1. The main story was not very well-told, even though it had high potential.
2. The subway dungeon was too much and fucked with the game's pacing big time. The regular dungeons provided enough combat opportunities. Having to go in the subway dungeon in-between regular dungeons is bad design. Let the game breath a bit. Let me focus on doing social links. Yeah Yeah, "you can do that". Except if you don't progress in the dungeon, you'll have to do all of it at the end of the game, and it'll still mess with the pacing big time. In fact, if you wait until the end of the game to do the dungeon, it'll mess with the pacing even more, because at that point, you are ready for the game's ending. Seriously.
3. The game is too damn long. Remedying issue #2 would probably solve this issue.
I just beat it yesterday. Gameplay-wise, its a good Persona game, but plot/characters isnt particularly great. The Phantom Thieves is such a good concept but I dont feel they do anything neat with it
except for the Akechi trap in the interrogation room
Oh, it's also worth saying that I almost stopped playing P5 due to the treatment of gay characters. It's hard to support a company that promotes a 1950's view of gay men as sexual predators of boys in their games.
I agree with the OP on it being "just" very good. P4 and especially P3 are some of my favourite games ever and P5 didn't really meet that insanely high mark. It's a great game, but it didn't hit me nearly as hard as it's predecessors.
I do still think about the look and style of the game a lot. I've booted up the game just to walk through the streets more than once. I think it nails the feeling of strolling through a city street better than most. It's a proper piece of urban fiction.
I don't think the whole generational war theme is bad per se. Hell, Brexit and Trump are real world events that show a clear divergence between the futures sought by the young and the old.
The problem with Persona 5 is that it engages in the theme in the most limp dicked way possible. P5 is essentially a story about systemic abuses of power whose answer is, rather than changing or even dismantling the system, to just get the Right Guy in power and everything will be totally fine!
see, for me, this right here's what i'm referring to. you genuinely believe that everyone over a certain age supports these 2 things, while everyone under doesn't? that even a large majority does? that's just silly talk (hell, i'm almost trump's age & i can't stand the guy!) i mean, talk about facile! ...
I don't think the whole generational war theme is bad per se. Hell, Brexit and Trump are real world events that show a clear divergence between the futures sought by the young and the old.
The problem with Persona 5 is that it engages in the theme in the most limp dicked way possible. P5 is essentially a story about systemic abuses of power whose answer is, rather than changing or even dismantling the system, to just get the Right Guy in power and everything will be totally fine!
The game is not about a generational war. They are teens. Teens are angry. Teens don't know how to channel their frustration like adults. Having them wanting to give some payback to them shitty adults is a perfectly believable conclusion an angry teen would reach.
Persona 5 is a game about how apathy has permeated the hearts of most people in Japan. Their political sphere is made of a whole lot of old guys who've been in power for the last 40 years. There is a crescent disconnect between the government and the youth, which has decided to just ignore politics and focus on other more superficial stuff.
The game throws a bunch of teens that are frustrated because society put them in a tough spot in a power fantasy where they can use some special powers to do some justice (and vent their frustrations). As their targets get bigger, you start seeing the bigger picture and the person who fucked up the main characters life. And, guess what, you defeat it. But it does nothing. There is a whole comitee of underlings whose heart wasn't changed, society itself would rather give the reigns of their country to a goddamn sociopath so they can silently mind their own business. By the time you reach the depths of Mementos you see that society is prey of their own apathy (even the previous Palace owners are now prey of it, since their ambitions were robbed). By the time you fight its Treasure, you are defeated. You can't use force to defeat the apathy of a society. So you go back, try to make yourself notice with the help of your Confidants. Slowly, people become aware of what is going on and instead of supporting the encarnation of apathy, they cheer for a group that is a representation of rebellion and change. The bar grows, showing how social change can start from a small seed, and eventually reaches 100%, the encarnation of apathy goes away and after the final fight you see the cast working towards change (even if it's in a smaller scale) with the tools at their disposal as normal citizens. And accomplishing their goal.
Persona 5 Crimson will have Ryuji doing commentary on the last dungeon. Because after 70 hours of overexposition people was so used to it that they didn't seem to understand the underlying message behind the last 10.
Characters that have no direction or just flat out don't grow post whatever arc they are introduced in (Ann, Haru).
Story elements that just seem completely nonsensical
(Why have the traitor go out like that? Why does Joker have to turn himself in to prove the 7th palace person guilty?).
The cast lacks general group development with several of the special events throughout the year being used for plot points or ruined by certain characters (School Festival is used as a means to move the plot along, the School Trip is ruined by Mishima and Ryuji)
The Fanservice centers around a character that literally goes through an arc about sexual harassment which is just creepy as hell.
Extremely unnecessary additions to combat (why do Nuke and Psi even exist?)
The Cover mechanic makes the game stupidly easy (Advantage on almost every encounter in the game!)
Mementos is garbage (nuff said).
Story elements mirror Persona 4 beat for beat
(including during the freaking ending of all things).
An obsession with trying to make each new arc and target more grandiose then the last
(No I didn't want the game to suddenly have an end of the world type plot thrown in the last minute without a damn hint of foreshadowing unlike the previous games)
Palaces get worse and worse as you progress through the game
Palace 7's mice mazes are the worst use of padding in an RPG I've seen in a long fucking time.
Also just as a note: I rather they go back to randomly generated dungeons if they are going to do dungeons like palaces again.
Finally, I think I had high expectations for the game but one thing that has really been clear to me after time has passed is just how poorly the story is actually written and hobbled together and how the game really lacks a clear evolution over Persona 4. Persona 4 wasn't a clear evolution over Persona 3 but it came out 2 years after Persona 3 so I can forgive it for not evolving.
But Persona 5 came out 8 years after Persona 4. They had plenty of time to work on the game and it was delayed time and again and for this? I know a lot of people liked the game but its easily the worst of the modern Persona's. Hell one of the most unique things about it is its art and its sense of style... But if you take that away (when 90% of the time you aren't seeing that as Joker wonders around the real world) it looks extremely dated and boring.
Those are the major problems I have with the game but theres a ton of minor ones as well such as the social links (confidants, whatever its the same thing) for NPC's all literally following the same exact format. You meet them>You see a personal problem they have>They get in big trouble>You not no secretly help them>
Rank 10 they find out your identity.
It's actually cool the first time you see it but when you see it repeat over and over again the pattern becomes obvious and predictable and it makes the reveal at rank 10 feel extensively played out when literally EVERY character figures it out.
I'm not trying to hate on Persona 5, its not a BAD game its just not very good either. I think at release it was vastly overrated with people calling it GotY which I just can't agree with in the slightest. I'm hoping as time has gone on and more people have played through the whole thing that it'll be viewed in a more objective light but time will tell. I still see people saying how amazing MGSV was which was released in an unfinished and unsatisfying state and it still got a stupid amount of praise despite being released in the state it was in.
I don't know how anyone can defend characters like Haru who provide next to nothing to the plot or to her own character development or story elements that towards the end don't seem to make a lot of sense. I wanted this game to be better then it was and I think a lot of other people did too and its not wrong to bring up those kinds of criticisms on a game that took THIS long to make and has sold this well. This isn't a niche RPG anymore and it deserves to really be scrutinized with how much time went into it and the product they ended up making because of that.
Persona can be better then this, hell it was better then this.
Super stylish, some great (if repetitive) tracks, great characters, engaging story, good battles, and fantastic dungeons.
I wish there were a lot more events and bits to more fully flesh out the characters though. There shouldve been a lot more locales used to explore the relationships instead of constantly reusing the same ones.
The music was great though I also thought there shouldve been more of it as well.
Aside from wishing one particular character joined your party a LOT earlier, I did feel things were a bit rushed towards the end and the last few dungeons were a pretty big letdown.
Im not sure if Id buy whatever remake they released to fix these issues, but I was satisfied and it left me wanting more, which is a good thing.
It's more as if we played a totally different game tbh xD
1. Mementos being the palace of the whole society meant that by taking down its treasure (Yaldabaoth), they triggered a change of heart in their society. They didn't "throw away their powers to get the right to vote" they erased what was wrong within the society that rejected them which means there's no need for the Phantom thieves to act and change one person at a time when they reformed the whole society ad now all individuals can stand on their own, no more manipulation, no more people pretending everything was fine when it clearly wasn't the case. It was a better outcome than still doing the whole PT business.
2. Remember the scene where they met Kamoshida, Shido, Madarame, at the heart of Mementos? The PT even realized all they did to all of them was returning them to the prison. And it's totally justified imo: They needed ambitions to get free of the total control Yaldabaoth put on them, even if those ambitions were twisted and made everyone around them suffer.
3. They did learn a lot, they became more mature as the story progresses and realized they cannot keep doing what they had been doing the whole game. Their own mistakes brought the death of the father of one of them, but they are not the classic naive and at times incompetent team of heroes. That's why one of the story twists is actually pretty satisfying: they knew all along they were heading to a trap and outsmarted everyone.
Yeaaah i know all this it's just a difference in perspective i guess lol
1. I at no point thought that the adults in this game were shitty due to some omniscient thing. The change brought forth via mementos, as far as i understand it, is the elimination of comfort as a crutch; they gave the public more vision to see how fucked up ppl in power are and gave them the will to address it...theoretically, since no change is shown and shido is still around. You say it was a better outcome, but thats the whole "greater good" stuff that i want to see pushed against. I dont think they reformed society at all.
2. I remember this, but again i find it problematic that their ambition is forwarded as a way to emancipate themselves. I want the game to shit on them with no remorse because they are rapists, murderers, manipulators, and in general ppl who take advantage of their position of power. But i do remember the scene and i understand what happened
3. This is actually pretty important to me and a big reason the story fell flat for me (it's my own fault tho). Throughout the game they try to give an aura of uncertainty amongst the cast and i thought they were going in a particular direction; that at some point the p thieves would realize that "changing hearts" is fundamentally fucked up or at least see that changing hearts is a drop in the ocean of a bigger problem (which i guess they do but the bigger problem ended up being a boss fight lmao), and that they needed to use their powers to rework everything, not ppl they happened to run into who they saw doing bad things. Their real mistake was not choosing between going big or going home. They learned their lesson but to me it's a lesson of reintegration, i just find that so unsatisfying
see, for me, this right here's what i'm referring to. you genuinely believe that everyone over a certain age supports these 2 things, while everyone under doesn't? that even a large majority does? that's just silly talk (hell, i'm almost trump's age & i can't stand the guy!) i mean, talk about facile! ...
Where in my statement did I say that was an absolute?
The existence of trends doesn't doesn't eliminate outliers. The fact that the African American community largely votes Democrat doesn't mean Ben Carson doesn't exist
It's great, really great but it doesn't have the pull of P4 or P3. Which is the reason why I haven't finished it. Almost playing it real time...almost...
I find that I care less about the characters, especially the initial party members than I did in any Persona game. Not sure why that is though.
The designed dungeons are really great though, finally we are back to some proper design.
I don't think the whole generational war theme is bad per se. Hell, Brexit and Trump are real world events that show a clear divergence between the futures sought by the young and the old.
The problem with Persona 5 is that it engages in the theme in the most limp dicked way possible. P5 is essentially a story about systemic abuses of power whose answer is, rather than changing or even dismantling the system, to just get the Right Guy in power and everything will be totally fine!
I'm not sure where you're getting the last part from. Actually, I'm not sure you could really argue P5 takes any stance on how, specifically, the system needs to be changed. It's primarily concerned with trying to motivate people to simply speak out and fight back against injustice - it's a protest, not a policy meeting.
As a longtime SMT and Persona fan I feel like the series is leaning too much towards the VN portions and too far away from dungeon crawling and combat/fusing mechanics.
The game constantly wrestled control away from me and forced me out of dungeons to deal with VN stuff rather than letting me play the game the way I wanted to play. It's been a trend since P3 but it was significantly more of an issue in P5.
I loved my time with it but it's not a game I would think of going back to any time soon, whereas P3 and P4 are games I will constantly go back to.
It's pretty solid mechanically but I didn't enjoy it that much. It started strong and never really kept that momentum. On top of that I didn't particularly care about anyone or anything in the game. I fell asleep a bunch of times playing it which was never the case with the prior games.
I hope future games throw a wrench at the structure because it is so ploddingly predictable
Finally, I think I had high expectations for the game but one thing that has really been clear to me after time has passed is just how poorly the story is actually written and hobbled together and how the game really lacks a clear evolution over Persona 4. Persona 4 wasn't a clear evolution over Persona 3 but it came out 2 years after Persona 3 so I can forgive it for not evolving.
But Persona 5 came out 8 years after Persona 4. They had plenty of time to work on the game and it was delayed time and again and for this?
I really enjoyed it. I didnt finish it though, and that kinda makes me reflect on how a person's circumstances are involved when playing games. I come to Persona for the atmosphere first and foremost. Persona 5 nails that. I love how the characters interact with each other, and I love the setting. However, I didnt need that kind of experience the way I did when Persona 4 was released. I was 17 and I needed an experience that allowed me to feel more involved in the outside world (outside world being my high school). Im much older now and I've gone to college, and I've worked for a bit, and moved into my own place. I dont need that expereince the way my 17 year old self did. I still enjoyed Persona 5 though, and I would recommend it to anyone.
It's a pretty good game, but not as good as 3 or 4, The best part of the game is the OST but it still pales in comparison to 4. The story and characters are my least favorite in the series. The combat and dungeons might be better, but honestly I only enjoyed a couple of the dungeons anyway. I just wanted the game to be over with at a certain point. The predictable structure/pacing of the game really grates on you after a while too. Not that 3 and 4 didn't have that as well to a certain extent, but it feels even more pronounced here. I didn't care for all the Phantom Thieves popularity tripe either and those text messages were often just filled with repetitive information. Game really needed to cut out about 25-30% of it's content.
That being said it's still one of the best games this year and could possibly even be my pick for GOTY because all my favorite games this year are flawed in some way. I definitely recommend the game, but keep your expectations in check because it's closer to an 8 than the 10 many of us expected.
Game of the Year and one of my top games of all time.
It has really stuck with me. So much, I've enjoyed watching other people play through the game on live-streams and enjoying seeing their reactions. It's pretty much an overall improvement over P4G in every way except for a couple of moments and characters in P4 which I still hold in high regard. However, I don't agree with the general consensus that P4 has a stronger story. I found P5 to much, much more engaging and memorable of a story and I found the overall "flash-back/flash-forward" storytelling method to be really clever and appropriate. Lots of fantastic twists too! Also, the story plays a much stronger role in the confidant relationships and the overall tone of the game. You and your friends really do feel like outcasts. If I have any complaints it's a few brief moments of poor taste regarding stereotypes and some between palace story sections drag on a bit too long.
I agree with most of this and it's my favorite game of the year without a doubt so far and might be my favorite this whole gen. Piggybacking on your streaming comment though, Atlus really shit the bed with their restrictions when the game was released. I think it hurt the game's sales to be honest because of the lessened exposure.
I wish I could get my £40 and 80 hours back. The game is massively overrated and Morgana is loathsome as fuck. Shouldn't be anywhere near GOTY conversations imho.
Was ultra hyped before release, during the first 50h and it went downhill from there. The game is stylish and all, but the story is not that good. I wish it was my GOTY, but it won't be.
It's my GOTY (so far) and a game I actually miss not being able to replay. I wish I had the ability to replay it fresh totally blind so I could experience it again.
I'm still on the fence as to if it's better than Persona 4, but I'm leaning in that direction right now.
Basically, I still love the game, weird pronunciation and translation issues aside.
It's my GOTY (so far) and a game I actually miss not being able to replay. I wish I had the ability to replay it fresh totally blind so I could experience it again.
I'm still on the fence as to if it's better than Persona 4, but I'm leaning in that direction right now.
Basically, I still love the game, weird pronunciation and translation issues aside.
It had some repetition but otherwise a wonderful experience. Going to listen to Futabas palace music right now. Definetely in my GotY list, albeit not in the top 3.
Amazing game. Was genuinely sad when it ended cause I just wanted to keep going. Loved the Phantom Thieves concept, and the style the game has. Overall I think I like Persona 4 better still, but that's a super high bar to live up to and P5 isn't far behind.
Probably the best Persona game if I could look at it objectively, but Persona 4 will always be my first and favorite of the series. Loved the music, they style, most of the characters. The game had its flaws, but I think it was pretty great and definitely in my top 3 this year.
Great game. A lot of the funneling/gating done by Morgana makes it hard to replay, plus it's like 100 hours long, but it's actually my favorite Persona even still.
Favorite game of all time. Absolutely phenomenal. Loved the story, loved the Phantom Thief motif, loved the premise, loved the ending, it was all great.
Best Persona game mechanically, least compelling cast but better written than 3(FES), decent story that has some serious holes. A fair number of little failures that impede the game from keeping you on that Persona high the entire playthrough. Overall a great game. Persona 4 is still my favorite though, and I don't think I'll be replaying this game anytime soon.
Fantastic game, and one of the best Persona games by far. Still not sure if I like it now overall than the P2 games, but at least gameplay wise it beats them out.
Though it's only a small part of the game, I really wish Atlus would cut it out with the homophobic bullshit. Like, seriously, it's 2017. This has no place anywhere, let alone a video game. :/
Basically every time the gay duo were around, they were hitting on the MC in a creepy, predatory way. At the beach, they say, "Those lovely boys look like they're just begging to be hit on!" and "If you don't answer our questions, we'll take you away!" and then demands that the MC and Ryuji strip naked. Then MC and Ryuji then scream and run away, and the text says "Catch them!", though the English voiceover uses the more menacing, "Get 'em!"
Or here's another scene where they approach the MC and Ryuji in Shinjuku. The men start fondling Ryuji as he screams, "Let me go!" and asks MC for help. Then they say they're going to take Ryuji away to "party" because he's "young", and the player is given three dialogue options which all frame the encounter as a joke. The MC leaves him to his fate and Morgana warns, "Come back alive", a strong hint by the game that leaving Ryuji with gay men is dangerous, even as it's couched in a joke.
The not-subtle implication here is that gay men are prowling for teenagers to molest, implied both by the actions of the gay characters and the fearful responses of the boys. This is exactly how gay men were viewed in America in the 1950's, as basically deviant criminals just because of their sexuality. So it's incredibly backwards and frankly damaging to impressionable young people playing the game; for kids self-identifying as gay, the game suggests that they are something to be laughed at and feared by society because of their sexuality, and for kids who are straight it presents a damaging, unrealistic view of gay people. The depictions of gay men in this game are extremely homophobic in the truest sense of the word.
I've booted up the game just to walk through the streets more than once. I think it nails the feeling of strolling through a city street better than most. It's a proper piece of urban fiction.
If you dug that aspect of P5, I highly recommend checking out Yakuza 0 if you haven't yet. It offers a highly detailed Tokyo neighborhood (and one in Osaka) based loosely on the real thing. I often just walked around the city looking at street signs and shops. It also just happens to be a fantastic game.
The gameplay is a bit too same old same old with only slight improvements. The characters are mostly very likeable, but the plot is hot garbage after the first arc. I'd say Haru and Akechi are some of the worst written characters in recent memory, Akechi because he never made any goddamn sense and Haru was semi-relevant for maybe 5 minutes before the game completely forgot she existed. Dungeon design ranges from pretty alright to downright wretched - (lateish dungeon theme spoiler) the
space station
dungeon in particular just kept going endlessly long after overstaying its welcome.
P5 didn't give me the same awestruck feeling I had after finishing P3 and 4 all those years ago. It might be because I've changed a lot as a person since then, but P5 just didn't resonate with me. Finished it once shortly after it came out and I haven't touched it since. Not like the game's structure lends itself to repeat playthroughs anyway.
It's obviously not a bad game tho, I'd give it like a 7/10.
-Loved the core gameplay and the systems around it.
-Hated the Palaces, on top of not being particularly interesting to look at or explore, P5 turns into a very bad stealth game while there, which soured me more than anything.
-Indifferent towards the story and characters and found it hard to become engaged in whole the daily routine loop. This probably has to do with personal taste than poor execution on Atlus' part.
15-20 hours in and staring down 100 more I decided to cut my losses. Under different circumstances I might've stuck with it longer, but 2017 is stacked and my gaming time is precious.
Nuke and Psi deal tech damage against enemies with ailments and status conditions, which is not super important on normal or hard mode, but can be useful against enemies who don't have weaknesses (Anubis) and I would imagine is probably more important on extreme difficulty where tech and weakness attacks get a huge boost. Though I can't say for sure since I haven't played it yet.
It also makes it a little more difficult to cover every type of weakness and makes considering which party members to bring along a little more interesting. I also like the other additions they made like baton pass.
I agree that it shouldn't have been so easy to gain an advantage, but at the same time after playing P4 I greatly prefer the cover attacks to Yu's horrible, awkward hitbox on his swings. They should have probably made attacking enemies from cover just trigger a normal fight and made you do something more risky/difficult to get an advantage.
I still pretty heavily prefer it over Tartarus and P4 dungeons. The more varied terrain alone makes it more interesting to look at at the very least, and the fact that you progress it alongside the regular, designed dungeons, rather than nothing but randomized stages, kept it from becoming tiring for me.
I really don't agree with this one, I think the palaces are definitely the most interesting in terms of both progression and aesthetics of the Hashino directed Persona games. And I really enjoyed most of the gimmicks they made you do in them. My biggest issue was constantly being interrupted by cutscenes or having the answers to already obvious puzzles spelled out to me. The
mazes
you mentioned was actually a nice change in that regard since I felt like I actually figured out the solutions to them on my own. I definitely hope they continue this trend of dungeon design in future games because the dungeons are the biggest reason I have no desire to replay P3 and P4 and my main reason for wanting to play P5 again.
I'm not trying to attack your opinion or say it's wrong, I just wanted to address some of the points in your post and give my own thoughts sine you obviously put a lot of effort into it. I didn't address your complaints about the story cause I generally agree with them, it was weak compared to the other games.
Lotta people seem to say it slogged at the end, but man, I loved that slow burn.
The descent into Mementos, seeing all these locked up people telling you to give up, reaching the Velvet Room, having the truth revealed, then fighting through the Qliphoth world up to the final boss. I even enjoyed the Archangel battles.
Lotta people seem to say it slogged at the end, but man, I loved that slow burn.
The descent into Mementos, seeing all these locked up people telling you to give up, reaching the Velvet Room, having the truth revealed, then fighting through the Qliphoth world up to the final boss. I even enjoyed the Archangel battles.
Even axing Mementos entirely would still result in a game that's far too long. To me the issue was (is, still playing through it) the opposite; the regular dungeons were far too long. Mementos was a breeze in comparison.
The other pacing issue with the game is dialogue. It's ridiculously repetitive even taking Japanese language's verbosity into account (which a proper localization would address, anyway, but the use of honorifics makes it ample clear what side of the "translation vs localization" was used when the game was brought over). It's repetition on top of repetition, loops within loops, with everyone stating the same things as everyone else in conversations that are already stating the same things as they did the day before. And worse, nobody has an interesting, defined or original enough personality to make up for so much verbosity. There are only so many times listening to Ryuji being dumb and everyone ganging on him, Anne being positive and hungry, Yusuke being florid and ignorant of the common world, Morgana insisting they're human, and everyone wondering if things are going to be OK before you start skipping it all.
Another issue are the social links. To put it bluntly, it's clear most of the effort went towards the waifus, leaving most of the male or non-romanceable female social links nearly devoid of charm. Not like there's a lot of them anyway, with a huge portion of social links devoted to party members or auto-ranking ones that don't really feel like you're making any kind of emotional connection with the characters.
It's a shame because for all these faults, this is a game that's mechanically and visually rich, and it probably has the most fun core gameplay out of any Persona game. One step forward, one step back.
Really don't understand the "game is too long" argument when it comes to JRPGs. I want these games to be long, that's part of the reason I like them. If I am enjoying a game and having fun with it, I want the length to be there...especially for games like Persona. I know people argue that "I don't have time for 100 hour games..." Ok, fine...maybe JRPGs aren't for you anymore then. I don't want a 10/20 hour JRPG, personally.
They mostly seem to exist so that each character can have their unique element without repeats. Which is kind of funny because, now that Dark and Holy have damaging spells, they could have used those instead.
I do like that elements have actual effects now, like Wind doing more damage to enemies that are on fire, and Psi attacks doing more damage to enemies (and characters) that have a mental debuff. I think that's new for a Persona game?
Really don't understand the "game is too long" argument when it comes to JRPGs. I want these games to be long, that's part of the reason I like them. If I am enjoying a game and having fun with it, I want the length to be there...especially for games like Persona. I know people argue that "I don't have time for 100 hour games..." Ok, fine...maybe JRPGs aren't for you anymore then. I don't want a 10/20 hour JRPG, personally.
I want it to be long because it's full of interesting, engaging content, character growth, story revelations and all that good stuff. Not cause characters have to text me every other day to tell me to go to the palace or ask me if the villains heart will change (for the 50th time).
You could cut out like 50% of the dialogue (or more) in this game and tell the exact same story without losing anything.
They mostly seem to exist so that each character can have their unique element without repeats. Which is kind of funny because, now that Dark and Holy have damaging spells, they could have used those instead.
I do like that elements have actual effects now, like Wind doing more damage to enemies that are on fire, and Psi attacks doing more damage to enemies (and characters) that have a mental debuff. I think that's new for a Persona game?
Really don't understand the "game is too long" argument when it comes to JRPGs. I want these games to be long, that's part of the reason I like them. If I am enjoying a game and having fun with it, I want the length to be there...especially for games like Persona. I know people argue that "I don't have time for 100 hour games..." Ok, fine...maybe JRPGs aren't for you anymore then. I don't want a 10/20 hour JRPG, personally.
I think the argument that a game wastes your time is more apt that simply detracting it due to its length. There's some good posts in the thread that talk on that point specifically, and what P5 could have done better on that front.
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