Persona 5... 3?

Huh?

Wait, no- we were promised a sequel. As in a proper sequel. After waiting all this time for ATLUS to stop dragging their feet and announce that they are even thinking about making a Persona 6, another licenced team have slipped out of the nether realms to announce what appears to be a direct sequel to Persona 5. But that in itself is a bit of a red herring, because Persona already had a sequel called 'Persona 5 Strikers'. So what in Arsène's name is 'Persona 5: The Phantom X' then? This franchise's own 'Persona 5: Lightning Returns'? (I still think that was one of the worst Final Fantasy game names of all time.) Ah, why am I complaining? More reasons to jump into one of my favourite universes of all time, with one of my favourite styles of game design, is always a boon in my books. I mean, even if it looks like more-of-the-same, that's never a total negative to me! Fallout New Vegas got the same criticism when it was shown off, only to prove that content matters far more than appearances when it turned out to be the greatest game in it's respective franchise! What could be so questionable as to make my faith in the Persona game series waver?

Its... it's a mobile game? Oh no... I should have known this day was coming. It was obvious, really. Live Services and mobile games are always a big hit for the Japanese audiences, even if the rest of the world recoils in disgust from the platform after being burned countless times. Japanese developers have to make games that cater for their immediate demographic, it's a surprise that there aren't more exclusive Final Fantasy mobile games to be honest. (Although there are already a few). It's just a heart breaker- to see potential for a new solid game entry be whittled down to the cramped and ugly confines of a 'mobile gam'e- and the reason why is borne purely from my prejudice to this platform, I'll be honest; but man, do I have precedent! It's not as though modern mobiles aren't capable of holding well made games- heck you can literally play Genshin Impact on mobile phones, and PUBG- it's just that mobile exclusives always let you down in the most important way.

To say what I mean, I should start my saying that 'Persona 5: The Phantom X' is not a throw away trash phone title like that terrible city builder Final Fantasy XV game. This is a real playable title, with RPG battles, inbetween socialisation breaks throughout the city and a real written-out narrative with some actual full-animated cutscenes. This isn't a throw away title by any stretch of the imagination and I imagine the developers wanted to make a game of worth and purpose within the Persona 5 sub-universe which I would love to get my hands upon. But when it comes to putting any game on the mobile platform it's almost as though a switch of regard to the audience just flips in the creator's heads. They have to make it free-to-play in order to match the market, and that means they have to find the most invasive, and pervasive way to sully the play experience begging for monetary funds from their audience. The more grubby the tactic, the better the performance of the game on the soulless board of 'money made'.

But my god do I love Persona. So much so, that I am willing and ready pretend the inevitable actually won't be the case for this game. Just looking at the gameplay trailer recently released, though it's all in Japanese, I get those stinging call backs to that colourful and evocative game which stole my heart the second I saw it with a teaser trailer. It's not quite to the visual flourishes of the original game mind you, a title which ruled it's themes with masterful aplomb in it's colouration and music, but this new entry looks as though it's leeching off the greatest of a title that had plenty to go around. Apparently some with a better understand of the language than I have said that some of the story snippets in the gameplay trailer seem to touch on somewhat similar themes as well, which is why it makes sense keeping this new cast of characters tied to the P5 world, however I do find it exceedingly curious that the Velvet Room seems to have adopted a distinct attendant who is missing nearly all the hallmarks of traditional attendants aside from the uniform. (How curious) And though I think the new Penguin mascot doesn't hold a candle to Morgana or Teddy, (it looks too... militant) I can see myself coming around to... accepting his presence with prolonged exposure.

At it's heart, what gives a mobile game it's vampiric thirst for cash injections is the desire for those titles to be constantly supported via integrated servers. For some reason every single mobile game under the sun is running with servers so expensive that unless the team are making multiple hundreds of thousands a month, that game just isn't worth the development time or resources to keep continuing. And I fully understand 'moving on because making a new game would be more profitable', obviously; but why do all these mobile games have to then be shut offline? (Am I still mad about Elder Scrolls Legends, you bet I am!) Although by that very same merit, the inherently live-service style of mobile games would probably slide into the Persona formula in a really unique way if the team can pull it off.

Think about it: living through the daily life of a school kid slowly improving their talents and relationships between bouts to the otherworld in a narrative that unfolds itself in seasonal chapters spaced out over a few years- that really would make a lot of sense given the framing structure of what Persona actually is. Of course, the narrative would have to be written in a manner that is satisfying in each one of those released chunks, but the general formula of a typical Persona game does already kind of play into that supposed model. You embark on investigations into certain characters which culminates in a progressive dungeon based and themed around that target's larger personal insecurities. Only instead of that resolution leading onto the next chapter immediately, it could lead onto a 'too be continued' cliffhanger, which the Persona story enjoyed doing anyway.

It's really going to be the actual inbetween gameplay elements where the game makes or breaks itself. Persona has a very clearly defined JRPG playstyle of statically linear weapon and level improvements spruced up by a splice and combine 'spirits' system for in-battle complexity. This system is tested throughout countless RPGs, it's complete and it works just fine. What I'm trying to say is, throwing in a rarity system and endless loot drops would not only be creatively lazy, it would sully a gameplay model that doesn't need replacing. This needs to be said, because like the Ubisoft open world design method this crutch of design is becoming honestly painfully overdone to the point where even the titles in which it belongs, like the upcoming Diablo IV, are starting to feel stale for merely sharing the larger industries woes. I need some RPG developer out there to solve the problem of how to create prolonged improvement without resorting to the lowest common denominator of design. Convince me that this industry still consists of artists and problem solvers, not mathematicians and financial experts.

Persona is a beloved franchise of mine; for which I pray on hoping for a new entry that will alight it's fame clear across the industry as much as Yakuza 0 did for Ryu Ga Gotoku. And whilst Persona 5's applause and success was already a big moment for ATLUS, one which they clearly aren't ready to move on from judging by the two sequel games they've got based around it- I know that a global synchronous release of a brand new Persona 6 will propel their brand to heights that company couldn't  currently dream of. So in my heart, ignoring my head, this mobile game is a stepping stone on the way to a smash hit 6. When I look at it that way, I can feign ignorance to the baggage that any mobile game invites into the equation simply by being itself. Hey, at least Joker is going to be in it- right?