Oh god Oh god We're all gonna die! Let's Play Shin Megami Tensei!

Table of contents:
Chapter 1: Kichijoji
Chapter 2: Shinjuku and Shibuya
Chapter 3: Kongokai
Chapter 4: Shinjuku 2: Electric Boogaloo
Chapter 5: Die for me!!

BONUS:

Supplemental Post #1: The GBA/iOS ports


The game automatically walks me through pink corridors, in which the walls and floor wiggle as if we're in a dream.

And thus, the standard RPG character naming begins. We have a protagonist, a Law Hero, a Chaos Hero, and a Heroine to name, and with this I'd like to open the floor for others to do the dirty work.

Originally Posted by Kalir You are Scooby, law is Fred, chaos is Shaggy, and heroine is Velma.

Originally Posted by Kalir you are Scooby, law is Fred, chaos is Shaggy, and heroine is Velma.

Originally Posted by Kalir You are Scooby, law is Fred, chaos is Shaggy, and heroine is Velma.

Originally Posted by Kalir You are Scooby, law is Fred, chaos is Shaggy, and heroine is Velma.

I'm all for the scooby doo gang, but I've decided a little compromise is in order in the naming department.




The luck and strength stats are important in this game, especially considering later circumstances, but we're going to spend a good portion of the beginning of the game buffing up our protagonist's vitality stat, because your hit points actually go up each level depending on your vitality. If it's higher now, we'll have more hit points later.






There's a dormant power in my pants. You heard it here, folks.



Pants will, of course, be taking most of the mage duties of the party.






Yoinks, scoob, there's like, a demon on me!



Contrary to scooby canon, our Shaggy will be kicking most of the asses.



Sounds like Shaggy to me.







GODDAMNIT MOM



A man named Stephen exposits at us lengthily via our e-mail. How bad could it be, Stephen? Anyway, now we get our lazy asses out of bed.

Originally Posted by Scypho I'm going to work on getting bigger screencaps next update. snes9X is clearly not doing the job. New tracks played during this update: Demo Title Dream Home There is also a Playstation 1 remake of this game with a redone soundtrack; I recommend looking into it as well.

Going back to sleep does nothing, and there are no imminent threats that warrant saving. What's on the computer?



Demon Negotiation is simple, but not easy.
Let's leave.



So crimes are committed in downtown Tokyo. Shocker.





Pascal is the best dog ever, but we'll see why later, his theme is one of my favorite songs in the game.



That house is the same colour as mine; surely it must be important.


Maybe it'll be important later. Let's go to the mall.



Yeah, it didn't even have a porn virus or anything. Super disappointing.



Look at these eighties punk douchebags. They're probably not important.




So the antique store owner sells heroine. I wonder what the secret password is.
He wont sell us anything of use now, so don't waste your money.






There's no way we're going to get framed for this. At all. We lose five hit points, but gain a weapon.



The waitress is dressed like a maid? Our mother has interesting tastes in restaurants.



Maybe he's doing Let's Plays, you don't know.




This is probably what the police sirens were all about. Well, at least the murderer is locked up.



Ah, yes, puns. My lifeblood. Tell me more.



I have my suspicions. Mom told us to give him the money up front, and he's being pretty pushy about it. Well, let's just get out of here, then.



At least someone noticed my bleeding face.



Yeah, murder murder. The rumour mill is a spinnin', my friends. With nothing else to do, we go to bed.

Oh god, this again. Curiously, Yuriko doesn't add herself to our party. It's also strange that she's not a spectre. But at least she's wearing clothes this time.



Save the girl, save the world. Since when do you sacrifice people at luaus, though?



Don't worry, I've got an attack knife. I can take him.
I'm gonna take a break for today. Now's last call for naming the Heroine, since I've used one name from everyone's suggestions. In the spirit of fairness, of course. Otherwise, she'll probably be named Velma.

By the way, thanks for the suggestion, Falselogic. Appreciate.

Originally Posted by Falselogic use snes9x to take pics and then run them through irfanview's batch editor to double their size. It is what I usually do.

Originally Posted by Scypho Yeah, murder murder. The rumour mill is a spinnin', my friends. With nothing else to do, we go to bed.

Honestly, I don't give a crap about Skirt's stats right now: I've set them all to 8. But that doesn't mean she won't be important later.











AAGH





Unfortunately for us, Steven made it so we have to go through two menus to get to the map. What a sloppy programmer. It's better than nothing, I guess.





OH SHIT SHE DOES OUR LAUNDRY CODE RED





Shut down.





OH NO WHAT'S THAT
Now, you'll start seeing random encounters. My advice is to go to the survival shop and buy one of every armor they have; knives are too expensive, and it's a pain to down a medicine after every fight.






This masterpiece is the map of the Kichijoji mall, for your reference. K is knives- the sword shop. S is survival- the armor shop. D is drugs-
G is antiques... I wonder why it's labelled G? Maybe we'll find out later.
X is something that will be important soon, but right now it's just a bunch of thugs. Keep that spot in mind, though.

If you go into the Café, the people there will tell you about an old homeless guy at the park, and tell you about the Echo building, and how a voice calls out from the door to use an 'ID card'. Maybe we should keep a look out for one of those.




So, normally those barriers you see will prevent you from leaving kichijoji; policemen will tell you no civilians are allowed beyond this point. But the southern one you see in this picture is actually a mandatory plot flag, and there's no way for you to know this, unless maybe you're japanese and are actually familiar with kichijoji.






You wanna fight old man? 'cause I can take you!






Shaggy is awfully determined to be invisible while I take screenshots. Maybe he's shy.





You don't control me! But I appreciate the sentiment.





To this day I have no idea what the things on each side of him are. They flip back and forth in time, but they look like brooms to me.






OH SHIT
just press auto for this fight; you can't beat him anyway. I've never tried to grind up to his level, and I don't intend to considering how long that would take when all I have to grind on are pixies. (hehe)






If you head to the building to the south of the old man, you can get this ghetto 'treasure box', made of cardboard. Magnetite will be good for getting demons to help you not die to everything. I'll talk more about what's actually in the building later.





Whoo!
Pixies have dia, of course, as they have in every SMT game. This one also has hapilma and zionga, which will make you untouchable by the level 1 mobs around.
So let's just head back home. It's been a tiring day of evading zombies.






I'm being prejudiced for my fetishes! This is blasphemy! I want to talk to my lawyer!

Originally Posted by Falselogic Where are Pixie's wings? Also did you fight her in order to get her or did she join as an autoevent after talking to the old man?

Sure, why not? I mean, she's not very nice to me, and her dad creeps me out, but you know. For you.







LEEEEROOOOOY






JEEEENKIIIIINS





Green- conversations
Red- Steven
White- Exit





We have free run of the place, now, but if you try to leave, a door with an electronic lock blocks your way. We've gotta fix that.





So, now we know where we are. That's a plus.





You're telling me if we stayed in the cell we could have become steve rogers? That's it, now I'm mad.
Let's go talk to some demons, yeah?












You can use the talk function to get a jump on enemies that you otherwise wouldn't have. I was actually trying to recruit the weredog, but it appears to be over level 4, because it just wasn't happening. You can't recruit demons that are a higher level than you.








Well... alright. See ya' later.
I did manage to get a knocker, though, despite their unsavory attitude. This is what happens when you talk to a demon you already have:





Fuck you, you're not jack frost!

Hey, it's this guy! Thanks for the virus, now my computer won't connect to the internet anymore. Jerk.








Yeah, just give everyone demons. That sounds like a fantastic idea: no one would use them for murder.






A pokedex, then.





Then let's go upstairs.





Green- Strength Incense
Purple- Boss


Strength Incenses boost the strength stat of the character you use it on permanently. You're definitely gonna want to use almost every incense you find on the main character, since he's gonna be the only party member you have for a good while later in the game.





This is the boss. Get prepared.





I wish. I wanna be captain america.






That's not what I had in mind. Well, we gotta stop you.





OH NO

First boss of the game, I hope you're ready. He's really not that bad, honestly; You're literally incapable of going into this fight without a healer, because Pants comes with Dia. Orias hits hard, but not hard enough to kill any of your party members right now, unless you arranged your stats abysmally. [That is, to say, every point into the luck stat.]
Both Knocker and Pants have Zan, but I would relegate Pants to using his gun instead to conserve MP in case you need to heal. Magic does way more than physical, though.





Yeah, let's get out of here, then.

Originally Posted by Scypho To this day I have no idea what the things on each side of him are. They flip back and forth in time, but they look like brooms to me.

Originally Posted by Scypho

Originally Posted by Torzelbaum Did this conversation get cut off?

Originally Posted by Scypho To this day I have no idea what the things on each side of him are. They flip back and forth in time, but they look like brooms to me.

Originally Posted by Sarisa but wouldn't ritual purification be the opposite of what you want if you're trying to invoke demons? Oh well.

So we exit the hospital here. Now what? Let's check out the red building over there real quick; the one that we went to earlier after the old man.





We can fuse demons here- well, later, anyway. Right now it's a no go because of our low level.





Pixie got killed earlier, so we'll revive her. Heal up your party too; you don't want a disadvantage right now, and we'll see why in a bit. First, to the mall!






Well, I mean, we only just walked in here with two demons. But no, please continue.





You tell 'em, Pants.

This is ozawa's gang, in the X on the map I showed you earlier.






That's what they all say.






Get a load of this asshole's fashion sense. I almost prefer the spectre, to be honest. Pants' outfit was classy. Red leather jacket? Timeless. What you're wearing? Jesus.





Easy: if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. That's what I'm doing.





Well, shit. Just invite yourself to tag along, then, I suppose.
Anyway, I guess we should see if there's anything we can buy now that we've stolen money from some demons.





Looks like the Antique shop owner has had a change of heart. Wonder what he's selling?


I don't know what the 'this' is that we need. Our yen and mag counts blink when he says this, but none of the numbers change. Maybe it's a bug in the patch.






Christ he sells guns. Hey, what's the difference between swords and guns in this game, anyway?


Swords have a hidden statistic- the amount of times they can hit. Soon, we'll be getting a sword that can do three consecutive attacks.
Guns have a different hidden stat- How many enemies they can hit. While swords always hit the frontmost demon in a group of enemies, guns will attack in a spread. Pants' gun right now only hits one target because he makes bad financial decisions, but Shaggy's can attack up to four.




Pants, you've never met my mother. How would you know if she's acting strangely?





Oh shit






Christ
To be honest, I never realized this was a boss the first time I played, however long ago. But he is- my point is that he's piss easy. Keep casting any spells you can on him, and you'll kill him before he's capable of doing enough damage for you to even notice. Hell, press the auto button if you actually want a risk. The odds are still in your favor.

Oh, hey, we needed that.





Confirmed: Pants is a socially stunted idiot.





The text disappears and the screen remains still for a few seconds, until





Hell yes I'm taking Pascal with me. Best dog ever.
Well, now where are we gonna go? Outside, I guess, to bury mom and get some fresh air.
Let's just get out of here.






Yeah, about that...





Here's where we'll be going next time. The Echo building, which we needed the ID card for. On our way there, we'll visit the Heretic Mansion.

By the way, I really dig the Shinto lessons I'm getting. Thanks guys!
I still don't see how there's a dancer in that sprite, but I'll buy it.