Where did this double post come from? I have no idea. I hit the button once, all of a sudden there’s my post. Twice. I had better do something clever to cover it up.
Oh, definitely not playing the hard mode. At least not the first time. And given how hard it is, probably not the second time, either. I’m getting my butt kicked in a few places to know that unless I sit down and start calculating personas I want, fusions of persona I want, and a whole gaggle of other elements, I won’t be ready for anything like “hard mode”.
Glad to hear that hard mode isn’t like Ninja Gaiden, though. Of course, if it was, I would hope they’d name it more appropriately, like “virtually impossible mode”, or something. :lol:
Digital Devil Saga was hard for me. Mostly because I got really frustrated that I work to defeat enemies and after they’re all dead the game can just say “Reinforcements!” and more enemies are there. It makes is nearly impossible to properly plan item usage and skill use in battle. And if you had the wrong mantra mix, you were screwed – utterly screwed. I don’t mean ‘Wow that probably would have been easier with the right mantras’ screwed. I mean ‘Oh wow, I just got butt raped on the first turn because I didn’t have the exact perfect mix of mantras (or I had Gale [or whoever is the guy that’s weak to status ailments] in my party)’ screwed. I like Nocturne though, I find the story more intriguing than DDS anyways – but it is Kills Your Friends Hard.
On Normal mode or Easy Mode there is virtually no need to do that kind of planning. The upper floors of the tower throw yen at you like it’s going out of style and you can make whatever kind of persona you want through the compendium. If you’re going for instant high level persona’s through your social links, then you do need to decide which ones you want. It’s technically possible to max all your social links on the first playthrough, but it involves a fair amount of luck since how much of a personal stat gets boosted per event seems to vary (and whether or not your social link buddies will call you to set up dates for sunday also seems to be somewhat random).