Almost perfect, infuriatingly.

This remake ALMOST knocks it out of the park, and it's seriously one of the most impressive remakes I've experienced, the added scenarios with every party member, the streamlined gameplay making it significantly more engaging, let me start there. The original's AI controlled party members is definitely my least favorite part of the game, while not as egregiously broken as detractors say, it is not something I look forward to when I revisit the game or think fondly of when looking back on it. The intention was for it to tie into the themes of the game, but they took too much liberty sacrificing gameplay for the story. Controllable party members with the new rebalances to the party had me switching team layouts all throughout the game until the end. Therugy attacks were initially my biggest concern, they appeared to be single button auto battle wins, however thankfully, MOST of the time they are great ways to tack on extra damage, and I think the game does a good job balancing around it.

I played on hard for reference. I'll go through my qualms about the game first.

Tartarus is significantly improved visually, and has a lot more interactivity with the crystals, chests, monad doors, and few special events, but even then I realize they could have done more, with the many improvements to roguelike video games over the years, Tartarus is still very simplistic in design even with all the added extras, only slightly digging deeper below the surface with it's engagement. I have always been a fan of winding sprawling dungeons in video games, and while Tartarus does somewhat fulfill that role, more could have been done. I also believe many 2nd therugies gained after a party member's 2nd persona awakening outright replace the initial therugy which could have been mitigated by making two therugies fulfill a different purpose, for example like with Yukari. Her initial therugy is a heavily damaging wind pierce attack, and her 2nd therugy is a magic attack boost to all your teammates. Same with Koromaru but with him it’s a dark pierce attack and a physical boost to your teammates. Ironically enough some of the late game issues carried over from the original to this remake, while not as bad, it still isn't fully alleviated. This game makes it easier to level up your social stats which is a pretty good thing, but once I reached the later months, my social stats were maxed out, I completed the only two social links you can do at night which is Tower and Devil.. and after that.. there is very little to do. I'd say around October and beyond is when the game started running out of content. P3R faithfully has the same locations with some very tiny extras like the deep web guy in escapade and some other tiny inclusions, however it keeps it too faithful, some extra locations or additions to the island would have been welcomed, especially during the night time because beyond some party member events, at night, there is almost nothing to do late game. So, when I said I was switching through party members throughout the game due to the rebalances and changes to these characters, there is one that I pretty much never touched beyond their introduction.. What the fuck did they do to Akihiko, all the characters have their niches and roles. Akihiko just has none? Junpei just outclasses him entirely, and his moves and stats are so... mediocre and it sucks so much cause he's one of the best developed characters in this game. Also, Koromaru’s voice.. why? Why did they not just get an actual dog for his voice actor. Instead we have a person making dog noises and it never, ever sounds good throughout the entirety of the game. It's a shame because Koromaru's design is very loveable and cute but the voice just ruins the illusion of a cute dog for me, it sounds like a furry. And finally, the new art style. It offers a different tone and majority of the time it is an upgrade visually, but there are times where I think things are a little too saturated and bright or maybe too clean looking? I somewhat wish Soejima redesigned his characters in this game, don’t get me wrong, the new art style is great. It’s beautiful in it’s very own respect, but seeing his work from P5 and especially Metaphor Re:Fantazio, I think it would have been cool, but this is more of a nitpick, the new art style is gorgeous either way. And with that.

This game is genuinely amazing, these few negatives do not hinder this game from its beautiful retelling of an already great story. EVERYTHING has been improved significantly and I could not really have asked for more from how this game is presented, re-told, and enhanced in every way. From the character scenarios allowing you to study, cook, hangout, and learn about your party members to understand and feel closer to them, to the completely enhanced and redone voice acting. Every voice actor completely recaptured the original and more, some.. (Fuuka and Aigis), are just straight upgrades in performance. The gameplay is streamlined and while on the easier side, still offers a fair challenge with certain mini bosses and enemies, the simple addition of controllable party members adds so much more. The gameplay never got boring for me, even with previously mentioned shortcomings with how satisfying, rewarding, and fast paced the battles and exploring Tartarus is, It gets very addicting even with the very small additions added just due to how quick, rewarding, and flashy the gameplay is. The simple addition of fully voiced social links make even the previously weaker social links breathe new tone, perspective, and engagement into characters that previously might have been missing out on. While it's now, unfortunately probably impossible to max out the social links and social scenarios with your teammates in one run, I feel that helps the themes more, put time into the things that interest you most with the little time you have. I completed the majority of social links and the links I previously thought were on the weaker side (Strength, Temperance, Magician.. and to an extent even Moon) were far more entertaining and gave me rediscovered joy for the characters I didn't personally care for previously. Also astonished on how much VA work there is with these characters, even previously simple dialogue bubbles sometimes have full VA work, it's so great. Finally, the music has been significantly improved, the new renditions of the tracks admittedly needed getting used to, but after comparing the two.. damn, songs like want to be close, changing seasons, deep mentality, are downright upgrades. Only exception being.. mass destruction, I still prefer the original. But the new one is still good, the rest are so great. This game is so great. It really is almost a complete replacement for the original, I wouldn't go as far as saying that is replaces it entirely since I do feel like there will always be merit in playing the original, there are better presentation choices in the original that I do prefer over this remake. Yet, as a complete experience, Persona 3 Reload, irons out the majority of the flaws of the original and gives the the title it's rightful place as one of the best in the series to those who were mixed on the original or just didn't see the appeal before. It's not the definitive edition with FemC and The Answer, but is something extremely special on it's own.