The game begins with a rather foreboding narration intercut by members of the case going about their way and making plans prior to the start of the game, some innocent, others not so much.
At this point we get to name the Hero. First name, last name, and a nickname, even though I don’t think that we’re on close enough terms with this disembodied voice to use a nickname. In the manga the Hero's name is Kazuya Minegishi, a mash-up of the Canon Names of the Shin Megami Tensei I and Soul Hackers Heroes, but since it's too long I’m going to be lazy and just break out my Japanese Name-O-Matic and dub my character Akira “Aki” Narita. Simple and plain. Afterwards the narration picks up again:
Very ominous, though the game doesn’t quite have that level of Book of Revelations’ imagery. Anyhow the scene changes to a bird’s-eye view of Tokyo, and the title of our first “chapter” comes up.
The Day Before – An End to the Ordinary
It’s mid-August, according to the (normal) narration, and Akira is meeting with his friends in Shibuya, as his cousin Naoya has called for them to meet. Atsuro Kihara and Yuzu Tanikawa soon arrive, and the conversation they have (being a silent protagonist Akira is naturally left out of the proceedings) quickly establishes their relationships – Atsuro’s the laidback sort of fellow while Yuzu’s a little more…uptight isn’t quite the right word but she does have a whiff of typical teenaged self-centeredness about her. Atsuro having saddled her with the nickname of “Yoohoo” doesn’t help her mood. All the story scenes are presented in the simple manner of this scene – each character has a series of static character portraits that appear over a 2D background illustration on the bottom screen. There’s a bar at the top that what chapter the game is on, in this case “day BEFORE”, as well as the current in-game time. The time is written in astronomical or military notation, but since the time is a very important part of the game I’m going to use the standard twelve-hour notation for clarity’s sake. Right now it’s 3:00PM.
Akira eventually gets the two to stop by “asking” if they’ve seen Naoya. Yuzu mentions that she in fact did run into him, and that he gave her some things to bring to the others as something had come up on his end. These things happen to be…Nintendo 3DSes (in the vanilla DS game they were simply regular DSes). Actually they’re handheld communication players called COMPs, Atsuro explains. He wonders what they’ll need them for but then sees that they’re running a homebrewed menu. He uses his laptop (no doubt kept in that bag he’s wearing) to hack into the three COMPs, figuring that this is his teacher's way of greeting him, and is eventually able to access their email functions. There’s already a message waiting for them sent by a mysterious “Observer” with the subject heading “Laplace Mail”:
Good morning. Here is today’s NEWS.
1. At around 4:00PM, a man will be killed in a Shibuya-ku Aoyama apartment. The wounds on the corpse are consistent with an attack by a large carnivorous beast.
2. A large explosion will occur in Minato-ku Aoyama at 7:00PM. The cause is unknown.
3. At 9:00PM, a blackout will affect the entire Tokyo metropolitan area.
Have a nice day.
The group is appropriately nerved out by this prophetic message, and Atsuro decides to fiddle around with the COMPs some more,. He says that it’ll take a while, so he tells the other two that they should go and do something to kill time. He gives Akira and Yuzu their COMPs before leaving.
We’re then taken to the overworld display. Travel around Tokyo is menu-based, with the top screen displaying a map of the city and the bottom showing a list of locations that we can visit as well as giving the options to “look around”, “listen to people here”, and “talk with your party” for the sake of flavor text. Places that have story events to watch will have a marker and a clock icon next to them and show the mugshot of the character that said scene will revolve around. These scenes will eat up a half-hour’s worth of time. Usually you’re free to pick whichever scene you want, but some will disappear after a certain amount of time or plot event has passed, and others you’ll eventually be railroaded into. Like right now we have only two scenes to choose from, but once we watch one we’ll miss out on the other since we’ll be railroaded into watching a plot-relevant one. Managing your time in this manner is important in unlocking the numerous ending paths that this game has.
Pressing the X button on the overworld map lets us access the main menu via the COMP. There are a number of icons on it, but only a few are available at the moment. Right now we can save the game, look at our emails, and view profiles on the characters introduced so far. Naoya’s, it should be noted, displays whatever surname the player gave the Hero, so in my file he’s Naoya Narita. Alliteration ho!
To illustrate my point above, one of the two scenes we have is pretty extraneous, simply consisting of Atsuro bragging about his hacking skills and telling us to wait a little longer. The other, however, is more relevant. In the Ikebukuro district Akira and Yuzu witness a group of orange-clad cultists calling themselves the Shomonkai preaching that the Ordeal of God is coming, and that those who wish to fight it and believe in the “power of the Internet” should gather in Tokyo. Power of the Internet, huh? Oh man, I don’t think anyone should wield that Pandora’s box. Yuzu decides that they should get away from these doomsayers.
We’re then railroaded into picking a scene taking place in the shopping district of Omotesando where Yuzu’s going on about how different neighborhoods all have their own distinct senses of fashion while Akira I’m imagining is just kinda smiling and nodding in a politely-vacuous manner. Yuzu asks for the time, and upon learning that it’s 4:30 her thoughts return to that strange email, and with perfect timing some police cars drive by, sirens wailing. They realize that they’re heading towards Aoyama, where the first incident in the mail was said to take place, and since Naoya lives in the area they decide to go and have a look.
Well it seems that Naoya’s apartment building was the one with the incident, as the place is swarming with cops when Yuzu and Akira arrive. They’re lucky enough to run into the man himself, who nonchalantly tells the two that the person who died was not only his next-door neighbor, but that he wasn’t simply mauled by an animal, he was partially eaten. By this point the characters finally put two and two together and realize that the email told the future (prompting a sarcastic “your thought process never ceases to amaze me” from Naoya), but he says that they shouldn’t be talking and that they need to find Atsuro, for “it” is about to start. He spouts one last cryptic line about overcoming fate before departing, leaving the two with plenty of lingering questions. On cue, we get a call from Atsuro saying that he's figured out how to unlock the COMPs and that he needs ours. Our next mandatory event has an additional mark in the form of an exclamation point, indicating that we'll be introduced to the game's battle system.
Atsuro has moved to Shibuya's Electric Museum. He expresses some skepticism towards the idea of an email predicting the future and claims that once he cracks open the COMPs everything will be clear. Our tech-head explains that all three of the COMPs are set up to wirelessly monitor each other, so he couldn't just crack one of them: he needs to do all three at once. He unlocks them, and a message pops up saying that the “DEMON SUMMONING PROGRAM” is booting. The screen's filled with a wall of programing code that ends in a passage from the Bible – Paul's Letters to the Romans to be exact – and the words: “Peaceful Days Died – Let's Survive.” There is a brilliant flash of light...
...and we are taken to a top-down, isometric view of the city street outside of the Electric Museum building. Akira, Atsuro, and Yuzu (now depicted in sprite form) are confronted by a trio of monsters who have magically appeared: the fairy Pixie, the bestial Kobold, and the feline Kabuso. While the humans freak out appropriately at the sight of demons coming out of their electronic devices, the demons declare their intention to attack their summoners. Dialogue from the demons are the only lines in the game aside from the location flavor text that aren't voiced – they get a wide variety of Voice Grunting instead, from giggles to growls to Evil Laughter and everything in between. It wasn't until the 3DS port of Soul Hackers in 2013 that the franchise's demons were actually voice-acted.
Mission 1
So, this is essentially the tutorial. Like most SRPGs the field is split up into a grid that all units can move around in, with the default maximum range being four cells. Since most of the maps are based off of real-world locations you won't be seeing all that much in the way of stage or terrain hazards, but many do have physical obstructions (sometimes of the waist-high variety) that need to be bypassed. All the action's on the bottom screen, meaning that the 3DS's top screen is stuck on menu-duty for the duration of the game, which sucks but what can you do? From the field menu we can check out our stats and those of the enemy's, descriptions of everyone's skills and attributes so you always know exactly what you're dealing with, each battle's objectives, and perform a suspended save for those times when you just have to go. I'll cover each feature as it comes up.
Turn order is shown at the top of the bottom screen in the form of a queue, and each unit's place in the order is determined by their Speed stat (which is different from Agility, take note). Every action has a “cool down” period of sorts that affects how soon the character will be able to move again. How far you're pushed back depends on what you did during your turn: if you simply moved to another part of the map or just passed your turn you'll be able to move again more quickly, while if you engage in battle or get attacked yourself that character will have to wait a while. The same thing goes for enemies, and keeping them from moving and attacking frequently is a good chunk of the game's strategy.
When choosing to engage an enemy or being attacked yourself we're taken to a first-person battle screen which will be familiar to Megami Tensei veterans. The action's on the bottom screen while the top screen displays the enemy team's skills and stats. Here we can select attacks (though right now all we can do is use our basic physical attack) to inflict damage on the enemy's HP or defend to reduce damage to our own. Devil Survivor uses the Extra Turn battle system which is in the same spirit as the Press Turn system from Nocturne and Shin Megami Tensei IV. Normally each team member (each team has a max of three – a leader that appears on the stage map and two allies) can only attack once per skirmish, but by striking a weakness, getting a critical hit, or reflecting/blocking/absorbing an attack, that member gains an extra turn and can thus attack again. Conversely, like the Press Turn system you can lose an extra turn if the enemy does the same to you, and they can take advantage of extra turns as well.
Unlike most other Megami Tensei games, the Devil Survivor generally does not follow We Cannot Go On Without You in regards to the Hero. Akira can usually die as many times as you like and the only negative repercussion is that you'll be down a team. That's not to say that that will always be the case, however.
Right now there's not much in the way of strategy, this being the opening battle. We don't even have to move, as each of the demons will make a beeline for one of the crew, and all we can do is slug it out with basic physicals until one side falls. The Pixie can heal some of her HP, but otherwise the battle's scripted in such a way that you have to try to lose. Whenever a demon is defeated we earn some experience points (the status screen shows how much until your next level up) and macca, the perennial demonic currency in Megami Tensei games. With each level up one of a character's four stats will go up by a single point (Akira, in Hero tradition, is the only one that has his points distributed manually. Everyone else, human and demon alike, has growths that are preset.).
When each demon is defeated they complement the crew on their strength and return to their COMPs, saying that the contract is fulfilled and that they'll lend us their powers. Beating them all without anyone dying allows us to clear the mission
Completing the mission earns us 35 EXP and 50 macca.
Following the battle we are returned to the 2D background/character portrait graphic style and the number 1 appears above Akira's, Atsuro's, and Yuzu's heads. Yuzu marvels that they're all still alive and demands Atsuro explain what he just did but he's just as clueless. She says that they should hand the COMPs to the police but we're supposed to talk her out of it on the grounds of, um, that might not be safe, and Naoya said to hold on to them...because he's certainly a paragon of trustfulness! (Then again, the police turn out to be little better, as we'll see later on...)
Atsuro does a little more poking around inside the COMPs now that the immediate danger has passed, and names two unfamiliar programs installed on them: the first is, of course, the Demon Summoning Program, while the second is the Harmonizer. The former is just what it says, while the latter apparently uses some sort of wavelength that, more or less, makes everyone in range Made of Iron so they don't get immediately pulped by whatever comes out of the COMPs, and makes it so humans can actually trade blows with demons. It's a nice touch how the game justifies a lot of its gamey functions rather than just making us roll with it.
After that bit of Gameplay and Story Integration Atsuro figures out what Naoya wants them to do: perhaps, he explains, that the death foretold by the email was actually a demon attack? If that was the case, they could've shown up to prevent it with their own demons. And that's another reason why they can't turn over the COMPs: what if they get attacked again, claims Atsuro, as there have apparently been a lot of strange things doing on in the city lately that could've actually been, in retrospect, caused by demons. He doesn't bother expanding on that point unfortunately, but given all the demon-centric weirdness that Tokyo seems to attract in the Megami Tensei multi-verse it's not hard to imagine the sort of stuff he's referring to.
At this point Akira apparently snaps out of some kind of trance to point out the numbers that have appeared over everyone's head, but apparently only he can see them. The narration also notes that many passerby (who seem to have somehow missed the demon battle taking place in the middle of the street) have numbers over their heads too, though theirs are all sevens. The group resolves to go back to Aoyama to see if they can get any answers out of Naoya.
This is getting kind of long, so this is a good stopping point. Next time we'll get an opportunity to go a little deeper into the statistical side of the game as we wrap up the main tutorial section.
Compendium
Since the Megami Tensei games have a massive kitchen-sink of demons taken from all over world myth and religion, some rather obscure, I'm going to be taking a leaf from my Megaman liveblogs and provide little encyclopedia entries on the ones we encounter at the end of each update. Have fun reading!
- Pixie
◊
- These mischievous sprites are said to be from southern England and are always depicted as being of diminutive size. In the Megami Tensei games it's traditionally been the first friendly demon that the player can recruit, until Shin Megami Tensei IV when that role was ceded to the nymph Napaea.
- Kobold◊
- A Germanic spirit that's been depicted in a number of forms, animalistic, inanimate objects, even humanlike. Some traditions claim that they live in underground mines, which is where the mineral cobalt gets its name.
- Kabuso◊
- A shape-shifting spirit said to be seen in Japan's Ishikawa prefecture, Kabuso often take the form of otters or felines and enjoy playing tricks on humans and talking their ears off.
Soundtrack
- Soul Survive
- This is the song that plays during Overclocked's opening sequence (a bunch of art assets and character art from the game being thrown at the player). It's notably sung by Haru's seiyuu in the Japanese version.
- Reset
- And this is what played during the original game's opening. Reset is the game's main theme, and it crops up in a couple different forms throughout.
- Reset (Instrumental Ver.)
- Such as for the title screen BGM.
- Demon of Darkness
- Opening track certainly shows you what you're in for.
- Action
- The main overworld theme, with an ironic title since all the action there is menu-based.
- Normal - Jingle
- One of only a few unambiguously upbeat tracks in the game.
- Anxiety - Jingle
- It's mostly stuff like this instead.
- Pinch
- Oh hey, "Incident Occurrence" follows me into a new series.
- Battle Beat
- I'm honestly not very fond of this soundtrack - most of it's just endless guitar riffs, buttrock, or just plain unremarkable - but I do like this little ditty for the skirmishes.
- Disquiet
- Or repetitive.
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