VGRC

Where the hell is my Megaten

For those of you who have been around here for awhile, you'll know that I'm a big fan of the Megami Tensei series... especially the latest entries on the PS2. SMT: Digital Devil Saga, SMT: Digital Devil Saga 2 and SMT: Devil Summoner have all earned Editor's Choice awards here on the hallowed pages of VGRC. So, for the past year, I have been eagerly awaiting the next entry in the series, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3. What I finally received was one of gaming's biggest let-downs since Donkey Kong Country 3.

Persona 3 starts off with our silent and nameless main character, (aka: You) who has just transferred to the Gekkoukan private high school. On the surface, it looks like your average private school, with students living in dorms on campus and going to classes and what-not. However, all of this changes at the Dark Hour, a “hidden hour” wedged between each day that most of the human population is completely oblivious to experiencing. While most people are frozen in time inside protective coffins during the Dark Hour, some people are capable of experiencing it... people such as yourself. Eventually, you find yourself being recruited by a group of students that can also experience Dark Hour, who call themselves the Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad, or S.E.E.S. for short. During the Dark Hour, they wage battle against the Shadows; evil beasts that feed upon humans during Dark Hour. To combat these beasts, members of the S.E.E.S. can call up their Personas, which are physical manifestations of their psyche that can unleash powerful attacks far beyond that of any normal human being. And there is, my friends, the entire premise behind Persona 3.

The world of Persona 3 is presented to you day by day in the life of your character. After various triggering events in the game, time progresses from morning to afternoon and night and so forth. During the day, you'll be attending school, going to classes and making friends and all that other stuff you normally do in school, and you'll have time to yourself after school for social and extracurricular activities. However, when Dark Hour rolls around, you'll be battling the Shadows in the tower of Tartarus, a mysterious building that makes itself visible on school grounds only during Dark Hour. However, nobody really knows a whole lot about Tartarus... not only because there was never enough people in the S.E.E.S. to safely venture in, but because the floor layout changes every night. Times have changed now though, now that the S.E.E.S. has some new recruits; There is now a large enough team to safely venture in and explore, while fighting the Shadow threat.

A serious portion of this game is spent doing all sorts of school type activities. During classes, you'll find yourself being quizzed, studying and gossiping with your fellow students during breaks. After school, when you're free to roam around, you can make friends, join clubs and even get in-game girlfriends. All of this builds "social links," which allows you to create and summon new and better Personas in battle. Some of these activities can also end up building your charm, academics or courage stats, so it's wise to actually try and weather your way through this all rather than half-ass it, because how well you fare in battle depends on it. The scope of this part of the game is massive, as you will find yourself with tons of people to hang out with, but not enough time in the game to do it. Tie that in with the fact that your Persona are all tied to different "cards," and there are varying types of friends that will build social links for various card classes. The game spends a couple hours trying to ease you into it all, but even then it is extremely overwhelming when it finally opens up to you.

One thing I really hate saying is “social activities” to describe what you do in Persona 3. Lets face it, you're playing a game where more than half the time is spent simulating a high school. It's far from enjoyable, unless you have no life and have to substitute for that by making friends with scripted game characters. I mean, seriously, what the hell is this garbage. It reminds me of my 4 years in high school, right down to the “thank fucking God I'm out of here” feeling that was shared between my real-world graduation and violently yanking out my PS2's power cord.

Despite the intricate details poured into all the clubs, NPCs and what-not, it's a shame it comes across as boring. This isn't an entertaining comedic romp like Bully. This is more along the lines of "if I wasn't trying to level up, I wouldn't give a shit." Basically, picture the disaster that is Brooktown High bolted onto an RPG, with your classic mature SMT themes strewn about. There's a story in there, but it's so riddled with teenage drama that you'll find yourself speeding through more dialogue than actually reading it.

To make things worse, the battle and dungeon exploration systems are not only equally lackluster, but downright painful to play. While some of my disappointment could be stemming from how impressed I was with the previous SMT games and maybe slightly high expectations for Persona 3, I think it has more to do with the fact that when you're forced to suffer through hours of simulating going to school, and battle doesn't feel rewarding enough to make up for it. It has some good points going for it: The ever changing floor layouts of Tartarus are a fun idea, and there are no random battles either. That's right, you see your enemies wandering down the halls, and you get to initiate contact yourself. It makes exploration slightly easier, as once you've cleared out a bunch of enemies you can explore freely without random battles popping up constantly. Random battles have been one of my few gripes of the past SMT games, and it's nice to see that has finally been addressed. Still, it doesn't make up for monotonous level design and the fact that you'll most likely find yourself battling each enemy anyways. Lots and lots of fighting. Grinding, rather. And you better get used to it pretty fast.

The battle system is somewhat reminiscent of Digital Devil Saga, only rather than each member of your party transforming into demons, they summon their Personas by forcing them out of their minds with an Evoker, a handgun shaped device that quite literally blows them out into the real world like flying brain matter. Unlike DDS, they keep their human bodies the whole time through, but much like DDS they will use their Persona's powers to fight the hordes of enemies you will face. The classic weakness system is back, with various enemies being weak to things like ice or fire and such, gaining you extra turns. However, unlike DDS where exploiting an enemy's weakness gained a turn for the whole party, exploiting weaknesses in Persona 3 only gains extra turns for the character who did it. You can stun enemies by hitting weaknesses, and getting the entire enemy party stunned will open them up to a full on assault by your party to finish them off. It sounds great at first, until you realize one thing: You can't control your party members. That's right, it's a turn based RPG and you can't control your party members, but rather can only provide them with really vague instructions of how to handle themselves. Worse yet, the AI behind them is absolutely piss-poor, leaving you longing for more control. You'll find yourself trying to accomplish as much as you can in one turn yourself, because you can't really rely on your teammates to do simple things like cure you of status ailments. And rather than maximize their turns by getting the entire enemy party stunned, they tend to work on one enemy at a time, whittling down its HP until it bites the dust. It really breaks everything the battle system had going for it.

Assuming you're still playing, you can also start gaining and fusing new Persona. After battles, you're occasionally presented with a three card Monte-style game where you can acquire new Persona. And much like the Gouma-Den in SMT: Devil Summoner (only a bit more simplistic) you can start fusing together these Persona to get new and more powerful ones. It's a nice feature to have back, as I loved Devil Summoner for it. It adds even more depth to this game, giving you plenty of combinations and options for creating new and better Persona... though it sadly doesn't feel anywhere near as in-depth as Summoner's Gouma-Den.

The sound is a mixed bag. On one hand is the great voice acting, which is rarely painful to listen to. On the other hand is the pitiful music selection. While there's a couple decent tracks, it's a far cry from the stellar soundtrack that rocked Digital Devil Saga in 2005. Expect annoying j-pop and rap, and some random electronica, and then repeat it into oblivion until you're so sick of hearing it you want to puncture your eardrums. Graphically, the game is alright, but it's obvious that the developers couldn't settle on a single art style. A lot of the Persona and enemy designs are recycled from the previous PS2 SMT games, but all the new characters were done by a completely different art director. On top of that, the game constantly seems to be switching from dark, gothic and moody design to cartoonish and bright... oftentimes in the same scene. Further adding to the myraid of styles are grainy anime cutscenes strewn about the game. In the finished product, it comes across as very inconsistent... though with a sheen of polish over it; everything is smooth and the framerate stays pretty good.

If you love grinding in your RPGs and Japanese school/dating sims, the depth of NPC interaction may turn you on. However, even if you do fall into that extremely niche audience, the glaring gameplay flaws may turn you away anyways. I'll give it some points for originality, as that kind of thing is rare in RPGs these days... and with a bit of extra work it could have been somewhat enjoyable for a slightly broader audience. Rent it first, then ask yourself if you really want to play 60-80 more hours of it. Or better yet, just avoid it and give Digital Devil Saga a good replay.