Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance Review – Combat And Finesse

November 12th, 2021, the world was able to play Shin Megami Tensei V. I remember my time with the game and was able to review the game. It was only on Nintendo Switch. Most of my issues with the original game stem from the performance, the story, and the execution. We now have the re-release of Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance which has been changed, as well as released on all platforms.

Game Name: Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance
Platform(s): Nintendo Switch, PC(Reviewed), PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S
Developer(s): Atlus
Publisher(s):Sega
Release Date: June 14th, 2024
Price: $59.99

Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance is a much bigger change than I was expecting when you consider that Atlus has done these reworked re-releases now for a little while. Pretty much every change and every new detail in this game was something that either expanded on the original or changed elements overall from it. Honestly, all these additions made a much more cohesive game than it used to be.

Return To Da’at

Beginning Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance immediately throws you into a choice. Do you save this mysterious girl from the chains that shackle her out of the story of the game, or do you unclasp her prison? Since I wanted to see the changed route known as “Canon of Vengeance,” I decided to reach out and save this girl. If you don’t, then the story is more aligned with the original Shin Megami Tensei V. Eventually, early on, when you first get thrown into the netherworld and combine with Aogami, you meet with this new girl. Her name is Yoko Hiromine. She has the power to use magic akin to a Saint. This introduces a new change to the game. Guest characters in your party much earlier in it.

You start pretty early having Yoko as a guest character, which already changes a lot of the first section in Shin Megami Tensei V. I don’t want to retread old ground as I did most of the deep dive into the combat and a lot of the world of shadows in my initial review of the original. As you do side quests or discover new red rails throughout all the maps, Yoko will actually give you commentary. She will talk about the world of demons and angels and how much she can’t trust being told what is what. When you help a demon or angel, she will give you side commentary on her thoughts on the situation. This trend continues when you get more guest characters in your party throughout the game.

This made me appreciate a lot of the characters in a new light. In the original Shin Megami Tensei V, the only character who got enough screen time to understand his motive was Daizo. The other ones in the list just assumed you knew why they were the way they were. This time around, with the Vengeance installment, these characters seem a lot more fleshed out.

Honestly, my favorite duo in Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance is Yoko and Tao. They are different in their belief system and throughout the game, they both tend to rub off on each other. Yoko becomes a bit more compassionate, and Tao gets a bigger backbone.

A change that is also in this game is the Demon Haunt. When you enter a Leyline, you can select to go to a Demon Haunt. When you enter the Demon Haunt, you can talk directly to Aogami about the current situation at hand. You can also talk to any of your guest characters that are in your party. The best part of the Demon Haunt, however, is being able to talk to the demons in your party. It is so cool to be able to see all the characters in your party in one place, and it lets you see a little into their mind. I loved learning more about their personalities as well as not having to wait to interrogate them to get dialogue out of them again. Something awesome is the more you have them in your party, they will have either an item to give you or motivation well up inside them that will increase their stats passively. The more you use a demon, the better the odds that they have something to give you at the Haunt. You will know by them having an exclamation mark on their name when at the pause menu.

They also added Magatsu Rails into Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance. When you are walking around the map, you may notice red tunnel-type things on the ground. If you get close to it and press interact on it, it can take you to a different part of the map. This is very helpful when you need to backtrack or find secret areas in the game.

You are no longer stuck only saving at leylines in Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance. There is an added hotkey to save at any time in the game. This made my ability to explore significantly less annoying. If I died due to a random enemy odds are my last save was only a few minutes ago because of how paranoid I was in this game. I had flashbacks to the original game that made me lose 7 hours of gameplay due to getting killed from lucky criticals or accidentally going to a place I shouldn’t have been. Letting me use that save made me want to do more side content too. I was able to explore more of what the game had to offer.

Through The Eyes Of Nahobino

The assets and the textures of Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance have not gone through a vast improvement. But what has, is the performance. When I played through the original on Nintendo Switch, gameplay was mainly in the 20s when it came to FPS. Cinematics could take massive hits when more models and textures were on screen. I am happy to report that on Steam Deck, when I played through Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance, it never left 50fps. The entire game ran basically at a locked 60fps. A few dips would happen when the game loaded up or during the transition from cinematic to gameplay, but it never dips low when you are playing the game. Most of my game time was on my Steam Deck or my laptop with a dedicated Nvidia RTX 3060 GPU.

Shin Megami Tensei Greatness

I think this second go at Shin Megami Tensei V was an excellent call by Atlus. Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance may not have many changes to the story beats, but with better execution and letting us dive more into this world, it hits a lot harder. Yoko is also a great addition to this cast and allows a lot of them to push back against her which gives the other characters more motivation to stand on. Having the ability to save whenever also helps you take more risks in the game. Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance is a fantastic game and one of Atlus’s best repackages.

Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance is available on Nintendo Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S|X, and PC.

Review Disclosure Statement: Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance was provided to us by Sega for review purposes. For more information on how we review video games and other media/technology, please review our Review Guideline/Scoring Policy.

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