But after finishing Persona 5 and falling in l’amour with it at the rip age of 20, I a dit to myself, “That was great, but no other Persona games that are accessible to me. Eternal Punishment and Revelations Persona are too pricey for me, I don’t have a PSP for Persona 1 ou Innocent Sin, and I would rather fucking kill myself than play Persona Q. What’s a man to do?” Well, what that man do is take back the PS2 and go onto amazone, amazon and check out the mainline series, Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne to be exact. I was sitting myself down ready for another happy adventure through animé land and ready to make some friends… What I got instead of fucking decimated par the Fiends, get Lost in dungeons for hours, experience insta kills, and realize my “friends” are assholes. But despite that, I also what I got was one of the best RPGs of my generation and probably of all time. And yes, despite this being an analysis, that titre holds truth. This is a better experience than Persona 5, in almost every way. So let’s stop talking around it and get to talking about it.
1: Genesis, ou The Beauty of the Intro
From the first moment I start the game, I am hooked. I am on board almost immediately. toi are donné the option of what to name the characters in the story… All four of them, of course. We can’t have toi throwing out too many names. This isn’t Final fantaisie VII. toi are told of the world ending, and all toi can think of, being a protagonist in an RPG, “Well shit, let’s get our gang together and stop it”. toi head to the hospital to meet your teacher, Yuko Takao, and there, toi run into your other friends, the level headed girl Chiaki and Isamu, a troubling child who totally ripped off my clothing style. But on the way, toi run into a reporter named Hijiri, who has an article on the hospital and how it is run par a mysterious cult. And being a mature horror enthusiast, I laughed. A cult? Really? Come on, how generic…. I was very wrong, but we’ll get there later. Once at the hospital, toi realize that it is completely empty. No staff to be found, and Takao isn’t anywhere. As toi explore the lower depths of the hospital, toi find bloody beds and empty halls. Oh, also a giant pentagram in one room surrounded par candles and curtains. Pay no attention to that. And in one of these rooms, we find a man named Hikawa, a supposed member of the cult suivant to a strange drum with symbols. Giving toi no time, he attempts to kill toi with some sort of monster shrouded in black. What is it, toi have no idea. Your choices are to either run ou to fight. Regardless, Ms. Takao will come and tell Hikawa to stop and leave toi alone. After convincing him par refusing to take part in an event, she asks toi to meet her on the roof. And here, after all the exploring… One of the best scenes happen. Scenes these good should be saved for at least halfway through the game, but Nocturne shows it in the first twenty ou so minutes. On the roof, Takao tells toi that the world will end, and nothing will stop it, but she has faith toi will survive. She tells toi to look for her, as the musique slowly builds up from this soft piano to this orchestral of violins in the background. And then, the Conception happens, the end of the world. All life on earth is wiped out in secondes as the world is turned inside out. A giant ball of light floats in the center of the earth and toi are assumed the last one left alive. But not all hope is lost. A young boy with blonde hair and an elderly woman clothed in black give toi aid, and with that, they insert a Magatama into your eye, a bug like creature that eats into your brain, turning toi into The Demi-Fiend, a demon that can survive the world. And from there, toi begin your journey. All human life is lost, toi are all alone, and now demons walk the earth. toi have nothing to go on except to leave the hospital and explore what was once your accueil city, while fighting the hostile demons that roam the earth now. This intro is amazing, bringing a sense of familiarity to toi before it throws toi into the end of the world. Chrono Trigger had the end of the world as a bad ending, but could be avoided. Final fantaisie VI did so half way through. But Nocturne wastes no time and with the music, the talk with Takao, and seeing the world change all around you, it’s one of the best scenes in video games….. And we’re just getting started!
2. Gospel, The musique of Nocturne
I am convinced that lead composer of Atlus, Shoji Meguro can do any style of music. From the lively hip hop beats of Persona 3, the joyous pop and rock of Persona 4, the smooth funky basse, bass that is in Persona 5, the soft jazz style of Catherine and the l’espace opera orchestral score of Strange Journey, and the hard rock that we hear in Nocturne is no exception. The world of Nocturne is strange and threatening. It is a world where death is around every corner, where everyone either wants toi dead ou wants nothing to do with you. And if there is anything that sets this in, it is the atmosphere. Atmosphere is, of course, a blend of visuals and musique and tone, but they are all so perfect that I want to talk about each one individually. The musique has a tone of mystery when toi are exploring, yet some familiarity. You’re exploring the ruins of real world locations in Japan, Shibuya, Ginza, Ikebukuro, all places that exist in Japan. toi (Or a Japanese player) can go to these places right now, yet toi don’t gotta worry about seeing a giant starfish with one eye ou an ironclad demon riding a horse in a shopping mall. The musique sounds familiar, but with that strange synthesizer and electronica in the background mixed with the faint guitare sounds gives it a strange vibe to it. Speaking of strange, the battle music. They are all real bangers to listen to, until toi get to the vocals, and then it sounds truly threatening. Some people say that it is the chiens of hell shouting at toi in anger, but really, it’s just the computers text to speech program that is lire it. toi remember using a laptop in school and toi had that one voice, the “Frog in my throat” one? People think it’s that. It’s not an uncommon practice. Suda51 of sauterelle uses a text to speech format from PlainTalk in his games all the time, like The Silver Case and No plus Heroes. Apparently the voices in the songs are referencings scriptures from the bible, which… yeah, I believe it. I don’t know if it’s true and I can’t understand it at all, but I believe it.
3. Psalms, The Art of the Conception
(At this point, you’re wondering why I’m referencing parts of the bible. But if toi are, then toi probably don’t play Persona ou SMT for those reasons).
Let’s discuss another man of brilliance that works at Atlus, Kazuma Kaneko, the lead artist for Nocturne. Having been doing this work as well as freelance art for Konami and Capcom, toi may know him as the artist for the robot designs of Zone of the Enders and for the Devil Trigger forms of Dante and Vergil in Devil May Cry 3. But everything else in SMT, every character, every world, every single one of the hundreds of demons toi can recruit, drawn all par him. And yes, his artwork does look a lot different in Nocturne than in the Persona games, because he didn’t draw art for those games. Persona, at least the mainstream ones, being 3, 4 and 5, were all drawn par Shigenori Soejima. And I am not going to compare the two, because they both have styles that work for their respective games. Soejima’s art is just as good, but it would not work in the dark world of Nocturne, so it fits with Persona. Same with Kaneko. SMT would never work in Persona. Got knows they tried to give SMT a lighter artstyle, which resulted in Tokyo Mirage Sessions and the less a dit about that travisty, the better
Anyway, Kaneko has a very distinct art style. toi could look at it from a surface level and go, “Hey, animé kids with animé features. That’s at least good for the merits it’s going for”. But no, there’s a lot plus to his art, and not just in the human designs. It’s the way he draws characters in their proportions, how these otherworldly beings have such strange designs. The detail he puts into their uniforms, into each and every character having a different look. No character can even remotely be considered alike because of their distinct features in facial features, hair, clothing, it all blends well. One thing that is a sort of trait to Kaneko’s art is the black shaded upper lip all of his human characters have. Now, why he does this is… uncertain, yet it just somehow works. It’s not distracting ou ugly, it’s actually quite stylish. Hey, if Hirohiko Araki can slap lipstick on all his male characters and have people say Part 7 should be in a museum, then I can say these black lips are fine and dandy.
4: Exodus, Exploring the World of Tokyo
How can a studio take the basic concept of a post apocalypse and make it plus unique. I like post apocalyptic settings, don’t get me wrong. Mad Max: Fury Road is one of my favori films ever. I think Fist of the North étoile, star is incredible. And Fallout: New Vegas is in my haut, retour au début 15 games ever. But most post apocalyptic settings are either deserts ou a bunch of plants growing around. But Nocturne, being the cheeky little unique boy it is, does something unique with it. Aside from an assortment of demons that roam around the world ready to throw your cul, ass to debuff hell and back, the world itself is designed amazingly. I a dit before that the world of Nocturne was turned inside out, and toi may ou may not be thinking about it correctly. Basically, there is no longer a sky. If toi were to look up, right where toi are standing, assuming toi are in America, if toi look up into the sky, toi can see probably China off in the distance. The entire earth revolves around a giant glowing ball known as the Kagatsuchi, an entity that is just out of reach, but if someone were to reach it, a human to be exact, they could create a new world in their image. Just thinking about the design of the earth is so cool. Apparently the artists, Kaneko and Soejima wanted to let toi see buildings off in the distance and whole other areas, even ones toi could go to, but due to the limitations of the PS2, they had to scale back. I hope that whenever SMT V comes out, they can fix that. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha……… Anyway, we got it all, gang. We got the music, we got the art, and we got the world. This bad boy has got it all in the ragoût to make ourselves a zesty atmosphere soup. But we can’t talk about atmosphere forever… I mean… I can… I want to. But this article isn’t even halfway through. All these amazing design choices and we haven’t even gotten to talking about the gameplay yet (Huh, maybe that Clerks article would have been shorter than this)
5: Proverbs, JRPG Battles CAN be Fun
Now I hear a lot of people, usually fools who play shooters ou Fortnite ou some garbage game, that RPGs are dull and boring because toi have to wait your turn to attack. I just think that these people must’ve never had to wait their turn in their life. Clearly these motherfuckers never played a real board game in their youth like Candy Land. Well that’s what JRPGs are. A fun board game about strategy and planning. So in short, yes, I just a dit Nocturne is Candy Land… With Satan! But seriously, it’s plus complex than that. The game has this annoyingly fast encounter rate. toi can walk three steps, and that is enough time to send demons at you. Thankfully, the battle system is fun so toi don’t have to hold triangle down and wait for it to be over like other JRPGs. In Nocturne, the game is a lot plus about planning because enemies have weaknesses and resistances. toi have a set of physical attacks along with magic, buffs to your party, debuffs to the enemy, healing, and toi (But only Demi-Fiend) can use items. If an enemy is resilient, it will do less damage, while Null has no damage, reflect sends the attack back to the attacker, and drain heals the enemy. If toi hit their weaknesses, toi will get an extra turn. That means toi can abuse this system to get way plus damage in on your foes, but only once per turn, so it will stop. But be warned, as your enemies can do the same. If they hit a weakness on any of your three party members, they get an extra turn. And they all have the same moves toi can get. Including insta kill moves, so if Demi-Fiend gets hit with those, it’s back to the start. Yeah, this is one of those JRPGs where if the lead party member dies, it’s game over. No matter how much healing items toi have, no matter if your party members are still standing, game over. But that is where the Magatama come in. There are twenty four in all, with a secret twenty fifth one toi can collect. What these do is they can change your stats, completely nullifying one attack while possibly making toi weak to another, as well as changing your stats, like giving toi plus health ou strength. It can change the tide of battle with ease. An enemy that is getting turn after turn on toi can waste all their turns and leave toi wiping the floor with them. It’s great and using the Magatama when possible will make fighting super bosses like (SPOILER) and (SPOILER) and my personal favori (SPOILER) less of a headache. Also there’s something with the Kagatsuchi, cause it changes phases like the moon. Sometimes you’ll get plus encounters, and other times toi can recruit new demons. It’s kind of unreliable and mostly a neat gimmick for like… two boss fights. Oh, and speaking of recruitment.
6: Numbers, The Mechanics of Recruitment and Fusions
I swear to toi all, Nocturne isn’t like those other JRPGs. It isn’t going to hold your hand like Tales ou bore toi with simplicity like Secret of Mana ou give toi absolute trash like Tokyo Mirage Sessions (DID I MENTION I DON’T LIKE TOKYO MIRAGE SESSIONS). Even other SMT games gave toi party members. DDS gave toi party members and I can barely remember them. Persona was fucking full of them. And yet, Nocturne has no party members. I know that telling an SMT fan that Nocturne is like Pokemon will flat out piss them off… So I’m gonna do it. Nocturne is like Pokemon… kinda. Let me explain. In SMT, toi don’t get regular party members. toi gotta go out and collect them par finding them out in the world and getting into aléatoire battles. There, toi can talk to them and ask them to join. Depending on your level, on how they communicate, they will ask for a bribe of either money, items, take some of your health, ou ask toi questions. And this is both amazing and annoying. Amazing because I l’amour the idea of just talking enemies from the battlefield to rejoindre you, but the problem comes with aside from probably not finding the demon toi want on the first battle and either beating them up ou running away several times, when toi do, there is no chance that they won’t just take your items and then fuck off into the night. It’s a 50/50 chance they’ll rejoindre you. But don’t worry, because that’s where the Cathedral of Shadows comes in to make it less of a pain. In the Cathedral of Shadows, toi can fuse demons together to get a brand new demon. It’s like a fucked up science experiment, how toi get them depends on what demons toi have, what level toi are, and also if toi sacrifice other demons. It’s actually kind of insane the level of depth this thing has. And toi can fuse all sorts of demons, from anges to devil lords to (SPOILER), it’s pretty great. Also, on a Full Kagatsuchi, toi can sacrifice, yes, kill, another demon in your party to give the demon plus experience to level up faster ou to get a new demon completely. It’s really the only way to get a powerful Angel onto your team. So yeah, Cathedral of Shadows. Pretty cool place to go. So yeah, battles are really cool and I l’amour the demon fusing and recruitment. Level design and enemy encounters can get pretty obnoxious, but the world is cool and I like the story and Pixie is just a cutie. That’s my IGN review. Better than God Hand/10. But this is NikPiks. This isn’t a video game review series, this is an analysis on the deeper meaning of things because I’m a hipster. So let’s talk about something else. Let’s talk about Lucifer!
7: Apocalypse, The Bonds with Lucifer
salut look, toi can forge a bond with someone. That someone just happened to be Lucifer, devier of God and The Prince of the Underworld. Now common confusion in the SMT fandom is why Lucifer is this… child… old man… giant superboss… when there is clearly Satan and Beelzebub in the same game. Well thank translations from the bible, ou rather, stuff Lost in translation. Basically a bunch of stuff surrounding how Lucifer is not really an entity of evil but plus of a demon that lures people away from god, seen as horrible in religion, but has now become far plus romanticized in modern jour due to atheism on the rise and is now plus of an icone against a cruel god in the eyes of some. Whether that is true ou not…. I don’t fucking know, I just wanna talk about a game. Anyway, Lucifer. I’d say it’s a spoiler, but we all know who it is. All Lucifer does is give toi the Magatama to make toi a demon. That’s it. What toi choose to do from there is all up to you. Bring Reason to light, restore the world to normal, ou throw that all out and destroy everything, just know that Lucifer is always watching. Of course, toi could do as he says and rejoindre him. It isn’t too hard, all toi gotta do is beat every single superboss in the game. But doing so gives toi so much plus content, so much plus lore, so much good stuff, and possibly my favori ending in the game… But we’ll get to that later. For now, just know, Lucifer is not your ally unless toi want him to be, but he won’t be your enemy. But he is a spectator, and he doesn’t want toi to bore him.
8: Covenant, The Demons and Characters In The World
But is it all bad? Is the world of Nocturne really a barren hellhole where everyone wants Demi-Fiend dead? Well…. Not super really. Sure some of the demons want to slaughter you, but they want to slaughter everyone. Nothing personal. But seriously, there are other demons that do other things. Some of them don’t believe in killing for the sake of proving their strength. Some are just content with wandering the world, doing their own thing, living in peace. Some of them are no different than people in personality, hanging out with other demons as comrades, being flirty, crass, sad, witty, all sorts of emotions that they have. Some demons want to fight their way to the haut, retour au début of the Tower of Kagatsuchi, and others just want to sit at a bar and drink their problems away. Some demons are content with slaughtering as many as they can to prove their strength, and others just want to stay in a boutique and make a profit. There are other humanoids in the game known as the Manikins, mud poupées that represent humans but are made from mud and twitch violently. But aside from that, they are peaceful. Some demons hate their peace and want to torture them for fun, but other demons live with them, perfectly content with coexisting. And the Manikins are the only ones that won’t attack Demi-Fiend (Well except those ones toi meet in aléatoire battles, and Sakahagi, but fuck ‘em). Their leader, Futomimi, wishes for a Reason, which we will discuss in detail later. He wants a world where everyone can rely on each other and live in peace. An idea that is laughed at in the world ruled par demons, but a nice one to have. Yes, and I am aware that Dante from the Devil May Cry series is in it. Get your memes out of the way now. He’s really cool, his chase is intense, and has the best physical attacks in the game. He’s cool, I guess. But of course, there are the humans toi meet as well. And honestly, they are plus ruthless than even the demons. And let us discuss those humans. Right now.
9: Acts, Comparing Reasons to Law and Chaos
In the days of older SMT, there were three alignments. Law, Chaos, and Neutral. Law gave everyone peace and paradise at the cost of individuality and were to be one person. Chaos gave everyone true freedom at the cost of a world where chaos reigns. And neutral was to just keep a perfect balance of both in human society. Everyone chose Neutral because it made the most sense and it was the one with the most content. But in Nocturne, they dropped Law and Chaos in place of just Reasons. With this, it was much harder to pick which route to go with. toi couldn’t say one person was plus evil ou just than the other because they all had their merits in a way, yet how they achieved those goals were pretty terrible. And this is where the article goes into spoiler territory so…
(MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR SHIN MEGAMI TENSEI III: NOCTURNE FROM HERE ON OUT! CLOSE THE article IF toi WANT TO PLAY THE GAME YOURSELF!)
The three characters toi met before all have their own reasons and desires to recreate the world in their image, but only three of them go through and gain a Reason. Chiaki goes par the Reason of Yosuga, a world where only the strong willed will survive to obtain what they want, a world where those who lack drive will perish and only those that aim for what they want can live. Isamu wishes for a Reason of Musubi, a world of isolation where toi are at the center of your own world, where toi are in your own paradise at the cost of being the only true thing there. Hikawa follows the Reason of Shijima, where everyone lives in peace and cares for the earth that they walk of at the cost of individuality, and thus, they become one. But to obtain these Reasons, they all do horrible actions. Chiaki, once she calls her good, Baal Avatar, kills all of the Manikins to obtain their power to summon her god. Isamu steals the plans Hijiri had in mind, along with killing Hijiri to summon his god Noah. And Hikawa… yeah, obviously, destroyed the earth. Takao also wanted to create the world, using her god to create a world where everyone was happy, but was nothing but a maiden to help Hikawa and her god didn’t do anything but give her hope, as that was all she could do. Hijiri also had intentions of recreating the world, but what that was is unknown as he’s kinda dead. Whether he was going to use Demi-Fiend as a sacrifice ou not is unknown, but hey, everyone else is crazy, why not Hijiri. And these all come together in the final act of the game, the climb to Kagatsuchi, and the creation of a new world.
10: Judges, The Endings
This is where all the choices matter. Any moment in the game, toi could change your reason completely with NPCs toi talk to just because of something toi said. And I want to talk about my favori endings, and that’s three of the six. Demon, Freedom, and True Demon. Masubi, Yosuga and Shijima aren’t anything special. toi get to create a new world while getting a farewell from your friends. Chiaki thanks toi and disappears. Isamu pretty much says thanks and disappears. And Hikawa, the fucker that tried to kill you, is the only one toi get physically in an ending. Sure, the other two were no winners but still. But let’s talk about the other endings. Throughout the game, toi are told that toi have immense strength, and that not using that strength would be a waste. And toi can’t have that kind of strength without a responsibility. My uncle told me that himself before he got shot- Wait, no, that was Spider-Man. Anyway, toi can’t go through the game being indecisive and scared of the world. toi gotta make a choice. Because not making a choice at all is worse than making the wrong choice, because really, what is the wrong choice? What is the right choice? If toi go through the game without making a decision, without changing for the better, than the world will fuck you, and the game will fuck toi with a fucked ending. Kagatschi tells toi to fuck off and peaces out, and then Lucifer says that you’re pretty strong, but the world’s fucked and he ain’t helping, and then he leaves too. With that, toi get a shot of Demi-Fiend looking over the world, no humans, no demons, just a dark world, completely alone. No final boss, no new world to montrer for it. Video game over. Fuck you. Love, Atlus. It’s a brutal way to psych toi out for not making a choice and it makes it hurt that much more. And also makes toi want to try again. So let’s be decisive this time, but instead, choose not to want this strength of a demon. Let’s throw it all away and be human again, and fight for a world toi know. That is the Freedom Ending, the worst ending for the characters in my eyes, but still a good ending to discuss. This is because, yes, toi are back in a world toi know, and toi are back with your friends, even if they tried to kill you, but now toi know that there is a world that can end, and shit, the world is going to end again some day. Maybe later rather than sooner, but it will end, and toi may not be there to survive when it happens again. This isn’t Persona. toi don’t get to shoot God in the face and pat yourself on the back for saving Christmas. All toi did was delay the inevitable, and that’s AT LEAST. But let’s say toi use that strength, and that power, and want to stop the cycle of death and rebirth. Your world is fucked, and toi can’t fix it, but you’re told there are millions of worlds that go through death and rebirth. What if toi can stop that. True Demon ending, baby. After fighting all the Fiends, all the bosses and punching Kagatsuchi in the face, toi are left with a dark world, ruined forever, no chance of reviving itself. And then out pops old Lucifer, congratulating toi on a job well done, and gives toi an offer. toi did such a good job killing pretty much the moon and throwing your world into eternal darkness that he wants to hire you, but only after toi prove yourself. This starts the true final boss of the game, Lucifer, the most deadly boss in the game, a boss that has the highest HP in the game, insane stats and immunities, and can almost one shot your party if toi aren’t careful. But if toi prevail and defeat him, he will bring toi into his ranks as the general of the army of hell, and with that, toi take your new demon army and march your way to the gates of Heaven to end the cycle of death and rebirth once and for all. Fucking metal. Aside from plus content, this ending makes the True Demon route so much plus satisfying. And it fits with the tone and the gameplay of Nocturne perfectly in my eyes. It’s brutal, it’s a long hard road, and you’ll die many times, but toi will prevail, with demons par your side and strength to slay even gods. Oh, and also, I beat Lucifer on my first try. Suck it! Nocturne has the perfect atmosphere, the perfect gameplay, and the perfect use of characters. There’s a reason why I am excited for SMT V…. And a reason why Persona 5 is not the perfect game
11: Revelations, The Part Where I chienne About Persona 5 Not Being Shin Megami Tensei
Now comes the part that I advertised in the titre of this fucking article. The part where everyone disregards how great Nocturne is and tells me how I am a hipster bigot because I don’t like Persona 5. And I l’amour Persona 5. I think that it is one of the best JRPGs in years. After Final fantaisie 15 XV was disappointing and after Tokyo Mirage Sessions made me want to kill myself, playing Persona 5 was a breath of fresh air and I loved it. But my problem comes from the characters, tone shifts and how it comes so close to being a l’amour letter to SMT, especially Nocturne but just misses. The characters of Persona 5 don’t feel that fleshed out. And again, this is coming from someone who loves Persona 5, including the cast. But this article could’ve been all about Persona 4 and I would’ve had the same problems. The cast are great, but we only really learn about their entire character in certain parts and that’s it. We learn about Ann’s relationship with her friend and Ryuji’s anger towards Kamoshida early in the chapter, and not much else from there. Their S. liens are where it becomes really disappointing. You’d think we’d learn about them from there, but instead, we learn about these new characters. Want to help Ann better herself in her job and how it supports ou affects her personally? Nope, let’s talk about her rivalry with some aléatoire bitch. Wanna work out with your bro Ryuji? No, let’s talk about his relationship with the sports club. No, Makoto, I don’t want to pretend to be your boyfriend to help some aléatoire girl who doesn’t even have a fucking character portrait. And poor, poor Haru gets no intro other than dad’s a dick, fiancees a dick, I have a Persona now. The characters just didn’t feel like friends. They felt plus like teammates. I had plus of a bond with my Jack Frost in SMT Nocturne. I was plus worried about losing him than I was losing Morgana when he got into an incredibly annoying and forced argument with Ryuji 2/3rds into the game. That part sucks and toi can’t tell me otherwise. But I will say this, at least the level design in Okumura’s dungeon paid tribute to the level design of Nocturne. It was just as bad and obnoxious too. But I do l’amour Persona 5, and while I think it’s character écriture was lacking, compared to not just Nocturne but other SMT games, it excels in gameplay and especially presentation. I don’t want to compare Nocturne to Persona 5 because you… really can’t. Yes, I know, I put it in the title, but this is not a comparison article, at all. This is a preference article, and personally, I l’amour Nocturne just a little bit more.
12: Testament, Nocturne is Amazing
Nocturne is a lot plus than a game with an oppressive atmosphere that scares and intimidates you. Nocturne is far plus than a difficult RPG that will demand toi to power through it. Nocturne is plus than a bunch of scary skeletons and Dante memes. It’s a game that has a lot of cœur, coeur to it, even with all the weird cameos and the strange tone shifts. It’s a game that respects your choices and asks toi to make them, a game that rewards toi for sticking par it to the end with one of the most compelling narratives I’ve seen in a game, that cuts back on the tropes of other JRPGs and tells something unique, unseen in the genre at the time. It may not have a heartfelt message to it ou a deeper meaning, but it is a game that holds a lot of glory to it. Art doesn’t need to tell toi some deeper thoughts ou some extremely deep story, because Nocturne, while having a great narrative, is not completely deep. It just needs to make toi feel something to be important to you, and I do feel something for Nocturne. It’s that feeling of accomplishment, of completing the impossible, ou what is considered impossible. The impossibility of traversing a world that doesn’t want toi and will kill you, the impossibility of defeating all these foes of mythos and religion that hold greater power over you, the impossibility of changing the world in your own image to feel that toi accomplished something. The impossibility of completing a game as difficult as Nocturne. And yet, I did it. Many before me did it. And I hope many plus will do it. In conclusion, WHERE THE FUCK IS SMT V!?
