This week is going to give me heart attack if all these cool rumours don't stop coming!
Hmm, what's that? Sorry, I'm so used to being completely ignored and forgotten in the things that I beg for so even so much as hearing rumours of this has been enough to strike me blind, dumb and illiterate. There's simply no way that this is finally happening after years of begging from my end and just about every other hardcore JRPG fan out in the world today, as such I can only assume this is a cruel joke and/or misfiling that'll soon be cleared up. But man, the evidence sure is piling up on the positive end. I'm going to cut straight to the point today because I need to- Persona 5 Royal was just rated on Korean ratings Boards for release on Microsoft platforms. That would include Xbox, which would make that platform one step closer to being great, and much more importantly Microsoft Windows, The PC! Finally, are we going to get the game we've been begging for since the birth of Internet fan boying? Is the modern Persona journey finally going to be completed and, most importantly of all, will I stop haranguing ATLUS once this game comes out? Of course not, to that last one, then the begging moves onto a Persona 3 Remaster. Then... Persona Q, I guess? (By 2025 I'm going to be on the Persona 6 train, don't you worry.)
So what does this actually mean then? Well it means that one of the biggest sleeper hit Japanese JPRGs is finally going to be hitting the platform best for RPGs; PC. Now I've said this before but let me clarify what I mean; Role playing games tend to be extremely involved experiences that consume and spit out your free time before you have time to even process it. They don't like you to split your attention most of the time, they want you dedicated for hours at a time, and they'll tax your problem solving in the harshest of cases. Having them be on consoles sort of makes sense to this end, though I feel the PC audience, as a stereotype, are going to be more attuned to sitting down and working out stat values or reading a 50 minute long dialogue where the protagonist contributes to the conversations merely with variations of "But what do you mean?" as the villain reiterates forever. ('Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty' PC port when?) What that description absolutely precludes is handheld gaming, which is typically designed for quick bursts and 'whilst your doing something else moments'. And yet Shin Megami Tensi III (The parent series for Persona) got a Switch release. (huh.)
But I'm breaking things down for the choir, it would seem, because Persona 5: Royal could very well be less than a few days away and I'm honestly hyperventilating at the possibility. I remember when a similar Playstation-only holdout game finally made it's way to a new platform in 'Crash Bandicoot: The 'Nsane Trilogy'. Those games were Playstation exclusives, and classics, back in the day but when they were remastered it seemed almost silly to keep that classic away from the wider gaming world, and yet that's still what they did. Playstation exclusive, even for remasters. No one could have expected that holding pattern to change until, just like today, a leak came out which revealed a rating board's assessment for an Xbox version and before you knew it we were looking at Crash on the Xbox and PC. Of course, the PC version still isn't available on Steam and would have to be bought through the Microsoft store, but that's progress on Sony's part.
If I'm going to complain everytime that Sony hoards an exclusive game for themselves for a ridiculous amount of time, it's only fair that I praise them to for finally relenting. For clarification, I don't mind Sony turning around and publishing or acquiring an exclusive game every now and then, it's the way that things work in this business and they're just playing the game as it was laid out for them before they ever even joined the industry. But I don't think there's any real excuse for keeping a game as a Console exclusive indefinitely. It's asinine. We're in too big of a gaming world now, too many potential hands want to play the game and if it's exclusivity isn't lifted within a year it just makes it feel like you're trying to hold people hostage from the developers they want to support, and at that point you're just leeching off of dev's work. (Okay, first party published games can probably be justified as exclusive for multiple years; but they have to come to everyone else eventually.) Supporters like to bring up parallels with the TV streaming world, but to be clear there lies no real comparison outside of gaming for this set-up; it's a unique problem to us. No other movie or TV show requires you to shell out £500 for hardware.
I'm glad to say that's an argument that doesn't need to be had anymore, because I'm certain Persona 5 is on the way. Even aside from the smoking gun I just mentioned, there's also the fact that Persona 5 was recently spotted on the Xbox game store before being pulled down, which on it's own might have just been a false report lacking a screengrab as evidence, but in tandem with what we know might as well be explicit confirmation. It also lines up with the way that ATLUS handled this with 'Persona 4 Golden', in which they announced the game's PC port and dropped it the very same day, something which took a whole lot of behind-the-scenes shaking hands to line up in order to master. It's lining up again, once more on E3 day, and I couldn't be happier for this 'surprise drop' that everyone is anticipating with bated breath.
Speaking of Persona 4 Golden, there's a game that I haven't spoken all that much about since I first picked it up on this blog, and you might be wondering why that is. Not too long after the initial purchase I posted a blog gushing about how I'd fallen for the game, but I didn't do a follow up review. Well the reason is because even now I'm still not finished with the game, and my love hasn't abated at all, it's just grown personal. It almost feels odd to share my journey through Persona 4 Golden given that so much of it isn't really about big set-piece moments, but more about how the day-to-day shapes us and how our relationships blossom. If I were to write another blog talking about Persona 4, it would literally have been going over everything I'd already covered but reiterating how this doesn't feel repetitive but gloriously natural and finely crafted. I'd be praising writing and pacing, which I've already done, and I think a Persona 4 return blog is only really justified once I'm going for a review; which at this rate is going to be getting penned after 5 is in my hands. (And I have no problem with that whatsoever.)
I'm mentioned it before, but Persona 5's gang of misfit cat burglars stole my heart years ago with that initial reveal trailer. Having never played or even heard of Persona before that day, watching that trailer was like an awakening to me for how fun and exciting it all looked, even when there wasn't any actual gameplay footage. From that point I avariciously devoured everything I could about the game until the heart breaking realisation that this was going to be a Playstation exclusive, after which I grumbled and tried to forget about a game which had swooped me up so effortlessly. Because that's pretty much how such things work on me, I don't rush out to sell a kidney so that I can afford the new console, I swallow the heartache. (Does exclusivity really drive up sales that much?) Coming around to the game is like filling a long-gouged void in my stomach, and I'm relieved to be granted such a reprieve.
Though as I've mentioned this doesn't mean that the struggle is over. There's plenty of titles being unfairly held hostage over on their consoles by the respective platform owner and it's becoming a thorn to have to deal with. At least with the various store exclusivities on the PC there isn't a stupid hardware cost you have to cover, it's merely a bad look, with consoles it's a real problem. What's more, this really does seem to be the direction that Sony is leading the industry and Microsoft seems eager to follow suit. What a stupid clash of dumb titans that us consumers really shouldn't have to pay the price for, but such is the consequence when the money men take the reins. But I refuse to end this on a sour note, rejoice around the land for the liberation of a brilliant RPG and let me know any exclusives you're hoping will soon join the lands of the free. (FF7R- fingers crossed!)
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