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Please explain the Persona series to a n00b

F

FiveMinuteHero

Member
I have been following Persona 5 news for a while and there seems to be a lot of hype surrounding this game. I just watched the new video and I really liked what I saw, albeit not understanding what is going on. I do not own a PS3 or a PS Vita so am not able to play the fighting arena game, nor P4 The Golden. I would appreciate if someone can explain to me what the game is about (I guess it is a JRPG though), the mechanics and the world it exists in.

Thanks!
 
E

Einbroch

Banned
Interesting characters, world, and story with mediocre gameplay and high production values. It's a jRPG with turn-based combat.

Also the w-word.
 
M

MaximumSpider

Banned
Plots aren't connected to one another so you can jump in at any point.
I think the characters and writing is amazing.
Music is just soooooo good.
 
L

Lime

Member
weeaboos and waifus (husbandos in a few cases)

Seriously though, it's like a JRPG with lots of dungeon grind coupled with visual novel + dating mechanics similar in design philosophy to Bioware.
 
suikodan

suikodan

Member
JRPG
Standard combat and exploration system
Personas are like Pokémon with special abilities (fire, ice, etc...)

Social Links develops your relationship with people (and strength of the Personas of the SLink's element...)

High school
Horror flicks
waifus
Great OST

That's Persona (to me)
 
P

Pankratous

Member
I've loved JRPGs my entire life and I cannot find the ability to be interested in what I'm seeing. Persona... I just don't get it and I don't know why.
 
D

DJSharpeCheddar

Banned
Well, from the looks of that trailer, Persona 5 is HUGELY different from the previous ones, so an explanation of them may not be very useful. Heh.
 
T

threelights

Member
Great characters, world, story.

The battles are fun and turn-based

The dungeons (until 4) were randomly generated (some like, some don't). In 5 they don't seem random though.

There's P3 and/or P4 available to like, any system today, go play one of them (they are stand-alone games, you don't have to start from the first).
 
D

Dawg

Member
Excellent writing.

Fantastic music.

Interesting gameplay.

Fun calendar system.

Pokémon-like Persona system.
 
M

Mendrox

Member
Just play Persona 4 Golden and thank us later.

Persona 3+4 are Persona games where you go to school, do something after school and go to dungeons at the end of the day (or do something with friends again). Doing something with your social links (friend circle, colleagues etc.) will strengthen their bonds. With these bonds you are able to fuse Persona and use them in battle. Think Pokemon, just that there are 4 people in battle where one person (the main character) is able to change between different persona all the time, all the other characters are stuck to their main persona and their evolutions).

The music is godly. The gameplay is very good. Social links do not only strengthen the MCs bond, but you also feel attached to the characters like in no other game.

TL;DR I cried everytime when I finished P3 and P4. I miss my friends.
 
N

Nibel

Member
Only played (or still playing) P4G, and it's a great JRPG that is vastly different from anything else that I've played in the genre.
 
B

bomblord1

Banned
Have you ever wanted to play an anime? And I'm not just referring to the art style I'm talking play an anime down to choosing what the character does after school and what friends he hangs out with.
 
P

Pennywise83

Banned
A jRPG with characters that are built to be as cool as possible in the eyes of video gamers, so they imitate what's popular at the moment (emo - P3 / hipster - P4 / crime drama - superhero series from the 70s - P5); boring gameplay; nice music; overall interesting story.
 
C

CorySchmitz

Junior Member
If you decide you wanna get into it, maybe grab a PlayStation TV for $60 + Persona 4 Golden (it was on sale for $13 recently, I believe.)

It's one of my top five games ever.
 
E

EhoaVash

Member
Also new into the persona thing,

Can you get married in this series of games, have kids? Is this a life simulation?
 
L

LaunchpadMcQ

Banned
Einbroch said:
Interesting characters, world, and story with mediocre gameplay and high production values. It's a jRPG with turn-based combat.

Also the w-word.
Click to expand...

Alright, I think we need to nip this in the bud before moving forward. The gameplay is NOT mediocre. It's a more basic form of the Shin Megami Tensei mainline gameplay, but that does not make it mediocre.
 
U

UpperCaseN

Member
There are 2 halves to modern Persona (3 and 4, I have not played 1 or 2). During the day, you are a student. You have to juggle class, studying, extracurricular activities, and relationships with friends, both guys and gals, not always students either; could be people from the neighborhood, family, etc. This sounds boring but building these relationships expands on character stories and also directly influences the 2nd half of the game, the jrpg side. At night, you'll be clearing floor by floor of a dungeon and fighting bosses, leveling up, etc. It's a modern day jrpg which seems very rare rather than fantasy setting.
 
C

Chariot

Member
DJSharpeCheddar said:
Well, from the looks of that trailer, Persona 5 is HUGELY different from the previous ones, so an explanation of them may not be very useful. Heh.
Click to expand...
Hugely different? The characters have a slightly different attitude, but other than that it looks like an evolution of what was good to me, not necessary something completely different.
If nothing else it still has style.
Lime said:
Just like with Bioware games (Tali sweat), some fans grow too affectionate of these virtual characters. Let's just leave it at that.
Click to expand...
It should also be said that most people use this not in serious intend. For the most part it just means that somebody likes a certain character.
 
E

Einbroch

Banned
LaunchpadMcQ said:
Alright, I think we need to nip this in the bud before moving forward. The gameplay is NOT mediocre. It's a more basic form of the Shin Megami Tensei mainline gameplay, but that does not make it mediocre.
Click to expand...

It's pretty mediocre. But, you know, opinions. A lot of people think it's actually bad. I wouldn't go that far, personally.
 
K

Kinsei

Banned
LaunchpadMcQ said:
Alright, I think we need to nip this in the bud before moving forward. The gameplay is NOT mediocre. It's a more basic form of the Shin Megami Tensei mainline gameplay, but that does not make it mediocre.
Click to expand...

The combat in P3 and 4 is an unbalanced mediocre mess and the dungeons are downright terrible IMO.

The games live on their story and characters but hopefully the new one has good gameplay to go along with it.

CountBlackule said:
I don't need to play P4 to understand P5?
Click to expand...

It's not very likely. Previous Persona games have been pretty self contained.
 
C

CypherSignal

Member
Gameplay is predominantly a classical turn-based RPG, with attack and magic with elemental affinities. The "it's like ff but..." twist in it is that the magic your characters can use is governed by a "Persona", which you can have collect, build up, fuse (i.e. breed), switch to in combat, etc. kind of like Pokemon.

The other half of the game is just pure story. At least for Persona 3 and 4, it's grounded in modern-day-Japan, with the main character going through high school, and featuring a large cast of endearing and interesting characters with their own stories and arcs.
 
L

lol51

Member
In Persona 4 you would go through a year of game time. Days pass, weather changes, exams arrive, holidays, summer break, etc. Meanwhile, there is a story element where you must investigate a gruesome killing which occurs in your small town. As days pass you can choose to spend them as you wish, such as: Studying alone in your room to increase Intelligence, build relationships with characters (results in things such as; improving dialog options in future encounters or unlocking battle skills), going out to explore dungeons, attempting to solve the murder etc.
 
M

Molemitts

Member
I've never played Persona, but that trailer looked really stylish and cool. It's a shame, because I'll probably never play it, the presentation of it kinda interests me. I can't be bothered with JRPGs anymore. I also can't stand the writing in a lot of visual novels, dialog heavy JRPGs, or whatever.
 
S

Soriku

Junior Member
You can summon Satan.

468px-Satan.jpg


He's weak to wind.


FiveMinuteHero said:
Do TVs play an important role of some sort in the game?
Click to expand...

Only in P4. There's another world in the TV where you go to dungeons.
 
A

Amir0x

Banned
Basically the appeal of the series now is that they place you in a year of time (at school or something) and you get to try to balance normal life stuff - like taking school tests, family or friend vacations, dating - with the hardcore life of dungeon crawling at night.

And sometimes these things intermingle, giving you incentive for both... if you develop the right friendships for example some of your Persona fusions will be more effective and your ability to wield them superior.

To me, this creates a sort of synergy between game design and story design that few jRPGs really tackle all that well (not that Persona is perfect, social link system in 3 and 4 need to be greatly increased in complexity to be really special).

On top of that, they usually got a great new pop Japanese soundtrack mixed with some incredible battle and dungeon themes, again feels like a fusion between many disparate elements that happen to draw together its different elements beautifully.

At the heart of the game is the same drive many dungeon crawlers have - loot and character progression - but everything is just elegantly put in a special context. Dungeon floors in P4 for example are usually manifestations of something that is occurring in the world or amongst your friends; bosses retain elements of subconscious fears that our protagonists/antagonists have.

It's a special series.
 
J

jay

Member
A bunch of teenagers make jokes about having sex while fighting in poorly constructed randomly generated dungeons.

It's like Porkies meets Evolution.
 
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