Remaking a game released all of two and a half years ago must seem strange. Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclocked is an update of the DS’ earlier Devil Survivor, a tactical RPG that let players build their own squad of fantasy-style monsters and fight their way through a demon invasion in modern Japan. The core of that game is intact, with a variety of new content that makes this basically the ’director’s cut’. While one can question the need for such an edition, it’s worth noting that the original Devil Survivor still commands a fair amount of its original retail price today so this improved re-release could be a very good purchase for some people and particularly those who missed out on the previous game. Much of this review’s content will be aimed at that crowd, thus.
With the story taking place in modern Japan, players are given control of a small group of teens caught up in what initially appears to just be a gas explosion that ends in the government erecting a ’lockdown’ throughout much of Tokyo. Your characters are among those now trapped, and have to survive both the ensuing demon invasion plus society struggling to cope with a loss of electricity, dwindling food and medicine, and soldiers willing to enforce the lockdown with lethal force. All of this takes place over several in-game days, each such ’day’ taking about two to five hours of play time depending on how thorough you are in exploring the plot. There is a lot to see in the story, with any given day having about three or four major fights and double to triple that in story segments.
Player freedom is one of the major themes in Devil Survivor, and while it isn’t a ’sandbox RPG’ by any means you’re given plenty of options to pursue. The plot itself has several different routes to follow, and while though they do share some mandatory events across each day they are on the whole a varied and interesting mix that asks some very deep questions about modern society. How would we as a whole react to large scale city lockdowns, the loss of common utilities, and a lack of information? How would individuals react to demons running loose, diminishing supplies, and an unusual lack of official reaction to the events going on in the lockdown circle? These themes, along with several character-interest pieces and exploring mysteries, are all handled quite well. The vast majority of the storyline, previously told through just text, now has good voice acting accompanying it to add more emotional weight and this is one of Overclocked’s more noteworthy features.
This emphasis on freedom carries over to battles as well. You’re given over a hundred different creatures to put in your teams, with each offering different advantages and drawbacks. Many of them struggle to remain relevant in the middle and late game segments, though devoted players will find ways to extend the ’service life’ of just about any creature in some way or another. Combat takes place in a two-step process, with groups of creatures taking turns moving through a tactical grid. When a group of enemies meets with you, the fight then shifts to a turn-based RPG format and each side goes at it for a few rounds. If a conclusive winner is determined then the losing group is eliminated and tactical turns continue, but it’s quite common for neither side to win on their first engagement. In such cases, successive fights on later turns may resolve the matter or you may find it smarter to simply have several of your teams gang up on one target. While tactical movement and combat are both relatively simple in layout, the sheer variety of creatures to use keeps things interesting.
While this is a very good tactical RPG, there are a few problems worth discussing. The most significant is that a few missions in the early and very late game segments are set up with very frustrating enemy groups and difficult goals. For example, one early fight has your characters protecting a group of civilians fleeing from demons and you lose if even one civilian dies. This normally wouldn’t be a problem, but the demons often overtake them before you can even get close with a normal team. Such stages end up being more like puzzles as a result, since you have to figure out the correct mix of movement skills and attacks to quickly solve the problem... and even then there is still a little luck involved. A few later stages offer their own twists on this ’combat as puzzle’ idea, though they are thankfully not the norm. Strangely, Overclocked seems to have either a bug or undocumented change in regard to your main hero. Most stages indicate the game will end if he dies, and your other characters act like all hope is lost if he’s defeated. Nonetheless, in all but a few stages this isn’t so and play will continue as normal. It’s either a recurring glitch or something they forgot to adjust the script for, but it’s a welcome feature all the same and means you don’t have to babysit your hero character all the time.
Despite those rough edges, there’s no doubt that Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclocked is a decent update of a very good game. Whether I can recommend it for purchase or not depends on several factors, however. If you already own the original, you have to ask: "Is excellent voice acting, various minor (very minor) visual touch-ups, what appear to either be balance improvements or bugs that actually make the game better, and an extended end-game segment worth $40 all over again?" It might be, especially if you can get a decent sale/trade price for your old copy and want to explore the new content. If you haven’t played the original and have a 3DS, then this becomes much easier to recommend; the only criteria is that you enjoy Tactical RPGs such as Final Fantasy Tactics, Disgaea, Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars, Front Mission, and so on. If you don’t own the original version and are debating which one to buy, this is definitely the one to get. A quick scan through online sales suggests the old game still costs about $30 USD new in box or $20 used, while this is $40. It easily has enough content to justify the extra ten dollars, offering one of the better tactical RPG experiences on the 3DS at this time.
