Truly Special
Despite the trappings being completely different, I feel like Persona 4 is some sort of kin to Mass Effect 2. Both have strong core gameplay, but what puts them over the top, what makes them extraordinary and memorable are the characters. The key difference, however, is that Mass Effect 2's characters are compelling because of how unusual they are. Not even the human characters are anything approaching normal because they're products of that universe. Persona 4's characters draw their strength from how ordinary they are. Their fears and the things they struggle with, the constant clash of who they actually are versus the mask they where when out in the world, couldn't be more relatable. Watching their personal stories unfold is legitimately touching, a video game rarity.
Even though I had watched the Endurance Run and knew all the plot beats, I couldn't put Persona 4 down. I blew through it in eight days, which is pretty fast if you know just how long a game it is. When a game is primarily praised for its story, many times it comes with the caveat that it's not very much fun to play, but that is definitely not the case with Persona 4 (although that really depends on if you like JRPGs or not). The mechanic of both you and your enemies getting an extra turn for hitting a weakness kept me consistently engaged in the combat. Being rewarded for exploiting weaknesses with something more substantial than just a few extra points of damage was really nice. I also love the designs of the boss Shadows. They reflect the secret feelings of the characters in some pretty creative ways.
I can say without any qualification that this is a challenging game. Even if you're overleveled for an area, if you let the wrong group of enemies get the advantage you may find yourself staring at a Game Over screen and wondering what the hell just happened. Some people might find that annoying, but many modern JRPGs have been a cakewalk for me so dealing with some adversity was refreshing. And I was only playing on Normal, not Expert, the hardest difficulty.
The fusing system was one of the more fun parts of the game for me. In a lot of ways it reminds of Pokemon, a series I've always enjoyed, but there's a level of complexity here that those games have never had, which is largely why I've grown less interested in them over the years. A Persona you fuse can inherit several moves from its components, which means you can customize most of your fusions to fit your style of play. I always rolled with dudes that had plenty of buffs and de-buffs, but it definitely doesn't have to be that way.
I don't want to imply that Persona 4 is a perfect game. I feel like if I hadn't watched the Endurance Run a lot of the mechanics would have been confusing to me, since this was my first foray into the Shin Megami Tensei series. Despite all the knowledge I had about the systems coming in, I still managed to forget for most of the game that having a Persona that matches the Arcana of the person you're S-Linking with on you will speed up relationship progression. There's also some minor UI stuff, like your sidequests being buried in the System section of the menu, where you'd normally only expect to find sound settings and the like. I'm also not sure how you're supposed to get the true ending without using a FAQ. Even if you feel like the good ending didn't answer all your questions, the actual steps you need to take to trigger the true ending aren't very obvious. But you know what? None of that shit is important. None if it has any real impact on how I feel about this game.
Even after sinking 85 hours into Persona 4, I still wasn't ready to say goodbye to its characters. It's similar to the sense of loss I get when I finish a book series and realize that I won't be going on any more adventures with these people I've grown so fond of. Games hardly ever make me feel that way, but this one did. That's how I know it's great.
