#smt4 spoilers

[rustyvanburace]

No one ever talks about Isabeau under the Yaso Magatsuhi gas. She was so real for this.

[beantothemax]

MORE KUROKAMI INBOX FIC: THIS TIME WITH THE RETURN TO CANON SMT IV!! This contains slight spoilers, But its mostly after what i consider to be the "First act" of the game, that being post-Minotaur.

Anyways, lets begin~

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Shinjuku. A place known for its nightlife, lies in disarray. This isn’t new for the citizens of Tokyo. And hasn’t been for years.

A girl sits on a rooftop. She is dressed in a brown school uniform of unknown origin, her dark hair flowing freely in the cold wind of Tokyo.

She looks out of place here, too clean for the crushed buildings and unkempt streets. But she doesn’t care. She never really cared at all. In the dreadfully short time between then and now, many things have changed.

Her head tilts up from her reverie, looking at a new person who entered the torn fence.

She walks smoothly, gliding across the broken asphalt like water on tile. She is dressed in a different school uniform, one with a white-gray plaid pattern on a black skirt. Her white hair flows down her back in a loose braid.

She, too is an outlier in this land. A pristine black and white, plucked straight out of an old movie. She contrasts the other girl as she jumps down, amber eyes meeting black.

“That’s a new look, I almost didn’t recognize you!” The brown haired girl said. She has a chipper sort of voice, one that wouldn’t seem out of place in a cheerleading squad.

“Thought I would match you, maybe even bring a souvenir back. So to speak.” The braided girl smiled back, a genuine one, like greeting an old friend. Her voice is more somber, deep and smooth like the depths of the ocean.

“Oh I see now! That uniform…”

“Yes, it is that one. Thought you would like it. Sadly, I don’t think I could recreate it wholesale.”

The white haired one put on a pensive face for a moment, then looked at the curious demons watching their exchange.

“Let’s go somewhere else. I don’t think I want anyone overhearing us, Hikaru.”

“Alright, suit yourself. What do you think about up there?” Hikaru pointed to the top of the building next to them, neglecting to mention that it was where she previously was sitting.

“It’s perfect,” the other girl chirped, “I bet we could see a lot from there.”

“Well, come on then!” Hikaru flashed a smile at her, before bounding up stacked rubble.

———

Two girls sat upon the rooftop, looking out into city streets.

Hikaru tapped her nails on the concrete, while the other girl hummed a somber tune.

“You know… you never did tell me where you went, Vidé.” Hikaru smiled mischievously.

Vidé matched the smirk with her own devilish grin. “I went to a lot of places. Traveled both above and below ground. Say, did you know that Minotaur is not as good at blocking the exit as Aquila thought he was?”

Hikaru laughed. “I’ll say! I have to ask though, how did you get past it?”

“Trade secrets, I’m afraid.”

She frowned, “You’re no fun.”

“Oh come now, we both know that I’m plenty fun! I let you eavesdrop on me while I traveled. That’s fun enough, right?”

“I suppose…”

“Enough about that, I have something for you.”

Hikaru leaned into Vidé’s space, trying to spy what she was rummaging for in her pockets. Vidé shifted, trying to keep the other girl from looking too hard, but it quickly became a small game of keep away. Culminating in turning her back on the brunette before finally pulling the thing out of her pocket.

It was a white worm, no larger than her hand. Affixed to its head was a flat helmet, with a set of two squared horns jutting out from it. It was hanging limply from her hand in a loose grip.

“I believe this is yours.” Vidé said, turning around.

Hikari’s eyes widened, looking shocked as she looked at the Magatama in her friends hand. “Now why would you do that? I gave that to you as a token of our friendship!”

“Please. it was either this, or I toss it into Tokyo for some unlucky soul to find. We can be friends without the surveillance.”

Hikaru pouted again. “Really? I’m shocked you would even say I was doing that kind of thing.”

“Hikaru.”

“But Vidé… you’re interesting…”

“And you can learn about me like a normal person. Like asking questions, and me answering them.”

“You are so not fun.”

“So I’ve graduated then? Do I get a diploma?” She smirked.

“You know what I mean.”

“Will you take the worm or not?”

“Fine…”

Hikaru took the Magatama from Vidé and rather inelegantly stuck it into her bag.

“So did you come by just to drop this off? Or did you want to stay?” Hikaru asked.

“Bit of a toss up, really. I met the most fascinating pair last time I came here, and I want to see them again. Maybe I’ll play another song for them.”

“Oh? You played music for them? Can I hear it?”

Vidé laughed. “Sure. I think you would like it too.”

She sat down on a nearby piece of rubble, pulling an acoustic guitar out of nowhere. The instrument looked well-worn, with small dents and scratches littering the greyed wood.

She played a note, before humming the key. Hikaru sat down on the ground, eagerly awaiting the performance.

The citizens of the Shinjuku underground heard the intercoms turn on for the first time in decades. Broken machinery rekindled for a single performance. Many would clutch the words to their hearts, remembering the lyrics and attempting to sing them for themselves for days to come.

Let's go in the garden, you'll find something waiting, Right there where you left it, lying upside down. When you finally find it, you'll see how it's faded, The underside is lighter when you turn it around.

Everything stays right where you left it. Everything stays, but it still changes. Ever so slightly, daily and nightly. In little ways, when everything stays.

Hikaru smiled, letting the melody wash over her. Music was such a human thing to do. Same with art and cooking. Time wasters. Humanity was always such an interesting thing to see flourish in the cracks of a world, and even more fun to puppet.

Perhaps everything does stay the same, but it still changes.

Go down to the ocean, the crystal tide is raising. Waters’ gotten higher as the shore washes out, Keep your eyes wide open, even when the sun is blazin’ The Moon controls the tide, it could cause you to drown.

Everything stays right where you left it. Everything stays, but it still changes. Ever so slightly, daily and nightly. In little ways, when everything stays.

Hikaru clapped, as is customary. She smiled wildly, showing her unnaturally long canines.

“That was beautiful!” She chirped.

“Thank you. That’s what they said too. I doubt they would understand the intricacies of it as ones such as us though.” Vidé smiled.

Hikaru laughed, rocking back and forth on the ground.

They smiled at each other for a bit, before Hikaru picked herself up and sat next to Vidé on a piece of rubble. They stayed like that for a while. Gazing out at the streets and skyscrapers, listening to the distant chittering of Demons. It was interesting down here. Chaotic and strange, but Vidé thought it was a good type of strange. The kind of strange that settled into an alien normalcy. Humans… such interesting things. All with their own melodies to sing, with stories engraved upon their hearts, carving out niches for themselves.

“Say, Vidé.” Hikaru said, breaking her out of her reverie. “Do you want to do a favor for me?”

She knew exactly where this was going.

“No, I’m sorry. But I don’t think I want that kind of commitment.”

Hikaru tilted her head, wearing a pensive expression. “Why not? You seem like you would enjoy the kind of things that I do.”

A moment of silence.

“Don’t tell me you’re with Him.” she spat.

Vidé laughed. “Please. I couldn’t possibly side with Him. He's far too similar to what I was before.”

Hikaru raised an eyebrow, curiosity coloring her eyes. “And what would that be?”

“Not your business, that’s for sure.”

“Come on! You and Lilith would get along great!”

“It’s a generous offer, but I prefer to go my own way.”

Hikaru rolled her eyes, “Fine. Be that way. I’ll ask again if you’re up to it.”

“I gathered as much.”

Vidé stood up, and stretched her arms up and around. “It’s about time I got going. I’m sure if I dawdle any longer, those two I want to visit will be dead and gone.”

“You’re leaving so soon?”

“We’ll have plenty of time to catch up when next we meet, Lucifer.”

She laughed at the casual use of her Name. Even after Vidé jumped off of the building they were sitting on.

Hikaru smiled.

“Likewise, Kurokami.” -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- So! Context and fun fact time! Kuze is wearing a monochrome black-and-white Shujin uniform, all perfectly to the letter neat. This is a callback to the time that they passingly met in the P5 universe, which Kurokami went to while passing through SMT IV Land It is Highly implied that SMT uses a multiverse system, and by highly i mean basically canon, so its not too far-fetched that the Lucifer Persona is tangentially connected to Lucifer SMT.

The area that Hikaru and Kuma are meeting is the area in front of the south entrance to the Shinjuku settlement.

Kuma is using Vide as a fake Name because she is Very Much A Fey and as a personal middle finger to the final boss of octopath 2, which she visited before this. (Its literally Void in french, how could i pass that up???) Lucifer knows Kurokami, but doesnt know the other Aspects' Names. Anyways yeah thats it bean have fun dont die

kurokami fic!!!!!!! hooray!!!!!!!!!!!!! love how hikaru lucifer and vidé kuma are just chilling on a rooftop as demons are probably massacring innocents on the streets below. hashtag girl.

speaking OF hashtag girl why is Lucifer, Prince Of Hell just. disguised as a schoolgirl? what’s that scamp’s motive this time around…

ALSO also why did hikaru plant a goddamn worm on kuma like a bug?????????? (the listening kind not the critter kind) what is this fella doing!!!!!!!!

positively fascinating fic vin, chewing on this like a puppy would an ice cube. and I did not die! hoor- [GUNSHOT] [GUNSHOT] [FIREBALL SFX] [FIREBALL SFX] [EXPLOSION]

…

[GUNSHOT]

[jenovacomplete]

i fucking love this game

[yurashimadepot]

Good observations. I forgot how unhinged Isabeau was here.

I've always thought SMTIV is very biased in Chaos favour. Even from the start of the game with Mikado's class system (and Navarre trying to get you killed) you're likely to become predisposed to antiestablishment.

And then you get to Tokyo and the Ring of Gaea is unambiguosly presented as honorable while the Ashura-Kai, who are maintaining a Law-like system in place cross every moral event horizon with the Reverse Hills reveal. There are some hints of justification like when Tayama says that we have no idea how bad was it before the Reds and that we're wrong if we think the demons are the only ones responsible of Tokyo's destruction but it's never really explored and they added a bit of dialogue that suggests Tayama might have pedophile inclinations to put the final nail in the coffin so why should we pay attention to what he says?

Perhaps they thought the chaos-like state of current Tokyo seems bad enough so they had to make the extra effort to make Law look bad? Maybe having a teleport maze in their HQ already makes the Ring of Gaea super evil in the eyes of the players? In any case the other games always looked more balanced in their portrayal of the alignments to me.

all the prentices' reactions to Tayama and Reverse Hills is sooo interesting. They all have a sort of defining moment here (often obfuscated by people still laughing at the yaso magatsuhi stuff).

First, Isabeau:

A VERY extreme reaction, especially for her, and unlike the other two it does nothing to hint to her future aspirations. This is a cornerstone as to why Isabeau isnt a representative of neutrality to me, really. She's less a rep and more a character, which is only odd because she is surrounded by reps constantly.

But yeah this is very odd and extreme and a bit heartless concerning Tokyo, especially for how late we are in the game.

Jonathan, much more subtle and demure even. He is horrified as well, this has harmed him and made his goodwill wilt. Humans are weak, that means they must be defended by powers greater than them--it means he, too, is not enough. This happening right before we meet the angels, having Jonathan already placed so low, is why the slip is so easy.

Conversely, Walter is enraged. The horrors of the Reverse Hills and Tayama's actions have inflamed his spite. He has already fallen for Yuriko's words and worldview and witnessing the 'opposite' has left him hating this world. (Even though I would argue, the Ashura-kai lead through strength as well, but is the Law-style strength of systems and leadership rather than of the individual).

Anyways. Very interesting to me Isabeau is such an outlier, especially because her perspective will not be revealed again until much later. She doesnt get to go to the other Tokyos, she had no moment to compare. And she is thus very different.

[megidoreyn]

(This is a companion post to Walter-Lucifer's character design sheet right here.) Since we didn’t get pseudo-fiend designs for the alignment characters in SMT4, I was curious in seeing how they’d look! So I made pseudo-fiend designs + turnaround sheets for Walter-Lucifer and Merkabah-Jonathan just for fun 😈😇💕 They both use elements from Lucifer + Merkabah's boss phases, as well as Walter + Jonathan's human features. It was fun drawing both of their unique wing shapes + Merky's feathery legs in particular! ⚡️twitter ⚡️misskey

[yurashimadepot]

As for writing this, I finished no-fusion runs on both SMT4 and SMT4A. Usually when you think of challenge runs like this you expect unnecessary difficult and/or tedious playthroughs for people who already finds the games' hardest settings a piece of cake but nothing could be further from the truth. I wholeheartedly recommend giving a try if you like these games because it makes the experience really fresh without making it frustrating.

You see, I like games with high party customization, which includes most "monster-catching" games including SMT, because of the freedom you have to tackle the game's challenges and its replayability. For example, most players will confront the infamous Matador boss fight from Nocturne with accuracy buffs to circumvent his skill that maxes his evasion but I've seen people basing their offense on Counter since counterattacks skip evasion/accuracy checks.

SMT4 was the first mainline game that introduced manual skill inheritance when fusing demons, and while I understand this was for the best I also noticed that this resulted in many players, consciously or not, making a team of physical oriented demon/magic oriented demon/healing demon and just fusing them into stronger versions of themselves, essentialy having a Dragon Quest party that changed appeareance every other dungeon plus a lot of fusion fodder. There's nothing wrong about playing like this but I felt it loses a bit of its charm and that was my main motivation to try these runs.

And what do you know, it was a really fun experience! You start seeing the demons as more unique entities and because of their limited moveset you'll be switching around them a lot more often, without a "main party". It helps a lot that these games have plenty of QoL features to acommodate this, with benched demons also gaining EXP, switching demons in battle costing only half a turn and demons being allowed to switch themselves with another demon. You feel more like a commander of a small army.

Speaking of which, I found the usually worthless "Bad Company" skill really useful in this run. Since everything is so fragile in SMT4 replacing your entire lineup with a single action can be a blessing for those subquests where you're forced to do battles that start with an ambush. Also a common strategy for bosses was starting with a weak lineup of demons with debuffs then using it to replace them all immediately on the second turn with your strongest guys. It's not as good in SMT4A since demons can actually take hits in that one.

Difficulty-wise, I played both games in the Normal difficulty fearing I might find it too difficult otherwise. I think SMT4 is perfectly doable in Hard. SMT4A is another story, since the last dungeon doesn't allow you to recruit anything there there's a big gap between the strongest demons you can recruit and the final boss, I don't think the last part of the game would be very fun playing like this in the higher difficulties.

So there you have it, hope this encourages at least someone to give them a try!

[callmearcturus]

Wait, do people know about the Before I Play wiki?

I have used this for..... at this point easily over 6 years. It's a wiki where there will be low-spoiler/non-spoiler hints about just stuff you would want to know before playing a game.

It's always stuff like.... "Vitality in this game is useless, put your points in everything else first" or "Don't leave the second hub town until you buy X item, it'll become unobtainable."

Lemme pick an example almost everyone will know. From the Animal Crossing New Horizons page, the first tip is:

Nearly everything on the island is movable later, including all buildings and even cliffs and rivers. The main things that are fixed are the stuff on the border of the island (river mouths, beaches, rocks/peninsulae, the dock and the airport) and the resident services plaza, so picking your island layout should be based around that primarily.

That's stellar advice, tbh, given what you'll know about the game 30 hours in instead of 30 minutes.

Not every game is covered obviously and not every piece of advice is good, it's all subjective, BUT..... I look up almost every game I play for the first time, just to keep stuff in mind. The SMT4 page had top tier advice imo.

[furinana]

Dagda was announced as DLC for Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance. What are your thoughts about that?

Japanese text: "Hmph, are you the one guiding my mother?"

The obvious: it'll be the first instance of having Dagda interact with a protagonist that isn't Nanashi and since he's a sidequest DLC, he'll have unique dialogue.

[spoiler alert for SMT4A]

The likely: between this being the original Dagda from SMT4A and the "submissive Dagda" created by Danu in Bonds, I think we have more evidence towards the latter. OG Dagda wouldn't submit to Danu's whims and be unlockable for fusion because he's against being shackled to his role of god.

The NOT likely: The dealbreaker for a lot of people would be if Dagda's presence automatically will mean the presence of Nanashi (and going as far as include Flynn's). I actually wrote regarding my feelings on Nanashi & Flynn as bosses before.

From how they marketed this DLC, I'm sorry but I'll have to destroy your hopes of seeing the SMT4 duo because I assure you they'd *absolutely* tell us if they were in it. The only guest star here is Demifiend.

My opinion: As you might know by this blog, I'm biased towards SMT4A's Massacre route. The concept of paying to have Dagda, a mythology figure borrowed to be carefully crafted to go against the flow, as a summonable ally is... well. I just think he's one of those main boss characters in the series where it'd feel more thematically appropriate not to treat him as a disposable demon. You're basically chaining and kicking a jaded old man to perform tricks against his will. And... I don't think I also need to write a deep comment on how irrelevant DLCs have been for whatever is going on in SMTV. Rather than complements to the lore they're just challenges with filler for your compendium.

In any case, I don't feel enthusiastic in having to buy an enhanced version alongside DLC content after having already paid full price before. Many fans feel the same.

This last user said it all lol.

New players being given the best experience of the game while the ones that gave you the initial support to keep you afloat? Unrewarded!

[lu15d4]

Revisiting Infernal Tokyo now that Akira is king (SMT4)

Did you know you can revisit Blasted and Infernal Tokyo after defeating Lucifer in the neutral route? Have you seen all of its new content?

2 things to say before we start

This blog contains spoilers of Shin megami tensei IV so I wouldn't recommend you to read this blog unless you at least got locked in one alignment and be in the monochrome forest.

Sorry for the poor quality of the pictures, I took them directly from my phone

With that said, let's get started!

Not long ago I realized you can revisit blasted and Infernal Tokyo if you get locked into chaos or you beat Lucifer in neutral.

After getting locked in one alignment, if it allows you to freely get to the yamator reactor room (am I right Merkabah?), go there. Once you're there, Burroughs will ask you if you want to go to either Blasted Tokyo or Infernal Tokyo, or just stay in the Tokyo you're in now.

So I didn't think twice and decided to explore both Tokyos to see what's new in them.

For Blasted Tokyo I haven't seen much change. But for Infernal Tokyo tho, damn there's a lot here to discover:

Ikebukuro and Shibuya are fully open to explore

New sidequests

A LOT of new dialogue from npcs

Ikebukuro and Shibuya

During your first time in Infernal Tokyo, before Akira became king, you couldn't enter these districts because they were owned by Kenji, and if Akira was only allowed to pick up trash and be humiliated in there, of course the guard wouldn't let you to even set a foot in.

But now that Akira is king, I went there to see what would happen if I got there. And well, the guards are now even polite towards me.

So now that they let me pass, we can freely explore the districts. Obviously, being Infernal Tokyo a Tokyo that isn't meant to be stayed in for a long time, the districts are much smaller than ceiling Tokyo, but in both of them there's a pub where you can heal and take challenge quests, shops, npcs to talk with and even a domain (pretty much all like Infernal Shinjuku). Speaking about sidequests...

The sidequests

There are both sidequests you can get from the pub and from speaking with demons.

The pub ones is killing one of the many funny d*ck demons from a ritual and Fornite in Infernal Tokyo :)

The others are beating the demon from the domains (Loki and the 4 horsemen of the apocalypse) and sidequests mostly about hindu mythology demons.

Honestly, none of them are bad, but compared to other sidequests of the game, they aren't the greatest either. The Kartikeya one is pretty cool because it gives you a bit of hindu lore but not much else.

The npcs

Now this is what I really want to talk about.

There's a nice amount of npcs around Infernal Tokyo with new dialogue, from the ones of the newly unlocked districts to the ones from Shinjuku and Akira's former base.

What they talk about can be divided between:

The ones who talk about how life has been as demonoids/nurishers.

The ones who talk about king Akira

The ones who talk about their life as demonoids/nourishers

There's not much to say about them other than how most npcs say positive things about it

However, there are 2 cases I want to mention

1- the one who calls Kenji a hero. He says that before the nourishers were a thing, demons used to eat humans until Kenji arrived, killed the demons and established the demonoid/nourisher system.

What I find interesting is how, despite Kenji leaving Tokyo a place where everyone kills each other and the strong abuse the weak, his actions improved the situation for some people to the point some of them call him their savior.

What's kinda funny is that how Ikebukuro from the unstable Tokyo is somehow more stable than the Ikebukuro from the lesser unstable Tokyo (ceiling Tokyo).

2- The demonoid you find near the cocoon in Shijuku (while his dialogue already appears even before Akira took Shinjuku, I believe this is still worth mentioning).

What this guy says is a bit of his story about the reason he became a demonoid, which was to overcome the death of his daughter, who just like Akira's sister, rot in the cocoon.

With this I think it's safe to say that Akira's case wasn't a unique one, with the cocoon filled with nothing but children (and maybe teenagers); once it was opened many had to see at a very young age their siblings/cousins/friends not only dead, but also in a rotten state, as well as many parents who had to see their children dead and in a rotten state.

Probably many people turned themselves into demonoids just to overcome the death of people really close to them. After all it must have been a really traumatic experience to all these people. Just look at Akira, who after 25 years of the events he visits his sister's grave every time he picks up trash, which it's pretty much a routine. There's also the demonoid near the cocoon, who might visit it frequently because of his daughter.

The ones who talk about Akira

Because how can a story of a walking joke who did nothing but be humiliated and pick up trash and suddenly becomes the king of Tokyo not be a topic to talk about a lot?

A lot of the demonoids talk about his obvious lack of strength compared to Kenji and how they feel bad for him or believe he really needs help.

Others give their opinion about his plan of making Tokyo more equal.

Most demonoids say how unused they are to the word "equal". Some nourishers on the other hand, say some of their new rights for nourishers, such as having more food (said by the same nourisher who previously said that Akira would give them access to baths) and even having vacation days.

For that to work, Akira decided to every now and then go to each district and count the amount of nourishers each district has, to bring more to those who lack of them.

It really looks like when he became the leader of Shinjuku, he found out the big amount of nourishers he had, so he decided not to let the nourishers keep feeding the demonoids all the time. And since he really liked that, he decided to do the same regulation in all Tokyo.

A sentence that stands out a lot is "he's (Akira) kind of a weird demonoid. But then again, he's the only one who treated us like real humans". This opens a headcanon I have about how nourishers are treated.

While initially, the main perk of being nourisher is that you won't be killed by demonoids, it was just initially.

There's a nourisher in Kasumigaseki who said (before Akira took over Shinjuku) that the good thing of being a nourisher is not being killed, but the thing is that the districts weren't keeping in touch each other, so each of them had their own way to manage things.

Which means that while Akira's nourishers might actually live the perks of a nourisher (because he's a cinnamon roll) and think that's how other nourishers live, the nourishers from other districts might not at all. And since everyone can do literally what the want, I'm sure the nourishers must have been living severe cases of abuse or even be killed if the demonoids thought they had more than enough nourishers.

Because it's in our nature to take advantage of the weaker, to exploit the weaknesses of the one next to us, just like when you nonstop threw bufu to minotaur once you realized he's weak to ice, and if nothing is stopping you, even if it's just your morals, then you'll just do it.

Akira was a special case, he wanted the nourishers to be treated like decent human beings, plus even more if he couldn't get more nourishers.

Also, I'm pretty sure the leaders of the districts usually abused even the demonoids from their district. Just like in a company, one person from a higher position in the company, can easily abuse the ones from the lower positions.

In a place where strength is was matters, the leaders surely are the strongest of their district, and there's nothing stopping them for doing what they want, so why not doing what you want with your people?

But with all that, there are 3 dialogues I want to highlight

1- a demonoid from Shinjuku was asked by Akira to pick up trash for him, just like how he has been doing before being king. What's impressive is that he seemed sad when asking that.

Maybe Akira after many years being humiliated by a guard, picking up trash and going to his sister's grave as a routine, he might have developed some form of Stockholm syndrome to that and therefore he might actually deeply miss that routine.

Plus, that same demonoid mentioned previously how Akira murmured about how he won't be able to visit his sister frequently anymore.

2- In a pub in Ikebukuro, there's a demonoid who talks about how some demonoids from Kasumigaseki killed demonoids from Ikebukuro because they didn't support Akira. And to that there's a lot to say.

First of, there's something clear about this, no matter what you do, no matter how good your actions are, no matter how good you are as a leader of a region, there will be ones who will not be happy, who will prefer the other thing; and probably there are a great bunch of demonoids who preferred Kenji as the ruler, maybe because they had more freedom.

Second, the fanaticism some developed for Akira. For every famous person, there are people who will follow them like if they were Jesus, who will agree with whatever they say and will do something against anyone who disagrees/doesn't support them. And even if the people from Kasumigaseki got their life improved, they probably didn't get the fact that there are people who not only didn't, but also politically disagree with them.

And this might perfectly be something Akira didn't even want, but this could perfectly make the ones who initially were against him, dislike him even more, specially if Akira doesn't do anything about it, things could go really bad.

3- A nourisher from Ichigaya was given a new role by Akira, which she says she's grateful for that because she just won't give brain juice anymore. However she says that Akira was apologizing "from the bottom of his heart".

For what she, other nourisher and a demonoid in Ichigaya say, I think Akira brought some male and female nourishers and made them do nothing but make babies.

If it's true, I have to say

Akira is so damn cute.

After seeing how others have done far worse things for "the greater good" (ehem ehem, Tayama, ehem ehem, Yuriko,...), as well as finding them justified and on top of that, showing no remorse whatsoever, Akira apologizing from the bottom of his heart for a far lesser bad thing, Akira, I really love you.

Although this shows how even Infernal Akira, despite having the role of representing the nice, benevolent, necessary, uncorrupted side of law (just like Blasted Akira with Chaos), has to dirt his hands even if it's a little bit.

And finally, Akira

As for Akira however, he doesn't say much. It's much more what others say about him rather than what he says.

What he says is how difficult it will be to take care of everyone in Tokyo (now that it's not just the people of Kasumigaseki) and how he's already tired, but he has to stay strong nonetheless.

We already made him king of Tokyo and there not much we can do other than hope for the best, now that Tokyo and its future is in his hands.

Also notice how he calls you "boss", which it's not the first time he does. I think we're pretty much a hero for him, making his biggest wish come true, which was something that would be practically impossible if it wasn't for us. Plus, it could perfectly be the only reason why he decided to stay alive and endure 25 years in an unfair and depressing Tokyo.

And well, that's everything Infernal Tokyo offers. I'm surprised how more than half of its content is inaccessible until you get locked in chaos or you defeat Lucifer in neutral. And it's quite a lot considering it's from something really hidden I didn't know it existed until not long ago.

So hey, thank you for dedicating time to read this ;)

[rustoma]

📌 About.EXE

🚧 Under construction.

Hi I'm Rusty and this is my MegaTen fandom blog! I blog about Shin Megami Tensei and also a little of Persona too!

I am especially fond of the Shin Megami Tensei IV and IV: Apocalypse duology, which are some of my favorite games in the franchise and of all time. I love its themes and cast, especially Navarre and Issachar.

I like to write about these games and also draw them. I post most of my art on my art blog and will also post some of it here too.

🌙 Rusty | 30↑ | He / they | Queer | Disabled

🌙 SMT IV/A, Navarre and Issachar💚🧡, SMT Strange Journey

🌙 Main: @rustyvanburace

🌙 Art blog: @rustyburacedraws

This blog tags spoilers. E.g. "smt4 spoilers", "smt4a spoilers". Tags for other game spoilers will be similar to those.

Please be patient if sending me asks or DMing me. I may not notice right away.

[rustyvanburace]

[cake-apostate]

Four Akiras in a Trenchcoat AU: Envy and Violet

[The premise of this AU is that Akira Kurusu of Persona 5 is his timeline’s version of Akira from SMT4. Before the start of the game, Big Bad had Black Mask kill “that stupid kid” out of sheer pettiness, leaving Akira an empty shell. To salvage their Wild Card, the Velvet Room drags in four parallel versions of him: Blasted Akira, Infernal Akira, the late King Akira, and Anarchy Nanashi. The four of them possess Joker’s empty shell.]

Given that the Four are the same person who made different decisions, I wonder if they’d relate to Violet? I can see how they could envy one another, especially since they could have been one another. 

Infernal Akira envies their character. He could have been clever like King Aquila, decisive and unrelenting like Nanashi, but most of all, he could have been charismatic and levelheaded like Blasted. He knows that he’s cowardly, weak, that he backs down and makes other people do the work for him. “Why couldn’t I be strong like them?”

Blasted Akira envies their circumstances. The other Tokyos had most of their resources unspoiled, and Mikado is a prosperous country. He envies Infernal Akira most of all, because there’s so much untapped potential with a completely unnuked Tokyo and Demonoids abound. Meanwhile, he’s stuck in a radioactive desert where God wants everyone dead. “Why couldn’t I be lucky like them?”

Nanashi envies their charisma. He knows full well how fickle public adoration can be, but there’s something about how the Samurai of Mikado were reluctant to break King Aquila’s code, how he was so beloved that the angels tried to erase his legacy. He’s jealous of how everyone looks up to Blasted, how no Demonoid wants to usurp Infernal because he’s doing such a good job as king. Nanashi sacrificed his bonds for the greater good, not because they were worthless. “Why am I alone at the end of my road?”

King Aquila, most of all, envies their potential. He’s long dead, and he saw how he failed. His legacy was misread, the kingdom he built waged war on his homeland, and right when he thought everything would turn out fine, some idiot monk starts wreaking havoc to the point where Nanashi murdering literally everyone in his kingdom is considered a mercy kill. “Why can they still change the world?”

Spoilers for the third semester

Since they all could have been one another, the Four understand how Sumire feels inferior to her own twin sister. After her cooldown, they wind up going to dinner and swapping stories about how they felt like they each got the short end of the stick. Also Akechi is along for the ride. 

Also, the new reality. I was thinking that the Four woke up during the third semester not because they had no desires, but because the new reality wasn’t built to handle their situation.

I was thinking that there’s got to be someone out there with a seriously outlandish wish, like, “I want to be a space ranger,” or, “I want to be a wizard.” I think the system usually deals with those by separating their perception from everyone else’s; for example, if Mr. Akiyama the salaryman wants to be a fantasy hero, he’ll see a mall as a goblin cave, while the shoppers see a small cute child waving around a toy sword.

King Aquila sees Tokyo as Mikado because his wish is the chance to fix Mikado, but the other three see Tokyo as Tokyo. Once they realize that he’s not seeing the same things as them, they argue over who’s hallucinating.

The next crack is Nanashi’s desire to be loved. Whether he wants to be worshiped or simply liked, he’s still a god and lots of people declaring their undying love for him qualifies as worship. Suddenly he gains the power to perform divine miracles, which is a huge crack in their ‘normal’ world. I’m not entirely sure if this is in character, but I do think that it would be hilarious.

Also, Nanashi finds the whole reality to be fake not because it’s poorly constructed, but because there’s a huge disconnect between his idea of normal and the current Tokyo. 

Blasted and Infernal’s wishes don’t really conflict with the reality; Blasted wants prosperity and glory, while Infernal wants to be strong, brave, and just. They break out anyways because when they all start arguing over what’s real and what’s not, they end up punching holes in each other’s ideal worlds to the point where the whole illusion shatters.

[jenovacomplete]

have only just dipped my toes into blasted tokyo but my wild guess at the future direction of the plot is... well, it's already been long established that humans and demons are made of the same stuff; humans can become demons and demons can become humans, and the only real divide between them is a surrendering to base desires (a yearning for power, for freedom, what have you) and a means to do so -- either through eating reds (made of human brains) or lilith's enlightenment (worldly knowledge). spreading this fact is her primary goal, and the reason given for god's messengers, the angels, calling for her execution. demons are summoned and commanded using the demon-summing program, a literal piece of software capable of running on everyday tech (like phones) and the stated catalyst for the catastrophe that ruined tokyo. both walter and jonathan remember the flynn from their respective routes after crossing the expanse, and a ghost in the counter-demon forces' bunker recognises flynn's face with fujiwara's voice. so, like......... are the samurai from a simulated reality powered by the expanse. is that why there's timeline fuckery and weird parallels and how there's such a thing as a perpetual reactor that doesn't generate power. because it's either that or it's gonna continue to get even more batshit than I can comprehend

[tsukai22]

Metaphor ReFantazio thoughts

I finished it a few days ago. I didn't post about it because I wasn't in the mood.

I really liked the ending sequence - it's either my favourite or 2nd favourite ending for a game released this year (competing with Persona 3 Reload).

It also had a lot of twists that I didn't expect - often back-to-back.

More spoiler-y stuff:

Even though it takes far more inspiration from Persona that mainline SMT, I like that it still had one notable SMT thing - there was a clear Law Faction (Forden and the Sanctist Church), a clear Chaos Faction (Louis & co.) and a clear neutral faction (yourself). It also had the turn system of modern SMT games, which I think I prefer to modern Persona. To a lesser extent, the main cast being of various ages from various walks of life - akin to SMT4 Apocalypse - instead of all of one being teenagers was nice for the sake of diversity.

The fact that no member of the main cast was primarily comic relief felt like a breath of fresh air.

When you're virtues are maxed out, any extra points in them giving Magla instead of just wasting a bit of time is also really nice. I hope future Persona games incorporate this somehow.

My story predictions almost always ended up false. I can't remember many examples, but I sort-of got close with one - I predicted that Basilio would sacrifice himself and then Fideleo would join the team, but it was the other way round. In hindsight I think that's better because Basilio would've had very little character development otherwise, while Fideleo already had quite a lot.

A gameplay thing I found questionable though: why does unlocking Heismay's Royal Archetype require far more effort than anyone elses? The full requirements are: - Ninja rank 20, Tycoon rank 15, Dragoon rank 15, Sniper rank 20, Seeker rank 10, Thief rank 20, Assassin rank 20, Gunner rank 20, Commander rank 10, Merchant rank 20, Magic Knight rank 10, Mage rank 10, Knight rank 20. Investment in thirteen total Archetypes for a total of 210 levels. Comparatively, Eupha's Royal Archetype requires: - Devil Summoner rank 20, Summoner rank 20, Seeker rank 20, Magic Seeker rank 20, Soul Hacker rank 20. Investment in 5 total Archetypes for a total of 100 levels.

And finally, an oddity with Trophy numbers: As of writing, only 6.7% of players have gotten the Sword Surfer trophy, which I find weird as I got it quite early and it's easy to do - I thought everyone would've gotten it by the mid-game but I guess most players either didn't use it for some reason or just fast traveled everywhere. In comparison, 10.3% of players have mastered every archetype with the Protagonist and 13.5% of players have done every quest which are much harder to do.

[megidoreyn]

Since we didn't get pseudo-fiend designs for the alignment characters in SMT4, I was curious in seeing how they'd look! So I made a pseudo-fiend design and reference/turnaround sheet for Walter-Lucifer just for fun😈💜 He uses elements from both of Lucifer SMT4's phases, as well as Walter's human features.

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[afriendlyirin]

My review of Shin Megami Tensei V, which was a very disappointing game even by the standards of massive disappointment I had gotten used to over the course of the series.