0 
0 Raidou Remastered: The Mystery of the Soulless Army is an action, RPG branching from the Shin Megami Tensei series. With the publishing power of ATLUS and the funding from SEGA, we finally get this game. This is a remaster of Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs. the Soulless Army. Originally released on the PlayStation 2 on October 10th, 2006, it was just one of several subseries under the SMT umbrella. I’m thrilled to get to play this game again after over a decade since my last playthrough, this time on PC! It’s honestly going to be a bit difficult to remember everything from that version over the remaster. But, I’m going to give it a shot!
Be it demon, human, or something in-between. As long as I got Gouto, my sword and my gun, nothing will stand in my way!
It’s the year Taisho 20 in Tokyo, Japan. We begin by meeting our main character, whom you can name as anything you want. Later, after successfully passing the trials shown to him, he is now Raidou Kuzunoha XIV! Basically, it’s the name any successor will receive to carry on the mantle of the legendary demon summoner. Afterwards, we start our lives in Tokyo, working in the Narumi Detective Agency.
For our first case, we get a call from a young lady wishing to meet at a bridge not far from the office. After approaching the meeting spot, she requests for us to kill her on the spot! Yet, before we can even ask anything useful, a smokescreen appears and the girl gets kidnapped. Consequently, we’ve found something bigger going on in the Capital, revealing a huge web of mysteries we have never seen until now.
Gameplay
Now with the story explained, I want to now point out some things that I’ve seen when playing the Remaster. From the get-go, the combat system didn’t just stick to its hack and slash roots, it slightly improved them as well. Basically, adding an easier way to access the demon summoning menu and items while fighting is amazing. Yet, I wish swapping out my sword skills was just as simple as swapping out demons, rather than having to go through a few menu selections. Some further mechanics I experienced were both the Devil’s Bane and Spirit Sword.
The Devil’s Bane is triggered from either attacking constantly or performing a perfect dodge. However, I’ve had quite some issues trying to pull off the perfect dodge multiple times, and only managed it accidentally.
Spirit Sword is an OP move that is great at clearing enemies, but only does a small amount of damage to Boss enemies. It has a gauge that fills up depending on your hit combo counter, rewarding aggressive gameplay. The other element I love about the Spirit Sword mechanic is the fact that it carries over between every fight. You can literally just hold onto it until the boss fight, or burn it anytime and fill it back up later.
Magic & Sword Alchemy
Another combat mechanic that I’m glad they changed was how the gun works. Instead of just looking at the enemy and firing your gun, you actually get to aim and shoot yourself to stun demons. With that, and getting to actually lock-in on our targets, these features were very much needed. One further change I noticed in the combat is the MP or MAG gauge. Previously, the demons and Raidou had their own MP gauge. Now, Raidou and the demons share a singular MAG bar that only recharges from Raidou’s light attacks.
Lastly, the branching skill tree — the Sword Alchemy — helps us make our Raidou very diverse. With the build options of either sword, spear, or axe, they each offer a different play style for all players. I normally stuck with either sword for both damage and speed, or spear for the wide and fast heavy attacks. Yet, choose wisely, since each weapon upgrade comes with a passive combat skill or a sword skill you can equip once unlocked.
Graphics & Audio
ATLUS really did a heck of a number on the graphics on this remaster. Before, whenever we walked around in town exploring, the background was mostly static images. Now, we have fully 3D rendered buildings to give the area more depth. Even though the camera angles are locked, and give me a slight tank control feel from it, it didn’t stop me from enjoying the detail added for each building and shire. Even the overworld map got a lot of love as well.
However, just because there was a lot of good, it doesn’t mean there isn’t some bad as well. For example, when heading into the dark world, the entire place is covered in a bright red glow. Unlike in the original where the whole dark world is, I don’t know… dark, giving players at the time a slight sense of fear from entering this unknown place for the first time. Hopefully they reverse this decision in the future if they choose to remaster Raidou Kuzunoha vs King Abbdon.
Another thing that got a complete glow up was the cutscenes themselves. Not only did they improve the models of the characters in the cutscenes, but it looks amazing on a 1080p widescreen. For those who don’t understand, the original game would bug out or stop working complete on our modern TV/monitors.
Voice Acting? In My Radiou?
Yet, speaking on the model upgrade, it seems the NPCs didn’t get the same treatment as the important characters that have actual voice lines. Yes, you read that right. Voice lines. This remaster spoiled us with giving every significant character a voice that each fit perfectly. Not only giving us Ray Chase as Gouto, Stephen Fu as Raidou, and Chris Okawa as Rasputin but to secretly cast Alejandro Saab as Yoshitsune and not telling us who voiced Ippon-Datara is a beautiful crime on its own. Meanwhile, the OST crafted by the godsend Shoji Meguro is still incredible. With the OST having a slightly touch-up, it still has the smooth rock jazz fusion that he’s well known for in the SMT series.
Longevity
So, if you’re going to play and are only going to straight through the story, it’ll take you about 20 hours. However, if you do Case Files (which are side quests) you’ll be looking at adding 7 more hours to your journey. Now, adding the crazy task of acquiring every demon from either the wild or fusion will add more time. Since the odds of having a fusion accident could take some time away from remembering the fusion list for the demon you wanted in the first place. So, either get a fusion calculator or get a notepad ready to make a reminder for each demon fusion.
Final Thoughts
Raidou Remastered: The Mystery of the Soulless Army is in my opinion the best way to remaster a game. Upgrading the art style, adding a few life improvements to certain mechanics, and giving a game that was once mute a voice, was absolute cinema. I was originally worried that they were going to only put on a new splash of paint and change nothing. Yet, I’m glad I was wrong on that front.
Getting to see a game I loved when I was in high school was finally getting attention is wonderful. Hopefully the attention that’ll convince ATLUS to give us the 2nd game as well, with maybe a new third game to the series?
I give Raidou Remastered: The Mystery of the Soulless Army the Thumb Culture Platinum Award.
Disclaimer: A code was received in order to write this review.
YouTube | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Discord | Podcast
About Author
