YMMV / Megami Tensei II

• Anticlimax Boss: YHVH is kind of a joke in this incarnation, only knowing a few basic elemental spells. And the path where you fight him hands you multiple powerful Demons for free, such as the Lv 99 Lucifer, making it even easier.
• Awesome Music: YHVH and Satan actually get their own unique battle music, OMEGA, that's so nice many fans of Shin Megami Tensei II are outright disappointed the last several bosses of said game share the same song by comparison.
  • Many tracks are considered this, thanks in part to a memory mapper that produces higher sound quality than the average NES soundtrack.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: SEVERAL. Namely the Kuchinawa Sword sidequest, the Nihilist Sword sidequest and Zaratan Island.
• Good Bad Bugs: Considering how high the rate of encounters is, a godsend for players of the NES version is the Autopilot glitch. Using the program to set an A Point, warping back to A, and hitting cancel will let you stop, or keep moving. Stopping while in a dungeon completely turns off Random Encounters, letting you explore to your heart's content.
• Growing the Beard: This is where many series staples were introduced, such as Jack Frost (albeit with a VERY different design), buff/debuff skills, Cyberpunk designs, an explorable overworld, Multiple Endings and a post-apocalyptic story. This is also the first game that Kazuma Kaneko was the artist for.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: There's a puzzle where you have to figure out which of four children has been replaced by a demon. The children's names are Aleph, Gimmel, Daleth, and Zayin, whose names (based on the Phoenician alphabet) would be used for four major characters in Shin Megami Tensei II. The answer is Zayin, a twist repeated in SMT II, where Zayin is revealed to be Satan.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • How does losing your arm and having to walk around a post-apocalyptic Tokyo sound to you?
  • The opening sequence has a startling visage of a giant screaming head appearing over a city as it's being nuked. The strobing black-and-white flickering effect doesn't make it any better.
• Suspiciously Similar Song:
  • The ending theme, "Dawn of the Human Being", which sounds a little bit like the theme song from Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
  • The Casino theme, "I Love Money" sounds a lot like "Johnny B. Goode".
  • The overworld theme, "2D Tokyo", sounds quite a bit like "Am I Evil?" by Metallica.
• That One Boss: Many. Tiamat, the Hydras, Moloch (who can use Mediarahan up to 9 times!), Lucifer (should you choose to fight him) and Satan.
  • A particularly brutal example is Mitra, who doesn't seem too bad at first...until he unleashes a devastating fire breath attack that probably won't do too much damage to your protagonists by that point of the game but will likely burn through the demons in your party like tissue paper unless you've really been grinding for high-level demons. The good thing is he is optional, although you have to beat him if you want the best armor for the Hero in the game (although said armor is also something of a Guide Dang It! in of itself).
• That One Level:
  • Zaratan Island. You have to explore two opposite ends of the dungeon and you take damage every few steps, PLUS there are random encounters with enemies that like to use offensive spells that hit multiple members of your party. And you find yourself in the dungeon without any warning. Hope you have enough MP to keep everyone healthy!
  • Bael's Castle with its random teleports that send you back outside the dungeon also qualifies.
  • Astaroth's Castle. In a game where Status Effects aren't useless by any stretch of the imagination, at least in your enemies' hands, a dungeon where the most common enemy can put you to sleep, cause panic, or worst of all (because it doesn't come off through walking) paralyze you easily would already be That One Level, but this game one-ups even that: just before you enter the dungeon, Astaroth kidnaps the Partner, who may easily be your only means of healing from the various problems you run into, especially Status Effects and particularly paralysis.