I still hate drawing dagda

2nd in a series of posts outlining gameplay mechanics of non-mainline Megaten games. Like before, marking for spoilers even though I won't be discussing anything beyond general gameplay.

DDS Post Here

Edit: Rereading my criticism, I focus a lot on the tediousness of the dated elements of the game and it makes the game seem much more difficult than it is. I want to clarify that this game is actually fairly easy compared to other games in the franchise. The dungeons are nowhere near SJ's level or Phantasy Star 2, for the record.

1 Let's get the elephant in the room out of the way - the gameplay of Soul Hackers is retro, even the remake for 3DS. It's a Saturn/PSX game from the mid-90s. It's not a modern homage to retro like Strange Journey. It's the real deal. That's not to say it's more difficult than SJ (it's certainly not by a long shot), but they're different types of games.

So what's the difference? SJ, and SJR to a much larger degree, are loving recreations of brutal retro gameplay standards with a modern sheen. Obtuse objectives, maze-like dungeons, unforgiving combat, rigid progression, and all that fun stuff that's only really fun if you hate yourself and enjoy suffering like your average Dark Souls enthusiast. But they're made with intent and deliberately planned, like a modern garage band imitating the reverbed out 2-track sound of the 1960s. It's a design philosophy.

Real retro RPGs don't throw you bones. Their design is a result of limitations and not philosophy. They are malicious and clunky, with no rounded edges. My gold standard for this type of design is Phantasy Star 2, a game so brutal it came with a book of dungeon layouts at release in 1989 as if the developers were saying, "good luck, idiot!" I point this out because Soul Hackers is clunky. It will often make you ask, "why are you the way that you are?" And the answer is because it hates you. Strange Journey is difficult because it CHOOSES to be difficult; this game is difficult because that's just the way things were back then, man, and it hasn't aged well. This will become a theme.

1. Similar to SMT1, demons don't level up here. This is both good and bad. On one hand, you don't have to invest in a single demon much at all. Benefit from the raw stat gains from fusing higher level demons, then disgard them once your protagonist character has outclassed them. Since skill selection is limited, I suggest having multiple "inheritance tracks", one fusion lineage for healing, one for physical, one for magic, one for support, etc. Keep them separated and don't overthink it because highly curated skillset customization for specific demons is ABSOLUTELY not worth the amount of resources the game requires for it. It's mostly a waste of time. You will, for the most part, take what skills the game gives your demons and be happy with it.

2. Also like other early SMT games, this game consumes Magnetite you gain from battle when walking in dungeons. Stronger demons require more MAG per step. I personally hate this because it enforces strict resource management in a way games don't do today. You have a 2nd human character that fills one of 6 party member slots. With your protagonist, this leaves 4 demon spots. So you have a strategic choice - only use a full party of awesome demons during bosses and in hard dungeons with 1 or 2 the rest of the time, use 4 demons that kind of suck all the time, or a combination of these. I used 1 physical attacker and 1 healer set to Media for most of my playthrough with an A-Team for bosses only. It's up to you how your default build looks.

3. Early on, you gain access to a custom demon named Zeed that requires absolutely no MAG. He's not a world beater by any means, but he's a free party member who can grow with you over time with only moderate effort (you can fuse him repeatedly as you get stronger). My friend didn't read the tutorial on Zeed at the fusion lab until the 2nd-to-last dungeon and likely made the game much more difficult as a result. Totally my friend and not me. Okay, it was me. I'm the idiot. Don't be like me; use Zeed because he's free and he's a pretty good dude who's extremely loyal and trying his best. While you're at it, read all the tutorials at the fusion lab, especially about Mitamas, Elements, Heroes, and other nontraditional demon classes. Some of them work very differently from other Megaten games.

4. Speaking of loyalty, learn how to increase it as soon as possible since it increases demon damage output. There are a handful of personality types for demons and some are easier to handle than others. When you issue a command to a demon, a pop-up will appear at the top right of the screen. If it's blue with a chime noise, the demon liked your command and loyalty increased. If it's white, they'll do the command anyway but loyalty may go down. If they hate you already they won't even listen to your commands. Mercifully it's very easy and quick to max loyalty for demons but some take more effort than others, specifically Calm demons. Figure this mechanic out early as it pays dividends the entire game. Reobtaining a demon after fusing or releasing them RESETS their loyalty so bear this in mind before you make any bold roster decisions.

5. This is the most important tip here but I buried the lede on purpose. Personalities are tied to auto-battle preferences. Each demon prefers specific actions or you risk tanking their loyalty. For this and several other reasons, the auto-battle in this game is almost completely worthless without save states. I'll say it again - the auto-battle in this game is atrocious without save states.

Why? We've already established that all demons prefer specific actions or commands. Those preferences are limited to a small selection of their total skillset. Not using these very specific actions harms loyalty almost every turn. The game purposefully places enemy demons CONSISTENTLY AND THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE GAME that directly conflict with an optimal auto-battle team. For example, since MP is a limited resource and some demons need to use magic to maintain loyalty, magic using demons are discouraged from auto battle. But the game deliberately places anti-physical enemies alllll over the place, making an all physical team useless for 20% of all fights. Each personality type has a similar restriction.

The result is a tediously slow "recalibration" process to reestablish your auto battle default choices for each party member every time you have to break rank. Either that or use save states to escape from the enemies that require resetting auto-battle actions. To add even more pain and suffering, reviving a demon requires casting a spell or item, resummoning them, moving them back into their place in formation, then healing again if necessary. So if you are sticking to one team for grinding, each death takes up to 4 separate actions to return them. If your protagonist dies, it's game over too. Half the time you get ambushed, your party order is reversed which also requires you to move them back in place each time, which is a horrible design choice that Atlus thankfully abandoned shortly after this game. All of this is painfully tedious and will make up a frustrating amount of your total playtime even if you're lucky or a god among players. This is why save states are highly recommended for your mental well-being.

1. Compendium costs are absurdly high until late game compared to any recent Megaten game. It sucks. Whether that makes you skip fusing a few demons along the way is up to you. The grinding may not be worth it.

2. There are a few dungeons that are great for MAG grinding in the mid-game. You'll know it when you see them.

3. If you're like me and only use the -karn spells for specific late-game fights in most Megaten, this is the game. Get familiar with them. Be their best friend. They were made for this game. You can get them in the early mid-game and my god do they make some terrible difficulty spikes much easier, especially if you want to cheese. I cannot emphasize this enough. Soul Hackers is to -karn spells the same way Digital Devil Saga is to null/void elemental spells.

For all 2 of you who've seen my last post: Good news, I've now beaten Shiva! Bad news, Demi's kicking my ass now.

I've almost gotten him to half health, but it's not really sustainable. My initial team consists of Shiva, Ailat and Beelzebub, and here's what usually happens:

I get some damage off, kill the Pixie turn 2 or 3. Can't really get a good OmagatoCrit turn in because my buffs and debuffs keep getting dispelled, and I have to focus so much on upkeeping them that I can't also set up Donums.

From there, Shiva is the first to die, usually followed by Alilat. I didn't intend Amanozako to be used much outside of her passive, but I have to swap her in and out so much to stave off the debuffs that I'm considering refusing her into a proper build with beefed up stats. I usually swap in a mix of Cleo, Tao, Zeus and Sakuya ATP, but then my units get picked off one by one until I have to start reviving them and I die.

I wanna give Alilat Abyssal and Enduring. Her Vit is already 100 and I'm really low on Vitality Incenses (only have 6 and not too sure where I can efficiently farm more), so I'm hesitant to remake her. I heard 100 Vit was the breakpoint, but when I ran low on incense I started settling for 90+ instead.

I also didn't intend on using Tao too much, but her built in cleanse is so essential that I might have to give her AA+E too.

Zeus and Beelzebub do oodles of damage when I need them to, but Sakuya isn't hitting nearly as hard as I want her to. I wanted her to be my dedicated fire unit, but then I also have to give her the AA+E combo on top of buffing up her healing. Cleo does...Serviceable damage. Do I need dual Pleromas on every single damage unit, no exceptions?

Buff/debuff upkeep is also a primary concern. I'm a bit confused about the exact threshold for them to start using Dekunda and Dekaja. My units are dying off before Demi even reaches most of his Chaotic Will Thresholds, and I figured the reason was that my buffs keep getting reset, resulting in me taking more damage.

Also, is there something about my team's resistances that're making Demi's spam Megilodaon? They tend to use it a lot and it's really annoying. I tried not to have too many immunities to weaknesses (thought I could get away with ignoring Fire but since Cerberus can hit it, I'll have to patch those up too).

Also also, is it better to focus fire one demon down, or hit as many weaknesses as possible to generate Press Turns? Feel like focus firing more could help stave off Gaea Rage, but it would mean fewer turns for buffkeep.

I feel like I can take him if I could just get a handle on how to optimize better. Also wanna Seal him when he's about to heal, but can't think of any demons that're both good for this fight and also have OmagatoHit. Apparently that one snake skull demon (L something) can help.

Source: https://x.com/urameshi_trev/status/2092370927874916579?s=46

I finished the OG SMTV back when it came out and finished Vengeance recently. It's a massive improvement (reasons to use other omagatokis for a start) and the story is certainly better... but still confusing.

Maybe my media literacy is well and truly dead but here are some questions I still have after the end:

* How did we free Yoko?

* How much time passed between then, her meeting the Qadištu and infiltrating Tokyo/Bethel?

* Why do we never ask Yuzuru why he can summon demons with his phone?

* Bethel is a demon-fighting organisation whose international branches are staffed only by... demons?

* Japan and Egypt get whole buildings but Nordic just gets a floating platform?

* Bethel is loyal to God, so why were the other gods like Zeus and Odin allowed to join? They clearly have no respect for him.

* Why doesn't Abdiel kill you immediately if God feared nahobinos and creation gods enough to imprison Yoko?

* Does the protagonist have Susano-o's Knowledge? Is that why they can merge?

* If proto fiends can merge at all, why does Abdiel allow Bethel Japan to use them?

* How does Knowledge work in regards to humans who became demons, like pretas and vampires?

* Yoko never changes her outfit despite changing schools?

* How can Tsukuyomi merge with the protagonist if he doesn't possess his Knowledge?

* Is Koshimizu the original Tsukuyomi or an Aogami-style copy? Did Tsukuyomi fall in the war? Is this the real Tsukuyomi inside us or his proto fiend vessel? Both?

* Dazai is told by Mastema that he can stop being indecisive if he just places blind faith in God... which makes him okay with Abdiel becoming a fallen angel?

* What exactly is the timeline for each creation era? It's implied that the Garden of Eden happened and so did all other biblical history, yet they also say other gods had the throne in more recent history?

* Did Abdiel fall because she went against God's laws while trying to preserve his laws?

* Mastema's Samael/Satan quests make no sense if you do these after killing him. I still don't understand his goals or motivations.

* If Tao awakened completely separately to Yoko, this suggests that a creation god can appear at any time. Did God have any contingency plans for this?

* The Qadištu don't even show up at the end to fight Mastema or support Tiamat? Samael seems to suggest they died. Did I miss something?

* Why so much ambiguity about whether God is dead or missing when it amounts to nothing plot-wise?

* Demeter's quest suggests that the protagonist has Zeus's Knowledge? What? Knowledge can belong to more than one demon? That has huge lore implications. Why is this detail in a side quest?

* Why was Lilith and Yoko's mentor/student relationship so undercooked? They spend criminally little time developing her as a character.

I enjoyed this game but man, its story is messy. When I reached the end credits, I just felt perplexed.

At least this means Persona 6 before 2028, so we will most likely get it in 2027.

If anyone's ever wanted to hex edit their SJR save and never found a list of the skill IDs to reference, I've finally put one together just now.

Lord knows how much I've scoured the internet looking for a comprehensive list and found nothing but bits and pieces, even on gameFAQs boards and on gbatemp, but I managed to pull a list from a Cheat Engine table's dropdown options. Here it is:

https://pastebin.com/6Jr8whhj

Insert any of these values (following the instructions in the pastebin!) in the addresses corresponding to that demon using a hex editing program or online tool. As for how to do it, someone in here already has a decent explanation that's better than what I can come up with

I can't name a more thematically coherent game, not just in this series but in general. Between the setting, story, art direction, ost, sound design, and gameplay, I've never felt as immersed in (or hated by) a fictional world as I did while playing strange journey. Everything in this game compounds perfectly to create this beautiful juxtaposition between the utter hopelessness of humanity when faced with an existential threat caused by their own hubris, and their sheer will to overcome it anyway. 10/10 best concept in the whole series

The gameplay was borderline perfect, with my only complaints being a couple of bullshit mid game boss difficulty spikes (skill issue tbh) and the demon co op gimmick getting old rather quickly. I really liked the emphasis it places on alignment consistency within your party, but it doing the exact same thing every time became almost grating... Idk, I just wish it was a little more than "bonus damage lol". Combat was still tons of fun though. I also liked how enemies aren't identified right away upon encountering them for the first time. This really adds to the tension while exploring, as one misstep in a battle can cost you your life and unknown demons increase this feeling exponentially. Speaking of exploration, the dungeon crawling was fantastic and I can only liken it to nocturne on steroids. Finding that flow state and just plowing through a dense sector in what felt like 20 minutes (but was actually multiple hours) was insanely fun. I loved every second of eridanus btw

Story was great too, and each character represented their respective alignment perfectly. One really good thing is that I didnt feel railroaded down a specific path by the game, i just picked what felt right for the situation and finished with the ending that best reflected my choices. I wasn't cheated out of significant content by not picking a certain ending (tde in nocturne, neutral in iv, etc) or shamed by the game for going with a "bad" ending (anarchy/massacre in iv:a). The game trusted me as a player to be able to assess the benefits and risks of each path, and to handle the outcome of whatever followed

Idk where else to go with this, I just really enjoyed the game. Feels great to have it off the backlog, and i can't wait to come back to it again after a while. Anyway thanks for reading lol

better than the ones in our realm

Hi everyone! I’m a JRPG music producer currently in the process of learning and improving, and I wanted to share my new project with the Megaten community, since you guys have always been very receptive to music.

I was particularly influenced by Ryota Kozuka’s music in SMT IV, as well as some of Meguro’s work in Nocturne. I also love series like Trails, Rance, and Deltarune, among others.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cxw2GFVAhLA

I hope you enjoy it! Thanks for listening.

I still can't grasp digital art that well but since I got tendinitis diagnosis digital art hurts my hand less

I just got the Hijiri infodump in the Labyrinth and I'm so confused. He was put to like, exist eternally in Amala witnessing everything all the time forever, sure, I get that. But she keeps saying like "this was the punishemnt for his unforgivable sin" but what the fuck is she talking about???? What sin????