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This excellent Xenogears study guide inspired me to attempt to create something similar for the Megami Tensei franchise, which I have dubbed Megatengaku (メガテン学, ‘Megami Tensei Studies’) thus far. For now, I have collected some random materials that I used for my MA thesis (e.g. interviews about, and random text dumps from Strange Journey), but considering the scope of the franchise, I figured I might as well appeal to its passionate fan community.

Currently, I am in the process of translating materials that have been published only in Japanese, such as an interview with Kazuma Kaneko regarding Strange Journey, summaries of the Digital Devil Story novels  and a digitalisation of aKyuuyaku Megami Tensei player’s guide (pretty random, heh).

I would like to compile an archive of Megami Tensei materials, which may lead to articles or essays that treat the archive as its sources. Therefore, I kindly request that if you happened to have stumbled upon articles (such as this report of Nocturne’s launch party or Gamasutra’s interview met Kaneko) that might be relevant for such a study guide – regardless of the article is still available online or only through the Internet Archive Wayback Machine – please drop me a message with a link or, if you feel like it, the entire article in text format. High-res scans of paper articles, regardless of language, are also welcome. The same goes for questions, tips, critique and pictures of Black Frost.

If it appears that not only I am interested in this project, I will try to shift my working space from my local computer to this place.

– Guan van Zoggel

2014年05月31日

It has been a while – almost four months to be exactly – and although I would like to say I have not been sitting still, I must admit I have (been busy with other projects). Eefara, however, took over and added a great number of game pages to the archive, including transcriptions of the manuals and boxes, and did some general tweaking through the games section. Thanks a lot, Eefara!

Games > Persona

Games > Devil Survivor

Games > Devil Children/DemiKids

Games > Last Bible

Games > Stand-alones

Not only Eefara, artemis-maia, too, has been very active in the past few months and produced a number of articles, including the continuation of her comparisons of Persona 2 characters to Greco-Roman myths. She continues her exploration of deities by moving on to Persona 3, discussing Orpheus, Athena, Isis and Penthesilea so far. She also delves into Devil Survivor in her musings on the first murderer and the first martyr.

Background articles > artemis-maia’s musings

For the next update, I will try to finish the Kaneko interview that’s still in progress.

2014年02月09日

It’s 2014, and there is a lot of Megaten goodness ahead of us!

In various interviews, the Maniax team behind Shin Megami Tensei IV indicated they are planning to expand SMTIV’s universe by releasing a World Analysis book and the highly anticipated four-disc soundtrack at the end of this month. While Japan and Northern America have finished their four playthroughs by now, Europa is still waiting for a release date for SMTIV. It doesn’t seem to be part of the 2014 line-up, unlike Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem strangely enough. In the meanwhile, the Persona team started releasing one-minute videos of Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth, which can be watched on Atlus’ YouTube channel. Oh, and then there’s a bit of news on the themes in Persona 5.

In the course of this weekend, the following game pages have been added. The majority of the transcriptions are submitted by Eefara, who I would like to thank once again.

Games > Shin Megami Tensei

Games > Devil Summoner/Raidou Kuzunoha

Games > Persona

Games > Digital Devil Saga

Games > Last Bible

In addition to these pages, artemis-maia published two articles on comparisons between Persona 2 characters and Greco-Roman myths, and a write-up filled with spoilers on the endings of the mainline Shin Megami Tensei titles. Enjoy! 

Background articles > artemis-maia’s musings

2013年12月23日

Just a small update to fix the loose ends I actually forgot to include in last update.

Artbooks

Background articles > artemis-maia’s musing

Happy holidays. May the transition from The Year of Luigi to The Year of Raidou Kuzunoha the XIV be a chaotic one. Or lawful, whatever you prefer.

2013年12月01日

For a website dedicated to materials on a particular game franchise, it struck me as remarkable that almost a year has passed since the establishment of Megatengaku and that virtually no time was spent on actual pages about the games. Let’s change this per now. 

Games > Megami Tensei

Games > Shin Megami Tensei

While the Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei is still a partially finished transcription of the manual, there are some illustrations from the manual that might interest some of you. The Shin Megami Tensei game pages are mostly brand new, with some information on the differences between the many versions of the first instalment, the differences between the many packages the Japanese version of Nocturne came in, and transcriptions of boxes and manuals by the kind eefara.

Also new are three interviews with Kazuma Kaneko, which were originally published in an appendix to the Kazuma Kaneko Works. I’ve translated the third one, of which scans have been provided by the generous Primaeros. There is an additional page, in which Kaneko answers some questions by pen; I’ll try to add this later. As usual, I feel the translation is kind of rough, so please contact me if you feel something could get improved.

Interviews > Artbooks

The DDS-NET’s Serebii inspired compendium I mentioned during the previous update has expanded its compendia to even the shores of NINE (y’know). I did some additional translation work (mostly demon skills) to express my appreciation and support for this initiative. And with the Atlus USA’s forums closing, a forum dedicated to the Megaten series was founded on DDS-NET as well. Over 170 people already registered and many interesting discussions have flourished, but hey – what else did you expect with a Shin Megami Tensei IV inspired theme this gorgeous? How about signing up right now?

Have a great holiday season and make sure you pick up some interesting deals, like this one, this weekend! See you in 2014.

2013年11月01日

As of today, Atlus’ parent company Index Corporations is officially a subsidiary of Sega Sammy Holdings as Sega’s Dream Corporation, which in turn has been renamed to Index Corporation with Yakuza series producer Toshihiro Nagoshi and Atlus USA president Naoto Hiraoka on the company’s board. It is likely that Devil Survivor 2 Break Code‘s second delay, pushing the remake back to 2014, is due to these business transfers and shuffles.

Franchise > Games > Kyūyaku Megami Tensei

  • Updated the in-game information page by putting the data in tables, added magic skills and finished the list of demons sort by race for KMT’s Megami Tensei. Data for the second KMT game will follow soon.

Readings > Background articles

  • Tumblr user artemis-maia, who zealously writes about the Megami Tensei series in relation to religion, mythology and symbolism on Tumblr, will henceforth publish these articles under artemis-maia’s musings as well.

Essays

In the background, kouhai buromu is working on the translation of the summary of the third Digital Devil Story novel whilst I myself try to put Kazuma Kaneko’s interview and art process description from 2003’s Comickers into proper English.

To wrap up this update, I’d like to call attention to three interesting projects. There’s Dsyfo’s Tumblr with ongoing Megami Tensei romhacks, the heavily Megaten inspired promising indie game Gate at Indie DB and DDS-NET’s Serebii inspired compendium.

2013年09月29日

This update would not have been this voluminous without the efforts and devotion of Atlus forums member Eefara, who has been submitting numerous interviews, background articles and transcribing segments of artbooks and game manuals over the past two months. I have not been able to add all of Eefara’s submissions in this update, though. More will follow.

In order to properly present this increasing stream of materials, I have made minor adjustments to the website. The ‘Interviews‘ section has become a subsection of ‘Readings‘ alongside ‘Artbooks‘ and ‘Background articles‘. Hopefully this will be considered an improvement.

I also finished translating the Nakama Cards of the Devil Children card game. Whilst I do not think many have been looking forward to seeing this getting translated, I prioritised this particular translation to build up a translation memory (alongside the Kazuma Kaneko Works trilogy) which may help to make subsequent translations easier and more consistent. Especially translating names of mythological creatures can be tricky, which I hope to have largely covered now.

Compendium

Readings > Artbooks

Readings > Background articles

Readings > Interviews > Magazine articles

Readings > Interviews > Website articles

2013年09月14日

By now, most of you probably have finished their first cycle through the land of the Unclean Ones in Shin Megami Tensei IV. Some even managed to complete their demon compendium. We have once again come to love, ridicule and slaughter beloved ones. With that, it’s time for another update.

Games

  • Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei, for which the manual is being transcribed for reference purposes. Artwork from the manual is provided as well.

Compendium

  • Kazuma Kaneko Works trilogy, for which an index has been made based on the ID (page number), common name in English, Japanese name and game the demon is associated with in the trilogy.

Website articles

Since last update, I’ve been fortunate enough to obtain most Megami Tensei associated games that were released before the 2000s. Over time, I will scan the boxes, manuals and other materials that can be found in the box, and upload these to Megatengaku. Tips on scanning these precious materials without ruining the source are very welcome.

I also need to thank the people who have been submitting materials through the Tumblr of Megatengaku. These submissions have not found their way to the website yet, but I’m planning to include these in the next update.

To conclude, if you’re using Tumblr and not following artemis-maia yet, you might want to do so. She’s regularly writing snack-sized though-provoking essays on Shin Megami Tensei in relation to religion, like this one on Milton’s Paradise Lost. Great stuff.

2013年07月13日

With a brand new main instalment of the Shin Megami Tensei series looming at the horizon (some of you might already be the proud owner of a copy), it is only fitting that the minor updates added over the course of last months receive an update. The additions are not Shin Megami Tensei IV focused only, though.

Website articles

Game guides

While the first two websites articles are clearly focused on recent developments, the interviews found in game guides might require some clarification. The former is an interview with Cozy Okada and Kazuma Kaneko for the PlayStation remake of Shin Megami Tensei, while the latter is an interview from 1994 regarding the sequel with the same gentlemen and scenario/event writer Ryutaro Ito, which you can see in this fancy picture I happened to stumble upon here.

New is the addition ‘Developer’ and the page ‘Atlus Historia’, which chronicles the events from the establishment of Atlus in April 1986 up until 2009, when Index Holdings acquired Atlus’ rights. Speaking of which, the report regarding the ‘Civil Rehabilitation’ procedures Index entered as a result of proclaiming bankruptcy has been partially (and, frankly, poorly) translated to English.

Also, do not forget to pick up Shin Megami Tensei IV from July 16th onward. And while you are at it, you might want to consider getting Fire Emblem: Awakening (if, finally, in stock) as well.

2013年04月05日

Over the course of this week I added three new interviews. The first was one with Eiji Ishida and Kazuma Kaneko from the official Japanese Strange Journey website. I also ran into an interview with Cozy and Kaneko about Nocturne for Denkgeki Online, which was published more than ten years ago. From the same month is the developer’s interview on the official Japanese website for Nocturne. All of these are in Japanese, but will be translated over the course of time.

Website articles

The Creator’s Voice with Kaneko discussing the development of Strange Journey has been fully translated by now. If you happen to stumble upon translation mistakes, please let me know; it’s been almost two years since I actively translated, so even though reading the article notably improved over the course of the process, Kaneko’s relatively long sentences and Japanese expressions remains a tough cookie to translate.

Essay

New at Megatengaku is the ‘Essay’ category. Sam Hatting, also known as ‘tophatting‘ on Tumblr, kicks off with an essay on Nocturne and Nietzsche’s Übermensch. Feel free to comment to Sam’s essay, suggest related readings or share your experiences in the comment section below the article. Please be polite and respectful to the author. Megatengaku was born from the wish to stimulate this kind of writing, so it’s great to finally be able to add this category.

2013年03月17日

Last weekend I added two new interview, one with Eiji Ishida on Strange Journey and another from 1UP about the developers of Persona 4.

Magazine articles

Website articles

Furthermore, I continued translating the Japanese interview with Kazuma Kaneko (of which I now finished the first out of seven pages). I also started working on a game script for Strange Journey, but is an extremely time-consuming process. The segment from the introduction up until the negotiation tutorial with the Pixie accumulated to 10.000 words.

Simultaneously I started working on a transcription of the dialogues with the demons during battle. Thus far, the Young Child personality type (e.g. Jirae Knocker) is taking up six pages and I’m sure there are much more questions and even more answers in there. Once I have decided on a format, I might ask the community for contributions.

If you stumble upon something that would contribute to Megatengaku as a study guide, please do not hesitate to submit your materials. Thanks in advance.