Persona 3
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Peacedog
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Hipolito
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Re: Persona 3
After 220 hours of playing Persona 3: FES, I feel the need to splatter my brains about it. No spoilers, just many words.
Neither of the two halves of Persona 3, the relationship sim and dungeon crawl, would be a very fun game on its own. But the subtle interplay between the two makes the combination irresistible somehow. Spending the day building relationships at high school, then coming home to chat my dormmates and go on a midnight shadow hunt with them, reminded me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I love that show, so it's natural that I love the premise of the game.
Like Buffy, the characters are easy to like thanks to witty dialogue and fine acting. I feel that the English translation preserved Japanese culture and customs while being Americanized enough for me to relate to. Though there's a lot of sibilance in the audio, the voice acting is one of the game's highlights. The actors for Junpei and Yukari are great throughout. The actors for the other characters are good except during extremely emotional scenes, when they kind of blow it. The one big negative is a certain someone who takes the battle support role after the first couple of chapters. Ugh! It's puzzling that the actor does a fine job outside of battle.
Building relationships (Social Links) with people in high school and around town is fun. I usually chose the rude or apathetic dialogue options; in other games, this would lead to hostility, but here, characters often reacted with amusement or gratitude for the candor. Despite all the time I put in the game, I ended up maxing out fewer than half the links. Worse yet, I had not started a single romance! What I had done was wait until each girl wanted to become exclusive, then reload and work on the next girl until she wanted to become exclusive, and so on. My goal was to bring all the girls to the verge of exclusivity and then choose the one I'd want to go steady with. Unfortunately, as soon as I'd reached that point, the game was over! That'll teach me to min-max with the opposite sex.
I'm glad, though, that I maxed out the Hermit link. I found this very fulfilling, personally. It's difficult to raise because it's only available on non-school days and costs a ton of time, but it's so worth it in the end! The other links I maxed (excluding the automatic ones): Tower, Sun, Devil, Magician, Chariot.
I've read some complaints that the game is a grind, and I assume those complaints apply to the dungeon crawl. I don't agree. I approached each new dungeon level with the goal of exploring it fully and fighting all shadows along the way. (I didn't always fight respawned shadows; maybe only half the time.) I also sometimes imposed limits of one new floor per night so I wouldn't burn out on combat. With these approaches, my characters leveled up sufficiently and it didn't feel like a grind. If anything, sometimes the relationship sim felt like a grind when I talked to the same people repeatedly without raising Social Links.
Repetitive, ubiquitous fighting is generally not my favorite part of Japanese roleplaying games. But at least in Persona 3, battles are fast, flexible and flashy. The Personas are neat to behold, and the infamous method of summoning them never gets old. Even though I couldn't directly control the actions of my party members, they usually came through and made a good team. Sometimes they developed a fixation on less useful spells like Marin Karin or Break, but it was a thrill whenever one of them singlehandedly set up an All-Out Attack.
The story builds slowly, but it's subversive in ways you don't tend to see in American games. What's more surprising is that despite peering into dark corners, the game keeps its characters poignant and encourages positive values like friendship, loyalty, compassion, perseverance, and self-improvement. One would even be tempted to recommend this as a good game for young people were it not for the somewhat deserved M rating.
I like the bold pop soundtrack. I did get tired of hearing the battle theme, Mass Destruction, every 30 seconds while dungeon crawling, but it's a pretty great tune. I'm listening to it even now (for what may be the 500th time).
Everything I've said so far applies to the original Persona 3 ("The Journey"). The FES version adds a mini-sequel titled "The Answer," which I will now comment on.
What did they do to my wonderful game? What did they do to the ending?? The ending of the Journey was beautiful and deeply affecting. It raised a major question without answering it, but that was part of the beauty. I was happy pondering the mystery of what had happened. "The Answer," sadly, broke my reverie by stacking explanation upon explanation with gratuitous layers of mysticism. It introduces a new character that comes across as a bad joke. Worst of all, it does away with the relationship sim and keeps the dungeon crawl, which as I'd mentioned earlier doesn't make for a very fun game. If the Journey is Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the Answer is a Matrix sequel.
I slogged through it, though, and it wasn't all terrible. The battles are more difficult and some of the boss battles are fearsome challenges. I like the slight remix of Mass Destruction and the soothing new dungeon music. The story ended up being fairly compelling (mainly because the voice actors held their characters up) and even had some emotional moments and subversive twists like the predecessor. So I'm glad I played the Answer. It's an interesting failure.
I know Persona 4 exists and is a better game by many accounts, but I'm skipping it. Persona 3 was such a commitment that I don't think I should play another game like it for a while. (I'd rather replay 3 anyway and max all the Social Links I couldn't before.) Also, part of the fun of Persona 3 was that it was my first Shin Megami Tensei game. The fun of discovering Personas, learning the tarot card and battle systems, and appreciating the SMT style would be missing, I think, if I moved right on to 4. I'll just wait for Persona 5 and hope it will be for the PlayStation 3.
In fact, Persona 3 seems to have sated my interest in gaming in general. I don't feel like moving on to anything else now. I'll keep working on my Fallout 2 AAR, but after that, who knows? Well, there's Fallout 3, but even that doesn't excite me presently. This isn't the first time a good game left me feeling this way, so it's just a brief phase.
In the unlikely event you've read this far, your reward is knowing that I'm offering a free copy of the original (non-FES) version of Persona 3, without soundtrack and art book. I'll pay for shipping, too. I suggest you skip this deal and get Persona 3 FES (it's not expensive) so that you can enjoy the enhancements to the original game, but PM me if want it anyway.
Persona 3, like Planescape: Torment and Trinity, is one of the most emotionally satisfying games I've ever played. I love what it put me through. I love the main character, he's a new hero for me. If I looked like him, I'd cosplay him every day. I'd like to end this long and suddenly disturbing post with my favorite motivational quotations from the game.
"Reaching your limit means you can't get any stronger...and that only applies to someone who's a master. Most people use it as an excuse. They say they've reached their limit, but in reality, they've just given up. You can start by forgetting about reaching your limit. That's the first step to getting stronger."
"Men have to fight for their women, even if you know you can't win."
"You're scared because you're not running away. That's nothing to be ashamed of."
"Worrying about it won't accomplish anything. Please move on and find the truth!"
Edit: fixed the link to Mass Destruction.
Neither of the two halves of Persona 3, the relationship sim and dungeon crawl, would be a very fun game on its own. But the subtle interplay between the two makes the combination irresistible somehow. Spending the day building relationships at high school, then coming home to chat my dormmates and go on a midnight shadow hunt with them, reminded me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I love that show, so it's natural that I love the premise of the game.
Like Buffy, the characters are easy to like thanks to witty dialogue and fine acting. I feel that the English translation preserved Japanese culture and customs while being Americanized enough for me to relate to. Though there's a lot of sibilance in the audio, the voice acting is one of the game's highlights. The actors for Junpei and Yukari are great throughout. The actors for the other characters are good except during extremely emotional scenes, when they kind of blow it. The one big negative is a certain someone who takes the battle support role after the first couple of chapters. Ugh! It's puzzling that the actor does a fine job outside of battle.
Building relationships (Social Links) with people in high school and around town is fun. I usually chose the rude or apathetic dialogue options; in other games, this would lead to hostility, but here, characters often reacted with amusement or gratitude for the candor. Despite all the time I put in the game, I ended up maxing out fewer than half the links. Worse yet, I had not started a single romance! What I had done was wait until each girl wanted to become exclusive, then reload and work on the next girl until she wanted to become exclusive, and so on. My goal was to bring all the girls to the verge of exclusivity and then choose the one I'd want to go steady with. Unfortunately, as soon as I'd reached that point, the game was over! That'll teach me to min-max with the opposite sex.
I'm glad, though, that I maxed out the Hermit link. I found this very fulfilling, personally. It's difficult to raise because it's only available on non-school days and costs a ton of time, but it's so worth it in the end! The other links I maxed (excluding the automatic ones): Tower, Sun, Devil, Magician, Chariot.
I've read some complaints that the game is a grind, and I assume those complaints apply to the dungeon crawl. I don't agree. I approached each new dungeon level with the goal of exploring it fully and fighting all shadows along the way. (I didn't always fight respawned shadows; maybe only half the time.) I also sometimes imposed limits of one new floor per night so I wouldn't burn out on combat. With these approaches, my characters leveled up sufficiently and it didn't feel like a grind. If anything, sometimes the relationship sim felt like a grind when I talked to the same people repeatedly without raising Social Links.
Repetitive, ubiquitous fighting is generally not my favorite part of Japanese roleplaying games. But at least in Persona 3, battles are fast, flexible and flashy. The Personas are neat to behold, and the infamous method of summoning them never gets old. Even though I couldn't directly control the actions of my party members, they usually came through and made a good team. Sometimes they developed a fixation on less useful spells like Marin Karin or Break, but it was a thrill whenever one of them singlehandedly set up an All-Out Attack.
The story builds slowly, but it's subversive in ways you don't tend to see in American games. What's more surprising is that despite peering into dark corners, the game keeps its characters poignant and encourages positive values like friendship, loyalty, compassion, perseverance, and self-improvement. One would even be tempted to recommend this as a good game for young people were it not for the somewhat deserved M rating.
I like the bold pop soundtrack. I did get tired of hearing the battle theme, Mass Destruction, every 30 seconds while dungeon crawling, but it's a pretty great tune. I'm listening to it even now (for what may be the 500th time).
Everything I've said so far applies to the original Persona 3 ("The Journey"). The FES version adds a mini-sequel titled "The Answer," which I will now comment on.
What did they do to my wonderful game? What did they do to the ending?? The ending of the Journey was beautiful and deeply affecting. It raised a major question without answering it, but that was part of the beauty. I was happy pondering the mystery of what had happened. "The Answer," sadly, broke my reverie by stacking explanation upon explanation with gratuitous layers of mysticism. It introduces a new character that comes across as a bad joke. Worst of all, it does away with the relationship sim and keeps the dungeon crawl, which as I'd mentioned earlier doesn't make for a very fun game. If the Journey is Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the Answer is a Matrix sequel.
I slogged through it, though, and it wasn't all terrible. The battles are more difficult and some of the boss battles are fearsome challenges. I like the slight remix of Mass Destruction and the soothing new dungeon music. The story ended up being fairly compelling (mainly because the voice actors held their characters up) and even had some emotional moments and subversive twists like the predecessor. So I'm glad I played the Answer. It's an interesting failure.
I know Persona 4 exists and is a better game by many accounts, but I'm skipping it. Persona 3 was such a commitment that I don't think I should play another game like it for a while. (I'd rather replay 3 anyway and max all the Social Links I couldn't before.) Also, part of the fun of Persona 3 was that it was my first Shin Megami Tensei game. The fun of discovering Personas, learning the tarot card and battle systems, and appreciating the SMT style would be missing, I think, if I moved right on to 4. I'll just wait for Persona 5 and hope it will be for the PlayStation 3.
In fact, Persona 3 seems to have sated my interest in gaming in general. I don't feel like moving on to anything else now. I'll keep working on my Fallout 2 AAR, but after that, who knows? Well, there's Fallout 3, but even that doesn't excite me presently. This isn't the first time a good game left me feeling this way, so it's just a brief phase.
In the unlikely event you've read this far, your reward is knowing that I'm offering a free copy of the original (non-FES) version of Persona 3, without soundtrack and art book. I'll pay for shipping, too. I suggest you skip this deal and get Persona 3 FES (it's not expensive) so that you can enjoy the enhancements to the original game, but PM me if want it anyway.
Persona 3, like Planescape: Torment and Trinity, is one of the most emotionally satisfying games I've ever played. I love what it put me through. I love the main character, he's a new hero for me. If I looked like him, I'd cosplay him every day. I'd like to end this long and suddenly disturbing post with my favorite motivational quotations from the game.
"Reaching your limit means you can't get any stronger...and that only applies to someone who's a master. Most people use it as an excuse. They say they've reached their limit, but in reality, they've just given up. You can start by forgetting about reaching your limit. That's the first step to getting stronger."
"Men have to fight for their women, even if you know you can't win."
"You're scared because you're not running away. That's nothing to be ashamed of."
"Worrying about it won't accomplish anything. Please move on and find the truth!"
Edit: fixed the link to Mass Destruction.
Last edited by Hipolito on Tue Jan 10, 2023 11:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Gracias por estar aquí.
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Avatar: my Shepard from Mass Effect 1.
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Crawley
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Re: Persona 3
Thanks for these comments. I had picked up Personal 3:FES on Black Friday but haven't loaded it yet. It will be my next game after Fallout 3 however. So thanks for the insights and I'll try maxing out the Hermit link.
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D.A.Lewis
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Re: Persona 3
I bought Persona 3 about 3 months before Persona 3 FES came out. After that event, I felt like I was ripped off and just could not get into, getting into what I read is a great great game. However, after reading Hipp's impressions, I get the feeling playing the pre-FES just may be worth it. Or should I suck it up and seek out FES for the 10 to 20 bucks??????
AKA: Dajjer
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ChrisGrenard
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Re: Persona 3
FWIW, I played about 10 hours of Persona 3 before deciding that the non-control of teammates and quick death mechanics were BS.
Fortunately, both these issues were fixed in Persona 4. I've heard P3 is a great game and all, but I'd say just go with P4.
Fortunately, both these issues were fixed in Persona 4. I've heard P3 is a great game and all, but I'd say just go with P4.
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D.A.Lewis
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Re: Persona 3
yeah yeah yeah Chris,ChrisGrenard wrote:FWIW, I played about 10 hours of Persona 3 before deciding that the non-control of teammates and quick death mechanics were BS.
Fortunately, both these issues were fixed in Persona 4. I've heard P3 is a great game and all, but I'd say just go with P4.
but damn, Hipp's review was so well stated, frankly your hater speech isn't swaying me. . . . much. (I do plan on buying P4, but not sure when I'll play it. but I plan on playing some kind of P3 in the very near future)
AKA: Dajjer
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Hipolito
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Re: Persona 3
Absolutely. I bought both versions and don't feel ripped off at all given how much I enjoyed the game. Besides, the more money you invest in Atlus products, the more likely there'll be a Persona 5 in my future!D.A.Lewis wrote:Or should I suck it up and seek out FES for the 10 to 20 bucks??????
Speaking of which, I may break my oath to not buy Persona 4. I wasn't impressed by what I saw at first (the opening cutscenes), but then I saw some YouTube videos of the early boss battles. The game looks awesome, I'm in pain from not playing it! But I unfortunately read a major plot spoiler (the answer to the big mystery), so maybe I'll wait 6 months and hopefully forget.
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ChrisGwinn
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Re: Persona 3
I need to get back to Persona 3. It's one of the few JRPGs that's ever held my interest.
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Isgrimnur
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Re: Persona 3
Persona 3 Reload available for PC/XBox 1,X,S/PS 4-5
It's almost as if people are the problem.
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Victoria Raverna
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Re: Persona 3
Is it a total remake of the old game for new console? Or just a remastered version?
BTW, it is also available from gamepass.
BTW, it is also available from gamepass.
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Scraper
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Re: Persona 3
Its a total remake using the unreal 4 engine. They kept the story and dialogue mostly the same, just cut some stuff out for PC purposes.Victoria Raverna wrote: ↑Fri Feb 02, 2024 10:56 pm Is it a total remake of the old game for new console? Or just a remastered version?
BTW, it is also available from gamepass.
FTE
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Octavious
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Re: Persona 3
It's really good. I lost track of time last night and played until 4am. It's always been my favorite story of the recent 3 games.
The interface is so snappy and it just has the perfect gameplay loop.
The interface is so snappy and it just has the perfect gameplay loop.
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hitbyambulance
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Victoria Raverna
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Re: Persona 3
From what I read, it is a remake of non-FES PS2 version. It doesn't include features that came with FES version.hitbyambulance wrote: ↑Sun Feb 04, 2024 8:50 am... what does this mean?
(i also have the original, non-FES PS2 version - i suspect this version is different enough from that to warrant getting)
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Scraper
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Re: Persona 3
One of the reviews i read said that there was at least one scene that was insensitive to trans people, and they changed it.hitbyambulance wrote: ↑Sun Feb 04, 2024 8:50 am... what does this mean?
(i also have the original, non-FES PS2 version - i suspect this version is different enough from that to warrant getting)
FTE