This is a special game to me, no it’s not just because of the fantastic characters, the hilarious humour or the intriguing and smart story, it’s because it’s a JRPG that actually kept me interested all the way through.
One evening I was browsing the bomb and came across the Endurance Run series, had no idea what Persona was or what these videos were about but I had a look at a few and for some reason it just struck me as a game I had to play. I tried the game on an emulator but it was glitchy so after a few hours of that I ended up buying a PS2 with a copy of the game.
I consider that easily one of the best decisions I’ve made, I have since bought Persona 3: FES and Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor. Starting P3:FES later tonight and saving Devil Survivor for when I fly to the US in 3 weeks, that’s enough talk though now I will shift focus to Persona 4.
You start the game as a high school student that is on his way to the rural town of Inaba, greeted by your uncle and cousin the opening of the game consists of lots of dialog and many X button presses. Everything starts off fairly normal, you start settling into your new surroundings, bumping into students around school and participating in classes.
This doesn’t last long however, very early on a grizzly murder occurs which sends shockwaves throughout the small town, Atlus do an excellent job of getting your attention and it’s likely you will be glued to the TV throughout the opening. It doesn’t take long before you discover another world that exists within televisions and that you and your companions are able to enter that world by stepping through TV screens. From this point on it only gets more and more interesting, the pacing is excellent and getting to know the characters is a joy.
There are some very hard hitting moments in the story I found, it does a great job of highlighting how people can suppress their thoughts, desires and character traits. The writing is top notch and the humour is unrivalled in the RPG world. I felt very close to some of the characters and I won’t lie, I got teary eyed at points. On the surface it might seem quite cute and kiddy but once you get more and more drawn into the game you will see that the themes of the story are very mature indeed.
Personas can be compared to Pokemon, each have strengths and weaknesses and you (the main character) are able to use multiple Personas and freely switch between them. Personas belong to certain arcanas, depending on which they belong to it’s possible to get additional bonuses when forging Personas.
Each character has a HP and SP bar, SP is basically your mana bar and abilities will either cost you HP or SP to cast. When characters die in battle they can be resurrected either by using spells or items however, if your main character dies the game harshly puts you back on the main menu losing all unsaved progress, this will make you want to save your game frequently! This also gives battles an added degree of tension because nothing is more annoying than nearly killing a powerful opponent then going on to getting one shot and put back on the main menu.
When you are not dungeon crawling or forming bonds with people you can also raise various attributes within your character that can unlock additional dialog options. Knowledge, understanding, expression and diligence can be raised by reading books, eating food in the Aiya diner, studying, working and by taking part in afterschool clubs such as drama and soccer practice. Knowledge is also raised while in class at school too, of course.
Persona forging is essentially mixing different Personas together and seeing what your results are, you are able to see the abilities of the Persona you have the option of crafting so you can have a good hard think before committing to the forging process. Fear not, if you accidentally lose a Persona you have the option of buying it back for a fairly modest fee.
Socialising doesn’t have to be just to level up a social link though, I won’t spoil anything here but there’s quite a few story segments in the game which have you hanging out with your friends that result in some hilarious situations which are sure to leave you smiling and laughing throughout.
Like its predecessor, Persona 3, it uses a turn based battle system which allows you to have 4 party members at a time, it’s fairly deep and does require you to use your brain, whether it’s buffing your party, knowing when to guard or taking note of what type of attacks enemies are weak against, strong against, or immune to, heck some enemies actually reflect attacks so you have to be careful you don’t accidentally one shot yourself. I played on the normal difficulty and had my fair share of deaths, you do have the choice of a beginner and expert mode too.
The visuals are top notch, the character portraits and artwork are all very well done, the dungeons and monsters are varied in design and are definitely on the imaginative side. That’s probably a huge understatement. Inaba is rendered nicely on the PS2 and there’s a lot of detail in each area, the real star of the show is the excellent voice acting however.
The game is of course from a Japanese origin and this can ring alarm bells for many, fortunately the voice work in Persona 4 is top notch. I would say there’s a few lines that sound a bit odd but 99% of the time the performances by the voice actors is superb, they do a fantastic job of displaying a wide variety of emotions within their voices and it really brings these characters to life. Whether it’s the anger of Kanji, the laughing fits from Yukiko or the unsettling amount of puns you hear from Teddie the incredible writing and voice acting really make each character stand out.
Now for another huge player in making this game so excellent; the music. It has a varied soundtrack consisting of some very catchy songs, many of them will be playing in your head even when you’re not playing the game. Some of the dungeon and boss battle music especially is incredible, I’ve been listening to a few songs from later on in the game almost non stop over the last few days, it’s just that good.
In closing this is a game that will forever be very important to me, it’s easily my second favourite game of all time, I’m actually starting to think it’s taken over Shenmue for me but I’ll have to think about that some more. If you appreciate a good story, humour, deep and interesting characters then this is a game you must experience.
Roll on Persona 5 and Catherine. I cannot wait, Atlus, you are gods.