Summer of 2007 I went to my local Gamestop outlet and picked up two RPG's that had just released, Wild Arms 5 and Persona 3. At this point I had never heard of the Persona franchise, Or Shin Megami Tensei in general. So I started WIld Arms 5 first, Its a decent game but it wasn't great so It took me about 3 or 4 months before I finished it. Another month later I got started on Persona 3 and was fucking shocked. I didn't expect the game to be half as good as it was, I was pulled it, 150 hours later I finished the game with an 80% persona compendium, and immediately started a New game +.  Played through Persona 3 FES, and purchased every other Megaten title I could get my hands on.  
 
Unfortunately, Revelations Persona isn't a game you can really get your hands on nowadays so I emulated it. Revelations Persona was a first person rpg and very very different from the titles that are being released nowadays. And I must admit, was very very hard to get into. The navigation was terrible, it was near impossible to find your way around...and considering most of an RPG is wondering through environments to get to your next destination..it made it far more of a grind than it should have been. The franchise nowadays can basically be described as a high school simulation rpg I suppose. With the exception of some of Persona 2 Innocent SIn and Eternal Punishment (The first of which was never released in the U.S. though a thorough fan translation exists online the majority of the characters in the persona franchise consist of high school students who get dragged into saving the world.  But I digress too much, If you want more background on the franchise you can wiki it. My initial point was Revelations Persona is extremely dated, Terrible localization, grainy repetitive looking dungeons, poor user interface. Atlus U.S.A. have worked their asses off on this game, Including the giant segment of content (The snow queen quest) that was removed from the initial release, re-composing the soundtrack to sound more like the newer games (Some fans are upset by this, I personally like the chirpy music in Persona 3 and 4 so i'm pretty happy with it.) Interface changes, dungeon redesigns, characters restored to their original Japanese designs.  
 
I could go on and on, and I probably will considering that Ive written 2 giant paragraphs and haven't said much of anything. With all the changes Atlus has made for this release, I couldn't be more happy to jump back into the original persona. It had a fantastic, albeit poorly localized story before, and I think with this release, the game will blow alot of minds, including my own. 
 
Basically, I am excited. Very excited for this upcoming release.
Anybody else?

Im pretty happy about it as well, I did play the original Persona, not to finish or anything, but Its been a very long time and I dont remember much anyway. Im picking up the game on release day, so Im pretty happy about it as well :)

I'm set to pick this game up when it's released.  I missed out on it the first time, but like you I was introduced to the Megami Tensei games through Persona 3 and have been hooked ever since.

It's crazy, I know, but I started off with Persona 4 because of the ER. It quickly became my favorite game ever and made me re-consider my "JRPGs are boring and suck" stance.
I'm going through Persona 2: Eternal Punishment and BROTHER YES, the menus are pretty hard to navigate and it doesn't tell you where to go sometimes. Not to mention they don't give a very good tutorial to the Contact/Battle system the game uses.
I'm enjoying it so far though and it's time for a self-plug, I should have a review up by the end of this week hopefully.

I'm still undecided about P1, if only because I'm importing Strange Journey when it comes out in Japan in just a few weeks and I don't want to be Megaten'd out by the time that arrives.

" It's crazy, I know, but I started off with Persona 4 because of the ER. It quickly became my favorite game ever and made me re-consider my "JRPGs are boring and suck" stance. I'm going through Persona 2: Eternal Punishment and BROTHER YES, the menus are pretty hard to navigate and it doesn't tell you where to go sometimes. Not to mention they don't give a very good tutorial to the Contact/Battle system the game uses. I'm enjoying it so far though and it's time for a self-plug, I should have a review up by the end of this week hopefully. "