The 2021 release of Shin Megami Tensei V received a solid response from fans and critics alike. The Switch exclusive title scored 8.25 out of 10. Sports Informer and a score of 84 out of 100 on review aggregate site Metacritic. With Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance, Atlus hopes to take the well-loved entry to even greater heights. Not only is this new version of the well-loved RPG making the jump to additional platforms, it’s bringing with it new locations, new demons, various quality-of-life improvements, and an all-new story. I recently had the opportunity to meet with Sega to spend two hours with SMT V: Vengeance to see how this final edition of the game is shaping up.
In Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance, you can take two completely separate paths, each lasting around 80 hours and having different endings. Canon of Creation is the story of the original game, while Canon of Vengeance is an entirely new path found exclusively in this new version of SMTP. In Canon of Vengeance, you meet a new character named Yoko Hiromine, a mysterious girl. With the power to fight demons. She can join your party, filling one of the slots usually reserved for demons.
My hands-on demo consists of two hours of gameplay. The first hour takes place on the school grounds and in Bethel Japan. My first task is to find Ichiro in the diet building. After finding her and meeting Yuko, the party touches down at the terminal to return to Tokyo. They are greeted by Archangel Abdel, who is displeased with Awgami and the main character’s advances, but before Abdel can correct his anger, the Saint Tao of Bethel’s Japanese branch, steps in to save them. After talking to the party and the director of Bethel Japan, Koshimizu, I take the main character to her dorm to prepare for the next day.
As the next day begins, I go to school, where Yuko Hiromine is introduced as a transfer student in the protagonist’s class. She later reveals that because she knows they will work together, she thought it would make sense to be a student in his class. When I go out of the classroom, I see that Sahori Itsukishima is being bullied. During the confrontation, she hears a voice asking her if she wants power. Miyazo helps Sahori, but is concerned about the nature of Sahori’s injuries. Later on the dorm roof, Tao tells the protagonist that she wants to stop the bullying, but Yuko overhears the conversation and tells Tao that if she really wants to stop the bullies and help Sahori, she should Bullies have to be killed. It’s a stark reminder that Shin Megami Tensei isn’t afraid to take dark turns in the story.
My first hour ends with Naama appearing at the train station and diverting people to the sand to collect magatsuhi. This challenging battle requires you to overcome various status ailments, not the least of which is Charm, which has weakened my team on multiple occasions. This shows that despite being playable by a larger number of players thanks to the increased number of platforms, Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance isn’t pulling its punches in terms of difficulty delivered by the vanilla version. .
After this battle, I go into the final part of my demo. The protagonist meets Tao at a temple in Shinjuku, a brand new location for SMT V: Vengeance. After taking the invitation to Shinjuku, Tao and Yuko join the party. Tau is best used as a healer, but she also deals light damage to the table. Meanwhile, Yuko is versatile in her offense, providing fire, electric and dark abilities. Because of this, Yoko comes in very handy, as SMT’s combat strategy is built around exploiting weaknesses.
As I enter Dawat Shinjuku, an angel greets the party, but instead of welcoming them with open arms, they are seen as intruders. Much of the story in this area is figuring out why the party is being treated as a group of enemies, but also working out how to get past the alerted cherubs and angels. so that you can reach your goals. I won’t spoil too much here, but two characters from the vanilla version of SMT V appear with a plan, but it also seems very likely that they both have ulterior motives.
I spend the rest of my hour exploring the area, participating in battles. On a couple of occasions, I’ve lost a battle, forcing me to start over from my last save. Battles are very interesting, requiring me to change status ailments, base weaknesses, and orders, but even with all the information useful (and a save file full of recovery items, it seems ), it is still a challenging experience.
After an hour of exploring this new area, I drop the controller. I started playing the original Shin Megami Tensei V when it came out on Switch in 2021, but I didn’t get a chance to get through the first several hours. With Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance promising new platforms, better performance on all platforms (except the Switch) and tons of new content, it’s worth returning to the world of SMT V with this new version. Feels like the perfect time. .
Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance will be coming to PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, Switch and PC on June 14. For our thoughts on the original Shin Megami Tensei V, head over to our review here .