SMT: Digital Devil Saga is impressively solid title with an interesting, mature and memorable (if short) story.
Cons: extremely short (20-40 hours of game-play, not much of that is plot either) | extremely frequent random encounters | surprisingly easy for a game in the Shin Megami Tensei franchise
My main enjoyment of Digital Devil Saga is largely combat based.
The story itself is extremely short. By the time I beat the final boss, I clocked in at about 40 hours of game play and I had maxed out some of my skill trees. The vast majority of your time will be spent grinding through dungeons, desperate to get through all the enemies so you can fight the bosses, and then thoroughly beating the bosses. As a veteran to the SMT franchise, I found these boss battles extremely easy and breezed through nearly all of them (except for the optional bosses).
Yet despite the ease, I found this game extremely addicting. If you are prone to compulsive collecting, this game will suck you in. Getting enough macca (money) to purchase new spheres (mantras) on the skill trees and consuming the demons to earn experience (Atma) to unlock the skills is almost as bad as collecting vast quantities of demons. In a lot of ways, I was heavily reminded of Final Fantasy X, which isn't the worst thing to be reminded of since the leveling system allowed for huge amounts of customization and specialization.
All I can say is, if DDS2 continues with the combat system and stat/skill development while expanding on the story more, I'll be incredibly pleased with this little off-shoot of the SMT franchise.
To Long Did Not Read: If you want a quick, easy to pick up game in the SMT franchise, this one is fairly easy and fairly short. The character designs are gorgeous, the voice acting is pretty good, and the battles are numerous and engaging.