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Shin Megami Tensei: Lucifer's Call

Published: Fri 13 Apr, 2007 | On:

Shin Megami Tensei: Lucifer's Call (referred to as "Lucifer's Call" from now) is an RPG much like pokemon, where you recruit creatures on your quest. The difference here is that instead of being joined by cute cuddly creatures like a Pikachu, you're gonna be convincing demons to join your party.

Story: In Lucifer's Call, you start out naming this teenager who is on his way to a hospital to visit his teacher. Once you get there, you hook up with a couple of friends and find that the hospital is deserted. You begin looking for your teacher and once you do, a bunch of things happen and the world ends. Seriously! The world is reduced to a demonic world and you have survived, having been turned into a demon too. Now, you have to find out what happened to your friends, your teacher and just what the hell is going on.

Gameplay: Combat is turn based and relies on your party consuming "press turns" for actions like attacking. Combat consists of melee attacks and magic attacks. Skill is rewarded where if you hit an enemie's weakness (fire vs ice, for example), you essentially gain a turn. Conversely, if you hit a resistance or your attack gets absorbed, you lose one or all you turns. Your party will consist of you and demons that you can recruit. The main character, and sometimes other demons, have a skill "talk" (for demons it is something like seduce, or beseech) that allows you to talk to a demon. That character goes up to a demon and initiates a conversation. If all goes well, the demon normally asks for money/items and then depending on the phases of the demonic moon known as kagutsuhi, it can either join your ranks or go crazy and keep on attacking. Some demons will not join, and others can not speak, so there are other methods of gaining demons.

Just like in Pokemon, once you convince a demon to join your party, you can use them in battle and level them up. A special process allows you to combine demons, making stronger ones which retain a couple of the skills from the parents. A great thing is that the skills transferred are randomized, and an expected "resulting monster" is shown, so you know what you are getting. If your new monster does not have the skills you want to give it, you can reselect the demons to fuse until the desired result is displayed. As for the evolution of the main character, leveling up gives you a point which you can put into strength, agility etc. Skills for the main character are gained through the digestion of certain parasites called "Magatama". They provide different skills and resistances so careful planning is needed if you want to learn a variety of skills. The pokemon formula of catch, use, exp, evolve, and breed all add up to an awesome experience used in a mature themed game.

I should warn that this game will test your patience a bit. Bosses require some planning to hit their weaknesses and to avoid them hitting yours. A badly formed party will die very quickly to a boss who keeps getting extra turns. There is no easy way to find resistances and weaknesses so it can be a bit of trial and error. Expect to die a few times if you haven't got your hands on a walkthrough.

Graphics: The graphics are adequate for an RPG - no lag or jagged edges. The demons themselves look great and there's a wide variety of them. The dark colours reflect the tone of the game well and the bosses are pretty cool. Fairly early on you will face bosses like Thor and Dante the demon hunter from Devil May Cry.

Sound: The music during battle is decent rock and the background music for each area is properly bleak and mysterious. There's no voice dialogue which makes the game a little plain, but on the whole you are not missing out on much.

So, if you enjoy the pokemon style of gameplay, do get this game. You will addicted for hours getting more demons and fusing them to get even more demons. And if you've played and enjoyed the later Shin Megami Tensei games like Digital Devil Saga 1 and 2, definitely get this game. You will recognise most of the skills and combat mechanics.