Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga review

Wednesday 20 July 2006
The first thing to be said about Digital Devil Saga is that this is no typical RPG. There are no medieval towns, no princesses in towers, no crazy stuffed toy style characters and you most definitely will not save the world. It's already been destroyed you see?

This is a post-apocalyptic nightmare of a world known as the Junkyard, where our 'hero' Serph and the other members of the Embryon Clan that he commands fight five other tribes.

The winners will supposedly be transported to Nirvana. It all goes pear-shaped when, in the middle of a tribe battle, a weird alien organism is struck by a blinding light from the sky, causing every person on the planet to develop the ability to change into a demon and eat each other. We hate it when that happens.

The story may be sprawling and weird but it's certainly compelling enough to make you want to buy the forthcoming Digital Devil Saga 2 to see how it all turns out.

From the very start you'll find battles surprisingly easy to navigate. The enemies are interesting and smart, changing tactics, calling in reinforcements and healing each other as they go. They'll also attack your weaknesses - using a fire spell on a character with low resistance to flames and so forth.