Shin Megami Tensei's main mechanics have come in many forms over the years, whether it be in Persona, Raidou, Soul Hackers, or any other spinoffs I may be forgetting, but most of the games have come with the iconic Demon Negotiation system. This system allows the players to talk with their enemies, which often leads to baffling conversations, in an attempt to recruit or get items from them.
It's a fun part of the SMT series, and actually quite groundbreaking back when it was first introduced, but it may not have actually existed had one of Atlus' developers not had a stickler for the rules as a Dungeon master in his Dungeons & Dragons group.
In a recent interview with Encount (translated by Automaton), Atlus developer Kazunari Suzuki revealed that the idea for Demon Negotiation was pitched thanks to his frustrations with not being able to talk to goblins in a Dungeons & Dragons session, and his DMs insistence that talking to them was against the rules.
“It never made sense to me why you can’t speak to the goblins," says Suzuki. "Goblins are also sentient creatures, right? They have a language, and form societies. But if you run into them inside...
