Shin Megami Tensei II picks up right where the first game left off, but with way more polish—this is the SNES era, after all. You start off as some poor kid stuck in a dystopian Tokyo slum, and before long, you're negotiating with demons, fusing them into stronger monsters, and trying not to get wrecked by random encounters. The atmosphere's grim, the music slaps, and the moral choices actually matter (unlike some games where "good vs. evil" just changes the ending cutscene).

Combat's still turn-based, but the demon recruitment feels less random than the first game—though good luck getting a Pixie to join your party without handing over half your HP. The dungeons are brutal in that old-school way where you’ll be drawing maps on graph paper unless you enjoy getting lost for hours. If you liked the original or just want a darker, weirder JRPG from the '90s, this one’s worth digging up.