It's well documented that I'm a big fan of Atlus' Persona series and I know a few others here quite like them too, so it really should have its own thread.
Particularly today as Persona 5 Strikers has just come out and for once I have a game on launch day.
I've only played an hour of it but so far it treats you like you've played through Persona 5 as things kind of pick up around 6 months after that game.
They've gone for a different approach with Strikers though, as it's a Musuo game, instead of turn based battles against Shadows you have to fight large swarms of them using action based combat instead.
I loved Persona 3 and 4 but never played 5. The series (and visual novels in general, I guess) seem so tied to a handheld format that I couldn't imagine playing them on a big TV. If they ever release it on the Switch then I'd get it immediately.
Good games and the spin-offs are always interesting. I've played one of the 2D fighting games which was pretty good (but hardly my area of expertise) and one of the portable music spin-offs which made me feel a bit queasy when it started insisting I play as a dancing 8-year-old girl. I never played any of the 3DS dungeon crawlers though. Have I missed anything?
I adored Persona 4 Golden on the Vita (and have also since bought the PC release on Steam), but attempting to go back to P3FES left me cold, and while I finished and mostly enjoyed P5, it had some thematic and mechanical issues that meant it didn't quite gel with me the way P4G did (though it looked incredible, I loved the battle system, and the soundtrack was superb).
Persona 5 Royal is a good time that I will probably never play again ever because it's insanely long. IMO the peak of Persona, it's the one that manages to hide the formula the best and felt like marathoning a two part 26 anime series in one go. Also, the Royal exclusive semester is amazing.
I loved Persona 3 and 4 but never played 5. The series (and visual novels in general, I guess) seem so tied to a handheld format that I couldn't imagine playing them on a big TV. If they ever release it on the Switch then I'd get it immediately.
Good games and the spin-offs are always interesting. I've played one of the 2D fighting games which was pretty good (but hardly my area of expertise) and one of the portable music spin-offs which made me feel a bit queasy when it started insisting I play as a dancing 8-year-old girl. I never played any of the 3DS dungeon crawlers though. Have I missed anything?
Persona 5/Persona 5 Royal works exceptionally well on Vita Remote Play.
The 3DS games are a seperate thing, really really difficult and mostly fan service (though not THAT kind from what I've played).
I finished 5, bought Royal but only played part of Kamoshidas Dungeon, so I need to return to that at some point.
I do wanna' add, there are a fair amount of changes that even before the new semester dungeon and boss make Vanilla 100% obsolete now (You can even just not do the new semester if you want, for whatever reason, so that's not a reason for Vanilla) like Morgana forcing you to go Bed less, Ammo refilling automatically, the way status effects work in combat has now been buffed etc…if price is an issue just borrow my copy.
Persona 5 Strikers look extremely polished for a 'musou', and having said that the mechanics look really unique in the genre whilst definitely suiting a Persona game. So I'm very impressed by it all, but it'll be a while before I can play it and tbh I can still taste Persona 5 Royal in my mouth (like when you drink a whole bottle of Baileys).
When is Persona 5 Arena tbh.
I haven't played a Musuo since erm either a PSP or Vita release so only have those as comparison.
As is normally the case it's mostly been dialogue so far, and thankfully the characters are (so far) as you'd expect, loving palling along with Ryuji again. Had some battles and it's been cool how they integrate the Persona use in to them. You can have a party with 3 of the other characters in but I don't think you have control of them, certainly not right now anyway, so it's a little difficult to follow what's going on sometimes.
The spin off musou games are usually really good to be fair, Hyrule Warriors being the main example. In my opinion it's a solid game template but maybe I'm biased since I could play the main Samurai/Dynasty Warriors forever.
Fine I'll play P4G. God.
(P3P is one of my favourite ever games.)
It’s Vita Revival Week on the Soc so it couldn’t be better timed.
My Vita spent most of last year as a Minecraft Machine for 8yo Little Miss Bloodaxe. She's playing on Mac now though so I suspect that I can have my Vita back.
Omg I can run around as Ryjuji!
Always did like that we're all big Vita fans here. And even though I prefer P5, I think having P4G on handheld was actually ridiculous. I know Golden is on Steam now (good) but I don't think it takes away from the Vita version at all.
Omg I can run around as Ryjuji!
But Yusuke was always best boy, dude was hilarious.
So Strikers has a similar beat to its predecessor. Infiltrate the Palace/Jail, find the Treasure/Desire, take on the person who rules over the Palace/Jail.
Except there are differences. Now, I've not finished the first Jail yet.
Anyway, here there are mid-bosses, which are stronger versions of Persona. 5 had them too but they weren't part of the plot of infiltrating the Palace from what I remember (I'm probably wrong), and they're HARD, I've not cleared one the first time. Part of what makes it hard is the combat, it's very easy to get surrounded by mobs and just hammering away your combo, but you really have to pay attention as these mid-bosses have tells showing you what attack comes next and it can be either animation to show them winding up or it can be an AoE tell on the ground.
Also, the idea is is not to use your Personas abilities directly. I mean, you can, but you run out of SP really quickly if you do, which is usually what happens in the first areas of Persona games anyway. Thankfully here you can include Persona use in your combo, so hitting square a few times followed by triangle will usually result in your Persona using their elemental ability, which doesn't always stagger the opponent like it did in previous games but does give you an advantage.
Baton passes are important here too, not only do they usually result in your comrades using their elemental attacks (with no SP use as far as I can tell) but it also builds up your Show Time attack, which is another form of the All Out Attack in previous games (which is still present here).
Using your team is also important here, particularly as there'll always be more than one enemy type for you to clear, so you can face Pixie, Jack o Lanterns and Succubus all at once and will need the correct party make-up to dispatch them quickly. Thankfully you can switch characters in and out of your party at any time when not in battle.
