While the West got Persona: Revelations, an Americanized port for the Playstation, Japan got its first Persona game under Megami Ibunroku Persona. The West eventually got a more faithful and enhanced remake on the Playstation Portable titled, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona with changed UI and music. This 1996 Atlus role-playing game takes you on an adventure throughout Mikage-cho, where your classmate, Maki Sonomura, suddenly goes missing. Battle against demons as you fight your way to the suspicious SEBEC branch president, Takahisa Kandori. Additionally, join the battle back at St. Hermelin and rival against the Snow Queen as she freezes the school and possesses your beloved homeroom teacher, Ms. Saeko.
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I might’ve said this in my review of the PSP remake but the sad truth with this game is it was made to be an ambitious and bold experiment in an era of looking forward for the future of Megami Tensei. This has become evident to me (a “megaten maniac”) with the fact that no video game company nowadays would throw away a system they built upon to make a spinoff that boldly would try and do something so risky like being cinematic (based on interviews this seemed to be the main goal). Sadly this creates a tedious gameplay experience that hides a genuinely good story and one I feel like is the most “wow I need to go outside and live my life now” Persona game I’ve played honestly. Whether it’s having the best use of a hidden video game character for legitimate thematic relevance, the crawling darkness of peering deeper into the mind, the absorbing darkness and coolness of the music, or the inner reflection on loneliness in a genre that’s kind of all about playing a long as game by yourself. I think Megami Ibunroku Persona was a great and interesting experiment.
https://youtu.be/2DYqwhSTeGQ?feature=shared
https://youtu.be/2DYqwhSTeGQ?feature=shared
UNDERRATED should be played more
How does it feel being the superior version of persona 1...my goat...original arrangements were peak and the auditorial storytelling was pretty good, psp port lost most of that,,
Nanjo me parece excesivamente sexy, lo cual me impidió concentrarme durante gran parte del juego tomando en cuenta que es obligatorio en la ruta SEBEC. De ahí en fuera buen juego, lo recomiendo si te gustan los tipos con lentes.
Not as bad as people say, but still feels very dated and a little bit grindy.
It is quite an enjoyable experience once you get past the (good?) old maze-crawling RPG scare. If you can't embrace the 80s... yeah you'll be in for a bumpy ride.
Now if you endure the initial hardships, you will be rewarded with a rather well-flashed-out, creative demon-merging system—the Persona system! The setting and character structure are also really fun (though that's SMT if...'s merit, I guess). And I just loved the whole demon contact thing, though I guess that also comes from other games (this was my first Megaten). I've always found most JRPGs to be way too combat focused, so that was just lovely, though the final reward is still combat-related. One negative takeaway is that the combat encounter rate is way too high, making leveling up Agility on your MC a necessity, hindering your roleplay possibilities. Story wise, I guess I just wish the good ending requirements were clearer and that there were more story options overall.
TL;DR simple, old school, though watered down (yeah you read that right) maze dungeon crawler, with super cool RPG mechanics that set the game apart from others, even from previous Megaten games. Rewards patient players that are willing to overcome the steep learning curve (coming from modern games), though the reward is definitely not that great.
If you're a modern RPG player, this is a scary one. If you're a hard-boiled Ultima/Wizardry/Bard's Tale player, this is one hell of a cakewalk -- you just need to figure the Personas out, and grind a little bit on the Snow Queen route).
Now if you endure the initial hardships, you will be rewarded with a rather well-flashed-out, creative demon-merging system—the Persona system! The setting and character structure are also really fun (though that's SMT if...'s merit, I guess). And I just loved the whole demon contact thing, though I guess that also comes from other games (this was my first Megaten). I've always found most JRPGs to be way too combat focused, so that was just lovely, though the final reward is still combat-related. One negative takeaway is that the combat encounter rate is way too high, making leveling up Agility on your MC a necessity, hindering your roleplay possibilities. Story wise, I guess I just wish the good ending requirements were clearer and that there were more story options overall.
TL;DR simple, old school, though watered down (yeah you read that right) maze dungeon crawler, with super cool RPG mechanics that set the game apart from others, even from previous Megaten games. Rewards patient players that are willing to overcome the steep learning curve (coming from modern games), though the reward is definitely not that great.
If you're a modern RPG player, this is a scary one. If you're a hard-boiled Ultima/Wizardry/Bard's Tale player, this is one hell of a cakewalk -- you just need to figure the Personas out, and grind a little bit on the Snow Queen route).