Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga |
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European Digital Devil Saga cover art
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Developer(s) | Atlus |
Publisher(s) |
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Director(s) |
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Designer(s) | Makoto Kitano |
Programmer(s) | Satoshi Ōyama |
Artist(s) | Kazuma Kaneko |
Writer(s) |
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Composer(s) |
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Series | Megami Tensei |
Platform(s) | PlayStation 2 |
Release | Digital Devil Saga Digital Devil Saga 2 |
Genre(s) | Role-playing |
Mode(s) | Single-player |
Aggregate scores | |
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Aggregator | Score |
GameRankings | 80% (DDS) 83% (DDS2) |
Metacritic | 78/100 (DDS) 82/100 (DDS2) |
Review scores | |
Publication | Score |
1UP.com | B+ (DDS) B+ (DDS2) |
Eurogamer | 8/10 (DDS) 9/10 (DDS2) |
Famitsu | 34/40 (DDS) 34/40 (DDS2) |
GameSpot | 8.2/10 (DDS) 8.3 (DDS2) |
IGN | 7.8/10 (DDS) |
RPGamer | 3.5/5 (DDS) 4/5 (DDS2) |
RPGFan | 93% (DDS) 99% (DDS2) |
Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga, known in Japan as Digital Devil Saga: Avatar Tuner (Digital Devil Saga アバタール・チューナー Dejitaru Debiru Sāga Abatāru Chūnā?) is a duology of role-playing video games developed by Atlus for the PlayStation 2. They are a spin-off of the Megami Tensei series. The first Digital Devil Saga was released in Japan in 2004, North America in 2005 and Europe in 2006. Its direct sequel, Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 2 (Digital Devil Saga アバタール・チューナー2 Dejitaru Debiru Sāga Abatāru Chūnā Tsū?, lit. Digital Devil Saga: Avatar Tuner 2), released in 2005 in Japan and North America, and 2007 in Europe. The games were published in Europe by Ghostlight and in other regions by Atlus.
Digital Devil Saga follows the Embryon, a tribe who fight against six other tribes in a digital world called the Junkyard. After being infected with a demon virus that grants them demonic powers, the Embryon must fight with and devour the other tribes to ascend to "Nirvana". During the conflict, they shelter a woman named Sera, who has the power to calm their demonic powers. In Digital Devil Saga 2, having escaped into the devastated real world, the Embryon are caught up in the fight against the Karma Society, who are intimately linked to the source of the disaster. The gameplay of both titles feature third-person navigation of playable characters around to-scale environments, and turn-based gameplay against demonic monsters and human enemies.
Digital Devil Saga began development pre-2002 under the working title New Goddess. The game's concept and original draft were written by Japanese author Yu Godai, but she withdrew from the project for personal reasons, and was replaced by Atlus scriptwriter Tadashi Satomi. The gameplay concept of the characters transforming into demons was based on an unused idea for Shin Megami Tensei. The second game began development immediately after the first, with the main development effort going into refining and improving the gameplay. While their commercial performances varied, both games were praised by critics for their story, graphics and gameplay. Since release, the game has inspired a mobile prequel, and Godai wrote a series of novels based on her original premise for the story.