Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor

Did You Know?

• A drama CD based on the game was published by Frontier Works in August 2009.
• Two light novel anthologies were published by Harvest Publishing in August and September 2009.
• A manga adaptation ran in Kodansha's Monthly Shōnen Sirius from May 2012 to February 2016.

Gameplay

In Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor, a tactical role-playing game, you step into the shoes of a silent protagonist caught in a Tokyo lockdown. The story unfolds over seven days, with gameplay split between location visits and story sequences that use up half an hour on the in-game clock, plus combat encounters tied to the main plot or optional free battle arenas. Characters appear as sprite-based graphics on the field and static portraits during dialogue. Some story events happen at the same time, and picking one locks out the other; you can also fast-forward time to the next major story battle. Combat takes place on a top-down grid arena, while battles between parties shift to a first-person view, with information spread across the Nintendo DS’s two screens. You control up to four units, each made up of a human character and two assigned demons. Before battle, you position these units, and during their turn they can move, use special out-of-battle skills, or fight. Every action has a Turn Cost that affects where the character lands on the turn order timeline. When combat begins, the game switches to a first-person, turn-based system: each side gets one round of turns. Actions include standard physical attacks, skills that cost HP or MP to deal damage, heal, or change stats, and using items. You can choose auto-battle or take manual control. Both your party and enemy parties have a leader and two other fighters; defeating the leader instantly wins the battle. Landing critical hits or hitting weaknesses gives you an extra combat round. The game ends if you fail a predetermined battle condition or all your characters are knocked out. Winning fights rewards Macca and experience points for all party members, with bonuses based on wiping out the entire enemy team and how much damage you took. When the protagonist levels up, you get skill points to freely allocate to their stats; other characters and demons have fixed stat gains. Human characters learn new active and passive skills through Skill Crack: you target a skill from a specific enemy unit, then must defeat that unit with the squad you assigned. Once cracked, you can assign that skill to any human character.

Synopsis

Devil Survivor is set in modern Tokyo within the Yamanote Line. A demon outbreak prompts the Japanese government and Self-Defense Forces to lock down the area under the pretense of a major gas leak, cutting electricity and basic services. People use a program in their COMPs, small portable gaming devices, to contract demons and fight other demons and humans. Everyone receives a Death Clock, an invisible timer counting down seven days until everyone within the Yamanote Line dies. The silent protagonist, a high school student, receives exclusive warning messages from his COMP's Laplace Mail service and can see the Death Clock counters. He is joined by friends Atsuro Kihara and Yuzu Tanikawa. Over seven days they meet characters including Keisuke Takagi, Midori Komaki, Tadashi Nikaido, Yoshino Haruzawa, Eiji Kamiya, Mari Mochizuki, and Misaki Izuna. Key figures are Naoya, the protagonist's cousin who created the COMP's demon summoning functions, and Amane Kuzuryu of the Shomonkai cult. One day, the protagonist, Atsuro, and Yuzu receive modified COMPs from Naoya. Shortly after, a demon outbreak triggers the lockdown. Vigilante groups emerge, COMPs can recruit friendly demons, and the protagonist sees counters over people's heads indicating their death time, allowing him to change fates. Early on, Keisuke reveals everyone in the quarantine will die in seven days. After defeating the demon Beldr, the protagonist is recruited into the War of Bel, an effort by humans including the Shomonkai cult to access the Throne of Bel.

Development

Devil Survivor came from Atlus, the studio behind the Megami Tensei series. Several key staff members had worked on the Growlanser series before, including director and producer Shinjiro Takada, writer Yoh Haduki, and art director Akiko Kotō. Media.Vision helped create the backgrounds and environments. Suzuhito Yasuda, known for illustrating the Durarara!! light novels, designed the characters, while series veteran Kazuma Kaneko created new demons. The team wanted to make a tactical game that was friendly to newcomers, with a fresh story and art direction compared to other Megami Tensei games. They picked the Nintendo DS because of its big casual audience and dual screens. The time management feature came from Growlanser. The demon auctions and the pacing of both story and free battles were set up to make tactical play easier and give players quick access to demon fusion. Balancing the demons fairly while keeping the tactical challenge was tough, and Kotō said the team constantly pushed against the DS's video memory limits. The game was announced in October 2008 and came out in Japan on January 15, 2009, using the title Megami Ibunroku, which had appeared on Revelations: Persona to mark it as a spin-off connected to the main series. Atlus USA handled the English version, with Nich Maragos and Scott Strichart working on it. Unlike earlier Megami Tensei games, it received a Teen rating from the ESRB and launched in North America on June 23.

Reception

In its first week in Japan, Devil Survivor sold over 55,000 units, ranking third best-selling that week. By October 2009, Japanese sales exceeded 110,000 units against expectations of 100,000, and North American sales exceeded 40,000 against expectations of 25,000. Overclocked had first-week sales of over 21,000 units in Japan, reaching over 39,000 by year's end. The original game scored 84 out of 100 on Metacritic, indicating generally positive reviews. Famitsu noted the slower, more strategic combat as enjoyable, calling it difficult but exquisitely balanced. Jeremy Parish of 1Up.com praised the new spin on the Megami Tensei combat system while noting high difficulty. GameSpot's Lark Anderson praised combat design, story, and customization, but complained that clear marking of storyline missions made other events useless. Joe Juba of Game Informer enjoyed combat and story but faulted chance elements and low graphical quality. Mark Bozen of IGN praised story and the blend of tactical RPG with Megami Tensei mechanics, and the art design despite lack of variety, but faulted the soundtrack's repetitive nature. Michael Cunningham of RPGamer praised story and gameplay but noted lack of variety in artwork and music.