Shin Megami Tensei Series

Increasing your intelligence makes it easier to negotiate with demons. Heck some of them will even start minigames in conversations.

Favorite Alignment Heroes, anyone? Admittedly I've only played two games myself, but of those I'll say Zelenin is my favorite Law hero and Walter my favorite Chaos hero. Neutral is harder, but I think I'll give it to Gore.

jiminez, yamato and....atsuro? yuzu? that teacher, yuko?

/shrug

Zelenin was, pre-crazy, a pretty well-done character.

I like Chiaki's writing, too, even if she gets equally crazy later on.

Gore and Isabeau are the only real Neutral Heroes in the series- The Heroines of the first two games will go along with you no matter which path you walk, and Yuko is too ineffectual to really qualify.

eh, the devil survivor games give a fair few neutral heroes.

gin and yuzu and atsuro all clearly fall into the "screw both sides, we'll do what we want" stereotype usually associated with neutral, and daichi, io and hanako are the same. only difference with them is that they all have the same side, and daichi is the leader.

edited 19th Aug '14 3:57:36 PM by Tarsen

I think Zelenin is well-done even post-crazy because you could totally see why she becomes crazy. Unlike Jonathan (easily my least favorite in both games), who's been drinking the Kool-aid from the beginning and never stops throughout the entire game, Zelenin has realistic insecurities - about demons, the deaths of her comrades, the prognosis of the mission, and if Asura is to be believed, about her looks, gender, and place in her field - that make her turn to Law very plausible.

well, not so much her turn to law, rather her turn to mastema's side, the one guy who's been with her this entire time, promising better things on the other side of the line. on the otherside she's just got jiminez being jiminez and space marine being space marine and the crew being the crew and walking the line just leads back to everything that fueled her insecurities.

edited 19th Aug '14 4:10:05 PM by Tarsen

• Favorite Law Hero: Amane Kuzuryu

• Favorite Chaos Hero: Jimenez

• Favorite Neutral Hero: Gore

Jiminez and Isabeau for me.

I like Isabeau a lot, but I actually once read a screed that made the case that she's just there to be Fetish Fuel for otaku, being a cute girl who likes geeky things like manga. I can... sort of see this, I guess, but I definitely don't agree that's her purpose in the story.

...it feels somewhat awkward that a character is being lambasted as wankbait because she has interests in things girls stereotypically do not.

Sounds like something some douchebag on 4chan would say.

Dude, you just described why she'd be wankbait; she's "Not Like The Other Girls"

Well you could argue that she doesn't really have her own ideals, she's just really indecisive. (which is fair, because both the decisions suck lemons)

She does eventually come around, though, enough that she's willing to fight her friends for it. Of course you only really see this in the routes where it's a Foregone Conclusion she'll lose...

so wait. let me get this straight.

a geeky girl having an interest in manga.

thats...unheard of? that, an interest shared by a preeeeetty large number of people, male and female, is enough to qualify as "you are not like the others...whom i have never talked to, interacted with, or gotten to know on any level, so they could very well actually be just like you who knows"

maybe the people who think this should grow up.

edited 19th Aug '14 4:31:24 PM by Tarsen

I've even seen Isabeau called something straight out Persona 3 and 4.

That's how these folks think. They're usually the kind of guys who either think all the girls in school deserve better than their current boyfriends, or think that they're all shallow, fashion-obsessed bimbos without the brain cells God gave chipmunks.

The best alignment hero is the Dark Hero and I will not hear otherwise.

Wooooow White Rider was a complete chump. Stone Gaze from Valkyrie made short work of the Virtues and he didn't even attempt God's Bow once.

The only Rider who is any sort of threat is Red Rider tbh, and that's more because he is probably the most straightforward. He doesn't try any tricks, he just smashes you with Terrorblade.

For all the hype they get, the Fiends are kinda disappointing tbh...I hear later games up their threat level a lot though.

Pale Rider might or might not be a bother depending on how well-prepared you are for his Loas' Debilitate.

Guess who just beat Nocturne!

Guess who kicked Kagutsuchi's disco ass!

Guess who got the Freedom ending!

This guy!

Woohoo!

About endings, is it generally accepted that Neutral is the "assumed canon" ending for all games?