Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne HD Remaster has a tall order to fulfill. It's a modern-day port of an older Shin Megami Tensei game that was still experimenting with 3D movement and presentation (those have mostly stuck to the Persona games while later SMTs went back to first-person dungeon crawling). It's also a challenging game with strict rules, brutal battles, and precious little room for error. It's stylish and gruesome, oppressive yet charming all at once, a bizarre mix of brutalism and ultra-modern anime designs.

It might be a little hard to recommend, but Nocturne is still one of the most gripping and rewarding JRPGs you could experience.

Nocturne's rough spots are quite obvious. As mentioned before, it was the first 3D Shin Megami Tensei game and plays as such. Dungeons consist of maze-like hallways, either in the bizarre and alien geometric brutalist fashion that only demons could love, or in the manner of the dilapidated ruins of human civilization. You almost expect you'll be forced to move in a grid-like pattern as you delve into areas. The camera doesn't quite move as well as you would like, and it doesn't seem to like even the briefest of moments when an object passes between it and you as you rotate your view. The many locations you visit feel appropriately empty and forlorn, twisted to suit the purposes of demons. Random encounters dog you at every step—there are no safe zones whatsoever. By the time Persona 3 came out, many of these issues were sanded over; here, they're just a part of the cruel world the Demi-Fiend has to explore.

And cruel it is. Where later Shin Megami Tensei and Persona games make acquiring new abilities a snap, here your growth is slow and must be deliberately planned. You can only learn so many skills at once—earning new skills from your Magatama requires you to forget old ones permanently. The Press Turn battle system rewards relentlessness and memorization as you target enemy weaknesses to earn more actions—but you aren't even afforded the luxury of a reminder icon as to your enemies' weaknesses. Enemies will not hesitate to hit hard and fast and are all too glad to take a chunk of you with them when they go down.

Dungeons are almost exhausting in their inhospitability. The alien geometries and bizarre music defy human sensibilities and wear on your patience as you solve puzzles and survive onslaughts of attacks. Save points are distant. Mid-bosses are plentiful.

And yet—Nocturne is gripping in its alien nature and exciting in the options presented to you.

The Demi-Fiend's search for a Reason is as involving as you wish it to be, presenting you with a full cast of demons whose moralities you can ponder at your leisure. The Amala Labyrinth is foreboding in its atmosphere, and yet inviting in its possibilites. The sight of Dante from the Devil May Cry series is a charming enough cameo on its own to draw in many. The very nature of the demons you encounter—capricious, violent, yet curious and desperate for a purpose of their own—is fascinating and inspires you to delve further into the world.

And best of all: the years have been kind to Nocturne. Not only do you get to remake the world, you get to tailor your experience doing it. Quicksaves make it easier to put the game down for a moment. English and Japanese voice acting breathe new life into the story. Optional music from the other numbered Shin Megami Tensei titles is available for long-time fans. Add in new difficulty modes, optional characters (like the aforementioned Dante), and maps for easy grinding and the result is the definitive Nocturne experience. Whether you simply wish to soak in the atmosphere or to cut your teeth on new spins with old enemies, players now have the options to make this the Shin Megami Tensei experience they want it to be—even if it comes at an extra $10.

Are there issues? Of course. This is still a game that is over 15 years old, and all the remastering cannot disguise stiff animations. The DLC feels a little spiteful, as without it you have neither the Dante nor Raidou cameos and you cannot access the Amala Labyrinth or the True Demon ending. Difficulty notwithstanding, that old-school dungeon crawling grind can be annoying when you add in the need to hunt for specific skills in order to weather specific boss fights. But there aren't many other games like Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne, even within the greater SMT series, and ultimately the experience more than makes up for the headaches.