Woof, that took a while. While I did really like a lot of the revised content, Royal unfortunately left me with a bad taste in my mouth. I’ll detail the games merits first before diving into what soured me on an otherwise overall improvement on one of my favorite roleplaying games.
The Good
Core Gameplay -
Improvements across the board.
Gun ammunition replenishing after every battle eliminates the need to hoard ammunition for weaknesses and Down Shots.
Baton Pass being non-confidant locked helps strengthen the still solid press-turn system.
Some of the remixed boss battles are genuine improvements over the original.
The grappling hook makes traversal more varied and provides an avenue for refreshing the returning palaces.
Mementos functions as a much better Tartarus-like with the addition of Jose’s bonuses and new tracks for the different depths, making grinding far less time-consuming and sanity draining.
Skill reworks for almost every Confidant makes unlocking them far more rewarding.
Daily life rebalancing makes maxing out social stats far less tedious.
Confidants Expanded -
Overall additional positive characterization for the majority of the cast.
The revised translation and additional scenes for the most part add some depth to already well fleshed out characters, avoiding Flanderization into tired stereotypes like many of the spin-offs are guilty of.
The Thieves Den is a fun new addition that allows unlikely combinations of characters to interact with each other on different topics
It made me further enamored with a cast of characters I already loved to pieces.
What’s bonkin?
Honorable Mention: Pancakes -
Akechi’s reworked confidant gave him the depth and characterization he needed.
His expanded confidant plays up the rivalry between himself and the protagonist to wonderful effect, making him a joy to hate.
His true personality on display in the third semester made him into one of my new favorite party members for just how well he owned being a bastard.
Robbie Daymond’s performance as him in the third semester is a treat to listen to.
The Councillor -
Almost everything about Dr. Maruki is a net positive addition to the game.
Going through a game full of the worst of society as your obvious enemies, having a genuinely altruistic person as an ally turned enemy with a sympathetic motivation provides a spectacular contrast.
His Palace functions as an even better homage to both the Law faction of classic MegaTen and the eldritch horrors of the first three Persona games than Yaldaboath already did.
His multi-stage boss fight was fun, challenging, and incredibly interesting on a thematic level.
The unpowered fist fight with him as the final battle of the game feels like it was pulled straight from my brain and I couldn’t have enjoyed it more.
Tunes -
It goes without saying there’s a number of fantastic new tracks to accompany the already brilliant original soundtrack.
Shoji Meguro just keeps topping himself as an artist and doesn’t look like he’s going to stop anytime soon.
Likewise, Lynn’s unique vocal range continues to astound and make the vocal tracks stand out as some of the best songs in the game.
The Bad
Violet - Alright, let’s address the elephant in the room. Kasumi, or rather, Sumire is problematic.
She’s not nearly as bad as Marie was in Golden, but she has many of the same problems. The game expects you to be in love with her, which makes things uncomfortable from the jump, and only gets worse when she fails to properly endear herself to you. Her insertion into the plot and the Thieves feels very unnatural at points.
She has self-esteem issues and is victim to personal tragedies that would ordinarily engender some sympathy to her, but these sympathetic traits are handicapped by her own unhealthy methods of coping with them, namely trying to kill you when threatened with facing reality.
Further, the sympathy generated is not enough to make up for her lack of likable traits. To barely oversimplify, outside of her multi-tiered depression, all she has going for her is wanting to be good at gymnastics, having a sister complex, and being really forward about how much she’s infatuated with the protagonist... despite spending comparatively little time with him.
Her focus on personal ambition over everything else bleeds over into the ending, up to and including her absence when the protagonist is released from juvie and when he leaves Tokyo, only catching him by sheer coincidence.
Where Maruki’s toxic escapism makes him a more compelling villain, Sumire’s just makes her a less likable person.
General Gripes -
Some writing flaws from the original are unaltered while others are made worse. Most glaringly, the poor treatment of Ryuji in general as well as his and Mona’s conflict are still horribly forced.
Some changes to the plot are for the worse. Many of the genuinely fantastic scenes following Yaldaboath’s defeat are full on cut from the game in favor of the new content. Valentine’s scenes are worse in revision and the new White Day scenes do little to make up for it.
Some of the new music isn’t of the same quality as the original soundtrack. Take Over is nowhere near as good as Last Surprise, but thanks to how easy and optimal ambushes are, you almost never hear the battle theme that gave the original game so much of its identity.
Fin -
Holy shit, it’s been a minute since I’ve seen a game shoot itself in the foot at the finish line this badly.
Persona’s 5′s ending is touching and uplifting, a perfect send-off to an amazing experience that reinforces the bonds of the core cast that you’ve come to know so well over the course of the game.
Royal for some inexplicable reason decides to flush that down the toilet and make a decidedly worse version of 4′s ending, that makes your connection to your friends seem like an afterthought.
The whole of the main cast decides they are moving away from each other improbably at the same time and otherwise focusing on their personal goals over maintaining a healthy support group. Most of the stated goals and means make no sense logistically or otherwise regress characters back into issues the protagonist helped them resolve. Yusuke is the only character even momentarily perturbed by this.
Worse still, the lonely train ride replacing the touching roadtrip only serves to show off the two new additions to the cast one final time, as well as direct implying Akechi’s survival.
The series about the importance of interpersonal connections and self-improvement through them proposing you should disregard your social life to focus on your education and career comes off as disarmingly tone deaf.
So, while Persona 5 Royal is a decided improvement as a roleplaying game, it’s not without some sacrifices to the original’s quality. Most importantly, the original ending is vastly superior to Royal’s that entirely squanders the main theme of the series. This is still a great video game and one that deserves to be played, but it just can’t stand up against the original’s finale, even with its superb new villain. If there’s any silver lining, it’s that Scramble look to be not only a proper sequel, but also appears to avoid the few pitfalls Royal has. I cannot look forward to playing it enough... whenever it’s localized at the least.
“Shiho becomes a phantom thief AU” because I said so 😳
I designed her Persona, while @rerenah took care of the phantom thief design!
Her Persona is based off a character from the Orlando Furioso, Bradamante, a brave paladin - we researched lady knights for a while before settling on her because of her weapon of choice, a spear (which ended up being Shiho’s weapon in the end, since we wanted to give the feeling of both offense and defense - thus shield and spear :’) )
On 2018 i made this collab with frei, and this pile of buchimaru. Then this pile of shadows for 2019. This year I’m keeping it extra simple lol im tired
I will stand by you
I will help you through
When you’ve done all you can do
If you can’t cope
I will dry your eyes
I will fight your fight
I will hold you tight
And I won’t let go.
I made it back to the hotel quick as I could, as promised. Much to my relief, there was a portion of sushi saved for me. I did my best to put on a brave face and make it look like this wasn’t a big deal, but I could tell how much everyone was concerned for me. Futaba and Ryuji digging through my things certainly made it easier to laugh it off at the very least and Makoto hasn’t left my side since I got back. Eventually, the festivities for the evening died down and the others went back to their own rooms, leaving the two of us alone together.
It’s hardly a moment after Haru shuts the door behind her that I collapse, leaning into the crook of Makoto’s neck. The tears start falling, my whole body shuddering from a sob before I force myself to regain some degree of composure. Her arms anchor me to reality and the soft look in her eye reminds me of just how much I’m cared for. Taking off my now tear-stained glasses, I hold one of her hands tightly in mine, my eyes glued to the floor.
“...I just- ...I didn’t think it was going to hit me as hard as it did, y’know? They threw me away and I hate them for it. I should be happy, finally getting away from them. So why does it- ...Why does it still hurt so much?!” The waterworks start up again and I can’t do more than cry against her shoulder for a solid minute.
Her hand combing through my frizzy mop of hair, I eventually manage to recover. It takes a few deep breaths and wiping off my face to get me back to conversational. I give her an appreciative smile as I squeeze her hand I’m still not ready to let go of.
“S-Sorry about this. I’m being an ass, complaining to you about my folks after you lost yours. ...But I appreciate you being here for me anyway. I love you, Makoto. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
And what a view it is. I could spend all day just drinking it in. But that would be a great disservice. As beautiful as my Queen is to be gazed upon, she’s even more charming when I can feel her.
I take her in my arms and hold her close, pressing a gentle kiss against her lips before brushing a lock of hair back behind her ear. “Guilty as charged. If she’s so inclined, I’d love to do quite a lot more with my honor student girlfriend.”
”Wanna explain the story behind this one man? Did you just have a dream about wanting to be John Wicke or some shit and this Persona rolled in sayin I got’chu homie? What can’t it dodge at this point!?”
“...I’m only holding onto it until I find something decent to fuse it with. Which is totally a waste of time because I could just stick something in solitary and get a Drain passive easy if I needed to cover a weakness that badly.”
“...These alarms are making me lose my mind, Ryuji. I don’t know what I did to deserve this...”
@makotoniijimaweek2018 Day2: Broadening Horizon
*The gang teaching Makoto how to play old maid*
Futaba: You two are pretty bad at this lmaooo
Ryuji/Makoto: Shut up
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