4cr Plays – Persona 3 Portable

Growing up, I had a passionate love affair with Japan. The culture, anime, the games – you name it, I loved it. Yeah, I was that kid. You know the type, the annoying type who would get all superior and rub my knowledge of Asian cultures in other’s faces. Still, as much as I loved pocky or Galaxy Express 999, the one thing I loved above all was the Japanese role-playing game.

Back in those days, on the SNES and the first Playstation, Japanese RPGs were king. Nothing could match these sweeping epics, these incredible story-telling experiences. Who could forget Chrono and Marle’s journey from the middle ages to the ancient past and the far-flung future? What villain could possibly top Kefka, the terrifying clown who actually destroys the world?

Is it just me, or has the genre gone to hell?

Of course, time commitments are a big issue. I don’t really have the time to spend sixty or seventy hours on a single game unless it is one hell of a game. These days, if you’re not Fallout 3, you probably aren’t worth a hundred hours of my time. So, yes, a lack of free time pushes the quality bar to unfair heights.

Even beyond that, however, modern JRPGs just feel… tacky. The storylines are never quite what they used to be – they feel more like cheesy anime than a lasting mythology. If the story isn’t going to grab me, what’s left? I grew tired of turn-based “fight/spell/item” combat at the point where dinosaurs still roamed the Earth.

So, that just leaves one question to ask – how did Persona 3 make me fall back in love with the Japanese RPG?

Ok, I am kind-of cheating. I’ve already played Persona 3 once, back on the PS2. I knew basically what to expect from the newly-released PSP version of the game. Still, my memory of it was a bit fuzzy (hey, I’m a cranky old man and the original game is more than three years old), and my attention span is even shorter these days. End result – I was surprised by just how much I enjoyed the game.

Let’s start with the obvious element – the storyline. Persona 3 casts you as a new transfer student at a Japanese high school. Arriving late at night, you are plunged right into the action as a monster attacks the dormitory. As it turns out, there is a hidden period of time between midnight and 12:01 AM where ordinary humans are turned into coffins and shadowy monsters prey on the innocent. The students belonging to your particular dormitory can stay awake during this “dark hour,” and thus, it becomes your duty to defeat the darkness and save the world. Plus, you still need to pass your exams and make time for your friends!

Now, let’s throw away most of that. Persona 3 isn’t really about going to school. It isn’t about “saving the world,” because frankly, every game is about saving the world. At the core, what makes the story of Persona 3 so special is that it is about friendship. It is about the endless relationships we form while growing up, from minor acquaintances to first loves to life-long partnerships. Every facet of the game, from story events to the gameplay itself is shaped by who you become friends with and how strong your relationships are.

Persona’s writing has some issues, notably its tendency to dip into anime and fan service stereotypes a little too often for its own good, but it more than makes up for that with its characters. Each person you meet has some interesting background, and each is deeply flawed in their own way. Their stories are all interesting – even that of the annoying French exchange student – and it is well-worth going out of your way to learn about them.

The developers make great use of the school setting to fuel the gameplay. Rather than the standard trope of exploring some massive continent, Persona 3 takes place on an entirely local scale. The game is split into a set number of days, and you must complete your goals before each successive full moon. During the day, you attend school, watch movies, hang out with friends, or take part in any number of other activities. Time management is crucial, and you’ll have to form entire strategies around what activities you can take part in each day.

Your chance to fight comes at night, as you dive into the seemingly-endless tower Tartarus. You will form a party, choosing three of your teammates, and progress through floor after floor of monsters. Tartarus is divided into blocks, with barriers that disappear with each successive full moon. Each floor is randomly generated and is full of treasures for players that really want to explore. You can’t backtrack, but there is a teleporter every few floors. Of course, those very same floors contain powerful bosses.

Battles in Persona are an interesting mix of Dragon Quest and Pokemon. Each party member is bonded to a “persona,” which grants the type of magical powers that you would expect in an RPG. Each turn, you choose a command from your menu – fight, power, run, item, etc – and go to town. As you gain experience, both you and your persona will level up. Now, you aren’t stuck with a single persona. As you progress, you’ll discover a number of different monsters, and you can combine your current personas to form new ones.

This is where those relationships come in. Friendship isn’t just an important plot element, but an important gameplay element as well. Each of the relationships (called “social links”) that you can form in the game corresponds to one of several “arcana.” Each Persona also has an arcana, and they gain an experience bonus when you fuse them based on the power of that friendship. If you maximize any of your friendships, the newly formed Persona will gain a massive power boost. Suddenly, your daytime activities have a strategic link to your nighttime ones.

Honestly, the battle system is pretty bland. There are a few cool flourishes like the co-op attacks that you can pull off or the relatively complicated system of strengths and weaknesses. Still, this is fundamentally the same kind of battle system that RPGs have had since the NES days. Most of the time, the battles were interesting enough that I didn’t mind, but after about forty-five hours, I was tired of the grind. To Atlus’ credit, they made two fantastic design decisions to help keep the game fresh. First, all enemies are visable. Don’t feel like another fight, simply run by. They will chase you, but you can escape if you’re determined. Second – and most important – you can set your own pace. You have a “month” per section of the central tower. At any time, you can take a break, save your game, and avoid Tartarus for a few days. My tendency was to marathon through each new section, but I greatly appreciate the option to pace things out.

Persona 3 Portable is an attractive game. The actual 3D is a bit dated – some of it is quite weak by PSP standards. However, the daytime half of the game is entirely in 2D (you click on static objects with a cursor), and Shigenori Soejima’s character art is fantastic. Beyond the art itself, the game just has this slick sense of style. The menus, on-screen information, and even the word bubbles and fonts all work together to create this attractive interface. I know, it is odd to harp on the actual interface of the game, but I kind of dig the extra layer of attention. Shōji Meguro’s incredible soundtrack ties in well with the interface and art direction. It all gels together into this “urban Japanese” style, which is both kind of awesome and a refreshing change of pace from the tired Tolkien setting preferred by so many other RPGs.

Interestingly, this is actually the third release of Persona 3. We’re just about to Square Enix levels here, folks. The primary addition to the PSP release is the ability to play a female character. Although the central plot remains the same, the interactions with other characters change quite a bit. Choosing the female protagonist also results in a few other cosmetic changes, and it alters which songs are played throughout the game. For hardcore players, Persona 3 Portable adds two additional difficulty settings (bringing the total to five). The battle system has also received a few upgrades. In the PS2 version, all party members were controlled by the computer. Now, you can turn off the AI and directly control them. I, personally, left the AI on. You can choose tactics (healing, all-out attack, etc), and the computer-controlled characters generally made smart decisions. Sadly, the PSP release is lacking the extra content from the FES expansion for the PS2, though many of the game tweaks are ported over. All-in-all, it’s nice to have this game on the go. I spend a lot of time on buses, and there is nothing like an entertaining story-heavy game to pass the time. I need to dock a couple of points from the developers, however, for not having the foresight to include a “quick save” function. I don’t care how often save points appear, and I don’t care that the PSP has a stand-by mode – include a quick save in your game!

To return to the question I posed earlier, what do I love so much about Persona 3? I love the writing and the story. I love the characters, who feel so fleshed-out that you can’t help but care about them. I love the structure of the game, which lets you set your own pace and schedule. I love the art and the music, and how they form one cohesive package. The game isn’t perfect; I wasn’t thrilled with the need to grind or the mostly-traditional battle system, and not including a quick save in your portable game is an annoying mistake. However, it is a fantastic RPG, and the portable release feels like the “definitive” version. I would have liked all of the FES content, but playing as the female protagonist is a fresh experience, even for those that have played Persona 3 to death.

For even casual JRPG fans, Persona 3 is a game that you must play at some point in your lives. Charge up your dusty PSP – this is one of the best games out for it this summer.