I think one of the problems with the take of, “3 = best story, 4 = best characters, 5 = best gameplay” is that people start acting like other aspects of each game are unimportant as if these games can’t be great in multiple ways. Every persona game I’ve played so far has had extremely compelling storytelling, characters, and gameplay.
I’ve actually played all of these games and agree with what each game does best, but I also agree with your comment. Yeah, for example, persona 3 has the “best story”, but the gameplay and the characters along with the story is what makes it a good game.
@IolZ555gameplay? The clues/quests were tedious and the combat is pretty weak among of the modern games. It really boils down to Phys Spam after a point because Magic is pretty buns with no equivalent to Shift/Baton Pass.
@IolZ555It really doesn't. A third of the story is filled with no meaningful story progression besides new characters, said characters are underdeveloped unless you do their social links (an issue no other game in the franchise has nearly as bad as 4) and the gameplay is probably the third weakest after 2 and 3 FES
@TheDracolordianI've played persona since persona 4 golden. Played persona 4 golden, persona 3 and reload, persona 5, persona 5 royal and persona 5 tactics. P4g is brilliant, p3 is shite. Persona 3 reload is brilliant, persona 5 og isn't good and persona 5 royal is brilliant. Can't stand tactical games so p5t sucks
Or because most people see an objective truth 💀 P5 has the best gameplay bc it is 8 years younger than 4 and 12 than 3 if I’m not mistaken. So it is objective that it is better in terms of gameplay. P4 has more likeable characters because its a goofier game. Its basically the whole cast being the Persona bro stereotype. Which makes them more likeable than the rest. P3 has a more serious story with higher stakes and it is the most Shin Megami Tensei out of the bunch, while having outdated and annoying mechanics(bc at the time they were experimental and later refined in the sequels). And the characters for the most part aren't as likeable as either P4 or P5. They are forgettable except for their design and besides Aegis and maybe Junpei none of the main cast really sticks out in too much of a positive light. Also they are all kind of jerks.
@@xornedge8204 None of what you said is objective though it's just a consensus that people made up in their heads. Persona 5's gameplay is good but it also has way too gaddang much and doesn't think about the balance. Persona 4 characters are goofy and I enjoy that but that's personally not something I look for in a cast to be good. The P3 cast is so good to me BECAUSE they aren't that close at first and get actual on screen development with each other that ties them together. I do like P3's story but I don't agree with the notion that P4 or P5's story's are bad at all. Especially P5, in my eyes it's a fantastic borderline movie experience and it does what it's trying to do well.
THE THING YOU SAID NEAR THE END IS SO TRUE, THOUGH. Like... I liked Persona 3 a lot. It has compelling themes, and so much deliberate thought put into how everything feeds into the big picture. I did play Reload first, and I do think it was a great experience, but I've really appreciated the love you give to FES, even if it's not something I can see myself having as much fun with due to personal tastes. That being said, as someone whose favorite Persona character is Akechi despite having consumed P1 - P5R in some form and thus knowing the others, it gets so grating when people act like Persona 5's writing is somehow the worst in the series when a lot of its writing problems come down to some of the localization choices or, more commonly, people not engaging with the game's writing from a Japanese cultural context (see again: Akechi). Mind you, I played Royal and not vanilla P5, which has the benefit of Akechi being much more fleshed out, in addition to extra scenes helping flesh out the Phantom Thieves' friendships as well as the excellent third semester, but even then, I see a lot of "P5's villains are unrealistic" comments... and then I look at real people in the world (politicians, billionaires and CEOs, etc) and I'm like "nah, this is hilariously true to reality. Some of the worst people in the world are just as 'cartoonish' in their absurdity." I do think that Kaneshiro is a weak antagonist, mind, and not every arc is good as the rest, and the November Akechi text messages you ONLY get by delaying Sae's Palace infiltration to 11/13 should've been scripted because they explain so much... But what really grates on me in these fan discussions is the kind of hive mind mentality you see, where people repeat the same takes again and again without giving it their own personal spin. I love Aigis, and I think she's incredibly charming, but my favorite P3 character is Ken, in large part due to his excellent linked episode in Reload. I think he's really compelling and tragic due to his age and just how far he was willing to go. I'm a latecomer to the fandom, but it makes me sad to see Ken often infantalized or shat on without actively engaging in what his character represents, the same way that people refuse to look at how Akechi in P5R serves as the ultimate extreme example of what happens to kids who are trampled over by society and left without support systems, the same way the Thieves might have ended up if they didn't find each other (Yusuke even points this out after the engine room). With P4, I think the most frustrating part with Kanji is that I don't think a queer reading necessarily undermines the purpose of his arc... if you read him as bisexual or pansexual (he does show interest in Naoto before the Reveal), but Kanji's arc is such an important exploration of toxic masculinity and how it can negatively impact kids who fall outside of what's seen as acceptable. To act like it's *just* about sexuality really ignores the greater purpose of his arc, and I honestly think he has the best realized arc out of P4's main party, whereas my main gripes with Naoto is how much the writing goes "lol Naoto girl" and obsesses over things like her chest size after her dungeon. But I think every Persona game has its moments of jank writing like that, and these things are worth discussing, but I think the healthiest discussions are the ones that are done in good faith rather than just oversimplifying things. It's why I tend to just hang in smaller subsets of the fandom rather than in larger parts of it because it's just a lot less draining when a fandom this massive is always bound to have a vocal minority with questionable takes. On the gameplay front, I do like P5R the best, but a lot of that does come down to the flow of baton passes and technicals and the added reward you get from engaging in its battle system. The presentation also goes a long way, and I like how immersive the Palaces feel with their stealth and puzzle mechanics, but I don't think every Persona game needs to be another P5 when they can find their own balance or identity. tl;dr: Good video, lots to think about.
The repeated takes perfectly illustrates how unusually sensitive the Persona community is when hearing different opinions. Like we can have our disagreements, but there's no need to be so... intense. It's a fucking video game, bruh. I do agree with 2/3 of consensus being characters and gameplay. My favorite story outta the 3 (modern Persona games anyway) is P5 but holy crap, it feels like if you even dare imply that P5 has good story or characters ppl will take up their pitchforks and headhunt you. I even heard that one person on Twitter deactivated because they got attacked for expressing their love for P5 and THAT was just... disgusting And even if I agree with 2/3 of the consensus, there's definitely more to say regarding those. I could go in depth to P4's main party because I related to almost EVERYONE'S in IT's struggles one way or another. Heck, do ppl even remember that P4's shadows are also a mixture of society's views on them which explains why Rise's was a literal stripper? Don't even get me started on how stories like Naoki's or Hisano's are so underrated. Or the myriad of varied activities P5 have in its social sim and the little details like how every game you play in Joker's room have different mini games or how Joker's activities to improve himself such as physical training in his room or mental training at the shrine has smaller stories of him gradually improving, even trying different things when talking about the physical training. And even if P3 isn't my favorite story, there's interesting stuff happening in it BEFORE the final month. Ken's story anyone? Hell, Reload's new Shinjiro content makes that story hit even harder! What about watching the video of Yukari's father for the first time and learning more on how the Dark Hour happened, as well as how that affected Yukari afterwards? Stuff like this is why I'm glad I don't interact with the Persona community as much as I used to. My mind never felt more clearer the moment I just chose not to interact with those always trying to force opinions on you rather than accepting that different viewpoints can exist.
It’s definitely something I’ve noticed with the Persona fandom. Some people are cool, but too many let their passion override their better judgement. Pretty ironic considering one of the main messages of P4.
@@magnusprime962 It's SO ironic. Whenever Kanji or Naoto discussion pops up, I always keep that irony in my head to have a laugh. Y'all are literally being the people the game is warning about! 😂
The fact that people don’t even acknowledge P5’s story (ESPECIALLY THE ROYAL PART) makes me so upset. I do believe 3’s is better but that’s just because it was so much more relatable to my life, but the prospect of government corruption and the loss of free will as a story is sooo good and served as a precautionary tale of what the world could become with its themes.
It's quite ironic that the games which talks about breaking away from societies standards, facing yourself and finding peace for how you are has a community of people how hold them as the main stardard and fight with eachother when they disagree.
@@brunobarreto5256 what can I say, Yaldabaoth and Izanami were both right I guess (not serious). But I personally share the take with OP. I played P5 after P2, P3 and P4 but I found that story on a personal and external level the most compelling and P5R sealed the deal for me. They are all great don’t kill me and I love them all (look at my pfp). People just seem to yearn for security in their status of being “correct” instead of embracing the freedom of being “wrong” and what it allows in self development of taste. Metaphor may have beat my P5R story superiority take but that’s just based on my experience. We need some major changes as people.
I wish people would talk about P5's NON-Dungeon related gameplay. Tokyo has a lot to do and feels so alive. The confidant' giving you abilities incentivizes players to not just focus on their party member's links and makes them more memorable, which I feel like is a part of the reason P4's side cast is so forgotten. I especially agree with the flow and momentum part when it comes to the fights. The P3 party already had great synergy, but P5 takes it to another level. Every single party member (At least from the base roster of Phantom Thieves) work so well together that any team comp is viable because of the way they're tailored around using technicals.Then Royal added passive skills on top of that to make them have even more synergy. The fact that using two physical attackers on the same team, each with relatively low magic damage and having them use their magic skills for reasons beyond targeting weakness is a good idea is a VERY good example of how well made the combat in P5 is. In my opinion, once you learn how the combat works, all the Persona games become easy, but P5 is the only one that stays fun after that point
Super based. I laughed so hard when you asked if people can even inflict technicals or check the settings because I cant lie I've seen that in real time with friends
yep. It is crazy how little people actually look. And it isn't only settings. Often times people will overlook entire mechanics or upgrade systems if they aren't carefully explained to you. My girlfriend who is a pretty thurough gamer all things considered has played Mass Effect 3 for 55 hours before she knew that she could upgrade weapons. And she only learned that because I told her after seeing that she ran around with unupgraded stuff in late game areas. Thjis isn't unique to her. So many people just never check.
@@reksravenI’m not gonna lie…. I didn’t know you could upgrade weapons in me3. I guess that’s more of a game balance issue though, because I never felt like playing was too hard and I figured that the attachaments were the upgrades
I have seen a guy stopped using technicals at after mid game. When i asked why he said non of them works. Dude you have passives and traits for a reason, USE THEM.
Gamers want games to be acknowledged as art so bad but then pick and choose what parts of the game count as art depending on the title and how much they enjoy it, pretty irritating ngl
Yep. I think it is weird to me that people seem to only hail media as art if it just has traditionally accepted art alongside it. Even highly praised games like Nier:Automata are only seen as "art" because of their writing and less because of their gameplay. Even though gameplay is what makes videogames a unique artform.
Lies, there's no "gamers" consensus, most of this comes from journos and vocal circles on social media, what if I told you video games should be entertainment first and art a distant second? I bet most "gamers" just want fun video game, not art.
@@Gigamokin There are a lot of non-"journos" that talk about games like art. Some might argue there are more people who aren't journalists who want to see games talked about as art. So extrapolating from there most people want games to be art. Most gamers I know want games to be recognized as art and dislike games that are products first i.e. AAA stuff. People didn't love Nier because it was a nice product. But fake little gamer bois like you will not comprehend. (I am also more confrontational right now because I hate people who use the word "Journos" unironically)
Persona 3's story has so many parallels to Neon Genesis Evangelion that I can't help but think this is intentional. But what makes this a _good_ thing is where they _differ._ Evangelion shows characters slowly succumbing to their psychological issues and it basically ends in disaster. Persona 3 is the opposite: It shows (most of) the characters _overcoming_ those same issues and it ends on a hopeful note. It reads more like a response to Evangelion than a ripoff of it.
I’m not saying that there’s no influence there, but eva is not the first nor the most close to p3’s story. Hell 2 did the same concept (albeit with some key differences) as three
Parroting ideas is legitimately one of my biggest pet peeves. People don’t know how to think for themselves and don’t care to learn how. Here, some hot-takes (apparently): Main cast-wise, I’m personally SEES all the way. I genuinely find that, looking at the big-picture, the story of 5 is the strongest in the series. Aigis is not the strongest character in 3. Between FES and Portable, I prefer the latter. As you said in the video, I find the Investigation Team to be the most mixed cast despite the quality of the SLs being the highest and most consistent overall. And perhaps the hottest take of them all: I enjoy the story, characters, and gameplay of all three of these games. It is not a zero-sum game.
listen dude beyond bandwagoning what if you genuinely just agree with others? they all have good casts stories and gameplay, but 5 obv has the best because its the most modern, 4 has the best characters to me because they do a good job at making me feel like i have friends, and 3 has the best story because it was the first game to make me cry
Disagree, investigation team all the way Disagree, p4 all the way Yeah, wouldn’t the protag be cause of the universe arcana? I’ve only played reload 😱 (hot take: it is not good) We can’t really put SEES in this convo cause more than half of the cast doesn’t have an SL, but if we compare p4 and p5, p5 has a much more mixed cast imo. I like characters like Ryuji, Yusuke, Makoto, Morgana, and even Akechi. But I couldn’t care less about Ann, futaba, haru, and while i liked her at first, i lowkey forgot Kasumi was a character when she got reintegrated into the story. Investigation team has Yukiko, who is kinda boring, but everyone else rules, imo Based last take
@ have you beat p3reload also even though i said p4 has good chars and whatever, the only ones i really enjoyed were yosuke and chie. the rest were kinda there
My problem with "3 = best story, but 4= best characters" is that it pretends that the characters aren't the biggest contributing factor that makes 3's story great. It's like people judge the stories based off a short paragraph plot synopsis
I think what people mean is that while the good characters in p3 are amazing, the game has so many forgettable links. Gourmet king, kenji, Kaz, and yuko are four of just the first few characters and all of them feel EXTREMELY bland. There are a ton of great links too, but there are plenty more of mediocre to outright bad links in the game
The social links for Kaz and Kenji annoyed me in P3. You have to tell them whay they want to hear even if its bad for them. Kaz wants to be told to suck it up when going to get medical help would be for his own good and Kenji is pining for his teacher when the best outcome is for him to get rejected and the worst is that his pursuit of the teacher coul result in her losing her job and being stigmatised in society@@bruis1527
@@Idk-ts1yi I like yuko myself, but admittedly, she brings nothing new or interesting if this isn’t your first persona game. Kenji is kind of funny too to me, but kaz is just there and gourmet king actively sucks. There are also some other links that I just don’t care for either like hidechi (I think that’s his name, but the student council dude) and a few others. Then there’s links like the old couple, the monk guy, and even the teacher which I think are all some of personas best (I love Mrs. Toriyumi’s, or however it’s spelled, link, especially the idea of bonding over an mmo). There are a lot of other really strong links, but I’d say just as many weaker ones too
Gaming discourse generally sucks and the main reason is the fact that people think that most things in games are objective and if you go against their personal opinion you’re wrong and they might even personally attack you. This goes for people that have unpopular opinions along side the ones with the popular opinions.
I so agree with the point about p5s gameplay and okumura, coming off p3p and p4g, okumura whipped my ass and genuinely made me restructure my party compared to the breeze of most other encounters in the game and it was genuinely a highlight and one of my favorite parts of the game.
Yeah the issue is the huge difficulty spike. like you need to figure out the weaknesses for each type of bot and then make a plan of what characters you use when and what personas joker will have. just a lot of planning and preparation which the previous bosses didn’t need
I feel like the takes are understandable even if not wholly true. Persona 3 best story? It definitely has the most dramatic one. The 2D cutscenes are the best of the series, using high contrast shadows, dramatic close-ups and dutch angles and vibrant colors to sell the darkness of the setting. The plot has the biggest stakes in the series, you can't get much bigger than fighting Death itself. I think this monumentality makes the characters harder to notice in comparison. The themes are so grand that they overSHADOW the characrers (haha) Persona 4 best characters? Well, the game relies the most on having you connect with the characters. The structure of the game and dungeons literally forces you to confront their deeper aspects. Plus, gameplay-wise, getting to control them also makes you more attatched to them, as part of YOUR team and not separate entities with their own agendas. The more natural voice acting and writing compared to P3 also helps. Persona 5 best gameplay? Well, it dedicated itself the most to quality of life and adding more JUICE to every part of the gameplay. With Persona 5 you always feel like you have forwards momentum. Even the downtime moments are full of little kinetic and fun UI or interaction. The fights are faster and more dynamic. The palaces have more unique gimmicks and bosses than the past two games COMBINED. But this addicting momentum also means that it can be harder when the game wants you to slow down or engage more with the plot and characters. They aren't worse, but the general speed of the game makes it sometimes harder to care.
Persona 3 has the best story overall, sure, but the pacing is terrible. 1 month doing tartarus, confidants, activities etc ->boss-little plot advancement->repeat.
@@wumbocookies9015tbf, P5/P5R has the best forward momentum plot wise after those time blocks imo. I always felt like I got the most out of our mission being accomplished in that game compared to the ones where pretty much your cast are the only ones that know you did something.
I think you’re onto something when you mention voice acting. I think a not insubstantial part of discussion about characterisation in Persona comes down to localisation and voice work, both of which are things modern Persona has done consistently well. Yes, you see a lot of discussion of Akechi and Kanji, but you’re inevitably gonna see someone bring up how good Robbie Daymond and Troy Baker were in those roles. Hell, look at how quickly the narrative around P3 social links like Yuko became once some good VAs were able to inject some charisma into them. Like I think ‘P4 has the best characters’ is an effectively an oversimplified shorthand for ‘P4 has a large cast of charismatic, interesting and memorable characters (both main and side) brought to life with good voice acting, and a feel good atmosphere that encourages players to get especially attached’.
@h_works2965 It's one reason that I can get behind Persona 1 and 2 remakes, because if they get a proper FULL voicework, plus good cutscenes for the most dramatic plot moments, plus a more natural world presentation instead of those old PS1 isometric worlds, then I think people will be more invested in stuff like Maya's game-long ark in P1 or all the characters and crazy plot in P2
Persona 5 is both the most popular and most flanderized game Ive ever played, never change persona fandom, never change (please do its annoying sometimes)
My hottest Persona take is that Persona 1 has honestly incredible gameplay, things like lining up damage into auto battle to most efficiently defeat enemies, negotiating with demons, hell fusion might be at its best here at this was the only game in the series that I’ve played where I ended up having to hunt for specific cards in order to fuse specific personas instead of just fusing whichever persona has the best stats and brings forward the best moves
Occurred to me last night how, if P3 is inspired by Greek tragedies, P5 is inspired by pulps, or their predecessors. Popular, accessable, "low art" fiction. From Zorro, to stories of heists, to the very western comic book- like costumes, and secret identities. Even figures like Captain Kidd with a basis in reality was the subject of the penny dreadful and the like. And yet, I don't find P5 to be cheaper because of its inspirations. Part of this is, of course, the fallacious notion of low art, but in large part it's about how the writers of the games take their inspiration and synthesize them for the games' narrative ends.
It's one of those takes that "makes sense" on the surface but in reality strips a lot of nuance out of debating the merits of any game. For example, unlike most people I find SEES to have the best roster of characters out of the three because their interpersonal drama adds a more interesting angle to all their character dynamics than the other 2's.
100% get that. It's the story relevancy, and growth the characters undergo that makes the P3 cast so likeable, and human in my opinion. 4 and especially 5 have characters with exaggerated personalities which do make them more eye-catching or entertaining on the surface, but P3 develops it's characters in a way that made me like it's cast 10x better than the 2 of those other games combined.
It almost feels like its used to shut down arguments for what game is the best. Prob the logic of "You can't argue against the general fan consensus. Shut up and accept"
Hot take, Okumura is the coolest boss fight in the game, I had to keep swapping characters with Hifumi's ability so it was like the one boss where character got to shine, felt like an actual battle with ALL of the phantom thieves.
I think the world needs more insane takes, otherwise people just get set in stone. We need people to say that Innocent Sin has the best gameplay, mean it (somehow), and then actually try to defend it online.
My favorite main cast has always been sees. The reason for this is because they actually develop throughout the story, and actually move the story forward. Like Aigis relation with Makoto, or Junpei’s development with Chidori, Yukari and Mitsuru’s relation to the fall, or the development between Ken, Akihiko, and Shinji. The characters actually work off each other and even move the story along. Making the protagonist feel less like messiah who solves everyone’s problems and more like a participant to a greater story and Narrative.
Very good point, as persona 3 definitely has the most complex inter-party relationships, but as a result of the added complexity, it makes sees seem way more like a group of various "friend groups" rather than a single united party to me. Ken and Aki's development with shinji is fantastic and deeply moving, but Ken doesn't have an interesting or at the very least enjoyable dynamic with anyone else besides those two, aki being a little bit better due to his relationship with mitsuru. Junpei and Fuuka are also fairly isolated in the group, with Junpei only getting constant bickering from Yukari and an envy arc with the protag, and poor Fuuka getting even less. The protag also being less important in everybody's development creates a lack of connection between him and the later party members barring Aigis. The game even shows this by having Minato's friend group after forgetting everything on the true ending only being Yukari and Junpei, only having loose relationships with everyone else. Other than those three, Minato has very shallow relationships with everyone else outside of Mitsuru's and Fuuka 's social, which is odd considering how pretty much the entire team practically worships him when they have little personal reason to. Minato is less of a social Messiah, but becomes more of a literal Messiah. While the characters might function better as individuals, S.E.E.S. in its entirety suffers, resulting in the most fragile group dynamic (as can be seen by the absolute chaos that happens in December and that the answer quite literally pits them against each other).
Pretty much. Persona 3 has the best characters because the party is the only one with members that actually have character development with or without the protagonist. Almost as if they're human beings with agency.
@@somethingofnote9241 But why is that bad? It's not like the members of SEES _have_ to be friends with each other. They're comrades with a common goal. They don't need to all be buddy-buddy.
I'm of the same mindset here, I absolutely love P3 for it's cast. I actually found P4/P5 to be lacking with their casts in comparison. Like, a lot of characters in both games had all of their development tied to their social links, and as a result they basically don't exist for most of the story. I love Yukiko as a character, but you could legitimately remove her from the story and it would barely change anything past the first dungeon. Same goes for Ryoji, Naoto, Ryuji, Ann, Yusuke, Haru, etc... They just stop existing after a certain point and it makes them a lot less memorable as a result
"The problem arrives whenever people just start saying shit" might be the most succinct way I've ever heard this put. It's crazy how much of the stuff Persona warns against is present in the community.
It’s like the Batman Arkham series repeated take Asylum- best atmosphere City- best story Origins- best boss fights Knight- best gameplay Hate these takes because I feel like it’s always used to immediately dismiss comparisons between games in the series and boils them down to one aspect without acknowledging what else makes the game good
I feel like this type of cliche also comes from a place of trying to appear "fair" or unbiased, by distributing good qualities as evenly or equally as possible among various entries. But most of the time, I can't help feeling people with this take are being dishonest with themselves on some level. The truth is it is incredibly unlikely that a real player's experience will reflect this kind of perfectly neat distribution. This is just prioritizing a spurious or forced desire for "equality" over an honest or authentic subjective assessment of one's _actual_ experience. And it fundamentally ignores that many of these elements (whether story, atmosphere and characters, or boss fights and gameplay) are inextricably related to each other. They can't be easily separated. My own favorite game in the franchise is P3 by a good margin. And I have no issue sincerely saying that I think it does _most_ of the things I value better than other entries I've played. I have no problem with somebody saying the same for P5. Say it with your chest.
@@index3876 You explained my thoughts perfectly, I think Persona 5 is the best in the series in multiple aspects not just gameplay and I hate that any comparison between the 3 games is shut down by people wanting the three of them to be completely equal in different aspects. Don’t get me wrong I think 3,4, and 5 are all amazing games but I have a clear preference.
Hey man, I just wanted to say I really appreciated this video. I think on an online forum or something similar a couple years ago I brought up the same topic of the “3 best story, 4 best characters, 5 best gameplay” trope was limiting discussion and promoting very surface level analysis. I don’t remember the reception, but since then I’ve mostly stepped away from online discussion about these games, just with how circular it can feel sometimes. I often enjoy talking or reading things about why people DISLIKE these games more than like them, because they usually offer new perspectives that I haven’t heard before and either challenge my thinking or make me appreciate things more. One example of the “hive mind” that gets to me is like you said the ignorance of the side characters. It seems like if you ask anyone nowadays they will say that the moon arcana is the worst social link in persona 3. Like… what? You are the same group of people who say that you love persona 3’s themes of death and confronting grief, and then you hate on the one that has one of the most realistic portrayals of that theme. Did you bother thinking about his themes of trauma causing over eating, loss making someone more vulnerable and making drastic lifestyle changes (with the cult), and so on, or did you just read somewhere online that his SL was bad and make fun of him for being awkward and fat? I have similar sentiments with funnily enough the moon arcana again in P4. Even now, I hadn’t ever really contextualized the p4 cast in my mind as “yes men” before, and now it makes a lot of sense. I often question why this community either hates or ignores the depth of characters like Yukari and Ken in favor of, again as you put it, highlighting “their” idea of what the p4 characters are. It is quite frustrating and why I largely avoid discussion or videos about persona nowadays. It’s more fun to reach my own conclusions and do my own research :P
Well said. I agree with this except I do engage with the fandom lol. But yeah this type of take is just too limiting and it sucks because persona can spawn so much interesting discussion but everyone wants to have the same 5 takes and talking points 💔
You're so right about the way the community views Persona 5's gameplay and it's so frustrating. So many people got into Persona with 5 so now they look at the old games and want to remake them to get rid of ALL unique gameplay differences. Can't expand the roguelike nature of Persona 4's dungeons, it **has** to be like Persona 5's palaces now. Can't expand the tactics system of Persona 3 or improve the fatigue system, we **have** to get rid of those and make it resemble Persona 5 on a surface level as much as possible. Can't keep the grid system in a Persona 1 remake, because how can ideas from an old game have any value? People can't even claim that it's about bringing old Persona games up to modern standards anymore because Persona 5 is a game from 2016. It's about making everything like Persona 5 because Persona 5 is the only one they truly liked, so they want to remake the entire series in it's image so that they like it more. Now every game is going to play the same and that's so boring.
I 100% agree, my favorite is P5 but I wish P4 Remake doesn't change the dungeons to palaces like P5, each game is supposed to be unique and different, P3R already took some things from P5 but I'm glad Tartarus didn't change as much.
Persona 5 is the best in the series. Go cry about it. And persona 5 has scripted well designed dungeons but also a tartarus like main dungeon it has both. Does your littel persona 4 have that 😢😢😢😢 ohhh!!! No it doesn't 😢😢😢.
@tomgu2285 You're missing the point. Even if we consider P5 being the best in the series as an absolute truth, does that mean every future Persona game needs to play like Persona 5? Does that mean we have to change games that aren't Persona 5 to be exactly like Persona 5? These are different games, why can't they be allowed to be different? No wonder companies don't take risks anymore, people play one game that they like and decide everything should play like that forever.
The tactics system is just dumb, ngl. I get that it's super cool and helps SEES feel like their own people rather than just accessories to the protagonist. It's just that if the AI is so brainless when you let it do whatever it wants that you have to use tactics to micromanage their behavior, at that point it's just Direct Commands with extra steps.
@@HunterStiles651 Even if you think that's the case, I think there was a better solution than just "replace it with P5 combat". Replacing a rotten apple with an orange doesn't make it a better apple.
I mean for me personally I was the one guy who was like persona 3 best character, best story and best gameplay. I know thats a hot take, I just love persona 3. It was the only persona game I beat in like 1.5 weeks and didn't see sunlight
The weird thing about the "P4 = best characters" take is that most people I've talked to (not representative of the fandom as a whole) list P4 as their least favorite main cast. And as far as P3's story, while I agree with it being the best (I'd personally rate P3 as the best in all three of these categories), I think P5 has a better plot than P3, though P3 has the stronger overall story due to its handling of its themes and characters being so much stronger.
Thank you!!! I think Persona 3 is the best game overall specifically because of how the narrative and the characters all tie into the themes of finding reasons to live. Persona 3's story is the best because the character's do a fantastic job of facilitating it and connecting us as players to it. I dont dislike the Persona 4 cast, but I'll take SEES over the Investigation team any day.
For all of these super repeated takes, it's always a good idea to ask them why. Not for disagreeing (though disagreement is still allowed), but rather for checking wether they're just following the popular opinion or actually ended up with it themselves.
Takes are meant to be subjective but I've had a friend who once thought it were to be true, as it gets parroted among the community, only to then get into the series on their own merit & being disappointed at 4 having very poor character moments (namely Teddie & Yosuke were their biggest gripes). This also hit when they were playing P3, saying it had poor pacing in their eyes & a lot the setup for half the game could have been done within the first two months, which halted their enjoyment of the title a bit. They also did not take a liking to December as a whole. When fans repeat something for a long while, people outside of the community will take them by their word & whether it's true or not won't really be debated with unless you are already someone that persists in the fandom.
Yeah P3 FES is my favorite Persona game but back when I first got into the series I thought it was the most boring, character trope, non-moving plot game of all time for a while lol.
7:20 YES. I’ve always hated people saying persona 4 had the best main characters or group because it always shafts what imo is the best cast of social links the series has. Persona 3 to me will always have the best main characters because of how dynamically written they are throughout the game. But persona 4 has this amazing ensemble cast of characters that show up in each others social links and show up for hangout slots together and such, it truly feels like a small town that all know each other.
I think the argument is more so that the investigation team seemed like actual friends. SEES always felt like a group working towards a goal. ATLUS saw that and added stuff to make them seem more like friends in Reload. In 5, the Phantom Thieves seem like they're broken in smaller cliques. Haru/Makoto, Ann/Ryuji, Futaba/Yusuke. They all seemed to have their own plans when Joker left, and didn't show they'd miss him like SEES misses Makoto or the investigation team missed Yu
@@Jermaine2099 What do you mean they didn't show that they'd miss Joker? They literally drive him home on a long road trip BECAUSE they know they won't see him for a long time; they're trying to spend as much time with him as they can because they know they'll miss him so much.. Unless you're referring JUST to Royal's additional ending, but that portrays everyone as being out of character, it clearly wasn't written by someone who understood what the vanilla game was going for.
@@Kneevirus I get not liking the characters but ya can't ignore Mitsuru and Ken's whole development with loss confiding in Yukari and Akihiko unless you dislike em so much to the point of falling asleep whe they're on screen. Also in regards to Fuuka, I get that she does nothing substantial in most people's eyes but to me she's one of the characters that represents the life aspect P3's themes the most. She develops the importance of bonds and the appreciation of the little things in the base game not by a single personal death but by relishing in the moment of her own experiences whether that be cooking, developing tech in her own time, or simply talking with friends and by her positive attitude she's a key member in tying the team together bringing a bit of sunshine to their otherwise broody mood.
@@ShadowOfMassDestruction While I disagree with your examples, I can see your point. I just think the P4 soundtrack has the most songs I keep replaying, and that's coming from someone who likes the other 2 games better. Time to make history is my favorite in the series but even discounting that, I just think the whole soundtrack is just incredibly good, even songs that aren't that stand out like SMILE are stuck to my head to this day
I hate when people just blindly follow what other people say instead of forming their own opinions, that being said, all persona games are great, they all have good stories, likeable characters and fun gameplay.
11:55 You are hitting the nail on the head when it comes to my problem with Persona 5's combat--*half of the mechanics can be completely ignored because you can get away without them!!* this is a problem a lot of JRPGs have, but Atlus had been pretty good at avoiding it. Persona 5--especially Royal--just piles on bonus after bonus that makes it so by midgame you have multiple dominant strategies to choose from and battles don't really require much thought anymore. And speaking of ludonarrative dissonance--how is it that you have _so much money_ as a juvenile delinquet with no friends, compared to _literally having the richest family in the country on your side_ in P3???
@@rfmerrill The problem with this though is that if people actually bothered to play the game and not immediately run to Izanagi no Okami the bosses do teach you the mechanics of how to play the dang game. Madarame teaches you weakness and passes Kaneshiro teaches that if you don't put those losers to sleep they'll keep blocking you plus... exp is not hard to get in P5. Just go grind a little bit more. Stop being lazy and fuse some dang Persona's. If they can't beat Okumura five palaces into the game they shouldn't be playing Persona.
Tbh, I like having so many options. Even if a lot of the combat is easy, it’s fun playing with different team comps and broken stuff. Baton pass is easily my favorite mechanic! (That being said, I’m still trying to beat the Twins/Lavensa so that part feels hard rn)
I think we truly forget the most important thing about the Persona series and how it expands on different views of human society, our hearts and minds, and how we all strive to find our place of happiness in the world that isn’t promised or guaranteed, and how dark and lonely it can be when we lose our way or don’t have a good support system. We all love the stories they tell, and we all relate to one more than the other. That’s what makes it so great is trying to find the communication between the different fans. So let’s all start a new social link 🔗 and be fans of the series and not just one ☝️
I think the reason this take is so prominent is simply because people want to make it easy to categorize different games in the series dependent on what people want. So they default to stuff like "Oh well 3 has the best story, if you like characters then 4, if you like gameplay then 5." But when you do that, it makes it confusing to new people since it makes the other aspects of the game seem worse in comparison. What's the point of playing 5 for example, if all that there is, is the gameplay. Why play 3 when it only has a good story, but the characters / gameplay aren't good, these extremely simplistic takes honestly make it harder to get into the series if anything. I think it's better to categorize these games into the themes that they tackle, rather than the "gameplay/story/characters" since it's just stupid overall to simplify it as "this has best gameplay, best story, best characters" like that makes no sense, Characters make good stories, you can't have a good story without good characters, neither can you have good characters without good story. They're also video games at the end of the day, so boiling it down as one being the best gameplay is simply false too. Do I think P5 has some really good gameplay? Of course, but I don't think it's the end all be all, and some people actually prefer the dungeons from P4 / P3 with the procedural generation and such. Categorizing into themes allows one to just be able to understand what they want from the game, stuff like how P3 is inspired by Greek Mythology with the Persona designs and the story, how P4 is inspired by Japanese Mythology, how P5 is inspired by Rebels and outlaws from literature. As for discussion within the community, it should be more based on more complex aspects of the story, going beyond the surface.
idk what the community is smoking, persona 3 had some ass story i had a difficult time finishing the game, though p5r and metaphor are my top 2 games so idk man maybe im high
my argument for best story and cast would be persona 3 bc they are inextricable. the full moon battles give the story a reliable structure and usher the player into the game’s twist and final act, and the cast’s individual experiences with death, the past, and moving forward are all built up and paid off within this structure. unlike other games where characters seem to have their allotted space and then their individual perspectives are regulated to social links/confidants.
I also think that sees is the best main cast, because with Sees they actually have a presence with the story and develop as characters together, like Aigis with the protagonist, Junpei and Chidori, Yukari and Mitsuru relation to the fall. The characters actually drive the story forward and develop together as characters.
@Vinripp Yeah I think P4's cast is underwritten in the main story. Mostly because the devs and writers couldn't have known what you might know about the main characters at that point. Any type of reveal or twist regarding the characters has to happen in S-Links or they have to have a different reveal for the main story. Which is easiest achieved by just making their arc relegated to the dungeon they are in. I personally like the main P4 cast. I love Yosuke and they make for great social links. But that is really about all. Each one of them could have not been a member of the team and I would like them about the same.
I'd say the same about gameplay too. The gameplay compliments the characters and story in P3 so well that I wouldn't even really try to separate it when talking about the game. Complimenting the characters and story is what the gameplay's there for imo.
100% agree with you. listen i think 4's casti great, it's a good game. that's true about all persona games. however with 3, the cast actually feels like they're always there. their character development just doesn't suddenly stop bcuz their 'arc' is over, it happens throughout the game. each of sees character arcs feel so.. refreshing, they feel real. they intertwine and twist with each other to create a main cast with a strong bonb to each other, not just the main mc. it feels like each member of sees relationship with each other is unique. I've seen people complain that p3 cast 'isnt the closest', and idk. i think it adds a layer of realism that some characters are close, but maybe not the closet (like junpei and mitsuru vs junpei and yukari). anyways sorry I love p3, I've loved it since fes, loved it during reload. but each persona game has their merits,
Yup. It's why characters who are introduced at the very start of the game still have revelations and resolves at the end of the game. Because they aren't thrown away the second their arc is over and they're intertwined with the plot.
This is probably the best way I've heard my thoughts on the "best characters/story/gameplay" discussion get put into words, because I feel almost the exact same way, particularly on the persona 4 front. It's nice to hear more appreciation for the side cast and less on a main cast that I felt was VERY hit or miss.
One pattern that I have noticed over the years in regards to RPG's in general is that combat systems that are unique or have extra layers to them are usually the ones that people dislike the most. Persona 3 FES, Final Fantasy VIII, and Xenoblade Chronicles 2 all fit this same pattern. All of the games have combat systems that take time getting used to and require you to learn the games mechanics more than people would like to thus leading to all of these games getting criticized by their fandoms.
As far as P3's gameplay goes, I understand why they made it the way they did, and it makes perfect sense from a thematic standpoint. I can even praise it for trying something new to communicate those things. However, that doesn't mean I or anyone else has to like it.
Honestly, to me, the best story and characters are on the P2 Duology. I did start with P3FES and then went back, Maya and the gang are my favourite Persona main cast. As for side characters, I do feel strongly for the ones in 3. I like the story on 4 more than 3, just because of the fact that it is more optimistic.
especially with how things have been post-reload i think it's pretty clear that the reason p5 is considered "best gameplay" is because it looks and feels flashiest while being the most convenient and "unobtrusive" compared to the previous games. that doesn't mean it plays bad though, i think it plays fine.
My dad doesn't believe that videogames can have deep and moving stories, but when I told him Hisano's story he was like: "THAT'S in a game?". So yeah, those SLs and the main cast trying to accept themselves is something I fondly remember from Persona 4.
persona fans are just dumb i completely agreee with the fact they can't take anything except the universally accepted opinion call me crazy but i loved exploring tartarus
@NateyBoi90059 I love Persona 3 but I don't know about that one chief. I like Tartarus not because of Tartarus itself but because it's a playground for fights. P5 palaces are actually *dungeons* and not just walking around aimlessly until you find some stairs.
Im going to cry i love this video so much. It feels like everything ive had on my mind about the fandom and their takes on the games for so long. I thought i was going crazy for feeling like i saw this take regurgitated 500 times. Everything said here i agree 100%. I wish fandoms learned to think for themsleves and have interesting conversations more...didnt p5 teach us to not give into the hivemind mentality?? Oh wait p5 best gameplay only so Nobody cares about the story I wanna say more but i dont want this to be an essay...all i'll say is that all persona games are good in my opinion. Its very rare you get consistently high quality games with so much content and love back to back but atlus manages to hit the mark every time. So im not sure why we even need to compare and fight each other when we're here for a shared love of the SERIES. But nobody hates persona more than persona fans :/
Some people need to learn that different people have different opinions and that’s okay, Persona 5 is my favourite persona game, because it has my favourite story, themes, cast and gameplay. Do I think the others games are bad just because they not my favourite persona games, HELL NO, they are amazing games and deserve all the love and the fans and then some. They’re all Masterpieces imo and deserve to be praised and celebrated.
0:32 RARE P1/P2 APPRECIATION 🗣🗣🗣🗣🗣 Most fans as usual deny the existance of these games because they know their dumb asf takes would be blown out of the water if the 3 intro games were given into consideration
10:40 honestly based boss fight though. Is it frustrating? Hell yeah. I still had heaps of fun with it. If I'm completely honest, the "ideal gameplay" for the Phantom Thieves would be somewhere in the center of the venn diagram of Strikers and Tactica. Dodging, spinning, jumping around like a Dynasty Warriors game, but with sleek setups and tactics like, well, _Tactica._ The Thieves take battles in a flow state. The IT take battles up front and grounded. SEES are up front and _strategic._ I think Persona 5 and 3 Reloaded have my favorite gameplay of the 3/4/5 set of games mostly for the life sim aspects. The actual battles aren't different enough between 4G, 3R, and 5/5R for me to say with certainty that I prefer one over another, and I actually love that Tartarus and the TV World *_aren't_* like Palaces. It lets Mementos feel much more like one branch of the collective unconsciousness instead of its own separate thing. Especially since my take on the TV World areas were that they're an extreme showcase of how the Shadow thinks *_others_* perceive the trapped individual. They're putting on a show for an audience, after all, not acting for no reason. Kanji's Shadow acts the way it does to play up Japanese stereotypes of effeminate men-which basically just means "flaming" when translated for the Western audience. Same with Naoto. She acts masculine because detective work is a "man's job" and hates that her gender matters at all. It's not transitioning that is being shown as horrific, but the fact that she's having to strip away part of herself-part of her _humanity_ even-just to be taken seriously. Her Shadow isn't a boy, it's a _robot_ with its most striking feature being its exposed computer brain. In other words, she's got the brains for detective work, but feels like she has to tear off her own skin in order to show that to the world.
Funnily enough, I once had this take, though the reason came from "comparing to Persona 5", as I experienced the stories in reverse order (nothing to do with the community, as memes had too many spoilers, so I stayed away). "P4 best characters" = "The main group was strikingly similar to the P5 crew, but I liked them much more thanks to them having to face their own Shadows." "P3 best story" = "This felt a lot more impactful and climatic compared to P5 & 4, I mean listen to that final boss theme, this feels like the finale to all of Persona!" (Yep, based this on endings only). "P5 best gameplay" = "It feels weird to not have P5 be #1 at something.. I mean, it has visual style, but that doesn't really say much, huh? I guess.. gameplay?" (This one was influenced by the community, since it felt wrong to say "I don't like P5 as much as the other two" at the time.) Watched the P3 movies and P4+G animes before playing the games at a later time, though my opinions didn't shift. My opinions today: Favorite characters/story (because the characters make the story) = P4G from beginning to end. P3R from beginning to base game end (still haven't played The Answer). P5R, but only the new parts. Honorable mention to the P2 games, I've only seen highlights of someone's playthrough, but it left a good enough impression that I feel like it'd meet whatever vague standards I'm giving these games. I feel like a lot of influence for which characters I like came down to the spin-off incarnations, as they felt like "cover only, no pages" editions of themselves. Everything I actually liked about the characters isn't going to be displayed, so if I wanted "more of these characters", it came down to if I found them annoying or likeable/funny at their base level. I found that I really don't like most of the P5 cast on rip (and that goes double for Royal, though I get that they don't wanna give major spoilers). At the end of the day, this was all about people cheating to put 3 games in a #1 position, because when someone asked "which one is your favorite?", they couldn't pick. Favorite gameplay = And sometimes a decision doesn't need to be made. I can't appreciate modern Persona mechanics after playing SMT5V.
Yeah A lot of people forget all of the character development throughout P3 and how so many of the mechanics of P3 are just outright built around making the characters feel more real and reflecting their struggles
Hear me out, Persona 3 is presumed to have the best story because it actually created a sense of dread or tension. The story keeps you guessing and there is a real sense of peril from the more visual novel style storytelling Persona 4 has the “best” characters because the atmosphere from the setting and interactions feels more natural/genuine Persona 5 mechanics are just too tight and there is so meticulous detail that the bar has been set high. Persona 5 led to metaphor (games reception speaks for itself) being a more polished beta in prep for Persona 6 for a reason
How much does it matter that Kanji isn’t gay if half the jokes around his character are blatantly homophobic? It’s still directly going against the message of his character if the game still mocks him for his perceived sexuality and eccentricity. People wanting Persona 4 to have designed dungeons like Palaces instead of randomly generated dungeons doesn’t go against core themes of P4. It’s people wanting the characters to have intentionally designed spaces to further go into their character like palaces do. SMT gameplay has follows a similar niche ever since press turn was invented. People enjoying P5 gameplay and wanting that to be a new fixture of the One More system isn’t some failing.The trait system, baton pass, and technicals were all great new additions to the core gameplay of Persona that should continue. None of those gameplay features directly contradict anything core to the series and Baton Pass becoming a staple gimmick reinforces the importance of bonds that is prevalent throughout all of Modern Persona.
As a guy who likes P3 the most, each game has so many strengths to each other that I can appreciate the other a lot. My favorite reason as to why P3's and cast are so multi layered and is excellent is due to how the game starts as just being a "cooky secret job" where you slowly start exploring Tartarus while dealing with their life and academics, but as the game's stakes and trials continue to get more intense, we get to see everyone grow. I think the main character that I feel perfectly capsulates this feeling is not Aigis, but Junpei. He starts off as just a goof and a bit misogynistic, but he grows into one of the best and most emotional characters, willing to put his life to protect his friends and the person he loves. It's honestly the reason why he's my favorite main "bro" character of the series.
Also, for me, in terms of gameplay, I think Reload is my favorite due to the flow of it. I do think it suffers a lot of the same issues of P5 with the difficulty, but I think it is far better at being difficult, and Theurgies are my favorite side mechanic, even if they can be VERY op. I still think SMT VV and Metaphor due outrank the entire Persona series for their combat, as the press turn, Demon Negotiation, and Archetype systems are more interesting and better-balanced difficulty wise.
I think this has good points even if you do say Persona fans as a general blanket statement a lot. Going against the grain in any way is usually seen as bad unfortunately. Like saying you love P3's gameplay like I do and people will be quick to judge defenses of the tactics system, fatigue, etc or even that SEES is largely not close whatsoever for a good portion of the game. It also shows that it's good to think critically. Like you said: why do you like P5's gameplay more or 4's cast the best? What actually made that game stand out in the aspects it does? And why do some fans want the games to all be like 5 when each Persona game (1and 2 included) have their own mechanics and identity? This is partially why I was disappointed in Reload. Not just because of the lack of FemC or the inclusion of Episode Aigis as DLC but because it feels like it actively both is not the definitive version and is also trying to erase 3's unique identity to be more like 5. Good points, man.
Dude the amount of people bashing p3fes' gameplay for no reason during the initial launch window of P3R was aggravating. You tell them how the system isn't approachable but rewarding once you master it and that you just wish to have that gameplay (cleaned up) as an option. And they say "I still don't like it direct control is better and nobody cares about AI-Tactics actually"
It's honestly a shame that Atlus didn't improve the existing mechanics because there's a lot of potential. But also understand why they do that You have your best selling game and it's highly praises for the gameplay, then you want to create a remake of the third game and be a success. I would honestly do the same and just erase the things people complaint since the launch of the game (Tired and not allowed to control your party) and doing the gameplay to be more similar to my most succesful game.
@@reksraven Agreed. I get if others don't like the tactics system (it took me a long while for it to click) but it's part of what makes 3 3 unless we count Portable. I'm fine with direct control but tactics as an option (maybe as an original gameplay mode option) would have been so sweet
@@Zora-jr2lk I agree. It's a damned if you do damned if you don't situation. I would vote for having an original mode (include tactics, fatigue, etc but spruced up and rebalanced) and a new mode (direct command and no fatigue) or even try to mix the two with selectable options
I feel like the "take" has Personas 3 and 4 backwards. To me the main draw of P3 _is_ the characters; whereas with P4 it's how well-integrated the Persona awakening mechanic is with the theme of discovering and embracing your true self, and how well the setting plays into both the plot and each character's sense of identity. I think P4 is the most cohesive story experience, and if not for some of the Golden changes I'd say it's the best entry point into the series for new players. My one knock against P4 is how surface-level your party members' interactions with each other seem to be; in P3 they have a lot more history with each other so their conversations when MC isn't around are more meaningful. I prefer P3's characters, and as Persona is mainly a character-focused RPG I'd say P3 is my favourite. P5 is the best _game,_ which is to say it's the one title where everything seems to feed back into dungeon-crawling the most. The new Confidant system gives you gameplay motivation to engage with social links outside of the marginal "oh I might fuse a Persona that starts at a higher level" that P3/P4 provide, which takes emphasis away from just experiencing social links for the story aspect. I've noticed this trend especially while playing Metaphor, where the main thing that guides me in selecting which Follower to see next is the abilities they give and _not_ which story beat I most want to see. Despite this I do think P5 has my favourite roster of social links, which redeems it in my eyes as a Persona game.
Kanji is (probably) not gay. Naoto is (probably) not trans. Yosuke may be gay, but probably isn't. Maybe bi. All bets are off when they go to college lol
Some of what that take says is true but I'd argue that p3 had some gameplay elements that were taken in reload to be more like p5 and those elements were good like the mc having multiple weapons to wield which then got improvements in metaphor and the knock down from one more taking a turn and being able to search Tartarus faster by telling your team to go on their own P4 cast is the best but not because they feel like friends it's because every character is interesting to me and that could differ from one person to another and that the game has the most balanced screentime for each character Sees not feeling like friends is what it is supposed to be they get to know each other better with the story going forward and p4 is a sequel to that it's what friends do after knowing each other and becoming friends And p3 had the best story if compared to p5 but with royal I prefer p5r story more
I feel like the people who complain about P3's lack of party control have never used the tactics menu. People always conveniently leave out that you can basically get the characters to do what you need them to do with it. Either that or they haven't even played P3 original or FES.
Mostly true but it's frustrating sometimes. Like when I want Aigis to use buffs but she keeps healing instead. Or when I have to tell Junpei to wait because he keeps killing himself on Moonless Gown.
@@swordfish1390 It's not bad game design it's a difference in strategy. Modern Persona requires and rewards reactionary decisions while P3 FES requires and rewards prepared decisions. It's up to the player to make sure they acquire the knowledge, prompts, items, and equipment needed for any given situation which is why I found it very interesting. It's not perfect of course but people acting like it's a flaw that Hashino even tried to give the cast more character through interesting gameplay as if it's a sin among sins frustrates me when half the fanbase complains that they can't even beat Okumura in their easiest title. That only tells me that they shouldn't be listened to.
It's incredibly ironic that for a fandom that supposedly played and liked the Persona games and therefore the message it brings, they can come off as one of the shallow passerbys trash talking people on the street. Persona 4 and Persona 5 made liberal use of them to highlight how different the main cast is in pursuing the truth and justice from the rest of the world who readily accept the surface-level slop and situation even as the world gradually devolves into fog or apathy. The Persona series is all about listening to your true self and using your own senses to perceive reality while cutting through lies and fog. This video is one such example of that. Feel free to make your own interpretations, that's the power of your own persona. But don't just accept the general consensus just because it's safe or fashionable or just because they told you to. The Persona games showed you that there's a better way, now it's up to us ourselves to live that better way. Also, the Okumura fight is one of my favorites. It's one of the rare few times the battle system of P5 is stretched to its fullest potential. (the other being Maruki) Most of the time, random Shadow battles don't last long enough to do a full Baton Pass, and the results are spectacular when you pull one off.
Yeah exactly I hate p4 fans and thier discussions about how hashino is transphobic and homophobic like wtf? Who cares who let these people play these games?
You know what, I don't like like half of the cast of Persona 4 and not a huge fan of the main story either for various reasons... HOWEVER I definitly agree that Persona 4 has the best set of Social Links and I truly agree that the side characters in these Social Links are underated, while there is many Social Link I dislike in P3 and 5, the only one I actively disliked in P4 is Marie (cause imo she just feel extremely forced (which considering she is an addition of Golden is not crazy), the way that all the characters just magically decide to become best friend with her immediatly after meeting her for the first time, while she keeps her Tsundere whatever attitude), every other Social Links I actually liked to various degree.
Here's the reality. Persona 3: great characters, good story, basic gameplay. Persona 4: Weak characters, okay story, good gameplay. Persona 5: top-tier characters, top-tier story, good gameplay. SMT III: Weak characters, weak story, top-tier gameplay. SMT V: okay characters, good story, better-than-top-tier gameplay. Revelations: Persona: okay game. Persona 2 Innocent Sin: _trash game_ . Persona 2 Eternal Punishment: Good game, top-tier game with their recently released content involving Tatsuya and the Sea of Souls. I can't wait to see the Persona 'fandom's' response to this.
@@peacemaker0240 It's just plain true though. They're all a step away from being giant, flanderized parodies of themselves. That game is actually afflicted with the same disease of writing that Guardians of the Galaxy gave to all Marvel movies that came after itself. The P4 characters, except for a few social links and the main antagonist, are _not_ to be taken seriously. They are almost not real. The worst offenders are Chie, Rise, and Teddy, by _far_ . That is not to say that they are without any kind of merit at all, but there's precious little to be had, and what is good about the characters of P4 is incredibly overshadowed by the bad moments. Let me ask you this; can you think of even a _single_ character from P4 that is written as well as, say, Junpei of P3 is? Or Aragaki?
@@binahobino "Okay with everything except SMT3, characters are not weak and story is full of lore" 'Lore' is just fictional history. It's not a story. It is not the _plot_ , and I'll get to the plot in a little bit. The thing is, story and characters are intertwined. The story of the characters is the story, of the story, and unless the characters are well-written, including characterization, you don't have a good story. I'll use an example that has _frequently_ been a problem in Atlus' games, but it's especially bad in SMT III, and that is the opening. Simply put, the protagonist is far too quick to accept the severe strangeness that first greets him at the game's opening. He greets it all with the silent protagonist equivalent of a shrug, and he's a high school student. He has zero reaction, zero affect, to what happens to him at the start of the game, and there is no good reason explaining why he behaves that way. Contrast that with the protagonist of SMT V, who practically has a breakdown when he goes through something extremely similar, but decides (correctly) that he has to pick himself up and move if he wants to survive, and it becomes obvious that the 'inner life' of one character is much more deeply drawn than the other, and that trend persists throughout comparison points of the two games. Examining the supporting characters of SMT III leaves you looking at two-dimensional cut-outs who were written primarily to embody a philosophy rather than be people with hopes, dreams, fears, and weaknesses. I'll use Chiaki as my example for the supporting characters, but the same basic issue plagues Isamu and Yuko as well; the moment she is thrust into the conception, she turns into a walking argument for 'rule by the strong,' and in order to justify that, we get a thick, expository monologue about how her past suffering convinced her that her newfound philosophy is true. Remember, _the whole point of the game_ is to create a new world (or not) on a set of new founding principles, and that's _why_ those characters are as I described earlier, avatars of a particular philosophy first, and people second, which leads to them saying weird things, like Yuko describing the old world as valuable and then literally in the next sentence, contradicting herself. I have a suspicion as to why that is; I think the writers did that on purpose to specifically make each of the 'Reasons' an unappealing choice, to push people toward the 'true' labyrinth ending, but they did that at the cost of including poor characterization in their games. Because the primary vehicle for conveying the plot to the player _is_ the cast of characters, when characterization suffers, the plot suffers, and in this case, the plot of the game, is that the protagonist has to make a hard choice about what reason to support, and why. Obviously, SMT, and Persona, are somewhat different in that the silent protagonist was specifically designed to be a self-insert, and so their personal characterization is left deliberately light, which is fine, good, even, when done right, but in this case that means that it is really _the player_ who is making the choice about what reason to support. I know that sounds like a simple and obvious thing to point out to anyone who has played the game, but there's a significance attached to that choice, concerning the plot, that I think gets missed by a lot of people; the point of this game, _is that the player is being asked to weigh arguments, for and from various principles, as he progresses through the game_ , and if those arguments aren't meaningfully impactful in one's experience of the story, if the subsections of the plot don't bring those arguments into sharp focus, the experience of the drama gets reduced to an academic exercise (this is painfully obvious when Chiaki launches the assault against the Manikins). This problem is at its most severe with the 'true' ending of the game, the labyrinth ending. I'm supposed to just believe that a high school student, because he's suddenly thrust into this terrifying, alien world that is the conception, he's going to suddenly understand the true mechanism and purpose of the menorahs, and pursue that to the end of the destruction of the cycle? There's nothing that the character experiences in the story that should give him a remotely compelling reason to think or behave that way, no set of experiences that he undergoes that even really make the argument for the labyrinth ending in the same way the Reason-bearers argue their cases. The fact is, the characters all behave the way they do, including the silent protagonist, because that is what is necessary for the plot to happen. They don't, ironically, have personal, lower-case-r reasons for their actions, nothing with which to interact and interface with the events of the plot, which are, to sum up in a single word, 'sparse.' Really, the whole plot of the game is _just_ two factions creatio ex nihilo, represented by two characters, duking it out for supremacy throughout the whole game, and the characters that lead those factions act how they act because they have to represent those factions. That's not good writing. None of that is good writing.
Character, story and gameplay discussions are always going to be debatable for each person. I myself never played P3R (yet) and only barely touched P4G and Royal. But I will say the reason why I still hold P4 close to my heart is because of the anime. In fact, if I didn’t love Persona 4 as much as I did, I wouldn’t nearly hold much care in Futaba’s arc and awakening as I still do. 1:45 As someone who definitely does think Persona 3 does have the best story, IMO, it’s the slowest paced when comes to its plot. For me, it really took Aigis’s appearance at Yakushima to say the plot was moving anywhere besides dealing with the “Shadow(s) of the Full Moon cycle” plot. I will always still stand by Aigis being my favorite character, no matter how many people try to convince me otherwise. 6:06 Funny, I already saw video talking about Kanji and Naoto. They are my favorite P4 characters, and it boggles my mind how people can’t understand their characters when it is written right in front of you.
10:23 YES, THIS RIGHT HERE. 1000% THIS!!! Persona 5 Royal I feel is very similar to pre-Final Mix Kingdom Hearts 2. The mechanics are incredible, but most people don't notice because there's no mode that really pushes you to learn them. Merciless kinda tries to incentivize Technical by tripling its damage but that only skews things in favour of the player once you really get it, and it also gives you more exp than the lower difficulties. It wasn't until Critical Mode and Exp Zero that people started to realize "dude KH2 gameplay is actually peak", P5R really could've used something like that. (I think it's for similar reasons that I find the fanbase overrates Ryuji as a party member and underrates Yusuke. Ryuji's best tools only come online in the very lategame, while if you're good with technical Yusuke is consistently stronger for longer) In terms of other points: -I fully agree that people ignore the early parts of P3, though I chalk that up less to Aigis and more to the ending. Not to mock it as I do think it's legitimately good, but the surface level take of "WAT OTHER GAME ENDS WITH YOU LITERALLY DYING?!" is very prevalent. It's something guaranteed to stick with people. -The "is that guy GAY?!" thing with Kanji's arc is something I also experienced and witnessed a lot in high school, which is something I feel often gets missed. From the perspective of adults Kanji's arc can look very problematic, but teenage boys really did act like that back in the 2000's. Not that that's a good thing. -P4's supporting cast is underrated too, though I do think Eri is one of the most boring Social Links in the series. -My overall ranking of the stories is P3 best overall, P4 has both the highest highs and lowest lows, and P5 is the best paced. -Similarly with characters, all of them have different strengths. P3's have their development integrated into the main story. P4's feel like a group of high school friends. P5's make strong impressions due to being the stars of their own personal arcs when they join, and I'd also say there's good ludonarrative integration in their gameplay roles. -And that's my final take: the beauty of the Persona games is they're all very DIFFERENT despite being nominally in the same series. And this is why I kinda worry about Persona 6, as making it "like Persona 5" would be missing the point. Heck, I think the reason they do spinoffs is that each sequel is basically its own thing, if you want more Persona 3 you won't find that in 4 (and so on) so you need to go to spinoffs.
In my opinion, I think there is no definitive 'best' concept (i.e. story, characters, gameplay) since it just falls into a manner of personal preference. For instance, I, too, like Persona 4's story. Specifically, how it delves into various themes such as the search for truth, appreciating your uniqueness, understanding yourself, and the value of friendship. (P.S. for the record, these themes may also or may not be found within P3 and P5, however significant) But still, P3 and P5's themes are not bad as well. I just feel like P4's story resonates with me more. To put it simply, it is okay for you to define your own 'best' something, and no one has the right to judge you for that. They have their own opinion about it, good. But you also have your own opinion as well, and that is also okay. (P.S. I hope I got my message well. I apologize if it's not comprehensive. 😅)
tbh I don’t actually like palaces that much, they feel way too long compared to quick runs into tartarus or even doing an entire tv world dungeon in persona 4. I know this is probably just me but every time people praise the palaces gameplay it feels a little alienating, I enjoyed persona 5 for the story and cast not for the palaces. My favourite persona game is persona 4 cause the story is the most intriguing to me and fits the scope of a small town compared to tokyo, I also like the cast of course but feel like teddy and yukiko are underwhelming.
i think i both agree and disagree with you. im not really a gameplay oriented person so in that regard if it’s not actively frustrating its all the same to me and p5’s gameplay is flashy enough that i have too much fun to think about things like pacing. but i think what actually makes it shine is how the palaces tie into the story and themes, and what the puzzles and gimmicks say about each palace ruler’s psychology - like kaneshiro’s safecracking, sae’s rigged dice games, or futaba’s tomb paintings. i definitely see how they could feel overinflated but i tend to see it as an opportunity for more story
i came into this video agreeing with the P3 best story, P4 best characters, P5 best gameplay take, and I still do, but i agree with every point made in the video lol, P3's story feels unique compared to the other 2 (i havent played 1 or 2 so no comment on those) in 4 and 5 you jump from palace to palace / dungeon each one linked to a party member, its kinda like a "villian of the week" type of vibe to it imo. Whereas in P3 you have a set goal and the story builds on top of it with strega, the 12 shadows, the ikutsuki moment, it feels more flushed out than the others and as u mentioned it also ties in the party in a very nice way that leads up to the conclusions nd the promise the group develops beautifully along with the story at first feeling just like dormmates but at the end feeling like friends for life not to mention P3 has imo the best ending by a mile. For P4 im not gonna eat ur shit lmao but ill stand by the group does feel like close friends not yes-men (most the time at least) and like you were saying this take isnt just for the main cast but for the under-shadowed side cast. P4's group feels tightly nit throughout the whole game unlike with 3's cast, and the interactions feel more natural than 5's more hollow (might be a hot take) interactions STILL FEELS NATURAL dont get me wrong, but comparatively to 3 and 4 id say its more shallow plz don't crucify me in the relies if anyone even replies lol P5 is pretty straight forward take, baton pass, technicals, more elements, more moves, palace exploration, no gameplay debate really side note -> P3R (10/10) >= P4G (10/10) >= P5R (10/10) - all the games r peak and all have amazing story, gameplay, characters, and writing overall tho great video and great takes and points i subbed
While I haven't played P4 yet, I feel for the meme, P3's area should be replaced with emotions instead of story. For me, P3's story has some serious issues such as weaker reveals compared to P5's and especially atrocious pacing. That said, I can't say P5's story is outright superior since I feel the more accurate description is that both stories excel at different aspects such as P3 arguably handling character relevance better and P5 handling pacing and reveals a lot better. And best emotions is more accurate to describe P3 for me since Reload made me cry whereas Royal almost made me cry. Also, my guess is I might end up saying P4 has the best chemistry instead of best cast considering how much people go on about the solid chemistry in P4. But I can decide when I play P4G or a P4 remake.
I agree that game discussion is seriously polarised in the sense that disagreeing with an opinion is met with nonconstructive ridicule, so I hope you don't take this the wrong way when I say using wojaks to portray people who disagree with you on persona 3's gameplay is like, the prime example of what this is.
Watching this video so far, it feels like it’s more so an overall rant about the fanbase and honestly? I don’t blame you. This fanbase can be insufferable when it comes to discussing them and I feel you using the common take of “best story/characters/gameplay” is a good way to analysis it. For the p3 section, I can see what you mean by how some fans seem to always be so ignorant towards the beginning of SEES and their struggles (something I admittedly was like at first due to me being spoiled on the ending) but even then I did enjoy what I saw a lot with it beforehand, and I feel p3RE gave me a chance to reexpereince the first half and enjoy the stories of these characters, because like you said, 3 really is about everyone finding a meaning to life. And yeah, you aren’t wrong about how P3RE has also made discussing the gameplay of FES even worse. Even as someone who likes the gameplay after, I always felt 3/Fes had its own sort of fun to it. So seeing people now disregard the gameplay of it so hard is upsetting. In general the discourse between P3R vs. OG3 is infuriating, because it feels like who are extremely dismissive of any criticism towards it, to a point that they just see it as “hating” or people who hate it so much that they gotta make people who enjoy it feel worse for liking it. Both making people assume the worst out of anyone who is more causal and understandable with their hate or love for the game. But I imagine that’s something you and many fans are basically tired of discussing at this rate lol For P4, I admit that I do love the main characters, I think you made an interesting point at how said cast is the most positive out of all of the games. Because it points out something I’ve noticed with these games that people really don’t like the most abrasive and somewhat negative characters (Morgana, Juenpi, Yukari). Now there’s nothing wrong with disliking them per say, but I think it’s telling when some complaints about them feel less like it’s coming from a place of critique and more so just based on how they feel. So you get people declaring that Morgana is just a obnoxious creep who should be cucked out of getting with Ann (if you know you know) and that he sucks, while praising other characters just for being…nice and that’s it. Like I like Gallica, but the amount of people saying she was better than Morgana just because she isn’t abrasive or has any negative traits really, feels telling as to the sort of “mascot friend” character people want. It’s like I don’t blame someone for disliking a character purely because they annoy them or irritate them, but the level of hate some people have goes beyond parody and just seems so deranged. To a point that they disregard the positive aspects. (haven’t gotten to the p5 section yet, will comment on it)
As someone who has these opinions, I hear people complaing about P3 best story, P4 best characters, P5 best gameplay and just think "Ha ha, w-what a sheepish opinion am I right?"
so do you agree that fuuka is worst s.e.e.s member or also okumura's bossfight isn't bad even though it took me 3 hours but its the fact that it doesn't prepare you for it at all you go from fighting 1 miniboss at your own pace and take infinite turns to do it to fighting 4 of those, and you have to do it in 3 turns, with 1 exploding fuck that I guarded at first because that's what the game thought me when big boom also without preparation I think its literally impossible to do it without swapping teammates if you have the wrong ones
On a surface level discussion level yes Fuuka is the "worst* human party member of S.E.E.S but I fundamentally disagree with how useless people make Fuuka out to be when they talk about her. Some characters provide small actions but very long lasting benefits with their influence but people overestimate a character's role when they see them on screen and always want everyone to be equally the highlight of everything such as the case with Ann in P5 when that's not how writing works. Fuuka is great and one of the characters that represents P3's themes of life the most BECAUSE she's off to the side. She learns the importance of bonds and treasuring the small moments not needing any personal death but by her own accord whether that be cooking, making tech, or simply talking with friends. That along with her positive attitude brings sunshine to the teams's constant rain clouds which makes her a fine teammate to have in my opinion.
@@ShadowOfMassDestruction yeah no she's definitely not bad I just feel like from a story standpoint all the other members of the cast bring more to the table
For me, gameplay, among other things, is convenience. If there's something in the game that wastes my time, if it takes unnecessary amount of clicks to get to the menu you frequent, if the inventory is clunky etc., it immediately detracts from the game. Like, for example, carry weight was the first thing I edited out of Pathfinder and Witcher games, the stupid "save by drinking" in Kingdom Come, the insanely clunky menus of Skyrim... and there are things like this in P3 and 4 that make me just groan. And never once have I thought that about the general gameplay of P5. Except the unnecessary forced ingame time wasting (yes, including the whole "go to sleep!!!"). Characters are simpler. I don't think it matters at all if a character is incredibly well written if you just don't like them. And I'm not talking about hating characters you're supposed to hate, but just on average. For example, I couldn't care less about spending time with P5 Sun. Simply did not care. And I generally hate Junpei. To me he is one of the worst teammates you can get in all 3 games, I just don't find a single point about him I could relate to and want him as my friend. Even if he has a lot of character growth and all. And don't even get me started on that creep, Yusuke... And I can say very little of that about P4 cast. If you gave me a tier list of all the characters in these games, I'm pretty sure 4 would have the most top-heavy result by the end of it. Which makes it the best characters for me. And as for the story... the main fault of 5 was that it never managed to achieve the emotional height of the 1st palace again with any other palace. Other than, maybe, Futaba's. The main fault of 4 was the general predictability, aside from the later bits, of where the story was gonna go. 3 was much more... even, I guess. The main story held your attention throughout much better then social links in it. Which makes it the best story.
What you are referring to as gameplay is more UX and UI. Tho I personally love inconvenience in games if it is implemented right I can see your point. I also think most games drop the ball on making inventory management engaging. The only game that comes to mind for me is Resident Evil 4 and onwards. Also Neverwinter Nights was using a similar grid system. I also like dedicated save points (I don't know how kingdom come does it) but it gives me a higher sense of care and immersion if I have to play carefully. But most games are either to hard or bug out when the have an ironman esque mode.
But carry weight is meant to stop you from carrying everything at once and Kingdom come's limited saves are there to stop you from save scuming. They're meant to be inconvenient because otherwise you would have too much of easy time.
I just don't trust the game (or A game, it's not just Kingdom Come, but a general thing) not to bug out or crash and lose me hours of progress. I need my saves, thank you very much :P
Fantastic work as always. (I regularly come back to your channel after I read one too many comment somewhere saying P3’s story doesn’t start until November)
I 200% agree with this; saying that the sick mechanic and not being able to directly command allies in Persona 3 FES, are actually good, unique and work extremely well with that the game is trying to convey, is somehow one of the most controversial things a person could say in the MegaTen community. And my question is why? Why are most people just so rabid and hostile towards others' opinions? Ignoring whether they make sense or not, whether they are correct or not, there's absolutely no need for people to act like that, respecting others' opinions shouldn't be such a hard thing to do. As for the actual takes themselves, I do think that Persona 3 has the best cast because Atlus could have done much more with the Investigation Team and the Phantom Thieves which is what makes me think that SEES is better, it's not about the actual quality but about the potential. Main story wise, SEES are the only ones that actually change and develop throughout the story while the other two stay the same since awakening their persona until the end of the game (and no, it's not because the dudes don't have social links, even the girls have their development happen in the main story), IT and PT's entire development (ok maybe like 90%) happens from when you meet them until they awaken their personas and beat their main story boss while their social links are where you get to truly see the characters Ryuji reconciling with his track team and Kanji not acting shy about making plushies for the little kid anymore and making more plushies for the kid's friends. However, other than that, it doesn't develop them as much as the main story develops SEES, hell, Sojiro's confidant for example developed Futaba more than her own confidant did in all honesty (yes you need to rank up her confidant to finish his, but you see the development not in hers but his). And the fact that their main character development is done through optional content is in my opinion a problem, yes, social links are as important as the main story itself, but it's still up to you to do which one you want. A normal person's normal playthrough could have them not do Yukiko's social link and not see her realise what she truly wants to do and accept the role of becoming the new head of the Amagi inn but instead just think she still doesn't want to do it. On the other hand, SEES' social links just add more to the character and showcases their growth instead of being their growth beyond the persona awakening (as that symbolises change in Persona stories).
I think the discussion of killing or not killing a (supposed) criminal only coming at the end of P4 makes sense in the context of the story. 4 doesn't even have a real villain in the story until Kubo, who practivally everyone doubts as being the true culprit despite him claiming otherwise. And even when Namatame is revealed, the team (and most players) are more concerned with saving Nanako. It makes sense they only discuss killing Namatame when they've got him at their mercy after Nanako seemingly dies and Namatame's Shadow taunts them. Anyway, good video overall. I agree 4's side characters are pretty underrated, even though we all love the Dojimas and their arcs. I never even thought about the hypocrisy in praising 5's gameplay yet complaining about Shadow Okumura. I can imagine a scenario where a blind player didn't invest in the Shogi girl and also doesn't have all the skills on Joker to hit the required weaknesses, but other than that, it's a fair enough test of what the player has learned so far.
I lowkey think all of them are well rounded to a degree. One of the categories can't make the entire game so they stand together. What really sucks is if this mentality of finding the best field in the game comes back around when P6 drops😔
Saying BASED is an understatement, I always have hated this take because it tries to categorize something as subjective as a persona game, and the fact that half of the community believes it to the point that every other aspect of these games is treated like shit is just ridiculous. P3 has my favorite story tied with p5r, so I generally agree with the take, the only issue with p3 is the pacing, when I say that the first half is "empty" it's because when you compare like the first 3 months of p3 with those of p4 and p5, you will have achieved so much in those game, while in p3 the most important story arc is what, the Fuuka arc? That's why I don't fully agree with take, pacing is just as important as the storytelling itself. I completely agree with your opinion, it's something I've been saying for years at this point but the p4 community has become a stupid circlejerk when talking about p4 that it seems impossible to have a real talk about the game. I don't dislike the cast, but they are the most unrealistic to me, that's because the group is together every single moment of the damn game, like let me breathe a little. The real issue here is that for a game where the main theme is to be your true self, we sure don't see the characters act like one, we have a 10 minute cutscene after the boss, that's it, after that they only act based on their anime archetype, and that would be fine if the character had some alone moments like with p3 and p5's cast. I really like the side cast of p4, Ai Ebihara is probably my favorite sl in that game, not to mention Dojima and Nanako. The story doesn't even help the characters imo because it's just stupid, these guys waste an entire arc trying to catch someone who obviously not the killer and the funniest thing is that after those month of "investigation" Naoto still has more knowledge about the case then the party does, this shit is hilarious, and no being a detective is not an excuse for the group being dumb lol. As for p5r I see your point, when I personally say that the gameplay is the strongest is because of things you can do, like you said technicals, acrobatic takedown, baton pass, more aliments to use, the smoothness of the gameplay, and even outside the combat, the game has much more to offer, you can fish, play baseball, darts, pool, hell you can even customize your own palace. The gameplay is simply an evolution of the core mechanics introduced in p3. Now saying that gameplay is the only good thing p5 does good is stupid imo, the story is imo the best paced, no arc is boring, at worst is mid, at best is amazing, and for all those who say that the story is cliché, replay maruki's arc, just that. The characters are great too, they are not my favorite anymore, that goes to sees, but I still like them more then the p4 cast, because I related to a lot of their problems, but most importantly because even after forming the group they don't just forget about their lives, everyone has their own shit to do before and after meeting up, and that's what many forget, if the PT are not as friend as the IT then why do every pt member make up time in their schedule to meet each other?. Either way great video and sorry for yapping, but I'm genuinely happy that people like you exist in the community, people who opinions that even personally do not agree with sometimes but at least they think with their own mind, and do not follow a stupid meme
I disagree on p4 not having a realistic cast, sure you have rise and naoto who are definitely not your average high schooler. And you have teddie, who is a creature from the tv world. But everyone feels like a real teenager, getting into shenanigans and goofing off. P3’s cast feels so mature and kinda boring, and how you described P4’s cast is how i feel on 5’s (unrealistic, always together), but with p4, everyone thing kinda works for me. Sure they’re always together, but it makes sense cause the town is so small, chances are they don’t have anything better to do. Sure they’re not the brightest, and it is true that barely any of the investigation gets done until naoto shows up, but do you seriously expect these guys to get things done? Before you even go into the tv world, you can tell that chie and yosuke are goofballs. They’re realistic because they’re allowed to be and act like teenagers, imo at least
@IolZ555 I'm not talking about the backgrounds of the characters, I'm talking about how they act in relation of their development. The cutscenes in which they accept their other half is great, makes them feel like they are on ghe right path to mature and become better in general, but the game doesn't let you see it, let's take Rise as an example, her arc was about acknowledging her true self, whether she is an Idol or not, she is still her; after that what does she do exactly, narrative wise to make her change stand out? Nothing, the game's most important events after that are slice of life scenes with no relevance to the plot and end with the worst arc of the game, and once Naoto joins she is just there. Yukiko is another great example, her arc talked about how she felt trapped by her responsibilities and about her toxic friendship with Chie, very good introduction, but we do not see a resolution at least for the friendship part, her and Chie are never shown to make up, the game just goes on, forgetting about this plot point entirely. Having a small town is not an excuse to not have individuality imo, p3's setting is even smaller compared to Inaba and yet the characters have their own stuff going on, the only ones in p4 that are similar are Yosuke and Yukiko. I mean is it my fault that THEY themselves decided to catch a killer and instead waste 60% of the plot rescuing people and doing nothing? It's not exactly the first murder mystery to have characters that do not have anything to do with an investigation, so yeah I will keep saying that having Naoto shouldn't allow the team to not do anything important. Being realistic is imo at least having responsibilities but make up time for your friends and loved ones, not forgetting them entirely until someone that is more knowledgeable then you comes around to help, but I mean I appreciate your opinions even if I do not agree with them your reasoning is solid, that's just my preference at the end of the day, and it's not like I hate p4, far from it, I just love p3 and p5 more
100% agree with you, P4's cast is amazing but they're always together and that does make them slightly unrealistic, I prefer how the Phantom Thieves are friends but also have their own individual arcs/scenes where they are alone. Also, P3's pacing is the worst in my opinion, not because of the story itself, but because most of the game consists of just tartarus grinding, the overworld feels empty and there's not many things you can do, not many side activities, and that makes the pacing feel even slower.
Honestly, i liked these games so much that I have a difficult time choosing a thing that one game does better than the others one I even hard a difficult time just choosing a favorite one
He's only talking about how after Reload anything said in favor of the original gets you in a choke hold like you're supposed to have their opinion and you're not allowed to have your own which is admittedly really annoying.
@ShadowOfMassDestruction I feel like it's the opposite, fes fans have the superiority complex and look down on people for liking reload and don't give it credit for doing anything right. Which has resulted in reload fans being more aggressive back. It's not good either way but as someone who played Portable and reload I like p3 and wish the tactics fans didn't act like they're the only ones who understand the true meaning of the game just because some people don't like the tactics menu
@@vivilover9409 I don't blame any one side because it's all a feedback loop. If you don't like Reload and you like FES more the Reload fans come out and say you like trash gameplay and muted colors so anything you say means nothing. If you like Reload well you like oatmeal with water and no sugar, you like toast with no butter, and you like you're gameplay as plain as a saltine cracker. It's not that we can't have these opinions per say but they often talk really antagonistically trying to put people down rather than seeking good proper discussion.
I’m so happy to finally see someone else who has the same opinion on the p4 cast that I do. I always get attacked when I say the persona 4 cast isn’t the best, and when I ask them why they just say the p4 characters feel the most like friends. Uhh, yeah, half of the p3 cast barely are friends with each other but that reason is exactly why I think p3 has better characters. The character dynamics in p4 are barely existent except characters sometimes cracking jokes at eachother, but otherwise being silly best friends. I need more people to be told that being better friends doesn’t make better characters that’s all🙏
P4 is pretty bad in my opinion. They definitely implemented a lot of good stuff and expanded more mechanic-wise, but in this case, sometimes I feel like more is less. They sold the small-town vibes really well, which I can appreciate, but it’s also a downfall at the same time. A perfect example for me was hanging out with Marie, and everyone is just forced to hang out with you or cock-blocking the mood, but at the same time, those are small-town problems in real life 😂
If you think that their whole interactions are just jokes I think you don't remember anything about the game. Chie and Yukiko has a dynamic where they are jealous of eachother even though they are best friends. Chie feels insecure about her femininity and feels inferior to Yukiko. Yukiko thinks she is incompetent and is in cage and envies Chie's strentgh and free spirit. Rise and Kanji don't seem like they are interacting at all but if you pay attention to game you can see that Rise is interested in Kanji's skills and chats with him about it. Yosuke and Yu's bond is one of the strongest in the whole Persona series and you can see it spread in all over the games. Yes, they act silly most of the time but they massively support eachother and isn't circled around Yu unlike P5.
@@AdacherTheCabbageEater I disagree p5's no way more centered around the protagonist then p4, especially when they never argue outside of Namatame, in p5 every party member's trust is earned and it's not like they all share the same view, hell look at Kasumi who even after awakening doesn't join because she doesn't agree with the pt's methods
@cristianoducceschi3547 think Joker is the one who glues everyone together. I can see P4 cast being the same without Yu (hell, he was the one who joined the Yosuke/Chie/Yukiko group, which even after that Chie and Yukiko are still the closest friends) but in P5 it feels like if Joker goes out of the picture they wouldn't be friends. Ann and Ryuji knew eachother and interacted before (Ryuji stood for Ann and bleached his hair for her) but they weren't even in touch for years before Joker.
@@AdacherTheCabbageEater Firstly no that's wrong simply because half of p4's cast wouldn't know each other without Yu, yeah Yosuke, Chie and Yukiko already know each other but that's it the other 4 needed Yu to join the group. Actually Ryuji and Ann know each other since middle school, so way before compared to Yosuke, Chie and Yukiko. In p5 the characters get to know each other even after joining, like Yusuke with Futaba or Makoto with both Ann and Haru, so I do not agree both cast are the same in that regard. You could make a point that the IT has more fun time, but that's actually why I like them the least because they use these moments to completely forget about the case while in p5 the manage to do that as well as introducing the next arc in the story
"People don't like unpopular opinions", yeah Bubbletea, that's why they're unpopular... I appreciate your work but these arguments are just pretty bad on a logical level. Opinions are popular if a lot of people came to the same conclusions and otherwise unpopular if only a few people did. The specific criticisms are pretty shallow too.. "Persona 3 IS the best story but people are wrong for appreciating the wrong parts and wrong characters" - just comes off elitist and shallow dude. It's okay to really like the ending. And a lot of people liked the chill plot in the first half, but there's honestly so little to talk about it. The whole point is bonding organically through shared experience there's very little to talk about that. "Players don't appreciate persona 5 gameplay because they can't play the game good and just want to say other games need to be persona 5" - this is such a nothing take that's just "I hate the community for reasons I can't explain". I'm kinda sure you know how nothing that is but you felt like you needed to make the quota of debunking all statements. Truth is Persona 5 does so objectively have the best gameplay that there's barely much to talk about it and ironically the worst part about the meme is that it's the only non-narrative "best category" to appeal to the "I'm too cool for Persona 5" elitists. Persona 4 argument is the only one with substance, because it's the only one where you're actually trying and don't just hate the community, but if so many people like a cast of nice friendly "yes men", they kind of make the point that this is the most popular cast even if it doesn't appeal to those of us who prefer realism and hardship to nice "yes men" power fantasy, and that's fine.
checking the config menu at least once in p5r should be a requirement for marukis ending bc no way in hell someone who uses the default settings would break away from his reality
I think one of the problems with the take of, “3 = best story, 4 = best characters, 5 = best gameplay” is that people start acting like other aspects of each game are unimportant as if these games can’t be great in multiple ways. Every persona game I’ve played so far has had extremely compelling storytelling, characters, and gameplay.
What’s crazy is that p4 is the best in all of these catagories 🗿
I’ve actually played all of these games and agree with what each game does best, but I also agree with your comment. Yeah, for example, persona 3 has the “best story”, but the gameplay and the characters along with the story is what makes it a good game.
@IolZ555gameplay? The clues/quests were tedious and the combat is pretty weak among of the modern games. It really boils down to Phys Spam after a point because Magic is pretty buns with no equivalent to Shift/Baton Pass.
@IolZ555It really doesn't. A third of the story is filled with no meaningful story progression besides new characters, said characters are underdeveloped unless you do their social links (an issue no other game in the franchise has nearly as bad as 4) and the gameplay is probably the third weakest after 2 and 3 FES
@IolZ555Nah, Metaphor clears 🫢
There's a lot of repeated takes because most persona fans haven't even played any persona games lol
This
Persona's Most Repeated Joke
@TheDracolordianI've played persona since persona 4 golden. Played persona 4 golden, persona 3 and reload, persona 5, persona 5 royal and persona 5 tactics. P4g is brilliant, p3 is shite. Persona 3 reload is brilliant, persona 5 og isn't good and persona 5 royal is brilliant. Can't stand tactical games so p5t sucks
Or because most people see an objective truth 💀
P5 has the best gameplay bc it is 8 years younger than 4 and 12 than 3 if I’m not mistaken. So it is objective that it is better in terms of gameplay.
P4 has more likeable characters because its a goofier game. Its basically the whole cast being the Persona bro stereotype. Which makes them more likeable than the rest.
P3 has a more serious story with higher stakes and it is the most Shin Megami Tensei out of the bunch, while having outdated and annoying mechanics(bc at the time they were experimental and later refined in the sequels). And the characters for the most part aren't as likeable as either P4 or P5. They are forgettable except for their design and besides Aegis and maybe Junpei none of the main cast really sticks out in too much of a positive light. Also they are all kind of jerks.
@@xornedge8204 None of what you said is objective though it's just a consensus that people made up in their heads.
Persona 5's gameplay is good but it also has way too gaddang much and doesn't think about the balance.
Persona 4 characters are goofy and I enjoy that but that's personally not something I look for in a cast to be good. The P3 cast is so good to me BECAUSE they aren't that close at first and get actual on screen development with each other that ties them together.
I do like P3's story but I don't agree with the notion that P4 or P5's story's are bad at all. Especially P5, in my eyes it's a fantastic borderline movie experience and it does what it's trying to do well.
THE THING YOU SAID NEAR THE END IS SO TRUE, THOUGH. Like... I liked Persona 3 a lot. It has compelling themes, and so much deliberate thought put into how everything feeds into the big picture. I did play Reload first, and I do think it was a great experience, but I've really appreciated the love you give to FES, even if it's not something I can see myself having as much fun with due to personal tastes. That being said, as someone whose favorite Persona character is Akechi despite having consumed P1 - P5R in some form and thus knowing the others, it gets so grating when people act like Persona 5's writing is somehow the worst in the series when a lot of its writing problems come down to some of the localization choices or, more commonly, people not engaging with the game's writing from a Japanese cultural context (see again: Akechi).
Mind you, I played Royal and not vanilla P5, which has the benefit of Akechi being much more fleshed out, in addition to extra scenes helping flesh out the Phantom Thieves' friendships as well as the excellent third semester, but even then, I see a lot of "P5's villains are unrealistic" comments... and then I look at real people in the world (politicians, billionaires and CEOs, etc) and I'm like "nah, this is hilariously true to reality. Some of the worst people in the world are just as 'cartoonish' in their absurdity." I do think that Kaneshiro is a weak antagonist, mind, and not every arc is good as the rest, and the November Akechi text messages you ONLY get by delaying Sae's Palace infiltration to 11/13 should've been scripted because they explain so much...
But what really grates on me in these fan discussions is the kind of hive mind mentality you see, where people repeat the same takes again and again without giving it their own personal spin. I love Aigis, and I think she's incredibly charming, but my favorite P3 character is Ken, in large part due to his excellent linked episode in Reload. I think he's really compelling and tragic due to his age and just how far he was willing to go. I'm a latecomer to the fandom, but it makes me sad to see Ken often infantalized or shat on without actively engaging in what his character represents, the same way that people refuse to look at how Akechi in P5R serves as the ultimate extreme example of what happens to kids who are trampled over by society and left without support systems, the same way the Thieves might have ended up if they didn't find each other (Yusuke even points this out after the engine room).
With P4, I think the most frustrating part with Kanji is that I don't think a queer reading necessarily undermines the purpose of his arc... if you read him as bisexual or pansexual (he does show interest in Naoto before the Reveal), but Kanji's arc is such an important exploration of toxic masculinity and how it can negatively impact kids who fall outside of what's seen as acceptable. To act like it's *just* about sexuality really ignores the greater purpose of his arc, and I honestly think he has the best realized arc out of P4's main party, whereas my main gripes with Naoto is how much the writing goes "lol Naoto girl" and obsesses over things like her chest size after her dungeon.
But I think every Persona game has its moments of jank writing like that, and these things are worth discussing, but I think the healthiest discussions are the ones that are done in good faith rather than just oversimplifying things. It's why I tend to just hang in smaller subsets of the fandom rather than in larger parts of it because it's just a lot less draining when a fandom this massive is always bound to have a vocal minority with questionable takes.
On the gameplay front, I do like P5R the best, but a lot of that does come down to the flow of baton passes and technicals and the added reward you get from engaging in its battle system. The presentation also goes a long way, and I like how immersive the Palaces feel with their stealth and puzzle mechanics, but I don't think every Persona game needs to be another P5 when they can find their own balance or identity.
tl;dr: Good video, lots to think about.
The repeated takes perfectly illustrates how unusually sensitive the Persona community is when hearing different opinions. Like we can have our disagreements, but there's no need to be so... intense. It's a fucking video game, bruh.
I do agree with 2/3 of consensus being characters and gameplay. My favorite story outta the 3 (modern Persona games anyway) is P5 but holy crap, it feels like if you even dare imply that P5 has good story or characters ppl will take up their pitchforks and headhunt you. I even heard that one person on Twitter deactivated because they got attacked for expressing their love for P5 and THAT was just... disgusting
And even if I agree with 2/3 of the consensus, there's definitely more to say regarding those. I could go in depth to P4's main party because I related to almost EVERYONE'S in IT's struggles one way or another. Heck, do ppl even remember that P4's shadows are also a mixture of society's views on them which explains why Rise's was a literal stripper? Don't even get me started on how stories like Naoki's or Hisano's are so underrated. Or the myriad of varied activities P5 have in its social sim and the little details like how every game you play in Joker's room have different mini games or how Joker's activities to improve himself such as physical training in his room or mental training at the shrine has smaller stories of him gradually improving, even trying different things when talking about the physical training. And even if P3 isn't my favorite story, there's interesting stuff happening in it BEFORE the final month. Ken's story anyone? Hell, Reload's new Shinjiro content makes that story hit even harder! What about watching the video of Yukari's father for the first time and learning more on how the Dark Hour happened, as well as how that affected Yukari afterwards?
Stuff like this is why I'm glad I don't interact with the Persona community as much as I used to. My mind never felt more clearer the moment I just chose not to interact with those always trying to force opinions on you rather than accepting that different viewpoints can exist.
It’s definitely something I’ve noticed with the Persona fandom. Some people are cool, but too many let their passion override their better judgement. Pretty ironic considering one of the main messages of P4.
@@magnusprime962 It's SO ironic. Whenever Kanji or Naoto discussion pops up, I always keep that irony in my head to have a laugh. Y'all are literally being the people the game is warning about! 😂
The fact that people don’t even acknowledge P5’s story (ESPECIALLY THE ROYAL PART) makes me so upset. I do believe 3’s is better but that’s just because it was so much more relatable to my life, but the prospect of government corruption and the loss of free will as a story is sooo good and served as a precautionary tale of what the world could become with its themes.
It's quite ironic that the games which talks about breaking away from societies standards, facing yourself and finding peace for how you are has a community of people how hold them as the main stardard and fight with eachother when they disagree.
@@brunobarreto5256 what can I say, Yaldabaoth and Izanami were both right I guess (not serious). But I personally share the take with OP. I played P5 after P2, P3 and P4 but I found that story on a personal and external level the most compelling and P5R sealed the deal for me. They are all great don’t kill me and I love them all (look at my pfp). People just seem to yearn for security in their status of being “correct” instead of embracing the freedom of being “wrong” and what it allows in self development of taste. Metaphor may have beat my P5R story superiority take but that’s just based on my experience. We need some major changes as people.
I wish people would talk about P5's NON-Dungeon related gameplay. Tokyo has a lot to do and feels so alive. The confidant' giving you abilities incentivizes players to not just focus on their party member's links and makes them more memorable, which I feel like is a part of the reason P4's side cast is so forgotten.
I especially agree with the flow and momentum part when it comes to the fights. The P3 party already had great synergy, but P5 takes it to another level. Every single party member (At least from the base roster of Phantom Thieves) work so well together that any team comp is viable because of the way they're tailored around using technicals.Then Royal added passive skills on top of that to make them have even more synergy. The fact that using two physical attackers on the same team, each with relatively low magic damage and having them use their magic skills for reasons beyond targeting weakness is a good idea is a VERY good example of how well made the combat in P5 is. In my opinion, once you learn how the combat works, all the Persona games become easy, but P5 is the only one that stays fun after that point
Super based. I laughed so hard when you asked if people can even inflict technicals or check the settings because I cant lie I've seen that in real time with friends
yep. It is crazy how little people actually look.
And it isn't only settings. Often times people will overlook entire mechanics or upgrade systems if they aren't carefully explained to you.
My girlfriend who is a pretty thurough gamer all things considered has played Mass Effect 3 for 55 hours before she knew that she could upgrade weapons. And she only learned that because I told her after seeing that she ran around with unupgraded stuff in late game areas.
Thjis isn't unique to her. So many people just never check.
@@reksravenyep
@@reksravenI’m not gonna lie…. I didn’t know you could upgrade weapons in me3. I guess that’s more of a game balance issue though, because I never felt like playing was too hard and I figured that the attachaments were the upgrades
@@dirtyningen8118 How the heck do you miss technicals while Makoto is yappin in the corner about em???
I have seen a guy stopped using technicals at after mid game. When i asked why he said non of them works. Dude you have passives and traits for a reason, USE THEM.
Gamers want games to be acknowledged as art so bad but then pick and choose what parts of the game count as art depending on the title and how much they enjoy it, pretty irritating ngl
AGREED
Yep. I think it is weird to me that people seem to only hail media as art if it just has traditionally accepted art alongside it.
Even highly praised games like Nier:Automata are only seen as "art" because of their writing and less because of their gameplay.
Even though gameplay is what makes videogames a unique artform.
Lies, there's no "gamers" consensus, most of this comes from journos and vocal circles on social media, what if I told you video games should be entertainment first and art a distant second? I bet most "gamers" just want fun video game, not art.
@@Gigamokin There are a lot of non-"journos" that talk about games like art. Some might argue there are more people who aren't journalists who want to see games talked about as art. So extrapolating from there most people want games to be art.
Most gamers I know want games to be recognized as art and dislike games that are products first i.e. AAA stuff.
People didn't love Nier because it was a nice product.
But fake little gamer bois like you will not comprehend.
(I am also more confrontational right now because I hate people who use the word "Journos" unironically)
@@reksraven games don't NEED to be recognized as art, they can be but it's not mandatory, that's all, geez man.
Persona 3's story has so many parallels to Neon Genesis Evangelion that I can't help but think this is intentional. But what makes this a _good_ thing is where they _differ._ Evangelion shows characters slowly succumbing to their psychological issues and it basically ends in disaster. Persona 3 is the opposite: It shows (most of) the characters _overcoming_ those same issues and it ends on a hopeful note. It reads more like a response to Evangelion than a ripoff of it.
I’m not saying that there’s no influence there, but eva is not the first nor the most close to p3’s story. Hell 2 did the same concept (albeit with some key differences) as three
Parroting ideas is legitimately one of my biggest pet peeves. People don’t know how to think for themselves and don’t care to learn how.
Here, some hot-takes (apparently):
Main cast-wise, I’m personally SEES all the way.
I genuinely find that, looking at the big-picture, the story of 5 is the strongest in the series.
Aigis is not the strongest character in 3.
Between FES and Portable, I prefer the latter.
As you said in the video, I find the Investigation Team to be the most mixed cast despite the quality of the SLs being the highest and most consistent overall.
And perhaps the hottest take of them all: I enjoy the story, characters, and gameplay of all three of these games. It is not a zero-sum game.
Fr tho 😂
listen dude beyond bandwagoning what if you genuinely just agree with others? they all have good casts stories and gameplay, but 5 obv has the best because its the most modern, 4 has the best characters to me because they do a good job at making me feel like i have friends, and 3 has the best story because it was the first game to make me cry
Disagree, investigation team all the way
Disagree, p4 all the way
Yeah, wouldn’t the protag be cause of the universe arcana?
I’ve only played reload 😱 (hot take: it is not good)
We can’t really put SEES in this convo cause more than half of the cast doesn’t have an SL, but if we compare p4 and p5, p5 has a much more mixed cast imo. I like characters like Ryuji, Yusuke, Makoto, Morgana, and even Akechi. But I couldn’t care less about Ann, futaba, haru, and while i liked her at first, i lowkey forgot Kasumi was a character when she got reintegrated into the story. Investigation team has Yukiko, who is kinda boring, but everyone else rules, imo
Based last take
@ have you beat p3reload
also even though i said p4 has good chars and whatever, the only ones i really enjoyed were yosuke and chie. the rest were kinda there
portable sucks and you're wrong
My problem with "3 = best story, but 4= best characters" is that it pretends that the characters aren't the biggest contributing factor that makes 3's story great. It's like people judge the stories based off a short paragraph plot synopsis
I think what people mean is that while the good characters in p3 are amazing, the game has so many forgettable links. Gourmet king, kenji, Kaz, and yuko are four of just the first few characters and all of them feel EXTREMELY bland. There are a ton of great links too, but there are plenty more of mediocre to outright bad links in the game
The social links for Kaz and Kenji annoyed me in P3.
You have to tell them whay they want to hear even if its bad for them. Kaz wants to be told to suck it up when going to get medical help would be for his own good and Kenji is pining for his teacher when the best outcome is for him to get rejected and the worst is that his pursuit of the teacher coul result in her losing her job and being stigmatised in society@@bruis1527
@@bruis1527 damn i actually genuinely liked all of their links
Yeah I'd argue that P4's S-Links have the most bangers out of any game. I like P5's quality being consistent, but P4's good links are INCREDIBLE.
@@Idk-ts1yi I like yuko myself, but admittedly, she brings nothing new or interesting if this isn’t your first persona game. Kenji is kind of funny too to me, but kaz is just there and gourmet king actively sucks. There are also some other links that I just don’t care for either like hidechi (I think that’s his name, but the student council dude) and a few others. Then there’s links like the old couple, the monk guy, and even the teacher which I think are all some of personas best (I love Mrs. Toriyumi’s, or however it’s spelled, link, especially the idea of bonding over an mmo). There are a lot of other really strong links, but I’d say just as many weaker ones too
My answer to this take: I like all of their stories, characters and gameplay equally.
Gaming discourse generally sucks and the main reason is the fact that people think that most things in games are objective and if you go against their personal opinion you’re wrong and they might even personally attack you. This goes for people that have unpopular opinions along side the ones with the popular opinions.
I so agree with the point about p5s gameplay and okumura, coming off p3p and p4g, okumura whipped my ass and genuinely made me restructure my party compared to the breeze of most other encounters in the game and it was genuinely a highlight and one of my favorite parts of the game.
Yeah the issue is the huge difficulty spike. like you need to figure out the weaknesses for each type of bot and then make a plan of what characters you use when and what personas joker will have. just a lot of planning and preparation which the previous bosses didn’t need
I feel like the takes are understandable even if not wholly true.
Persona 3 best story? It definitely has the most dramatic one. The 2D cutscenes are the best of the series, using high contrast shadows, dramatic close-ups and dutch angles and vibrant colors to sell the darkness of the setting. The plot has the biggest stakes in the series, you can't get much bigger than fighting Death itself. I think this monumentality makes the characters harder to notice in comparison. The themes are so grand that they overSHADOW the characrers (haha)
Persona 4 best characters? Well, the game relies the most on having you connect with the characters. The structure of the game and dungeons literally forces you to confront their deeper aspects. Plus, gameplay-wise, getting to control them also makes you more attatched to them, as part of YOUR team and not separate entities with their own agendas. The more natural voice acting and writing compared to P3 also helps.
Persona 5 best gameplay? Well, it dedicated itself the most to quality of life and adding more JUICE to every part of the gameplay. With Persona 5 you always feel like you have forwards momentum. Even the downtime moments are full of little kinetic and fun UI or interaction. The fights are faster and more dynamic. The palaces have more unique gimmicks and bosses than the past two games COMBINED. But this addicting momentum also means that it can be harder when the game wants you to slow down or engage more with the plot and characters. They aren't worse, but the general speed of the game makes it sometimes harder to care.
Persona 3 has the best story overall, sure, but the pacing is terrible. 1 month doing tartarus, confidants, activities etc ->boss-little plot advancement->repeat.
@@Trattato68
”persona 3 has the worst pacing”
*describes the pacing of every persona game*
@@wumbocookies9015tbf, P5/P5R has the best forward momentum plot wise after those time blocks imo. I always felt like I got the most out of our mission being accomplished in that game compared to the ones where pretty much your cast are the only ones that know you did something.
I think you’re onto something when you mention voice acting. I think a not insubstantial part of discussion about characterisation in Persona comes down to localisation and voice work, both of which are things modern Persona has done consistently well. Yes, you see a lot of discussion of Akechi and Kanji, but you’re inevitably gonna see someone bring up how good Robbie Daymond and Troy Baker were in those roles. Hell, look at how quickly the narrative around P3 social links like Yuko became once some good VAs were able to inject some charisma into them.
Like I think ‘P4 has the best characters’ is an effectively an oversimplified shorthand for ‘P4 has a large cast of charismatic, interesting and memorable characters (both main and side) brought to life with good voice acting, and a feel good atmosphere that encourages players to get especially attached’.
@h_works2965 It's one reason that I can get behind Persona 1 and 2 remakes, because if they get a proper FULL voicework, plus good cutscenes for the most dramatic plot moments, plus a more natural world presentation instead of those old PS1 isometric worlds, then I think people will be more invested in stuff like Maya's game-long ark in P1 or all the characters and crazy plot in P2
Persona 5 is both the most popular and most flanderized game Ive ever played, never change persona fandom, never change (please do its annoying sometimes)
My hottest Persona take is that Persona 1 has honestly incredible gameplay, things like lining up damage into auto battle to most efficiently defeat enemies, negotiating with demons, hell fusion might be at its best here at this was the only game in the series that I’ve played where I ended up having to hunt for specific cards in order to fuse specific personas instead of just fusing whichever persona has the best stats and brings forward the best moves
Haven’t played P1, but I’m curious about it.
Does this apply to the PS1 version or the PSP?
@myyoutubeaccount4167 psp, I’m not familiar with how the PS1 version differs
people's opinions are also completely influenced by which game they played first
Occurred to me last night how, if P3 is inspired by Greek tragedies, P5 is inspired by pulps, or their predecessors. Popular, accessable, "low art" fiction. From Zorro, to stories of heists, to the very western comic book- like costumes, and secret identities. Even figures like Captain Kidd with a basis in reality was the subject of the penny dreadful and the like. And yet, I don't find P5 to be cheaper because of its inspirations. Part of this is, of course, the fallacious notion of low art, but in large part it's about how the writers of the games take their inspiration and synthesize them for the games' narrative ends.
It's one of those takes that "makes sense" on the surface but in reality strips a lot of nuance out of debating the merits of any game. For example, unlike most people I find SEES to have the best roster of characters out of the three because their interpersonal drama adds a more interesting angle to all their character dynamics than the other 2's.
100% get that. It's the story relevancy, and growth the characters undergo that makes the P3 cast so likeable, and human in my opinion. 4 and especially 5 have characters with exaggerated personalities which do make them more eye-catching or entertaining on the surface, but P3 develops it's characters in a way that made me like it's cast 10x better than the 2 of those other games combined.
It almost feels like its used to shut down arguments for what game is the best. Prob the logic of "You can't argue against the general fan consensus. Shut up and accept"
persona fans are not proving yaldabaoth wrong with this one
@@Iamverykarpy They ain't proving Izanami wrong with this one either...
Hot take, Okumura is the coolest boss fight in the game, I had to keep swapping characters with Hifumi's ability so it was like the one boss where character got to shine, felt like an actual battle with ALL of the phantom thieves.
I think the world needs more insane takes, otherwise people just get set in stone. We need people to say that Innocent Sin has the best gameplay, mean it (somehow), and then actually try to defend it online.
This is the most Trash Taste Podcast thing I've ever heard and I love it.
Persona fans: "Persona games need to be harder!"
Atlus: *Makes the games harder*
Persona fans: "This is badly designed!"
They didn't make the games harder tho
@ Royal tweaked the bosses to make them harder
@@SonicTheCutehog Didn't even realize
My favorite main cast has always been sees. The reason for this is because they actually develop throughout the story, and actually move the story forward. Like Aigis relation with Makoto, or Junpei’s development with Chidori, Yukari and Mitsuru’s relation to the fall, or the development between Ken, Akihiko, and Shinji. The characters actually work off each other and even move the story along. Making the protagonist feel less like messiah who solves everyone’s problems and more like a participant to a greater story and Narrative.
Very good point, as persona 3 definitely has the most complex inter-party relationships, but as a result of the added complexity, it makes sees seem way more like a group of various "friend groups" rather than a single united party to me. Ken and Aki's development with shinji is fantastic and deeply moving, but Ken doesn't have an interesting or at the very least enjoyable dynamic with anyone else besides those two, aki being a little bit better due to his relationship with mitsuru. Junpei and Fuuka are also fairly isolated in the group, with Junpei only getting constant bickering from Yukari and an envy arc with the protag, and poor Fuuka getting even less.
The protag also being less important in everybody's development creates a lack of connection between him and the later party members barring Aigis. The game even shows this by having Minato's friend group after forgetting everything on the true ending only being Yukari and Junpei, only having loose relationships with everyone else. Other than those three, Minato has very shallow relationships with everyone else outside of Mitsuru's and Fuuka 's social, which is odd considering how pretty much the entire team practically worships him when they have little personal reason to. Minato is less of a social Messiah, but becomes more of a literal Messiah.
While the characters might function better as individuals, S.E.E.S. in its entirety suffers, resulting in the most fragile group dynamic (as can be seen by the absolute chaos that happens in December and that the answer quite literally pits them against each other).
Pretty much. Persona 3 has the best characters because the party is the only one with members that actually have character development with or without the protagonist. Almost as if they're human beings with agency.
@@HunterStiles651This. They feel the most realistic and the most realized.
@@somethingofnote9241 But why is that bad? It's not like the members of SEES _have_ to be friends with each other. They're comrades with a common goal. They don't need to all be buddy-buddy.
I'm of the same mindset here, I absolutely love P3 for it's cast. I actually found P4/P5 to be lacking with their casts in comparison. Like, a lot of characters in both games had all of their development tied to their social links, and as a result they basically don't exist for most of the story. I love Yukiko as a character, but you could legitimately remove her from the story and it would barely change anything past the first dungeon. Same goes for Ryoji, Naoto, Ryuji, Ann, Yusuke, Haru, etc... They just stop existing after a certain point and it makes them a lot less memorable as a result
"The problem arrives whenever people just start saying shit" might be the most succinct way I've ever heard this put.
It's crazy how much of the stuff Persona warns against is present in the community.
It’s like the Batman Arkham series repeated take
Asylum- best atmosphere
City- best story
Origins- best boss fights
Knight- best gameplay
Hate these takes because I feel like it’s always used to immediately dismiss comparisons between games in the series and boils them down to one aspect without acknowledging what else makes the game good
I feel like this type of cliche also comes from a place of trying to appear "fair" or unbiased, by distributing good qualities as evenly or equally as possible among various entries. But most of the time, I can't help feeling people with this take are being dishonest with themselves on some level.
The truth is it is incredibly unlikely that a real player's experience will reflect this kind of perfectly neat distribution. This is just prioritizing a spurious or forced desire for "equality" over an honest or authentic subjective assessment of one's _actual_ experience. And it fundamentally ignores that many of these elements (whether story, atmosphere and characters, or boss fights and gameplay) are inextricably related to each other. They can't be easily separated.
My own favorite game in the franchise is P3 by a good margin. And I have no issue sincerely saying that I think it does _most_ of the things I value better than other entries I've played. I have no problem with somebody saying the same for P5. Say it with your chest.
@@index3876 Absolutely agreed. P5 is the best one in all departments btw.
@@index3876 You explained my thoughts perfectly, I think Persona 5 is the best in the series in multiple aspects not just gameplay and I hate that any comparison between the 3 games is shut down by people wanting the three of them to be completely equal in different aspects. Don’t get me wrong I think 3,4, and 5 are all amazing games but I have a clear preference.
Hey man, I just wanted to say I really appreciated this video. I think on an online forum or something similar a couple years ago I brought up the same topic of the “3 best story, 4 best characters, 5 best gameplay” trope was limiting discussion and promoting very surface level analysis. I don’t remember the reception, but since then I’ve mostly stepped away from online discussion about these games, just with how circular it can feel sometimes. I often enjoy talking or reading things about why people DISLIKE these games more than like them, because they usually offer new perspectives that I haven’t heard before and either challenge my thinking or make me appreciate things more.
One example of the “hive mind” that gets to me is like you said the ignorance of the side characters. It seems like if you ask anyone nowadays they will say that the moon arcana is the worst social link in persona 3.
Like… what? You are the same group of people who say that you love persona 3’s themes of death and confronting grief, and then you hate on the one that has one of the most realistic portrayals of that theme. Did you bother thinking about his themes of trauma causing over eating, loss making someone more vulnerable and making drastic lifestyle changes (with the cult), and so on, or did you just read somewhere online that his SL was bad and make fun of him for being awkward and fat? I have similar sentiments with funnily enough the moon arcana again in P4.
Even now, I hadn’t ever really contextualized the p4 cast in my mind as “yes men” before, and now it makes a lot of sense. I often question why this community either hates or ignores the depth of characters like Yukari and Ken in favor of, again as you put it, highlighting “their” idea of what the p4 characters are. It is quite frustrating and why I largely avoid discussion or videos about persona nowadays. It’s more fun to reach my own conclusions and do my own research :P
Well said. I agree with this except I do engage with the fandom lol. But yeah this type of take is just too limiting and it sucks because persona can spawn so much interesting discussion but everyone wants to have the same 5 takes and talking points 💔
@@Blue-fe4by Don't mess with Persona fans. We only know three dialogue options.
You're so right about the way the community views Persona 5's gameplay and it's so frustrating. So many people got into Persona with 5 so now they look at the old games and want to remake them to get rid of ALL unique gameplay differences.
Can't expand the roguelike nature of Persona 4's dungeons, it **has** to be like Persona 5's palaces now. Can't expand the tactics system of Persona 3 or improve the fatigue system, we **have** to get rid of those and make it resemble Persona 5 on a surface level as much as possible. Can't keep the grid system in a Persona 1 remake, because how can ideas from an old game have any value?
People can't even claim that it's about bringing old Persona games up to modern standards anymore because Persona 5 is a game from 2016. It's about making everything like Persona 5 because Persona 5 is the only one they truly liked, so they want to remake the entire series in it's image so that they like it more. Now every game is going to play the same and that's so boring.
I 100% agree, my favorite is P5 but I wish P4 Remake doesn't change the dungeons to palaces like P5, each game is supposed to be unique and different, P3R already took some things from P5 but I'm glad Tartarus didn't change as much.
Persona 5 is the best in the series. Go cry about it. And persona 5 has scripted well designed dungeons but also a tartarus like main dungeon it has both. Does your littel persona 4 have that 😢😢😢😢 ohhh!!! No it doesn't 😢😢😢.
@tomgu2285 You're missing the point. Even if we consider P5 being the best in the series as an absolute truth, does that mean every future Persona game needs to play like Persona 5? Does that mean we have to change games that aren't Persona 5 to be exactly like Persona 5? These are different games, why can't they be allowed to be different? No wonder companies don't take risks anymore, people play one game that they like and decide everything should play like that forever.
The tactics system is just dumb, ngl. I get that it's super cool and helps SEES feel like their own people rather than just accessories to the protagonist. It's just that if the AI is so brainless when you let it do whatever it wants that you have to use tactics to micromanage their behavior, at that point it's just Direct Commands with extra steps.
@@HunterStiles651 Even if you think that's the case, I think there was a better solution than just "replace it with P5 combat". Replacing a rotten apple with an orange doesn't make it a better apple.
People only say this because they think it’s the resolution to all debates on the games. Like “see guys, we’re all winners”
I mean for me personally I was the one guy who was like persona 3 best character, best story and best gameplay. I know thats a hot take, I just love persona 3. It was the only persona game I beat in like 1.5 weeks and didn't see sunlight
The weird thing about the "P4 = best characters" take is that most people I've talked to (not representative of the fandom as a whole) list P4 as their least favorite main cast. And as far as P3's story, while I agree with it being the best (I'd personally rate P3 as the best in all three of these categories), I think P5 has a better plot than P3, though P3 has the stronger overall story due to its handling of its themes and characters being so much stronger.
Thank you!!! I think Persona 3 is the best game overall specifically because of how the narrative and the characters all tie into the themes of finding reasons to live. Persona 3's story is the best because the character's do a fantastic job of facilitating it and connecting us as players to it. I dont dislike the Persona 4 cast, but I'll take SEES over the Investigation team any day.
For all of these super repeated takes, it's always a good idea to ask them why. Not for disagreeing (though disagreement is still allowed), but rather for checking wether they're just following the popular opinion or actually ended up with it themselves.
I never get anything meaningful out of doing that though. The immediate response they jump to is to bash on another thing which tells me nothing.
Takes are meant to be subjective but I've had a friend who once thought it were to be true, as it gets parroted among the community, only to then get into the series on their own merit & being disappointed at 4 having very poor character moments (namely Teddie & Yosuke were their biggest gripes). This also hit when they were playing P3, saying it had poor pacing in their eyes & a lot the setup for half the game could have been done within the first two months, which halted their enjoyment of the title a bit. They also did not take a liking to December as a whole.
When fans repeat something for a long while, people outside of the community will take them by their word & whether it's true or not won't really be debated with unless you are already someone that persists in the fandom.
Imagine my face when i boot up p3 reload thinking it’ll have the best story just for nothing to really happen until the trip during summer time ☠
Yeah P3 FES is my favorite Persona game but back when I first got into the series I thought it was the most boring, character trope, non-moving plot game of all time for a while lol.
7:20 YES. I’ve always hated people saying persona 4 had the best main characters or group because it always shafts what imo is the best cast of social links the series has.
Persona 3 to me will always have the best main characters because of how dynamically written they are throughout the game. But persona 4 has this amazing ensemble cast of characters that show up in each others social links and show up for hangout slots together and such, it truly feels like a small town that all know each other.
I think the argument is more so that the investigation team seemed like actual friends. SEES always felt like a group working towards a goal. ATLUS saw that and added stuff to make them seem more like friends in Reload.
In 5, the Phantom Thieves seem like they're broken in smaller cliques. Haru/Makoto, Ann/Ryuji, Futaba/Yusuke. They all seemed to have their own plans when Joker left, and didn't show they'd miss him like SEES misses Makoto or the investigation team missed Yu
I'm not a big fan of like half of p3's cast
Imo characters like mitsuru, ken, fuuka are just kinda dull and not super fleshed out
@@Jermaine2099 What do you mean they didn't show that they'd miss Joker? They literally drive him home on a long road trip BECAUSE they know they won't see him for a long time; they're trying to spend as much time with him as they can because they know they'll miss him so much.. Unless you're referring JUST to Royal's additional ending, but that portrays everyone as being out of character, it clearly wasn't written by someone who understood what the vanilla game was going for.
So does that mean Persona 4 is mostly liked for nostalgia, just like Chrono Trigger?
@@Kneevirus I get not liking the characters but ya can't ignore Mitsuru and Ken's whole development with loss confiding in Yukari and Akihiko unless you dislike em so much to the point of falling asleep whe they're on screen. Also in regards to Fuuka, I get that she does nothing substantial in most people's eyes but to me she's one of the characters that represents the life aspect P3's themes the most.
She develops the importance of bonds and the appreciation of the little things in the base game not by a single personal death but by relishing in the moment of her own experiences whether that be cooking, developing tech in her own time, or simply talking with friends and by her positive attitude she's a key member in tying the team together bringing a bit of sunshine to their otherwise broody mood.
Couldnt people not agreeing on something be proof that something is deeper than just the surface seems.
Persona 4 is the best to me that’s all I gotta say and I can’t wait for a remake
The only thing that is objectively true is that P4 has the best soundtrack
No disrespect I just can't agree. There's not a single track in P4 that comes close to "Mass Destruction" or "I Believe" dawg.
Sorry. I gotta disagree. Even the Persona 5 Imagining Project beats P4's OST
@@ShadowOfMassDestruction While I disagree with your examples, I can see your point. I just think the P4 soundtrack has the most songs I keep replaying, and that's coming from someone who likes the other 2 games better. Time to make history is my favorite in the series but even discounting that, I just think the whole soundtrack is just incredibly good, even songs that aren't that stand out like SMILE are stuck to my head to this day
No disrespect but Time to Make History is not even in my top 20
We stan the bros who call out the hypocrisy of people calling Kanji gay 🫡
I hate when people just blindly follow what other people say instead of forming their own opinions, that being said, all persona games are great, they all have good stories, likeable characters and fun gameplay.
11:55 You are hitting the nail on the head when it comes to my problem with Persona 5's combat--*half of the mechanics can be completely ignored because you can get away without them!!* this is a problem a lot of JRPGs have, but Atlus had been pretty good at avoiding it. Persona 5--especially Royal--just piles on bonus after bonus that makes it so by midgame you have multiple dominant strategies to choose from and battles don't really require much thought anymore.
And speaking of ludonarrative dissonance--how is it that you have _so much money_ as a juvenile delinquet with no friends, compared to _literally having the richest family in the country on your side_ in P3???
I mean, the juvinile delinquent IS a thief...
@@rfmerrill The problem with this though is that if people actually bothered to play the game and not immediately run to Izanagi no Okami the bosses do teach you the mechanics of how to play the dang game.
Madarame teaches you weakness and passes Kaneshiro teaches that if you don't put those losers to sleep they'll keep blocking you plus... exp is not hard to get in P5. Just go grind a little bit more. Stop being lazy and fuse some dang Persona's.
If they can't beat Okumura five palaces into the game they shouldn't be playing Persona.
Tbh, I like having so many options. Even if a lot of the combat is easy, it’s fun playing with different team comps and broken stuff. Baton pass is easily my favorite mechanic! (That being said, I’m still trying to beat the Twins/Lavensa so that part feels hard rn)
@@ShadowsCrawlDown That's why I don't care about P5R being easy to be honest lol. It's plain fun and customizable.
I think we truly forget the most important thing about the Persona series and how it expands on different views of human society, our hearts and minds, and how we all strive to find our place of happiness in the world that isn’t promised or guaranteed, and how dark and lonely it can be when we lose our way or don’t have a good support system. We all love the stories they tell, and we all relate to one more than the other. That’s what makes it so great is trying to find the communication between the different fans. So let’s all start a new social link 🔗 and be fans of the series and not just one ☝️
I think the reason this take is so prominent is simply because people want to make it easy to categorize different games in the series dependent on what people want. So they default to stuff like "Oh well 3 has the best story, if you like characters then 4, if you like gameplay then 5." But when you do that, it makes it confusing to new people since it makes the other aspects of the game seem worse in comparison. What's the point of playing 5 for example, if all that there is, is the gameplay. Why play 3 when it only has a good story, but the characters / gameplay aren't good, these extremely simplistic takes honestly make it harder to get into the series if anything.
I think it's better to categorize these games into the themes that they tackle, rather than the "gameplay/story/characters" since it's just stupid overall to simplify it as "this has best gameplay, best story, best characters" like that makes no sense, Characters make good stories, you can't have a good story without good characters, neither can you have good characters without good story. They're also video games at the end of the day, so boiling it down as one being the best gameplay is simply false too. Do I think P5 has some really good gameplay? Of course, but I don't think it's the end all be all, and some people actually prefer the dungeons from P4 / P3 with the procedural generation and such.
Categorizing into themes allows one to just be able to understand what they want from the game, stuff like how P3 is inspired by Greek Mythology with the Persona designs and the story, how P4 is inspired by Japanese Mythology, how P5 is inspired by Rebels and outlaws from literature. As for discussion within the community, it should be more based on more complex aspects of the story, going beyond the surface.
idk what the community is smoking, persona 3 had some ass story i had a difficult time finishing the game, though p5r and metaphor are my top 2 games so idk man maybe im high
my argument for best story and cast would be persona 3 bc they are inextricable. the full moon battles give the story a reliable structure and usher the player into the game’s twist and final act, and the cast’s individual experiences with death, the past, and moving forward are all built up and paid off within this structure. unlike other games where characters seem to have their allotted space and then their individual perspectives are regulated to social links/confidants.
I also think that sees is the best main cast, because with Sees they actually have a presence with the story and develop as characters together, like Aigis with the protagonist, Junpei and Chidori, Yukari and Mitsuru relation to the fall. The characters actually drive the story forward and develop together as characters.
@Vinripp Yeah I think P4's cast is underwritten in the main story. Mostly because the devs and writers couldn't have known what you might know about the main characters at that point.
Any type of reveal or twist regarding the characters has to happen in S-Links or they have to have a different reveal for the main story. Which is easiest achieved by just making their arc relegated to the dungeon they are in.
I personally like the main P4 cast. I love Yosuke and they make for great social links. But that is really about all. Each one of them could have not been a member of the team and I would like them about the same.
I'd say the same about gameplay too. The gameplay compliments the characters and story in P3 so well that I wouldn't even really try to separate it when talking about the game. Complimenting the characters and story is what the gameplay's there for imo.
100% agree with you. listen i think 4's casti great, it's a good game. that's true about all persona games. however with 3, the cast actually feels like they're always there. their character development just doesn't suddenly stop bcuz their 'arc' is over, it happens throughout the game. each of sees character arcs feel so.. refreshing, they feel real. they intertwine and twist with each other to create a main cast with a strong bonb to each other, not just the main mc. it feels like each member of sees relationship with each other is unique. I've seen people complain that p3 cast 'isnt the closest', and idk. i think it adds a layer of realism that some characters are close, but maybe not the closet (like junpei and mitsuru vs junpei and yukari).
anyways sorry I love p3, I've loved it since fes, loved it during reload. but each persona game has their merits,
Yup. It's why characters who are introduced at the very start of the game still have revelations and resolves at the end of the game. Because they aren't thrown away the second their arc is over and they're intertwined with the plot.
This is probably the best way I've heard my thoughts on the "best characters/story/gameplay" discussion get put into words, because I feel almost the exact same way, particularly on the persona 4 front. It's nice to hear more appreciation for the side cast and less on a main cast that I felt was VERY hit or miss.
Tbh the Arkham series has a similar issue with that one image of “Best Atmosphere, Best Story, Best Boss Fights, and Best Gameplay”
TRUE
One pattern that I have noticed over the years in regards to RPG's in general is that combat systems that are unique or have extra layers to them are usually the ones that people dislike the most.
Persona 3 FES, Final Fantasy VIII, and Xenoblade Chronicles 2 all fit this same pattern. All of the games have combat systems that take time getting used to and require you to learn the games mechanics more than people would like to thus leading to all of these games getting criticized by their fandoms.
As far as P3's gameplay goes, I understand why they made it the way they did, and it makes perfect sense from a thematic standpoint. I can even praise it for trying something new to communicate those things. However, that doesn't mean I or anyone else has to like it.
Honestly, to me, the best story and characters are on the P2 Duology. I did start with P3FES and then went back, Maya and the gang are my favourite Persona main cast. As for side characters, I do feel strongly for the ones in 3. I like the story on 4 more than 3, just because of the fact that it is more optimistic.
especially with how things have been post-reload i think it's pretty clear that the reason p5 is considered "best gameplay" is because it looks and feels flashiest while being the most convenient and "unobtrusive" compared to the previous games. that doesn't mean it plays bad though, i think it plays fine.
My dad doesn't believe that videogames can have deep and moving stories, but when I told him Hisano's story he was like: "THAT'S in a game?". So yeah, those SLs and the main cast trying to accept themselves is something I fondly remember from Persona 4.
Hell yeah bubbletea upload
Fax
The fact that most persona fans haven’t played the games get more realistic each day
persona fans are just dumb i completely agreee with the fact they can't take anything except the universally accepted opinion call me crazy but i loved exploring tartarus
Tartarus is better than some of the P5 palaces and I'll stand on business for that one
@NateyBoi90059 I love Persona 3 but I don't know about that one chief. I like Tartarus not because of Tartarus itself but because it's a playground for fights. P5 palaces are actually *dungeons* and not just walking around aimlessly until you find some stairs.
Im going to cry i love this video so much. It feels like everything ive had on my mind about the fandom and their takes on the games for so long. I thought i was going crazy for feeling like i saw this take regurgitated 500 times.
Everything said here i agree 100%. I wish fandoms learned to think for themsleves and have interesting conversations more...didnt p5 teach us to not give into the hivemind mentality?? Oh wait p5 best gameplay only so Nobody cares about the story
I wanna say more but i dont want this to be an essay...all i'll say is that all persona games are good in my opinion. Its very rare you get consistently high quality games with so much content and love back to back but atlus manages to hit the mark every time. So im not sure why we even need to compare and fight each other when we're here for a shared love of the SERIES. But nobody hates persona more than persona fans :/
Some people need to learn that different people have different opinions and that’s okay, Persona 5 is my favourite persona game, because it has my favourite story, themes, cast and gameplay. Do I think the others games are bad just because they not my favourite persona games, HELL NO, they are amazing games and deserve all the love and the fans and then some. They’re all Masterpieces imo and deserve to be praised and celebrated.
0:32 RARE P1/P2 APPRECIATION 🗣🗣🗣🗣🗣
Most fans as usual deny the existance of these games because they know their dumb asf takes would be blown out of the water if the 3 intro games were given into consideration
I deny them because visually they look awful. Especially the dungeon crawling.
Soundtracks are really good though.
10:40 honestly based boss fight though. Is it frustrating? Hell yeah. I still had heaps of fun with it.
If I'm completely honest, the "ideal gameplay" for the Phantom Thieves would be somewhere in the center of the venn diagram of Strikers and Tactica. Dodging, spinning, jumping around like a Dynasty Warriors game, but with sleek setups and tactics like, well, _Tactica._ The Thieves take battles in a flow state. The IT take battles up front and grounded. SEES are up front and _strategic._
I think Persona 5 and 3 Reloaded have my favorite gameplay of the 3/4/5 set of games mostly for the life sim aspects. The actual battles aren't different enough between 4G, 3R, and 5/5R for me to say with certainty that I prefer one over another, and I actually love that Tartarus and the TV World *_aren't_* like Palaces. It lets Mementos feel much more like one branch of the collective unconsciousness instead of its own separate thing.
Especially since my take on the TV World areas were that they're an extreme showcase of how the Shadow thinks *_others_* perceive the trapped individual. They're putting on a show for an audience, after all, not acting for no reason.
Kanji's Shadow acts the way it does to play up Japanese stereotypes of effeminate men-which basically just means "flaming" when translated for the Western audience.
Same with Naoto. She acts masculine because detective work is a "man's job" and hates that her gender matters at all. It's not transitioning that is being shown as horrific, but the fact that she's having to strip away part of herself-part of her _humanity_ even-just to be taken seriously. Her Shadow isn't a boy, it's a _robot_ with its most striking feature being its exposed computer brain. In other words, she's got the brains for detective work, but feels like she has to tear off her own skin in order to show that to the world.
Funnily enough, I once had this take, though the reason came from "comparing to Persona 5", as I experienced the stories in reverse order (nothing to do with the community, as memes had too many spoilers, so I stayed away).
"P4 best characters" = "The main group was strikingly similar to the P5 crew, but I liked them much more thanks to them having to face their own Shadows."
"P3 best story" = "This felt a lot more impactful and climatic compared to P5 & 4, I mean listen to that final boss theme, this feels like the finale to all of Persona!" (Yep, based this on endings only).
"P5 best gameplay" = "It feels weird to not have P5 be #1 at something.. I mean, it has visual style, but that doesn't really say much, huh? I guess.. gameplay?" (This one was influenced by the community, since it felt wrong to say "I don't like P5 as much as the other two" at the time.)
Watched the P3 movies and P4+G animes before playing the games at a later time, though my opinions didn't shift.
My opinions today:
Favorite characters/story (because the characters make the story) = P4G from beginning to end. P3R from beginning to base game end (still haven't played The Answer). P5R, but only the new parts. Honorable mention to the P2 games, I've only seen highlights of someone's playthrough, but it left a good enough impression that I feel like it'd meet whatever vague standards I'm giving these games.
I feel like a lot of influence for which characters I like came down to the spin-off incarnations, as they felt like "cover only, no pages" editions of themselves. Everything I actually liked about the characters isn't going to be displayed, so if I wanted "more of these characters", it came down to if I found them annoying or likeable/funny at their base level. I found that I really don't like most of the P5 cast on rip (and that goes double for Royal, though I get that they don't wanna give major spoilers).
At the end of the day, this was all about people cheating to put 3 games in a #1 position, because when someone asked "which one is your favorite?", they couldn't pick.
Favorite gameplay = And sometimes a decision doesn't need to be made. I can't appreciate modern Persona mechanics after playing SMT5V.
Yeah
A lot of people forget all of the character development throughout P3 and how so many of the mechanics of P3 are just outright built around making the characters feel more real and reflecting their struggles
Hear me out,
Persona 3 is presumed to have the best story because it actually created a sense of dread or tension. The story keeps you guessing and there is a real sense of peril from the more visual novel style storytelling
Persona 4 has the “best” characters because the atmosphere from the setting and interactions feels more natural/genuine
Persona 5 mechanics are just too
tight and there is so meticulous detail that the bar has been set high. Persona 5 led to metaphor (games reception speaks for itself) being a more polished beta in prep for Persona 6 for a reason
Yesss exactly the characters are the story in p3
How much does it matter that Kanji isn’t gay if half the jokes around his character are blatantly homophobic? It’s still directly going against the message of his character if the game still mocks him for his perceived sexuality and eccentricity.
People wanting Persona 4 to have designed dungeons like Palaces instead of randomly generated dungeons doesn’t go against core themes of P4. It’s people wanting the characters to have intentionally designed spaces to further go into their character like palaces do. SMT gameplay has follows a similar niche ever since press turn was invented. People enjoying P5 gameplay and wanting that to be a new fixture of the One More system isn’t some failing.The trait system, baton pass, and technicals were all great new additions to the core gameplay of Persona that should continue. None of those gameplay features directly contradict anything core to the series and Baton Pass becoming a staple gimmick reinforces the importance of bonds that is prevalent throughout all of Modern Persona.
As a guy who likes P3 the most, each game has so many strengths to each other that I can appreciate the other a lot. My favorite reason as to why P3's and cast are so multi layered and is excellent is due to how the game starts as just being a "cooky secret job" where you slowly start exploring Tartarus while dealing with their life and academics, but as the game's stakes and trials continue to get more intense, we get to see everyone grow. I think the main character that I feel perfectly capsulates this feeling is not Aigis, but Junpei. He starts off as just a goof and a bit misogynistic, but he grows into one of the best and most emotional characters, willing to put his life to protect his friends and the person he loves. It's honestly the reason why he's my favorite main "bro" character of the series.
Also, for me, in terms of gameplay, I think Reload is my favorite due to the flow of it. I do think it suffers a lot of the same issues of P5 with the difficulty, but I think it is far better at being difficult, and Theurgies are my favorite side mechanic, even if they can be VERY op. I still think SMT VV and Metaphor due outrank the entire Persona series for their combat, as the press turn, Demon Negotiation, and Archetype systems are more interesting and better-balanced difficulty wise.
I think this has good points even if you do say Persona fans as a general blanket statement a lot. Going against the grain in any way is usually seen as bad unfortunately. Like saying you love P3's gameplay like I do and people will be quick to judge defenses of the tactics system, fatigue, etc or even that SEES is largely not close whatsoever for a good portion of the game.
It also shows that it's good to think critically. Like you said: why do you like P5's gameplay more or 4's cast the best? What actually made that game stand out in the aspects it does? And why do some fans want the games to all be like 5 when each Persona game (1and 2 included) have their own mechanics and identity? This is partially why I was disappointed in Reload. Not just because of the lack of FemC or the inclusion of Episode Aigis as DLC but because it feels like it actively both is not the definitive version and is also trying to erase 3's unique identity to be more like 5.
Good points, man.
Dude the amount of people bashing p3fes' gameplay for no reason during the initial launch window of P3R was aggravating. You tell them how the system isn't approachable but rewarding once you master it and that you just wish to have that gameplay (cleaned up) as an option. And they say "I still don't like it direct control is better and nobody cares about AI-Tactics actually"
It's honestly a shame that Atlus didn't improve the existing mechanics because there's a lot of potential. But also understand why they do that
You have your best selling game and it's highly praises for the gameplay, then you want to create a remake of the third game and be a success. I would honestly do the same and just erase the things people complaint since the launch of the game (Tired and not allowed to control your party) and doing the gameplay to be more similar to my most succesful game.
@@reksravenfr they are so biased 😂
@@reksraven Agreed. I get if others don't like the tactics system (it took me a long while for it to click) but it's part of what makes 3 3 unless we count Portable. I'm fine with direct control but tactics as an option (maybe as an original gameplay mode option) would have been so sweet
@@Zora-jr2lk I agree. It's a damned if you do damned if you don't situation. I would vote for having an original mode (include tactics, fatigue, etc but spruced up and rebalanced) and a new mode (direct command and no fatigue) or even try to mix the two with selectable options
I feel like the "take" has Personas 3 and 4 backwards. To me the main draw of P3 _is_ the characters; whereas with P4 it's how well-integrated the Persona awakening mechanic is with the theme of discovering and embracing your true self, and how well the setting plays into both the plot and each character's sense of identity. I think P4 is the most cohesive story experience, and if not for some of the Golden changes I'd say it's the best entry point into the series for new players. My one knock against P4 is how surface-level your party members' interactions with each other seem to be; in P3 they have a lot more history with each other so their conversations when MC isn't around are more meaningful. I prefer P3's characters, and as Persona is mainly a character-focused RPG I'd say P3 is my favourite.
P5 is the best _game,_ which is to say it's the one title where everything seems to feed back into dungeon-crawling the most. The new Confidant system gives you gameplay motivation to engage with social links outside of the marginal "oh I might fuse a Persona that starts at a higher level" that P3/P4 provide, which takes emphasis away from just experiencing social links for the story aspect. I've noticed this trend especially while playing Metaphor, where the main thing that guides me in selecting which Follower to see next is the abilities they give and _not_ which story beat I most want to see. Despite this I do think P5 has my favourite roster of social links, which redeems it in my eyes as a Persona game.
im a big fan the series and personally 5 has the best story for me
Kanji is (probably) not gay. Naoto is (probably) not trans. Yosuke may be gay, but probably isn't. Maybe bi. All bets are off when they go to college lol
Some of what that take says is true but I'd argue that p3 had some gameplay elements that were taken in reload to be more like p5 and those elements were good like the mc having multiple weapons to wield which then got improvements in metaphor and the knock down from one more taking a turn and being able to search Tartarus faster by telling your team to go on their own
P4 cast is the best but not because they feel like friends it's because every character is interesting to me and that could differ from one person to another and that the game has the most balanced screentime for each character
Sees not feeling like friends is what it is supposed to be they get to know each other better with the story going forward and p4 is a sequel to that it's what friends do after knowing each other and becoming friends
And p3 had the best story if compared to p5 but with royal I prefer p5r story more
Digital Devil Saga best story, best characters and best gameplay ez
@@leosee-through6147
Based.
I feel like the people who complain about P3's lack of party control have never used the tactics menu. People always conveniently leave out that you can basically get the characters to do what you need them to do with it. Either that or they haven't even played P3 original or FES.
Mostly true but it's frustrating sometimes. Like when I want Aigis to use buffs but she keeps healing instead. Or when I have to tell Junpei to wait because he keeps killing himself on Moonless Gown.
Exactly this. People who defend the tactics system to the death seem to think instances like that are a skill issue when it’s just bad game design.
@@swordfish1390 It's not bad game design it's a difference in strategy. Modern Persona requires and rewards reactionary decisions while P3 FES requires and rewards prepared decisions. It's up to the player to make sure they acquire the knowledge, prompts, items, and equipment needed for any given situation which is why I found it very interesting.
It's not perfect of course but people acting like it's a flaw that Hashino even tried to give the cast more character through interesting gameplay as if it's a sin among sins frustrates me when half the fanbase complains that they can't even beat Okumura in their easiest title. That only tells me that they shouldn't be listened to.
It's incredibly ironic that for a fandom that supposedly played and liked the Persona games and therefore the message it brings, they can come off as one of the shallow passerbys trash talking people on the street. Persona 4 and Persona 5 made liberal use of them to highlight how different the main cast is in pursuing the truth and justice from the rest of the world who readily accept the surface-level slop and situation even as the world gradually devolves into fog or apathy. The Persona series is all about listening to your true self and using your own senses to perceive reality while cutting through lies and fog. This video is one such example of that. Feel free to make your own interpretations, that's the power of your own persona. But don't just accept the general consensus just because it's safe or fashionable or just because they told you to. The Persona games showed you that there's a better way, now it's up to us ourselves to live that better way.
Also, the Okumura fight is one of my favorites. It's one of the rare few times the battle system of P5 is stretched to its fullest potential. (the other being Maruki) Most of the time, random Shadow battles don't last long enough to do a full Baton Pass, and the results are spectacular when you pull one off.
Yeah exactly I hate p4 fans and thier discussions about how hashino is transphobic and homophobic like wtf? Who cares who let these people play these games?
You know what, I don't like like half of the cast of Persona 4 and not a huge fan of the main story either for various reasons... HOWEVER I definitly agree that Persona 4 has the best set of Social Links and I truly agree that the side characters in these Social Links are underated, while there is many Social Link I dislike in P3 and 5, the only one I actively disliked in P4 is Marie (cause imo she just feel extremely forced (which considering she is an addition of Golden is not crazy), the way that all the characters just magically decide to become best friend with her immediatly after meeting her for the first time, while she keeps her Tsundere whatever attitude), every other Social Links I actually liked to various degree.
Here's the reality.
Persona 3: great characters, good story, basic gameplay.
Persona 4: Weak characters, okay story, good gameplay.
Persona 5: top-tier characters, top-tier story, good gameplay.
SMT III: Weak characters, weak story, top-tier gameplay.
SMT V: okay characters, good story, better-than-top-tier gameplay.
Revelations: Persona: okay game.
Persona 2 Innocent Sin: _trash game_ .
Persona 2 Eternal Punishment: Good game, top-tier game with their recently released content involving Tatsuya and the Sea of Souls.
I can't wait to see the Persona 'fandom's' response to this.
Persona 4 as weak characters is a hot take to say the least
@@peacemaker0240 It's just plain true though. They're all a step away from being giant, flanderized parodies of themselves. That game is actually afflicted with the same disease of writing that Guardians of the Galaxy gave to all Marvel movies that came after itself. The P4 characters, except for a few social links and the main antagonist, are _not_ to be taken seriously. They are almost not real. The worst offenders are Chie, Rise, and Teddy, by _far_ . That is not to say that they are without any kind of merit at all, but there's precious little to be had, and what is good about the characters of P4 is incredibly overshadowed by the bad moments.
Let me ask you this; can you think of even a _single_ character from P4 that is written as well as, say, Junpei of P3 is? Or Aragaki?
@@StupidAnon-gn8ih Fair enough, but then again p3 is my fav so i'm biased
Okay with everything except SMT3, characters are not weak and story is full of lore (I'm playing right now I'm just about to beat it)
@@binahobino "Okay with everything except SMT3, characters are not weak and story is full of lore"
'Lore' is just fictional history. It's not a story. It is not the _plot_ , and I'll get to the plot in a little bit. The thing is, story and characters are intertwined. The story of the characters is the story, of the story, and unless the characters are well-written, including characterization, you don't have a good story. I'll use an example that has _frequently_ been a problem in Atlus' games, but it's especially bad in SMT III, and that is the opening. Simply put, the protagonist is far too quick to accept the severe strangeness that first greets him at the game's opening. He greets it all with the silent protagonist equivalent of a shrug, and he's a high school student. He has zero reaction, zero affect, to what happens to him at the start of the game, and there is no good reason explaining why he behaves that way. Contrast that with the protagonist of SMT V, who practically has a breakdown when he goes through something extremely similar, but decides (correctly) that he has to pick himself up and move if he wants to survive, and it becomes obvious that the 'inner life' of one character is much more deeply drawn than the other, and that trend persists throughout comparison points of the two games.
Examining the supporting characters of SMT III leaves you looking at two-dimensional cut-outs who were written primarily to embody a philosophy rather than be people with hopes, dreams, fears, and weaknesses. I'll use Chiaki as my example for the supporting characters, but the same basic issue plagues Isamu and Yuko as well; the moment she is thrust into the conception, she turns into a walking argument for 'rule by the strong,' and in order to justify that, we get a thick, expository monologue about how her past suffering convinced her that her newfound philosophy is true. Remember, _the whole point of the game_ is to create a new world (or not) on a set of new founding principles, and that's _why_ those characters are as I described earlier, avatars of a particular philosophy first, and people second, which leads to them saying weird things, like Yuko describing the old world as valuable and then literally in the next sentence, contradicting herself. I have a suspicion as to why that is; I think the writers did that on purpose to specifically make each of the 'Reasons' an unappealing choice, to push people toward the 'true' labyrinth ending, but they did that at the cost of including poor characterization in their games.
Because the primary vehicle for conveying the plot to the player _is_ the cast of characters, when characterization suffers, the plot suffers, and in this case, the plot of the game, is that the protagonist has to make a hard choice about what reason to support, and why. Obviously, SMT, and Persona, are somewhat different in that the silent protagonist was specifically designed to be a self-insert, and so their personal characterization is left deliberately light, which is fine, good, even, when done right, but in this case that means that it is really _the player_ who is making the choice about what reason to support. I know that sounds like a simple and obvious thing to point out to anyone who has played the game, but there's a significance attached to that choice, concerning the plot, that I think gets missed by a lot of people; the point of this game, _is that the player is being asked to weigh arguments, for and from various principles, as he progresses through the game_ , and if those arguments aren't meaningfully impactful in one's experience of the story, if the subsections of the plot don't bring those arguments into sharp focus, the experience of the drama gets reduced to an academic exercise (this is painfully obvious when Chiaki launches the assault against the Manikins). This problem is at its most severe with the 'true' ending of the game, the labyrinth ending. I'm supposed to just believe that a high school student, because he's suddenly thrust into this terrifying, alien world that is the conception, he's going to suddenly understand the true mechanism and purpose of the menorahs, and pursue that to the end of the destruction of the cycle? There's nothing that the character experiences in the story that should give him a remotely compelling reason to think or behave that way, no set of experiences that he undergoes that even really make the argument for the labyrinth ending in the same way the Reason-bearers argue their cases. The fact is, the characters all behave the way they do, including the silent protagonist, because that is what is necessary for the plot to happen. They don't, ironically, have personal, lower-case-r reasons for their actions, nothing with which to interact and interface with the events of the plot, which are, to sum up in a single word, 'sparse.' Really, the whole plot of the game is _just_ two factions creatio ex nihilo, represented by two characters, duking it out for supremacy throughout the whole game, and the characters that lead those factions act how they act because they have to represent those factions. That's not good writing. None of that is good writing.
Character, story and gameplay discussions are always going to be debatable for each person. I myself never played P3R (yet) and only barely touched P4G and Royal.
But I will say the reason why I still hold P4 close to my heart is because of the anime. In fact, if I didn’t love Persona 4 as much as I did, I wouldn’t nearly hold much care in Futaba’s arc and awakening as I still do.
1:45 As someone who definitely does think Persona 3 does have the best story, IMO, it’s the slowest paced when comes to its plot. For me, it really took Aigis’s appearance at Yakushima to say the plot was moving anywhere besides dealing with the “Shadow(s) of the Full Moon cycle” plot.
I will always still stand by Aigis being my favorite character, no matter how many people try to convince me otherwise.
6:06 Funny, I already saw video talking about Kanji and Naoto. They are my favorite P4 characters, and it boggles my mind how people can’t understand their characters when it is written right in front of you.
10:23 YES, THIS RIGHT HERE. 1000% THIS!!! Persona 5 Royal I feel is very similar to pre-Final Mix Kingdom Hearts 2. The mechanics are incredible, but most people don't notice because there's no mode that really pushes you to learn them. Merciless kinda tries to incentivize Technical by tripling its damage but that only skews things in favour of the player once you really get it, and it also gives you more exp than the lower difficulties. It wasn't until Critical Mode and Exp Zero that people started to realize "dude KH2 gameplay is actually peak", P5R really could've used something like that.
(I think it's for similar reasons that I find the fanbase overrates Ryuji as a party member and underrates Yusuke. Ryuji's best tools only come online in the very lategame, while if you're good with technical Yusuke is consistently stronger for longer)
In terms of other points:
-I fully agree that people ignore the early parts of P3, though I chalk that up less to Aigis and more to the ending. Not to mock it as I do think it's legitimately good, but the surface level take of "WAT OTHER GAME ENDS WITH YOU LITERALLY DYING?!" is very prevalent. It's something guaranteed to stick with people.
-The "is that guy GAY?!" thing with Kanji's arc is something I also experienced and witnessed a lot in high school, which is something I feel often gets missed. From the perspective of adults Kanji's arc can look very problematic, but teenage boys really did act like that back in the 2000's. Not that that's a good thing.
-P4's supporting cast is underrated too, though I do think Eri is one of the most boring Social Links in the series.
-My overall ranking of the stories is P3 best overall, P4 has both the highest highs and lowest lows, and P5 is the best paced.
-Similarly with characters, all of them have different strengths. P3's have their development integrated into the main story. P4's feel like a group of high school friends. P5's make strong impressions due to being the stars of their own personal arcs when they join, and I'd also say there's good ludonarrative integration in their gameplay roles.
-And that's my final take: the beauty of the Persona games is they're all very DIFFERENT despite being nominally in the same series. And this is why I kinda worry about Persona 6, as making it "like Persona 5" would be missing the point. Heck, I think the reason they do spinoffs is that each sequel is basically its own thing, if you want more Persona 3 you won't find that in 4 (and so on) so you need to go to spinoffs.
In my opinion, I think there is no definitive 'best' concept (i.e. story, characters, gameplay) since it just falls into a manner of personal preference.
For instance, I, too, like Persona 4's story. Specifically, how it delves into various themes such as the search for truth, appreciating your uniqueness, understanding yourself, and the value of friendship. (P.S. for the record, these themes may also or may not be found within P3 and P5, however significant) But still, P3 and P5's themes are not bad as well. I just feel like P4's story resonates with me more.
To put it simply, it is okay for you to define your own 'best' something, and no one has the right to judge you for that. They have their own opinion about it, good. But you also have your own opinion as well, and that is also okay.
(P.S. I hope I got my message well. I apologize if it's not comprehensive. 😅)
tbh I don’t actually like palaces that much, they feel way too long compared to quick runs into tartarus or even doing an entire tv world dungeon in persona 4. I know this is probably just me but every time people praise the palaces gameplay it feels a little alienating, I enjoyed persona 5 for the story and cast not for the palaces. My favourite persona game is persona 4 cause the story is the most intriguing to me and fits the scope of a small town compared to tokyo, I also like the cast of course but feel like teddy and yukiko are underwhelming.
i think i both agree and disagree with you. im not really a gameplay oriented person so in that regard if it’s not actively frustrating its all the same to me and p5’s gameplay is flashy enough that i have too much fun to think about things like pacing. but i think what actually makes it shine is how the palaces tie into the story and themes, and what the puzzles and gimmicks say about each palace ruler’s psychology - like kaneshiro’s safecracking, sae’s rigged dice games, or futaba’s tomb paintings. i definitely see how they could feel overinflated but i tend to see it as an opportunity for more story
i came into this video agreeing with the P3 best story, P4 best characters, P5 best gameplay take, and I still do, but i agree with every point made in the video lol,
P3's story feels unique compared to the other 2 (i havent played 1 or 2 so no comment on those) in 4 and 5 you jump from palace to palace / dungeon each one linked to a party member, its kinda like a "villian of the week" type of vibe to it imo. Whereas in P3 you have a set goal and the story builds on top of it with strega, the 12 shadows, the ikutsuki moment, it feels more flushed out than the others and as u mentioned it also ties in the party in a very nice way that leads up to the conclusions nd the promise the group develops beautifully along with the story at first feeling just like dormmates but at the end feeling like friends for life not to mention P3 has imo the best ending by a mile.
For P4 im not gonna eat ur shit lmao but ill stand by the group does feel like close friends not yes-men (most the time at least) and like you were saying this take isnt just for the main cast but for the under-shadowed side cast. P4's group feels tightly nit throughout the whole game unlike with 3's cast, and the interactions feel more natural than 5's more hollow (might be a hot take) interactions STILL FEELS NATURAL dont get me wrong, but comparatively to 3 and 4 id say its more shallow plz don't crucify me in the relies if anyone even replies lol
P5 is pretty straight forward take, baton pass, technicals, more elements, more moves, palace exploration, no gameplay debate really
side note -> P3R (10/10) >= P4G (10/10) >= P5R (10/10) - all the games r peak and all have amazing story, gameplay, characters, and writing
overall tho great video and great takes and points i subbed
While I haven't played P4 yet, I feel for the meme, P3's area should be replaced with emotions instead of story. For me, P3's story has some serious issues such as weaker reveals compared to P5's and especially atrocious pacing. That said, I can't say P5's story is outright superior since I feel the more accurate description is that both stories excel at different aspects such as P3 arguably handling character relevance better and P5 handling pacing and reveals a lot better.
And best emotions is more accurate to describe P3 for me since Reload made me cry whereas Royal almost made me cry. Also, my guess is I might end up saying P4 has the best chemistry instead of best cast considering how much people go on about the solid chemistry in P4. But I can decide when I play P4G or a P4 remake.
I agree that game discussion is seriously polarised in the sense that disagreeing with an opinion is met with nonconstructive ridicule, so I hope you don't take this the wrong way when I say using wojaks to portray people who disagree with you on persona 3's gameplay is like, the prime example of what this is.
Watching this video so far, it feels like it’s more so an overall rant about the fanbase and honestly? I don’t blame you. This fanbase can be insufferable when it comes to discussing them and I feel you using the common take of “best story/characters/gameplay” is a good way to analysis it.
For the p3 section, I can see what you mean by how some fans seem to always be so ignorant towards the beginning of SEES and their struggles (something I admittedly was like at first due to me being spoiled on the ending) but even then I did enjoy what I saw a lot with it beforehand, and I feel p3RE gave me a chance to reexpereince the first half and enjoy the stories of these characters, because like you said, 3 really is about everyone finding a meaning to life. And yeah, you aren’t wrong about how P3RE has also made discussing the gameplay of FES even worse. Even as someone who likes the gameplay after, I always felt 3/Fes had its own sort of fun to it. So seeing people now disregard the gameplay of it so hard is upsetting. In general the discourse between P3R vs. OG3 is infuriating, because it feels like who are extremely dismissive of any criticism towards it, to a point that they just see it as “hating” or people who hate it so much that they gotta make people who enjoy it feel worse for liking it. Both making people assume the worst out of anyone who is more causal and understandable with their hate or love for the game. But I imagine that’s something you and many fans are basically tired of discussing at this rate lol
For P4, I admit that I do love the main characters, I think you made an interesting point at how said cast is the most positive out of all of the games. Because it points out something I’ve noticed with these games that people really don’t like the most abrasive and somewhat negative characters (Morgana, Juenpi, Yukari). Now there’s nothing wrong with disliking them per say, but I think it’s telling when some complaints about them feel less like it’s coming from a place of critique and more so just based on how they feel. So you get people declaring that Morgana is just a obnoxious creep who should be cucked out of getting with Ann (if you know you know) and that he sucks, while praising other characters just for being…nice and that’s it. Like I like Gallica, but the amount of people saying she was better than Morgana just because she isn’t abrasive or has any negative traits really, feels telling as to the sort of “mascot friend” character people want.
It’s like I don’t blame someone for disliking a character purely because they annoy them or irritate them, but the level of hate some people have goes beyond parody and just seems so deranged. To a point that they disregard the positive aspects.
(haven’t gotten to the p5 section yet, will comment on it)
Persona 3 best story gameplay and characters
As someone who has these opinions, I hear people complaing about P3 best story, P4 best characters, P5 best gameplay and just think "Ha ha, w-what a sheepish opinion am I right?"
No cap
There’s nothing wrong with holding these opinions inherently. We’re just frustrated with how they’re parroted with very little nuance or insight.
so do you agree that fuuka is worst s.e.e.s member or
also okumura's bossfight isn't bad
even though it took me 3 hours
but its the fact that it doesn't prepare you for it at all
you go from fighting 1 miniboss at your own pace and take infinite turns to do it
to fighting 4 of those, and you have to do it in 3 turns, with 1 exploding fuck that I guarded at first because that's what the game thought me when big boom
also
without preparation I think its literally impossible to do it without swapping teammates if you have the wrong ones
That's kinda the point, you're supposed to swap teammates and use the game's mechanics, it's not just mindless attacking without thinking
On a surface level discussion level yes Fuuka is the "worst* human party member of S.E.E.S but I fundamentally disagree with how useless people make Fuuka out to be when they talk about her.
Some characters provide small actions but very long lasting benefits with their influence but people overestimate a character's role when they see them on screen and always want everyone to be equally the highlight of everything such as the case with Ann in P5 when that's not how writing works.
Fuuka is great and one of the characters that represents P3's themes of life the most BECAUSE she's off to the side. She learns the importance of bonds and treasuring the small moments not needing any personal death but by her own accord whether that be cooking, making tech, or simply talking with friends. That along with her positive attitude brings sunshine to the teams's constant rain clouds which makes her a fine teammate to have in my opinion.
Okay, okay... hold on, chotto freaking matte... how the hell do you take three hours on Okumura???
@@ShadowOfMassDestruction yeah no she's definitely not bad I just feel like from a story standpoint all the other members of the cast bring more to the table
@@ShadowOfMassDestruction taking that much time on this boss is not that weird 😭
This might be the best Persona-related video in all of youtube ngl, you hit it right on the nail on the community's perception on those games.
For me, gameplay, among other things, is convenience. If there's something in the game that wastes my time, if it takes unnecessary amount of clicks to get to the menu you frequent, if the inventory is clunky etc., it immediately detracts from the game. Like, for example, carry weight was the first thing I edited out of Pathfinder and Witcher games, the stupid "save by drinking" in Kingdom Come, the insanely clunky menus of Skyrim... and there are things like this in P3 and 4 that make me just groan. And never once have I thought that about the general gameplay of P5. Except the unnecessary forced ingame time wasting (yes, including the whole "go to sleep!!!").
Characters are simpler. I don't think it matters at all if a character is incredibly well written if you just don't like them. And I'm not talking about hating characters you're supposed to hate, but just on average. For example, I couldn't care less about spending time with P5 Sun. Simply did not care. And I generally hate Junpei. To me he is one of the worst teammates you can get in all 3 games, I just don't find a single point about him I could relate to and want him as my friend. Even if he has a lot of character growth and all. And don't even get me started on that creep, Yusuke... And I can say very little of that about P4 cast. If you gave me a tier list of all the characters in these games, I'm pretty sure 4 would have the most top-heavy result by the end of it. Which makes it the best characters for me.
And as for the story... the main fault of 5 was that it never managed to achieve the emotional height of the 1st palace again with any other palace. Other than, maybe, Futaba's. The main fault of 4 was the general predictability, aside from the later bits, of where the story was gonna go. 3 was much more... even, I guess. The main story held your attention throughout much better then social links in it. Which makes it the best story.
What you are referring to as gameplay is more UX and UI.
Tho I personally love inconvenience in games if it is implemented right I can see your point. I also think most games drop the ball on making inventory management engaging. The only game that comes to mind for me is Resident Evil 4 and onwards. Also Neverwinter Nights was using a similar grid system.
I also like dedicated save points (I don't know how kingdom come does it) but it gives me a higher sense of care and immersion if I have to play carefully. But most games are either to hard or bug out when the have an ironman esque mode.
But carry weight is meant to stop you from carrying everything at once and Kingdom come's limited saves are there to stop you from save scuming.
They're meant to be inconvenient because otherwise you would have too much of easy time.
I just don't trust the game (or A game, it's not just Kingdom Come, but a general thing) not to bug out or crash and lose me hours of progress. I need my saves, thank you very much :P
@@SimonCleric really get that never done an ironman run for xcom for that reason
Fantastic work as always.
(I regularly come back to your channel after I read one too many comment somewhere saying P3’s story doesn’t start until November)
This video convinced me to take a second look at a series I historically did not like.
I 200% agree with this; saying that the sick mechanic and not being able to directly command allies in Persona 3 FES, are actually good, unique and work extremely well with that the game is trying to convey, is somehow one of the most controversial things a person could say in the MegaTen community. And my question is why? Why are most people just so rabid and hostile towards others' opinions? Ignoring whether they make sense or not, whether they are correct or not, there's absolutely no need for people to act like that, respecting others' opinions shouldn't be such a hard thing to do.
As for the actual takes themselves, I do think that Persona 3 has the best cast because Atlus could have done much more with the Investigation Team and the Phantom Thieves which is what makes me think that SEES is better, it's not about the actual quality but about the potential.
Main story wise, SEES are the only ones that actually change and develop throughout the story while the other two stay the same since awakening their persona until the end of the game (and no, it's not because the dudes don't have social links, even the girls have their development happen in the main story), IT and PT's entire development (ok maybe like 90%) happens from when you meet them until they awaken their personas and beat their main story boss while their social links are where you get to truly see the characters Ryuji reconciling with his track team and Kanji not acting shy about making plushies for the little kid anymore and making more plushies for the kid's friends. However, other than that, it doesn't develop them as much as the main story develops SEES, hell, Sojiro's confidant for example developed Futaba more than her own confidant did in all honesty (yes you need to rank up her confidant to finish his, but you see the development not in hers but his).
And the fact that their main character development is done through optional content is in my opinion a problem, yes, social links are as important as the main story itself, but it's still up to you to do which one you want. A normal person's normal playthrough could have them not do Yukiko's social link and not see her realise what she truly wants to do and accept the role of becoming the new head of the Amagi inn but instead just think she still doesn't want to do it.
On the other hand, SEES' social links just add more to the character and showcases their growth instead of being their growth beyond the persona awakening (as that symbolises change in Persona stories).
I didn’t really even know this youtuber. But hearing you have bluesky, I’m going to go and follow you just because.
I think the discussion of killing or not killing a (supposed) criminal only coming at the end of P4 makes sense in the context of the story. 4 doesn't even have a real villain in the story until Kubo, who practivally everyone doubts as being the true culprit despite him claiming otherwise. And even when Namatame is revealed, the team (and most players) are more concerned with saving Nanako. It makes sense they only discuss killing Namatame when they've got him at their mercy after Nanako seemingly dies and Namatame's Shadow taunts them.
Anyway, good video overall. I agree 4's side characters are pretty underrated, even though we all love the Dojimas and their arcs. I never even thought about the hypocrisy in praising 5's gameplay yet complaining about Shadow Okumura. I can imagine a scenario where a blind player didn't invest in the Shogi girl and also doesn't have all the skills on Joker to hit the required weaknesses, but other than that, it's a fair enough test of what the player has learned so far.
The fact that I've only just started playing these games and heard this on a discord just two minutes ago
I lowkey think all of them are well rounded to a degree. One of the categories can't make the entire game so they stand together. What really sucks is if this mentality of finding the best field in the game comes back around when P6 drops😔
Saying BASED is an understatement, I always have hated this take because it tries to categorize something as subjective as a persona game, and the fact that half of the community believes it to the point that every other aspect of these games is treated like shit is just ridiculous.
P3 has my favorite story tied with p5r, so I generally agree with the take, the only issue with p3 is the pacing, when I say that the first half is "empty" it's because when you compare like the first 3 months of p3 with those of p4 and p5, you will have achieved so much in those game, while in p3 the most important story arc is what, the Fuuka arc? That's why I don't fully agree with take, pacing is just as important as the storytelling itself.
I completely agree with your opinion, it's something I've been saying for years at this point but the p4 community has become a stupid circlejerk when talking about p4 that it seems impossible to have a real talk about the game. I don't dislike the cast, but they are the most unrealistic to me, that's because the group is together every single moment of the damn game, like let me breathe a little. The real issue here is that for a game where the main theme is to be your true self, we sure don't see the characters act like one, we have a 10 minute cutscene after the boss, that's it, after that they only act based on their anime archetype, and that would be fine if the character had some alone moments like with p3 and p5's cast.
I really like the side cast of p4, Ai Ebihara is probably my favorite sl in that game, not to mention Dojima and Nanako.
The story doesn't even help the characters imo because it's just stupid, these guys waste an entire arc trying to catch someone who obviously not the killer and the funniest thing is that after those month of "investigation" Naoto still has more knowledge about the case then the party does, this shit is hilarious, and no being a detective is not an excuse for the group being dumb lol.
As for p5r I see your point, when I personally say that the gameplay is the strongest is because of things you can do, like you said technicals, acrobatic takedown, baton pass, more aliments to use, the smoothness of the gameplay, and even outside the combat, the game has much more to offer, you can fish, play baseball, darts, pool, hell you can even customize your own palace. The gameplay is simply an evolution of the core mechanics introduced in p3.
Now saying that gameplay is the only good thing p5 does good is stupid imo, the story is imo the best paced, no arc is boring, at worst is mid, at best is amazing, and for all those who say that the story is cliché, replay maruki's arc, just that.
The characters are great too, they are not my favorite anymore, that goes to sees, but I still like them more then the p4 cast, because I related to a lot of their problems, but most importantly because even after forming the group they don't just forget about their lives, everyone has their own shit to do before and after meeting up, and that's what many forget, if the PT are not as friend as the IT then why do every pt member make up time in their schedule to meet each other?.
Either way great video and sorry for yapping, but I'm genuinely happy that people like you exist in the community, people who opinions that even personally do not agree with sometimes but at least they think with their own mind, and do not follow a stupid meme
I disagree on p4 not having a realistic cast, sure you have rise and naoto who are definitely not your average high schooler. And you have teddie, who is a creature from the tv world. But everyone feels like a real teenager, getting into shenanigans and goofing off. P3’s cast feels so mature and kinda boring, and how you described P4’s cast is how i feel on 5’s (unrealistic, always together), but with p4, everyone thing kinda works for me.
Sure they’re always together, but it makes sense cause the town is so small, chances are they don’t have anything better to do. Sure they’re not the brightest, and it is true that barely any of the investigation gets done until naoto shows up, but do you seriously expect these guys to get things done? Before you even go into the tv world, you can tell that chie and yosuke are goofballs. They’re realistic because they’re allowed to be and act like teenagers, imo at least
@IolZ555 I'm not talking about the backgrounds of the characters, I'm talking about how they act in relation of their development. The cutscenes in which they accept their other half is great, makes them feel like they are on ghe right path to mature and become better in general, but the game doesn't let you see it, let's take Rise as an example, her arc was about acknowledging her true self, whether she is an Idol or not, she is still her; after that what does she do exactly, narrative wise to make her change stand out? Nothing, the game's most important events after that are slice of life scenes with no relevance to the plot and end with the worst arc of the game, and once Naoto joins she is just there. Yukiko is another great example, her arc talked about how she felt trapped by her responsibilities and about her toxic friendship with Chie, very good introduction, but we do not see a resolution at least for the friendship part, her and Chie are never shown to make up, the game just goes on, forgetting about this plot point entirely.
Having a small town is not an excuse to not have individuality imo, p3's setting is even smaller compared to Inaba and yet the characters have their own stuff going on, the only ones in p4 that are similar are Yosuke and Yukiko.
I mean is it my fault that THEY themselves decided to catch a killer and instead waste 60% of the plot rescuing people and doing nothing? It's not exactly the first murder mystery to have characters that do not have anything to do with an investigation, so yeah I will keep saying that having Naoto shouldn't allow the team to not do anything important.
Being realistic is imo at least having responsibilities but make up time for your friends and loved ones, not forgetting them entirely until someone that is more knowledgeable then you comes around to help, but I mean I appreciate your opinions even if I do not agree with them your reasoning is solid, that's just my preference at the end of the day, and it's not like I hate p4, far from it, I just love p3 and p5 more
@cristianoducceschi3547 i get you ngl, well worded reasoning.
I’m kind of just a sucker for slice of life stuff with characters i like ☠
@IolZ555 that's completely fair, Inaba's vibes are unmatched, I wish my small town were like that lol
100% agree with you, P4's cast is amazing but they're always together and that does make them slightly unrealistic, I prefer how the Phantom Thieves are friends but also have their own individual arcs/scenes where they are alone.
Also, P3's pacing is the worst in my opinion, not because of the story itself, but because most of the game consists of just tartarus grinding, the overworld feels empty and there's not many things you can do, not many side activities, and that makes the pacing feel even slower.
Honestly, i liked these games so much that I have a difficult time choosing a thing that one game does better than the others one
I even hard a difficult time just choosing a favorite one
Also people are allowed to like reload and normal p3 not sure why ur still hung up on that
Feels like youtubers like to act like victims while constantly egging on the same shit that gets them hate
He's only talking about how after Reload anything said in favor of the original gets you in a choke hold like you're supposed to have their opinion and you're not allowed to have your own which is admittedly really annoying.
@ShadowOfMassDestruction I feel like it's the opposite, fes fans have the superiority complex and look down on people for liking reload and don't give it credit for doing anything right. Which has resulted in reload fans being more aggressive back. It's not good either way but as someone who played Portable and reload I like p3 and wish the tactics fans didn't act like they're the only ones who understand the true meaning of the game just because some people don't like the tactics menu
@@vivilover9409 I don't blame any one side because it's all a feedback loop. If you don't like Reload and you like FES more the Reload fans come out and say you like trash gameplay and muted colors so anything you say means nothing. If you like Reload well you like oatmeal with water and no sugar, you like toast with no butter, and you like you're gameplay as plain as a saltine cracker. It's not that we can't have these opinions per say but they often talk really antagonistically trying to put people down rather than seeking good proper discussion.
I’m so happy to finally see someone else who has the same opinion on the p4 cast that I do. I always get attacked when I say the persona 4 cast isn’t the best, and when I ask them why they just say the p4 characters feel the most like friends. Uhh, yeah, half of the p3 cast barely are friends with each other but that reason is exactly why I think p3 has better characters. The character dynamics in p4 are barely existent except characters sometimes cracking jokes at eachother, but otherwise being silly best friends. I need more people to be told that being better friends doesn’t make better characters that’s all🙏
P4 is pretty bad in my opinion. They definitely implemented a lot of good stuff and expanded more mechanic-wise, but in this case, sometimes I feel like more is less. They sold the small-town vibes really well, which I can appreciate, but it’s also a downfall at the same time. A perfect example for me was hanging out with Marie, and everyone is just forced to hang out with you or cock-blocking the mood, but at the same time, those are small-town problems in real life 😂
If you think that their whole interactions are just jokes I think you don't remember anything about the game. Chie and Yukiko has a dynamic where they are jealous of eachother even though they are best friends. Chie feels insecure about her femininity and feels inferior to Yukiko. Yukiko thinks she is incompetent and is in cage and envies Chie's strentgh and free spirit. Rise and Kanji don't seem like they are interacting at all but if you pay attention to game you can see that Rise is interested in Kanji's skills and chats with him about it. Yosuke and Yu's bond is one of the strongest in the whole Persona series and you can see it spread in all over the games. Yes, they act silly most of the time but they massively support eachother and isn't circled around Yu unlike P5.
@@AdacherTheCabbageEater I disagree p5's no way more centered around the protagonist then p4, especially when they never argue outside of Namatame, in p5 every party member's trust is earned and it's not like they all share the same view, hell look at Kasumi who even after awakening doesn't join because she doesn't agree with the pt's methods
@cristianoducceschi3547 think Joker is the one who glues everyone together. I can see P4 cast being the same without Yu (hell, he was the one who joined the Yosuke/Chie/Yukiko group, which even after that Chie and Yukiko are still the closest friends) but in P5 it feels like if Joker goes out of the picture they wouldn't be friends. Ann and Ryuji knew eachother and interacted before (Ryuji stood for Ann and bleached his hair for her) but they weren't even in touch for years before Joker.
@@AdacherTheCabbageEater Firstly no that's wrong simply because half of p4's cast wouldn't know each other without Yu, yeah Yosuke, Chie and Yukiko already know each other but that's it the other 4 needed Yu to join the group.
Actually Ryuji and Ann know each other since middle school, so way before compared to Yosuke, Chie and Yukiko. In p5 the characters get to know each other even after joining, like Yusuke with Futaba or Makoto with both Ann and Haru, so I do not agree both cast are the same in that regard. You could make a point that the IT has more fun time, but that's actually why I like them the least because they use these moments to completely forget about the case while in p5 the manage to do that as well as introducing the next arc in the story
"People don't like unpopular opinions", yeah Bubbletea, that's why they're unpopular... I appreciate your work but these arguments are just pretty bad on a logical level. Opinions are popular if a lot of people came to the same conclusions and otherwise unpopular if only a few people did.
The specific criticisms are pretty shallow too..
"Persona 3 IS the best story but people are wrong for appreciating the wrong parts and wrong characters" - just comes off elitist and shallow dude. It's okay to really like the ending. And a lot of people liked the chill plot in the first half, but there's honestly so little to talk about it. The whole point is bonding organically through shared experience there's very little to talk about that.
"Players don't appreciate persona 5 gameplay because they can't play the game good and just want to say other games need to be persona 5" - this is such a nothing take that's just "I hate the community for reasons I can't explain". I'm kinda sure you know how nothing that is but you felt like you needed to make the quota of debunking all statements. Truth is Persona 5 does so objectively have the best gameplay that there's barely much to talk about it and ironically the worst part about the meme is that it's the only non-narrative "best category" to appeal to the "I'm too cool for Persona 5" elitists.
Persona 4 argument is the only one with substance, because it's the only one where you're actually trying and don't just hate the community, but if so many people like a cast of nice friendly "yes men", they kind of make the point that this is the most popular cast even if it doesn't appeal to those of us who prefer realism and hardship to nice "yes men" power fantasy, and that's fine.
checking the config menu at least once in p5r should be a requirement for marukis ending bc no way in hell someone who uses the default settings would break away from his reality