In Persona 3, you play as main character Minato Arisato – as his name
is revealed in the Japanese manga series – though you are free to name
him as you wish. Minato is starting at the upscale Gekkoukan High
School, and things immediately take a strange turn. Upon arriving at
the school, he experiences a wide range of bizarre experiences –
signing a contract presented to him by a child (believing it to have
something to do with his registration), arriving in the Velvet Room
where he meets the enigmatic Igor and Elizabeth, and crossing paths in
the dorm itself with an extremely nervous girl armed with a pistol.
Once the latter misunderstanding is resolved, he meets two of his
dormmates: the high-strung Yukari Takeba, and her polar opposite, the
well-collected student body president Mitsuru Kirijo. From that point,
the main cast is rounded out with the introduction of class clown
Junpei Iori and upperclassman Akihiko Sanada, and things get going in
earnest. The dorm is attacked by monsters simply referred to as
"shadows," Akihiko is seriously injured in the conflict, and Minato
ends the battle by picking up Yukari's pistol, or "Evoker", and
shooting himself in the head, thus calling forth his main Persona,
Orpheus. With Akihiko out of action, Minato is named interim leader of
the group, known as S.E.E.S. (Specialized Extracurricular Extermination
Squad)
Graphically, Persona 3 is a mixed bag. The character design is expertly
accomplished by Shigenori Soejima (Stella Deus). Mitsuru,Akihiko and
Shinjiro are my favorites. Small touches such as when the seasons
changes during the school year, the characters clothing reflects the
season. I know, small to some of you, however I think small touches
such as this shows the developers are paying attention. Those of you
who have played previous Shin Megami Tensei games will recognize many
of the summon characters, such as Nekomatta and Jack Frost. The School
and the City are well done and interesting to explore. The Tartarus is
equally well done, however randomly generated areas can only be so
exciting.
The Tartarus, battle system, and fusing Persona. during the Dark Hour,
you can fight in the Tartarus, an enormous 200+ floor dungeon (it goes
up..don't dungeons go down..?) which you can level up your player and
Persona(s). Essentially you and up to three other Persona users grind
for experience, items, and other goodies and you climb the Tartarus.
Usually, for me, grinding is a chore, however in Persona 3 I never
really tired of it. For players of the Shin Megami Tensei series,
certain aspects of the battle system are familiar. What was referred to
as the Press Turn system in Digital Devil Saga in Persona 3 is now "One
More". The enemies you battle have certain weaknesses which you can
have analyzed by a member of your team.Exploiting this weakness will
gain the attacking character one more attack. This weakness, can
however be used against you, so thankfully when you analyze the enemy
doesn't eat up a turn so you can summon the appropriate Persona. You
have some control over what your teammates do, such as heal, wait,
knock down, etc. this wasn't a problem to me, as the AI would usually
do what I would've wanted them to do anyway, which usually involves
using the appropriate Persona. This brings me to the technique of
summoning. Yes, this is the part which the characters point a gun-like
object called an Evoker to their heads, pull the trigger, bits of
"soul"fly out of their heads, and the Persona is summoned. Never once
was I creeped out or disturbed by this. In fact, I thought the
animation was rather cool. So relax folks, I don't think playing
Persona 3 will result in mass evoking from the innocent gamers. After
the battle, Shuffle Time may appear.
With the huge spanning quest that promises to be 70+ hours, many
secrets to uncover and plenty of side-questy relationships to play out.
you won't be upset at dropping $50 on persona 3. It's the music that's
really the showstopper here. It's quite simple one of the funkiest
soundtracks i have ever heard for a game. Excellent!
