Shin Megami Tensei 5’s director opens up about difficulty, player engagement in RPGs

Shin Megami Tensei V is back with a Vengeance, leading its director Shigeo Komori to talk to GameRadar+ about some of the team’s design choices for the original game and its revenge-driven revival. Komori, also the director for several Etrian Odyssey games, shared the following:

“Based on all of our experience developing RPGs, we believe that battles are supposed to be an obstacle that players need to figure out the solution to…They shouldn’t be designed in such a way that it’s possible to win by simply pushing buttons without thinking much. That might be why the series ended up being associated so strongly with high difficulty.”

Vengeance was constructed with that philosophy in mind, he added.

“Even for Vengeance, we wanted battles to have depth and to require players to think in order to prevail. Our intent was never to make things difficult for difficulty’s sake, but to design combat to be engaging, so we hope we’ve properly adjusted the balance to achieve that.”

Mirroring FromSoftware’s Hidetaka Miyazaki, another believer in player engagement driven by challenge, Komori sees difficulty as having the capacity to make or break a role-playing game. But while most Souls games (including Elden Ring) lack difficulty options, SMT V offers several, from the anxiety-alleviating “Safety” mode to Vengeance’s new anxiety-inducing “Godborn” difficulty. A reason for this divergence on Komori’s part may have to do with the targeted player base for the game. Souls games are reputable enough to where they can afford to lose causal players, while Shin Megami Tensei remains a lesser-known series that is well served by making small sacrifices in exchange for broader appeal and greater success. But if contemporary classics like Cuphead and Celeste are any indicator, demand for difficulty is widespread, and many players are willing to brave unknown storms for the familiar feeling of pride waiting on the other side.

Source