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    Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4

    Game » consists of 5 releases. Released Jul 10, 2008

    Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 is a role-playing game developed and published by Atlus for the PlayStation 2. It is chronologically the fifth installment in the Shin Megami Tensei: Persona series. Like its predecessor, its gameplay combines a traditional role-playing game with elements of a social simulation. Its critical and commercial success spawned a sizable media empire, including several spinoff titles.

    Cult of Persona-lity

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    Ford_Dent

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    Edited By Ford_Dent

    As a younger man—one with significantly more free time on my hands than I knew what to do with, courtesy of a disinclination toward social activities that were not sports-related (i.e. mandatory) and a group of friends with similar opinions, my brother and I spent a large amount of time playing video games through most of our schooling careers.

    Yep, we're on this now
    Yep, we're on this now

    What this meant more than anything else was that we had time for the sort of lengthy epics typical of JRPGs at the time, and while I and my cohorts were somewhat late to the game, Final Fantasy-wise, we made up for it in enthusiasm once we’d managed to get into it (a process which involved convincing our friend to play Kingdom Hearts, then further convincing him that Final Fantasy IX was “basically just like it, but better” which, while the ‘better’ part was true, the ‘just like it’ part was a complete fabrication), even obtaining an old cart of the first game in the series so that we could begin at the beginning—though we’d never beat that particular entry.

    I have a distinct memory of my father irately informing us that we’d wasted an entire summer on video games at one point, shortly before returning to whatever it was he’d come upstairs to do. At the time, we’d chewed through Kingdom Hearts and were two discs into Final Fantasy IX. We would go on to beat VII, VIII, and X, then waste some money on XI, and begin to suspect that we’d be finishing off any subsequent Final Fantasies as they came out.

    Except by the time FFXII came out, we were all a little burned out on fantasy JRPGs, so we never quite finished it, and then XIII was… XIII, so we never finished that off either, and I tried real hard to give a shit about Lost Odyssey but never quite got there (although I think I got to the second disc? I don’t remember). Basically, I stopped caring about JRPGs entirely, partially because the settings were stale as hell, and partially because who the fuck has time for that sort of thing anymore?

    Now I should make something clear, which is that our attempts at finding a good JRPG extended beyond the Final Fantasy series. Somewhere, probably in a box belonging to my brother, is a copy of Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne (or something like that), which I had briefly gotten super into, shortly before getting fed up at how long it took to get to a save point and losing something like an hour’s worth of progress (and so much demon fusing or whatever the persona fusion equivalent is). So when a friend of mine started talking to me about Persona 4 (post-college, because I’d already missed its release completely) I was naturally skeptical, and my friend, in spite of his enthusiasm for the game, failed utterly to sell me on the concept of the game (it does not help that he was on the Kanji boss fight and excitedly told me that he’d been doing it for like two hours). I stopped thinking about the game entirely for the next two years.

    Then of course I broke down and started to visit Giantbomb regularly, which inevitably lead to being told that I should watch the Persona 4 endurance run, and by that point my fate was more or less sealed. I picked up a copy off PSN and started playing, in spite of knowing how the story goes (although it’s so long that I don’t really remember everything, even though I only finished watching the ER like a month or two ago).

    I mentioned earlier that I don’t have as much time to play games as I used to—I have a job, and I try to be a sociable dude more than I used to these days, and while that’s still true, I’ve also gotten to the point where it’s nice to just set aside an hour or two a night to sit down and play something for a little while, then go to bed or whatever. Generally you’d think that a game like Persona 4 would not lend itself to short play experiences (I mean you just sit and hit x for a long time before you can even save for the first time), but through generous use of the Goho-ms I’ve got a good system going.

    Aha! Is this our chance? Yes, Chie, this time.
    Aha! Is this our chance? Yes, Chie, this time.

    The fights in P4 are surprisingly satisfying, far more than I remember that sort of turn-based nonsense being as a general rule. I spend a surprising amount of time dicking around with Personae, figuring out what’s weak to what, and then attempting to burn through fights as quickly as possible. It is safe to say that it will take me a very, very long time to get through Persona 4—it is not the only game I’m currently playing, for starters, and will continue to not be the only game I’m currently playing because I like to have options when I sit down every evening—but it is strangely satisfying to have a JRPG that I actually enjoy sitting down to play again.

    Maybe, if I’m lucky, I will even have Persona 4 finished by the time Persona 5 comes out (but I doubt it).

    AN: Is there more to say about the Persona series, and am I going to end up writing more about it? Oh, undoubtedly.

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    Justin258

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    Generally speaking, Persona 4 is a lot easier to get through than most JRPG's because you feel like you can get something done in a spare half-hour, or maybe even several somethings. I almost never put that game down without feeling like I hadn't made some sort of meaningful progress, whether it was just going up another floor in a dungeon or getting a social link or two in. It does an excellent job of chopping its progression up into tiny, manageable bits. It took me months to finish it - mostly the last semester of college, actually - but I finally did and it was pretty great.

    I played Persona 3 and Nocturne over the summer between Junior and Senior years. I loved Nocturne, I still look back on it very fondly, but I'm not sure if I have another 77 hour game full of random encounters in me. I really liked P3 a lot as well but the only leg up it really has on Persona 4 is plot (and by that I mean the driving storyline, not the characters and the setting and everything else that makes up an entire story).

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    FrostyRyan

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    Golden was my first Persona game which I got last December, and finished in February of this year.

    Most addicting game I've ever played in my life. It's all I played when I got it. couldn't put the damn thing down. ended up clocking out at over 80 hours. It revitalized my interest in RPGS, ignited my interested in SMT, and became my favorite game of all time.

    Best story, characters, gameplay, and music in an RPG in my opinion. Ever.

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    Ford_Dent

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    #3  Edited By Ford_Dent

    @frostyryan: Yeah I am even now considering picking it up (along with a Vita) just because it picks up and plays so quickly and easily. I can see myself dumping the odd 30 minutes-an hour into it any time I'm traveling, which is set to become more frequent these days.

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    FrostyRyan

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    @frostyryan: Yeah I am even now considering picking it up (along with a Vita) just because it picks up and plays so quickly and easily. I can see myself dumping the odd 30 minutes-an hour into it any time I'm traveling, which is set to become more frequent these days.

    Do you know anything about the new content for Golden? there's a hefty load of extra story content with a cool new character. more events with the gang, a new dungeon, and of course a lot of gameplay improvements.

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    Justin258

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    @ford_dent said:

    @frostyryan: Yeah I am even now considering picking it up (along with a Vita) just because it picks up and plays so quickly and easily. I can see myself dumping the odd 30 minutes-an hour into it any time I'm traveling, which is set to become more frequent these days.

    Do you know anything about the new content for Golden? there's a hefty load of extra story content with a cool new character. more events with the gang, a new dungeon, and of course a lot of gameplay improvements.

    My first actual playthrough of P4 was Golden, though I had finished watching the ER before playing that. It is the best version of the game but I can't vouch for Marie. I really didn't like her character or anything she added to the game. Some of the other new events are pretty cool and that new dungeon is all right if only because it adds some wrinkles not seen in the other dungeons.

    Also, play Golden on hard.

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    Ford_Dent

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    #6  Edited By Ford_Dent

    @ford_dent said:

    @frostyryan: Yeah I am even now considering picking it up (along with a Vita) just because it picks up and plays so quickly and easily. I can see myself dumping the odd 30 minutes-an hour into it any time I'm traveling, which is set to become more frequent these days.

    Do you know anything about the new content for Golden? there's a hefty load of extra story content with a cool new character. more events with the gang, a new dungeon, and of course a lot of gameplay improvements.

    Yeah I have seen all the extra stuff in Golden, which is part of why I want a copy of it (and part of why I don't mind the idea of playing through it multiple times). Plus, Persona on the go is always welcome as a concept.

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    FrostyRyan

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    @ford_dent: @believer258:

    Wow you guys are nuts ruining the story before you play it yourself, haha. Like I genuinely feel sorry for you (in the least condescending way possible)

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    DeadpanCakes

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    @frostyryan: I think it says a lot that the game's still fun to play after you've watched that play-through/that that play-through is still fun to watch after you've played the game. I think there's something really intuitive about the socialization aspect of that game that doesn't really come through when you're just watching somebody else play.

    Anyway, I'd say that, even though I think the new content is largely hit and miss (I didn't really like Marie either, for instance), it's still very much worth playing.

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    Ford_Dent

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    #9  Edited By Ford_Dent

    @ford_dent: @believer258:

    Wow you guys are nuts ruining the story before you play it yourself, haha. Like I genuinely feel sorry for you (in the least condescending way possible)

    Knowing where the story's going doesn't actually bother me that much. I thought it might, but honestly I don't remember many things about the early going--plus I figure I might make some choices differently (I've already had a weird dream about Chie that was not in the ER. We weren't luchador wrestling which was disappointing but it was still weird). So yeah I don't know that I mind--I'm not huge on "spoilers" and their ability to ruin my day.

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    Bocam

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    #10  Edited By Bocam

    Golden spoils the player by including Adachi's S.Link. It would've been a great new game+ addition

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    Ford_Dent

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    @bocam: Yeah hearing about that S.Link seemed like a pretty weird choice--although I suppose the assumption is that the primary audience for the Golden edition of the game already knows what's up.

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    Justin258

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    @frostyryan said:

    @ford_dent: @believer258:

    Wow you guys are nuts ruining the story before you play it yourself, haha. Like I genuinely feel sorry for you (in the least condescending way possible)

    Knowing where the story's going doesn't actually bother me that much. I thought it might, but honestly I don't remember many things about the early going--plus I figure I might make some choices differently (I've already had a weird dream about Chie that was not in the ER. We weren't luchador wrestling which was disappointing but it was still weird). So yeah I don't know that I mind--I'm not huge on "spoilers" and their ability to ruin my day.

    The vast majority of Persona 4's story appeal lies in its characters and setting, obviously, but I feel like the overarching plot is kinda weak anyway. It's got some cool surprises but at some point I was like "wait, how does this all fit together again?" Jeff and Vinny kinda said the same thing at some point in the ER.

    I've seen the ER and played through the game once and it still has an almost permanent residence in my Vita. I find myself picking it up for a half hour or so every now and then. I may or may not ever beat it again, but I wouldn't be surprised if I did.

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    Ford_Dent

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    @ford_dent said:

    @frostyryan said:

    @ford_dent: @believer258:

    Wow you guys are nuts ruining the story before you play it yourself, haha. Like I genuinely feel sorry for you (in the least condescending way possible)

    Knowing where the story's going doesn't actually bother me that much. I thought it might, but honestly I don't remember many things about the early going--plus I figure I might make some choices differently (I've already had a weird dream about Chie that was not in the ER. We weren't luchador wrestling which was disappointing but it was still weird). So yeah I don't know that I mind--I'm not huge on "spoilers" and their ability to ruin my day.

    The vast majority of Persona 4's story appeal lies in its characters and setting, obviously, but I feel like the overarching plot is kinda weak anyway. It's got some cool surprises but at some point I was like "wait, how does this all fit together again?" Jeff and Vinny kinda said the same thing at some point in the ER.

    I've seen the ER and played through the game once and it still has an almost permanent residence in my Vita. I find myself picking it up for a half hour or so every now and then. I may or may not ever beat it again, but I wouldn't be surprised if I did.

    Yeah the plot kind of goes crazy at the end of P4 (although I guess it wouldn't be a JRPG if you didn't wind up fighting the concept of death or entropy or man's nihilist impulses or whatever the fuck at the end), but for me that's secondary to doing everyone's social link and such--part of why I'm interested in Golden is the opportunity for some new social links, and also the extra voice acting in the links themselves. I've never beat P4 (obviously), but it's real nice to have a game that I can pick up and put down almost at will. A dungeon floor here, a social link there, and then back to something else (like Sunset Overdrive, holy crap that game's good).

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