Atlus i'm playing Persona 4 right now

[aweigh]

haven't tried the PS2 emulator in quite a few years but the last time i gave it a whirl i was using ancient tech compared to my new battlemech rig that has 4 cores and a flagship model 6670 amd card that doesn't even require external power... so i figure it'll run aces now. right?

i've been playing the persona series since persona 1 back on the PSX when i was in the eigth grade. damn. i turn 30 in october. glad my priorities in life haven't changed since middle school

is it better than persona 3? i clocked about 60 hours on the third one before getting bored of the badly done tower dungeon the game makes you climb. i remember being mildly shocked at how incredibly repetitious it was even by jap standards without any real flare or trick besides learning new enemy weaknesses every few floors. the rest of the game was p. good though, and very enjoyable as pure escapism just like back in the day.

edit: the persona 1 dungeons were Wizardry IV level of hard-core in comparison to that tower in persona 3. the first hospital dungeon is classic!

 

[evdk]

Prepare for the first three hours containing next to no gameplay at all.

 

[aweigh]

ugh

 

[ghostdog]

i remember being mildly shocked at how incredibly repetitious it was even by jap standards without any real flare or trick besides learning new enemy weaknesses every few floors.

The same applies for P4. It's how much you'll like the rest of the game that will determine how much time you'll eventually invest in it.

 

[Rahdulan]

is it better than persona 3? i clocked about 60 hours on the third one before getting bored of the badly done tower dungeon the game makes you climb. i remember being mildly shocked at how incredibly repetitious it was even by jap standards without any real flare or trick besides learning new enemy weaknesses every few floors. the rest of the game was p. good though, and very enjoyable as pure escapism just like back in the day.

It's an iteration of the P3 formula with the addition of fully controllable characters and other things. I would argue that P3 has a better story when it actually gets going halfway into the game, though. If anything the tones of two stories are different. When it comes to game structure itself they're very similar - same highschool sections and tower climbing. If you liked P3 there's a high probability you'll like P4.

I'd rather play Strange Journey if you have a DS or can emulate it. No nonsense first-person dungeon crawler.

 

[Mrowak]

i remember being mildly shocked at how incredibly repetitious it was even by jap standards without any real flare or trick besides learning new enemy weaknesses every few floors.

The same applies for P4. It's how much you'll like the rest of the game that will determine how much time you'll eventually invest in it.

Sadly, that's pretty much the case. I *wanted* to like this game but simply couldn't. It was such a haphazard collection of ideas meashed together into incoherent whole. I liked the cheesy teenage plot, the premise of the story, but all of that just didn't fit the idea of a dungeon crawling set in some magical world. IMO, either it should have gone SMT route or make an adventure game (with actual gameplay) about the exploits of the characters instead of this nonsense.

 

[Jick Magger]

I found that P4's story, while not quite up to P3's level in terms of scope or quality, was certainly much better paced. As Rahdulan notes, the game's story starts out fairly strong, then grinds to a screeching halt around 5 hours in and doesn't budge until the 20-30 hour mark. I'll admit that P4 takes awhile to actually get started, but once it does the story is fairly tight and keeps rolling until the endgame.

...Unless you're playing Golden, at which point there's about five separate emotional climaxes and I start getting bad flashbacks to Return of the King.

P4's also the most upbeat game about murder I've ever played, right next to Deadly Premonition.

 

[Hirato]

Despite being the guy who is doing a let's play of the damn thing, I don't have much to add that hasn't already been said.
The writing, characters, setup, pacing, the art direction, etc, are absolutely fantastic.

It's just, everything you come to expect/love in an SMT title - dungeon crawling, filling out your demon dossier, combat (usually turn-based) that requires strategy and tactics, Law vs Chaos factions (usually) - are just completely horrible in Persona 4.
It's an unpleasant obstacle you have to overcome to get to the good bits.

I've ranted on numerous occasions just how horrible those aspects are in comparison to SMT: Nocturne during my LP.
Besides Noctunre is the game you want to play if you enjoy SMT titles for combat and dungeon crawling.

 

[felipepepe]

i clocked about 60 hours on the third one before getting bored of the badly done tower dungeon the game makes you climb. i remember being mildly shocked at how incredibly repetitious it was even by jap standards without any real flare or trick besides learning new enemy weaknesses every few floors.

Abandon all hope, P4 dungeons are still boring as fuck. The rest of the game is pretty good though, enough to make me bear the dungeons.

 

[Mrowak]

i clocked about 60 hours on the third one before getting bored of the badly done tower dungeon the game makes you climb. i remember being mildly shocked at how incredibly repetitious it was even by jap standards without any real flare or trick besides learning new enemy weaknesses every few floors.

Abandon all hope, P4 dungeons are still boring as fuck. The rest of the game is pretty good though, enough to make me bear the dungeons.

You mean the part that actually isn't a game? :/

 

[Hirato]

You mean the part that actually isn't a game? :/

The Social-Sim aspect?
Yeah, pretty much.

 

[felipepepe]

Does anyone honestly play Persona for the combat/dungeoncrawling?

 

[ghostdog]

It's the reason I haven't ever finished the game. I've started playing it 2 times and have never completed it because at some point I get incredibly bored of the combat. And believe me I have endured many games with sub-par combat that had other things to offer, but it's the nature of the dungeoncrawling in SMT games that if it's not at least above average, after a while I find it extremely tedious.

 

[Mrowak]

You mean the part that actually isn't a game? :/

The Social-Sim aspect?
Yeah, pretty much.

Yhm, but even then it's not good at doing the social-sim bit. I've "played" visual novels more interactive than Persona games.

Does anyone honestly play Persona for the combat/dungeoncrawling?

Define "play".

But aside from that even if the focus of the game is so different then why in the name of the Flying Spaghetti Monster must the player suffer through attrocious gameplay bits? Wouldn't it be better to actually have good gameplay that could convey the story rather than have the plot undermined and demolished completely by gameplay getting in its way... in a goddamn game?

Persona series is for me like something along Hepler's wet dream made manifest.

 

[evdk]

Does anyone honestly play Persona for the combat/dungeoncrawling?

Jasede

 

[MasPingon]

Prepare for the first three hours containing next to no gameplay at all.

After 4th dungeon I started to miss that hours containing next to no gameplay. This game is more for watching then playing. Just take a controller, sit on your couch and relax while pressing x button from time to time. No longer then 1 hour a day. I liked it because it has a bit of 90's adventure movies(Stay with me, Goonies) vibe mixed with Twilight Zone ideas.

 

[felipepepe]

But aside from that even if the focus of the game is so different then why in the name of the Flying Spaghetti Monster must the player suffer through attrocious gameplay bits? Wouldn't it be better to actually have good gameplay that could convey the story rather than have the plot undermined and demolished completely by gameplay getting in its way... in a goddamn game?

Is not that extreme, Bioshock: Infinite-like level... the gameplay makes total sense with the story, it's just dull.

 

[deuxhero]

I would argue that P3 has a better story when it actually gets going halfway into the game, though. If anything the tones of two stories are different.

What?

P3's story stops entirely half way (The final full moon boss) and becomes nothing but endless social links with a tarturus section once a month while waiting for the final boss to show up. Persona 4 has the mystery "solved" halfway through, but it's a pretty obvious red herring and the plot quickly returns.

 

[Mrowak]

But aside from that even if the focus of the game is so different then why in the name of the Flying Spaghetti Monster must the player suffer through attrocious gameplay bits? Wouldn't it be better to actually have good gameplay that could convey the story rather than have the plot undermined and demolished completely by gameplay getting in its way... in a goddamn game?

Is not that extreme, Bioshock: Infinite-like level... the gameplay makes total sense with the story, it's just dull.

So... you can ruin most exquisite stories just by telling them badly. That's bad storytelling for you: if a narrative device cannot hold water, however interesting the plot might be the overall story is bad... And quite frankly it just feels that way. It's broken, and borked.

 

[Corporate_Jew_Master]

edit: the persona 1 dungeons were Wizardry IV level of hard-core in comparison to that tower in persona 3. the first hospital dungeon is classic!

Yep. Snow Queen later on was even harder.

And you won't find any of that beyond Persona 2, perhaps. The only good thing about later Personas is that the characters weren't so lifeless as in 1 and were quite amusing in that animu sort of way. Try Innocent Sin for the PSP if you haven't already, chances are you'll hate P4, even if the dungeons are a bit more varied than 3.

 

[Random]

I would argue that P3 has a better story when it actually gets going halfway into the game, though. If anything the tones of two stories are different.

What?

P3's story stops entirely half way (The final full moon boss) and becomes nothing but endless social links with a tarturus section once a month while waiting for the final boss to show up. Persona 4 has the mystery "solved" halfway through, but it's a pretty obvious red herring and the plot quickly returns.

Except it doesn't, and you're an idiot. The final full moon boss occurs roughly 3/4ths of the way into the game. What comes after is the calm before the storm, where storyline housekeeping occurs, the party members wrap up their individual subplots and a few gain their upgraded personas, and the player character begins to really finish out his social links and get to the meat of dozens of storylines. From a gameplay perspective, it's a chance for you to grind the everloving shit out of your personas and prepare for the final boss. It all feels right.

And even with that, you're still an idiot, because your problem is with the pacing, which is only part of the story. P3 has a story and a theme far more compelling than P4's. P3 is about accepting death and learning that life is worth living in spite of it. P4 is about accepting yourself, which, while more accurate to Jung's Persona/Anima/Shadow relationship, does not carry the same weight as P3's theme.

And on top of that, P3's Evokers are a far more powerful and evocative (heh) imagery than the glasses and the fog in P4. They accomplish their purpose, which is to make the player feel completely weirded out and almost afraid of what's going on at the start, which makes the scene where the MC gets brave and pulls the trigger possess way more impact. It's a feeling that fades quickly since you see the characters faux-blowing their brains out constantly in battles, but the symbolism is top-notch. P4 doesn't try to impart that same kind of apprehension or inspire many feelings aside from feel good happy times. So the tone and the imagery used in both games are not equal in effectiveness.

So, let's say you are correct from an objective standpoint about the pacing. If P4 has better pacing than P3, then it is still inferior from a story standpoint because it has a lesser theme, inferior imagery and symbolism, and the tone is nowhere near as weighty.

 

[deuxhero]

*checks* The Hanged Man is that far into the game?

Weird. Those two months sure felt like half the game.

 

[aweigh]

i downloaded Nocturne. time to fire up PCSX2.

 

[Jick Magger]

Digital Devil Saga isn't half-bad, either. A bit easier than the other games in the series (if only for the sole reason that the MC's death doesn't result in a game over), though ironically enough it's also got by far the hardest boss fight in the entire series, too.

 

[Comrade Goby]

Emulate P3 FES

uses cheats to skip grinding

That game has a better story than P4 and some better songs but they're both great