Persona 3 Reload is an absolute success in terms of being a remake. It probably helps that the original game was apparently already excellent, and that two pretty much perfect sequels set the stage for how this series plays in the modern day, but still, it doesn’t demerit the fact that this remake is just a blast to play through and the best way to experience Persona 3 yet.
Everything I love about the Persona series is here, from the jazzy earworm-y tunes to the absolutely mind-boggling interface design, characters to watch grow and evolve, ever-increasing stakes, and a delightful combat experience.
The game overall has an ever-present dissonance with regards to the content and the gameplay experience, which don’t fully mesh. It feels like the content from Persona 3 was just inserted wholesale, warts and all, into the framework of Persona 5. The combat is on that level, the visuals are on that level, the voice acting is on that level, same with quality-of-life updates and several little details that weren’t present, or just worked differently on the original Persona 3, and were improved upon on the sequels. What I refer to as “content” here is the overall story, the pace, the structure, the social links, and the characters, which very much feel from an era before the polish and improvements that Persona 4 and 5 brough upon the original Persona 3 formula.
The overall narrative is very engaging, thematically compelling, and bold, but feels disjointed and the pacing is just all over the place. It has a real slow start, and long stretches of nothing going on. Though it ends up sticking the landing with a beautifully melancholic ending, I can easily see how plenty of people would simply drop the game way before reaching a compelling twist or plot point.
These long stretches of nothing going on in the major narrative are supposed to be filled with activities, social links, events, and combat. In terms of things to do there’s way less here than it the sequels, and once the players stats are maxed out, most of those are basically useless ways to get the game to progress. Events are also lacking, there are less opportunities to do activities with side characters, and so, less opportunities to interact with them and get to know them.
Social Links suffer from this “wholesale insert” approach the most next to the overall story, as Persona 3 clearly was the first time that this time was exploring this concept, and got much better at it in the later games. Characters are very fun and compelling, they each have their own little arcs and evolutions they go through in the company of the protagonist, but each episode is extremely short and minor, and end up having no integration with the main narrative nor any real crossover whatsoever. Once Social Links are completed, these characters may as well be dead, there’s no incentive to interact with them, nor any real opportunity to do so. Sadly, the same thing happens with the romance opportunities, there’s no effect on the narrative, no mention of them outside their respective Social Links, and not even consequences if the player pursues multiple romantic partners like happens on the latter games.
Social Events are a very welcome addition that serve to fix one of the major issues of the original Persona 3, the main side characters having no Social Links at all, and it’s an approach that I would have liked to see applied to the overall game a lot more.
The combat itself is outstanding, and pretty much an exact copy of Persona 5, which I don’t mind at all. Tartarus is the issue. While yes, there are some side objectives to complete, exploring Tartarus gets monotonous and dull pretty damn quick. There could have been way less floors with bigger, more compelling layouts, and more enemies to fight in each of them, maybe even making them a bit more visually distinct could have helped in this regard.
I’m glad I finally played Persona 3, I had a great time with it and remembered why I love the series so damn much. I wish the dev team took a lot more inspiration from Persona 5 and dared to make more profound changes to the original, still, as it stands, it’s a spectacular RPG experience that has little to envy from the newer entries in the series.
I can see why this game is beloved now, it has all the charm and style of the latter Persona’s, with a very 2006 edginess and melancholia that makes it very endearing.
Everything I love about the Persona series is here, from the jazzy earworm-y tunes to the absolutely mind-boggling interface design, characters to watch grow and evolve, ever-increasing stakes, and a delightful combat experience.
The game overall has an ever-present dissonance with regards to the content and the gameplay experience, which don’t fully mesh. It feels like the content from Persona 3 was just inserted wholesale, warts and all, into the framework of Persona 5. The combat is on that level, the visuals are on that level, the voice acting is on that level, same with quality-of-life updates and several little details that weren’t present, or just worked differently on the original Persona 3, and were improved upon on the sequels. What I refer to as “content” here is the overall story, the pace, the structure, the social links, and the characters, which very much feel from an era before the polish and improvements that Persona 4 and 5 brough upon the original Persona 3 formula.
The overall narrative is very engaging, thematically compelling, and bold, but feels disjointed and the pacing is just all over the place. It has a real slow start, and long stretches of nothing going on. Though it ends up sticking the landing with a beautifully melancholic ending, I can easily see how plenty of people would simply drop the game way before reaching a compelling twist or plot point.
These long stretches of nothing going on in the major narrative are supposed to be filled with activities, social links, events, and combat. In terms of things to do there’s way less here than it the sequels, and once the players stats are maxed out, most of those are basically useless ways to get the game to progress. Events are also lacking, there are less opportunities to do activities with side characters, and so, less opportunities to interact with them and get to know them.
Social Links suffer from this “wholesale insert” approach the most next to the overall story, as Persona 3 clearly was the first time that this time was exploring this concept, and got much better at it in the later games. Characters are very fun and compelling, they each have their own little arcs and evolutions they go through in the company of the protagonist, but each episode is extremely short and minor, and end up having no integration with the main narrative nor any real crossover whatsoever. Once Social Links are completed, these characters may as well be dead, there’s no incentive to interact with them, nor any real opportunity to do so. Sadly, the same thing happens with the romance opportunities, there’s no effect on the narrative, no mention of them outside their respective Social Links, and not even consequences if the player pursues multiple romantic partners like happens on the latter games.
Social Events are a very welcome addition that serve to fix one of the major issues of the original Persona 3, the main side characters having no Social Links at all, and it’s an approach that I would have liked to see applied to the overall game a lot more.
The combat itself is outstanding, and pretty much an exact copy of Persona 5, which I don’t mind at all. Tartarus is the issue. While yes, there are some side objectives to complete, exploring Tartarus gets monotonous and dull pretty damn quick. There could have been way less floors with bigger, more compelling layouts, and more enemies to fight in each of them, maybe even making them a bit more visually distinct could have helped in this regard.
I’m glad I finally played Persona 3, I had a great time with it and remembered why I love the series so damn much. I wish the dev team took a lot more inspiration from Persona 5 and dared to make more profound changes to the original, still, as it stands, it’s a spectacular RPG experience that has little to envy from the newer entries in the series.
I can see why this game is beloved now, it has all the charm and style of the latter Persona’s, with a very 2006 edginess and melancholia that makes it very endearing.