Shin Megami Tensei II

"Several decades after the great destruction... While cultivating the wilderness, fighting off packs of demons, and through countless deaths, humanity survived... but people were not strong enough to survive without someone or something to cling to or to rely on... The Mesian religion preached the advent of a savior, gathered together believers and built a city on the site of the old cathedral..."

"The city came to be known as Tokyo Millenium."

- Shin Megami Tensei II intro, Aeon Genesis English version.

The second game in the Shin Megami Tensei JRPG series and direct sequel to Shin Megami Tensei I. It was released in Japan in 1994 for the Super Nintendo, with remakes coming out for the Playstation and Game Boy Advance in 2002 and 2003 respectively.

At the end of Shin Megami Tensei, the protagonist decided to create a world where the forces of Law and Chaos could exist freely, and people would have the freedom to make their own choices. Well one hundred years later and something has clearly gone wrong with that initial plan. Demons run freely throughout the wastelands of the world, the air is unbreathable and the only place where humans can live is an encapsulated city called Tokyo Millennium, run by the Messians.

The main character is Hawk, a amnesiac gladiator living in the Valhalla district of Tokyo Millennium. The citizens of Valhalla regularly fight in a tournament for the prize of being allowed to live in the Center district, a place of luxury which is completely free of demons. Hawk wins one such tournament and gains his citizenship in the Center, only to find out from the leader of the Messian religion that his true identity is Aleph, the prophesied Saviour of the human race who will bring about a paradise called the Thousand Year Kingdom.

Aleph is set to work by the Center eradicating demons in preparation for the Thousand Year Kingdom, but as he fights he bears witness to the various tragedies brought about by the Center's rule, eventually learning that the Thousand Year Kingdom necessitates the complete genocide of everyone outside of the Center. But then again, the alternative is allowing the last bastion of human life to be over-run by demons. Should Aleph fulfil his destiny and become the Thousand Year Kingdom's champion, or should he turn to the other side and bring down Tokyo Millennium?

Main characters:


 * Hawk/Aleph - The silent protagonist. The Designated Hero of the Messians. Using the Demon Summoning Program, he can converse with and recruit demons into his party.
 * Hiroko - A Temple Knight of the Messians. She meets Aleph whilst searching for a missing scientist and shares a immediate rapport with him. Eventually becomes your main female companion. Appears to have forgotten her pants.
 * Beth - A Temple Knight of the Messians assigned to aid Aleph in establishing the Thousand Year Kingdom. She tells Aleph that she will be his "eternal partner"... and the last time someone called you that in a MegaTen game, things didn't work out so well.
 * Zayin - A Temple Knight of the Messians. He is completely devoted to the Center at the beginning of the game, but after witnessing some of the less moral acts that they commit, he begins to reconsider his allegiance.
 * Gimel - A quirky young man with a harp who rules over the beautiful forest of Arcadia. He seems to be unusually knowledgeable on Aleph and the Center, so can you trust him?
 * Daleth - An arrogant man who shows up and proclaims himself to be the true Saviour. Clearly, you're going to have to kick his ass.

Yes, the game is chock-full of religious symbolism, but this was before it became popular to oversaturate your work with it. It uses the same system as Shin Megami Tensei but refines several aspects, such as the fact that you can now access your minimap with a single button press rather than having to go through three menu screens. The graphics and environments have been improved, though the difficulty is still as high as ever. Also, several features that would go on to be mainstays in the Shin Megami Tensei series were added, such as fusion accidents and skill inheritance from "parent" demons.

Though the game was never released in the West, a group called Aeon Genesis has released a translation patch for the ROM.

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Tropes seen in this game:

 * After the End
 * Anticlimax Boss: The Twelve Shinshou. They are mentioned as early as, and you start to mentally prepare for an epic Boss Rush that requires careful conservation of resources... only to find out that they're complete pushovers who die in 1-4 turns, have trouble consistently hitting your party and yield less XP than a Random Encounter.
 * Artificial Human:.
 * As Long As There Is Evil:.
 * But Thou Must: For the first part of the game. Eventually you get the freedom to make your own choices.
 * Character Alignment: Measured by two axis: Law-Neutral-Chaos and Light-Neutral-Dark. Your alignment affects what demons you can recruit (Lawful demons will not contract with a Chaotic protagonist and vice versa) and if you can use certain pieces of equipment.
 * Crapsack World: Earth, AKA Malkuth. The environment is permanently polluted from a catastrophic nuclear war that happened centuries ago, demons are everywhere, what might be the last human civilization on Earth is run by a bunch of sadistic, genocidal ChurchMilitants, and depending on your actions,.
 * Clone Jesus:.
 * Church Militant: The Messians are back, and are now even stronger and more genocidal than ever. However, they are the rulers of Tokyo Millennium, one of the last stable human civilizations left in the entire world. The Gaian Church also appears, but is significantly less important this time around.
 * Dark Messiah: Daleth. You can choose to make Aleph one of these too.
 * Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu: ?
 * Disc One Nuke / Game Breaker: There are 2 races of demons that correspond to both Gaians and Templars which are composed entirely of trained humans, and, since they aren't demons in the strict sense, they don't follow the same rules regular demons do, and give random demons of a certain alignment depending of the fused human and demon; this by itself is not very impressive, but rather, that the result of the fusions can be of a higher level that Aleph its theoretically possible, if one has enough patience to summon Metatron a lot earlier to what its intended, and what's worse, its possible to do this on Valhalla, the first area on the game, since the weakest Gaian that appears there has a random encounter and its only level 8, which means its entirely possible to have a full team of end-game demons fused before even the second dungeon is finished.
 * End of the World Special
 * Fake Memories
 * Fate Worse Than Death: The Updated Rerelease of Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne implies this happens to . What do you expect when you commit ?
 * Designer Babies
 * God: Actually identified as "YHVH".
 * God Is Evil: And how..
 * Heroic Sacrifice:.
 * Historical Villain Upgrade: Aleister Crowley now has real magic powers, is keen on performing demon "rituals", and sports a One Winged Angel form named Master Therion, who has a big dick in his concept art, paying homage to Crowley's own drawings of demons. He's also horny and completely batshit insane. It's difficult to tell if he's the real Crowley, and it's also left a mystery to the ages if he is actually killed when you defeat him in battle.
 * Hot Shounen Mom:.
 * Karma Meter: The Law/Neutral/Chaos alignments. Law is associated with kind actions and generally maintaining order and rules, Chaos is associated with being cruel and being free, and Neutral is based on keeping a balance between the two Chaos and Law and refusing to ally with members associated with any alignment.
 * Kill Em All:.
 * Knight Templar: The elite Messians of the Center, including the Temple Knights, and the Angels.
 * Inside a Computer System:.
 * Lotus Eater Machine:.
 * Louis Cypher: Two of them, actually.
 * Multiple Endings
 * Mutants: There is a small mutant population living in the ruins of Old Tokyo. Apart from blue skin, and a few with deformities they seem relatively healthy. This didn't stop the Centre from oppressing them and preventing them from leaving the Underworld.
 * Nintendo Hard
 * No Campaign for The Wicked: Just like previous game, Aleph's Law-Chaos alignment can be change, but his virtue is fixed to Light
 * No Export for You: For a whole boatload of reasons.
 * No Ontological Inertia:
 * Nonstandard Game Over: Due to the game mechanics, if Aleph should be in a dying state in the second fight with Daleth after you beat him then you'll get a game over in the middle of the next cutscene because . A bit of a Tear Jerker when you realize that this means that.
 * Not the Fall That Kills You: Averted. You can get punched in the face by demons, even those much weaker than you, and get hurt. But get thrown out of for  and you fall hundreds of feet to the surface without so much as a single hit point lost.
 * One Hit Kill: "Satan points his finger!" "YHVH let out it's voice!"
 * One Winged Angel:.
 * Order Versus Chaos
 * Pieta Plagiarism: See the page image.
 * Plot Relevant Age Up
 * Rage Against the Heavens: Chaos has this in spades, and Neutral applies because you have to reject both sides to maintain that alignment. But Law also counts, since
 * Satan: aka
 * Stripperiffic: Almost all of the women seen in the dance clubs dress this way.
 * That's No Moon: Mountains seen in Makai and the Underground are actually the spines of the giant dragon Kuzuryu. They actually move. The top of Tokyo Millennium is, in fact,
 * Wave Motion Gun: The Megiddo Arc.
 * Word of God:
 * Younger Than They Look
 * Younger Than They Look