Shin Megami Tensei

Game Description: Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 is a strange and wonderful trip into an anime adventure. You're an orphaned high school student, transferred to Gekkoukan High School on Port Island. After arriving, he's attacked by creatures known as Shadows. The assault awakens his Persona, Orpheus, from the depths of his subconscious, enabling him to defeat the terrifying foes. He soon discovers that he shares this special ability with other students at his new school. From them, he learns of the Dark Hour, a hidden time that exists between one day and the next, swarming with Shadows. Under the supervision of school chairman Shuji Ikutsuki, he joins his new companions in confronting this threat to humanity. With your school as the primary battlefield, you'll be forced to juggle two lives: Student by day, defender by night. And your greatest challenges await you on the eve of each full moon.

Persona 3's mechanics are ingenious and fresh, the characters are well-written and engaging, the voice work and music are top-quality, the art is beautifully stylish, and by couching it all in a real-world setting far from any of the standard fantasy clichés, it establishes an identity and qualities uniquely its own.

It's too early to pick the RPG of the year for 2007, but if I had to vote today Persona 3 would be my choice...hands down. It's a wild and unique gaming experience that melds disparate subgenres into a whole that transcends the sum of the parts. It's not without a few flaws, but the good so definitively outweighs the negatives that it's hard to imagine anyone who's a hardcore RPG fan passing this game up.

According to ESRB, this game contains: Blood, Language, Partial Nudity, Violence

According to ESRB, this game contains: Blood, Sexual Themes, Violence

Although it clearly takes the series in several brand-new directions, there's no doubt that Devil Summoner is a worthy addition to the series and excellent in its own right.

Game Description: Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner guides you through thrilling episodes of action and intrigue, as you learn the incredible secrets of the Soulless Army! Raidou Kuzunoha is a private detective in Japan's Taishou Period of the 1910s and 1920s, but he's much more than just a well-dressed crime scene investigator; he also has the power to capture and conjure demons to do his bidding. Take control of Raidou and his otherworldly companions, guide them all through!

I have nothing against cutesy role-playing games (RPGs). But sometimes, their sunny kingdoms and bildungsroman-style heroes get on my nerves. A boy's journey into manhood is a fine theme—Charles Dickens and Mark Twain did some pretty good stuff with it—but do we really need more boob-obsessed teenagers who think they're the greatest warrior who ever lived?

According to the ESRB, this game contains: Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Language, Sexual Themes