Devil Summoner 2: Soul Hackers FAQ - ver 0.1 Started on October 17, 1998 Newest Version released on November 3, 1998 written by Robert Boyd rwb36@email.byu.edu This FAQ is copywrited by Robert Boyd. All other products are copywrites of their respective companies. CONTENTS: I. About this FAQ i. Introduction ii. What is Soul Hackers? iii. Comparison to Persona iv. The US future of Soul Hackers v. Version history II. Walkthrough - CD1 i. Introduction ii. Vision Quest 1 iii. NS Building iv. Your COMP and the warehouses v. The rest of CD1 (under construction) III. Walkthrough - CD2 (under construction) IV. Equipment Charts (under construction) i. Weapons a. Close Range b. Firearms c. Bullets ii. Armor a. Body Armor b. Helms c. Gloves d. Shoes V. Spells & Skills Charts (under construction) I. About this FAQ: i. Introduction: Welcome to the Devil Summoner 2: Soul Hackers FAQ! For some reason, no one has made a FAQ for this great game yet, so I decided to step in. When this FAQ is complete, it should be the definitive guide to Soul Hackers, complete with a full blown walkthrough, story notes, gameplay tips, and charts galore. Of course, this is all still quite aways away so it may never actually come to pass, but I can dream can't I? As you will undoubtably notice, this FAQ is very incomplete. There are several reasons for this. First of all, my Japanese skills are very limited. I'm working on this - my college (Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah) has an excellent Japanese program - but learning any language takes a lot of work and time and I'm still a long ways away from achieving full fluency. Secondly, I haven't completed Soul Hackers yet (it's pretty hard to write about things that you don't know). Finally, this is my first FAQ so I'm a bit new at this kind of thing. Still, I figured any FAQ is better than none, so I've uploaded this FAQ despite its noticeable shortcomings. If you have any information on Soul Hackers that I don't have or if you notice a mistake (excluding spelling and grammatical errors) or if you just have a comment (hopefully positive), feel free to give me an email at rwb36@email.byu.edu. Make sure to include Soul Hackers in the email title. ii. What is Soul Hackers? Devil Summoner 2: Soul Hackers is a science fiction RPG for the Sega Saturn that was created by Atlus. Unfortunately, none of the Devil Summoner games have been translated for the US (probably due to complexity and the lack of popularity of the Saturn here). The closest thing that we have is Revelations: Persona for the PSX. The story of Soul Hackers is very different from your typical medievel RPG plot. In the near future, a software company has created an exciting new virtual world called Paradygm X. Sounds like a typical day in the 21st century, right? Unfortunately, there's something seriously wrong, even evil, with this piece of software. As an amateur hacker, it's up to you to set things right. Gameplay is very unique as well. Instead of just mindless attacking every enemy that comes into your path, you can actually try to negotiate with them. Successful conversation can result in nice things like money and items. It's even possible (and often necessary) to talk enemies into joining your party! However, failed attempts at negotiation often results in your enemies getting a free attack on you. Other nice gameplay features include lots of weapons (2 types like in Persona), a portable computer with add-on modules, and a semi-permanent save feature that can be used anyway - perfect for long dungeons. Graphics aren't fantastic, but they work and fit the story of the game well. Unlike most Japanese RPGs, most of the graphics are shown from a first person perspective. Music tends to be well done and helps the mood a lot. There are plenty of neat FMV scenes that advance the story along. Good graphics, moody music, deep gameplay, and a very unique story - in short, Soul Hackers is a very good RPG. Hopefully, through this FAQ, players who were having trouble with this game, will find the help they need to enjoy this unique and fun game. iii. Comparison to Persona: Since a number of people in the US have played Atlus' Revelations: Persona, a game that is in the same general series as Soul Hackers, I thought it might be useful for those people if I described some of the major differences between the two games. The story, characters, and locations are different (obviously). The control is much better in Soul Hackers than in Persona. The isometric perspective in Persona has been removed. The town layout in the two games are very different (3D town in Persona, still shots in Soul Hackers). The FMV in Soul Hackers is more frequent, is of higher quality, and is better integrated into the actual gameplay (like FF7, but the transitions aren't quite as smooth) than in Persona. Battles are shown from a first person perspective (like Dragon Warrior/Quest) in Soul Hackers. The map command is a tad more functional in Soul Hackers (you can switch floors, for example). A 1 time load/save feature has been added. Six characters can be in your party (5 in Persona). The formation system has been simplified (3 characters in front, 3 in back). A character's actions in battle don't affect how much XP they receive in Soul Hackers. Guns in Soul Hackers have a limited number of bullets (they can be reloaded). The negotiation system is very different in the two games - in Persona, each character has 4 conversation options and the results of these interactions are shown through enemy emotion meters; in Soul Hackers, enemies talk to you and you have to select your response. Your main characters has a portable computer with a number of different abilities in Soul Hackers. Battles don't seem to take up as much time in Soul Hackers as they did in Persona. And of course, there's the really big gameplay difference between the two games - the persona magic system in Persona and the monster summoning in Soul Hackers. iv. The US future of Soul Hackers: Until recently, I thought that there was no chance at all that Soul Hackers would ever come to the US. After all, the game was very complex, it's been out for about a year, and it's for a system that is not very popular in the US. Because of this, I was quite surprised and pleased with a piece of news I heard recently. Apparently Atlus is considering porting Soul Hackers to the Playstation and translating the game into English! This sounded too good to be true, but I've heard it from a couple of different sources (including Atlus' own web page). But before Atlus invests their time and money towards this great project, they'd like to hear what the public thinks. Send your opinion to Atlus at SoulHackers@atlus.com - let them know you want to see this great game in the US! v. Version History: version 0.1: FAQ originally created. II. Walkthrough - CD1: i. Introduction: Upon starting a new game, you'll see some dialogue and then a news report on Paradygm X. After this, you'll find yourself outside where you're trying to hack into Paradygm X. You will meet your best friend, Hitomi, at this time. Eventually, you manage to break into Paradygm X's user database (nice FMV here) and will replace one of the user's name and code with your own. Enter your name (family name is first in Japan) and your code name and then select the choice on the left (for those of you who know absolutely no Japanese, the word on the left is yes and the word on the right is no). After some more dialogue, you'll go to your house. Here, you'll meet your father, sister (Tomoko), and mother. You also receive an e-mail from Spooky, the leader of your hacking group. I'm not sure about this, but I imagine the message tells you to meet him (since that's what you have to do next). Next, you'll find yourself in one of the area maps. While on an area map, you can talk to people (people are represented by colored dots; a message will appear in the corner when you're close enough to talk), enter buildings and other locations, look at the locations you can enter (press L or R), and look at the main menu (press C). The main menu is pretty self explanatory (all the commands are in English-yeah!) so I won't spend too much time here. You can look at, equip, and use items (you only have 2 story items at the moment), look at your status (LV1 for you and Hitomo), change your characters' position in battle, change the settings, and do a temporary save (select Quit and yes). Temporary saves will be erased when you restore them so they are useless as insurance against death, but if you want to take a break in the middle of a dungeon, they are quite useful. Talk to the people in this area if you want and then leave the area by walking to one of the edges and pressing C (I love the "TV off" effect when you do this). You'll now find yourself on the city map. Only two areas are currently selectable; the bottom one was where you just came from, so choose the top selection. You'll find yourself in another area. There's a mall in this area, but all the shops are closed right now, so ignore it. Go to the rendez-vous point with Spooky (the other location that you can enter besides the mall). After a short FMV, you'll find yourself in the Spookies' semi-truck. Spooky is there and he'll show you your portable gun-style computer (COMP for short). After some conversation, he'll leave, and you'll be a given a list of things to do. The top left item is to save, and the bottom left item is to leave (you can't do this right now). Select the top right item twice and you'll logon to Paradygm X. The receptionis and "Captain Paradygm" will greet you and tell you about Paradygm X. Now, you'll find yourself in the 1st person perspective mode. Holding B while pressing a direction will cause you to move instead of changing directions (like in Shining the Holy Ark). Explore if you like, but there are really only two things you have to do here. First, go all the way down the alley and watch a news report. Then go to the VR building (Hitomi will comment when you're in front of it) and enter it. You don't actually have to do anything here (you can try out different VR worlds if you want), but if you don't go here the next event won't be triggered. When you're tired of Paradygm X go back to the room that you first entered Paradygm X. Instead of seeing the cheerful receptionist, you'll find that there is nowhere there. Hmm, this is odd. An unidentified voice will speak to you, a burst of energy will emit from your monitor (FMV), and then you'll find yourself face to face with a talking coyote. The coyote will talk to you for awhile, teleport you to the VR building and then you will experience the first Vision Quest. ii. Vision Quest 1: After a few FMV scenes and some dialogue, you'll find yourself in the Algon Soft Net Services building. Instead of controlling yourself and Hitomi, you're now in charge of a man name Urabi. You can be attacked in the NS building, but don't worry, Urabi is LV20 and he has three monsters to help him. There are two new commands in your main menu now - Magic and COMP. Magic is used to heal your characters (two of your monsters can use healing magic; take advantage of this) and COMP enables you to use your portable computer. Only use automap for now; you shouldn't mess with the summoning commands right now. Battles aren't very hard here - commands are in English, and your characters are powerful. The back of the Soul Hacker manual has a map for this building so you shouldn't have much trouble with it. On floor 1, go up the elevator to floor 2. On floor 2, the elevator has been locked off so go up the stairs to floor 3. On your way there, there's a room where the coyotewill save your game and restore your HP and MP (it's marked T on the map). You can also pick up two items near the stairs. On floor 3, go up the stairs to floor 3 (you'll meet a security guard on the way; ignore him). On floor 4, go up the stairs to floor 5. On floor 5, go to the only room that isn't locked. Here, you'll get the data you're looking for, the Nemissa Program. A man named Fuinegan will show up, forcing you to flee. You'll automatically try to escape the building, but unfortunately the path back down has been blocked off so you'll be forced to go to the roof. Once there, you'll need to enter in a password to lock off the contents of your COMP. Any password will do so make it simple, since you'll need to re-enter it soon. Then, Fuinegan catches up to you, the screen goes black, and Vision Quest 1 is over. iii. NS Building Now, you're back in the Spookies semi-truck. Take out your COMP and enter the password that Urabi entered. The summoning functions (including the new command, Unite, which combines two monsters to create a more powerful one) have been activated on your COMP. However, this is not the only thing that happens. A ball of energy flies out of the COMP and into Hitomi. Now, Hitomi is possessed by Nemissa. Hitomi's body now houses two spirits, Hitomi's and Nemissa's. Hitomi's apparence will change to let you know who is currently in charge of her body. You'll meet two more members of the Spookies group at this time, Six and Lunch. You'll also get a phone call from Spooky. Turns out, he's calling from the Algon Soft Net Services building. After seeing what you just did in the Vision Quest of that building, you're worried about him and decide to go after him. Six and Lunch will follow you, but they won't show up as party members. Around this time, your LVs should go up. It's up to you to decide what stats to allocate your points to. As far as I can tell, the stats are (from top to bottom): Strength, Magic Power, Magic Accuracy, Stamina, Speed 1, and Speed 2. Strength increases the power of your close range weapon. Magic Power and Magic Accuracy affect the power of your magic, your MP total, and the spells you can cast. Stamina affects your defense and HP total. Speed 1 and Speed 2 both affect your evade %; Speed 1 also affects the accuracy of your close range weapons, while Speed 2 affects the accuracy of your guns. I personally focus Nemissa's stats towards magic ability. I make the main character good overall (no particular stat emphasis). Go to the city map and select the 3rd area. Go to the NS building. You'll talk to Six and Lunch here; Lunch will stay with you, while Six will stay behind. The enemies here are much weaker than before, but so are you so be careful. Thankfully, you aren't as weak as you were at the start of the game - you should be at around LV6, you now have some equipment, and you should have some HP+40 items and a decent supply of bullets. In battle, try to talk monsters into joining your team. I don't have any suggestions here - if you can't read Japanese you're just going to have to rely on trial and error like I've been doing. Now would be a good time to explain MAG (abrieviated M$). This is the amount that is listed right below your yen total. M$ can be won in battle and found in chests and is used with your summoned monsters. Each monster cost a certain amount of M$ to summon into your party and a certain amount of M$ per step to keep in your party (with the more powerful monsters obviously costing more). The decision between conserving M$ and having a powerful party is one that you're going to have make throughout the entire game. Another important game concept that you might not understand immediately (I didn't figure it out for a couple hours) is the loyalty system. Each monster that you summon has a different loyalty rating. There are 5 major loyalty LVs, each of which has 4 colored bars underneath it for a total of 20 different loyalty ratings. Monsters start out with a loyalty rating of 10 (right in the middle). Monsters with high loyalty are more likely to do what you tell them than monsters with low loyalty. Also, monsters with low loyalty may leave your party. Loyalty can be changed in combat (if a monster's attack is show in blue, their loyalty has gone up slighty; if it's in red, their loyalty has gone down slightly), and by giving your monsters gifts (select item, then gift). I recommend you let your monsters control themselves in battle until their loyalty is fairly high. Your path in the NS building is going to be different than it was while you were Urabi. Go to the 2cd floor via the elevator. Here, go to floor 5 through the locked elevator (Lunch will unlock it). Go to the previously locked door on floor 5. Lunch will leave you here. Go to the area beyond the door and make your way to the elevator (picking up an item on the way). Take the elevator to floor 4. On floor 4, you'll get a phone call from Lunch. Go down the stairs to floor 3. On floor 3, you'll get a phone call from Six. Make sure to pick up M$300 on this floor; it's in a chest in a small room. Go down the stairs to basement 1. A boss encounter is in the small room at the west end of basement 1 so make sure you're ready before going there. Your HP and MP are fully restored when you LV-Up so if you're almost at a new LV, you might want to fight a few more battles. If you haven't already done so, summon a monster or two to help you out; if you don't, the next battle will be very hard. When you're ready, go to the small room in basement 1. You'll meet (of all things) a guitarist. After some conversation, he'll summon 4 monsters and attack you. None of the enemies are particularly hard, but there are 5 of them, so be on your guard. Use healing items and magic when necessary and attack when you can. If Nemissa has learned the spell, Agi, use it; it is very useful here. Make sure none of your characters die, especially the main character and Nemissa. If the main character dies, the game is over, and if Nemissa dies, she will miss out on the very large EXP reward that you get for winning this battle. Monsters don't gain EXP so it is less important (but still a good idea) to keep them alive. After defeating the guitarist, you'll find Spooky. With him, you'll leave the building (the game will do this for you) and regroup with Lunch and Six. Then you'll return to the Spookies' semi-truck. Here, you'll meet the final member of the Spookies group, Yu-ichi. Your COMP will start emitting an error message; your next task is to fix it. Apparently, there's a group called the "Phantom Society" that can help out. iv. Your COMP and the Warehouses A new location has been enabled in this area - the cruise ship. Go here and after some dialogue and an FMV, you'll go to a secret underground room. Here, your COMP will be fixed and you will get 2 new COMP modules, Neo Clear and Davinchi. Neo Clear will enable a small map in the corner of the screen and I'm not sure what Davinchi does. Go back to the Spookies semi-truck. You'll get a new message from Summoner Net with the ominous message, "The Day is Coming." A new command has been added here. The bottom right command lets you insert and remove modules from your COMP. Change your module setup if you want (Neo Clear takes up 2 of the 5 slots in your COMP). Three modules are already in your COMP: Enemy Sonar (detect enemy activity in dungeons), Honey Bee (automap feature), and Muun Adaruto (?). The shops in the mall have been opened so go there now. From top to bottom the shops offer: weapons, armor, special items, healing items, special items, HP/MP restore, and Mag<>Yen transfers. Get ready for the next dungeon by buying new equipment, items, and restoring your HP and MP. The last shop will enable you to exchange M$ for yen and vice versa - the exchange rate varies, but it's usually around M$10 for 100 yen. The shops will get new merchandise as the game goes on, so make sure to come here often. Go to the city map. A new area has been added; go here. The next dungeon, the warehouses, is in this area. Like the Algon Soft Net Services building, the instruction manual has a map for this dungeon at the back of the book. Try entering the middle warehouse; it's locked. Then enter the warehouse on the left. Make sure to pick up the Jaba foot; it's a useful piece of equipment that is in one of the side rooms. Go to the small room at the northern end of the warehouse. A guard is here; he'll talk to you and then give you some items. Now go to the warehouse on the right. There's a cure poison item in one of the side rooms. In the small room at the end of the hall is another guard. Talk to him. If you've talked to the guards in both of the side warehouses, you should have the password to the middle warehouse door. When you enter the middle warehouse, it is quite obvious that something is definitely wrong here. Since the manual has a map for this area, you probably won't get lost. On floor 1, take the elevator to B1F (either elevator will work, but the western elevator is quicker). On B1F, take the elevator in the NE part of the floor to B2F. At the beginning of B2F, there is a healing spot and a terminal room (you can save your game and switch COMP modules here). Take the southernmost elevator to B3F (picking up M$400 on the way). On B3F, go to the freezing room at the end of the hall. Here, you'll meet the second boss in the game. It has around 350HP and has some powerful ice based attacks. If you've been powering up Nemissa's magic like I have, you should have little trouble here (the boss is very weak against Nemissa's Agi spell). Once the boss has been killed, the mist in the warehouse will go away and the previously locked doors on F1, B1F, and B2F are now unlocked. Although you could take a short cut out of here via an elevator, don't. Instead go to all of the rooms that were previously locked for some items. On B2F, there's 1 item. On B1F, you can find M$200, a Chakra Pot (MP+), a healing item, and a Battle Fury Knife. The locked door on F1 is the most important. Here, you'll talk to a scientist, see a strange FMV (very reminiscent of Jenova from Square's FF7), and pick up a key item. After you've gone to the locked room on F1, you'll automatically go to the area map. You'll receive another phone call from Spooky. Go back to the Spookies' semi-truck for a story scene. After this, go to the secret room on the cruise ship. Here, you'll give Victor the item you just got in the warehouse and will receive a new item, the doriikadomon. This item can be combined with one or two monsters to create a very unique monster (it looks like an alien with a chain). This monster will have the same LV, spells, and skills as the monster (or monsters) you used to create it, but its loyalty is maxed out and it doesn't have any summoning or maintanence cost! The only problem is that the monster's stats are lowered in the process. v. The rest of CD1 (coming in future versions) III. Walkthrough - CD2 (coming in future versions) IV. Equipment Charts (under construction): An X in the name represents a kanji symbol. i. Weapons: a. Close Range: Name Atk Power Hit% Gender Cost Comments Sukiauvooa 30 16 Male ? Hits a row Igu Knife 9 4 Male ? Sukiandou 8 6 Female ? Razer Comb 11 18 Male 800 Half Pike 9 3 Female 980 Hit from back row Battle Fury Knife 14 8 MF 1600 Army Dato 16 12 Female 2400 b. Firearms: Name Atk Power Hit% Gender #Bul Cost Comments AKS74 34 12 MF 20 ? Lousy K*K 14 4 MF 3 ? Rugaa P95DC 17 8 MF 10 1200 Sutekki XXXX 18 2 MF 10 2200 c. Bullets: Name Atk Power Hit% Cost Comments Normal Bullets 1 1 10 Bad Shot 3 8 30 ii. Armor: a. Body Armor: Name Def Power Eva% Gender Cost Comments Burigandain 32 11 Male ? Keburaabe Suit 8 5 MF ? Padded Armor 10 8 MF 780 XXX 8 6 MF ? ? High Leg Armor 12 8 Female 1600 ? b. Helms: Name Def Power Eva% Gender Cost Comments "Urabi's Hat" 6 8 MF ? Nokkuauto X 2 2 MF ? Fleece Helm 4 6 MF 680 NBC XX Mask 7 2 Male 1300 Stat4+1 Metal Taaban 8 6 MF 1180 ? b. Gloves: Name Def Power Eva% Gender Cost Comments Rattle Snake 8 8 MF ? Razer Glove 2 3 MF ? XXXX Ring 4 2 Female 600 Jamming Arm 7 9 Male 1100 Stat3+2 b. Shoes: Name Def Power Eva% Gender Cost Comments Escape Shoes 7 24 MF ? Stat5+2 Razer Boots 2 2 MF ? Crime Boots 4 1 MF 980 Jaba Foot 5 15 MF ? Ieroo Chapusu 6 12 MF 1200 V. Spells & Skills Charts (under construction): Name Target MP Learned Effect Deia 1 2 LV 1 Restores HP Agi 1 3 LV 7 Fireball Medeia All 6 LV 15 Restores HP Thanks for reading the Devil Summoner 2: Soul Hackers FAQ! Robert Boyd rwb36@email.byu.edu