Shin Megami Tensei V opens with a high school student pulled off an ordinary Tokyo street and into Da’at, a post-apocalyptic realm where angels and demons are fighting over a dead god’s throne. It is the fifth mainline entry in Atlus’s long-running series, and it arrives on Nintendo Switch.
The premise is simple and it is not. The protagonist fuses with a mysterious man — the artificial Proto-Fiend Aogami — and becomes a Nahobino, a being who has regained divine Knowledge. Neither human nor demon, he is forbidden by the order the Creator built. Lucifer kills the Creator before the game even begins, and the power vacuum that follows is what the Nahobino walks into.
Trailer, via Nintendo of America.
Aogami and the Nahobino
Da’at is a full realm, not a corridor. It is divided into open areas with distinct environmental themes and distinct enemy populations, and the Nahobino moves through it freely: running, dashing at speed, jumping, slashing at objects or demons with his sword. Friendly NPCs hand out quests. Hidden beings called Miman grant Glory, an upgrade currency. Small orbs restore HP, MP and the Magatsuhi gauge. In some areas a companion character leads the Nahobino to items and treasure.
The game does not hold your hand through its world. It expects you to look at it.
The Press Turn System Still Bites
Combat is turn-based and it runs on the series’ Press Turn System. The party is the Nahobino plus up to three allied demons. Each side takes turns performing actions: a standard physical attack, skills that attack or heal or alter statistics, guarding, using an item, or escaping.
The hook is the Press Turn itself. Hit a weakness or land a critical and you gain an additional turn. Miss or void an attack and you lose one. That rule has been in the series for years, and in my reading of it, the system has rarely felt tighter. Every battle can turn into a negotiation with your own party’s weaknesses, and a sloppy turn can cost you.
New here are Magatsuhi Skills, activated when the Magatsuhi gauge is full. They add a layer of burst that the old system did not have, and they give you something to build toward in long fights.
Recruiting Demons in Da’at
The Nahobino recruits and fuses demons to fight alongside him, and that system is the spine of the whole game. Fusing is not a side activity. It is how you solve the Press Turn problem: you build a party that covers weaknesses, then you rebuild it when the enemies change.
Demon Abscesses block progress in some areas. They are growths surrounded by demon mobs, and you have to destroy them to move on. Enemy demons roam Da’at openly. You can engage them, and if you strike first you get the opening round. That advantage can be the difference between a clean fight and a wiped party.
Completing quests rewards experience points, which raise character levels, and Macca, the in-game currency.
Two Tokyos, One War
The story splits between modern-day Tokyo and Da’at. The Tokyo the protagonist returns to is not the true one. It is a copy generated by the Creator when the real city was swallowed by a supernatural phenomenon and became Da’at. The Bethel Organization, an alliance of divine beings and human operatives from around the world, keeps demons from leaving Da’at and spilling into the copy.
The moral structure is carried by supporting characters. Ichiro Dazai, friendly and dim-witted, represents Law. Bethel agent Yuzuru Atsuta represents Chaos. The rogue Shohei Yakumo and his demon companion Nüwa represent Neutrality. Around them: Tao Isonokami, Bethel’s mystical Saint; Yuzuru’s shy younger sister Miyazu; and Sahori Itsukishima, a bullied fellow student.
During an attack on the protagonist’s school, Miyazu is briefly kidnapped, and Sahori is influenced by the fallen deity Lahmu into killing her bullies and becoming its Nahobino. The protagonist is mortally wounded by Lahmu. Tao sacrifices herself to revive him.
Neither human nor demon, the newly-forged Nahobino and his friends must decide what is worth saving… and prepare to sacrifice everything in its name.
Multiple endings follow from in-game dialogue choices and alliances.
Where the Story Slips
Journalists praised the gameplay design and graphics, but faulted aspects of its story and technical performance. That split holds up. The alignment characters read as schematic, and Dazai, Yuzuru and Yakumo tend to carry their positions more than they carry themselves. Sahori’s arc is the sharpest thing in the script to my eye, and it ends too quickly. Tao’s sacrifice landed for me, but the game did not sit with it long enough.
The silent protagonist does not help. He is a vessel for choices, which is the point, but it leaves the emotional weight on characters who get fewer scenes than the world deserves.
None of this sinks the game. It just keeps it from being the best thing Atlus has ever made.
What Kazuyuki Yamai’s Team Built
Production on Shin Megami Tensei V began in 2016, with the aim of blending elements from Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne and Shin Megami Tensei IV. Returning staff included planner Kazuyuki Yamai, artist Masayuki Doi, and composers Ryota Kozuka and Toshiki Konishi. Development ran long because of the Unreal Engine and the Switch hardware.
That time shows in the exploration and the battle design. It shows less in the technical performance and least in the story, which is the part that needed another pass.
The original release sold over 1.1 million units worldwide by 2022. That number is not the argument. The argument is that Shin Megami Tensei V is the cleanest version of this series’ central idea: a world without its Creator, a throne nobody deserves, and a battle system that makes you earn every extra turn.
Da’at is the best thing here, to my mind. It is open and hostile and specific, and it rewards the player who treats it as a place rather than a menu. The demons you fuse are not collectibles. They are the answer to a problem the game keeps posing.
The flaws are real and they are mostly narrative. A stronger script would have pushed this into the top tier of the genre. What Atlus shipped instead is a role-playing game with a combat loop worth studying and a world worth crossing twice. For a series that has spent decades refining one idea, that is a strong return.
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