Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey
Encyclopedia
is a role-playing video game developed by Atlus
and Lancarse for the Nintendo DS
. It is a title within the Megami Tensei
series of video games, and was released in Japan on October 8, 2009 and in North America on March 23, 2010. It is considered to be the fourth of the main Shin Megami Tensei games.
Strange Journey features dungeon crawl
, first-person
environments for the player to explore. Demons, the enemies encounted by the player, can be negotiated with, a staple in the Megami Tensei series, to join the protagonist's party, aiding him in combat.
Players take on the role of an unnamed soldier assigned to a UN-mandated research team deployed to the South Pole to investigate an abnormal area in the region dubbed as the "Schwarzwelt" (German for "black world"). There, the protagonist discovers that the Schwarzwelt is full of demons, which can be persuaded to join him in battle.
elements. The player controls the unnamed protagonist
through several dungeons in a first person
persepective. Battles with demons typically occur as random encounter
s and are turn-based
. During battles, the player can choose to attack, use items or skills, defend, or speak to one of the demons on the opposing side. When speaking to demons, the player must answer a series of questions to appeal to the demon's specific personality in order to gain the option to request items, Macca (in-game money), or for the demon to join the protagonist. The player can build a party of demons in order to aid in battle, storing extra demons in the Demon Compendium, which allows any demon the player has already owned to be summoned for a fee.
, Welsh
, Hindu
, and Christian
mythologies. Demons are either encountered during random encounters in dungeons or during boss battles related to a mission. When an undiscovered demon is first encountered through a random encounter, it will appear as an indistinguishable blue mist. After defeating a new demon for the first time, any encounters afterward will allow the player to see the demon's sprite, name, and, after several encounters, its elemental strengths and weaknesses. By defeating demons, the player's party earns experience points which allow the protagonist and demons to grow stronger, Macca to buy items, and sometimes items, which can be used to heal the party or consumed to create new items aboard the Red Sprite.
Players are allowed to build a battle party of any combination of three demons. Each demon has different skills and traits, and many can be persuaded to join the player during battle after a negotiation and paid tribute. The player can also fuse two or more demons together to create a different, often more powerful one, and some demons can only be obtained through fusion. Every demon has a unique password
of thirty-two characters that can be used to summon that demon from the Compendium even if the player has never encountered it. If a demon created through fusion has different skills from its normal version, a different password will be stored in the Compendium along with the original password, allowing players to store custom demons.
and causes a space abnormality known as the "Schwarzwelt" (シュバルツバース, Shubarutsubāsu, Schwarz-verse), which poses an imminent threat for humankind and the Earth, growing at a steady rate and consuming all matter in its path and with it war, crime and needless suffering inflicted upon the Earth. Concerned with this threat, the United Nations
sends a group of researchers from all over the world to investigate the area. Four teams are sent to Antarctica to investigate the phenomenon
, led by Commander Gore. Inside, the investigators quickly find themselves trapped in the Schwarzwelt and that the interior has been infested with demons seeking to take control of the human world.
The player assumes an unnamed soldier from America, or Japan, in the Japanese version, who will be working with three other crew members of the Red Sprite. , leads the crew, with , an experienced, reward-seeking American mercenary, and , a knowledgeable Russian scientist. The crew dons the Demonica suit, which enables access to abilities as well as regulating the player in the harsh conditions within the Schwarzwelt. While trapped in the Schwarzwelt, the protagonist must travel through several different sectors, each representing a social critique on humanity, ranging from battlefields, shopping malls, and red-light districts. The sectors house powerful demons that drop rare items when defeated, which allows the investigative crew to travel further into the Schwarzwelt as they search for an exit back to Earth.
During gameplay, the player must make moral decisions for the silent protagonist, which will alter his alignment towards Neutral, Chaos, or Law. Each of the other three main characters is representative of one of these alignments, respectively. By choosing which alignment the protagonist ultimately takes, the player can receive three different endings, each one pitting the protagonist against one of his comrades. By siding with Jimenez, the protagonist must face the angelic incarnation of Zelenin, who wants to place the human world under the rule of Heaven in which Mankind will be free of suffering but will pay the price by losing their free will forever. If the protagonist sides with Zelenin, he must defeat the half-demon Jimenez, who wants to free humanity by releasing demons into the human world, freeing mankind to do whatever it pleases, but leaving Earth as a primal, barbaric planet where the strong take whatever they want. By choosing the Neutral path, the protagonist must continue the original mission of destroying the Schwarzwelt, fighting both Jimenez and Zelenin along the way, to keep the human world exactly as it was.
Kazuma Kaneko, the game's producer and creative designer explained that he had set the game in Antarctica instead of Japan to appeal to audiences outside of the game's native country. Eiji Ishida, the game's chief designer commented that "In order to depict danger on a worldwide scale, we needed to select an appropriate setting...So we chose Antartica." Also, the team decided not to designate a number in the title to minimize confusion outside Japan. Strange Journey uses the same dungeon crawl game engine as the Etrian Odyssey
series, also developed by Atlus and Lancarse.
In early November, Atlus USA announced a North American release, sometime in the spring of 2010. Atlus USA revealed in December 2009 that it would be bundling a soundtrack with each launch copy of Strange Journey. The soundtrack features songs from the game written by composer Shōji Meguro
, known for his extensive work on other titles in the series. In January 2010, Atlus then revealed that an exclusive mini-poster would also be bundled with the game in the US. The poster was to be exclusive to GameStop
customers only, both in-store and online. Aram Jabbari, Manager of Public Relations and Sales at Atlus, commented that "Some of the best bonus items are the kind you can listen to, hence the soundtrack CD we're including with launch copies of the game. Still, sometimes you want a bonus item that you can feel..." Since the game's release, March 23, Atlus USA has given out exclusive demon passwords to fans to unlock otherwise inaccessible demons during gameplay.
. The game's plot have earned mixed reviews, but critics agree that Strange Journey's gameplay is above average. Strange Journey was named IGN's Nintendo DS Game of the Month in April 2010. Strange Journey sold 97,000 units in its first week, coming in third on the Japanese sales charts, behind only Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver
and Wii Fit Plus
. The game received very positive reviews from Japanese gaming magazine, Famitsu
, which awarded the game 36 of 40 (10/9/9/8), the highest score the magazine had ever given to a Shin Megami Tensei title.
Charles Onyett of IGN
called the game's plot "interesting" and "well-developed", concluding that there is a "surprising amount of personality in the game". Andrew Fitch, in his review on 1UP.com
, commented that the game's story is the "same kooky MegaTen narrative fans have come to expect", but that fans will miss the voice acting of the Persona games. A reviewer on the The A.V. Club
complained that "Much of the plot is delivered in huge text-dumps that can be a slog to get through." Lark Anderson of GameSpot
agreed, calling the plot "excessively preachy", also making note that the dungeon design was too repetitive to be interesting.
Nintendo Power
has given immense praise to the game, citing it as the game that proves that "a dungeon crawl doesn't have to be dull...in fact, there's very little it has to be at all." The editors also noted that, unlike Etrian Odyssey, the game featured in-game automapping, a positive. Anderson found that the variety of demons was the most favorable feature of the game. Andrew Fitch of 1UP
called the gameplay a combination of "classically engrossing MegaTen and Etrian Odyssey
", noting that the "same sense of exploration's still there, but there's also a meatier plot pulling you along". The critics in Famitsu praised the game's consistent balancing present throughout the game as well as commenting that while the player is having fun exploring, there is always a constant tension around. They also praised the demon combination system by saying that it was "the greatest asset the game has -- they give you better results the more you use them" as they allowed the battles to remain fresh and new. Famitsu also noted that "The tutorial is helpful, and the mission goals are clear enough that you're never really lost."
Atlus
is a Japanese computer and video game developer, publisher, and distributor based in Tokyo, Japan, best known for developing the console role-playing game franchise Megami Tensei. The first Megami Tensei was a Nintendo Entertainment System video game published by Namco based on a trilogy of...
and Lancarse for the Nintendo DS
Nintendo DS
The is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
. It is a title within the Megami Tensei
Megami Tensei
, commonly abbreviated as , is a Japanese console role-playing game metaseries which was originally based on the novel series Digital Devil Story by Aya Nishitani and has gone to become one of the major franchises of the genre in its native country...
series of video games, and was released in Japan on October 8, 2009 and in North America on March 23, 2010. It is considered to be the fourth of the main Shin Megami Tensei games.
Strange Journey features dungeon crawl
Dungeon crawl
A dungeon crawl is a type of scenario in fantasy role-playing games in which heroes navigate a labyrinthine environment, battling various monsters, and looting any treasure they may find...
, first-person
First person (video games)
In video games, first person refers to a graphical perspective rendered from the viewpoint of the player character. In many cases, this may be the viewpoint from the cockpit of a vehicle. Many different genres have made use of first-person perspectives, ranging from adventure games to flight...
environments for the player to explore. Demons, the enemies encounted by the player, can be negotiated with, a staple in the Megami Tensei series, to join the protagonist's party, aiding him in combat.
Players take on the role of an unnamed soldier assigned to a UN-mandated research team deployed to the South Pole to investigate an abnormal area in the region dubbed as the "Schwarzwelt" (German for "black world"). There, the protagonist discovers that the Schwarzwelt is full of demons, which can be persuaded to join him in battle.
Gameplay
Strange Journey is a role-playing video game with dungeon crawlDungeon crawl
A dungeon crawl is a type of scenario in fantasy role-playing games in which heroes navigate a labyrinthine environment, battling various monsters, and looting any treasure they may find...
elements. The player controls the unnamed protagonist
Protagonist
A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...
through several dungeons in a first person
First person (video games)
In video games, first person refers to a graphical perspective rendered from the viewpoint of the player character. In many cases, this may be the viewpoint from the cockpit of a vehicle. Many different genres have made use of first-person perspectives, ranging from adventure games to flight...
persepective. Battles with demons typically occur as random encounter
Random encounter
A random encounter is a feature commonly used in various role-playing games whereby encounters with non-player character enemies or other dangers occur sporadically and at random...
s and are turn-based
Turn-based strategy
A turn-based strategy game is a strategy game where players take turns when playing...
. During battles, the player can choose to attack, use items or skills, defend, or speak to one of the demons on the opposing side. When speaking to demons, the player must answer a series of questions to appeal to the demon's specific personality in order to gain the option to request items, Macca (in-game money), or for the demon to join the protagonist. The player can build a party of demons in order to aid in battle, storing extra demons in the Demon Compendium, which allows any demon the player has already owned to be summoned for a fee.
Demons
The enemies in Strange Journey are called demons, a term encompassing creatures from different real-world mythologies, including Rapa NuiRapa Nui mythology
The Rapa Nui mythology, also known as Pascuense mythology or Easter Island mythology, is the name given to the myths, legends and beliefs of the native Rapanui people of the island of Rapa Nui , located in the south eastern Pacific Ocean, almost four thousand kilometers from continental...
, Welsh
Welsh mythology
Welsh mythology, the remnants of the mythology of the pre-Christian Britons, has come down to us in much altered form in medieval Welsh manuscripts such as the Red Book of Hergest, the White Book of Rhydderch, the Book of Aneirin and the Book of Taliesin....
, Hindu
Hindu mythology
Hindu religious literature is the large body of traditional narratives related to Hinduism, notably as contained in Sanskrit literature, such as the Sanskrit epics and the Puranas. As such, it is a subset of Nepali and Indian culture...
, and Christian
Christian mythology
Christian mythology is the body of myths associated with Christianity. In the study of mythology, the term "myth" refers to a traditional story, often one which is regarded as sacred and which explains how the world and its inhabitants came to have their present form.Classicist G.S. Kirk defines a...
mythologies. Demons are either encountered during random encounters in dungeons or during boss battles related to a mission. When an undiscovered demon is first encountered through a random encounter, it will appear as an indistinguishable blue mist. After defeating a new demon for the first time, any encounters afterward will allow the player to see the demon's sprite, name, and, after several encounters, its elemental strengths and weaknesses. By defeating demons, the player's party earns experience points which allow the protagonist and demons to grow stronger, Macca to buy items, and sometimes items, which can be used to heal the party or consumed to create new items aboard the Red Sprite.
Players are allowed to build a battle party of any combination of three demons. Each demon has different skills and traits, and many can be persuaded to join the player during battle after a negotiation and paid tribute. The player can also fuse two or more demons together to create a different, often more powerful one, and some demons can only be obtained through fusion. Every demon has a unique password
Password (video games)
In many video games of the 8-bit and, to a lesser extent, 16-bit eras , after a level was beaten and/or when all continues were used, the game would display a password, that when entered in the game would allow the player to return to this part in the game...
of thirty-two characters that can be used to summon that demon from the Compendium even if the player has never encountered it. If a demon created through fusion has different skills from its normal version, a different password will be stored in the Compendium along with the original password, allowing players to store custom demons.
Plot
At the beginning of the 21st century, a sudden massive atomic collapse occurs in the South PoleSouth Pole
The South Pole, also known as the Geographic South Pole or Terrestrial South Pole, is one of the two points where the Earth's axis of rotation intersects its surface. It is the southernmost point on the surface of the Earth and lies on the opposite side of the Earth from the North Pole...
and causes a space abnormality known as the "Schwarzwelt" (シュバルツバース, Shubarutsubāsu, Schwarz-verse), which poses an imminent threat for humankind and the Earth, growing at a steady rate and consuming all matter in its path and with it war, crime and needless suffering inflicted upon the Earth. Concerned with this threat, the United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
sends a group of researchers from all over the world to investigate the area. Four teams are sent to Antarctica to investigate the phenomenon
Phenomenon
A phenomenon , plural phenomena, is any observable occurrence. Phenomena are often, but not always, understood as 'appearances' or 'experiences'...
, led by Commander Gore. Inside, the investigators quickly find themselves trapped in the Schwarzwelt and that the interior has been infested with demons seeking to take control of the human world.
The player assumes an unnamed soldier from America, or Japan, in the Japanese version, who will be working with three other crew members of the Red Sprite. , leads the crew, with , an experienced, reward-seeking American mercenary, and , a knowledgeable Russian scientist. The crew dons the Demonica suit, which enables access to abilities as well as regulating the player in the harsh conditions within the Schwarzwelt. While trapped in the Schwarzwelt, the protagonist must travel through several different sectors, each representing a social critique on humanity, ranging from battlefields, shopping malls, and red-light districts. The sectors house powerful demons that drop rare items when defeated, which allows the investigative crew to travel further into the Schwarzwelt as they search for an exit back to Earth.
During gameplay, the player must make moral decisions for the silent protagonist, which will alter his alignment towards Neutral, Chaos, or Law. Each of the other three main characters is representative of one of these alignments, respectively. By choosing which alignment the protagonist ultimately takes, the player can receive three different endings, each one pitting the protagonist against one of his comrades. By siding with Jimenez, the protagonist must face the angelic incarnation of Zelenin, who wants to place the human world under the rule of Heaven in which Mankind will be free of suffering but will pay the price by losing their free will forever. If the protagonist sides with Zelenin, he must defeat the half-demon Jimenez, who wants to free humanity by releasing demons into the human world, freeing mankind to do whatever it pleases, but leaving Earth as a primal, barbaric planet where the strong take whatever they want. By choosing the Neutral path, the protagonist must continue the original mission of destroying the Schwarzwelt, fighting both Jimenez and Zelenin along the way, to keep the human world exactly as it was.
Development
The first information on a new title in the series appeared in the form of a teaser site created on July 16, 2009 for the Japanese Atlus website, depicting Earth with a large hole in the bottom. Using the image's source code, it was deciphered the game's title was Strange Journey and confirmed it to be a Megami Tensei title. A week later, Atlus officially announced the game for the Nintendo DS, clearing up the rumor among fans of another Persona game. Scans from Famitsu revealed four new characters as well as two demons, Bugaboo and Mansemat.Kazuma Kaneko, the game's producer and creative designer explained that he had set the game in Antarctica instead of Japan to appeal to audiences outside of the game's native country. Eiji Ishida, the game's chief designer commented that "In order to depict danger on a worldwide scale, we needed to select an appropriate setting...So we chose Antartica." Also, the team decided not to designate a number in the title to minimize confusion outside Japan. Strange Journey uses the same dungeon crawl game engine as the Etrian Odyssey
Etrian Odyssey
Media Create/Famitsū reported that Etrian Odyssey had sold 119,584 copies in Japan as of July 1, 2007. Atlus' own July 2007 investors report listed US sales of the title at around 30,000 units, roughly 2 months after release....
series, also developed by Atlus and Lancarse.
In early November, Atlus USA announced a North American release, sometime in the spring of 2010. Atlus USA revealed in December 2009 that it would be bundling a soundtrack with each launch copy of Strange Journey. The soundtrack features songs from the game written by composer Shōji Meguro
Shoji Meguro
is a Japanese video game composer and director who joined Atlus in 1996 and has composed music for many of their games, mainly those in the Megami Tensei series.-Biography:...
, known for his extensive work on other titles in the series. In January 2010, Atlus then revealed that an exclusive mini-poster would also be bundled with the game in the US. The poster was to be exclusive to GameStop
GameStop
GameStop Corporation is an American video game and entertainment software retailer. The company, whose headquarters is in Grapevine, Texas, United States, operates 6,500 retail stores throughout the United States, Canada, Australia, Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, New...
customers only, both in-store and online. Aram Jabbari, Manager of Public Relations and Sales at Atlus, commented that "Some of the best bonus items are the kind you can listen to, hence the soundtrack CD we're including with launch copies of the game. Still, sometimes you want a bonus item that you can feel..." Since the game's release, March 23, Atlus USA has given out exclusive demon passwords to fans to unlock otherwise inaccessible demons during gameplay.
Bonus soundtrack CD defect
Due to a manufacturing error, the Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey Bonus Soundtrack CD packed with the game did not play properly. In an interview with Tim Pivnicny, the Vice President of Sales and Marketing at Atlus, apologized to fans on March 26, 2010 and thanked them for their support of Atlus games. "We are moving quickly with our manufacturing partner to replace defective soundtrack discs, launching a fulfillment site into which customers can input their information and receive a new soundtrack CD in 2–4 weeks", he explained. Atlus USA quickly fixed the problem by letting customers send their contact information to receive a new CD free of charge.Reception
Strange Journey received positive to fair reviews from critics, earning a generably favorable score of 83 out of 100 on MetacriticMetacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
. The game's plot have earned mixed reviews, but critics agree that Strange Journey's gameplay is above average. Strange Journey was named IGN's Nintendo DS Game of the Month in April 2010. Strange Journey sold 97,000 units in its first week, coming in third on the Japanese sales charts, behind only Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver
Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver
are enhanced remakes of the 1999 video games Pokémon Gold and Silver. The games are part of the Pokémon series of role-playing video games, and were developed by Game Freak and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS...
and Wii Fit Plus
Wii Fit Plus
is a fitness video game by Nintendo for the Wii console. The game is an enhanced version of Wii Fit and was announced at Nintendo's E3 2009 media briefing on June 2, 2009. The game was released in Japan on October 1, 2009 and in North America three days later on October 4. It was released in South...
. The game received very positive reviews from Japanese gaming magazine, Famitsu
Famitsu
is a line of Japanese video game magazines published by Enterbrain, Inc. and Tokuma. Currently, there are five Famitsū magazines: Shūkan Famitsū, Famitsū PS3 + PSP, Famitsū Xbox 360, Famitsū Wii+DS, and Famitsū Wave DVD...
, which awarded the game 36 of 40 (10/9/9/8), the highest score the magazine had ever given to a Shin Megami Tensei title.
Charles Onyett of IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
called the game's plot "interesting" and "well-developed", concluding that there is a "surprising amount of personality in the game". Andrew Fitch, in his review on 1UP.com
1UP.com
1UP.com is a video game website owned by IGN Entertainment, a division of News Corporation. Previously, the site was owned by Ziff Davis before being sold to UGO Entertainment in 2009....
, commented that the game's story is the "same kooky MegaTen narrative fans have come to expect", but that fans will miss the voice acting of the Persona games. A reviewer on the The A.V. Club
The A.V. Club
The A.V. Club is an entertainment newspaper and website published by The Onion. Its features include reviews of new films, music, television, books, games and DVDs, as well as interviews and other regular offerings examining both new and classic media and other elements of pop culture. Unlike its...
complained that "Much of the plot is delivered in huge text-dumps that can be a slog to get through." Lark Anderson of GameSpot
GameSpot
GameSpot is a video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information. The site was launched in May 1, 1996 by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. It was purchased by ZDNet, a brand which was later purchased by CNET Networks. CBS Interactive, which...
agreed, calling the plot "excessively preachy", also making note that the dungeon design was too repetitive to be interesting.
Nintendo Power
Nintendo Power
Nintendo Power magazine is a monthly news and strategy magazine formerly published in-house by Nintendo of America, but now run independently. As of issue #222 , Nintendo contracted publishing duties to Future US, the U.S. subsidiary of British publisher Future.The first issue published was...
has given immense praise to the game, citing it as the game that proves that "a dungeon crawl doesn't have to be dull...in fact, there's very little it has to be at all." The editors also noted that, unlike Etrian Odyssey, the game featured in-game automapping, a positive. Anderson found that the variety of demons was the most favorable feature of the game. Andrew Fitch of 1UP
1UP.com
1UP.com is a video game website owned by IGN Entertainment, a division of News Corporation. Previously, the site was owned by Ziff Davis before being sold to UGO Entertainment in 2009....
called the gameplay a combination of "classically engrossing MegaTen and Etrian Odyssey
Etrian Odyssey
Media Create/Famitsū reported that Etrian Odyssey had sold 119,584 copies in Japan as of July 1, 2007. Atlus' own July 2007 investors report listed US sales of the title at around 30,000 units, roughly 2 months after release....
", noting that the "same sense of exploration's still there, but there's also a meatier plot pulling you along". The critics in Famitsu praised the game's consistent balancing present throughout the game as well as commenting that while the player is having fun exploring, there is always a constant tension around. They also praised the demon combination system by saying that it was "the greatest asset the game has -- they give you better results the more you use them" as they allowed the battles to remain fresh and new. Famitsu also noted that "The tutorial is helpful, and the mission goals are clear enough that you're never really lost."