In memory of Akira Toriyama I decided to play these two peculiar fighting games: Tobal No. 1 and No. 2.

They are no Tekken by any means. The first one could also feel very limited having only a tournament (aka arcade), vs mode (self-explanatory) and a very interesting quest mode. Ah, and option if we have to dig about ALL the menus have to offer lmao.

This is still an awesome game reminiscing of Virtua Fighter with fun fast-paced 1v1 running 60fps. Something you wouldn't expect that often, especially from a PS1 fighting game. A great alternative from Tekken and Virtua Fighter overall.

por onde começar né...
eu joguei esse jogo diversas vezes durante a minha vida, desde a infância até eu finalmente zerar ele em 2020
agora 4 anos depois eu resolvi comprar uma cópia original dele para zerar novamente e sinceramente foi uma boa decisão
me diverti bastante jogando, é um jogo que tem suas falhas mas dá pra ignorar tranquilamente as limitações da época se você focar na diversão mega irada que você está tendo coletando malas malucas
os gráficos se mantiveram atuais devido ao fato de serem estilizados de forma cartunesca e muito bonita
as músicas são engraçadinhas mas sem passar do ponto e em geral cobrem muito bem o ambiente
os designs dos cenários são criativos e demonstram várias áreas positivas do desenvolvimento de jogos do ps1
se fosse para eu criticar algo nesse jogo, teria de ser a câmera meio bêbada (comum nos jogos de ps1) e a maldita progressão bizarra dos itens que te faz coletar 4 pintinhos de 5, para então descobrir que os últimos 20 minutos da sua vida foram inúteis pq vc vai ter q usar um item que vc só desbloqueia daqui 10 fases, então vc joga o progresso que fez fora, avança no jogo até finalmente liberar o item, para então voltar e poder finalizar aquela missão ridícula dos pintos
mesmo com esses probleminhas, como falei antes, da pra se divertir tranquilamente e é um jogo bala
mt bala, mt bala
pica
tirei meia estrela por conta dessa desgraça ai
de resto é pica

With the release of Persona 3: RELOAD, I have the strong feeling to talk about this game in some capacity. Especially in regards to the properties of nostalgia, my interpretation of the origins of this game in relation to other SMT games at the time, and what I think of the game along with the "modern" Persona series at large.

First thing's first, just a quick timeline of when I played this game. I got this game mid 2014, while in the middle of watching a Persona 4: Golden LP from my favorite Gaming Youtuber "NicoB", and only started playing it roughly a year or so before the worldwide release of Persona 5. I am a relatively new fan of the Shin Megami Tensei series at large, and while my interest leans more towards the SMT side, I do greatly enjoy the Persona sub-series. Again, it's likely due to my first experience to Persona having been just watching someone else I like play it, but sometimes it just takes someone else's charisma to convince you to try something you never considered.

Persona 3 (be it the original game, FES, or Portable) is a classic and the origin of the "modern" Persona series. Beloved by many fans that straddled the line between the mainline entries and said sub-series, it was either the start of their admiration for Persona, or was eventually one they'd seek out after the others. Regardless, it's no secret that a lot of Persona and its fandom is attributed to this game in its three incarnations.

But, what exactly is this game? For the uninitiated that have never tried modern Persona, Persona 3 is a stratagy, Turn-Based RPG with time management and social simulation elements. By day, you're an ordinary student, going to class, hanging out with friends, and perusing the town at your leisure. By night, you climb an evil super-tower that houses monsters of the abstract variety in order to learn its secrets and prevent a mass affliction known as "Apathy Syndrome".

Gameplay is obviously split into two, with the Turn-Based RPG dungeon diving relegated to a specific nighttime event, and the social-sim confined to day-to-day actions and activities. In terms of the former, the RPG elements are relatively basic. Dungeon crawl through the labyrinth that is the tower of Tartarus, get into fights (approaching from behind gains advantage), fight in turns, hit weaknesses for bonus damage/extra attacks, gain items/money/experience, and climb to bosses/stopping points. The only time you fight outside dungeon exploration is when a full moon hits, and a major, story-driven boss appears, which upon defeating opens the stopping point to allow further dungeon exploration.

In terms of the latter, you spend the majority of your days chatting up the local populous, especially fellow students, sometimes participating in class and extracurricular, hang out in the neighborhood and local mall, buy stuff as needed (or wanted), and then return to the Dorm to determine your nightlife, whether it be further studying, bouncing around the city for more local shenanigans, or just head to bed early to probably feel better for the next day. Night or day, you can spend time with a wide variety of characters, improving your social standing with them, and thus powering up the classes of Personas.

Yes, the name of the game, the true purpose of interacting with other characters in the waking, normal world is to strengthen the variety of spiritual summons known as Personas, granting you better EXP bonuses for the Personas you collect and allowing for higher tier personas to be created. Further, a little while after the first act of the game, you can take your personas to a special shop and turn them into gear and weapons, and create some truly monstrous items at your disposal.

All of these elements, fortunately, feed very well into quite the solid gameplay loop, and really becomes an entertaining challenge just trying to find a good work, school, battle balance in your year long student life. It's no wonder that the series only became more popular as time went on and new games dropped over the years.

But what's a story driven game without its story? Thankfully the story itself is quite entertaining, where we go diving into a supernatural sci-fi world of a strange alternate universe just behind the veil of reality, with said world slowly leaking into the real world due to a city wide epidemic where people slowly lose their minds, becoming veritable zombies (without the hunger for human flesh, at least). Meanwhile, you, the protagonist, join up with a secret organization called SEES, where you fight back against the strange encroaching nightmare and try to uncover the truth of its existence. But all is not what it seems, as outside forces push back from time to time, hindering the heroes as often as they can, and are somewhat connected to what's going on in an unknown way. It's a plot that's tad basic with an appropriate amount of twists and turns, but I do think it's biggest strength has to be its atmosphere.

Persona 3, by and large, is a mood. From its very intense opening, its strong use of blue to bring a dour and melancholic look, even during bright sunny days, its use of imagery of death in all forms, to the music being a blues/jazz/rap mix that gives it a contemporary, moody feel. The heavy emphasis of nighttime, including when the player is able to jump into the dungeon crawling aspect of the game, also lends itself to how the game feels.

My major gripes with the game would mostly come down to "1st Game Syndrome", where "1st" is a bit of a misnomer considering the prominent "3" in the title. Dungeon crawling is rather straightforward and tedious, with very little variety in and out of fights. Only half of the Social Links (the optional social interactions) are actually interesting and worthwhile (with a couple of them being downright terrible). You're forced into the romance route when you social link with most female characters, creating rather awkward situations when the game almost reprimands you for doing so, which can really sour your 100% social link run (which is required if you want to unlock all the best persona in the game). You don't have direct control of your party and thus rely on the very minimal options for the party AI to hope things will work out when in tough situations (unless you play P3: Portable). Also, it's very possible you'll dislike many of your party members' personalities until about mid to late game, depending on your tolerance for their behaviors (save for a select few).

However, if you can forgive the gripes, attune to the dourness of the atmosphere, don't mind the dungeon crawling being a bit mindless, then you just might enjoy this game for years to come. And all of the games praises exist in, under my personal assumption, the idea that this might have been a budget title in the SMT series initially. It's very clear with its somewhat more simple design, especially when compared to an SMT entry that came out at roughly the same time that looks like it had a MUCH larger budget (both graphically and mechanically). But, I'll talk about that one another day...

In fact, I might just jump back into an NG+ playthrough for P3:FES that I left behind a while back. Time to hit abstract monsters in the face with my "Midnight Stick" and perhaps challenge the basement floors for a bit.

Oh, one more thing. FES comes with an extra chapter called "The Answer", and it takes place directly after the events of the game, and has you take control of one of the more prominent characters on her own journey of self-discovery. I haven't actually beaten it yet, so I can't really give a full critique on it, but I know for sure it's mostly devoid of the social sim aspect of the game, so if you actually enjoy the dungeon crawling and didn't care for the day to day stuff, it might be up your alley, but I strongly advise you to play "The Journey" first so you don't get spoiled on later game events and characters.

That's all there is to say. Persona 3 is a classic. Go play it.