Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance Preview – Preview

When Shin Megami Tensei Vengeance was introduced, I assumed it was going to be one thing alongside the strains of Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse. Apocalypse—a follow-up to the unique Shin Megami Tensei IV—was a model new story that served as a companion to its predecessor moderately than being a full alternative. This perception was bolstered by the truth that Vengeance permits the participant to decide on between the unique sport’s story (“The Canon of Creation”) and the brand new story (“The Canon of Vengeance”) originally of a playthrough. Upon getting hands-on with the sport, I found that Vengeance is just not a completely new story in any respect, and as a substitute serves a task much like re-releases within the Persona franchise corresponding to Persona 4 Golden and Persona 5 Royal.

Our demo started in a scene I acknowledged from the unique Shin Megami Tensei V: the introduction of the Bethel Japanese Department after the opening act within the sport’s Minato area. Except for the presence of a model new character—a scholar named Yoko Hiromine—this scene performed out precisely the identical as I remembered, and when listening fastidiously I might hear the delicate variations within the audio high quality of dialogue indicating newly-recorded strains every time somebody was acknowledging Yoko. The story would proceed into the story arc on the protagonist’s faculty that includes the demon Lahmu, and apart from Yoko often chiming in to supply her ideas on a narrative that was already written with out her presence the story remained the identical as the unique sport.

The one exception is a brand new scene that happens proper in the course of this arc that includes a boss combat towards one other new character, Naamah. Naamah had no clear connection to the occasions occurring within the story and I didn’t have any context for her transient look, however primarily based on present promotional materials I do know she is a member of the sport’s new group of antagonists known as the Qadištu. After the combat with Naamah ended, the college arc continued with no additional adjustments till it was time to modify to the subsequent a part of our demo.

The second a part of the demo befell in a model new space within the Shinjuku area. These occasions have been all new and completely distinct from the unique sport’s story, however we weren’t given any actual clarification for what was occurring. It wasn’t clear when these occasions happen within the sport story, however given the save file we began from featured a Stage 40 get together it was considerably later than the occasions we had seen thus far. From right here we have been allowed to discover the brand new Shinjuku area, which was filled with its personal side-quests and elective goals to seek out. It gave the impression to be a full-sized space on par with these within the unique SMTV, however within the restricted time we needed to play I couldn’t come wherever near exploring all of it.

Not a lot has modified in what gamers can count on from Vengeance’s gameplay. Clearly there are some high quality of life enhancements on par with these discovered within the Persona re-releases; the participant can now freely save wherever and menus have been retooled to be smoother to navigate. Atlus has promised some substantial additions corresponding to extra recruitable demons and probabilities to see new elective scenes with allies, however these have been powerful to essentially get a really feel for within the restricted time we had for the demo. Outdoors of the brand new story essentially the most important change to Vengeance is its launch on extra highly effective {hardware}, which meant our demo was working on the PlayStation 5. The sport was working considerably higher than I remembered it at full 4K with a rock-solid 60fps, although the Atlus consultant working our demo sheepishly clarified that these graphical enhancements wouldn’t apply to the Change model.

Shin Megami Tensei Vengeance guarantees extra SMTV, and that seems to be precisely what it’s. At its core this is similar sport that was launched three years in the past, and the addition of latest story eventualities has an apparent enchantment for followers of that unique sport. Sadly it’s additionally the newest in what seems to be a brand new custom for Atlus: to re-release a flagship title a pair after a few years with substantial story additions that make the unique model of the sport out of date. Should you’ve been holding out on enjoying SMTV till now then that persistence has clearly been rewarded as Vengeance options all the pieces the unique sport has and extra, bringing all the pieces to all-new platforms on the similar time. Nonetheless, for anybody that’s had their fill of SMTV, you’re most likely higher off ready to see simply how substantial that “and extra” is earlier than getting too enthusiastic about this one.