Raidou Remastered: The Mystery of the Soulless Army

Genre: Monster Collecting Action-RPG

Players: 1

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Review:

While the Persona series is by far the most well-known and successful spin-off of the long-running Shin Megami Tensei franchise, it is far from the only one. Another such spin-off series is the Devil Summoner series, whose third installment (and first to release in the West) was the 2006 PlayStation 2 Monster-Collecting Action-RPG Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs. the Soulless Army.

Now, nearly two decades later, we’re getting a remastered version of this game with the 2025 release of Raidou Remastered: The Mystery of the Soulless Army on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, and Nintendo Switch 2. And as this is a release that offers no way to upgrade from the Nintendo Switch release to the Nintendo Switch 2 version of the game, the following review will specifically be only for the Nintendo Switch 2 version of the game, not that I think it much matters.

I say this because even though this release of the game updates the resolution and framerate to be much smoother, the overall visual style of the game definitely still reflects its PlayStation 2 origins, complete with awkward animations and annoying fixed camera angles. This is joined by somewhat stilted voice acting and story and characters that aren’t exactly compelling.

The premise here is that you’re a demon-summoning detective in a version of 1910s-1920s Japan who uses his otherworldly allies to solve mysteries, which usually also involve demons, with the overarching story involving a girl apparently kidnapped by demons wearing red-caped army uniforms.

As with most Shin Megami Tensei games, the connective tissue between all of them is the consistent demonic monsters that you can recruit to help you in battle, such as the healing pixie and lightning-using agathion. However, the major difference here is that the action takes place in real-time, with players fighting and dodging enemies alongside up to two summoned demons.

I think this is both good and bad. It makes sense that this is something to set this game apart from the mainline Shin Megami Tensei games and the Persona series, but the actual action-based combat itself is merely decent, with enemies being damage sponges and the flow of combat being too frantic to make smart decisions about the best elemental counters you can summon to face your current enemies.

It doesn’t help that Nintendo Switch 2 owners have quite a few great options for Shin Megami Tensei games – there’s the Nintendo Switch 2 release of Persona 3 Reload, as well as the original Nintendo Switch versions of Persona 3, 4, and 5, as well as Shin Megami Tensei 3 and V. And if you’re really craving an action-focused game that uses the Shin Megami Tensei formula, I believe that Persona 5 Strikers did it far better.

However, if you’ve already plowed through all of that and are still craving more action-focused gameplay using Shin Megami Tensei’s Monster-Collecting formula, I think you’ll probably find Raidou Remastered to be a decent mix of those two things, albeit one that doesn’t really excel at any of it, and where the PlayStation 2 origins of the game are still very apparent.

tl;dr – Raidou Remastered is a remake of a PlayStation 2 game that takes Shin Megami Tensei’s Monster-Collecting gameplay structure and pairs it with Action-RPG gameplay, with results that are decent but where nothing here seems to excel, with damage sponge enemies, chaotic battles that work against SMT’s usual strategic gameplay, and a presentation that definitely feels like an updated PlayStation 2 game. All in all, this isn’t bad, but I think players have better options when it comes to games like this.

Grade: C+

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