>>724752187
>kept making new plot threads and then abandoned all of them?
Which ones specifically?
>And the characters stay with you the whole game but still barely get any development
Yes we call that mainline SMT. That said Isabeau was alright, especially when she fights you and then slits her own throat to spare you from dirtying your hands.
What I liked about IV was primarily the world and the feel. One thing that stood out to me was the little snippets you get from actually talking to NPCs. You get to know the people of Tokyo, how they're wearing coats year round due to lack of sunlight, how they feel dirty because water rationing makes it hard to wash, how one guy grumbles about how hard it is to grow anything down there and how it all goes to the tables of the rich, how an entire generation grew up without seeing sunlight etc. I very much prefer this grittiness to the silliness of nocturne and V's demons or the souls you talk to in the former, as they're the primary sources of conversation in the world. They're mostly Saturday morning cartoon whacky even when they do dispense information or try to kill you. I was really disappointed in Apocalypse when they made all those NPCs give useless small talk or obvious observations, quickly gave up bothering to talk to them.
For factions, Gaians get some spotlight when you see Kaga and co violently pummel Xi Wangmu from the inside after being eaten, meanwhile Tayama's idea with the Reds is both gruesome and yet a pragmatic way of cohabiting with the demons. I liked that.
On top of this, despite the lack of fleshing out and the heel turn towards extremism for law/chaos reps post route split, I quite liked the party dynamic. You're a group of young yet capable soldiers on a mission and this is maintained for most of the game. Walter and Johnathan have different backgrounds and temperaments and have some nice back and forth. I just liked the overall feel of trekking with them.
