Compelling in a completely different way, Nocturne will pull you in whether you want to or not.
The storyline of most of the RPGs are fairly simple: save the world. Nocturne completely crushes that concept and instead asks: the world is destroyed already. What will you do now?
You read right, the world as we know it in the game, modern day Tokyo as the case is, is completely blown to pieces within the first 20 minutes of the game. So much as for "save the world" lol. After the world is destroyed in the Conception, our hero (sort of) wakes up to an even that completely changed him. And I don't meant figuratively. He gets changed from a human into a demon by ingesting the Megatama, demon insects. Ew. From this point on, you the player is the hero, who is really sort of an anti-hero considering he's a demon bent on reshaping the world in his (your) own ideal...
Any case, battles are both simple and complex. It's turn based, with icons to indicate turns for both you and your enemy. However, having 8 or 9 elements in the game, and both your enemies and allies having strengths and weaknesses to these huge number of elements, it can be pretty difficult to memorize the weaknesses of all the enemies you come to face throughout the game. And there are a LOT of enemies. Because did I forget to mention that your enemies can also be your friends?
Believe it or not, you start the game alone, but you must talk to the demons you fight against, and convince them to join you and become your comrade. This is done during battle, you choose the Talk command and after a sequence of events, if you're successful, the demon you talked to will be in your party list after the battle is over. When that is done, you can pull the demon into your active party, and next time you fight, you have a new allie by your side to deal damage for you. Neat? Very. This demon-luring system is incredibly addicting, fun, unique (to the series), and ultra ultra cool. After gaining demons, you can also fuse them at the Cathedral to form more powerful demons. And there are a LOT of demons. Also every single demon int he game is based on some mythological creature, and hte designs for all these enemies are incredibly detailed and beautiful. The demons in the game is probably one of hte best part to the game.
That brings me to the graphics. A lot of the areas are very monotonous, in all actuality. The walls are usually very boring looking and the rooms are very bland and similar to each other. Usually a room in the dugeon would have a few pieces of ruin in one corner, and the highlight of hte room would be the single treasure chest in the middle of the room. The emptiness, however, doesn't detract from the game, oddly enough. There are not a lot of NPCs for you to talk to, mostly since this post apocalyptic Tokyo where no human survived. In other words, beside the main characters to the story, there are no other humans. So there are no "towns" and you get attacked in "towns' as well, and the NPCs you talk to are often spirits or other demons. There are no real safe place, because the world is destroyed and inhabited by demons afterall. So basically, the entire FEEL of the game is different than anything I've played before.
while the world itself isn't anyting special, the character designs are gorgeous. The characters themselves are gothic looking, and each are unique in some way. The design lends to the creepy atmostphere of hte game. The demons designs are the real gem; each are different, no same model with two different colors here.
The music in the game also fit, although nothing exceptionally special. However, they work incredibly well to match with the theme of the story. The battle themes are fast paced and fun to listen to. Dungeon music are often somewhat creepy and slower. The overworld theme is upbeat, yet not upbeat, reflecting the sundrenched sand that covers the post apocalyptic Tokyo that's both bright, yet depressing at the same time. Overall the music is great, although listening to it outside of the game doesn't work as well as for other game soundtracks (such as the music from Xenosaga, for example).
Without a doubt, this game is a one of a kind gem, and completely underappreciated since it's not a "mainstream" game like the FF series. More than anything, Nocturne is DIFFERENT than the other games in more ways than one, and all these differences come together to form a coherent whole that is better than almost anything I've played.
But beware, the game is HARD. I've spent more than 80 hours on this game, and in a lot of ways, I'm still not finished. Strategy in battle is a must; use brute force and you'll be dead within seconds. But even with whatever little fault the game has, it is worth every single minute of my time. For serious gamers who don't mind spending a lot of time, and fighting difficult battles, SMT Nocturne is for you. But if you're only a light gamer, then don't play it. You'll find yourself frustrated easily with how difficult it is.