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User Rating: 8 | Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey DS
As a long time fan of the Shin Megami Tensei saga I'm always pretty happy when a new episode is released for one of my consoles. Strange Journey catches me a bit unprepared, I've heard about a new megaten game for DS, but it got out early I expected.
I got the game at once, and the first surprise was just about the gameplay. I was expecting a hybrid strategy/Rpg like the precedent, and awesome, Devil survivor; instead we got a classical Rpg old school taking from others, by now, classical games like the first Persona or Nocturne (Lucifer Call in Europe). Actually, Strange Journey is a solid back to a gameplay old, but not necessary unengaging, though the fans the saga got with the last games (Persona 3&4, Devil survivor) could find it unbearable.

Indeed this game oozes old style fashion from every bit. Starting from the plot, beginning with great Science Fiction premises ending later with the usual mysticism typical of the saga where dozens of mythologies, religions and theories meet themselves.
Old style even the illustrations of characters and locations, but the real back to home is the gameplay, a pure rpg model recalling the beginning of the saga.
Normal exploration is faced in first person with the classical square's movement (just like the Etrian Odyssey saga games) with random encounter (anticipated by a sensor changing color during walk) and tons of fights with demons.
Luckily this game don't inherit the merciless difficulty level of similar old games, though being however pretty challenging. Main difficulties are not related to the battles, but to the environments explorations. Dungeons are huuuuge, and full of traps, mobile platforms and similarities. Moreover during your pilgrimages you will find often lost (though an effective automap on the lower screen) without any apparent way out needing to discover some hidden door forcing you to examine every wall around you. Adding a couple of puzzles hard to digest and we got a situation where the impatience player could choose to give up.

Battle system is pretty similar to the other Shin Megami Tensei games including Devil Survivor. Your character and up to three demons against enemies in a classical turn battle. Once again the enemies are represented in bitmap with a fixed background. Differently from the motionless monsters of Devil Survivor the demons in Strange Journey got some basilar animations.
Another difference with games like Digital Devil saga, Nocturne and Devil survivor is the disappearance of the extra turn system for another way to deal extra damage.
Previous games battles worked giving you extra action turns if you managed to hit enemies weakness, cutting at the same time their actions. This allowed you to fight practically without risk if your attacks matched enemies weakness, but was a double bladed weapon cause the opponents too could use at their advantage. In the end every time you changed locations there was the risk of encounter new enemies with abilities matched to your party's weakness able to wipe it out in a blink of time.
In strange journey we find a new system based on moral alignment. Your main character as well as the demons, enemies or allied, can have three dispositions: lawful, neutral and chaotic; if one member of your party hits an enemy in a weak spot, immediately each other party member with the same alignment will strike for extra damage. On the other side if one of your weakness is spotted you'll suffer the normal extra damage but no more bonus attack from enemies.
Thanks this the battles are really more easy than games like Nocturne without the risk to find behind a corner an impossible normal enemy. Bosses too are surely more friendly than the past, though some of them could require the usual amount of grinding and demons partners matched to the situations.
Directly from the past is the talk demon system.
Your main character can choose at the beginning of a round to talk with one of the enemies; demons will make you some questions and if you are able to satisfy their attitude you got another choice between asking the demon money or items or else invite him in your party.
Together with the demon fusion system this will be the only way to enroll new demons for your troop; that's right, here we have not any auctions like in Devil Survivor. Just like the megaten saga used us the demons gain experience and improve their features, but sooner or later they tend to became too weak for advanced environments, so is fundamental find new allies of fuse superior beings. The only limit to recruitment (and fusion) is that the demon can't exceed the experience level of the main character.
Though the number of available demons is surely higher than Devil Survivor, the customization system of their skill is in Strange Journey very less ductile than last megaten games.
When you find a new demon you will have no info on him. Several fighting and talking with him will raise a analyze meter revealing more and more info (HP, MP, weakness, skill, etc.). Same for the demons under your command, the analyze meter will increase using them in battle. Once a demons is fully analyzed at the following level up he will gift you with a shard of his power, a crystal containing some skill you could use during a fusion to give the resulting demon new abilities. This gameplay's choice encourages the farming of every demons you'll find 'cause some of the most powerful monsters come to life with poor skills unmatched to their basic features. A demon fused using a powerful crystal will be surely stronger than the normal version you could find during exploration.
Clearly this system increase even the life time of the title, though the game is already pretty long for a portable rpg.

The gameplay is surely a bit repetitive, with the locations that must be re-visited each time you gain the possibility to open a door firmly closed until the last inspections; however the game is long-lived and full of secret areas and things to do. A bit of grinding is required to use the most powerful demons the title offers but, with a fair farming, Strange Journey will take at least 60 hours of your life, with the possibility to replay in order to get new demons and find alternative endings.

Final Line
Strange Journey is a clear tribute to old school Rpg, but also a solid game that will entertain a lot people wanting to talk out its features. People grown playing old Shin Megami Tensei games or other classical Rpg will not find any problem with it resulting this last game surely less difficult and merciless than its precursors.
In the end I can recommend this game to anyone want compare with a game deliberately programmed similarly to some classic of the past.
If you are not much patient players, if you played the Shin Megami Tensei from Persona 3 to Devil Survivor, or if you consider the words "old school" like obscene languageā€¦ you'd better stay away from a Journey risking to became really indigestible.

Final Score: 8