Hunting down the Shin Megami Tensei remakes

[kyouki]

Hey everyone,

I've been trying to find the Shin Megami Tensei remakes (specifically the PSX versions). However, besides the fact that they are pretty hard to find (if not in Japan) there's an interesting issue with Shin Megami Tensei II. Apparently the first pressing had terrible bugs in it; in my research online it appears the game freezes all the time, load times are unbearable, there may even be frame rate issues. So anyway, Atlus released a second pressing which fixed all the bugs but from what I can tell there is nothing on the case indicating which version of the game it is! This is pretty frustrating because I can't request the game from a place like Genki Videogames because there's no way for them to tell if a used copy sitting at a store is the corrected version or not.

So, does anyone know if there is any way to tell if a given copy of SMT II PSX is bug free?

[Neo Rasa]

It depends on how long the bugged version was in print and what business quarter [of Atlus'] it was released in. If the moons were aligned right then you could ask for any with a specific copyright year on it. This difference would most likely be located on the disk itself rather than the cover insert/booklet though.

Outside of that, as you say, luck of the draw.

[wyrdwad]

You could always just get the GBA remakes. They're much more common, and aside from being a bit lower-res, actually look BETTER than the PSX versions, since they came later and were given even more graphical refinement.

-Tom

[kyouki]

I was tempted to track down the GBA releases but I have a hard time with Japanese text on portable screens. My eyes are bad. Also, I typically use my DS as a portable dictionary when I am playing imports, and if the DS is busy playing SMT then...

I'm making some progress anyway. I got Soul Hackers from Play Asia the other day, and ordered SMT If... from NCS. I ordered SMT 1 from Amazon.co.jp through Tenmeido international shipping service. There always seems to be at least one SMT II fixed version on yahoo auction japan at any given time so it's just a matter of going through one of those auction services and paying a ton of money to get it.

It's really too bad the bugs are so awful in SMT II. If it was just a random freeze here or there I could put up with the bugged version. But you'll often see in auction descriptions something like "This is the bugged version... please purchase this for collection purposes only as it is unplayable."

[Neo Rasa]

The GBA versions are good but they tend to be a bit overpriced whenever they appear. Also the music emulation is close but not quite close enough to the SNES awesomeness.

Shame about the PSX SMTII.

Now that Atlus is super prolific, it would be cool if any iteration of Shin Megami Tensei I and II made it to the GBA. At this rate I'd even take the SNES port of the original two Megami Tensei games on a DS card. Just somehow get the older games out in the US as they're awesome and would hold up today.

[kyouki]

So in case it helps anyone, there is a way to determine whether a given copy of SMT II PSX is the bugged version or not... however, it requires having the obi strap intact. So you can really only tell if the game is sealed or if the previous owner did not throw the obi away.

Anyway, on the obi is the sentence "Trading Card Included"... this is how you tell the bugged version from the fixed version:

The bugged version has this sentence printed within brackets: <Trading Card Included>

The fixed version does not have the brackets: Trading Card Included

It's stupid you can't tell just by looking at the disc/case, but there you go.

[sideshow]

Intersting information. Thanks