Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey: Difference between revisions

** The last question you must answer when you first get the Demonica is: "You have been sent to the Schwarzwelt, where conditions are expected to be harsh. Yet you have advanced equipment, a strong ship, the latest tech, and dependable comrades. Will the Schwarzwelt investigation mission succeed?". The only valid answer is "Yes".

** Played straight at the end of the Neutral path: {{spoiler|"Transfer your power to Arthur?"}} The game doesn't even ''give'' you a "No" option.

* [[Character Alignment]]: It's even [[Color Coded for Your Convenience]]. Blue is Lawful, red is Chaotic, white is Neutral. It's important for several reasons; if you strike an enemy's weakness, all party members of the same alignment smack the enemy for bonus damage. It's also difficult for a Lawful or Chaotic player character to recruit a demon of the opposing alignment (they're ambivalent if you're Neutral). That said, once you've got them working for you, there's nothing stopping you from having party members of every alignment.

** Even Jimenez and Zelenin's Demonicas are telling you their alignment. And their skin color, too.

*** [[Fridge Brilliance|That's why they need]] {{spoiler|Zelenin.}}

** Slime's Compendium entry refers to the demon and human realms as [[Digital Devil Story|Atzilith and Assiah]].

* [[Cosmetic Award]]: In the menu, you can find a list of various things you've accomplished, an amusing description to go along with it, and a title or "medal" case that serves as nothing more than bragging rights. Some of the things you have to pull off are impressive, like beating hidden bosses. Others are silly, like slamming into the walls 255 times (which you'll likely do a lot by accident anyway).

* [[Cosmic Egg]]: While it's never stated whether or not the universe itself hatched from them, the Cosmic Eggs of the game [[End of the World Special|have the power to remake the Earth as a world of absolute Law or Chaos.]] {{spoiler|[[Take a Third Option|They can also be detonated in order to destroy the Schwarzwelt instead]]}}.

* [[End of the World Special]]: {{spoiler|Subverted in the neutral ending; you have Arthur destroy the Schwarzwelt instead. Played straight in the other endings; you throw the Cosmic Eggs into the Vanishing Point and create a world of Law/Chaos.}}

* [[Enemy Chatter]]: ''[[Shin Megami Tensei]]'''s signature Demon Negotiation is taken above and beyond the series' standards. Particularly amusing ones often cross into [[Crowning Moment of Funny]], such as scaring "young women"-type demons with ghost stories or getting [[Orochi|a legendary man-eating serpent]] [[Always Save the Girl|to protect you]] after convincing it [[Blatant Lies|you're a beautiful woman]].

* [[Enemy Scan]]: Another function of the Demonica suit. However, in order to fully analyze a demon, including type, weaknesses, HP, skills, et al, you must encounter them and defeat them several times; if they're already in your party, their actions can also be analyzed by the Demonica and boost the scan rate.

* [[Energy Economy]]: It's not certain if the demons regard Macca as energy, but since you're humans and therefore completely outside the demonic market, energy is almost all it's good for (besides bribing opposing demons to join your side). See [[No Hero Discount]] below.

** The Red Sprite, the Lightning, Elve, and Blue Jet are all named after atmospheric phenomena.

* [[The Mirror Shows Your True Self]]: {{spoiler|Amaterasu and the Tamashiro Mirror}}.

* [[Those Two Guys]]: Irving and Chen, your inventors in the laboratory. Well, Chen is technically a woman, but the trope is otherwise played straight.

* [[The Very Definitely Final Dungeon]]: {{spoiler|Sector Horologium, the center of the Schwarzwelt. Not only does the area resemble primordial earth, as one character notes, but it's also where Mem Aleph, the [[Big Bad]] behind the Schwarzwelt, lives. This is also where the SMT games' traditional alignment-locking event happens.}}

* [[Villainous Breakdown]]: Mitra when you confront him in his palace, and {{spoiler|Mastema}} in the Chaos path.

* [[Villainous Glutton]]: Horkos. Dear god, Horkos.

* [[We Cannot Go on Without You]]: In the same vein as recent [[Mega Ten]] games. Protagonist dies, Schwarzwelt swallows Earth, game over. He is the only thing that is tying those demons down and once he kicks it, there is nothing stopping the demons from calling it quits right then and there and just ditching your dead body to the enemy, even if they are on the lawful side of the spectrum.

** While demons can be revived as often as needed with revival beads, resurrecting dead humans seems to be impossible {{spoiler|by conventional means}}, as quite a lot of human characters bite it over the course of the story.