I got it at launch cause I wanted the steel box. Its on my pile of shame and I intend to play it this winter, but some of these comments dont exactly fill me with hope.
One of the big reasons I loved P3/4 was because of the characters. I liked the setting/monsters too but Im not a big strategy/mechanics person.
Too much padding, can't even force myself to do a second playthrough. The theme they went for would have been mailed a lot better if they had a more colorful cast of characters. Idk why I expected it to be as funny and cool as Lupin.
Ryuji - aggressively stupid
Ahn - first world problems the person
Makoto - walking waifu archetype
Haru - lol
Morgana - just shut the fuck up
Yusuke - I forgot he was a character
Futaba - I guess the least bad
That's the problem with this game. Everyone sucks.
Haru, and "lol" doesn't seem like a really convincing argument otherwise. She's not a great character, but there's nothing offensive or bad about her I'd say.
Haru came in way too late to have any sort of impact. I didn't do her social link so I barely know anything about her.
Just the structure of the game focusing on villain dungeons (mostly) meant we didn't get to deep dive into the main cast like P4 did. Futaba is one of the stronger characters and it's no coincidence that she had a dungeon.
Haru, and "lol" doesn't seem like a really convincing argument otherwise. She's not a great character, but there's nothing offensive or bad about her I'd say.
It's not worth mentioning her. She's totally underdeveloped and unconvincingly written. Her entire arc is a mess. She also happens to appear when the game becomes explicitly unfun and overlong. They could have done such a better job with the time they actually took up.
Bitterly disappointed. It was my most anticipated game of the year but almost immediately the localization issues broke the experience for me. Just... wow. It's terrible.
I put 200 hours into my playthrough and managed to max every social link without usually a daily guide. I really enjoyed it while I was playing -- some fun characters, great music, and super stylish.
At the same time, the game has not stuck with me at all. I barely ever think about it, compared to Persona 3 and 4 which stuck with me for a long time. I liked characters on an individual basis more than 4's cast in general but I didn't think their group dynamic was as strong.
Futaba actually managed to steal the worst Persona character spot from Fuuka. I couldn't stand anything related to Futaba and she actively made story scenes worse. What a terrible character.
I bought and beat P4G before this game came out and grew very attached to the cast. I did not really care for the P5 characters until the very end of the game, and I did not have this problem with P4. On the other hand, I liked the design of P5 dungeons, especially right after blasting through P4.
P4 dungeons have a theme like a strip club or castle, but have a very orthodox style; a bunch of hallways with your final destination being the top floor or deepest part of the dungeon. P5 palaces for the most part are designed like the themes they represent which makes "stealing the treasure" all the more satisfying. It felt nice that requests in this game were tied to your work as phantom thieves, whereas in P4 your quests consist of grinding dungeons for item drops from shadows. Game menus and battles are also much more aesthetically pleasing than P4.
I like the story of the phantom thieves, but I don't like how it's always about the "next target." There is plenty of text message conversation and team meeting with speculation about who is behind mental shutdowns, but I never feel like there is a lot of deduction with finding the next target. It is just gifted to them usually. I guess that Joker and Morgana have a realization moment about a certain someone near the end, but other than that, idk. Maybe a better way to put it is that the true killer in P4 actually felt like a mystery.
Finally, I like Morgana more than Teddie as a companion/mascot. That being said, Teddie and Yosuke pick on each other, but I really can't stand how much Morgana shits on Ryuji, and a lot of the time out of the blue. I think at one point he calls him a stupid monkey or some shit like that. Leave Ryuji alone
Haru came in way too late to have any sort of impact. I didn't do her social link so I barely know anything about her.
Just the structure of the game focusing on villain dungeons (mostly) meant we didn't get to deep dive into the main cast like P4 did. Futaba is one of the stronger characters and it's no coincidence that she had a dungeon.
Another problem of her social link was the fact it was locked behind max level handiness. WTF Atlus, really?
Well, this was a problem with many social links, and worst is that sometimes it didn't make sense. Max level in charm for continue Makoto's social link? Just because Makoto's stupid friend doesn't want to hang out with you if you aren't super charming? I can understand intellect but never charm.
Overly long and drawn out. Got bored of it and the final 20-30 hours felt like a slog. Great visual style and music, but I don't actually remember details about the character or story, never really stuck with me in any way.
Haru is the only character of the main cast to have a social link that feels like it was written in an actual down-to-earth, pleasant way, and not just a character boiled down to a gimmick. As far as I'm concerned that makes her the best character out of the main cast, late introduction or not. Just wanna hang out with the nice character who likes horror movies and silly jokes.
Ryuji - aggressively stupid
Ahn - first world problems the person
Makoto - walking waifu archetype
Haru - lol
Morgana - just shut the fuck up
Yusuke - I forgot he was a character
Futaba - I guess the least bad
That's the problem with this game. Everyone sucks.
The only characters I really liked were some of the adults (esp. Sojiro and Takemi), which isn't a surprise after Catherine. I just think the writers are hampered by having to write high schoolers over and over. There's only so much you can say about people who have barely experienced life yet and who haven't really matured beyond the sketch of who they're trying to be.
Though I at least liked the cast in P3 better; they felt a bit more grounded and had more character development.
It's still definitely one of my favorite games of the year, and probably all time.
Even though I've long since platinumed the game I still get the itch to return to the game.
I thought Persona 5 was good. Not great. The longer I spend away from it the less of the good things I remember and the more the things I disliked stick with me, which is never a good sign really. The characters are okay. The story is pretty bad. The soundtrack has some jams but outside of a handful it's very forgettable. Coming off of my two favorite OSTs of all time it's hard not to be disappointed but I feel like P5's music doesn't even come close.
My biggest complaint is just that the game is way too long. I can't even imagine what a FES/Golden version of Persona 5 would even be. The best way to "enhance" this game would be to chop 20 hours off it, not add 20 more. Guess we'll see.
I thought Persona 5 was good. Not great. The longer I spend away from it the less of the good things I remember and the more the things I disliked stick with me, which is never a good sign really. The characters are okay. The story is pretty bad. The soundtrack has some jams but outside of a handful it's very forgettable. Coming off of my two favorite OSTs of all time it's hard not to be disappointed but I feel like P5's music doesn't even come close.
My biggest complaint is just that the game is way too long. I can't even imagine what a FES/Golden version of Persona 5 would even be. The best way to "enhance" this game would be to chop 20 hours off it, not add 20 more. Guess we'll see.
My issue is that the characters and dialogue is just not as memorable as P4/P4G and P3 (pick a version). Especially coming off P4 where the characters could have easily been people that I have known, P5 was not as great. The sloppy localization didn't help things (surprisingly VA was actually quite good but they only could do so much). Even non-party characters were not that great beyond the politician and (surprisingly) Shogi player.
The story started off great, slowed down toward the middle and then dragged on and didn't impress all that much. P4G I thought did a better job even though it was a somewhat lighter fare. Coming off P4G True ending you feel like you got to know these characters really well, you care about them and it's a shame you are separating. P5 was just meh by comparison.
And yes, the dungeons dragged on for far too long in the 2nd half of the game. Coupled with a terrible camera system it was just a chore at some points.
Overall P5 was still a good, even a great game. However, as a follow up to P4G it just wasn't there, especially in the characterization department. P5 Red (whatever the name) should tighten up dungeons, clean up the story, improve characterization like adding in 2nd to last party member earlier (the summer lull was too long).
I think for the next Persona game they should take some cues from SMT and try to actually say something. Persona 5 desperately wants to seem progressive and empowering but it's painfully safe and lacks any bite. I suppose as the series grows ever more popular it'll get ever more conservative though.
It was... OK, I guess? I didn't hate it, I had fun for like 60-70 hours, but I kinda already forgot about the cast and story went for on for too long and honestly got really bad past a certain point.
Characters:
P4's characters are all well developed and have continuous development throughout the whole game both as individuals and as a team.
P5's characters are not all well developed. Ann has a great development arc throughout the first part of the game but then doesn't do a damn thing for the rest of the game. Haru doesn't develop at all, ect. You have some standouts like Futaba and Sojiro but its few and far between. On top of that you never really see the group bond as a team, most of the events where those things happen in P4 are instead used to advance the plot or end up getting ruined by certain characters like Ryuji and Mishima.
All the problems I have with Persona games have existed since Persona 3:
Restrictive time system
Terrible pacing/too much playtime with nothing happening
Reptitive gameplay loop because of the aforementioned
Persona 3 had terrible AI controlled party members and a sleep inducing dungeon. P4 dungeons were the same. At least Persona 5, disregarding themes/characters, improved combat and dungeons over the previous iterations which elevates the game much higher over the other two. I'd still rather get out my 3DS or PS2 and play a traditional SMT game however. SMT IV for example is much more replayable than any modern Persona, and SMT IV is one of worst games in that series alone (still a great game though).
Ryuji - aggressively stupid
Ahn - first world problems the person
Makoto - walking waifu archetype
Haru - lol
Morgana - just shut the fuck up
Yusuke - I forgot he was a character
Futaba - I guess the least bad
That's the problem with this game. Everyone sucks.
Yep I agree but to go into more detail (because thats fun for me XD)
Ryuji - After the first arc he struggles to remain relevent to the group and literally gets you caught by Makoto because he can't keep his fucking mouth shut for five damn seconds. On top of that almost every group activity the group takes he generally ruins by just being such a downer about every fucking thing or over hyped for every fucking thing. Not to mention his really forced argument with Morgana.
Ann - Ann's biggest problem is that the writers had no idea what the hell they wanted her character to be. They want her to be the fanservice character but shes also the character that was nearly raped and was constantly sexually harassed. They want her to be this sexy and somewhat dominate character in battle but her actual personality is rather a basic school girl. Hell her romance is as vanilla as it could be despite the huge BDSM overtones with her Persona, and costume... which are meant to reflect her character, but again shes just not that person so it makes no damn sense at any point which is a shame because I think they actually did a great job with her during the first arc but after that she doesn't develop or change. For crying out loud her fucking social link is about her modeling career and her being somewhat of an airhead... what? Really? Where the fuck is the actual CHARACTER of Ann, who is she and what does she actually care about and want because this game makes her out to be 3 or 4 different characters and is NEVER consistent.
Makoto - Shes just kinda there throughout most of the game, she gets setup as the 'leader' of the group rather quickly and dictating what they need to do which works at first because Ryuji is a fuck up, Ann doesn't contribute much but she doesn't really grow much.
Her Social link is about her having trouble making friends and the repeatedly old story of trying to convince her 'new friend' that her boyfriend is a piece of shit which has been done to death in every media form already.
Shes not an awful character but I just didn't buy her role within the group when leading up to that her character arc is largely trying to reject the responsibility being forced on her by her sister and the principal. She's 1000x times more interesting as a character BEFORE she joins you then after. Also her arc with the gangsters was just beyond uncharacteristic and stupid.
Haru - I wanted to like Haru but they didn't do anything good for her character. Her arc is basically a repeat of Ann's with her going to end up being forcibly married to some jackass if the group doesn't save her.
Once her father dies all her development is done off screen, she mentions like one line where she says she wasn't sure if she should blame the group for her fathers death but its glossed over so damn quickly and they just flat out don't spend enough time developing her as a person. She should have been introduced into the story earlier on and given time to develop before the 5th arc takes place and been a social link you could progress to a certain point before she actually joins you. Also they really needed to drop that stupid ass forced relationship with the jackass she has to deal with. It's stupid, its boring, and its predictable and doesn't help grow her character because her development from it is so brokenly obvious that its just not fun to raise her social link up.
Morgana - I felt like they were just trying to pull a Teddie again with this character and while some of the questions about his origin are answered many of them still aren't. It doesn't help that hes used as a game device to prevent you from exploring which has just spawned an endless meme about how he won't let you go out at night. On top of that I already mentioned his fight with Ryuji is really forced but honestly his whole arc is, his self doubt never feels earned nor does the outcome which just seems largely used because they couldn't figure out how to introduce Haru into the group without repeating literally the same arcs they had already done 4 times previously... Even though as I mentioned with Haru they still did anyway.
Yusuke - Hes quirky... That's about it. He shows up at odd times, says odd things, and has a rather aloof personality. He's not a horrible character but hes really lacking real development. His social link is pretty basic just revolving around the only really noteworthy part of his character (being an artist) and doesn't broaden his scope as a character at all. He's just kinda there the whole game and is used for comedic relief most of the time. When I was playing through the game I thought his lack of real interest in the group was setting himself up to be the traitor but nope hes just kinda there, he makes the cards and helps but we don't really get to see him ever become an interesting person or really go through any real arc.
Futaba - They spend a lot of time on her and it does show, she has a clear character arc and does grow and change throughout the course of the game and her social link is about breaking the 'limit' of what she thinks shes capable of. Shes a pretty good character in all honesty but I also have a hard time buying her SUPER HACKER status which just goes unexplained and just written off as something everyone accepts without ever really being explained on how she got into programming and hacking and what not, shes just introduced as this most amazing hacker ever and it feels really forced but its easy to ignore because all of her development isn't ever around that. It's not a horrible thing like some of the other characters but like many things in this game it does feel lacking.
Joker - Despite being a silent protagonist I really didn't like Joker that much or rather I didn't like how forced his situation was, it didn't feel natural that he ended up in the situation he was in nor did the obvious setup of the same guy who screwed him over also ends up being the main antagonist. It just wasn't needed, I would have been much more interested if we were given less detail about what brought him to Tokyo and instead was just setup as a trouble maker and letting the player fill in the details like they did for P3/P4. They just kinda half assed a narrative to introduce the guy they wanted to be the main villain and because of that its harder for the player to really engage with Joker. Before I played the game all the trailers and everything had me thinking he was this bad apple that always rejected the world around him and then getting his Persona power it made him want to right what he viewed the worlds wrongs were. It made sense with the shady deals he was making with the various Confidants/Social links instead of this setup where hes a good seminarian who gets in trouble unjustly, that made me roll my eyes so much when it was eventually explained and they really could have done something more interesting with him if they wanted to actually have a narrative setup for him instead of just making him a complete blank slate like the other games.
Great game that went on for a bit too long imo. It felt like there was a dungeon too much, but in the end it was worth it. Decent story and characters, incredible music/presentation, and good combat. Pretty cool JRPG.
I also bought a PS4 just to play it and I felt like it was worth it (Yakuza 0 made sure I didn't regret it).
Beat the game during release, 135+ Hours, 2 achievements I didnt get at end of my play through.
My thoughts after 6 months:
GOTY so far, HZD also close, but both are so different but thats a separate discussion.
Persona 5 is amazing in many aspects, but suffers from being way too long for its own good.
The game simply DRAGGED on at the end. I wish it ended differently, I wish Akashi was end-game, not an intermediary villain.
But most importantly, game was too long. Seriously. I have no urge to go back and play it. Lots of things in this game suffered near the end. I cant even remember the last chick you recruit lol...she was useless to the plot. Some of the social links were good, some were ... very forgettable.
Music could have been more varied, but the music that was there was nothing short of astronomically pheonomenal. Will never change my PS4 wallpaper, can sit there and listen to that and just ponder how good that game was and the memories...
Combat was fun,...till near the end where it got cumbersome. Idk, the game has some significant pacing issues, and its not from social aspect vs. dungeon aspect. Its at the end of the game where it just never ends...
Well, I think I finished at about 85 so not 100 hours! That said, it's still a very good game. It's just after that long wait people are disappointed with certain aspects of it like characterization. It is still better then 99% of JRPGs out there. Combat is good, persona fusion is always fun, the story is good if not quite up to the expectations, and same for the characters.
Personally this year so far for me: Yakuza 0 was undisputed number 1. Divinity Original Sin 2 is at #2. Persona 5 vs Zelda BOTW for #3 and #4. Yakuza Kiwami is at #5. Other things follow. So in a year of very good games P5 has only been beaten by an amazing game like Yakuza 0 which is the best in the series and Divinity OS 2 which is one of the best CRPGs produced in last 15 years. That's not too shabby.
I liked the battle system, i liked the characters, i liked the music and the overall design of the game but it definitely has flaws.
for a game that just seems to take forever to finish, it sure doesn't give you much time to do anything other than forward the plot. I didn't even get close to maxing out even half of the S Links. I think I might have maxed out a couple Characteristics. and I only got to go fishing like twice! Why do you have to go to bed early all the time??
Played for 12-13 hours, got most of the way through the first dungeon, but could never really get into it.
It also really bugged me that I couldnt take screenshots during the game, as that is something I like to do and it felt very punitive of the dev to restrict that feature when nearly no other games do.
The translation is an absolute train wreck. Characters spout complete gibberish to one another, or respond in totally unnatural ways. I hope if they ever do a remake of P5 they take a good long look at the translation and make some substantial, sweeping changes and fix whatever went wrong that made the translation so poor to start with.
It's a weird one in that 50 hours in I was still optimistic that a good an concise ending might help me overlook the *many* problems of the first 50 hours and tie a bow on what could've been the best JRPG I've ever played, but that did not happen ultimately and I feel a little bit underwhelmed despite still thinking it's great overall. My issues with the game have already been discussed before I'm sure, one-note characters, bloat, unneeded restrictions (lemme make this lockpick gaodamnit!), childish portrayal of sex, overly long ending, pointless confident events/discussions, terrible awful and rubbish and cliche baddies, only one main battle theme is ridiculous for an 85 hour game, too much annoying and repetitive moments/dialogue (knocked 'em right off their feet!, For real!?, etc.) along with the dozens and dozens of pointless and stupid texting. Oh and the English localisation was definitely rough and unnatural quite often, people got a bit defensive IIRC when the complaints about the localisation surfaced soon after launch and I don't get why, it really doesn't feel like a step above something like Fire Emblem or Xenoblade or Monster Hunter and they get ripped to shreds over this. Voice acting was really good though.
It's weird that the game has lots of repetitive/reused/bloat e.g. did we really need in the final palace
4 boring mice things
no we did not I feel, yet despite all that needless bloat the game also feels restrictive and half-baked a lot
1000000th complaint about Morgana here as well as how underdeveloped Haru was and how the game just breezed through Akechi's 180 from a main villain to hero or something, was I meant to feel sorry for him? Was he a sympathetic villain? An anti-hero? I don't get it.
. And this is the game don't forget that took forever and an age to release. It just feels like misdirection, seen as well in how childish and immature the game is, the baddies have to be really bad and haha more hilllarious joke scenes about Ann being hot and sexy and gay people being creepy. Feels like their intended audience was really, really younger than I would've thought before playing at times.
Obviously not hilarious. But dumb.
And what I liked should be obvious too, the music, the artstyle, the overall amazing style of the presentation and how it comes together, the battle system, the basis of Phantom Thieves and palaces formed from people's distorted cognition and how all that worked was great, the Sakuras and Nijimas were the best characters, the addictive Persona system and more.
Absolutely loved it. Every now and then I look at my shelf, see the collectors edition, and get excited for early next year when I am going to play through it again to get the platinum. Currently in my top 3 favorites for GOTY.
I got bored midway through chapter two. For some reason I didnt feel compelled to keep playing. Quite honestly if I didnt see it mentioned here I would have forgotten about it completely.
Ryuji - aggressively stupid
Ahn - first world problems the person
Makoto - walking waifu archetype
Haru - lol
Morgana - just shut the fuck up
Yusuke - I forgot he was a character
Futaba - I guess the least bad
That's the problem with this game. Everyone sucks.
I don't think everyone sucks, but anytime there is a trip, or an event, or an opportunity for characters to stop sucking and become interesting ... Ryuji steps in to fuck it up by being aggressively stupid.
Pretty much every scene:
All: So here we are, time to get away from it all and just have some fun for a change!
Ryuji: Everything sucks, we are not popular enough. How can we be more popular?
All: ... lets just go home.
And that is how I feel about Persona 5. Amazing game, improvements in every sense, but Ryuji just drags the game down to the point where you have no choice but to stop caring. Since this also corresponds with the point the writers also stopped caring it makes for a disappointing finish.
But rather than just complaining about what should have been a Tales series character reject I'll go further. What compounds the problems is the change from social links to "whatever the fuck it was called in P5". Obviously it was the same thing, but there was a key difference. In P5 every rank up gave you a huge benefit. This massively changed the focus of what you were doing:
P3+4 - Well these social links suck, but if I'm not doing them then I might as well not play the game, so might as well make the most of it and enjoy them!
P5 - Another box ticked
You'll end up skipping most of the text for the ones you don't care about in P5. This is basically all of them.
Ryuji - aggressively stupid
Ahn - first world problems the person
Makoto - walking waifu archetype
Haru - lol
Morgana - just shut the fuck up
Yusuke - I forgot he was a character
Futaba - I guess the least bad
That's the problem with this game. Everyone sucks.
Haru came in way too late to have any sort of impact. I didn't do her social link so I barely know anything about her.
Just the structure of the game focusing on villain dungeons (mostly) meant we didn't get to deep dive into the main cast like P4 did. Futaba is one of the stronger characters and it's no coincidence that she had a dungeon.
Is the bolded a spoiler? I know you mostly but just being cautious.
So P5 mainly focuses on the villains instead? That's a shame. I really enjoyed the whole digging into the casts subconscious and the overcoming of your insecurities aspect of P4.
Musics were great but a little bit underwhelming after P3 and P4. Overall easy and the fact that harder modes doesn't feel clever at all make me stay on normal, but the battle system was better than P3 and P4. Presentation was stunning but sometimes the screen was too busy, besides the introduction video was pretty ugly.
The writing was sometimes great, sometimes horrible, feels like they were 2 writers. One that really wants to send a message about japanese society, the struggles of the teenagers, the abuse of the elders and others touchy subjects we rarely see in a game. And the other one who is the average pervy otaku who makes jokes about gay people, puts some random ugly anime bits with awkward situations and makes characters not relatable at all (Ryuji was great in the first part of the game then become infuriating after that)
Still a great game because it goes where a lot of games don't.
Ryuji - aggressively stupid
Ahn - first world problems the person
Makoto - walking waifu archetype
Haru - lol
Morgana - just shut the fuck up
Yusuke - I forgot he was a character
Futaba - I guess the least bad
That's the problem with this game. Everyone sucks.
Ryuji - aggressively stupid
Ahn - first world problems the person
Makoto - walking waifu archetype
Haru - lol
Morgana - just shut the fuck up
Yusuke - I forgot he was a character
Futaba - I guess the least bad
That's the problem with this game. Everyone sucks.
I found Ryuji too stupid, even for a teenager. His lack of common sense and intelligence just baffles me.
I had no idea what they were trying to do with Ann. Getting stronger by modeling lol?
Makoto is definitely portrayed as waifu material. Her social link just sucked so much.
Haru was introduced too late into the game. Her social link is so weak and uninteresting too. Little impact from her and didn't care much for her.
Morgana and his curfew, you gotta sleep a lot of nights.
Yusuke wasn't so bad. Sure, he's eccentric and maybe pretentious, but his lines are pretty funny during the story.
Futaba is the best written character with a fleshed out backstory. Her social awkwardness with people. Her fear of crowds and what she does to not see them lol. Her life as a shut-in. I really liked her.
The problem with the group is that they are too involved on the Phan-site. I get it, you want to be popular, but it shouldn't be your #1 priority. Compared to the cast of P4 which grew together as friends, P5 cast was just together for palaces and that's it.
The game also dragged too long near the end.
The perks were mostly the same for party confidantes compared to p4, but the non-party confidantes gave you some amazing perks. Store discounts, regen and sp accessories, take an extra action at night with Kawakami, raising other confidantes with Chihaya and more.
Ryuji - aggressively stupid
Ahn - first world problems the person
Makoto - walking waifu archetype
Haru - lol
Morgana - just shut the fuck up
Yusuke - I forgot he was a character
Futaba - I guess the least bad
That's the problem with this game. Everyone sucks.
Just... wow. It's terrible.
