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Found 17 results

  1. So there’s like a Japanese poll about Persona maybe coming to the switch. Not only that but apparently Persona 5 Royal underperformed on PS4, so SEGA and Atlus both might take Persona to the switch My questions are 1: Do you all take stock in this idea that Persona of any kind will get a port? 2: Do you think Persona should come to switch since it’s the spin off series of Shin Megami Tensei and SMT is a mostly Nintendo Series? 3: What other ports for the switch would you love to see? (Personally a Rhythm Thief port would be perfect)
  2. To commemorate the imminent release of TMSFE, let's do a round of which SMT/Persona (or Radiant Historia/Odin Sphere, if you so desire) character should have which FE character as their mirage. (I'm not sure whether this thread should be here or in a FE-specific thread, but anyway.) For the purpose of this excercise, the Atlus characters can have multiple mirages as their personas. My round: Persona 4: Yu: Male Robin Yosuke: not quite sure...Gatrie or Inigo maybe? Chie: Leonie/Lyn Yukiko: Lilina/L'Arachel Kanji: Ike, Hector, or Sigurd? Rise: Lalum Naoto: Lute/Soren? Teddie: Fa Nanako: Maria Marie: Idenn Tohru Adachi: Narcian Persona 3 Portable Minako: Female Robin Junpei: Hinata/Caspar Yukari: Lucina/Neimi Fuuka: Florina/ Akihiko: Dieck Mitsuru: Edelgard! Shinjiro: Rutger/Jeritza Ken: Lugh or Chad Aigis: Female Byleth Ikutsuki: Nergal Ryoji: Lyon Persona 5: Akira: Maybe Leif (Thracia 776) Masayoshi Shido: Definitely one of the senators from Radiant Dawn So, what's everyone's take?
  3. Persona 4 Golden: Review Part 1 - Story and Characters I've just finished my second run of Persona 4 Golden earlier today and thus thought that this is a good time to share my thoughts, both good and bad. Mostly good, thankfully - to the point that I recommend both this and Dancing All Night, which I will review that sometime later. Interestingly enough, TMSFE was the game that aroused my interest in Atlus's games in general and this game in particular, so I have to thank TMS for that. Main Story Synopsis: So you are a high-school student sent to live with your uncle (who is a detective) on your mother's side in the sleepy Japanese town of Inaba, while your parents are working overseas. Rumor are abound that on a rainy midnight, the TV in your house turns on and you get to see your soulmate on the screen. Meanwhile a series of bizarre murders and disappearances is occuring around town. You, and two of your new classmates try out the rumors to the test, and it turns out you can enter the TV via the screen. You find out that there an entire new world inside the TV. Could it have something to do with the murders and disappearances? In many ways, Persona 4 Golden was the story that hit almost all of the high notes for me. The main story was a perfect example of how a lighthearted story can nevertheless be a thought-provoking one. On the epic scale, there was an important story to learn about how it is easy to be caught up in the rumors and gossip fed by the media (and the TV in particular, being the plot-driver in the game), and how the main characters struggle and overcome the deception that comes with the TV. One climatic scene (which potentially leads to the bad ending) is noteworthy, as it particularly relates to the portrayal of suspects in a crime. Unfortunately, Japan has a particularly strong attitude towards "guilty unless proven otherwise", arising from honor versus shame, which Atlus questions in the story. (Although, if Michael Jackson and others are any indication, North America and Europe aren't free from such prejudices either.) Interestingly, the same thing gets revisited in Persona 5, except from a legal point of view, where Atlus questions the often rigged criminal court system of Japan, which has a 99.9% conviction rate, compared to 90-97% of various European and North American countries. It is only the heroes' efforts in digging deeper and not trusting the rumors of the media's portrayal of the serial murders that they got to the final boss, and it shows that we need to draw our own conclusions instead of having the media do it for us. Another highlight of the main story which is also related to the next argument below is how the power of friendship is portrayed. While the story is presented optimistically with the main party being good friends, they all actively work towards a common goal of identifying the serial killer - showing the importance in actually putting in the effort to achieve the end goal. Another aspect done right was that the same power can end up being harmful in the wrong circumstance: In saying this, there are some areas that could see improvement. Persona 4, being a JRPG, isn't entirely free on some of the negative aspects of anime jokes (including an infamous accident between the two genders in a hot springs), sadly didn't get adapted out in Persona 4 Animation. Thankfully, they are mostly confined in the more comedic chapters while the main story is quite serious (if still fairly optimistic). Another thing worth noting is that I was able to find very few plot holes in the story. There is a seeming plot hole that some people talks about, but it is a plot point that is actually justified when you spend some time thinking about it, which I shall elabourate in a later post. If there is a game showing why fake news is a real threat, this is the game. Characters and their arcs On the more mundane side of the story, if Atlus was trying to make me relive my high school years in Japan, it has been quite sucessful. Whether you are exploring the world inside the TV infested by the Shadows materialized from the collective subconcious, or you are at class listening to your teacher, you will be spending time with people. Persona has a variation of the dating sim system called the Social Link, which both provides character-specific arcs and various gameplay/battle bonuses like Fire Emblem's support system. Almost all of the people that the player character (canon name: Yu Narukami) befriends have their own stories and struggles to tell, which might as well be from real life. And in relation to me previous point about searching for the truth, many of said characters are actually different to how they are portrayed in their TV footages. Spoilers below: Everybody has their stories and their struggles to tell about, and it feels like I am talking to a friend or a family member in real life. And if there is one thing that all of the stories argue, it is of the importance to being honest with yourself, and it is through this that you will be able to move forward. Particularly, in at least two characters cases, gender roles are brought into question; one of your underclassman learns that there's nothing wrong in liking hobbies that are considered to be associated with the opposite gender. Another, who is working part-time as a skilled professional on top of being a student, realises that it is not her problem that she, as a girl, would be disrespected at work - it's society's misogynistic views that is the problem, and keep in mind that Japan's gender gap was ranked one of the worst according to The World Economic Forum in 2017. Of course, like all games, there are some areas that end up being flawed in the storyline. The aformentioned former has some unfortunate implications with his gender identity that ends up being used as a punchline a couple of times in the story - perhaps not helped by the fact that his sexual orientation has been made ambiguous to this day. The aformentioned latter, on the other hand, ends up being the closest to being a Mary Sue, due to her struggles not being all that apparent in her social link. Overall, however, the majority of characters are very well-rounded with realistic stories that showcase some of the issues that Japan faced back in the late 2000s and early 2010s. All in all, I am looking forward to what Persona 3 and Persona 5 has to offer in the story and characters departments. Part 2 - Continued in this post.
  4. Surprised no one made a topic about this yet but after a year of silence from Atlus they finally announced Persona Q2 yesterday and it's titled Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth. Personally this is a game that I have been waiting to hear to about even though it is pretty much what most expected it to be. The casts of P3, P4 and P5 (sorry P1 and P2 fans) team up to assist the game's OC girl out with whatever problem she will have. Seems like the aesthetics will be based around a movie theater I guess or maybe a theater for a play. Plot will probably be nothing to write home about but I still think it will be interesting to see the P5 cast interact with the older cast of characters since one part of the trailer makes it out to seem like the Phantom Thieves and the IT (Investigation Team/P4's cast) will be in conflict against each other for at least presumedly the early portion of the story. Hoping for more interactions between the different set of casts like Kanji and Ken did from PQ1 but I can already see some sillier ones like Teddie and Morgana arguing with other over who the better mascot, Yosuke/Junpei fawning over Ann and maybe Ryuji will become Akihiko's new training partner this time. Though what I am really interested in is that they actually decided to add the female protagonist from P3P to the game and I wonder what her role in this will be. Will they have the both Persona 3 protagonists interacting with each other or is it that you just decide the P3 protagonist's gender at the beginning of the game since I could see it going either way. And assuming the game is dubbed I wonder who will voice her now (and Rise for that matter) since I don't think Laura Bailey will be back to voice her. Alexis Tipton maybe? Anyways, game releases on November 29, 2018 in Japan and will probably be released outside Japan sometime in 2019. Feel free to discuss more about this.
  5. So this got announced not too long ago at EVO. It's essentially an Arc System Works crossover fighting game with BlazBlue, Persona 4 Arena, and Uniel with guest(s) from RWBY. I'm not quite sure if there'll be more RWBY reps than just Ruby herself, but I would love to see the main team and Pyrrha. And I'm generally just excited to see all of the anime fighting glory that is the beauty of Arc System Works. I'm not very good with their fighting games, but I'll at least try. Here's hoping for more Persona reps (mostly Akihiko for me and maybe even a P5 rep because why not?) and Nine (Konoe) from BlazBlue to make it in. Any thoughts, concerns, hype, general "what the hell did I just watch" comments?
  6. I should start out by saying this is just my opinion, if you disagree, please try to be nice about it. I should also state that I have no clue if there is another topic like this, if there is, I didn't see it when browsing earlier, my bad. Persona is seemingly the life blood of the Megami Tensei franchise, or MegaTen. There is 2 spin offs for the spin off series releasing in 2 days as of writing, a leaked/rumoured Persona 4 reboot thing, Persona Q2 which is a sequel to the Mediocre at best Persona Q, and a slightly confirmed Persona 6. While this may be seen as fantastic to a lot of people, I don't agree with that. Persona has eaten Atlus's attention for MegaTen. There are no more sub series or spin offs anymore, just Persona. It's now to the point where Persona and the rest of MegaTen are considered financially different. Sure, SMT5 is on the way eventually but that is it. While DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP Strange Journey just released, that was a rerelease of a DS game with new additions, whether you prefer it or prefer the original isn't of importance, but DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP SJ is just a rerelease. The game came out many years ago, it doesn't count. The only other game is Dx2 SMT Liberation, which doesn't count either. The mobile game was developed by Sega and is managed by Sega, not Atlus. Atlus is busy rushing out Persona spin offs with what will most likely be mixed results of Mediocre to potentially great, time can only tell. But with SMT5 being the only Main Line game being made, there is an apparent lack of presence of other titles. We haven't had a fifth Demon Summoner and the last DeSu game was a rerelease of Soul Hackers which was originally on the Sega Saturn. Hell, Demi-Kids isn't a thing anymore and Atlus tried to run that like it was the second coming of Christ. We haven't had anything similar to Digital Devil Saga, Devil Survivor, Demon Summoner, really anything in years. Ever since Persona 3 and 4 became popular, especially Persona 4. Persona 4 has brought about the end of a golden era of MegaTen. Instead of a new DeSu, we get a Persona 4 spin off regularly. Instead of originality, it's Persona 3 dancing! Only time can tell what will happen but this can potentially harm Studio Zero, a new studio formed of Atlus staff who are making Project Re:Fantasy as well as the port of Catherine. Funding will stop going to Studio Zero and will go directly to another Persona game. Eventually there will be a Persona fatigue and Atlus will be screwed with its new cash cow. SMT is all but surely dead, which is sad. Main Line has been a staple of Atlus's greatness. SMT 1, 2, and If... are staples of their SNES library and the PS1 ports are even better. SMT3, while being a product of its time, showed that even after a decade, Main Line was strong and capable of a genre defining game. Without SMT3, MegaTen as a whole would be completely different as well as the beloved PS2 games like DDS, DeSu, and both Persona outings. SMT 4 and 4F are both strong contenders of why the 3ds is a great place for JRPGs, they are both great games with an aura of brilliance in their gameplay. Strange Journey was a return to the first person dungeon crawling mixed with elements from the PS2 era, blending both extremely well. SMT NINE should be forgotten to time and IMAGINE was snuffed of the Main Line status even though NINE still is and NINE is the definition of steaming garbage. It'd be a shame if Atlus dropped Main Line, especially since this unnecessary milking of Persona has eaten up their interest. If this continues, SMT5 will be overshadowed even worse than it already is. Atlus needs to stop focusing on Persona and just let their developers go wild, MegaTen is a wacky franchise and that shouldn't ever be lost. Persona is so popular but the costs of its popularity is harmful to the franchise and needs to be scaled down by a lot. It's great that Persona 5 sold so damn well and is loved, it truly is. That love shouldn't mean more milking though. There will be a huge fatigue for Persona eventually and that will be an issue for Atlus and then what? There will be no more parts of the Franchise to rely on since all were murdered by the wave of Persona. Hopefully SMT5 succeeds and the Switch can get a lot of great sub series with that success. Have a nice day/afternoon/night everyone! Side Note: Please don't beg for Persona 5 switch ports, that's nonsense.
  7. Hello everybody. I am a huge FE fan. I have beaten every FE released in the US, including FE Warriors and Tokyo Mirage sessions #FE. My first FE game was Path of Radiance and it is my still my favorite one and Ike is my boy. I've kept a list of all the kill counts throughout the FE games that I've played and made a corresponding list in excel about it that I plan on posting in the future. Other games series I enjoy include The Shin megami tensei games and Persona games. A old school classic that is among favorite game series of all time is Monster Rancher, with MR2 being my favorite from the series
  8. Hello everyone I'm new so I hope I posted this in the right area. My apologies if it's formatted weird. So I got bored and decided to combine a bunch of SMT/Persona Elements into a possible chart. Let me know if certain things need more clarification or balancing. There are A LOT of elements so instead of the usual 8 Slots, I think increasing the slots by at least 2 would be an interesting balance. (10 Skill Slots) An Entity can be one or a combination of Main Types and/or Sub Types Main Types - Melee, Magic, Force, Blast, Bless, Curse, Almighty Sub Types - Wind, Earth, Water, Elec, Ice, Fire, Psychokinesis, Nuclear Main Types Magic/Melee are weak to each other Sub Types Wind/Earth/Water/Elec/Ice/Fire hit 4 weaknesses but have 4 weaknesses (Low Cost) Main Types Force/Blast are weak to each other and their corresponding Sub Types (Low Cost) Main Types Bless/Curse are weak to only each other (Medium Cost) Sub Types Psychokinesis/Nuclear are weak to each other and can get Technical (Medium Cost) Main Type Almighty has no weaknesses but does normal damage (High Cost) Type Element Spell Name Weaknesses Resist/Null/Absorb/Repel Category:Force Melee Force Physical Atks/Skills Magic Force Zan Melee/Magic Blast Melee/Magic Force Magic Psychokinesis (Psy) Frei Magic Wind Garu Bufu Zio Agi Tera Garu Aqua Magic Earth Tera/Magna Garu Zio Aqua Agi Bufu Tera Magic Water Aqua Bufu Zio Agi Tera Garu Aqua Category:Blast Melee Blast Gun Atks/Skills Magic Blast ??? Melee/Magic Force Melee/Magic Blast Magic Nuclear (Frei) Psy Magic Lightning (Zio) Bufu Garu Aqua Tera Zio Agi Magic Ice/Cold (Bufu) Garu Zio Aqua Agi Bufu Tera Magic Fire/Heat (Agi) Bufu Garu Aqua Tera Zio Agi Category:Bless Special Bless Kouha Curse Bless Special Bless Hama Curse Bless Category:Curse Special Curse Eiha Bless Curse Special Curse Mudo Bless Curse Category:Almighty (Normal Damage. Melee Skills use STR and Megido skills use MAG) Special Almighty (Melee) Skill No weaknesses ??? Special Almighty (Magic) Megido No weaknesses ??? Other Main Types Melee Weak to Magic(Any/All Combo) Resist/Null/Absorb/Repel Melee Magic Weak to Melee(Phys/Gun or Both) Resist/Null/Absorb/Repel Magic Opposing Elements + Reason Wind <-> Ice Wind can Break Ice. Ice can Block Wind. Ice <-> Fire Ice can Extinguish Fire. Fire can Melt Ice. Fire <-> Wind Fire can be amplified by Wind. Wind can Smother Fire. Wind <-> Earth Winds can Erode Earth. Earth(Metal) can Block Strong Winds. Elec <-> Ice Electricity Conducts in Ice(Water). Ice(Water) can Short Circuit Electricity. Water <-> Ice (Hot) Water can Melt Ice. Ice(Cold) can Freeze Water. Water <-> Elec Water can Short Circuit Electricity. Electricity Conducts in Water. Water <-> Fire Water can Extinguish Fire. Fire(Heat) can Evaporate Water. Elec <-> Earth Electricity Conducts in Earth(Metal). Earth can Ground Electricity. Fire <-> Earth Fire can Melt Earth(Metal). Earth can Extinguish/Smother Fire. Earth <-> Water Earth can Absorb Water. Water can Erode Earth(Metal). Wind <-> Elec Unexplained atm but its a Persona commonality Psy <-> Frei Opposites Force <-> Blast Opposites Curse <-> Bless Opposites Keep in mind, Earths relation to Metal, Fires relation to Heat, and Ices relation to Cold. Technicals - x2 Damage but no extra turn (Added Ailments to Wind/Earth/Water for Psy Technicals) Frei gains Blast Technical For: Psy gains Force Technical For: Fire causes Burn Wind causes Confuse Ice causes Freeze Earth causes Rage Elec causes Shock Water causes Brainwash (bad pun i know) Weakness/Resist/Null/Absorb/Repel conditions change if an Entity has 2+ Types First Type has Priority over Second Type for Skill Learning/Resistances/Etc. Second Type can cancel First Type Weakness but can give weaknesses. For Skill Learning. Examples of Multiple Types (Some combinations are alot better than others) Type 1 Type 2 Weaknesses Resist/Nul/Absorb/Rpl Neutral Melee Fire Ice,Wind,Water,Earth Melee,Fire,Elec Magic Earth Phys,Garu,Zio,Agi,Aqua Earth,Ice,Psy,Frei Bless/Curse Dark Ice Light,Agi,Garu,Aqua,Zio Dark,Ice,Earth Wind Elec Ice,Earth Wind,Elec Fire/Water Blast Psy Wind,Earth,Water Elec,Fire,Ice Frei Melee Magic Magic Melee Special Magic Melee Melee Magic Special Force Elec Ice Elec Fire/Water/Wind/Earth Blast Psy Water,Wind,Earth Psy Fire/Ice/Elec/Frei Force Blast None None All Magic Blast Melee Zio,Bufu,Agi,Psy,Frei Bless/Curse/Aqua/Garu/Tera Type 1 Type 2 Weakness Resist/Nul/Absorb/Rpl Neutral Almighty Fire No Weakness The Rest Ice,Wind,Water,Earth Almighty Force No weakness The Rest Ice,Fire,Elec Almighty Psy No weakness The Rest Frei Almighty Light No weakness The Rest Dark Almighty Magic No weakness Magic Melee Almighty Melee No weakness Melee Magic Special Combination (Almighty has no weaknesses. Special Entities such as Bosses) Possible Super-Boss Combination (Psy/Frei/Light/Dark are too OP for normal)
  9. So I had quite the enjoyment of Tokyo Mirage Sessions when I played the couple of first chapters with my friend's Wii U. After I complete that game, i might want to play Persona proper. The question is which to start from. I was thinking Persona 4 as the story for that is only somewhat darker than TMS, not to mention it would eventually lead into Dancing All Night, which has a similar (but darker) theme of the Japanese entertainment industry. Although, there is also the question of console/handheld to get as I currently do not own anything that is Playstation related.
  10. A few months ago I had an idea to add the MC from Persona 3 into Fire Emblem 7. I had a perfect image of how he would play in my head. He was like Robin in Awakening. He would have the player's in game name and act on the player's behalf as the leader of the squad just like in the game he was initially from, and he would've used both swords and spells and his spell use animation would be him summoning Orpheus. This all sounded amazing in my head, but I came back down to earth after realizing I don't know anything about rom hacking. I tried messing around with some in game sprites, but that didn't end up working out well. I'm putting this out because I'm hoping that some talented individual or group who loves both franchises will attempt to combine them in anyway. It doesn't have to be simply adding a character, it could be a whole new game that is a TRUE Shin Megami Tensei and Fire Emblem crossover. If anyone is interested please ask around and comment on this!
  11. So, I've tried getting into both Shin Megami Tensei and Persona previously with Persona 4 and the 3DS port/remake of Soul Hackers, but I didn't really end up getting far in either of them. I am to give both series an honest shot, though, so I'm curious if any fans of them on here have any recommendations for a good "first game" in each series, as well as things like what to expect from the gameplay, common newcomer pitfalls to avoid, what general sort of mindset to have when getting into each series, etc.
  12. To my mind this series is popular and beloved enough to deserve an own thread. You can discuss or ask questions about everything related Shin Megami Tensei including the related series like Persona, Devil Survivor or Devil Children. Since I only have played a couple of Persona games and the both DeSu parts it's a good way for newcomers like me to get to know more about this franchise. Each week I'll ask you a question to give a bit food for a discussion. Question #1: What's your favorite Shin Megami Tensei game and why? A lively and nice discussion is appreciated. Have fun! PS: Idk if it should be sent to the videogame section or here. It depends how this thread develops. I just put it there not to do any mistake.
  13. I’ll Burn my Dread and Then Face Myself It’s 12 o’clock midnight and it’s time to get wild. *Entering the Dark Hour* Not that wild, please no. *Survives the onslaught* Perhaps it’s best to never stay up past 12AM, unless you’re playing a game as good as Persona 3 perhaps, it’s your responsibility in the end, but be wary of those shadows, they will not hesitate to finish you off. Hey guys, I had many suggestions to play Persona 3 and after playing it for an entire month, I’ve seen it through to the end, so comes my review for it, I hope you enjoy reading as much as I enjoyed writing. Here's Yuriofwind's video review of it if you wanna see how the game works. Dreamless Dorm, Ticking Clock Persona games, at least the ones I played are fixated on this “Midnight” thing, Persona 3 more so than 4. The story of Persona 3 takes place in a small town in Japan and focuses on the Special Extracurricular Execution Squad. (SEES for short) They are high school students who live on the same dorm, all with the same special power Persona which I’ll elaborate on later, their goal is to restore peace to the world by defeating the evil creatures known as shadows. As the opening song states, this is indeed a dorm that rarely gets decent enough sleep. The only way to face the shadows is via the Dark Hour which takes place right when the clock hits 12AM, you know that time when people are usually asleep. The story takes place over little less than a year, the characters must defeat strong shadows every full moon so there’s a very important boss every month to advance the story. One of the many things that make Persona special is the character development, almost every character in the game is three dimensional and flawed, they may have special powers but they’re just high school kids, they get tired in battle, they face difficulties in real life tasks, but most importantly, they face themselves (No pun intended) Junpei is a video game nerd who could care less about his grades and finds his Persona ability to be the only important thing he’s proficient with, Ken is a 10 year old kid despite being mature about it, and Aigis is a bloody robot. Every character in the game have very clear and well thought out story arcs and the resolution for those story arcs not only change the character but also changing gameplay, as they literally unlock a new Persona better matching to their current state. (Except the OP as hell MC he has access to multiple Personas) Akihiko is my favorite character, I mean he’s just too badass besides developing a relationship with his old friend Shinji. But the story and plot are also interesting in their own right and have a lot of twists and turns like any good story has, the theme of the game is facing death, its inevitability and questioning life. The characters are very suited to the theme, as almost all of them have personal issues to deal with on top of being placed with the burden of saving the world. It’s a well written story filled with intriguing villains and grey morality. On par with that of Persona 4. The Arcana is The Means by Which All Is Revealed Persona 3 is a game that is very similar to Persona 4, or should I say the opposite, but it’s a very different game at the same time. A lot of the combat and gameplay aspects remain similar, there’s of course the Personas which are the series’ equivalent to Pokémon or Yu Gi Oh in a way, and they are spirits summoned from one’s heart into battle, each of them are related to the Tarot cards major arcana if you’re familiar with those cards. The game’s combat system is similar to that of a typical turn based JRPG, each party member takes turns followed by the enemy (Unless the enemy has higher speed) and the battle pretty much continues on until one of either party is dead. Don’t die though, just like in most JRPGs boy do you lose progress and you get to watch that lovely 5 minute boss intro scene which thankfully didn’t happen to me all that much as I almost never died against the major story bosses, only once during the Wheel of Fortune/Strength boss. The tower bosses are a different case, we’ll talk about those in a while. The only thing that makes combat in Persona different than other JRPGs are, well, Personas. These Personas each have different traits to them, different skills, strengths and weaknesses. And really one of the most fun parts of the game is Persona Fusion, fusion does what the name suggests, it literally fuses all different Personas you have to give you a single Persona that’s usually stronger depending on your fusion choice. Near the beginning, you get to fuse two or three Personas in a single fusion operation, and later on, you’ll be able to fuse even more than that. The cascade of synergy is the most exciting part of the game’s combat, managing a team of Personas on top of managing party members in battle adds flavor to the game. A Different Twin But what makes it very different to Persona 4? Well, it’s two major things among others, two of my biggest problems with this otherwise fantastic game. First of all, Tartarus. The game has only a single dungeon if you don’t count the very short pre major boss areas in which you mostly don’t do much, and that dungeon is Tartarus, a 264 floor tower that’s procedurally generated, just like Persona 4’s much more diverse procedural dungeons. You can progress in it a specific amount of stairs in each block, you’ll be able to explore it further every months, as blockades will disappear and allow you to progress further. And every now and then, you’ll reach a non-randomly generated floor that has a boss in it. Tartarus is a very boring dungeon, it’s visually repetitive, it’s repetitive in its exploration and it’s just tedious. Persona 4 was able to hide it’s repetition under the mask of its diverse settings in those dungeons and the reason why you pretty much rarely feel the dungeons in Persona 4 is that they are on average 10 floors long, not 264. Alright, every block in Tartarus has vastly different aesthetics and slightly different music, but they’re mostly pretty boring in my opinion, the game’s combat system and trying out different Personas/Party members make it not as painful as it sounds but when your core central part of the plot, this insane tower that’s a labyrinth of death is really just a 264 floors with variation in about every 40 or so of them. That’s never a good thing to have in your game. I have to at least commend the developers for trying to be different, but you can do better than that, even if you wanna be different. It doesn’t help that the tower bosses are usually cheap and uncreative, there are a lot of bosses in Tartarus that will just make you wanna throw the controller across your room, and others that are pathetically easy. The cheap ones have incredibly unpredictable attacks that stomp your party, sometimes in one hit if they’re weak to the ailment or are under leveled. If it weren’t for Akihiko and his debuffs, the battles would’ve been other levels of ridiculous, a couple of the bosses are just a case of having a good team and good Personas, but some have insane difficulty curves like the Sleeping Table which is a higher level boss than the ones after it in the freaking next block. But really the biggest problem I have with this game and the other major difference from its sequel is the fact that party members cannot be manually controlled, and the AI is so stupid, the only way to make them semi-reliable is going to the tactics menu every now and then and order them to change their behavior, but that’s not nearly as efficient as controlling them yourself like you can in Persona 4. There were a lot of times when I lost a battle just because of a party member’s dumb actions like waking a downed enemy up that I was setting up for an all-out attack, and there were a lot of cases where I would’ve loved if they could’ve used items from my inventory but guess what? They can’t, they only use items through their stupid infinite magical supply inventory that only has two or four crappy items. And there are times when I wanted them to use a different buff, having Akihiko only debuff an enemy on Heal/Support instead of healing an ally that barely took any damage. The final boss in the game was very good and very symbolic but it would’ve been much easier if I could’ve controlled party members instead of rotating the wheel every turn for different tactics that aren’t as reliable as manual control. There are other smaller differences like the stamina system, fight too many battles and you’ll eventually be too tired and suffer penalties, and eventually have to head back home. At first I thought it was a cool system because it brought a sense of urgency and gave a makes players choose their battles wisely, grind too much, and you’ll be too exhausted to keep fighting. But since the game required too much grinding, I just disliked it later on. The overall UI and Menus are much harder to navigate, it’s tedious having to talk to each specific character in order to change their inventory, in Persona 4 there’s one menu that has all of those options, but it’s a slow and tedious process in this game. In terms of technical differences there aren’t that much, the game uses the same engine as Persona 4 so nothing notable in terms of graphical, animation quality and sound differences. One major difference to the visuals is the 2D portraits, every different expression isn’t just a different facial expression but the whole body stance changes, dunno why they left that out in P4, too much work and drawing, I guess? The voice actors are just as excellent as they were before and the soundtrack is great, albeit less memorable than Persona 4’s. The game’s flaws frustrated me a bit, mostly the AI one with Tartarus as a close second, but the other parts of this game are its saving grace. Meaningful Choice This is one of the terms that game designers love to use, immersion is a word that both gamers and game designers love using but meaningful choice helps with that, greatly. Getting immersed in the game is greatly amplified if the game offers meaningful choice. If you’ve studied game design, or you like watching Extra Credits or read some of Gamasutra’s articles, then you’re probably familiar with the term. If you aren’t, I’ll quickly elaborate since I didn’t in my Persona 4 review. Meaningful choice is when a game gives you different choices that have unequal outcomes, those choices can be either gameplay related or story related, or even both. But they must have different results, one could be good or bad, good and better, bad or worse. These meaningful choices help immerse the player in the game’s world and sometimes the Illusion of Choice can be used instead in different games which isn’t as great but also effective. The Persona series has meaningful choice built onto its core, every day you can do a single activity, you can’t possibly do all since it’ll be late and you have to sleep, everyone has to sleep eventually. But what you do with your time is your choice and yours alone, whether you’re developing your social stats or hanging out with your friends is your decision, and you can’t hang out with all of your friends, only with one at a time. This game introduced the social link system that has become prominent throughout the series, and those different social links and different friends you get to hang out with will make certain arcanas stronger for you, making fusion offer more experience points and overall better results with more skills and such since they’ll level up further. A strength and an admirable quality in the Persona series, here it’s slightly weaker than in Persona 4 since you only have 3 social skills as opposed to 6 which means if you’re playing like me you’ll probably max them all out less than halfway through, which means you gotta rely on hanging out with your friends as your sole time killer and they’re not always there, and there are less of them than in P4. But otherwise, it’s an amazing part of the series, very amazing and I always look forward to see the results and fruit of my work. As a player, it empowers me emotionally, immersing me further into the world and making me care more about its characters. As a designer, it inspires me. I think it’s very clear to see that the strongest component of the series is still very much alive in this game, what’s the final verdict? Final Verdict: Persona 3 is an epic video game. It has its fair share of flaws and I wish I played it before Persona 4, or hell I wish I played Persona 3 Portable which had party control. But still, this game laid the foundation when Persona 4 polished it greatly, and there are a lot of suggestions I have for Persona 5 that can make it the perfect Persona game, and I’m pretty sure many others have such suggestions. But I digress, Persona 3 is a very good game and its final chapter was definitely better than Persona 4, while I still think Persona 4 is the overall better game, I still can find lots to appreciate here. Despite Tartarus and Lack of AI control, I’m still gonna give it a better verdict than you may have expected, a nine. The good outweighed the bad for me. Especially after how masterful some of its moments were. Final Score: 9/10 Excellent If you're interested, my Persona 4 review is here. The next game may be Okami, I still haven't beaten Dragon Age Inquisition and don't have the patience to restart it, I lost my save. But yeah, there's a good chance that I'll play Okami soon. And I have not played the extra chapter that came with the FES version of Persona 3, I may play that but I need a break from it. And yeah, new review style, even though I've been writing reviews as an on and off hobby since early 2011 I'm still up for making changes. Thank you for reading, feel free to post your thoughts on Persona 3 and tell me which one you like better, Persona 3 or 4? And why?
  14. It’s my birthday today. You know last year I played the original Xenoblade Chronicles game for the first time on my birthday, it was really something, a shame that I can’t include Xenoblade X on this list because I haven’t I haven’t started playing it yet. Which I should soon and a review will be coming. But for now, I want to see what games everyone really liked playing this year. I’m going to list my favorite games that I played in 2015 and I would like for you all to share your own as well. I played a lot of older games I had shelved for a while, so this list isn’t going to only feature games released in 2015 and in fact don’t be surprised to see games that are 2 generations old. Bloodborne is off this list since I didn’t play much of it, it was on a friend's PS4 but I don’t have a PS4 myself so I didn’t get to play it past the first boss. I didn’t play that much of Rocket League either. An honorable mention goes to The Beginner’s Guide. Okay without further ado, here are my favorites that I played during 2015 with a brief description for each. Mine is in no order. Metroid Prime Trilogy: Super Mario Maker Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain: Persona 3 FES and Persona 4 Undertale Fallout 4: Tabletop Simulator: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt: That is all for today folks, what are your favorite games that you played this year? Doesn’t have to be one released this year of course, feel free to list them here, and you don't need a description if you don't want to of course. And thank you to everyone who read if even some of the reviews I posted throughout the year, it’s been fantastic. It's still the morning, I’ll go and see what the rest of my birthday has to offer. Happy birthday to you too, Sully. *Wink*
  15. I can't understand the extreme Japanese fixation people have. There are those who'd rather have just Japanese with subs than just an English dub. I can't even see why. People say the English voices are annoying, but those people must have terribly thin skin. People complain about games like Persona, but why? Persona has some of the best dubs I've ever seen. Why are people so obsessed with the Japanese dub? I think the only examples that infuriates me are games with British accents. My specific examples are Xenoblade. The only time I ever get insanely mad is when someone disses the dub of Xenoblade and trashes the voice actors. Yeah, no. The terrible Japanese actors are nothing compared to the amazing British voice cast. I'd even go as far as wanting to meet Adam Howden, Carina Reeves, or Jenna Coleman to complement their work. I can't believe anyone would dislike a perfect British dub. British voices are the best in the entire world, and it angers me that anyone could be that intolerant. rant over
  16. Espinosa was totally correct that the Persona 4 LLG challenge ended up devolving into a huge grindfest as soon as the first dungeon began, and it looks like it won't end there. Since I'm not particularly interested in doing that at the moment, I decided I would work on something more fun: playing through my favorite game in the Persona series, in a 100% low level completion. I will be playing on Hard Mode, easier than Espinosa's Maniac Mode on P3P, for obvious reasons, but their will be a different set of challenges to this playthrough that he did not encounter. First of all, due to the different game mechanics, I will not be able to directly control my party members during this playthrough, which will make item spamming (and general battle tactics) more difficult; this, however, should be offset by the fact that I have access to fusion spells (and multiple Personas, unlike P4) and can change the MC's weapon type as necessary. In addition, my time constraints for clearing areas of Tartarus will be much more stringent due to the constraints of a Max Social Link playthrough; for example, I will most likely have to clear the first sector of Tartarus on my first visit to the area, and thus I won't be able to advance the storyline to gain access to the compendium (or more EXP/Akihiko, in general). In any case, I feel that this challenge should be a lot more fun to do, as even though there will still be grinding involved, it should be significantly less. I'm really looking forward to playing through this excellent game again. So my first question to my audience (you guys), is would you prefer to see this in the style of an LP (with me recording cutscenes and noncombat events) or would you rather I limit myself to screening boss fights only? I feel that the Persona games are very compatible with the idea of LPs due to the fact that they are largely story-driven, and for this playthrough in particular, a lot of what occurs during the regular part of the game will be important to maxing out social links and the like. But whatever you guys would like to see, let me know, and I'll let you know when I get started!
  17. If anyone cares, I'm currently working on this challenge and posting videos to YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPs9XPS9DEY&list=PLaRQIiRnzZu9oTu5A2fPAj-ZX6U9Q0YDI Should be fun! It's my first time playing through the game, by the way/ [spoiler=Boss Fights]Shadow Yosuke Shadow Chie Avenger Knight Shadow Yukiko
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