Confidant who is hyperfocused on burning ants: Alright Joker... it's a deal then... I'll be your ant burning friend from here on out
*flashback animation*
My sexy hag prosecutor: You must have had some kind of insect combustion expert on your team.. who was it!! TALK!!!!
Me, popping a stiffy so hard I'm about to pass out: i think i hauve mental shutdown syndrome

Great game, ultimately still strictly worse than the other 2 modern Personas if you care about anything else than presentation. Concept is great - who doesn't love silly Lupin heists? The story immediately drills into the core of Planet slop at the start of the Medjed arc and doesn't recover for more than brief moments of JRPG cheese (I like the gooey cheese though). All the Social Links (that's what they're called man) are pretty good, but none are really great unless it's like the two that I missed. The soundtrack? It's great. The UI? Okay this might get assassins sent after me but to me it's very busy for a UI and I think it's a bit overrated in terms of being the be all end all of design for that reason. It is beautiful though.

I really like the additions to the combat system, despite it all feeling a bit overtuned - I died like three times in my entire playthrough and 2 of them were due to not having high enough damage and 1 of them was me nuking myself on a reflect. The baton passing, extra elements and Social Link buffs really help One More stand out as Not Just Press Turn But Worse (it still is worse, but you know, it helps, and it's fun).

Honestly after P3 the whole time management system and Social Links kinda feels tacked on to the other Persona games. Like it was meant for that game in particular and makes total sense with the theme whereas here they are just... systems that surround a JRPG. If that makes any sense. If I'm crazy you can shoot me in the head.

I stopped at the third semester. "Why"? I shouldn't have to justify that. Why didn't you? You should explain yourself. The story is over. If you continued to play for 30 hours you don't care about story do you? You don't give a shit about storytelling at all. You just care about characters and seeing them interact in little set pieces. You're a poser. You just want to play with dolls in your head because the cast functions as premade OCs for your fanfiction when you can't write your own. You're having the Phantom Thieves step in for real relationships in your life. You're pathetic. Sorry.. sorry about that. I don't know what came over me. Forgive me.

Nitpicky Rant Minor Spoiler Asshole Lightning Round:
- I think JRPG creators have realized 60% of people only play the first act and that's why a lot of modern JRPGs are frontloaded nosedive halfway in. Much research to be done here.
- Morgana has decided 30% of my nights simply can't be used for anything
- Please do not give me insanely overpowered DLC items for no reason you crazy bastards
- Why are we still pretending Persona protagonists can be self insert? Please just name him next time. He's stuck in this weird limbo where he's an unvoiced blank slate but also randomly will have lines. Give it up Atlus.
- Could not fuck Akechi Goro
- Morgana cat form? Cute. Cuddly. What a little guy. Love him. Morgana Metaverse form? I'm going to kick him over a building.
- Ban all localization from saying "kek"
- Having the optional dungeon turn mandatory in the final act is insane, it didn't affect me but for those it did I am so sorry
- The in media res flashback structure contributes absolutely nothing other than to do a "Ohhh I actually forgot crucial details" plot twist, it's basically just there to be there
- "The Councillor" Tarot? Really? Come on.
- The final dungeons(s) are basically completely disconnected from the theming of the rest of the game which makes them seem really out of nowhere and lame
- Like 3-4 instances of Japanese being spoken but no subs anywhere. "Just play in English" Haha, no, obviously. Don't be fucking stupid
- Demon negotiation is actually just SMT But Lame
- We have yet to find a good way to hide elemental weaknesses and then show them later and this is no exception

Persona 5 Royal, released just three years after the original in Japan, is what Atlus defines as the ultimate version of the JRPG and is sold to you as such.
However, as digestible as they made the gameplay experience, I sincerely cannot see this as an improved version of what was Persona 5. Since its release, I've been going back and forth on this game, and it's become, perhaps, the most divided I've ever been about a videogame. Over 4 years later, this release haunts me, eating at my head to sit down and figure out just why I feel so dismissive of this game.

The gameplay has been grossly simplified and streamlined, starting with what is immediately apparent. Fights are easier, Persona fusion is much more accessible, inherent traits make Personas far more useful and worth keeping, technical damage is stupidly overpowered and over-rewarding, guns are no longer as limited as they used to be, network fusion is less of a coin toss, and much more.

In this sea of gameplay improvements, there are a few things to note as negative.

Persona fusion is simplified and aided by the presence of “Fusion Alarms”. At random times, often more than you’d think, the Velvet Room will enter a state of “alarm”. During this sequence, fusion will be considerably more rewarding and unique, often yielding results that are insanely beneficial, and not in a particularly balanced way. Even if your fusion ends up botched, you’ll get excellent fusion fodder that you can use to build whatever you’d like. On paper, this sounds fun, and for the first few moments it truly is, until it starts to get redundant and hand-holding, completely disallowing the game to pick up in difficulty even up to the very end. Fusion Alarms are FREQUENT, way, way too much. In a JRPG, it’s simply not fun to melt anything in your way because the game throws what’s optimal at you, and you’d need to be seriously stupid to not pick up what it’s giving you or to find yourself in a situation where you’ll have to do some serious fusion planning.

Technical damage is much more rewarding than simply striking a weakness, and this makes complete sense. What doesn’t, however, is just how devastating landing a technical is. This ends up making Merciless a cakewalk with the increased weakness damage, which in and of itself is an already deceivingly easy difficulty.

On the gameplay side, this is all I can really complain about. Other than that, it’s worth noting just how much more digestible a game it’s become. The grapple hook allows for some creative and fresh detours, and the added free time makes the whole game feel a little less strict. There’s something to note about the inherent traits as well, as well as how party members start with Baton Pass rather than earning it.

If Royal’s only issues lay in the gameplay, I would’ve loved this game to bits, despite how permissive it was. But as I went on and on, the game started to weigh me down, confuse me, and irritate me.

Palace after palace, going through the motions, you’ll start to feel something off, especially if you’ve played the original game.

Persona 5 Royal doesn’t feel like Persona 5, and you can cut the two apart so well that it’s disheartening. It’s right there that you start to realize that P5R isn’t an improvement; it’s an addition. It’s something separate from the original that doesn’t want to improve anything of its original self; it only seeks to grow until it’s entirely overtaken the flaws that were there, and it hopes to god you won’t notice that by the end, you’re playing a different game entirely.

The first disservice P5R does to its predecessor is how badly it waters down its aesthetic and artistic direction.

From the title screen, Persona 5 makes its aesthetic and style known almost immediately. “Phantom” starts playing; it's bass-heavy and jazzy; its sounds are deep and simple; and it stays subtle. You’re met with nine figures in red. The only thing that’s clear about them is their masks, and as a new player, it’s left entirely to your imagination what these characters will look like later on or what purpose they’ll serve within the game. The backdrop is a train station, and while it’s simple, it’s also so well represented that it makes these characters pop out so much more. This title screen is stylish and subtle; it knows what it’s doing, and it doesn’t need a lot of spectacle to get a message across.

Persona 5 also sports an excellent intro, which is only there to introduce some very surface-level information about these characters and show you what this game’s art style is about. The animation purposefully picks some very specific coloring, making some things pop more than others, and displaying these characters in an elegant, almost theatrical approach. Want to find out more? Play the game yourself. And every time you pass by that intro, you’re going to be thinking about the next party member, what they’ll be like, and what they’ll bring to the plot.

Persona 5 Royal takes a different approach, not only in its menu but also in its intro. “Colors Flying High” is fine on its own; it’s not a particularly good song, nor is it all that bad. It’s hard to match the energy and style of the original, and besides, Persona 4 Golden hadn’t really hit the same heights as its predecessor either. However, what’s really an issue is the opening animation itself, which not only has embarrassingly bad animation (compared to the original), but also (hilariously so) makes it its sworn duty to show you Ann’s ass as one of the first scenes, reinforcing one of the biggest disservices Persona 5 ever did to its characters. The rest of the intro is so forgettable that I had to watch it at least three times to even write this, and it loses direction once they just start... smashing shit? In their new winter outfits, no less, for some reason beyond me. It’s loud, flashy, and lacks direction.

Persona 5 Royal’s menu is another massive miss on my end. The secluded and mysterious subway station has been replaced with the bustling streets of Shibuya; our red figures now wear their whole ass outfits; and the music replacing “Phantom” is “Royal Days," a higher-pitched, more vivacious track. This track, just like the majority of the new additional OSTs, while fine on their own, always left me with the impression that they tried too hard. This doesn’t ease you into its aesthetic; it doesn’t leave you guessing either. This title screen and intro flaunt themselves so clumsily that they fall flat almost immediately. There’s an insurmountable lack of class and elegance, stuff that Persona 5 held. We’re talking about phantom thieves here, and the word “phantom” should be reflected in what I’m seeing pretty accurately; they lay low, they’re underground, there’s no need for this level of spectacle. They were in a subway station for a reason; they didn’t wear their Metaverse outfits for a reason.

P5R plays mostly the same as its original; very little is altered aside from gameplay, for better and for worse. The 3D models are still just as hideous as ever, with Kasumi and Maruki obviously being better made than the rest of the cast. Some of the errors in the English localization weren’t even addressed, and the new text options leave much to be desired. The Italian localization, for instance, bases itself off of the English script, and this is probably true for the rest of the other languages, and excuse me for not trusting the same localization team that gave us “This isn’t small potatoes.” and “Prosecutor turned lawyer.”. I don’t have to explain what losing things in translation is, but it happens quite often in Italian, with a fair share of horrendous misspellings too. I know Persona 5 has tons of text, but this isn’t and should never be an excuse for poor quality.

On the topic of plot, P5R disappoints me so greatly that it’s clear why it’s so engraved in my memory as one of the most saddening experiences I’ve had in gaming. To keep this as spoiler-free as I can, I’m going to speak vaguely but also very angrily.
A narrative that has nothing to do with the original premise of the game forgets to even make itself gray enough to give you a choice, and that is so deathly afraid of doing so that it forces you to make the “right” decision by offering you insanely high stakes. Bad ending content was cut, further showing just how incompetently the consequences of this ending were handled and how pointless the entire dilemma ends up being. Kasumi is a scapegoat for the plot, waifubait, and an overall bleak and uninteresting character.

Atlus and its formula of re-releases encourage a lazy, unhealthy, and deceitful practice of game development. Why buy this game when you can wait three years and play an “objectively” better version of it? The implication that the devs didn’t do their best this time, but they might later, or that they might get their grubby hands on something that was already flawed and glue shit on top, is simply disheartening.

An exceptional, incredible JRPG with excellent combat and dungeon mechanics and a fantastic soundtrack.
The story and characters are weaker here than in the previous three games, but I believe this is not as big of a deal as other people make it out to be.

Persona 5 is a game that wants you to feel. It doesn't neccessarily want you to think. If you just stop, let go of your analyistic brain, and just feel what the game is trying to get you to feel, you will love this game. Nothing in this series hit me in the same way as I Believe.

Mi segundo Persona

Antes de empezarlo: Me da cosa porque son largos
A las 15 horas de juego: Ojalá dure 1000 horas
A las 103 horas habiendo hecho una run normal y un NG+ obligado para la parte de Royal: uno de mis juegos favoritos

Arguably probably the best game I’ve ever experienced. August 2020 was a hell of a time to first experience this game, but boy was I surprised. Initially, I only knew of Persona because of Joker’s addition into smash ultimate, but a couple of my friends convinced me to finally play this game.

There’s just something about this game that just hits different. The style, the music, the world, the battling, the characters, I loved it all.

Beneath the Mask will forever be the OST I listen to when I just want to relax. I remember studying during lockdown to the song, I was seriously that hooked. Never knew I liked jazz music till this game. Other stands out for me include The Whims of Fate, Last Surprise, Takeover, and Swear to My Bones.

Going to keep this as spoiler free as possible. The first arc of the story was just an instant hook that got me into the series. It was so raw and that was definitely peak storytelling. Although the following arcs do go slightly downhill, they’re still enjoyable enough for me. There are some extremely questionable story moments that I ask myself why they’re in the story, but that’s only like three or four, and they’re very minor, and do not affect my enjoyment of the story in anyway. As a matter of fact, some of them just make me like some of the main cast even more.

Now talking about characters, I know that this game in the series isn’t known for their characters or the story, but I thoroughly enjoyed the main cast and supporting cast. Of course you’ve gotta love the badass protagonist, but each party member brings something that I just enjoy. Although, I wish they actually gave more spotlight to one character, and didn’t let another character take all of the spotlight during their arc. In the context of supporting characters, most of them were definitely hits, some were extremely interesting, whilst others, not so much, but still had fun interacting with them.

The social link system I thoroughly enjoyed. I just liked how each character was tied to a specific Arcana and granted different skills. From healing items, to party member skills, to making grinding extremely easy, and making money a non-issue, I definitely think they made the repetitive gameplay not as boring.

The gameplay. Honestly sometimes I just like coming back to this game for the gameplay, even though this game is regarded as the easiest in the series, I just like the wide amount of customisation you can do with persona fusion. I’ll eventually get around to making the ultimate Jack Frost and Black Frost.

Regarding the additional content of Royal (Third Semester), I enjoyed how it was able to flesh out the three major characters. I just found the take on the final boss so interesting because it wasn’t what I was used to seeing, but appreciated nonetheless, even if it did make me emotional.

Overall, I loved my experience with this game and I’m just so thankful that this game has not only introduced me to Persona, but also SMT. It’ll take a really really really good game to be able to personally top this game as my favourite of all time.

Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal are the story of a ragtag bunch of high schoolers combating societies corruption using the power of their Personas, physical manifestations of their rebellious will to help those in need.

I got into Persona 5 originally in 2017 after finding out that Persona games weren't one continuous story. When I found out Persona 5 was getting an expanded version with extra content and story, I was beyond excited.

Persona 5 is already a brilliant game in both story and gameplay, but the royal additions only enhance it further. The addition of new Personas, new palace mechanics such as the will seeds, new Ultimate Personas, etc. All these new additions only served to enhance an already incredible experience that I will never forget.

The story is pretty much the same, except for a few additional scenes, plus the additional Third Semester arc set after the original final boss of the game. The final boss of the Third Semester rains to be one of my favourite antagonists of all time, even after all these years. His story and journey mean so much to me.

I was a little cautious going into P5R; not because of any preconceived notions about the game necessarily, but because it was hard for me to imagine improving upon P5 vanilla, at least in terms of gameplay.

Fortunately for me, Royal’s series of small gameplay improvements add up to make something that I think is somehow a good deal better than the vanilla version.

My biggest issues with P5 vanilla were all writing related, and sadly I don’t think much improvement has been made in that regard.

Some party members are still more-or-less benched in favour of others (Makoto gets so much to do, and I just don’t find her very interesting. The fabled ‘Atlus new girl syndrome’ I’ve heard about is also at play here, although I do kinda like her). Leading with the most despicable character in the game still robs the rest of the game of its weight. The game’s exploration of vigilantism flirts with the complexities of such subject matter—the morality of vigilantism and its ramifications—and then promptly forgets about said complexities, instead preferring an approach that’s very naïve. In the new third semester, they try to get a little more morally grey, but once again its exploration of the ideas it presents are quite simplistic.

Persona writing has always shined in its individual characters—explored through ‘Social Links’ and whatnot—and it’s still mostly fantastic here.

I think the level design could be a bit better, too. And all the hyper-contextual platforming linearises the levels a little too much for my liking. Also the grappling hook is pointless.

Everything else about Persona—the time limits, the life/dating sim elements, the combat, etc.—is as great as you expect; if you’ve played one, you get the deal by now.

It’s still not as good as P5 could be, but it’s about as good as it’s gonna get, and in this case, ‘as good as it’s gonna get’ actually means pretty amazing.

style over substance: the game

finished Persona 2, Persona 3 FES and Persona 4 Golden and they were awesome

this one was super slog, dropped

videogames can't be more overrated than this and witcher 3

maybe maybe someday i'll get back to it though