Shin Megami Tensei 5: How Long to Beat

After years of waiting, Atlus's latest JRPG masterpiece Shin Megami Tensei 5 is finally gearing up for release this week, with reviews already indicating that the game continues the developer's streak of incredible turn-based RPGs. The developer has been hard at work on the game following its last major RPG release in the form of 2017's Persona 5, which was the studio's first title to achieve mainstream success. One thing many fans who jumped in with Persona 5 quickly discovered is that Atlus's games can be quite the time commitment, and Shin Megami Tensei 5 is no different in this regard.

Shin Megami Tensei 5 was first announced at Nintendo's very first Switch reveal event in January 2017, where Atlus revealed that it would be developing the next major title in the Shin Megami Tensei series exclusively for Nintendo's handheld/console hybrid, utilizing Unreal Engine 4 for the first time in the studio's history. Typically, Shin Megami Tensei and Persona games were developed using proprietary game engines developed in-studio. With Persona 5's English release in April 2017, the studio soon shot into mainstream success, putting more eyes than ever on its next major JRPG project, a return to the franchise that spawned the Persona series itself. With this in mind, it's no wonder Shin Megami Tensei 5 took so long to finally release.

How Long to Beat Shin Megami Tensei 5

Given that Atlus has a track record of developing incredibly long games, with most playthroughs of Persona 5 coming in at 100 hours, it's fair to assume that Shin Megami Tensei 5 will also be a beefy adventure through an apocalyptic Tokyo. As per The Best War Games's review of the game, Shin Megami Tensei 5's main story will run most players somewhere between 50-60 hours, but as the review notes, these can easily be pushed past 80 hours thanks to the wealth of side activities and demon fusing opportunities available to players. This will vary depending on the difficulty mode players choose.

This is mainly on par with other games in the mainline Shin Megami Tensei series, with HowLongToBeat noting that Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne playthroughs average around 50-60 hours too, and the Nintendo 3DS's Shin Megami Tensei 4 coming in at 40-60 hours.

Of course, some of the Persona series' titles tend to run a little longer, with Persona 3 and Persona 4 lasting a minimum of 70 hours, but this is often due to the higher emphasis on story content in those games over the mainline Shin Megami Tensei series' focus on atmospheric worldbuilding and brutalizing combat.