This is a game that's been waiting probably a lot longer then it should have. When it came out, I was excited to get my hands on it... until Atlus started coming after people for streaming the game like they thought people who didn't want to have it spoiled would not have the self control to just not watch. I put a damper on it, but ultimately I did get my hands on the game and put it in my backlog for several years... enough for me to play several other games in the franchise first. But I have to say it... this one was worth the wait.
Now before we continue, I must say that offhand, your experience with this game may vary from mine. My actual PS3 died a few years ago, so while I ripped the game myself, I was playing through an emulator. But with that in mind, let's get into it.
Story: You just got to Tokyo, but unfortunately, it is for less then stellar reasons. Expulsion from school has made it impossible for you to continue your education at home, so your parents did what they could and got you enrolled in Shujin Academy, the only place that would take you with your newfound criminal record. This change of schooling also meant a change in living locations. And a friend of the family offered to take you in for the school year as a temporary guardian. Not that you earned this new reputation fairly. Rather, you have been convicted of assault charges basically for trying to be a good Samaritan when encountering a drunken man trying to force a young woman into his car. Rather then save the woman in danger, all you did was turn the rage of a man with connections on you.
And this reputation followed you to your new home. While the man taking care of you agreed to help, he makes it abundantly clear how reluctant he is, leaving you to live in the storage space above his coffee shop. The school is also well aware of your "past" and outside of one teacher who seems too tired to do much, pretty much looks at you as a pariah who they want to deal with as little as possible. Someone even spread the news to the student body, so this isn't just an issue with the teachers.
But even an outcast can make a friend or two, especially when he's not the only one. In this case a student named Ryuji, an ex-track runner who has his own reputation of a troublemaker, particularly as he is blamed for the track team's disbanding. But your lives as high-school buddies on the fringe is about to get a lot more interesting and effect a lot of people in the world, and it's all thanks to a small app that installs itself on your phone.
For this is no ordinary phone application. It has no known developer and refuses to remain uninstalled. But if you use it with the right combination of a place, a name, and a keyword, it physically transports you to a parallel world warped by the desires of the people around you: the metaverse... and it isn't long before the connection between the places becomes very apparent as certain people have desires so corrupted they actively form their own nodes here. Known as palaces, these places house the warped inner workings of that person (known as their shadow) and reflect how rotten the person is in the real world.
With the stage set, I would prefer to let the game tell the rest of it's tale since it really does a fantastic job of it. But to give you the format, you will find the story broken down into a series of heists, both in story and dungeons. For story purposes, each focuses on one such corrupt individual's palace and taking it down in order to force them to reform from the inside out. And this game doesn't shy away from giving you a reason... ever. Your very first case, for example, is the gym teacher in you new school named Komoshida. The first time you see him, he appears a bit sketchy as he seems to be trying to pick up a fellow classmate on the way to school, but the depths of his depravity will be revealed as you begin to get to know your initial cast and culminating in your expulsion from Shujin at his hands as well! Thankfully you do have time to act however, since the order will be given at the next teacher meeting. So it's time to go change his heart by stealing from his palace the core desire that warped him so badly before he can ruin your life!
And while each heist has a similar format (new target picked due to events around you and your ever-growing team of phantom thieves followed by some reason that sets a time-frame the theft has to be completed within), they also all tie to a much bigger plot trickling details to you and hinting at the ripples in much bigger things you are causing or even forced to take part in. Simply put the writing itself here is actually really good in it's own right! Unfortunately though, there will be fans of the franchise who reach the end of the game and feel like they've been here before, however: particularly those who played the Persona 2 games. While the individual situations and day-to-day events are unique, masterfully done, and not afraid of to show the darkness in what's going on in the slightest, the final conflict feels like it was taken so much from this previous installment I was kinda disappointed to not see a certain Lovecraftian horror greet me for the final battle.
But the main event is not the only color you will get out of the plot of this game. As the series is now known for, there are also social links which will build up the story of your companions directly as well, giving interesting side-stories and insightful views on your friends. They are not at all connected to the main story, so you don't need to feel obligated to complete any of them to get it, but we will get into that when we get to the gameplay section. For now, just understand if someone grabs your attention, their could be something there to find out about that's worth the time.
9/10
Graphics: To the best of my knowledge, Persona 5 was the last AAA game released for the PS3, and simply put it shows. Right away you are escaping a brightly lit casino, jumping between neon lights and the scene simply looks amazing in it's own right, despite it's age. The crowd below you is lively and everything has this feel like it's been pulled out of a comic book world. The camera at this time is fixed in place, but the game uses that choice specifically to emphasize the scene and it's other-worldliness. Unless you have a situation like that, you can expect to be able to swing the camera around as needed, so do not expect it to be your enemy.
The characters that make up this world are also very lively. For the most part people look normal, but enemies will definately stand out. You will find them basically black forms wearing the uniform of the area (this being a casino, they will be in business suites) and a mask reflective of them being nothing more then shadows. It looks cool and stylized as well as a stark contrast to your costumed heroes. And when the battle begins, you will see them for the monsters they are. If you've played anything in the past couple generations of gaming with the name Shin Megami Tensei or Persona in the name, you have an more than an idea of what to expect there: mythological creatures represented on the screen in beautifully styled models (since this is a 3D game in the series) against a backdrop of the dungeon you are in. If anything you might have too good an idea since the style of these models really hasn't changed. Yes there is more detail then the games in the earlier titles, but that's all that really changed as the technology allowed.
Not that your characters don't fit perfectly themselves. Each one looks cool in their own right, but their costumes are each unique and outlandish to once again feel almost like a comic book this time around when in these worlds. For example, Joker (your character) runs around in a black trenchcoat, red gloves, a white mask, and often a shit-eating grin, while Ryuji (known as Skull in costume) looks like he would be at home in Michael Jackson's Beat It music video if he ditched his skull mask. In any other scenario, they wouldn't fit, but here, they do brilliantly.
Meanwhile for all the bright lights, stark contrasts, and eccentricities you will see in the palaces, the real world is often itself a contrast, creating some fairly mundane and down to earth locations for your daily life while playing, making sure when you are in the spectacles that are the palaces you KNOW it.
All of this looks really good using a cell-shaded look to bind it all together, a choice that is kinda traditional for the franchise and serves it very well here. Simply put the game looks wonderful and really I wouldn't be all that surprised if the PS4 version only really increases the possible base resolution of the game (and maybe the framerate? The PS3 version is locked at 30 FPS).
8/10
Sound: Like many games these days, the sound effects work, but often play second fiddle to everything else, especially for turn-based RPGs like this one. But that's more for the fact that they fall into the background then any lack of quality. The fact is this kind of thing is such high-caliber these days that it's more noticeable when the sound effects are bad.
What is noticeable here are the other things you will hear, the music and the voices. If I were to describe the music in this game, it's a generally mellow tone, taking it's inspiration from the very cafe shop you reside over. But that isn't to say it can't kick into gear when it wants to, amping up the tone and tempo when you are headed for a dungeon, reaching dark strides of an electric guitar when things get really serious. It won't blow your socks off, but you will get tension, chill time, and sometimes even a sense of foreboding and "cloak-and-dagger" feel from the tones the game plays for you.
But the real star, as also seems to always be the case these days, is the voice acting. Sadly not everything is this time around, but everyone seems absolutely on target whenever they are voiced. From the few times your character speaks at all (he usually nods or shakes his head and it's assumed he says what you chose from a menu selection) to the darkly amused Igor to the hotheaded Ryuji, everyone seems to just understand the personality they are playing and plays it up right. I honestly can't think of anything to say against the soundscape of this game.
7/10
Gameplay: As noted in the graphical section, Persona 5 is played from a 3rd person perspective as you wander around the maps that make up the worlds you will play in, whether you're in the metaverse or the real world. But the real difference between this and other turn based RPGs is time. In this game, you have a calendar which will both be planned around and decide when certain things will happen. Each day will offer you slots you can fill with your actions for the day, balancing your school, social, and superhero life. Anyone who has played Persona 3 or 4 will already understand this balance. For everyone else, each day will show slices of the day and you will either witness/partake in an event (like for example in school you may have a chance to answer the teacher in class) or the game will open up and give you the chance to choose what you wish to do. Most of the time these open slots will be "after school" and "evening" but not always.
When you do have that free time, you can wander anywhere you have unlocked in Tokyo, and you will have a variety of things you can do to fill that time. Do you think you need to gear up with better gear before you go into the metaverse again? Well there is a local shop that sells models of guns, armors, and accessories you can equip yourself with. Need some healing items? You have several choices of grocery stores and even a medical shop you can stock up in. Running short on cash? You can get a job and use one of your time slots to generate cash (or as I found far more useful, go back to that model shop and sell the things you pick up in the metaverse). And of course, you have the social aspects here in which you will have characters you can hang out with.
In previous games of the series, these hangout times were important since they meant the persona you create would gain more bonus experience when you make them. And this remains true here too, but this time, the scales have tipped to make them even more important. As the social link levels increase, each character (among the Phantom Thieves or not) will offer you additional abilities you can use in and out of combat. For example, anyone you take into battle will have the ability to gain anything from the ability to trade turns with each other and you after knocking over an opponent to even having the chance of taking a hit for you that would generally end your life (and the game). For those not in combat, you can gain abilities like the chance to not need to negotiate when capturing personas or even more freedom to change who's active in the fight mid-fight. Simply put the more you do here, the more options become available to you, the deeper combat can get, and the more edges you can take when the battle is hot and heavy.
In addition, activities will also boost your social stats. There are five of these, and while they do not do anything directly, they have a strong influence in what options become available to you (such as who will give you the time of day to build their social links or even how far you can take them), so making a point to work on these is also a good idea.
And finally, of course, you can visit the palaces themselves to take advantage of all the benefits these above choices give you. At this point, the game becomes a "stealth based" turn based RPG. You will make your way through the various palaces with the intention of hiding yourself to get the jump on the shadows that populate it, both giving you the edge in the fight and avoiding alerting everyone. You see the palaces have an alert meter which if a shadow catches you goes up and if you ambush one goes down. The higher it gets, the more dangerous the palace is and if it gets too high, you may even be forced to retreat, so ignore this aspect at your own peril.
And of course those fights make up the meat of this part of the game. When a battle starts you will be given a screen with you and your enemies ready to rumble. Each character will get a turn in combat as you might expect attacking, defending, or applying some special effect to others in the battle and there are a lot of enemies with a lot of variety in what they can do, what you can do to them, as well as the types of attacks they are strong and weak to. The same is true for your team as each will have their own selection of moves they can do as well as which elements they are strong against or can hurt them exceptionally well. And compared to most RPGs there are a lot of them: 10 of them in fact, not including "almighty" which there are no strengths or weaknesses against at all. You will have to learn how to use the weaknesses of your enemies to your advantage while shielding your team from their own to make it through this one.
In each of these palaces, there is also a specific goal you are trying to complete. Your mission is to find the treasure you are supposed to steal with enough time before whatever ill fate failing to take it will cause to send a calling card and head in for a final conflict to steal it and avert that fate. This may sound daunting, but you generally have 2-3 weeks of in-game time to complete any of these palaces and really you can do it in 2-3 days. So do not let this element hold you back from enjoying the game. It's there more to move the plot along then to be a challenge.
The end result of all of this, however, is a very well balanced RPG which on top of a great story just never stops feeling like a great game to play from beginning to end.
9/10
Bugs: As should be the case on a game for a console that is ending it's life, this game had absolutely zero bugs I could see in it. And as an extra bonus, this was done without ANY patches. They never released any updates for this game: what was on the disc is exactly what you got. GREAT JOB, ATLUS!
Score: Once again, we have a swan-song for a platform on our hands and just like the last time I said this about a game, is one hell of a last hurrah! True, it's not quite as good as SMT IV: Apocalypse, but what can I say, I just like the turn system of the main franchise over the traditional turn base we get here. But that aside, this is an absolutely fantastic game and sits among the best I've played.
9/10
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