brainee

Finally finished it! At least "The Journey" part. It makes me wish more JRPGs would think outside the box like this one. The story was really well-done, with a nice mix of horror, fantasy, sci-fi, drama, humor. And there were enough twists and turns in the story to keep things interesting.

I completely agree with the assessment that the Tartarus stuff wasn't the best part. For me, the total playing time clocking in around a monstrous 100 hours. But I think it would've been a better gaming experience with a shorter playing time, minus the level grinding in Tartarus. Pushing upwards in the tower and fighting past new bosses is one thing. But just running around in previously explored levels to gain experience because you're underpowered to tackle the next boss is something else. This was a particular problem for me at the end. Since I had no problem with the previous bosses, I figured I was ready for the final battle. But no ... I got my ass handed to me. And looking online for advice, I saw that I really needed to gain another 5-7 levels to be competitive at the end.

After playing the whole game ... yeah, I think the "M" rating is fully justified. There's not a single element that by itself would get a game an automatic "M" rating. But the combination of a number of adult elements throughout makes it an easy call.

I should play something else now Too much "Persona 3" is clouding my real-life thinking. Some signs that you've played too much:

-Thinking that's it safe to cheat on your girlfriend, since you've already maxed out your relationship (and once that happens, she doesn't care what you do)
-Going to the police station on Monday, and not only demanding to buy weapons but expecting a 10% sale
-Frequently give out Teddy Bears as gifts. Sure there are other things you could give. But Teddy Bears are cheap, and always seem to get a positive response
-Getting really anxious on a full moon (especially at midnight)
-Making a point of watching more French romances, since it will increase your charm
-Being disappointed before going to bed that you don't get a stream of cell phone calls trying to set up dates for the next Sunday

fujishig

I gave up playing for a while (got up to a pretty tough floor boss so I took a break), but I'm back in it now. There are several nights in the game where I have nothing to do (maxed out the "Devil" s-link and all my stats, and the monk is off) and I just skip to bed instead of even trying to go to Tartarus, just because I'm sick of the grinding. The problem, IMHO, is that the personas are just too disposable. I'll keep a few specific ones around for specific skills, but they always end up like 10 levels below my newly fused personas, so into the grinder they all go. This is where maxing s-links really helps, because the extra experience given in fusions really, really helps you not have to grind as much.

I have no idea why they still keep dumb restrictions in place for fusing. Namely, that you can't choose which skills to inherit, and the random fusion failures near the full moon. I have to go back and forth a ton before I get my new persona with the skills I want. And who doesn't just reset when a fusion goes bad?

I've also had a really hard time getting the specific special swords for the Tartarus quests.

maingon

Just picked it up, Trying to get into it, right now its alittle boring not able to do much, but it is interesting and will keep playing, ( i am only an hour or so into it. and most of its been cutscenes and not alot of gameplay right now)

brainee

Just finished "The Answer". I'd be lying if I said it was fun. Basically it threw out my favorite stuff from "The Journey" (school, S-Links, lots of characters, plot development, Elizabeth's quests, Japanese culture) just leaving a gigantic dungeon level grind. Your only difficulty option is "Hard", and it lives up to that. Regular shadows aren't too bad, but the bosses can be awful. I die more times in an average boss battle than I did the whole "Journey" part. The deaths are often kind of unavoidable - monster gets a critical or charm on you, and it's pretty much over. And usually the bosses have overlapping skills, so it's impossible to be completely resistant to everything they could throw at you. Death would be so bad if it didn't take so long to start playing again ... you've got a long slow text crawl, boot back to the opening company credits, and a few opening menu screens before you can reload. Making things even worse if that Persona fusing is gimped up by not including the compendium. Why would they not include that?

I suppose the story was alright, but I had a few problems with it:



Here's a side question I was wondering about - how do Japanese name suffixes work? I notice there are 4 ways a name can end:

-kun (Ken and Jumpei get this)
-chan (Koromaru gets this)
-san (the main character got this, but I noticed it got tossed around a lot)
-senpei (Mitsuru and Akihiko mostly)

I'm guessing senpei indicates seniority and/or respect. But I don't understand the others - they seemed to be used interchangeably.

fujishig

-san is basically a common honorific like Mr., Mrs., etc., basically used for politeness.

-kun (for boys): like -san, but more to a friend or someone you're close to.

-chan: similar to kun, except for girls and cute things, like little kids and pets.

-senpei: upperclassman, a sign of respect to those older than you in school or club or whatever.

Chris_D

Just to add:

-kun - can be used to reflect the higher standing of the speaker compared to the listener. e.g. a teacher addressing a student, a boss addressing an employee. Used for males.

-chan - as above, used for females.

brainee

Thanks for clearing that up It sounds like if the main character ever referred to Mitsuru as Mitsuru-chan, he'd get "executed"

lwhy?

The portable version of this just came out on a bunch of different consoles. I was going to buy it, but I think I'll play some of it on Game Pass first. There's also a rumored remake in the works.

Maxflier

Yeah, I'm going to wait for the remake.

lwhy?

The remake was just accidently leaked for early 2024.

Dan

^ yep, those are apparently part of the Xbox showcase on Sunday.