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  • This game already got one anime, so why are they planning to make another one?
    • Because the old one was panned? But seriously, where does it say they are planning to make another one?
    • My bad, I just misunderstood what the main page said about this game getting an Updated Rerelease. I took it as "this game will be remade, as will its anime".
  • Why exactly does the Anguished One consider the main character to be so important? In Devil Survivor 1 it makes sense, you're Abel in the middle of a war only people and demons with the name 'Bel' can win. Here we don't have anything.
    • He was one of the humans who defeated Dubhe; a Septentrione- which allows him the opportunity to meet Polaris, like the others who defeat a Septentrione. Not to mention the Death Clip rescues- defying what was written in the archives; as well as proving to be quite adept at learning how to use the Summoning Program. Perhaps the Anguished One seems to recognize the MC's ability to defy the odds and survive.
    • Hes the one who can unite the group and help them change. If you get the Special Ending you'll understand just how important that is.
  • The plan to knock Alioth out of the sky. When you summon Shiva, he promises to give you a boon in return for watching Hinako's dancing. So why do you need to trick him into throwing his spear at Kama just to hit Alioth? Why not just ask him "Can you please knock that huge weird-looking thing out of the sky with your spear?" It feels like Kama's just included so we can have some cheap laughs at his expense. Not that it isn't hilarious, but still.
    • Most likely so Shiva can have an excuse to return if you decide to go against Tokyo (battle against Hinako and Jungo).
      • Actually, I don't think it was an actual spear that was thrown. They wanted to use the power of Shiva's third eye, and the only other time he used his third eye was when Kama shot an arrow at him. They had to recreate that same scenario if they wanted Shiva's eye to open.
      • The anime did exactly what you suggested. Whether or not it was a Compressed Adaptation or it really wasn't necessary to do all of the work. I mean, in the anime, Yamato already planned to capture Kama immediately and Shiva just needed to see Kama to throw the spear (and Alioth was in space too so...)
  • Why is Yamato's Route considered Chaos? His sight for the new world is a place where the Might Makes Right... Which is not only similar, but the same with Yosuga/Chiaki's Reason back in Nocturne, the Reason that was supported by angels of all people.
    • Chaos and Law have been a bit different from the old standard in Atlus games of late. Yamato is an authority figure arguing for a world where the strong thrive and aren't held back by rules and the weak and where even his control can be threatened by someone more powerful challenging him, which is largely but not totally the same as the Chaos path in the old games. Similarly Ronaldo is a rebel arguing for a society where everyone supports each other, follows the rules and lives quietly, which again is similar but not quite the same as the old Law path. As for Yosuga, the angels there seem to support it for two reasons. The first is that this way there is a sort of hierarchy which is what angels want while the other Reasons would remove the hierarchy. The second is that the system is designed by YHWH, and so following any of the Reasons is indirectly following YHWH's orders. In any case Yamato's goal is Chaos-aligned, but it's a different kind of Chaos.
      • A bit of a flaw with this argument is that the Angels are perfectly willing to wipe out a majority of mankind to make their world of law, and only those who survive are treated as 'equal', which also fits with why they would support Yosuga as everyone unworthy is eliminated by default. Yamato world actually allows for those who are intellectuals and people who are skilled to rise up in rank, some of which like the nurse in his ending hate violence and shows detest for it in his ending, but they aren't afraid to fight if it comes down to it. Likewise a group of weak humans are lead by a child as well, who puts himself and another girl in danger so the weaker ones can go get help. What would put his ending as Chaos is the fact that demons are still around, causing trouble for everyone.
      • In the long run, Yamato's merit-driven world is inclined towards Chaos: As said above, the fact that anyone with strength could potentially change society at the drop of a hat, so long as they could enforce it , means that despite its apparent structure, it's more Chaotic than Ronaldo's world, where enforced equality would create and promote a status quo. The meritocracy appears to have no laws against murder, a view that presumably extends to the extremes of dog-eat-dog, which is inherently chaotic; contrast that with a world of total equality, created by a man with extremely black-and-white views of Right and Wrong, and where the lack of motivation to get ahead would result in a lack of the shake-ups a meritocracy would find endemic. In contrast to Yamato's ending, which has a theme of constant struggle, Ronaldo's ending implies a future of eventual stasis.
      • Is there any official material saying that Yamato's route is the chaotic one? Even without all of this, most chaos characters are driven by "selfish" motives ("selfish" as in, motives that come from their feelings before everything else; or why chaos characters tend to be all about freeedom) compared to the ordered way of a law path, which is more about having a real structure, no matter how "evil" it may seem, and screw free will if it is needed; exactly what Yamato is doing. Remember the law path in the first SMT; it definitely wasn't an example of a "nice" thing at all, if anything law path tend to be the worst of the two. And there being an "order" just means that it has to follow coherent rules; murder or not. Chaos and law are not a matter of "good and evil" at all, law isn't incompatible with free murder at all. That's the role of the good and bad alignment. If anything Ronaldo is the most chaotic one of the two, since equality aside, just when it comes to their personality, he's doing what he is doing against Jp for vengeance, he's a LOT more impulsive and follows his own feelings a lot more than Yamato, and do whatever he wants and that's it.
      • Chaos isn't really about vengeance or impulsive actions, the difference between Chaos and Law is supposed to be in the end goals. That being said, both Ronaldo and Yamato are seeking a higher power to grant their wishes in this, and there are other routes that might be considered at least as equally Chaos as Yamato's if not more so.
      • Yeah, impulsive actions and vengeance as in "having the freedom to do it" compared to being locked in a system (which is more like Yamato's mindset). And yeah, the end result is what matter, which is why Yamato and Ronaldo are both law; Yamato is law and his personality is classical law too, but Ronaldo is more like law in his goal with a kind of chaotic personality when it comes to how he reacts (he is okay with using a "superior order" brainwashing everyone, but definitely will not bow to said order if it goes against his own convictions. It's the very reason he is against Jp, he has the freedom so do it, so he does it. Even if Jp is/was "kind of right", he doesn't always follow an order just because that's the thing to do. In this way, he care more about freedom than Yamato when it comes to his reactions, but he doesn't apply it to his goals.). But he's still law in the end because of how both he and Yamato both want to use Polaris in order to create a "superior order" brainwashing everything. I was more talking about his personality, and less about his goal for this one, since Ronaldo isn't exactly the "Law archetype" personality-wise and is EXTREMELY different from Yamato despite both of them being Law. Alcor's route being the true chaos one (...which means that ironically enough, or not since this is a SMT, the only "nice god" loving and respecting human is in the chaos route)
      • While siding with Lucifer means chaos and siding with YHHV means order in the original SMT, this isn't true for Nocturne. Basically, choosing any reason is playing into the hands of the Great Will who seeks to erode free will through repeated apocalypses and creations. The angels favor Yosuga since it is the idea that will lead to the next cycle in the shortest span of time. Basically, the world of the mainline games is deeply wrong and in the center of this corruption, there is YHHV, twisting both Order and Chaos. The general idea of order is compassion for the weak, sick and poor. Ronaldos consequence is an egalitarian world. YHHV's consequence is eradicating free will. The general idea of Chaos is that everyone should have the opportunity and the incentive to achieve greatness. To Yamato, this means a society where everyone is weighted purely based on their merits. For Lucifer, this is dominance of the strong and violent.
  • Speaking of Yamato, one of the very first things you hear him saying on Day 1 (in reference to why he wants to keep the protagonists under arrest) to Makoto is how "When man grows accustomed to power, they tend to abuse it." This wisdom, in of itself, should destroy all merit behind his Meritocracy. Yet, this thought gets tossed right out the window at all other times you speak with him, replaced with speeches on how powerful he is, so he should rule by his own bizarre logic. Later in the week he looks more than a little drunk on power already, but if he was wise enough to see his own potential for problems through power, why would he push to be unrestrained in power?
    • Yamato's own ego. He believes that through his training and natural talent he's wise enough to use those powers properly while the vast majority of the population would just waste them. While the game shows that he has a point he also really loses it if someone he considers an equal chooses a different route.
    • Plus a good deal of envy, in that he's pissed off because Japan's leaders (who are, of course, corrupt and incompetent) are the ones everyone looks to, even though they don't deserve their positions (in his eyes). It's touched on when he talks about how his family served in secret and it was a thankless duty. Yamato's merit-based system is as much based on wanting people to recognize him as it is Yamato believing he's best-suited to run things, though in the Best End it seems to have been tempered by the MC.
    • Because it isn't contradicted by his meritocracy at all. The context is very, very important. The "When man grows accustomed to power, they tend to abuse it." is true in the current system, "our" system, the one at the beginning of the game. Using Polaris isn't only like changing a government, despite the heavily political nature of the game. Polaris is the administrator of our "system", in other words our reality. Humanity and how it behaves is not external to this system, but is a part of it and therefore can be changed like anything else. It more or less means using god's power to rewrite human nature and therefore how humanity will behave regarding everything, otherwise being egalitarian would be just as stupid or even moreso than a meritocracy. Basically, egalitarian = rewriting humanity and "fixing" it so that everyone will think that everyone is equal and that's it, and Yamato's meritocracy would be a meritocracy without the "corrupt" part(which is what he hated and was fighting against in the first place). Which is why also Alcor is the chaos/freedom path, he is against tampering them because the most interesting thing to him is freedom, despite the corruption, inequalities or pain it will have a chance to create. Using Polaris to rewrite human nature make the "drunk with power" point moot, since it is assumed that in this new world order, this will not happen. Only a pure meritocracy based on skills and being the most able to do something (which, when it comes to ruling, includes "not abusing your power". If you are doing it, then you are not "the best one" when it comes to ruling fairly according to your own system, and therefore you don't deserve your place according to your own meritocracy. If said meritocracy is created in a "perfect" way by Polaris, you will not rule, period. Yamato says many time that the most fitting one will rule, even if it's not him; but he'll be the "stepping stone" in order to make it happen and therefore create "his" meritocracy).
    • Even from a purely political perspective, Yamatos views are consistent. Let's say a leader rises to power through merit. According to Yamato, the problem is that this leader no longer has a reason to achieve excellence as they already have power and have no danger of losing it. This view is consistent with his behavior because he constantly pushes himself to be a better leader and takes responsibility for failure on himself instead of blaming subordinates. What he truly despises is complacency.
  • Why does Yamato need you to escort him during the first encounter with Alioth? He's clearly stronger than you and can take himself especially since he set himself up as the healer. Escort missions are meant to be annoying but Yamato clearly didn't need the escort or the protection that he claimed to need while examining the entire area.
    • Escort missions are not designed to be annoying. They are designed to make you help someone else. And even if Yamato is better than you, you are indeed helping him. I'd personally be thankful not to have a pathetic, useless teammate I have to escort.
      • Point taken. We do not want a repeat of the first Devil Survivor escort missions...which was like every battle in the game (Haru).
  • Why is Airi under the law alignment? For the entire game and her FATE route, Airi has shown disdain toward people that want to befriend her because of her talent. She is shown to dislike Rolando from his introduction especially with him having Rioters steal food from the Nagoya branch and Rolando is also can indirectly responsible for Jungo's death, and Airi doesn't have an issue with Yamato until the last day where she just seems to jump on Rolando's band wagon because Yamato pissed her off. In other words, I feel like Airi was always chaos aligned and she was only law because the game needed to divide the people up evenly.
    • Perhaps worse is that there is a reason for Airi to side with Ronaldo, but the game doesn't use it: Her father. Ronaldo is deep down motivated by revenge over Airi's Disappeared Dad and finding out about that side of the situation would surely be enough to get her to switch sides. Instead, she just gets fed up with Yamato and Fumi's superior attitude and Lack of Empathy... which actually is perfectly understandable.
      • I can see her dad being the reason why she would side with Rolando but given everything about her dad is an easy to miss side quest that isn't worth it when it comes to maxing out the FATE route. The problem was that Rolando himself hasn't done anything that would make Airi be on his good side. Yes Yamato is a Jerkass but Rolando hasn't done anything that would make her want to switch to his side though. Again, he could be indirectly responsible for killing Jungo but Airi and Makoto develop a good friendship in their FATE system given they have similar backstories in terms of what to do with careers and she is pissed at Rolando for attempting to murder Makoto and then Rolando barges in after failing to kill Makoto and claiming to want equality despite killing Makoto proves how much of a hypocrite he is about his world of equality. I can see Airi going to another side in a fit of rage but if I had to choose someone to side with, I would go with the Jerkass where his world would benefit you at the very least instead of the guy that attempted to murder your friends that you have grown close to.
    • Airi's hangup is that she had to stop because her father couldn't afford it; in Ronaldo's world, wealth or lack thereof would be a non-factor, so Airi could have continued the piano. Airi's also shown to resent people who excel because she thinks they make her 'look bad,' from berating Otome about being "too nice" to clashing with Hinako about pursuing her own dream (dance), and even half-heartedly accusing the MC of making her look like the bad guy, should he apologize after beating her; someone who resents others who excel (because she feels she doesn't have anything like that herself) wouldn't be a good fit for a meritocracy, though she does get better.
  • What exactly is Hinako and Keita's relationship and why Hinako is so dedicated to him? In the anime, they explained that Keita saved her from a demon and Hinako is returning the favor but in the game, I don't think it gave her a good reason to cling to Keita or get a death clip of him. The death clip is only received by people who you are friends with (or with Hibiki, he's the main character so he gets all the death clips). From what the game implied, she just met Keita and got his death clip immediately unless they knew each other before then but the game doesn't seem to say that at all which doesn't make sense given how in every continuity she cries over his death and in the anime, she even took up his demon Berserker as a tragic keepsake.
    • Death clips aren't only sent to people who are already friends - they're sent to people who are destined to become friends or otherwise linked by fate. If Keita dies, this becomes Hinako's greatest failure (or so it seems at the time) and apparently that's enough of a link to count.
    • Hinako is already portrayed as being pretty hot-headed and she puts a lot of emphasis on teamwork, even saying that people from Osaka just help each other out on pure principle. She doesn't seem to have gotten Keita's death-clip, as she obviously didn't know about it until the protagonist's group showed it to her. At which point, Hinako was Hinako and decided to help Keita, simply because that's the right thing to do. After all, she's introduced by running towards people screaming and fighting demons at the drop of a hat because, well, that's just what one does if they have the means to fight and help people. As for her relationship with Keita after rescuing him... it's likely frustrated shock that Keita is so selfish and doesn't care about helping people, when he really could do it easily. He just wants to get stronger.
  • What does Rolando have against Alcor? His actions when you choose Alcor's route makes no sense. Yamato has every reason to oppose Alcor given how they have a backstory together with Alcor leaving Yamato after he learned what Yamato wanted to do with the world. Rolando has almost no knowledge of Alcor given he doesn't even participate in defeating the Septerions and if pretty much left out in the dark except in stuff he investigates to make things worse for Yamato and is too busy assembling a resistance against Yamato that he wouldn't have time to know about Alcor. So him attacking Alcor even though at the beginning of the battle he say's "No hard feelings" feels out of character for him as much of a hypocrite he is given he HAS no reason to kill Alcor.
    • I always thought that Ronaldo was committing Suicide by Cop, not actually trying to kill Alcor, and that the "No hard feelings" was either in regards to attacking Alcor or for not being able to abandon his ideals and join the MC. As to why he jumped at Alcor specifically, it was probably because he knew that the others were unlikely to actually kill him.
  • For the Triangulum Arc, why do the characters revert to their old outfits? Given that there clearly are scenes showing the character sprites in the new attire and having portraits of the characters in the new attire - like Airi and Hina in their white and black clothes, respectively - why do they go back to the old outfits? Even Yamato, whose biggest design change is taking the coat off, goes back to putting it back on, despite the presence of sprites and portrait. Why did they go the obviously extra mile to expand on the sprites in new clothes, when they'll just revert to the old ones?
  • Why do the characters go through all the trouble to recruit Rama to take down Alioth? All they really need is for Shiva to hit it, and Shiva says he's willing to do them a favor to repay them for Hinako's dance. Couldn't they have just saved time and asked Shiva to Pasupata Alioth directly?

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