Shin Megami Tensei IV : Part-way Post 2 (and a little review?)

It's been longer than I thought I would do another post, so I actually went quite far in the game...
But anyways...

 

So yeah, the route I am going on has been decided, Law.

I just finished the White and Black Forest and am preparing to enter the last dungeon to fight Lucifer and such demons

Merkabah is on my side for the journey, as shown in this picture below.

 

 Anyways, so far, it has been a pretty good game. It is fun collecting and fusing demons. In a way, it almost feels like Pokemon, collecting and breeding them and trying to get your favorite moveset. However, you have a far smaller limit to the amount you can carry at once, so I always spend a bit of time trying to fuse demons to free up space. All kinds of demons and plenty of female-types, from moe (like Najya) to gruesome.

The story is satisfactory. I've never really been that good at reviewing stories, so I can't say much, but it is good enough. I had a hard time deciding what to do, especially deciding between Law or Chaos, but I generally went with how I felt.

The battle balance is merciless and hard, but it does get easier. At the beginning, there are very few options and that makes it hard, but once you get further into the game and have more options, it is easier to prepare for bosses. For instance, if you fight a boss and realize he uses Gun and Fire skills. Then you can bring out your demons that negate or reflect Fire and a demon that can use Tetorakan. If the boss uses Instead Death skills, bring out someone that knows Tetorajya (protects party from instant death once). And because absorbing and reflecting the boss's attack ends their turn, you can gain a big advantage. Of course, poking at their weakness is important too. 

The important thing to notice is that there is no such thing as Defense in this game. You only got your HP and the resistance, negation, and weakness that changes depending on what you are wearing. As you can see on the very top pic, I am currently wearing something that gives my protagonist resistance to physical and gun attacks. On the backside, he is weak against the two instant death types, but few enemies use those attacks and they can be blocked with Tetorajya. But because there is no defense, it is really important to attack first. If your opponent does, they can deal quite the damage. If you go first, you can at least lower the number of enemies that will attack you on their turn.

No problem with field movement, but the way you face after exiting rooms and such confuses me at times. Just not used to it.

And... that's about it?

Anyways, great game, though it was expensive. Once I complete the game, I will go through Chaos and Neutral, but I do want to stop at one place and train around and breed around. You know, get the perfect Alice or something like that? Haha.

Anyways, some pics and descriptions. The only members I always keep are Nekomata and Cherub, right now, with the final slot changing depending on the circumstances.

My protagonist's skills so far:

The level 3 skills for the four main elements, Energy Drain (absorbs HP and MP), Mekidora (level 2 Almighty skill, Sukukajya (increases party's accuracy and evasion), and a physical attack.

As you can see, I have decided to mainly focus magic, because there are far more demons weak to these elements than there are weak against Gun and Physical.

 

Cherub:

Yes, this is the Angel from the previous post. For some reason, she changes genders into a male and pretty much stays that way. Well, she might have changed back to a female once or twice, but they didn't really look female.

Anyways, evolving allows you to bypass the level restrictions, so the Angel and her evolutions will generally stay above your level until they reach their final form.

 

 Nekomata:

Mascot. Evolved her from a Kabuso to Senri and finally to this. The description for Senri says the final form is her, but that clearly isn't the case.

As I have kept Nekomata for a while, she is pretty low on the level-side, compared to the evolving Angel series or demons I fused or recently got. But her Tetorakan (reflects physical and gun attacks for one turn) is very useful.

It is true that there are other demons that can use it, but well, I just feel like using her. 

Unlike Senri, despite being humanoid, her voice is a cat instead of human.

 And here is my current stock. Most of them are constantly updated and fused to fill up the demon-dex, but others that I can't fuse to get anything strong and new, I fuse them with weak older demons to just fill up the demon-dex, such as Sylph, Kinki, and Raksis, as shown on the 2nd pic below.
I haven't fused away Lilith............ just because.

It's always good to have different demons that can deal with different circumstances in your stock. For instance, I call Yarilo against bosses that use Instant Death (Tetorajya protects entire party once).

This Asura just has a lot of resistances and negations. He's also my stock's Bad Company-user, if I must need him. Also gave him Dragon's Reaction from Seiryu.

And that's about it this time.