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SMTV is coming to the west
- Thread starter Pix
- Start date
I still don't get why they're building this on UE4, but yet making it a Switch exclusive. Why would they cut out easy revenue from PS4 (in the west)? I'm sure a lot of people like me who played Nocturne on a PS2 or PS3 are still in the ecosystem.
Xeno X was released in April 2015 in Japan so that's less than 3 years between XX and X2. I'm no dev but I think 3 years would be considered a pretty normal development cycle.
Who can say? I guess since SMT has been on the 3DS, they wanted to extend it into the Switch.
Going by the dev times of IV(3 1/2 yrs) and Apocalypse(2 3/4 yrs) we are likely looking at 2H 2019, easily slipping into 1H 2020 if they really only just start around Jan 2017 and depending on the scope of the game.
Maybe we'll get a miracle and somehow the lessons and experience with IV/Apocalypse and using a fully modern 3rd party engine will result in a much shorter dev time, but I doubt it. Winter 2018 would be quite simply remarkable. 1H 2019 is the far more "reasonable" hope for an early release even if still very unlikely.
Atlus should go really big on this game. SMT:IV sold quite well, 600k as of mid 2015. If the Switch maintains its strong sales and they give it the royal treatment and just continue to improve upon what IV and Apocalypse did well in terms of presentation and gameplay and fix the areas they were weak in I don't doubt that it could break 1 million and really elevate the series.
Maybe we'll get a miracle and somehow the lessons and experience with IV/Apocalypse and using a fully modern 3rd party engine will result in a much shorter dev time, but I doubt it. Winter 2018 would be quite simply remarkable. 1H 2019 is the far more "reasonable" hope for an early release even if still very unlikely.
Atlus should go really big on this game. SMT:IV sold quite well, 600k as of mid 2015. If the Switch maintains its strong sales and they give it the royal treatment and just continue to improve upon what IV and Apocalypse did well in terms of presentation and gameplay and fix the areas they were weak in I don't doubt that it could break 1 million and really elevate the series.
I think Atlus internally decided for some reason that SMT is exclusively for Nintendo and Persona is exclusively for Sony. It doesn't really explain Persona Arena and I think Persona Q is, according to them, an Etrian Odyssey spin-off, which is whatever. I don't work for Sega so I don't know if that's the case.
Nintendo does a lot of the leg work for marketing the SMT games + Atlus likes its RPGs to mostly be tied to one ecosystem + most of the mainline SMT audience was built on Nintendo platforms.
PlayStation= Persona
Nintendo=SMT
Baring spinoffs and ports they've been fairly consistent with this. Nocturne is the only one that stands out.
Nintendo=SMT
Baring spinoffs and ports they've been fairly consistent with this. Nocturne is the only one that stands out.
Just like the Persona games being Playstation exclusive, it doesn't really make sense from a business point of view so most likely the reason is "because Atlus".
SMT II came out over 20 years ago. A previous title being on the SNES has no bearing on platform decisions. IV was on 3DS and V is on Switch simply because mobile is where the JP market has gone, and maybe where they think the hardcore audience is. IV also made sense because it was lower budget. Going by the trailer, V seems to be bumped up considerably, so that's why it's odd to me to keep it exclusive.
Was it actually ever confirmed as Switch exclusive, or just all they've announced?
I'm not here to port beg but uhhhh, they suuuuure could fix that. *hintity hint hint*
Honestly they should port Nocturne to any modern platform, Nintendo or not. People would kill for that. However I think having Nocturne on your Switch would be the dream. That game would be perfect to play on the go.
SMT: SJ was DS. The Devil Survivor titles that bear the SMT moniker were DS. IV and Apocalypse were 3DS. Soul Hackers first released in the west on 3DS. Post PS2, everything SMT has been on Nintendo platforms aside from Persona.
The DeSu games don't carry the SMT moniker in Japan. Only the first one was called "Megami Ibunroku" (like Persona 1).
They haven't really been consistent with SMT at all. some SMT-related titles during the PS2 era were on PS2, others on DS. And that one weird Xbox game.
But again, that's because Nintendo had the popular mobile platform in Japan, not because Atlus felt like SMT had some special bond with Nintendo. Atlus goes where the money is, which is why it's bizarre to leave money on the table with a single-platform release.
I'm mainly referring to the mainline games. Nocturne is the only mainline game to launch exclusively on a non Nintendo console.
what else should they make it in? the Persona 5 engine? which took a long time to support PS4, so now they should add in Nvidia support and take forever again? the choice of engine doesnt beget system support
I believe it was confirmed as exclusive when this trailer was pushed out in Japan.
Same reason tons of other games built on middleware aren't made available for every platform that supports it
Same could be said for Persona 5 for Switch or hell even Vita if they really wanted to. Both P3P and P4G were just barely shy of matching their console counterpart's sales figures. Portable players have clearly shown a strong interest in the series that matches almost equally with their console counterparts. Even Persona Q being on a whole other ecosystem still sold over 250k copies which isn't far off from how all versions of P3 and P4 sold on PS2 or PSP/Vita and better than any of the other spin-off titles in the series. Yet so far there's no indication at all that we'll see it on any portable device. And then there's the whole PC side of things which has been very profitable and kind to many Japanese devs that have done even mediocre ports of their games to the platform. Including Atlus's own parent company Sega.
Suffice to say Atlus doesn't always make a lot of sense with how they handle things. But there's always tomorrow. P5 could easily wind up on the Switch or PC in a year or two, especially if they continue with their penchant for upgraded re-releases. Same could hold true as well for SMTV, barring any kind of true exclusivity deal with Nintendo. But at this point in time the most likely scenario is simply that Atlus is gonna Atlus and they're going to do things their way, as baffling as it seems at times.
Very true. Then there was Catherine, which was released for PS3 and inexplicably for the 360 which had no traction in Japan. I remember there being some speculation at the time that Atlus was perhaps wanting to learn not only about HD dev with Catherine, but also multi-platform dev. But that never came to pass. I wrongly assumed that under Sega management Atlus would embrace multi-platform, but....nope.
Inexplicable or not I'm really glad Catherine came out on the 360. I would never have played that game otherwise and it ended up being phenomenal
So having only played Persona 4 & 5, and also a Switch owner, what should I expect with this in terms of similarities/differences? I'm aware of some of the elements in P5 like negotiations were SMT and early Persona things, but what are the more defining differences?
there are no social links or life elements. it's a more straight forward rpg than Persona. world building is more important than characters here
The storyline and gameplay. Some of the dungeon stuff is similar, but there is no calendar, social links, or any school element to it other than maybe "the protagonist was at school then the world ended". The game takes place in a modern post apocalyptic Tokyo (this one is confirmed to, but most of them do with exceptions like Strange Journey, which takes place in Antarctica). The story comes down to the protagonists choice of how to reshape the world. The alignments are usually law, chaos, and neutral. The pros and cons of each are presented fairly well, to the point where you even see people arguing about them online.
Negotiation in P5 is more like SMT, however in SMT you don't have to exploit a weakness first, you can just straight up talk to them. You can also talk to a demon to get out of a battle if you have a demon of the same species with you, and they might even give you gifts.
While they haven't said what combat will be like in this game, there's a high chance it will be the Press Turn system, used in many games in the series from Nocturne onward. Both sides have press turns equal to the amount of members, except bosses usually get two. An action costs a turn, but if your action exploits a weakness, or is a critical hit, you get another turn for your side, but it still goes into the next demon in your party. If you hit a null, repel, or drain you lose all your press turns and it's the enemy's turn. However this works the same way for the enemy, and in fact sometimes the best strategy is to nullify an enemy attack to prevent most of their turns. There are no knock downs or all out attacks.
Since this debate about why SMT5 is a Switch-exclusive keeps coming up again and again, here are the facts for people that want a quick refresher course, and for those that just want to get caught up. After this, hopefully we can move past the platform discussion and begin talking about the game/series itself.
Regarding Persona:
Persona has remained largely exclusive to Sony platforms not because of custom engines or any sort of custom technology, really, but for business and marketing reasons. Aniplex, which is an anime production company owned by Sony, is responsible for the production of the various Persona anime series and movies. Aniplex is also responsible for the distribution of these shows in the USA.
Naturally, Sony recognizes Persona as a significant enough multimedia franchise that benefits their PlayStation business and their anime production house at the same time. At the same time, Aniplex's involvement and promotion of Persona helps the series reach out to more people and this benefits Atlus. It's a mutually beneficial situation.
Given how heavily involved Aniplex are in the promotion/marketing of Persona, it then in turn makes sense for Atlus to prioritize and promote Sony platforms in the case of this specific series. This is also why you see projects like the Persona Dancing games still being released for PS4 + Vita, rather than, say, PS4 + Switch. (Which would make a lot more sense in 2018)
Finally, there's the fact that PlayStation platforms appeal to a large portion of the "anime audience" in Japan. The PlayStation 3 was the default Blu-Ray player in Japan, and this extends to the PS4, so most of the market that collects anime BDs owns these platforms. Additionally, a number of PlayStation platform games are promoted during the commercial breaks for anime shows in Japan as well, because of the audience overlap (regardless of whether or not Aniplex has produced them).
This is largely why you see more presentation-focused games like the Tales games (Namco), the Trails games (Falcom) and Persona games (Atlus) all leaning toward PlayStation—because there is a significant enough overlap between the audiences of these games and the anime audience in Japan. One example of this is focus on presentation and production values is how important the voice actors chosen for the Tales games are to its fans. It also helps contextualize quotes like this one from Falcom.
Regarding Shin Megami Tensei:
SMT has historically been on Nintendo platforms, just as Persona has historically been on Sony platforms. The few instances where the series has been released on other consoles were when Nintendo platforms were incapable of providing a sufficiently large userbase for these games. Examples of these instances include the Devil Summoner games in the PS1 era, and Nocturne/Digital Devil Saga/Raidou in the PS2 era.
Even when these games were being released, the Game Boy Color and GBA were still receiving whatever SMT spin-offs Atlus felt those two devices were capable of running (Devil Children in the case of GBC and so on).
Something to keep in mind is that SMT's audience has typically skewed older than Persona's, and most other RPGs that come out of Japan. In Japan, the Nintendo DS and Nintendo 3DS were both market-leading platforms that were owned by users across all age groups, including people in their 30s and 40s, which is helpful in the case of a game like Shin Megami Tensei. (Games like Bravely Default andThe Legend of Legacy are on 3DS for the same reason)
This, combined with the fact that a large part of the SMT experience still places a greater emphasis on exploration and grinding as opposed to Persona's more life-sim approach has led the team to believe that portables are a more convenient place for these games. This is a statement the devteam has made not just about SMT5, but also the games that were on DS/3DS such as SMT4.
Finally, Nintendo themselves seem rather fond of SMT (likely because they recognize it as a brand that brings a very different flavour to their systems that they themselves don't/can't create). They helped promote SMT4 in the USA and later partnered with Atlus for Tokyo Mirage Sessions, which is a loose crossover between SMT and Fire Emblem. Given that SMT5's 25th anniversary celebration was announced at the reveal of their brand new console, they still seem pretty invested in working with Atlus on its development.
Other interesting stuff of note:
Hopefully, this post clears a lot of things up for people. The bottom line is, for the most part Sony has Persona whilst Nintendo has SMT. We might see the streams cross at some point in the future but that isn't the case at the moment. Let's move past this and focus on the actual topic at hand—that SMT is in a better place than it has been in years, and there's a new game coming.
Regarding Persona:
Persona has remained largely exclusive to Sony platforms not because of custom engines or any sort of custom technology, really, but for business and marketing reasons. Aniplex, which is an anime production company owned by Sony, is responsible for the production of the various Persona anime series and movies. Aniplex is also responsible for the distribution of these shows in the USA.
Naturally, Sony recognizes Persona as a significant enough multimedia franchise that benefits their PlayStation business and their anime production house at the same time. At the same time, Aniplex's involvement and promotion of Persona helps the series reach out to more people and this benefits Atlus. It's a mutually beneficial situation.
Given how heavily involved Aniplex are in the promotion/marketing of Persona, it then in turn makes sense for Atlus to prioritize and promote Sony platforms in the case of this specific series. This is also why you see projects like the Persona Dancing games still being released for PS4 + Vita, rather than, say, PS4 + Switch. (Which would make a lot more sense in 2018)
Finally, there's the fact that PlayStation platforms appeal to a large portion of the "anime audience" in Japan. The PlayStation 3 was the default Blu-Ray player in Japan, and this extends to the PS4, so most of the market that collects anime BDs owns these platforms. Additionally, a number of PlayStation platform games are promoted during the commercial breaks for anime shows in Japan as well, because of the audience overlap (regardless of whether or not Aniplex has produced them).
This is largely why you see more presentation-focused games like the Tales games (Namco), the Trails games (Falcom) and Persona games (Atlus) all leaning toward PlayStation—because there is a significant enough overlap between the audiences of these games and the anime audience in Japan. One example of this is focus on presentation and production values is how important the voice actors chosen for the Tales games are to its fans. It also helps contextualize quotes like this one from Falcom.
Regarding Shin Megami Tensei:
SMT has historically been on Nintendo platforms, just as Persona has historically been on Sony platforms. The few instances where the series has been released on other consoles were when Nintendo platforms were incapable of providing a sufficiently large userbase for these games. Examples of these instances include the Devil Summoner games in the PS1 era, and Nocturne/Digital Devil Saga/Raidou in the PS2 era.
Even when these games were being released, the Game Boy Color and GBA were still receiving whatever SMT spin-offs Atlus felt those two devices were capable of running (Devil Children in the case of GBC and so on).
Something to keep in mind is that SMT's audience has typically skewed older than Persona's, and most other RPGs that come out of Japan. In Japan, the Nintendo DS and Nintendo 3DS were both market-leading platforms that were owned by users across all age groups, including people in their 30s and 40s, which is helpful in the case of a game like Shin Megami Tensei. (Games like Bravely Default andThe Legend of Legacy are on 3DS for the same reason)
This, combined with the fact that a large part of the SMT experience still places a greater emphasis on exploration and grinding as opposed to Persona's more life-sim approach has led the team to believe that portables are a more convenient place for these games. This is a statement the devteam has made not just about SMT5, but also the games that were on DS/3DS such as SMT4.
Finally, Nintendo themselves seem rather fond of SMT (likely because they recognize it as a brand that brings a very different flavour to their systems that they themselves don't/can't create). They helped promote SMT4 in the USA and later partnered with Atlus for Tokyo Mirage Sessions, which is a loose crossover between SMT and Fire Emblem. Given that SMT5's 25th anniversary celebration was announced at the reveal of their brand new console, they still seem pretty invested in working with Atlus on its development.
Other interesting stuff of note:
- In recent years, Nintendo appears to have realized how lucrative Japan's anime audience can be. This is something that began with the success of Fire Emblem Awakening, and has continued with games like Fates and Warriors. There have also been hints at a Fire Emblem anime being in production, which says a lot.
- As pointed out in recent discussions. Xenoblade 2 seems more focused on attracting that audience to the Nintendo Switch as well, likely in the hopes of attracting certain kinds of publishers to the Switch. Alongside, we're already seeing some of these high-presentation, anime market games being announced for Switch, such as Tales.
Hopefully, this post clears a lot of things up for people. The bottom line is, for the most part Sony has Persona whilst Nintendo has SMT. We might see the streams cross at some point in the future but that isn't the case at the moment. Let's move past this and focus on the actual topic at hand—that SMT is in a better place than it has been in years, and there's a new game coming.
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Thanks for the write up, it was an interesting read and made me aware of a lot of factors.
Concerning how long until release, one comment I found interesting was in the Famitsu interview (translated here: https://www.rpgsite.net/news/6264-r...shin-megami-tensei-v-full-famitsu-translation).
"If we use Unreal Engine, it can be outputted in less than a minute, so the environment for making games has drastically changed. Because when you can check what you've made on the game screen instantly, you can take more time to polish ideas or do trial-and-error. Furthermore, this engine has deep capabilities that let us do arrangements unique to us, so I'm really glad we get to implement it."
I wouldn't be surprised if the development time differed from what previous games took, and if it takes as long, then it suggests we'll get a well crafted and polished game.
Japan is still the most important market for SMT. By the time this games release the Switch will be the current gen system with the biggest userbase. They announced the game early and made sure that anyone interested in SMT will need to get that system by that point. Just like it was the case on DS and 3DS.
Going exclusive means obv. more marketing support from Nintendo for the domestic and global support.
Late ports can still happen or could have been announced post January event if the Switch had a lackluster start. But after the performance so far especially in Japan I doubt they are sacrificing a lot of sales going Switch exclusive. The SMT fanbase will own the system, same way most people interested in Persona own a Playstation.
Going exclusive means obv. more marketing support from Nintendo for the domestic and global support.
Late ports can still happen or could have been announced post January event if the Switch had a lackluster start. But after the performance so far especially in Japan I doubt they are sacrificing a lot of sales going Switch exclusive. The SMT fanbase will own the system, same way most people interested in Persona own a Playstation.
Yeah they are definitely less busy, where part of Kaneko art is "less is more" and "unique take on religious or mythological figure". One of the best examples of a demon drawn by Kaneko vs one by a guest artist is Lilith:
Kaneko first
The SMTIV guest artist:
Kaneko's is simple and illustrates her lore quite well.
The SMTIV one...wtf is going on here. They just seemed to keep drawing just to keep adding features and you get this mess that isn't really cohesive with the lore.
I get the sort of incomprehensible horror look they were going for with the angels and higher level demons but yea it didn't work me either. Please come back Kaneko. :(
edit: also those are some big ass images
Nocturne was always the black sheep.
I guess its kind of ironic that everyone likes that one the best and that Persona is the adored spin-offf
Atlus makes Exclusives because it allows them to focus on one device.
They make better games because of that
SMTIV is world-focused (as opposed to being plot-focused or character-focused). It takes a while to get going, but once it does it's pretty interesting—provided you aren't hoping for deep character relationships. The story is very much about the state of the world and you deciding your place in it. It's a story that's told primarily through exploration.
