Persona 5 Royal, is the updated version of Persona 5 including new elements of the story and revised and improved gameplay mechanics.
Like in the original game itself, it focuses on the main character after being falsely accused by assault from Shido a really notorious politician with a huge backing of all kinds of corrupt people from Yakuza,Police and other local officials seeking power too in Japan has to clear their name and stop the conspiracy with their friends and find out what's really going on behind this conspiracy too.
The same story elements from before like outsiders of society fighting against bad guys inspired by Piqaresque fiction and also, complex psychological themes return. Now included is the focus of free will vs the concept of belonging with the updated storyline.
So more or less it follows the similar story formula that persona 3 has made and to be honest now at this point, after playing other shin megami tensei and persona games over the years I think its starting to get quite stale now especially since now with the pacing unlike in other smt games for the most part it takes a little while for things to really get going.
The new music is really great.
The updated visuals and artstyle was just amazing too. Production I.G returns to the animation for some of the cutscenes and its as great as ever.
The gameplay has some new features like a guide to help you go to the right direction if you’re lost.
The security system is still there if you get caught lot of times you’ll be kicked out so stealth is key here and ambushing enemies is how you lower your security meter.
On that note Ohya’s confidant is still pretty useless given how easy it is to reduce it without the need of her Confidant.
The palaces are like in the original has its own unique feel to them but with some unique twists too them like the grappling system and hidden seeds you’ll start to see what their real purpose is later on.
The confidant system makes its return and well it does somewhat rectify a issue I had with the previous games where lot of the character development is saved for the side stories then so the main game. Its required to help get through the true ending of the game but even still I would rather the lead character development happen in the main story and not as sidequests.
The more closer you are to them the more benefits you get be it new items or choices weapons modifications and exploration.
The user interface is still really just one of the most stylish I've seen in a video game.
Also there's some new locations too like Kichioji one of the many places you can take for your confidants during the game and theres new stores to visit too.
Now there's a clothing shop where you can trade dirty clothes for extra points.
You can visit a temple to increase your sp.
Some new minigames too like the darts game for those familiar with yakuza should easily get into it.
It introduces new characters like Sumire who honestly was the weakest link of the game since she just came across as an afterthought at last minute and she wasn’t really that compelling to me.
There’s also Maruki the guidance counsellor who’s a new confidant and the story Maruki has, honestly was really one of the most compelling I've seen in a video game like just wow.
The voice acting is as good as ever especially Maruki’s voice actor who in a way with their voice actors death it really just gives the story its own impact with how tragic it was. R.I.P to Billy Kametz.
Its also really good to see cutscenes now have more fully voiced moments in them something that’s often bugging me in Japanese games is the weird lack of voice acting in them.
Theres still some of the same flaws I've complained about years ago with persona 5 I still have today.
I still really didn’t liked Sae’s character that much because of how nasty she can be and its still a mystery to this day what her treasure was in her palace.
Haru’s character while she isn’t much as of afterthought as she was in the first game I still didn’t liked her that much because of her naïve pushover like personality and also, no there still to this day a missing chance to get back at her abusive fiancé Sugimaru.
Either way this was a really annoying loose end along with many others the game has.
Still not really that big of a fan of Ann either due to how ditzy she can be from time to time.
Speaking of missing chances, there is still to this day a missing chance to get back at Mika Ann’s gold digging and manipulative rival too.
I still really find Morgana to be very annoying, especially that brief fallout scene with the rest of the phantom thieves too.
I still did also found the constant bickering between Ryuji and Morgana to be very annoying and both their impulsive actions in the story did more harm than good honestly like in before.
At least Morgana’s not so strict now on telling you when to go to sleep.
That one cutscene of Makoto getting super angry to the point of violence in her confidant still to this day I found really annoying and sort of out of character for someone who has a responsible and firm personality and not helping either was the guy behind a lot of the mess was let off easy like sugimaru or mika other antagonistic characters in the confidants side story.
The dialogue while the localization of the game certainly has improved in a lot of ways a lot of it yet it still felt kind of cringey with the dialogue.
Unfortunately the newer versions of persona 5 royal is having a lot of censorship in it and it honestly doesn’t make any sense either to do so especially for a game that came out a really long time ago.
The padding and filler still isn’t really that fun to go through either.
Its turned based like in the usual smt games.
Combat wise here’s some of the tweaks, in addition to showtimes or a new form of all out attacks are now a new thing where all of your party members deal crippling damage to enemies.
Baton pass is instantly given to you where you can swap turns instead of establishing confidants.
The press turn system returns too where hitting an enemy with something they are weak with gives you an extra turn in combat.
Theres some new personas included in this game.
A thieves den has been included which is like a way to view extra content in the game.
Overall this was a pretty solid update to the original game.
It gets 5 out of 5
SEGA/ATLUS at this point really needs to get on with persona 6 already its been several fucking years now since the original release and they also really need to get on with bringing back their older ATLUS titles not just with the other megami tensei side series and its been shown that other ATLUS jrpgs like 13 sentinels can still sell pretty well and if anything the constant stream of spin offs will do more harm than good in the long term because fans will eventually lose interest in it and SEGA/ATLUS will be in another scenario where they’ll be in near bankruptcy again so maybe more fan demand things could change but its unlikely for it to happen so i'm not going to be surprised if SEGA/ATLUS ends up broke one day as a result of their fuckery with milking. :/
Comments