Loved it on release, not as excited about what's to come for its life cycle about six months in.

Gameplay is super fun. Balance patches are pretty consistent too, so online play has never felt stale for me. Aesthetically, I can't say I like the stages as much as prior entries, but nothing terrible. Not a fan of the OST either besides the goofy dubstep boat but that's a personal gripe. Story is cute too-- defo better than 6 & 7's put together lol

My main beef is with Namco and the Battlepass-esque inclusion of the Tekken Shop. There were already multiple warning signs with Tekken 7, but they quit giving a shit entirely about trying to be slick with it this time.

The EA-ification practice of bloating every game full of microtransactions is becoming so irritating. I wouldn't have gripes if it was legacy costumes only, but customization was so barebones on launch that it's a slap in the face that a game KNOWN for its great customization dropped the ball so hard. It's blatant that they made the basic options so bland that more people would be cornered into shelling out for cosmetics that don't resemble a white-collar uniform.

Part of the reason why Tekken remains my favorite fighting game franchise is because a big part of the fun is making a character personal to you. Telling your consumers to essentially shut up and "update their thinking" in response to this is so slimy. I'm already sick of it with every new Atlus game! It sucks it's spreading to other franchises I grew up with too. Namco waiting to pull the rug under players a month after release knowing the shit customization was already a big complaint is just shameless.

It feels unfair to dock my rating based on scummy business practices because this is still a fun game you can sink endless hours into. Tekken is easy to learn and tough to master-- I highly recommend picking this one up if you're interested in fighting games. It's just a shame part of the reason this game is going to be remembered is for controversy regarding more and more unnecessary microtransactions.

If you don't care about online play, go pick up Tag Tournament 2 (my personal favorite). It has a great built-in tutorial for understanding the game's mechanics and the customization is top-tier.

you can suplex/5

This is another case of me putting off playing a game because it has so much crazy hype around it but it seriously lives up to it. Just a crazy fun campy time. I still occasionally replay the opening village bit just because it's so damn fun to run around and juke the Ganados.

It drags in some parts. The castle felt like it lasted forever and by the time I got to Saddler I was like omfg finally... but I can't say I was ever really bored. More of a thriller than a horror game the Regenerador bit was the only time I was like AHHH!!! running around scared. Graphically holds up well IMO.. yeah the HD versions look sorta dookie but I still think the original has a certain aesthetic charm that the 2023 version lacks. Leon we freaking love you. Also I might be the only person on earth who was like YIPPIEE every time I got to unlock more bottlecaps

This feels like it was meant to be an entry point for new players to get into the SMT franchise. I can't recommend new players to touch this game at all though because it's stripped of the core elements that make other entries so fun or the typical elements that form the identity of any other SMT game. Tbh it's criminal that this game has a similar rating to smtv because that game is leagues above whatever this was. I get smt fans love to shit on whatever latest entry considering what we've seen happen to the reputation of smtiv over the years but good lord this game feels like "we have persona 6 at home".

By and away the worst part of this game is dungeon exploration and combat. Dungeons are painfully bland and filled with puzzles that were designed to waste your time rather than pose an actual challenge. It's mostly backtracking to find some key or trial and error to get a door to open. For a game that's supposed to be infused with cyber aesthetics, story dungeon design goes from shipping crates->subway->another subway->shipping crates->an everyday office building. Aesthetic-wise the last water dungeon is alright, but the water flow puzzle just bled the little enjoyment I got from it. The matrix is god-awful. It was interesting as a mementos-like thing for the first couple of floors, but once they introduced the teleporters it becomes insanely tedious. Sure I have gripes with dungeon exploration in SH1 but a.) The dungeons were at least interesting visually b.) That game was released in 1997. You kinda had to do what you could to make a game worth a ~$50 price tag. Expecting more from Atlus in 2022 post-Persona riches doesn't seem like a tall order considering dungeon design in old ass smt games w a fraction of the budget have been way better than this time and time again.
Yapping is a massive part of the game. Not even in a character development/world-building sense which you could argue for the Persona games, but like no one shuts up ever. Why did they think it was a good idea for characters to speak anytime you do anything ever during combat? You open the items menu? Voice line. You check your moves? Voice line. Change your mind and want to go back and your items again? Two voice lines. If you play on 2x speed like I did it gets unbearable within a couple hours. Multiple characters will talk over each other at once and nothing interesting or necessary is being said. Mimi is also the worst. This game isn't beating the Persona-like allegations because they shoehorned a titular animal mascot character into the narrative for literally no reason. Whenever you're running around the map she has voice lines for an enemy spawning, seeing you, chasing you, being knocked down, and so on. Enemies spawn fairly frequently, so it gets grating fast. P5 did this too to a lesser degree, but it was much quieter and would only happen when an enemy was around the corner or a situation akin to that. Considering how much lower the encounter rate was in that game it wasn't that bothersome imo.
The combat is a slog. Genuinely props to anyone who can stand to play this game without the fast mode on because it strips away two of the things that MAKE the combat of smt games so interesting: The press turn system (or some spin of it) and demon negotiation. The stack/sabbath system boils down to exploit weakness=big number go up. Like other reviews have noted something similar exists in Strange Journey but it's far more interesting because it's directly tied to your alignment and therefore influences how you build your party for the duration of the game. There's no strategy involved with using an extra turn to buff/heal/etc. and it feels like you're forced into using the commander skills. A version of those exist in smtv as well with the Magatsuhi skills but the combat of that game is so excellent it fits within the PT system perfectly-- and it doesn't feel like you're backed into a corner without it.
Demon negation not being in this game is such a shame because for a game about demon summoning there's not much of it. The loyalty gimmick from SH1 could be tedious and exploitable but it was an idea that would've been interesting to bring into modern SMT nonetheless. Stripping away your ability to negotiate in an smt game is just so eghhh... I already wasn't a huge fan of how simple it is in P5 but the complete removal of it in this game made me miss it so much. It takes away your ability to be like "Ah i need x demon as fusion fodder for y demon lemme go recruit one" you kinda just have to run in circles and HOPE one of your guys finds the one you're looking for. That is, if you even get that far, when you have a full party there's no option to get rid of a guy so if you don't have space/forget to remove one beforehand you're just SOL. How in the world did they leave out a mechanic that was in Persona 5 which came out 5 billion years ago and smtv iirc. Also maybe my copy was just buggy but recruitment just stopped working properly by the time I got to the last dungeon? I was level 50-something when I started the final dungeon but demons that popped up for recruitment (even the non-rare icons) would be in the 60s-70s, despite the fact in the first few rooms there were demons around my level I could recruit. When I got to the final room I had a level 85 Yurlungr pop up twice while I was barely breaking the mid-60s. I don't think Yurlungr spawns as an encounter so why did it even show up?
Speaking of... the level scaling in this game makes smtv's issues look like nothing. If you have any prior experience with smt games dungeon encounters are a breeze, but once you get to certain bosses it essentially feels like you're forced to go back and grind to a certain point just so you're not 1-shot constantly or have to burn a hole through your item supply. I beat the final boss with Ringo at level 67 and dear God I had to pull out all the stops to make it through. I enjoy doing low-level runs of these games but it was an absolute nightmare to attempt with this one JUST for the bosses--- regular encounters are fairly easy across the board. There's not much technical difficulty, bosses just have insane power scaling and there are arbitrary limits put on you during certain battles to force the illusion of difficulty. There's a couple of sidequest bosses where they're immune to everything. What's the challenge there? You just have to get a couple of demons with almighty skills and spam megidolaon. There's a few others where you're not allowed to use a character that have a higher stack bonus with a certain element (e.g., no Saizo on a Flauros boss because his Zan skills have higher stack rates). Alright, just switch their demon onto another guy. It's not balanced difficulty where the enemy can do exactly what you do like the press turn (or even one more) system, just imposing limits to make battles feel harder than they actually are. It robs you of the satisfaction of feeling like you overcame a fair fight imo. Minimal exp output + bland combat makes for a terrible grinding experience also. For every smt game you have to make small adjustments to your playstyle, but why were de/buffs next to useless in this game? I was struggling with an early boss, but on my next attempt I just brute forced my way through them using no buffs and had a significantly easier time. Matador and Minotaur skill checks are rolling in their grave!! There's just hardly any technical skill involved or even possible that leaves no room for experimentation. Have a couple guys with media and recarm and you won't have to worry about anything until the last hour of the game.
The story and characters left a lot to be desired. It's a shame that the first playable female protag since P3P is adhered to this game. I actually like Ringo a lot. Both her English and JP VAs do a great job and she's interesting. They do a great job of giving her a personality and execute the ~emotionless entity learning it has human feelings after all...~ trope very well. I'll get more into character detail in the spoiler section but generally they're fine! There's just a lot more they could have done. They scratch the surface with a lot of interesting ideas and development they could get into but choose not to. The super stilted and janky animation doesn't help. A super emotional scene could be happening but I'd just be laughing because someone's hand would be clipping thru their arm. I'm shocked to see people say it looks good. Please go back and rewatch a few cutscenes from smtv/p5. They're not tlou but they're far, far, better than what this game has to offer. I won't explain how in this section but it's also scummy that a massive chunk of character development that makes certain plot beats late in the game actually fit are paywalled behind dlc. The climax of the main story hardly makes sense without the context provided by the dlc "side story" :| The voice acting is actually pretty great. Ringo, Figue, and Iron Mask were the standout performances to me, but no one did a bad job, especially considering the anime ass dialogue they had to work with. The story is pretty bland up until one part where it gets crazy good... but then within a couple of hours from that point the game is abruptly over and it sorta crashes and burns. Generally my rule is if the story is bad at least make the gameplay good hence why I'm a warrior for vanilla smtv. If the gameplay is mid make the story enjoyable to go through. Soul Hackers 2 has uninspired gameplay and a rushed, surface-level narrative so it's like... what really is the point.

Some final spoiler-free thoughts: DO NOT buy this game at full price. I snagged it on sale at Gamestop for like $30 and even that feels like a bit much. If you trimmed all the bloat from this game it'd only be about 15-20 hours long. Including me staring at the demon fusion screen for hours on end it took me about 55 hours to beat the game.

Another thing that these games are known for is the fantastic soundtrack... it's nowhere to be found here. something else about these reviews that's genuinely baffling is people saying anything in this soundtrack is noteworthy. This song from SH1 alone outclasses everything in this game's soundtrack by a mile. The OST of SH2 is just sorta ambient and royalty-free adjacent music. I hold these games to a higher standard music-wise just bc smtiv soundtrack exists so what the heck!! Even the geriatric smt games from the dawn of the time had hits like this and this. The only way to change the songs is the same way you did with the Persona 5 dlc à la equipping the MC with a specific costume to hear that game's battle theme during combat. A good soundtrack is an integral part of any smt game (even stinkers like NINE). It's a huge part of cementing the identity of each entry, so it being completely absent here makes it feel like this game is missing soul. The uncanny valley of shin megami tensei games... no wonder they dropped it from the title
If you're looking to get into SMT, this isn't the game to do it. Oddly enough I can really only recommend it to other hardcore fans of the series to experience how bad these games COULD'VE been. If you're new to smt, entry points I'd recommend are smtiv or Strange Journey Redux if you liked the sabbath system. It's challenging, but you can save anywhere like in this game and the difficulty feels rewarding. p5r is decent too. Play it on hard or merciless and you'll have a great time.

This sounds harsh but I focused on nitpicks and gripes I noticed throughout the experience. If I really felt like it was the worst game of all time I wouldn't have bothered to finish it lol. For the money I spent it was an alright experience. Hopefully the awful sales on this one signals Atlus to not fart out another megaten game like this. Sucks because a return to the world from SH1 had a lot of potential-- hopefully we can see a fully fleshed-out return to it someday.

tldr: Super disappointing cash grab on Atlus' part. Feels like the announcement was rushed out to coincide with SH1's anniversary and to ride the attention they were getting circa 2021 from Royal and smtv. Gameplay and story is nothing to write home about. Skip it if you aren't a freak about this franchise like I am.
Needs more RHYME SOLDIER




SPOILER Discussion
If you're gonna play this game it's at least worth it to see these things on your own












These are just gripes and ramblings regarding the story. What the heck started going on at the midpoint-onward? The convenant stuff and yatagarsu/phantom society conflict was already so boring and poorly developed I didn't bother latching onto it, but right before the final Zenon fight when a bunch of mothman catch your guys my suspension of disbelief got shattered so bad I just busted out laughing. Even from the iota of character development we got about Figue at that point it was so OOC of her to accept Iron Mask's terms? Things already felt off from that point so the fake-out death that proceeded right after was ridiculous. Also wasn't Raven Iron Mask supposed to be some super-genius guy considering he took over from proto-Paul Iron Mask without much trouble? He knew at that point Ringo and Figue had the power to revive people so how did the possibility not cross his mind that Figue might've been faking HIM out with her death? Their relationship was so out of left field in general-- if you're not familiar with what happens in the DLC, it essentially makes it clear that Figue had some super love at first sight blushy crushy feelings with him after their first time at the orphanage which makes her chronic pick me behavior after the boss fight with him not such a shock. Do you know how many girls I know that would be willing to cause the apocalypse and go on a cross-country killing spree cuz they lost out on some dick if they had the power to? It made sense after that added context. It's crazy that's the only crumb of development we got for her though. It makes it seem like she already knew Raven was Iron Mask? Since she wasn't gagged when Arrow revealed it to the team. It just felt like there was a lot of lost potential by not exploring them more.
I wish Ringo's feelings for Figue got more attention from the writers. in the bad ending, she essentially goes catatonic over Figue's death, cuts connection with everyone else, and doesn't even bother trying to find a way to reconstruct Aion. It's implied she aimlessly floats through life in her new human body that she'll never feel comfortable in. Meanwhile, in the true ending, she's willing to die and sever her connection with the world just to be with Figue again. In the scene right after, Milady tells Figue to keep an eye on Ringo because "she'd fall apart without her", to which Ringo responds just by blushing. Feeling a little LGBT Atlus?
Lastly, it's crazy Paul Mask basically picked up Milady from her burning village, took her as a child bride, and she was just like "yeah we were so in love<3" and it's not really brought up ever again 😭 you were groomed girl! and then he had you assassinated by RHYME SOLDIER. but alright