem intent on making it impossible to play that way. It doesn't even run well on Steam Deck for some godforsaken reason.

Meanwhile, yeah, let's make this way more ambitious SMT game that has enormous environments, to-scale demons lumbering everywhere, and tons of advanced visual effects exclusive to Nintendo's latest toaster.

I still don't get how people are okay with Atlus releasing the same game, with some updates content, at full price with no upgrade path. If this were Ubisoft, people would riot

SMTV is one of my favorite game and I highly recommend it, but I can understand that it doesn't please everybody. It's difficult as a Soul game and convey a very weird and disturbing atmosphere, it's not a lay back JRPG like Persona with a funky music and teenagers discussing their feelings around Yakisoba noodles.

@NEStalgia How is Final Fantasy Online? The advertising is starting to get to my head, and I think I want to try it out, but I’ve only ever played the first two chapters of Final Fantasy 16, so I don’t know what to expect.

Ugh, I have so many games I want to play, and yet I’m tired of starting a game, really getting into it, putting it down, trying to play it again later, having no idea what I’m doing, getting frustrated or bored, and never playing it again until I eventually restart the whole thing, only for the cycle to begin again.

@AccessibleDaydream XIV is an odd duck. It's an MMO that largely plays like a solo JRPG but with a bunch of other people running around and parties assembled on the fly with random human players instead of AI NPCs.

But it's incomprehensibly obtuse initially because as an MMO it has layers of configuration options, and as an "establised" MMO most of the defaults are terrible, and keyboard/mouse-centric. You have to tune the UI a bit to your liking to make it feel "console".

It's a very classic RPG, with an over-empahsis on MMO side quests ("kill 10 of these and report back" and "go to the other end of town and talk to this person, now go to the other end of town and talk to this person, now go into the fields and talk to this person, then go back to town and talk to this person" are the most common side quests), and most of what they say isn't important. It's a very very slow burn at the start.

If you like classic RPGs, MMOs, or JRPGs in general, I think it's a forbiddingly enormous game (it's a 10 year old game with like 6 expansion packs so it's basically 6 large RPGs glued into one supergame) and the UI is VERY offputting at first, but if you can wrap your head around it, I think it's actually extremely good. But I've paid for 1 or 3 month blocks 3 times before and found the game incomprehensible and could not get into it at all no matter how much I tried. I gave it one last shot on XB, and I think the change of controller and the fact that I chose a character class with a different starting city made the difference and I finally "got" it....and it started hooking me.

Mostly though, throw any thoughts of FF 16 out of your head if looking at 14. 16 isn't an RPG at all. It's not FF at all outside of overarching world themes. It's pretty much a stand-alone spinoff action-adventure hack&slash set in the FF universe in the vein of GoW meets Souls meets Bayonetta otherwise unrelated to the FF series, and probably most closely related to 13 before you get to Pulse (the part everyone hates but somehow loves in 16, lol.) 14 OTOH feels a lot more like the PS1 era RPGs but with modern visuals and an MMO template. It really has more in common with the original FF7 than, say Rebirth, but Rebirth would be a better comparison than 16.

Very hard to get into. But once you do, I think very hard to get out of, lol.

Edit: Just to be clearer, I really like 16 a lot. It's a great game. But it's heresy they named it "FF 16" since it's very obviously a completely different genre, gameplay loop and everything from what an FF game is. If I were them I'd have started a new subseries called "Final Fantasy Dimensions" or something and named it "Final Fantasy Dimensions: The Awakening" or something like that. Similar to how SMT developed the Persona and Devil Summoner subseries, and Devil Survivor SRPG subseries, that are clearly part of SMT but clearly different series.

@NEStalgia That’s all very technical. Dizzying already… if I’m being honest. I have the Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth demo downloaded already, should I start there to see if I even like a ‘more traditional’ Final Fantasy?

@AccessibleDaydream Rebirth is definitely going to be more of a traditional RPG than 16 that's an all out action adventure with armor though still not quite traditional. But if you're interested in 14, and have never used a paid version or free play weekend or anything with it, you can download the Free Trial version of the game. You need to create a square enix account, but don't need to add any funds to subscribe.

The free trial is pretty generous. It's only available if you've never paid subscription, didn't buy a paid game version, and never did a free weekend of the paid version. It lets you play up to level 60 through the first expansion totally free, no time limits. The main limitations are you can join invites but can't create your own party with other players so you have to wait for them to invite you outside a dungeon, you can't join free companies (player guilds), can't trade items with other players, can't text chat in public (only really a thing for keyboard players anyway), a few other limitations, and obviously can't play past the first two out of, what, 6, story expansions.

But should be more than enough to either get hooked, or find it utterly overwhelming, or do like me and find it incomprehensible on and off for years before it finally clicks 😂

The map sucks and learning to control it is probably the biggest learning curve though. Touch pad cycles through the different "windows" of the UI. It's weird but I finally got used to the controls. Finally...

@NEStalgia I read something about the “Starter Edition” Game Pass perk messing with the free trial you mentioned. How do I avoid that?

@AccessibleDaydream The most surefire way is just don't take the perk. It's a $20 value that includes a $14 30 day paid sub. But if you're on the fence, and you end up loving the trial, you'll want to buy a complete edition with all the newer packs anyway so it might not save you too much. I did take the perk because I already had an account from my ps attempts and buying heavensword years ago before they even offered free trials, so I never got to use the trial.

That having been said, as far as I know the trial and starter are two separate downloads, so while I can't guarantee something I don't know about won't mess you up, i think you actually have to launch the starter, log in, and link your console account for it to show you have it, so if you install the trial FIRST, CREATE YOUR SQUARE ACCOUNT, LOG IN, LINK YOUR CONSOLE, THEN claim the perk, but DON'T download the starter edition should be ok.

As far as I know the starter license and 30 day access only activates when you launch the non trial version of the game. Though I think the 30 days with the paid/perk versions expire on 12mo anyway.

Yes square has account management and billing straight from 1998 but the game is charming enough to overlook it