>>529413516
There's nothing new under the sun, and even if I'm not a huge fan of the end product of SMT4 in totality, I think Kaneko's plot ideas were cool and drew from a wide enough variety of inspirations to be worthwhile.

>>529412787
Actually while I was reading up around the topic and doing the usual "comparative mythology hypotext hunt" that I love extending to art of all kinds, I was reading about the Quran's "Hamlet in Ruins" parable. One tradition states that it's a story about how Ezra/Uzair, on seeing the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem and being driven to despair, suggested that even God could not restore such a place, and God struck him dead and resurrected him 70 years later in the restored Jerusalem to teach him a lesson, where no one recognized him until he cured the sight of an old blind woman who had known him. Well, that's kind of what happens to Hero and Heroine in SMT1, isn't it? In a twisted sort of way. I like to think about whether the well-read people at Atlus were aware of these kinds of things when making the games.