With all the MMO subs I have running, tonight I dove back into the Megaten beta. I guess I’ll call it that, rather than Shin Megami Tensei or Persona Online, since that’s what it’ll be called in NA. I snagged a few screenshots but the screenie function is kind of not-great. The game looks much sharper than these screens would indicate.
Tonight I finished my training, which took a while as I got the hang of chaining attacks and allowing for charging time for defenses and what not. Then I headed out on my first quest, to bring back a Pixie Leader. We needed scales from her wing to cure a wounded comrade.
It took me a while to figure out how to “tame” the pixie; hopefully in release players will get a bit of extra handholding. And once I did, she floated along beside me with the title “Treated like a slave by Gillain”!! Hmph. I need to do something about that!
There’s a lot to this game, though. I spend a lot of time running around gawking at the demons that other players have summoned. There are cards that you find that, presumably, can get you demons. I’ve got a piece of gear that needs fixing, so I’m guessing there’s some kind of crafting. And the combat is quite fun (and a bit challenging) so far. Skills are increased by using them, and there are no firm classes. As you gain levels (so yeah, you do get levels) you get points to spend on your attributes. If you’re going to be doing a lot of melee, you boost strength. Mages will boost magic and gunners will boost agility. Then you have a big bunch of skills and choose which of those you want to improve. Once “toggled on” every time you use those skills you gain expertise in them. Gain enough and that skill levels up.
I still don’t have a full grasp of all that’s going on, but I’m *really* liking what I’ve seen so far. But keep in mind that I really enjoyed the Playstation versions of Persona, too.
Learn how to train a pixie below this guy. Spoiler Alert!
You have to use the “Greeting” skill (it should be on your hotkey bar by default..in the Skills window its labeled as “Talk”) on the Pixie Leader 3 times. After that, she’ll either join you or get bored and leave. Just keep trying until she says something about wanting to come along. Once she says that she’ll morph into a green egg-shaped thing which you can click on and collect, and after that you can summon her.
Errrrr… that thing in the last pic is a pixie? /cleans contact lenses
And OMG seriously? Skills that improve as you use them? Asheron’s Call flashbacks……….. /twitch
I have too much going on to even try to get involved in this, but please keep us posted. I didn’t think I’d like anime-styled games, but they’re looking better and better and I did like FF-whateverthenumber was when I played it yonks ago (a console version, not the MMO).
Also, check your email 😉
LOL, no, the pixie is the little critter floating in that first blurry picture (I hacked the resolution settings which might be why screenshots are so fugly). That last guy was a… erm, I forget what he was called, but one of the things you had to fight in the virtual trainer levels.
Do you know when megaten will be out of beta in the U.S. I played persona 4 on the ps2 and liked it. I played megaten and loved it but i had to do a complete system restore on my laptop. So I am trying to wait but the game monkey is on my back.