A great JRPG for veterans and newcomers alike
After clocking in over 70 hours in my first playthrough of persona 4 i decided that writing a review for this game was a must. I'm not going to bore you, the reader, with a quick summary of persona 4 since im sure most people reading this will have already watched at least the first few episodes of the endurance run. So lets get down to what matters: the good, the bad, and the final thoughts...
The Good: Persona 4's greatest aspect is of course its story since it is a JRPG (Japanese Role Playing Game). The story is brilliant from the first moment to the very last moments. Its filled with everything a great story needs, awesome characterization, drama, plot twists, some funny moments, and a meaningful ending. Being someone who has played persona 3, I do feel that persona 3's ending made a much bigger impact but in no way does that make persona 4's ending any less spectacular. Graphic wise the game looks marvelous considering it is a PS2 game, however once again if you really want to see what it looks like you can get a good idea from the first 2 episodes of the endurance run.
The whole battle system may not be taking any major leaps for the genre, but it works fine and is enjoyable for anyone who enjoys a good turn based battle. The thing that sets persona 4 apart from most other jrpg's is its social link system in which you spend time with certain characters in the story to enhance your relationship with them in order to help you build stronger persona's. This works great as it requires you to plan ahead of who you will hang out and when, who you wish to increase your relationship with and who you will sort of set aside for later. It will suck the player in rather quickly and is one of the more enjoyable parts of the game.
The Bad: Sadly persona 4 does have its faults that could have been imporved. Mainly my quarrel with P4 is its menu system which could have been organized in a much simpilar way. As well as the fusuing aspect of the game in which you have seen in the endurance run has problems of its own. Some more voice work during the parts in which you optionally spend time with other characters would have also been nice. But these are all minor issues in an otherwise brilliant game.
Final thoughts: If you have ever played a game such as the final fantasy series, tales, star ocean and such then i would highly recomend picking up a copy for yourself and digging right into this spectacular game. However if your a gamer who enjoys constant action and finds himself usually skipping cutscenes in games or dialogs in games then you may want to steer clear of this game and just keep watching the endurance run....but it really is your choice. All in all a great game that I plan to play once more when some free time opens up.
