Is it wrong that I love the "trimmed down presentation?" The pacing of the game is much much faster than I remember it to be playing it the first time around. I do agree that it is for fans, but I think the faster pacing and all the great P4 additions will actually have appeal to people who never tried the previous games.
I have a bunch of friends who love Persona 3 portable but never bothered to play P3 and FES because they wanted a more streamlined experience like P4.
they didn't even bother showing pictures of the girls the characters talk to.
I think I'm generally more offended that they didn't take the time/resources to make portraits for all the NPCs in the previous cutscenes... so you just have to assume that there are other students talking to you even if you never see them.
The *game* itself is better, and the game is fine without the in-engine cutscenes, but they really could have done a bit more to make the presentation more comparable to the original game.
The *game* itself is better, and the game is fine without the in-engine cutscenes, but they really could have done a bit more to make the presentation more comparable to the original game.
The *game* itself is better, and the game is fine without the in-engine cutscenes, but they really could have done a bit more to make the presentation more comparable to the original game.
Maybe for a first timer, but I'm presuming that this game is for people who have played P3 or FES.
But yeah, it's worth just watching MasterLL's playthrough on youtube just to see how these scenes played out in the original game if you don't have the context.
I can kind of understand the opinion, but for me, running around the halls of the school were part of what made the game so engrossing. It made it feel more like an actual school, a real set piece for the game instead of just a couple of video game locations existing only for an event to happen at some point.
To be honest, I wish they'd go further with the fleshing out of the city in future Persona games. What bothers me about P3 and P4 is that there isn't nearly enough set pieces for the world, and that travel between locations is done via a map screen. I'd love to have to actually go to a train station and hop a train to get from one place to the next, for example.
Of course, you make the game so it can be played both ways - either do the "mindless" travel or have the quick jumps between points - and both sides can be happy.
I don't think that anybody likes the game more directly because of the replaced presentation, but like the battle animation discussion in the DQ9 thread, the question is:
"Do the in-game cutscenes in P3/P4 add enough to justify the bloated length they also bring to the game?"
So far, I don't think they are. All of the various speed improvements (most stemming from cutscene redesign, improved map movement, and the reduced load times the combined changes bring) look like they're shaving 20~40 HOURS off of my previous playtimes, despite playing on a much harder and involved difficulty level.
Generally, I think Atlus needs to pay more attention to game speed in Persona 5. Even if they stick with the P3/4 presentation style, there's tons of little changes they can bring to make the game play faster.
The SMT series got along for years with a presentation similar to (but worse) than what is present in P3P. However, most of the scenes were originally designed with 3D models in mind, and thus don't present properly in 2D.
I think Girl's Side is for people who have played P3 or FES, but all the P4 carry-overs are for all the people who came in with P4 based on all the good word of mouth P3 got. P4's Atlus' best selling game ever, lest we forget. And those people are getting a kind of confusing, inelegant presentation takes away a lot of the atmosphere the original game tries to establish
(and struggles with, IMO)
and even leaves me, someone who last played Persona 3 less than a year ago, kind of confused by what's going on at times.
I think Girl's Side is for people who have played P3 or FES, but all the P4 carry-overs are for all the people who came in with P4 based on all the good word of mouth P3 got. P4's Atlus' best selling game ever, lest we forget. And those people are getting a kind of confusing, inelegant presentation takes away a lot of the atmosphere the original game tries to establish
(and struggles with, IMO)
and even leaves me, someone who last played Persona 3 less than a year ago, kind of confused by what's going on at times.
I think that's just wrong about P4. Best selling in quite a while, but some of their older games (SMT 1 and 2, Soul Hacker) did pretty damn well, if I recall properly?
"Do the in-game cutscenes in P3/P4 add enough to justify the bloated length they also bring to the game?"
So far, I don't think they are. All of the various speed improvements (most stemming from cutscene redesign, improved map movement, and the reduced load times the combined changes bring) look like they're shaving 20~40 HOURS off of my previous playtimes, despite playing on a much harder and involved difficulty level.
Given that you can triangle through the scenes in either case, I don't think that matters too much... certainly not to the extent of 20-40 hours. If anything, the summoning animations are the big time waster - but they're so important to the game that they'll never be removed.
I AM JOHN! said:
I think Girl's Side is for people who have played P3 or FES, but all the P4 carry-overs are for all the people who came in with P4 based on all the good word of mouth P3 got. P4's Atlus' best selling game ever, lest we forget. And those people are getting a kind of confusing, inelegant presentation takes away a lot of the atmosphere the original game tries to establish
(and struggles with, IMO)
and even leaves me, someone who last played Persona 3 less than a year ago, kind of confused by what's going on at times.
Well, I just wonder what the venn diagram of people who like P4 and who have never played P3 and also have a PSP might be... certainly there are new players in this thread, so who knows. I'd certainly be interested to hear their perspective anyway.
Well, I just wonder what the venn diagram of people who like P4 and who have never played P3 and also have a PSP might be... certainly there are new players in this thread, so who knows. I'd certainly be interested to hear their perspective anyway.
Given that you can triangle through the scenes in either case, I don't think that matters too much... certainly not to the extent of 20-40 hours. If anything, the summoning animations are the big time waster - but they're so important to the game that they'll never be removed.
Battle animations can still be shortened. Make it more like Nocturne or Rush Mode, where the cuts are faster and the animations segue into the next faster.
Triangling through scenes is WAY faster in P3P than it was in P3/4 due to the lack of animations to sit through.
Like I said, there's a TON of things that Atlus can do to make P5 faster, even if they go back to 3D models for cutscenes.
I think the question is whether or not they would have liked P4 if none of the cutscenes were there.
Yaweee said:
Battle animations can still be shortened. Make it more like Nocturne or Rush Mode, where the cuts are faster and the animations segue into the next faster.
Triangling through scenes is WAY faster in P3P than it was in P3/4 due to the lack of animations to sit through.
Like I said, there's a TON of things that Atlus can do to make P5 faster, even if they go back to 3D models for cutscenes.
I guess I feel like the streamlining could take part in the game play, not the presentation. Letting me do the Devil Survivor thing and pick which skills to pass on through fusion, for example, would save me so much time and aggravation. The skill cards are a step in the right direction (Jack Frost with Dia? Just fuse/capture a Jack Frost and level up a Pixie to get the Dia card, thankyouverymuch). Maybe something that tells me whether or not a Persona during a shuffle is already in my compendium, so I don't have to waste my time with the shuffle if I don't want it.
You won't complete every social link on your first playthrough. That's just the way it is; by design, it is extraordinarly hard to do everything that can possibly be done.
For each month, just try to reach the next barrier, and you'll be set for the Full Moon boss.
Fuse lots of Persona. Leveling is often a waste of time, as level-for-level Persona require more exp than your MC.
You don't need to split up your party, so there isn't really a right way to do it.
wait until Elizabeth/Theo tells you that there are missing people before going up the tower
simply because it saves you backtracking. If you don't mind the grinding, you can basically go all the way up the tower in a night and then go back when you have to
rescue people
You can't really miss social links, but if you don't follow a guide it'll be hard to max them out. Also, at least one of the links have to be attended to whenever the character is available or you'll miss your chance to max it.
If you're playing on normal or lower, I would say fuse just for the sake of fusing because it's relatively cheap to pull out your personas again. With the skill card system though, it's almost worth it to level up personas who give you cards just so you can add that skill to whatever persona you want. The fact that you can clone cards makes that even better.
The big beef with P3/P4 is that your party levels up independently... if you aren't OCD, you should just pick a core group of guys (to complement your own persona choices) and stick with them for the whole game. Keep in mind that
I only finished P4 2 weeks ago, so I would have played FES anyway, but I have to say that I do not think I would have enjoyed beating it.
Just to make sure I made the right decision, I tried FES today and I hated the fact that sometimes it would take forever before I control reverted back to me. Looking at all those animations without being able to do anything was fucking maddening.
Yeah, but I think that was implied. I mean, the only people who don't like the gameplay improvements are the "purists" - and I think we can all agree they're insane. :lol
mugwhump said:
Thanks dawgs
edit: oh yeah, which skills do fused persona inherit? All of them (including unlearned ones), or only ones that have already been learned?
I think Igor explains it in the game, but only certain skills can be passed down through inheritance. It depends on which arcana the persona are from, among other factors.
I'm not sure if I'm over-leveled or what but I just slapped fire from the first full moon boss without any effort what so ever and even the Tartarus bosses have been pretty damn easy. I don't remember the first P3 starting off without a hitch like this.:lol
I absolutely disagree. Static pieces of art with text boxes don't breathe life into the characters the way actual characters on-screen interacting with each other do. Even if those little polygon characters who are moving and talking and whatnot don't look real, they still present a living character. A piece of art is a piece of art, no matter how beautifully drawn.
I see it the same as voice in RPGs. RPGs don't need voice, and I can get through an RPG much faster reading a bunch of text versus listening to all of the lines acted out. And yet, vocal work adds so much to the characters and my ability to have a connection with them that, at this point, I have to have serious motivation to play an RPG that doesn't offer voices.
I think some people are forgetting that this is a PSP game. Having a direct port of the PS2 game is quite a bit to ask for.
I did have a problem with one of the S.links earlier. I was at the mall with Yuko and some random girls ended up talking to her but you couldn't see them. It got kind of weird because Yuko's pic was still centered and the only way you could tell the other girls are talking is if you payed close attention to the name of the text box when it changed. I'm sure there's plenty of things they could have done to make scenes like this better.
The problem I'm finding is having a Japan based setting and not having the ability to use the Japanese voice actors. I tend to read faster than the voice actors talk, so most of the time I'm skipping their audio anyway. Why not include the japanese track for purists? Granted, its a small gripe, but still one that is kind off-putting. It just seems a little campy to have Southern California sounding characters call each other by Japanese names.
I picked up P3P as my first Persona game, so I don't know about it being strictly for fans. I'd heard great things about P3 and P4 and figured it was finally time to jump in - this despite the fact that I tried Devil Survivor and really didn't like it.
So far I love it. I've looked at a couple video reviews of the original P3 and I kind fo think to myself "Wow, it would be awesome to run through the actual school hallways and actually go places instead of using this disembodied adventure-style pointer system." But then I realized how much faster I can accomplish everything in the world like this - teleporting from area to area, bouncing from checking out something on one end of an area all the way over to the other side in less than 2 seconds, etc.
These days I feel that some presentation sacrifice in order to take up less of my valuable time is generally worth it.
Those anime cutscenes sure do look pretty though...
The problem I'm finding is having a Japan based setting and not having the ability to use the Japanese voice actors. I tend to read faster than the voice actors talk, so most of the time I'm skipping their audio anyway. Why not include the japanese track for purists? Granted, its a small gripe, but still one that is kind off-putting. It just seems a little campy to have Southern California sounding characters call each other by Japanese names.
The problem I'm finding is having a Japan based setting and not having the ability to use the Japanese voice actors. I tend to read faster than the voice actors talk, so most of the time I'm skipping their audio anyway. Why not include the japanese track for purists? Granted, its a small gripe, but still one that is kind off-putting. It just seems a little campy to have Southern California sounding characters call each other by Japanese names.
Only if the both voice tracks exist as an option. Sorry, but for as much as I used to be hardcore on the "leave the voices Japanese!" bandwagon, P4's English voices are better than the Japanese ones (IMHO).
the English voice acting seems just as good as Persona 4. I'm sure plenty of Persona "purists" would rather the english voice acting. Out of all the games to ask this for Persona 3 and 4 seem like games that need it the least.
the English voice acting seems just as good as Persona 4. I'm sure plenty of Persona "purists" would rather the english voice acting. Out of all the games to ask this for Persona 3 and 4 seem like games that need it the least.
So, I sit down, put P3P into my PSP so that I can finally get to playing it, and my UMD drive dies. Struggles to read P3P, and now it won't read anything. FFFFFUUUUU.
Theo had a sentence all in Hiragana when he gave me the Compendium. It looked like the places in the sentence where Kanji should have been were replaced by boxes.
And then the LORD David Bowie saith to his Son, Jonny Depp: 'Go, and spread my image amongst the cosmos. For every living thing is in anguish and only the LIGHT shall give them reprieve.'
There's something off-putting about the rhythm of this game...maybe it's just me missing an opportunity somewhere, but I had to wait about 4 days for the second level of tartarus to open up, and as soon as it's open and I get excited that I can actually, you know, play the game again, my guys are tired, and I have to wait another night...I know how to cure tiredness on my end, but is it something I just have to wait out for my teammates?
Fortune and Moon if you're female... for story reasons.
Any experts on Fusion here? I went on a Fusing grind and from what I understand, if your Persona are too high levels, it's impossible to fuse the lower level Persona. Is there any way to prevent this short of restarting the game? I suppose I shouldn't have waited until after maxing S-links to do all this.
OK guys, first time playing a Persona game so be nice.
Is there a good guide floating around? I'm not sure how many floors I should go up (if there is a hard limit). First night I got to roam around Tartarus I went up 12 floors and felt I should stop.
OK guys, first time playing a Persona game so be nice.
Is there a good guide floating around? I'm not sure how many floors I should go up (if there is a hard limit). First night I got to roam around Tartarus I went up 12 floors and felt I should stop.
As long as you reach the barrier by the end of the month, you should be fine. The floor cap raises each month, and there's 2~3 bosses in Tartarus for each month.
For anybody who did, I strongly recommend the MShe's side. Not only do I think all of her new S. Links are great, but they are generally structured better and it makes it all feel like a better game. There is a more even split between Night and Day S. Links, more points necessary to advance ranks, but also more opportunities to earn additional S. Link points.
The Sun link can be missed when playing the Male side, which sucks because it's one of the best S.Links in the game.
A general rule of thumb is that you should make sure to talk to your party members in the dorm regularly as there are a couple things you can miss if you don't do so.
firehawk12 said:
Any experts on Fusion here? I went on a Fusing grind and from what I understand, if your Persona are too high levels, it's impossible to fuse the lower level Persona. Is there any way to prevent this short of restarting the game? I suppose I shouldn't have waited until after maxing S-links to do all this.
There are a few ways of getting lower-tier persona:
1. Buy them from the compendium
2. Go back to earlier floors of Tartarus and win them with Shuffle Time
3. If I remember correctly, if you fuse two persona of the same arcana that are Tier A and Tier A+1, the result will be a Tier A-1 persona of the same arcana. Not 100% sure about that, though.
The Sun link can be missed when playing the Male side, which sucks because it's one of the best S.Links in the game.
A general rule of thumb is that you should make sure to talk to your party members in the dorm regularly as there are a couple things you can miss if you don't do so.
For anybody who did, I strongly recommend the MShe's side. Not only do I think all of her new S. Links are great, but they are generally structured better and it makes it all feel like a better game. There is a more even split between Night and Day S. Links, more points necessary to advance ranks, but also more opportunities to earn additional S. Link points.
Well if you never advance the Hanged Man s.link then you'll never meet him in the first place and since her s.link starts off with a couple of requests that can be a pain to satisfy if you don't look up the answers in a faq (I lucked out by having bought one of each vending machine drink since you never know in an RPG what might come in handy down the road and the same with her food) I can see it being easily missed.
Anyone else notice how All Out Attack seems to have been changed? I was doing less damage on the statue boss for the 35th floor than Junpei did on his regular attack. Maybe they changed the damage type from Almighty or gave mobs some resistance to that?
Well if you never advance the Hanged Man s.link then you'll never meet him in the first place and since her s.link starts off with a couple of requests that can be a pain to satisfy if you don't look up the answers in a faq (I lucked out by having bought one of each vending machine drink since you never know in an RPG what might come in handy down the road and the same with her food) I can see it being easily missed.
Anyone else notice how All Out Attack seems to have been changed? I was doing less damage on the statue boss for the 35th floor than Junpei did on his regular attack. Maybe they changed the damage type from Almighty or gave mobs some resistance to that?
Yeah, generally it is a good idea to buy one of each "cheap" item from every store or vending machine. "Missed" normally refers to things that, once you pass a certain point in the game, cannot be found. None of the Male S. Links are like that.
It is possible that they changed the all-out attack damage, but with all of the level dependence it can be hard to tell.
tokkun said:
Yeah, I think there is a cut-off date for when you can do it, because I ended up completely missing that link in my first playthrough.
