Despite Royal's existence, this is definitively a masterpiece. While it is missing the Third Semester, Akechi's development and Kasumi, what's left still captivates me throughout the experience. The game's story and characters are almost flawless besides from a few rare hiccups. The gameplay is almost perfection, in fact, in some ways it's a bit better than Royal due to the better balancing, however I would still consider Royal's gameplay better. I put 180 hours into this game to platinum it, it took weeks to do this, and not even once did I feel bored for a second. Atlus truly created one of the best games of all time, and Royal somehow improved upon perfection. Well done Atlus.