Guide icon by @NESSI_winter_

The scope of this guide is NOT a checklist of what to do in the game to 100% it, but to inform you which to select from the two canons, the endings within each, and what order to do them in. As of writing, I have just 100%'d the game, 180 hours. Depending on the extent of what you want out of the game, your playtime will be very different.

I did Canon of Creation first and took me 80 hours to do everything in that playthrough. 25 hours to do a Canon of Vengeance playthrough at max level, again to do everything. The reason for this is because all fights (when not avoided), including most boss battles take 1-2 turns to finish. Exploration time is significantly cut down because you know where mostly everything is. There was also no need to hunt then fuse for demons from the wild any more as I did all that on the first run through. A playthrough with a max level character where you skip every cutscene you can and ignore everything optional will see completion in less than 5 hours.

Expect minor spoilers, but nothing that would ruin your time. Spoilers will be minimal and are only here to make the guide more clear.

There is a total of six. Yes, SIX routes to take in the game. However, the differences between them all are not big, as the split in the story for a canon happens not very long before it ends:

• Canon of Creation, Law ending
  
• Canon of Creation, Chaos ending
  
• Canon of Creation, Destroy ending
  
• Canon of Creation, Humanity ending
  
• Canon of Vengeance, Law ending
  
• Canon of Vengeance, Chaos ending

In order to check your alignment in-game, go to the Tokyo top-down map. If your marker is spinning clockwise, you are Law aligned. If anti-clockwise, you are Chaos aligned. If bobbing up and down, your are Neutral aligned.

Your alignment only locks you into an ending in the Canon of Vengeance. In the Canon of Creation, it's only dialogue options near the end of the game that decides your endings, but the Humanity ending is only available after completing certain side quests. More on that later.

There are five main regions of the game, but you go through four per playthrough. There are segments in the game between these regions, but most content is present within them:

• #1 Minato -> Jouin High School
  
• #2 Shinagawa
  
• #3 Chiyoda -> Demon King's Castle (Creation only)
  
• #3 Shinjuku -> Shakan (Vengeance only)
  
• #4 Taito -> Temple of Eternity -> Empyrean

Let me preface this by saying that within each canon, in terms of story, literally the only differences are in the last area of the game. There is some information only revealed in the Canon of Vengeance but they are still relevant for the setup of the Canon of Creation.

If you're more of a destination instead of the journey kind of person, this is the section for you, otherwise, ignore it. Heavy spoilers of course.

The first choice you make is right at the start of a new playthrough. Take the girl's hand or not. Doing so means you are in the Canon of Vengeance storyline. Not taking her hand means you are in the Canon of Creation.

You may want to know a bit of background lore to be informed what you want to leave the world like. Kinda-sorta spoilers ahead but all this stuff happened before the start of the game.

The world was originally nothing but chaos, ruled by Tiamat. But at some point, she was usurped by the horned god Marduk. Marduk set upon a curse that he would continue his reign even after his death. This created the system of order that is maintained by the Throne of Creation. The next ruler was meant to be Atum, but Marduk made the system prevent any deity with ties to serpents (or dragons) like Tiamat assume the Throne. Rule was instead given to Amon-Ra. After Amon-Ra was Baal. After Baal was the God of Law.

The God of Law did not play fair, and to help stay in power he essentially downgraded all the other gods to the status of demon, significantly reduced their power by removing their "knowledge". It was all then stored within the Tree of Knowledge. The goddess Nuwa supposedly created humanity at point before this. Some humans, including Adam and Eve, were tempted by the God of Chaos, Lucifer (or the serpent Satan), to eat a fruit from the tree, thus gaining the god's lost knowledge.

18 years ago before the start of the game, the God of Law was about to recreate the world in an event known at the Conception. Tokyo was ground zero. However, Lucifer intervened and lead an army of demons to battle against him and the angels, triggering Armageddon. This lead to the destruction of Tokyo, but before his death, the God of Law perfectly recreates it using a power called the Shekinah Glory, and the humans within now live in the copy, unaware of these events.

Descendants of the humans who gained the knowledge of one of more gods are still around. The God of Law's defeat means other gods can now regain their true form, called a "nahobino". Should the knowledge-bearing humans merge with a matching god, they transform into a nahobino. Angels who remain loyal to the God of Law attempt to hide the fact that he has been defeated and that other gods can now gain back their true form, maintaining order where they can.

Lucifer is a serpent deity, so instead of assuming the Throne of Creation after his victory, he took the God of Law's knowledge to transcend even further into a godly being. He awaits any who approach the Throne to defeat them, preventing any more new rulers so the system of law would stop. The reason he doesn't destroy the Throne is because he is not a nahobino, and you need the power of one to do so. Acquiring the God of Law's knowledge had him ascend, but not turn into a nahobino.

This is the setup for the Canon of Creation. Here are your choices;

Destroy the Throne of Creation. This is essentially agreeing with Lucifer. Instead of preventing new rulers, you just end the succession system entirely. This leads to chaotic demons to run rampant, and humanity to fend for itself. Some still have gods' knowledge, however, and no doubt technology will also help them survive. Although it remains hopeful that humanity will see victory, this will not be achieved without major loss of life. You still rule, and mostly observe what is to come.

Uphold the God of Law's order. You wish to rule by maintaining the order made by the God of Law when he was present. Humans remain unaware of demons and angels, and even the ones who were killed since the God of Law's rule ended are returned. Tokyo is also rebuilt. You rule from the Throne, keeping this order present, and judge all.

Allow the rule of many gods. To prevent a cosmic dictatorship, instead of one ruler, the world has opened up to many gods who can govern it. This will see a shift in power frequently, and while there may be a diverse set of ideologies, this ultimately leads to a great deal of never-ending conflict. You sit at the Throne, trying to convince yourself this was a good idea.

Create a world only for humanity. You wipe out all traces of demons, angels, and gods from reality. Humans will go about the rest of their days without interference from any of them. You still rule yourself, however. Therefore it is ambiguous whether this is possible.

Like with the Canon of Creation, the Canon of Vengeance also only has its story differences appear near the end of game, only even further into the end, after you've progressed past the Empyrean.

If you're more of a destination instead of the journey kind of person, this is the section for you, otherwise, ignore it. Heavy spoilers of course.

When Marduk slew Tiamat eons ago, this left some of her followers, the Qadištu, to pursue vengeance by aiming to revive their goddess to destroy everything and return the world to what it once was.

18 years before the start of the game, Yoko was a goddess of creation who would lead a suitable candidate to become the next ruler. To help keep his status, the God of Law imprisoned her. This is the girl you can free by taking her hand at the start of the game. Doing so means you are in the Canon of Vengeance.

Yoko and the Qadištu team up to achieve their goals of revenge and destruction. The Qadištu must gather enough Magatsuhi, a source of power used by demons, by killing humans in Tokyo, and Yoko must bring you, a nahobino with Marduk's dragonslayer ancestry, to them. This is what's required to revive Tiamat.

This is the setup for the Canon of Vengeance. During the final events of the game, before facing off against Tiamat, the game checks whether you are law-aligned or chaos aligned.

Law-aligned. You assume the Throne of Creation as ruler, and are guided to correct the problems of the current world to form an ideal one where humans live peacefully as you govern its order. You allow the universe to grow infinitely, and fulfill the wishes of its inhabitants.

Chaos-aligned. You reject the Throne of Creation, and start the world anew. This is to remove the problems at its root, and a total reset is the only way to do so. You and Yoko are at the beginning of a new universe, where there is only the primordial chaos. From here, you both aim to end the suffering of before.

It's just a better story in general as it improves character motivations and interactions which are not present in Canon of Creation. Do this by taking the girl's hand at the very start of the game and you're good. Between the Law and Chaos routes, you make certain dialogue choices and side quest decisions throughout your playthrough.

Agree with Tao, be optimistic, want to maintain the current world and fix problems if you want the Law ending.
Agree with Yoko, be pessimistic, want to end the current world and start from scratch if you want the Chaos ending.

There are some side quests which collide with each other. You essentially have to defeat the opposing quest giver to sway your alignment between Law and Chaos.


The split in the story happens at the end of the Empyrean, AKA after the Alilat boss fight and you go to the next room. Both routes have a unique penultimate boss fight.

Do not take the girl's hand at the very start of the game. Why do Creation first? This is the original storyline, and therefore lacks a fair amount of story additions that Vengeance has. Characters appear a bit underdeveloped the first time round, so you will very much appreciate the changes on your second playthrough. Why do Humanity ending? It has the most content and story, as it requires you to complete certain side quests and get additional phases for the final boss.

To get the Humanity ending, you DO NOT need to be on a NG+ playthrough. Also, it does not matter what alignment you are on, as the only requirements are certain side quest completions. Honestly, you're better off just doing every side quest available, but there is a specific decision at the end of one which you must select. At the end of the side quest titled "The Egyptians' Fate", spare Khonsu. I did not manage to determine the exact cutoff point for completing the side quests, but best to complete them all before meeting the boss at the end of the Temple of Eternity.

After the boss at the Temple of Eternity, select Destroy. Continue this route, but if Nuwa did not show up after defeating Abdiel, you did not meet the requirements and are unable to get the Humanity ending. If you didn't, it's not a huge deal really, just a different ending cutscene. After the Tsukuyomi boss fight, you will get an additional choice. This time, select Humanity. If you can't get the Humanity ending, this is your chance to jump to the Law or Chaos ending. Complete your playthrough, create a Cleared save file.

Load game from the Cleared save file from the main menu, and start again. Select either Newborn or Reborn for your NG+ playthrough. You'll get an explanation of both when selecting, but I recommend Reborn.

When you take the girl's hand and move onto the Canon of Vengeance, it starts very similar. Feel free to skip past dialogue and cutscenes until getting to meet with Yuzuru for the first time in the Netherworld. This is the first proper cutscene with a difference. From here on out, the majority of cutscenes are different. Read the previous part to get information about the Canon of Vengeance.

-or-

There are four super bosses in the game. Shiva and Demi-fiend can be fought on every route. Masakado is Creation route exclusive, and Satan is Vengeance route exclusive.

Satan can only be fought after you have a cleared game save file present, this is done after reaching any ending, except for Creation's Destroy ending. If you don't want to start a new playthrough, reload a previous save file that is not the cleared game save file. Return to Mastema and he will have a new quest for you if completed the quest to defeat Samael.

Masakado has two versions. You do not need any requirements to fight the (still difficult) lesser version. In order to fight the more difficult, super boss-y version, you must obtain the Kiou Sword key item from northwest Shinjuku first, which is Vengeance route exclusive. After obtaining it, Arahabaki appears and takes it. Next, in the Canon of Creation, when you get to the Kunitsu in Chiyoda (lead by Okuninushi), that same Arahabaki is seen floating over the nearby ledge. Reobtain the Kiou Sword. When you get to fight Masakado, you can now select the higher difficulty version.

-or-

Refer to the previous section to know how to unlock the fight against Satan. After defeating Satan, then completing your Canon of Vengeance playthrough you will unlock Godborn mode. This is in addition to selecting from Newborn and Reborn when starting a NG+ playthrough. Because of its requirements, Godborn is unlocked on your second playthrough at the earliest.

Godborn is separate from the difficulty level selection. This means you can select it alongside Casual, Hard difficulty, etc.

What even is Godborn mode? It's the exact same as Reborn, as in you keep everything from your prior playthrough, but all enemies and bosses are now level 150. You're probably level 99 at this point, but you can purchase the Miracle "Moral Transcendence" for 999 Glory to increase the level cap of you and your demons to 150.

The enemy level increase means a buff to enemy stats, but not necessarily to their behavior, except for them having unlocked more skills, just like how your own demons would have. You may still be able to unga bunga normal enemies just fine, even early bosses too.

If you want to tackle the game's hardest challenges (outside of Challenge Mode fights) then go ahead and try beating all four super bosses in Godborn mode. If you beat them all on a previous playthrough at some point, there isn't much else you can do different except for juicing your own stats with balms, and incense for your demons. You still won't be saved from Demi-fiend's Gaea Rage though. Ugh.

Yup, you have to complete this game six times to get all achievements. This is because you must complete all virtual trainer battles on one save file, and all are unlocked after getting every ending. These battles are just repeats of mandatory boss battles.

It's possible to completely fill out the demon compendium before your sixth ending. Unlocking some demons for fusion requires completing their associated side quest. Listing side quests is out of the scope for this guide, but it's easy to find out there.

Your choice of difficulty setting has no affect on achievements. If you're not trying to impress anyone just pick Casual when starting. Or better yet, download the Safety Difficulty and/or Mitama Dance DLC and use those. Don't worry, I won't judge.

Start with Canon of Creation, Chaos route. Why? Starting with Creation is explained in the "I want one playthrough of each canon" section, but since you'll be doing all endings, you should pick the one that benefits you the most for subsequent playthroughs.

At some point in the Empyrean on a Chaos-centric Canon of Creation playthrough, you unlock the "Inheritance Violation" miracle. This allows you to change a demon's starting skills during skill inheritance. Much, much better than the "Rank Violation" miracle you get on a Law-centric playthrough for Canon of Creation. It allows you to ignore the level requirement for demon fusion... but you'll be a high level anyway so this may not be useful for you at all. Note that you unlock both these miracles on any alignment in Canon of Vengeance at the Empyrean once you are ending-locked.

Since this would be your first playthrough, I recommend just doing everything the game has to offer. But if you don't care about that, and you don't need the experience points, just breeze through the game as you wish.

Next is your first Canon of Vengeance playthrough. Make sure to select Reborn mode when starting. Law or Chaos, doesn't matter, just one boss fight near the end is different. However, you must defeat Satan in a side quest and unlock Godborn mode for your next playthrough before finishing this one. Refer to the "I want to fight all the super bosses" section for information about Satan and Godborn mode.

Your third playthrough is another one for Canon of Creation, and will be your only one using Godborn mode. Why? Godborn mode has buffed-up stats for all enemies, so I recommend doing the Destroy route this time, as it features the least number of bosses you have to fight. At the end of the Destroy route, you do not fight Lucifer at the end, and so the "final boss" is instead Tsukuyomi.

After completing a Godborn playthrough, and you have the Moral Transcendence Miracle purchased during it, you DO NOT need to select it again upon starting a new save file for you to keep the increased level cap. This means you can do subsequent playthroughs as level 150 but everything else is back to their normal level.

The next three playthrough are just mop-ups. Do all the routes you haven't done already. After all six, you will have to still start a seventh playthrough and complete the Minato section to re-unlock the ability to do virtual trainer battles.

Anything I got wrong on the requirements and decision side, let me know. This guide was almost entirely based on my own experience playing the game but it was over the course of nearly two months so I might have misremembered some things. Thank you to 吸血鬼兎のヴァニラ for correcting my mistake regarding unlocking the Satan fight and so the guide was updated.

There's a lot of misinformation out there regarding the requirements of the Humanity ending and I do firmly believe it is just specific side quest completions.

In terms lore, I'm certain I got it right as well, perhaps some of it is left to interpretation considering a lot of it is just exposition but I'm willing to discuss the aspects of them.

Personally, I don't believe Shin Megami Tensei V exactly has a "Neutral Ending", that's why I referred to the two endings which could be interpreted as it as the "Destroy Ending" and "Humanity Ending". Historically within the series, the Neutral Ending in each game strikes a balance between law and chaos, and humans mostly do benefit from it. Destroy just leads to chaos honestly, and while Humanity comes close, it's more so rejecting the law versus chaos system entirely to create something new, which is inline with the game's theme.

And of course, thank you for reading.