Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga (PSN) Review

A dystopian adventure that's packed with mystery.

 Following the success of the 2003 hit, Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, developer Atlus continued its RPG offerings on the PlayStaion 2 with Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga in 2004. A futuristic and dystopian tale centring on the adventure of a tribe of survivors as they must fight their way to reach a peaceful paradise. The game features a more cinematic feel this time around, with the story and characters being the core aspects of the game. Digital Devil Saga is the first part of the overall experience, as it received a sequel months after its release. So how does it fare in terms of story and the renowned gameplay of the SMT series? Let's find out. Also, since the game is pretty old, I couldn't find any good resolution pics, so it's mainly text for this review!


 In a desolate land known as the "Junkyard", six human tribes are fighting for dominance. We follow Serph and his tribe Embryon as they survive to become the top tribe and reach "Nirvana", which is said to be paradise and a way out of the Junkyard. That's not all as the group must uncover the mystery behind the appearance of a black-haired girl Sera and their newfound demonic powers. Who is Sera and why is she the source of the conflict? Things get mostly explained since Digital Devil Saga ends on a cliff-hanger ending and continues the narrative in its sequel. So as a standalone game, the story is far from being a complete one.

 Still, it was engaging as the overall sense of ambiguity regarding the premise hooks you into finding out more about the cast and some of the light-hearted moments with neat as well. The cast fall into your standard archetypes and were likable despite not knowing much about them. As for the antagonists which are mainly the leaders of the other tribes, they were ok. Not the most fleshed out bunch but were generally meh overall.


 While the limited scope of the story may sound disappointing, Digital Devil Saga's gameplay is nothing but that. You control up to three party members as you battle enemies in turn-based fashion and gain experience to level up-- pretty standard stuff. DDS changes the series mechanic a bit by eliminating the need to recruit demons to join your party to actually transforming into demons in battles. Each character has their own unique appearances and abilities to set them apart. For example, Serph is strong against ice attacks but is vulnerable to fire attacks. 

 DDS also introduces the series' "Press Turn" system. In short, if you exploit an enemy's weakness like attacking an enemy weak to fire with a fire attack, then you'll receive a extra turn to attack. Conversely, if you miss or attack an enemy that drains a fire attack, then you'll lose your turns and the enemy gets the advantage. Seeing that DDS is an above average game in terms of difficulty, abusing the press turn system can mean an easy win or a quick "Game Over" screen if you're not paying attention, especially when dealing with late-game bosses.

 As you level up, you'll notice that only your stats are increased and won't learn any new skills. This is where the game's Mantra system comes in. Basically, Mantras are a bundle of skills that you can assign to a character using in-game money. These include physical attacks, status ailments, elemental boosts, and stats increases. All of the characters can master any Mantra, meaning that there's a huge room in freely customizing your party. Obviously, as you unlock more powerful mantras the price will increase and you'll even need to fully level it up before using its skills, so it can take a while to get all the skills you're looking for. On the bright side, levelling up in the game is very fast so it shouldn't feel much of a chore.

 A good portion of the game is spent inside dungeons battling enemies, solving puzzles, and beating tough bosses. Each dungeons has its own gimmick, from trap floors and light puzzles to keep you interested. You can save, teleport, and restore your health inside dungeons using Karma Terminals, which makes navigating them mostly smooth sailing. The map feature is especially handy here as the dungeon layouts can get confusing at times. I'll be honest here and just say that I didn't enjoy exploring the dungeons as much as I thought. With the exception of the giant cruise ship and the waterways, the rest of the dungeons felt boring and often dragged for way too long. Worse yet is the game's unnaturally high enemy encounters, as you'll just take a few steps then bam another battle pops out of nowhere-- even though you've just finished one seconds ago. I try to tolerate random encounters in RPGs, but DDS takes it up a notch with how annoying they can be.

 In terms of extra content, DDS has its share of light side quests that take the form of secret dungeons to explore that are filled with high-level enemies and truly some of the game's hardest boss fights, including one with the protagonist from SMT: Nocturne. If you beat some of the game's extra content, then you'll receive special items that you can use in Digital Devil Saga 2 once you transfer your save, which I found interesting. Overall, the game took me around 30 hours to beat with me doing most of the side quests.


 Digital Devil Saga holds up fairly well for a mid-life PS2 game. While it shows its age, an HD remaster is all it needs to look like a brand new game. DDS features the doll-like character designs of Atlus artist Kazuma Kaneko and while they may look weird at first, they're pretty unique. Each of the main cast stand out and the various demon designs you'll encounter throughout the adventure keeps things from being stale. There's a decent amount of cutscenes that were also engaging and kept me glued to my seat too. 

 The voice acting was surprisingly good, with none of the performances feeling out of place. However, there were a few lip-syncing and sound issues that disrupted the flow of the cut-scenes. The soundtrack comes to us courtesy of series composer Shoji Meguro and it packs some great rock-based tracks that compliment the moody atmosphere of the game. Tracks such as the opening theme, battle theme and waterways theme were some of my favorites.


 Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga was still a good game. Although it's definitely lacking in terms of story, the gameplay was a lot of fun thanks to the challenge and level of customizability. The presentation was also solid, with the art-style and soundtrack being standouts. All in all, fans of the SMT series would have already played the game. If you're a newcomer to the series, then there's fun to be had in Digital Devil Saga.