Persona 3 Portable Review

"I can sense death!"

When I fell for Persona, as described in my last review, the plan was very simple; I was going to play through Golden and when the time came, move on to Persona 5: The game I had waited nearly 5 years for. But plans are plans and reality is something else entirely and when the time came I had to really confront the situation and ask myself: do I really want to play through Persona 5 and have 3 waiting for me, or play through Persona 3 and have 5 waiting for me? It really sounds like a matter of basic numericals but some more matter did play into my decision. Keeping lightly to promotional material I dove into both games and and actually found the basic described premise of Persona 3 more intriguing. "What if I told you there was a hidden hour between one day and the next called the Dark Hour"? Who doesn't want to know what that's all about? And after Persona 4 absolutely wowed me with it's use of thematic symbolism and pathos- what was there to lose?

One sacrifice of my schedule later and I could delve into one of the most contentious ports that ATLUS has put out yet. Contentious why? Perhaps due to the fact that the company decided the best version of the game to port to PC was going to be Persona 3 'Portable'; the version created for PSP. What's the problem there then? Well, as the Playstation Portable was such an archaic piece of hardware, the port for Persona 3 on that platform had to give up a lot of it's more taxing systems in order to run smoothly. Namely; the open world. That's right, no navigating the world as you come to love the town you exist in- everything is navigated through menus and selection across screen grabs of what these backgrounds would have looked like if they were rendered. That also means all in-engine cutscenes, anything that would have 3D models, including all impactful scenes and SL link meetings, are conducted on background slides with nothing but the text box to inform you about any events happening in the scene.

Now if that sounds frustrating, I actually think it's a little worse than that. I actually think this kills the impact of some of the coolest reading scenes in the game. Especially coupled with the fact that, increadibly, ATLUS couldn't even fit the anime cutscenes on the game disk either! That means iconic moments, such as the very first moment the protagonist is forced to confront the monstrous 'Shadows' is performed entirely in somewhat flat text descriptions with the impassioned VO and music layered on top like this is a lazy-man's VN. Without seeing my character physically interacting in the world I'm a little robbed of my place within it and personally I struggled to connect with the members of the SEES team of Persona 3 quite as staunchly as I did the defenders of Inaba from Persona 4. Although the port is only a part of the issue, we'll get there...

But what Persona 3 Portable does have which makes it an interesting idea for a port, is the playable female protagonist who changes the course of the plot in subtle ways, with certain new characters that only she can meet and interact with. Think of it as an alternative storyline. But then also simultaneously dash that idea, because I believe one of the side games literally features a moment where she and the male protagonist cross paths so... alternate universe? Portable also comes with a plethora of features that have become series standard, such as the ability to directly control your teammates and- wait, you couldn't control your teammates in the original? That's- wow, yeah I can see why ATLUS didn't want to 

expose anyone to that sort of torment...

However, it is kind of disappointing that ATLUS did the bare minimum of making this port functional on PCs. Certainly remixing the open world elements of the original into this modern day port would be a decent bit of work on their end... but it would at least be the definitive way to experience this storyline. Whatsmore, Persona 3 Portable doesn't feature the epilogue chapter that the first rerelease of the game, Persona 3 FES, does; leaving the ending feeling weird and incomplete. Because it absolutely is. I had my creeping suspicions about what the end was alluding to, and it sucks that I had to read a synopsis to confirm I was totally right- which in turn makes the ending feel entirely hollow for it's bizarre (feels like there's more story here) conclusion. Although... I'm not that upset. Which is probably the worst part of it all. If Persona 4 had this sort of problem I would be devastated. I loved the characters so much that not being able to experience every nook and cranny of their story would feel like a dagger right in my heart, but for Persona 3... the blood just doesn't run that thick.

Persona 3 presents the mystery of a secret hour known as the 'Dark Hour' perceptible only to those with 'the potential'. (Persona summoning potential, obviously) Taking one quick look at the concept of 'the Dark Hour' pretty much lays the key theme of this game out for all to see- All normal citizens metamorphize into coffins, totally oblivious to the events of the mysterious hour, all operating systems stand still, and the game's central school morphs into a giant tower known as 'Tartarus': The mythological Greek land of the dead. (Or the most grim part of it, to be specific.) And if all that wasn't obvious enough, protagonists of Persona 3 can't just summon their Personas like Jojo cast members, they have to force it out of their bodies by using an 'Evoker' (which is essentially a gun) and shooting it out of themselves. Typically by putting the gun to their head and blasting the Persona out. Everytime they need to summon it. (It's amazing how quickly you become desensitized to watching high school kids shoot themselves in the head. Hmm... I don't like that sentence I just wrote. But it's the thought that Persona 3 leaves me with.)

Rounding back on that 'Tartarus', that there lies the central dungeon at the heart of the Persona 3 mystery and the grinding spot you'll be forcing your way through during the length of the story. Every month an 'operation' will demand your immediate attention, but those only serve as significant story bumps that unlock the next character, and section of Tartarus. You'll be coming back to this place (thankfully the only place that Persona 3 Portable managed to render in intact 3D) throughout the entire school year to pump up levels, fight dozens of painful minibosses and shoring yourself up for the unknowable threat of the next storyline boss. To that end I actually think the concept of Tartarus is actually quite clever. A testing ground in which if your party is capable of reaching the cut-off barrier to the next section, they'll definitely be strong enough to face the next story boss the game will throw your way. I'm not sure if I like that idea more than the unlocked themed dungeons that Persona 4 had, but I certainly am sure that I like the execution less.

Because, my god does Tartarus get repetitive! Even as the enemies become tougher and more varied and the environments change, the music is always the same. You can change it for a bit manually, but everytime you re-enter those tracks will reset. And grinding is robbed of some of it's mindless pleasure thanks to the 'Elizabeth Requests' (Which can be 'Theodore Requests' if you pick the female protagonist) that task you to do a plethora of mindless tasks, many of which is grinding random drop-rates up and down Tartarus for rare item drops, really rare golden hand enemies, or rare drops from annoying sparse enemy types. (Persona 4 had the same sort of quests, but at least they were a little rarer. Elizabeth dishes them out like she's your damn shift manager!) And there's also the 'Shuffle Time' system for winning fights with 'pile on' attacks- which presents annoying minigames instead of just letting you select the bonus arcana card you want. Overall, Tartarus is a bit of a pain. Not in any overwhelmingly offensive way, but with a procession of small cuts that add up into a bit of a bad gash after a time.

I can only thank the lucky stars that Persona 3 Portable is freely of the frankly garish 'Tiredness system' which plagued the original game. With that, characters would have a chance of becoming 'tired' after every battle depending on what level they were; with a 'tired' debuff effecting everything from hit-rate, to damage output to received healing. It essentially made you a vegetable. And the only way to recover? To leave Tartarus, sacrificing a day, and then spend the next day sleeping in bed, sacrificing two days. Totally horrific! In P3P, Tiredness only hits after you've left Tartarus, or if you allow a teammate to die and don't revive them before leaving the floor. Much more concussive to endgame grinding. The original system sounds like a genuine crime against RPG humanity.

Oh, and did I mention the Grim Reaper? Making his debut in the land of the dead, the Reaper serves as your incentive not to stick around any floor of Tartarus for too long; as in, more than 10 minutes. (Although there are some ways to summon him early.) The Grim Reaper will bee-line his way to you and attack you with a moveset and life bar strong enough to make end-game veterans blush. He is chaos incarnate, but the fact that facing him requires 10 minute waiting intervals is perhaps the biggest slap the Persona franchise has handed my thus far. Nothing is worse, in gaming, than wasting time for no gain. I have no idea how Persona 5 is going to handle it's Reaper iteration, but good god I hope some sort of lesson was learned because this is not how it's done!

Much as with the Persona subseries of Shin Megami Tensei as a whole, Persona 3 immerses it's players with a cast of high school classmates, the main cast of which are also secret members of SEES; a organisation dedicated to learning the secret truth of the Dark Hour and eliminating the shadows who roam the streets feeding on the emotions of the unwitting during that static hour and leaving them afflicted with unbreakable 'apathy syndrome'. (A little 'blunt force' with that metaphor, but okay.) It's a bit more 'secret agent task force' than the group of friends who teamed up in Persona 4, and the 3 cast were mostly around before you even showed up, making the protagonist feel like more of a tag-along than a central figure. (A feeling I don't think the narrative ever really successfully shakes.)

That being said, I think the main cast themselves are yet again a great and interesting lot. Mitsuru is the senpai of the team, a rich girl heiress raised under the weight of the responsibility of being the face of a prestigious organisation and struggling to relate with her classmates consequentially. Yukari is the popular girl with deep ties to the Dark Hour that she uses as both her strength and clings to as her weakness. And Junpei is your typical 'school friend' character who is revealed to be a little overshadowed and searching for purpose in a way that makes him latch onto being a Persona user with all of his might. Again, there are a whole cast of characters who I don't want to spoil, but I cannot move on without mentioning the best main character, Aigis, who's exploration into humanity and the purpose of life may not be groundbreaking but it's perhaps the most heartfelt growth you experience due to it's central importance to the narrative. Even if some of the emotional highs make actually no sense which slightly ruins them in my lens. (I appreciate the idea of what it represents- but how can she just start crying on a whim? That- she doesn't have- Argh!)

I think the real problem with this cast of characters comes from the slightly peculiar way that Persona 3 handles it's social links, firstly every main character can be interacted with to build a relationship, but only if you max out one of the related attribute skills, which is a considerable time investment which could have been spent, you know, actually getting to know the people you're risking life and limb alongside! You literally fight to the death alongside Yukari and you're telling me she's so worried about her 'image' that she won't even hang out with you after school unless you are 'charming' enough to talk her into it? But that's only the issue of getting the S-Link to begin with, then there's the contents themselves...

In typical Persona fashion, you slowly become closer with those around you by getting to know them and ranking up your social link. The higher the rank, the deeper into their soul you'll peer until they've bared all and you've had an effect in shaping who they are- bonding the two of you for life. But Persona 3 has a particularly... 2007 approach to it's writing. For one; both protagonists, male and female, are incapable of forming relationships with cast mates of the same gender. Meaning that even though characters like Junpei are positioned to be 'friend' characters to the male protagonist, he can't actually hang out enough with him to get to know the guy, so he only ever really feels like an acquaintance. This is because every single social link is written under the impression that you, the protagonist, are actively trying to romance the related character. Which is... problematic.

Why is that problematic? Well, remember that the cast of Persona 3 is made up of several male and female characters- meaning that if you want to rank up your Social Links- a necessary step to unlocking the top Personas of the related Arcana trees which is vial for the endgame- you need to start building a harem and romance everything with a heartbeat. There's even a 'cheating system' built into the game where one girl who's grown attached to you will become angry if you go a certain amount of days not talking to her or speak to another girl instead- as if the developers knew what a bizarre approach this was to take and committed anyway. Of course, the female protagonist alone posses the ability to form platonic bonds- but the male can't help himself- he just attaches to any girl who'll have him. (I guess there's something relatable there.)

This has the knock on effect of tainting the writing of these S-links. Because whereas the top ranks are usually dedicated to some epiphany moment wherein the associated character gradually connects with their inner self and is somewhat transformed- but with the approach that Persona 3 takes those higher tiers are instead dedicated to each character revealing their affection towards you which- I've got to be honest, I'm not even sure why they start feeling that way to begin with. The Persona 3 protagonist is not the leader guiding SEES, he's doesn't take much of an active role in main narrative events, a lot of key character conversations take place when he isn't even present, and without being able to see his presence in the world (Thanks Portable!) it kind of feels like you're just a heavy hitter wildcard who has the ability to change their Persona and that's the only point of interest about you. Until the final act, of course, but what draws people to you before that?

The side cast S-links of Persona 3 are pretty interesting as well, from a terminally ill young boy struggling to find purpose, to a young grade-school girl trapped in a sad home circumstance that she is frustrating powerless to effect. The drunk Monk who replaced his heart with alcohol, the sporty kid who places achievement and momentary prestige above long-term health and the best friend (who honestly seems closer to the protagonist than Junpei, as sad as that is) who's only real struggle in life in his indomitable teacher crush and his delusional tendencies which feed that doomed 'relationship'. They and the others are all solidly written and fun to get to know, with poignant apotheosis moments attached at the maxing of their S-links- which is what I would have hoped for from the main cast. The only character I flat-out didn't like was the Gourmet King- I found him and his story just stupid. Oh, and Vincent from 'Catherine' shows up in a wild cameo. And 'Margaret' from Persona 4. Both games that came out several years after Persona 3, which is pretty cool. Discovering the history of Persona backwards is really providing a lot of Easter eggs I would have otherwise brushed right by.

One point of the gameplay that I will commend Persona 3 on without 'backhanding' the compliment are the bosses. That is, the main game bosses. They're all increadibly creative, not just in their 'arcana related' design but the way you have to use your team to defeat them despite party weaknesses or enemy strengths. A stand-out has to be 'Fortune', and the weird 'roulette wheel' game you have to play simultaneously whilst fighting him and 'Strength'. And I think the final encounter is drawn out but rewarding if you get to the point of mastery enough to be able to trade those blows. I far over levelled for her (I thought I was going to beat the mega bosses, but the various S-link requirements to even get close made me realise that I needed to just new game + it if I really wanted to go that route.) and that fight still ran on for ages before I could get the upper hand. And then there are the side bosses.

Your progress up Tartarus is impeded by certain 'side bosses' who count as 'skill check' walls that if you can beat prove your team is strong enough to face the equivalent story event coming up, like I discussed. However these bosses aren't particularly interesting, mostly just bigger versions of level enemies whom (thanks to the way that 'analysis' works in Persona 3) you can't strategize for without annoying trial and error in the moment. (Unless you memorise what Arcana is typically weak to what, but even that is an imperfect system- these side bosses play by their own rules nearer to the top.) I understand their purpose and I've already praised it as worthwhile game design- but good god why did there have to be so many? I think I had to kill somewhere close to twenty five just to climb up Tartarus, and they were never more than a groan-inducing necessity to progression that rarely felt fun to face. Which seems to be the same for point a lot with this game, doesn't it? Great idea, curious execution. Not always bad, but definitely curious.

 

As I 'subtly' implied earlier without spelling it out; death and the way we choose to confront it and it's inevitability is a key theme to Persona 3; as is the way way we choose how to live our lives and the value we find in those days alive. Persona 3, once again, does a fantastic job exploring these themes in a manner that unravels naturally and thus has a chance to settle and ferment in the heart, as well as abruptly in it's climax through a confrontation which wields allegory like a club. I actually really like this approach that imbues it's message and stands proud alongside it, it helps make the heavily symbolic design of the game feel satisfying and worthwhile by the end. Although Persona 3's narrative doesn't slide into place quite as neatly as 4's did in its final moments. With some extended reading it seems like an FES port would have done a much better job tying up those loose ends, and I'm not even talking about that direct loose end at the final moments of the game. (To be fair, that scene was just blatant enough that I was more questioning if the allegory was supposed to be literal. Which FES reveals it very much was.) Alas, P3P has left me a little unsatisfied in some of the most nagging places. 

Once again the music is just brilliant, featuring a lot more harsh musical genres with a lot more atmospheric and more aggressive tracks than 4. (Or maybe I just noticed 3's more because Tartarus has that single repetitive soundtrack it keeps reverting to.) The living world themes are all great too, if slightly more 'of their decade' than 4's soundtrack. Don't get me wrong, they're not like '2000's pop rock' level, but you can recognise the environment they spawned from. I particularly took notice of the garbled English in this game's soundtrack, which I recently heard rumours of is intentional throughout the Persona franchise in order to create solid sounding music tracks with lyrics that a Japanese audience wouldn't understand and read too much into, and which an English audience might hear, but be unable to decipher unless they literally looked up the lyrics. Which is a pretty cool premise if true. Oh, and once again the final theme of the game which plays during the credits, Kimi no Kioku, just absolutely slaps. God, I love that they always save their best material for the credits, I can't wait to see what Persona 5 has in store! Oh, and the male singer who sometimes appears in the tracks is 'Lotus Juice' whom I instantly recognised as the voice behind 'Overdrive' from Jojo Battle Tendency. This time the reference is unintentional because this game was released years before the Anime for Jojo was even conceptualised, but I love that extra bit of connective tissue between two of my favourite franchises.

Summary

My summation may come as a bit of a shock, because reading through my thoughts you may have come to the conclusion that I didn't like my time with Persona 3; but you would be absolutely wrong. I compare my experience to the unmatched heights of Persona 4, and all my gripes are reasons why this game doesn't hit that same apex. But even then, shooting for the top still lands this game high. I think the story is great, the writing is solid, the soundtrack is fantastic, the combat is surprisingly nearly as good as a modern JRPG. The issues I've expressed are not, in any way, game ruining- and if anything each one are feasible fixes that a prospective upcoming remake could iron out. Persona 3 Portable would not be, in my opinion, the ideal way to play this game. Even with the unique Female protagonist, which is a cool addition, Persona 3 FES is literally more canon. Persona 4 had dialogue directly referencing FES content- we should have gotten a port of that game. Still, being able to experience Persona 3 is some fashion has granted me a chance to play a game which many consider formative to their person, and though Persona 3 didn't resonate with me on that level (which is the level Persona 4 hit me at, by the way) I can totally understand why, in it's best form, this game might have done just that. Ultimately, I'm going to give Persona 3 Portable a A- Grade on my arbitrary ranking system, still solidly landing greatness but not quite reaching my fresh-hold for a truly legendary title.  That being said, I absolutely recommend the game- it's a fantastic JRPG in every sense of the word and a great place to start your exploration into the world of Shin Megami Tensei if that's a direction you want to pursue. Honestly, it's a testament to how good this game was that even though it left me dissatisfied- it also has left me increadibly eager to try that apparent remake ATLUS is cooking up knowing that a few modern changes in direction (and perhaps an extended epilogue that stretches the story just a bit past FES's conclusion) could easily make this game every bit as near-perfect as Persona 4. Once again, the Persona franchise does not disappoint.