Imagine a game called Chuck E. Cheese's Modern Warfare. You'd probably think that was some dumb shit and wonder who it was for. Last Bible Special is the same deal. The point of Last Bible was to distinguish itself from mainline SMT and provide a different experience than first-person dungeon crawling, but with similar mechanics.

Naturally, they made this a hardcore dungeon crawler with almost no relation to Last Bible. It has a very cool class system with dozens of options for party building, and a neat Middle Eastern setting - but just about everything in this game relies on random chance, from recruiting team members, to getting critical quest items, to having weapons break, and even reviving fallen allies. It's a messy and cumbersome game that doesn't respect your time whatsoever, and definitely leans more towards luck than skill. To top it off, the soundtrack is reminiscent of slamming piano keys underwater, and I'm not saying that to be funny.

++ ost foda
+ visual bem único
+++ fumi e io based (na segunda run eu gostei da hinako, talvez mais pelo combate que pelo personagem em si e a io alem de perfeita é tetuda )
++ ronaldo gigachad, muito bem escrito
+ combate bom (tem que pensar sim, tem uma dificuldadezinha)
+- enredo interessante, do nada os personagens cortam pra umas piada que nem graça tem mas em contrapartida a mensagem que o jogo quer passar é interessante
? a versão em japonês se leva mais a sério, atlus fodase
- jogar em inglês é um incomodo pq as letras sao simplesmente horrorosas, não só nos diálogos mas a UI também
- tomou gameover reseta, sem paciencia
+ pacing do jogo é bom, muito jogo da atlus fica bem chato de jogar e esse jogo se segura muito bem


pau no cu da airi mina mimada

i played the first five days and let me say this, the game is good enough. i don't see myself replaying it anytime soon at all as the base mechanics are nothing too special, but the humor and simple dumb fun managed to keep me for it's whole base game. and even then some of the humor is in rather poor taste nowadays. i tried the saturday chapter but it failed to really interest me and i imagine i'll feel the same about sunday. and it doesn't help that i encountered a fair share of bugs on my way through.

tl;dr if the humor lands for you and you don't mind some horribly dated jokes and are willing to look past some bugs, then you'll love this. if it doesn't then there isn't really much for you.

ok this might be a long one cause i have quite a bit to say.

credited as one of the most influential mystery/horror vns out there, in particular directly inspiring uchikoshi and serving as the basis on which virtue’s last reward was built on, i was quite excited to jump into kamaitachi no yoru finally now that my jp is at a point where i can read stuff comfortably, and it definitely was worth the wait.

the story is essentially your typical and then there were none type setup. however instead of an island and the cast being trapped by a typhoon, instead the location is a ski lodge, with the characters being stuck in a snowstorm. its a small change but as someone whos seen this setup several times by now it was a nice breath of fresh air seeing the ways in which this change in location has an impact on the mysteries at play.

one aspect that i had heard a lot about going in was kamaitachi no yoru’s at the time unique approach to choice making. while you still have your typical cyoa choose a,b,c type choices, the main focus here is in identifying who the culprit is. quite early on in the story (before any of the main cast dies), you are given an option to point out who you think the culprit is by entering their name. there are no flags here meaning its entirely possible you could just get it right first try and get the best ending, however this is very unlikely. in the case that you don’t know who it is, the story will continue and people will start to die. a bit later on you are given a 2nd opportunity to solve the case in the same fashion. solving the mystery here will still net you a good ending, however slightly worse than if you had solved it prior. failing to solve the mystery here leads the murders to continue, where the only endings you can get are bad ones. looking back now its quite a basic structure but for me it was intriguing enough to draw me in and see how early i could solve the case. and whats especially great is there is no big xd cliche asspull plot twist - the culprit and their motives make a lot of sense, can be deduced from clues the game leaves, and feels rewarding to figure out.

kamaitachi no yoru originally released for the snes back in 1994. because of this, i was expecting the presentation to be slightly dated by todays standards but instead was blown away. the games artstyle uses a combination of photography and amazing pixel art to really craft this immersive world. instead of using anime style portraits, the game opts for sillouettes of the characters instead which adds a lot of charm culminating in a unique aesthetic that i really enjoy. some of these are animated at times as well and they look almost disney level quality at times. adding to this immersion is the ost which might be one of if not the most impressive scores i have ever heard on the snes. this was released under the brand of “sound novel” and its not hard to see why. without even touching on the phenomonal music, the use of sound effects from footsteps to these ominous pads that make you feel dread whenever they appear to the sound of the raging blizzard outside. its honestly mindblowing how a game from 20yrs ago can not only live up to but in many aspects outshine vns that are getting released today.

unfortunately, to experience the game in english your options are very limited with both being shit. the remake (kamaitachi no yoru rinne saisei) has gotten a fan translation however the amazing silhoutte style of the original that set it apart from all these fucking anime characters type portraits has gotten overhauled and replaced with just that which pretty much rips away and shits on one of the best aspects of the game. its so bad of a change in fact that the majority of jp fans dislike it too, mass disliking bombing the reveal trailer back when it came out.

on the other hand, there is an official localisation that was done in 2014 and though i havent played it i can tell you right now that you should stay the fuck away from it. first of all its ios only which should already be a red flag, but all the character names and where the story is set have been “westernised”. the main character names of toru and mari have been changed to max and grace and instead of taking place in a snowy region in japan it now takes place in fucking canada. also some of the lines i've seen just read really badly to the point where it breaks your immersion

it really sucks that these are the only options available. although i dont think my jp is good enough to do it justice rn, i really want to take a shot at making a full english script or even a fan translation for the original game at some point in the future so more people can experience this.

[Emulated on PCSX2]

Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs. The Soulless Army is quite a fascinating game with a lot to digest. First, I’d like to focus on its setting which is the Taisho era of Japan (which ended in our world in 1926 but has been extended to 1931 in this game).

To give some background, in 1853 Japan was forced to end its 200 year isolation and open up trade to the west. This caused a massive change in Japan with rapid advancement in industrialization with the new Western technology, reorganization of government from feudalism to a more centralized government, and a focus on growing the military to become a world power.

So why is all this important to Raidou? By the Taisho era, the effects of westernization could still be felt strongly and is one of the central focuses of the game. From the invading demons that represent Japan’s old world, the clever use of prerendered backgrounds mixing Western and outdated Edo period architecture, beautifully crafted soundtrack incorporating Jazz which was spreading throughout the world at the time, Atlus does an incredible job at capturing this era.

Every character is feeling the effects of modernization from Denpachi who's rickshaw business has come to a standstill due to the introduction of automobiles, Tae embracing the new freedoms of women in this era, and Munakata who desires imperialism using new technology. Other themes can also be seen in the story such as recognizing and cherishing our bonds with others along with passion to do our best in life despite dark times.

The story itself takes a lot of inspiration from detective dramas, with each part of the story fitting into an episode. The light hearted and witty approach to the story telling is very pleasant and the game does not hold back with how ridiculous the story gets. Every episode has something crazy from fighting yakuza in a bathhouse while being naked with nothing but your hat on to time travel and Russian cyborgs. Episodes are also very well paced, never dwelling too long on a plot point to avoid the player getting bored.

Gameplay wise Raidou does something unprecedented for a Megami Tensei title, swapping the standard turn-based combat system with action rpg gameplay. While theres definitely a lot that can be criticized such as the poor implementation of MAG that feels more of a leftover from previous games rather than serving any purpose, loyalty requiring grinding to fuse demons, random encounters in towns, to the clunky movement and lack of melee abilities outside of basic attacks, I still enjoyed the combat a lot and appreciate what it sets out to do.

Rather than feeling like a hack and slash, Raidou finds a way to bridge the gap between action and turn-based by having a focus on managing menus from switching demons, choosing their attacks, circulating through elemental bullets, to picking items to use. I found this approach to be quite unique and appreciated the experience it brought compared to other games in the genre.

Another aspect I loved was how Atlus incorporated the adventure genre into this game to fit the theme of being a detective game. Every demon has certain skills to help Raidou on his cases such as mind reading, fitting into small areas to reach something, using lightning to sense for clues, freezing water to walk on, and many more. Rather than this just being a skill you active from a menu you actually get to control the demons and move around as them which is really really cool.

While not a perfect game, the charming characters and story along with the unique gameplay made me fall in love with this game and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in this title, regardless if you’re a Megami Tensei fan or not.