WARNING: This page will contain unmarked spoilers for various Shin Megami Tensei games.
We are the Nephilim. Children of angels, servants of God, upholders of law.
Agents of chaos must be destroyed, for that is the will of God.
— Opening narration by Tatsuya
Shin Megami Tensei: Heavenfall is a new game in the Shin Megami Tensei franchise, focusing once more on the Order Versus Chaos conflict between God and Lucifer.
You play the role of a young half-angel Nephilim (Canon Name: Hakuno), who - alongside his senpai Tatsuya and Childhood Friend Shino - fights against the forces of Lucifer and the demons as a part of the Malkuth Organization. However, a chance encounter with a demon girl changes everything for him, and as the story goes on, he has to choose what he should fight for...
The gameplay is primarily based off of Shin Megami Tensei V, with Hakuno traversing an open world where demons roam free. A reworked Magatsuhi system and some new gameplay mechanics also encourage an extra strategic approach to the typical Press Turn system, while the new skills used by Hakuno introduce a new flavor of spectacle.
Later on, a DLC story would be released, called Messiahs in the Collapsed Realm. In it, the protagonist is mysteriously transported into the eponymous realm, with a mysterious voice telling him to "gather the three messiahs" and "save him". In this case, the messiahs are Tadano Hitonari, Raidou Kuzunoha XIV, and Ringo.
The tropes included are:
Main Game
- Adaptational Nice Guy: Surprisingly enough for a series where God and Satan Are Both Jerks, God is actually portrayed as more forgiving than usual. He has His moments, such as making Shino off herself in the Chaos route, but ultimately, all He really wants here is to win the war with Lucifer. As such, so long as you're not explicitly on the side of chaos, He's fine with you not being on specifically His side, which is why he is much more forgiving to a Neutral route Hakuno and why Tatsuya ends up falling in said route.
- As Long as There Is Evil: For a... given measure of evil. Upon being defeated in the Law route, Lucifer claims that he will never truly perish, as he will forever remain so long as mankind desires to achieve freedom.
- Combination Attack: This game includes the mechanic of Unison Skills, in which a select pair of party members can unleash a devastating attack together if they have the requisite skills (usually a Signature Move). It consumes MP from both involved party members, but the results are usually worth the cost.
- Cute Monster Girl: Nahemah is a demon, namely a type of succubus, but she is both adorable and a total sweetheart with Hakuno. Quite possibly the sweetest chaos representative in the franchise.
- Dual Wielding: Not seen often outside of demons like Yoshitsune, but a Neutral route Hakuno wields both his own sword and the dead Tatsuya's katana when using In Memoriam.
- Eye Color Change: Nephilim usually have blue eyes with whitish pupils, becoming golden if they become closer to God (Tatsuya being a prime example). They can also change color if they fall, Tatsuya's pupils becoming black and cross-shaped, while Hakuno's eyes become red with black pupils and sclerae.
- Fallen Angel: As shown with Abdiel in Shin Megami Tensei V, angels in this franchise are fully capable of falling. As half-angel hybrids, the Nephilim aren't exempt from this either, as both a Neutral route Tatsuya and a Chaos route Hakuno can attest to. Tatsuya gains feathered black wings, black wrappings over his bare chest and arms, horn-like streaks of black in the bangs of his white hair, and yellow eyes with black crosses for pupils. Meanwhile, Hakuno's change is more subtle, gaining a combination of Red Eyes, Take Warning and Black Eyes of Crazy.
- Good Wings, Evil Wings: Of course, there is the typical feathered (and sometimes metallic) wings for angels and leathery wings for demons or demon-adjacents, but then we get Fallen Tatsuya, who has a pair of black feathered wings to represent his fall into manic levels of piety that scare even the one he is pious towards.
- Limit Break: Magatsuhi skills have been reworked a little, as rather than being their own separate abilities, they instead allow you to use skills that are a higher level than what you have access to normally at the cost of your Magatsuhi gauge. If a skill only has one level, then it will instead unleash a super-boosted and extra-flashy variation that is much more reminiscent of a standard Limit Break.
- Meaningful Name: The organization that Hakuno, Shino, and Tatsuya work for is named "Malkuth", after the sphere of the Kabbalah's Tree of Life that is stated to be closest to humanity. Fitting name for a group comprised of half-angel Nephilim.
- Multiple Endings: As one may expect of a Shin Megami Tensei game, Heavenfall has multiple routes with their own endings.
- Law: Requires you to have your alignment gauge on the law side and kill Nahemah. Personally taking her life causes Hakuno's eyes to turn gold, signifying his direct connection to God and full dedication to His order. The Nephilim of Malkuth ultimately end up facing Lucifer as the Final Boss and defeating him, with him claiming that he will continuously come back so long as humanity yearns to be free.
- Chaos: Requires you to have your alignment gauge on the chaos side and save Nahemah. With Hakuno's decision to defend the demons, he is designated by God as an agent of chaos, taking over Shino and forcing her to take her own life as, in His words "an agent of chaos does not deserve happiness". This causes Hakuno to be consumed by rage and fall, going on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge against Malkuth, the angels, and eventually YHVH himself as the Final Boss. YHVH, on his end, is seemingly defeated, but then proceeds to one-shot Hakuno with a scripted Infinite Light, claiming His disappointment in His child born of man.
- Neutral: Requires you to either be neutral or on the opposite side of the alignment gauge when choosing Nahemah's fate. In either scenario, Hakuno realizes that both God and Lucifer do not really care for anything else so long as the other side is destroyed, abandoning both sides and becoming his own faction alongside a bunch of neutral-aligned demons. The Final Boss is a Dual Boss with Matter Lucifer and Almighty YHVH, the former proud of his independency while the latter is relieved he did not join Lucifer's side, this respect causing them to hold back enough to give Hakuno a chance to win. It also has slight variations based on whether or not Nahemah lives past the splitting point.
- Nephilim: Here, they are natural-born hybrids of humans and angels, with the Malkuth Organization being comprised almost entirely of them.
- Nice Girl: Shino is nothing but supportive of all your decisions throughout the game, and is the closest that it has to a representative for the Neutral route. YHVH has to actively take control to punish Hakuno by having her off herself, which just shows how much she cares about Hakuno. She's fine even if he chooses to abandon Malkuth and join Lucifer, if that is what makes him happy.
- One-Winged Angel: Several cases of this, actually.
- Technically speaking, any demon is capable of this via the Archetype Crystal, an extremely dense mass of crystallized Magatsuhi that drastically amplifies their power. Namely, Metatron and Satan both use Archetype Crystals as the Climax Bosses of the Chaos and Law routes respectively. Satan is forced to use it and becomes a pseudo-berserk version of his Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse design (albeit still playing the battle against Malkuth off as a mere final test for them), while Metatron uses it willingly and gains new, floating, segmented wings akin to his namesake Angel from Date A Live.
- In the Neutral route only, Hakuno's departure causes Tatsuya to begin breaking down, taking on the extremist ideology that God tends to have in most games (that is, "if you're not with law and law alone, you are inherently on the side of chaos and must be purged", believing even neutrality to just be more chaos). Because this version of God lacks this ideology, and is perfectly okay with Hakuno so long as he doesn't explicitly join Lucifer's side, Tatsuya ends up falling and becoming a lot more powerful, becoming the Climax Boss of the route.
- Also in the Neutral route, YHVH and Lucifer both undergo this. Lucifer becomes his True Final Boss form from Shin Megami Tensei V, while YHVH forms a massive humanoid body out of the polygons of his many heads. They then fight you as a Dual Boss.
- Spell Blade: During the game, you may gain access to elemental "Slash" attacks (named [insert base element name here] Slash, so for instance, a fire variant would be Agi Slash), which deal elemental damage based on your strength stat. Considering that strength builds in Shin Megami Tensei often lack elemental coverage, this is actually extremely good to have.
- Wave-Motion Gun: Of course, there are certain skills that have this effect, but the most notable here is the Chaos route exclusive Avenge Cannon: a dark-elemental blast from the dead Shino's handgun that grows more powerful the less HP Hakuno has left.Hakuno: "JUST DIE!!!"
- Weapon of X-Slaying: Upon killing Nahemah and locking into the Law route, you gain access to the route's unique skill, Sacred Execution: a light-element sword strike that deals a good chunk of extra damage to chaos-aligned enemies.
- Worf Had the Flu: YHVH and Lucifer both undergo One-Winged Angel transformations into Almighty YHVH and Matter Lucifer before being fought in the Neutral route, and are very explicitly more powerful (or at least supposed to be trying harder) than in their standard forms. By all means, Hakuno should be getting pulverized, but the two ultimate forces of the universe respect him so damn much that it causes them to subconsciously hold back, so that he would have an actual chance of beating them. Doesn't make kt easy though...
- Yin-Yang Bomb: In Memoriam, the unique skill acquired in the Neutral route, is technically considered an Almighty attack, but procs both light and dark weaknesses if the enemy has either of those, complete with extra Press Turns. This is signified by Hakuno Dual Wielding his own broadsword (shrouded in darkness) and Tatsuya's katana (wrapped in light).
Messiahs in the Collapsed Realm
- Badass in Distress: The mysterious voice asking Hakuno for help turns out to be Stephen, which anybody who's played the Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse DLC Messiahs in the Diamond Realm will recognize as one of the most powerful beings in the entire franchise. He has been trapped within Choronzon due to his innate magnetite interacting with the Magatsuhi flowing through the environment, causing it to clump around him and eventually crystallize into Choronzon.
- The Berserker: In the first phase of the Choronzon battle, it doesn't really communicate, but still shows a decent degree of intelligence as it bombards the party with Stephen's attacks from his battle in Messiahs in the Diamond Realm. When Stephen is broken out of it, it loses all sense of reason and begins lashing out with its own skills, which are much wilder in appearance compared to Stephen's moves.
- Call-Back: All of Raidou's skills are identical to what he has in Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne.
- Eldritch Location: The titular Collapsed Realm is a chaotic mess of crystalline structures, some floating in the air and others comprising the closest thing it has to infrastructure. The crystals are capable of projecting endless copies of figures from the messiahs' pasts, which have to be fought as enemies (Jimenez and Zelenin for Tadano, Iron Mask and Zenon for Ringo, Red Capes led by General Munakata and the Raidou Kuzunoha vs. The Soulless Army version of Sukuna-Hikona for Raidou). It is actually a degraded version of the Diamond Realm from Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse, brought upon by Choronzon's assimilation of Stephen.
- Final Boss: Choronzon, the massive accumulation of crystallized Magatsuhi (which Hakuno points out as effectively being a massive Archetype Crystal) that had gathered around and assimilated Stephen, distorting the Diamond Realm into the Collapsed Realm. Initially, the goal is to break Stephen out of there, after which it becomes actually beatable.
- Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Ringo qualifies as this solely due to one skill: Sabbath. A single-target almighty skill, it uniquely doesn't consume HP, MP, or Magatsuhi. Instead, it consumes your flashing Press Turn icons, becoming stronger the more are consumed. Playing with Ringo means making sure you get a full four flashing icons on Ringo's turn, before nuking the target down with unavoidable almighty damage.
- Solo Sequence: At least the first part. For some unknown reason, you lose access to all your summonable demons during the events of this DLC story, forcing your to rely on the skills acquired by Hakuno himself, such as the elemental Slash skills. However, this later becomes averted, as the messiahs gradually join your party in place of demons.
- Support Party Member: Tadano is most definitely good at fighting, but his greatest strength lies in the extremely potent support granted by his adapted Commander Skills, such as Bite the Bullet (granting the party a one-time-use Endure).
- Worf Had the Flu: Downplayed. Stephen does his best to restrain Choronzon's output from within, but even with that in mind, the entity is still pretty much invincible until Stephen is broken out.
