Nocturne Table of Contents and Personal Masterlist
My Old Attempt at a ThematSic Analysis
General Concepts of Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne
Character Analyses of . . .
Hikawa
Yuko Takao
Isamu Nitta
Chiaki Tachibana
Demi-Fiend
Christian Kabbalah References:
The Qliphoth References (From Debunking Series)
Personal Theories and Arguments:
The Manikins represented Fascism in its most pathetic form
My Opinion Piece on the Musubi Route
Why Hijiri is probably either Aleph or Mormon Jesus Christ
What TDE Raidou Route Means and Why it is my favorite
The Axiom / Great Will is probably some form of Brahman
I didn’t expect the last part with Gouto-Douji’s message to make my head explode. So, it essentially confirms that Raidou the 14th’s future became Nocturne’s world and not just Nocturne, but specifically the True Demon Ending / Rejection route since that’s the only ending where we get Gouto-Douji’s message and it is in the context of witnessing the True Demon Ending. I didn’t expect that we would receive a confirmation that Raidou games and Nocturne are connected as a timeline. The fan-translations were vague as hell and seemed to suggest Raidou and Gouto-Douji were just commenting on similarities and it also seemed weird that Raidou would just tag along with Demi-fiend to destroy the possibility of Creation. But no, that wasn’t what happened at all. Gouto-Douji and Raidou either figured out or knew from the Akarana Corridors of Time that Nocturne’s world was their future timeline. They decided to see what the hell Lucifer had been doing and then went back hoping to change it to prevent the destruction of the world; Gouto-Douji comments about possibly asking Demi-fiend, but he’s unsure if Demi-fiend would ever bother helping them with undoing his own timeline after going through TDE.
This may also explain how on earth a vision of Demi-fiend, Beelzebub, and Metatron appeared in Digital Devil Saga 1’s world. Raidou the 14th must’ve gone back to screw around with the timeline and accidentally created duplicate versions of them that Brahman ended-up using. The timeline screw-up also impacted SMT2, either due to the events of Raidou the 40th going back in time in Soulless Army to stop the SMT1-2 timeline or because of Raidou the 14th trying to stop the True Demon Ending from becoming the future of his timeline. So, the Archangels and Satan of SMT2 in DDS2 were possibly the results of Raidou the 14th and Gouto-Douji desperately trying to change the timeline or because they stopped Raidou the 40th.
What this means is that every timeline of Raidou is definitely screwed. Law-aligned case files in Raidou vs King Abaddon lead back into the Great Cataclysm and rise of the Center in SMT1-2 (this is basically confirmed due to Raidou 1 being a story about changing from this timeline), Neutral leads into the IF-Soul Hackers-Persona timeline which I’m told leads to another world ending conclusion with Persona 2 Innocent Sin (Confirmed by meeting Raidou in Soul Hackers in the Corridors of Time), and Raidou’s Chaos route with the Lucifer case files leads to Nocturne’s True Demon Ending route and that is confirmed in the Raidou version’s True Demon Ending. That’s also why it was called Maniax Chronicle. It was a Chronicle of the tragic ending of Raidou’s story. Nocturne confirms that every timeline of Raidou the 14th’s is doomed when taken all together.
However, perhaps the most tragic part, is that this could imply Raidou the 14th who went the Chaos route possibly died horribly. Gouto-Douji suggests asking Demi-fiend’s help to undo the timeline, past the point where the Demi-fiend killed his own friends and destroyed all possibility of creation as a wielder of the supreme power of Chaos. Why would Demi-fiend help him do this once fully going the True Demon path when the very next step is to destroy the next universe and continue on to wipe out the billions of Amala Universes in order to end the endless cycle? This could mean that Demi-fiend simply killed Raidou the 14th. Demi-fiend is canonically established to be stronger than Raidou by the Third Kalpa, but there’s two reasons that could suggest Raidou the 14th who chose Chaos simply died or went back and was unable to change anything:
- The possibility that he was simply killed off by Demi-fiend would be a parallel to his own story in Raidou Kuzunoha vs the Soulless Army, where he fights and kills Raidou the 40th, a Raidou Kuzunoha from the future who wanted to prevent the horrible future timeline of SMT1-2 from happening. In this case, Raidou the 14th would be an inverse, going to the future to prevent it from happening, only to be exploited by Lucifer and Demi-fiend before he was killed once he served his purpose as the “spark” that Lucifer needed for the possibility of changing the Demi-fiend’s fate.
- I hadn’t known this before, but people have screencapped the dark birds that Lucifer and the Lady in Black turn into and its two pairs of Yatagarasu. Raidou the 14th gets his powers from Yatagarasu (he even says as much when you recruit him). If Lucifer can transform into Yatagarasu, then its possible that as soon as Raidou the 14th went back to the past, Lucifer turned off his powers so that Raidou the 14th can no longer interfere and becomes a regular person without his spiritual powers heightened. That way, Lucifer gets what he wants and Raidou the 14th of the Chaos route is left regretting his choices knowing what the future will bring while stuck in Taisho 20.
However, my favorite aspect of ALL of this, is definitely Lucifer. I use to say Raidou 2 Lucifer was my second favorite and SMT3 Nocturne TDE route Lucifer was my favorite, but now that it’s basically confirmed that they’re the same person divided by vast stretches of time, this is my favorite Lucifer depiction in all of fiction. Although a bit convoluted, this has to be one of the most mythologically consistent Lucifer depictions with a range of cultural designs and set pieces that really make it all work so well together. From the Lucifer case files and Lucifer himself happy to have his ass kicked three times by Raidou in order to divulge Raidou the 14th’s ability to change a predestined fate (the “spark” that he refers to), to manipulating Hikawa, Yuko Takao, Raidou the 14th, Kagutsuchi, and Demi-fiend to get his long-desired outcome after so many endless defeats and stalemates. I fucking love these two depictions of Lucifer. He misleads Raidou the 14th by having his ass-kicked in order to ascertain Raidou’s ability and then essentially lies to the Demi-fiend by telling Demi-fiend the truth in the TDE route. Absolutely satisfying writing, concepts, themes, and ending on Atlus’s part. It’s amazing how they were able to blend Raidou so seamlessly into it.
A relatively short video of the two boss fights and ending itself:
For more on Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne:
Kaneko Interviews:
Demon Bible, 1UP Interview regarding Nocturne (Red Hot Chili Peppers as inspiration and Gnostic view of the world as inspiration for Nocturne) and Kazuma Kaneko Works III / Different Translation.
Non-SMT3 Interviews or Artbook Translations: SMT NINE Demons in Kaneko Works III (Eternal Recurrence Concept of Nietzsche referenced in Maria bio), Kaneko Works I, and Kaneko Works II.
From Atlus West: Atlus West Interview with Vice on how they translated the HD Remaster Script
Fan Content by Others
Other Blogs:
Philosophy of MegaTen Encyclopedia by Beadman
Sam Hatting’s Nietzschean themes in Nocturne (that inspired all of this)
SMT Nocturne and Space in Design by LazyMetaphors
Artemis-Maia Analysis of Amaravati and the Menorahs (that inspired my Qliphoth References) on Eirikrjs Blog
Youtube Content Creators:
SMT Theology by Kid Capes
Larrue’s Nocturne videos related to Themes and Development:
- Story of SMT Nocturne
- Lost SMT3 Nocturne’s Early Draft Concepts
- Kazuma Kaneko’s Art Team
- Learning more about Kazuma Kaneko
Deconstructing Nocturne’s Formulas by Robin and Zephyr
Rasen Bran’s Cathedral of Shadows Podcast:
Season 1, Season 2, and Season 3
Fither’s Lost Nocturne Tech Demo
The 4th Snake’s Opinion Piece on Nocturne’s Freedom Ending
This interpretation of the ending is absurd, Raidou and Nocturne are absolutely not in the same timeline, there’s a reason he says “in what appears to be” and not what is. I think it’s makes much more sense, considering the whole conflict of the end of RK1 and Lucifer’s plot in 2, that the reason Gouto is so worried about that future is because Raidou XL and Lucifer already warned them about a coming catastrophe, which would turn out instead to be the ICBM. Connecting their world so literally to Nocturne would make no sense with a larger context of how Devil Summoner connects to SMT 1, 2, if… and Persona
Nope, sorry. The timeline is clearly changed in Raidou 2 when going through the corridors of time and the entirety of the Lucifer case files allude to Nocturne. The ending of the TDE with the final case files when choosing Raidou confirms it. Appears to be is in the context of a whole sentence about them recognizing it as their future.
I’m sorry Mr. Jove but you are thoroughly deluded in your own fanfiction
Acting like Goto saying “yes this seems like a future Tokyo, let’s avoid ever reaching an outcome like this” is direct and literal confirmation that Nocturne is in the same timeline as Raidou is a crazy reach considering how substantially different and isolated Nocturne’s lore is from the rest of Devil Summoner, and if you can’t see that then I really don’t know what to say to you
1. It is in the context of the entirety in which Gotou explains they will try to change this future.
2. Raidou the 14th and Gotou-Douji could only have entered Nocturne’s world through the corridors of time, which they have regular access to. The Lucifer case files repeatedly foreshadow and hint at Nocturne’s events from the horsemen dialogue to Lucifer’s dialogue about Raidou being a “spark” for his plans.
3. Personal insults such as calling me deluded are not an argument. Thank you.
And that’s not even mentioning the fact that Kaneko and Okada made it clear they didn’t want SMTI/II connected to the final version of Nocturne, making it a possible outcome from Raidou would very clearly do that considering, as you yourself pointed out, Raidou 1 and 2 already established those games are a timeline off shoot of him not stopping the ICBM
No matter how you slice it, Nocturne being an actual outcome that’s happens directly in the Devil Summoner world makes very little sense both from a meta standpoint and a lore standpoint
You realize that Messians and Gaeans are there, right? Also, the entire point of Raidou 1 was that Raidou cut the timeline from the course of SMT1-2. In fact, the very music in which he slices Raidou the 40th off of Kaya is called “Cutting away the evil future” — it’s right in the song name.
As well, I completely disagree with your claim that Lucifer’s case files are all about Nocturne, outside of the reference to meeting again, I think they are very clearly referring to the ICBM plot thread that was left hanging at the end Raidou 1, as RK2 Lucifer specifically mainly focuses on “God’s will“ unlike Nocturne Lucifer who very clearly goes out of his way to refer to the Great Will specifically. Plus, narratively it makes way more sense for him to be addressing the ICBM thread, because it wasn’t at all resolved at the end of RK1
Yes, it was. Raidou cut the future by killing Raidou the 40th, after Raidou the 40th made changes to steer it away from SMT1-2. The fact you can go back to the Corridors of time and see the timeline is changed from reading the events expresses this point. In Raidou 1, it was all about SMT1-2 references; in Raidou 2 the same corridors of time heavily allude to the atomic bomb droppings and nothing regarding SMT1-2. Law brings it back to SMT1, implied by the Asura boss fight. Neutral to IF-Persona, and Chaos to Nocturne.