My Thoughts on Persona, Games 3–5 (Final Part: ‘Persona 4’)
This is the final part of the three blogs on my thoughts about the Persona games 3–5. In the previous blog, I talked extensively about my opinions of Persona 3. This week, I will be focusing on Persona 4.
Obviously, there will be plenty of SPOILERS. If you wish to experience any of these titles with as little knowledge as possible, best save this blog to read at a later date. Consider this your warning folks!
I think Persona 4 is great. As much as I love going to cities, I honestly prefer the countryside, so seeing how Persona 4’s small town of Inaba is set in the countryside, compared to the cities of 3 and 5. This was a welcome change for me. The protagonist’s introduction to the town is nice. You are staying with your uncle and cousin because your parents are working abroad. I am glad there was more of the world to explore and more things to do than there were in Persona 3. It was nice to see the series evolve in that regard.
I like how the Personas have been introduced this time around as well, as it was again different from Personas 3 and 5. It is implied that your power is given to you when shaking hands with a stranger at a gas station, I get the impression that Persona 4’s protagonist is forced into receiving his power earlier than he should do, which poses all sorts of interesting questions…
It is a sweet (but long) set up. Everything is all hunky dory…and then the murder’s begin. Dead people start popping up on ‘The Midnight Channel’, this games’ Mementos/Tartarus and the place where the bodies are taken before they die. When they die on TV, they die in real life and their bodies left suspended from TV aerials, for the townsfolk to see. This is however where my problems with Persona 4 start.
The second murder in Persona 4 was a child. At this point, I thought I was going to get another dark story with a bunch of miserable kids who get torn up by the potential of losing their friends (and lover in one case).
This has the darkest story out of all three of the games, but to me, it does not feel like it. I feel it does not have the punch and seriousness that it should have. All the way through this game, with one notable exception, it has this really annoying positive ‘Yeah MURDER!’ attitude which is just rather off-putting. I can understand the need, want and excitement of knowing you have this power to save people and doing something about it, but it is far too anime for my liking. This comes from someone who loves anime! I also get that none of the characters would be likeable if they were all a different shade of miserable, but they are just far too happy all the way through. There are loads of really dark moments in this game, but there are very few elements of seriousness here. I occasionally thought that they were doing it to feed their own ego and be the town heroes, in particular, I felt this applied to Yosuke.
Each party member, with exception of the protagonist, have to confront a Shadow version of themselves. Their shitty qualities are personified (pardon the pun) which leads to a boss battle as none of them want to accept these impure qualities. This causes the Shadow version of themselves to lose control. It was a nice metaphor for discovering yourself I thought, but this is only presented properly with each character once (when they encounter their Shadow) who then able to ignore it and carry on being the same individual they were after gaining their Persona, with the exceptions of Kanji and Naoto, who are arguably two of the most interesting characters in the game, because everything that follows with their social links and certain story events bounce off of their encounters with their Shadows. I will admit they improved upon this feature in Persona 5, where each party member had to snap and finally stand up to whoever it was that was giving them grief and change when facing the Shadow of the current antagonist. I also found it highly annoying with some party members that you have to find information about them that you already know before you can find them in The TV World. At times I felt I was in an episode of Blues’ Clues rather than Persona 4…
Persona 4 uses the same social link features that would appear in Persona 5. The more time you spend with such social links, the better skills you would get in a battle and the social links that are your party members unlock their Ultimate Persona if you managed to max out said social links (which is Level 10).
During the game’s climax, Nanako (the protagonist’s cousin) is kidnapped by the man who is believed to be the one behind the murders. There is a car chase, which seriously injuring Dojima (your uncle) while Namatame (the suspect killer) and Nanako disappear into the Midnight Channel through the large TV in Namatame’s truck. As Dojima rests in the hospital, the group comes to the conclusion that Namatame must be the real killer (he isn’t by the way). He and Nanako are tracked down and a boss fight follows. Once that is dealt with, the suspect and child are escorted to the hospital, the latter has fallen ill due to the effects of the strange fog that emits from The Midnight Channel. Sometime later, it is revealed that Nanako has died, which is a terribly tragic moment. She is sweet, innocent and curious about the world around her. It was a turn in the plot that I did not expect and I really wish ATLUS followed it through, rather than being a eureka moment where she suddenly comes back to life through the power of friendship. Once again a dark moment is transformed into one where everything can be as happy as happy can be when there is still a murder case that needs to be solved. If they did not intend on killing her off completely, they should have put Nanako in some sort of coma and have her revive at a convenient plot point. That’s just my opinion though.
What ATLUS does very well is the including multiple endings, most of which are found in Persona 4, with Persona 5 coming a close second. Persona 3 has three endings, one bad, one good and one true ending, whilst Persona 4 and 5 have a multitude of bad endings, which I love, as I love a good ‘what-if’ scenario. Bad endings are the ones that I find more interesting.
Persona 5 has one good ending, whilst Persona 4 has a good and a true ending. During my max social link run, I managed to snag the true ending (which can be easily missed and is not easy by the way) so I had to look up what the bad endings were. I like the different outcomes, which can make the player care more about the world if the constant upbeat attitudes of the party get to you. The REALLY bad ending that was added in Persona 4 Golden is my personal favourite, a playlist of them all can be found below.
The leap in production in the soundtracks from Persona 3 to 4 is amazing, even though I prefer the soundtrack of 3. Persona 4’s infectiously cheesy J-Pop and Rock fit nicely into the overly positive Persona 4 world. The cue ‘Who’s There?’ is perfect for making the player feel that the dangers of The Midnight Channel are around the corner.
The music does not change from semester to semester this time around, which I was not too bothered with as I was used to this with Persona 5. The cues that change are the ones that play when you walking around Inaba. Which one that plays depends on the weather. ‘Your Affection’ plays when Inaba is filled with sunshine whilst ‘Heartbeat, Heartbreak’ plays whenever it is cloudy. There are points in the game during Nanako’s hospitalisation where the music in the Dojima residence is dark and shallow which is very fitting and when the game remembers it is supposed to be depressing.
One of my favourite moments in the game is when the protagonists class of Yasogami High School go to visit Tatsumi Port Island, as part of a cultural studies trip. You may remember is the location for Persona 3. During this time, the class has a lesson at Gekkoukan High School and wander around the city, whilst being blessed with various cues from Persona 3! It made me really happy to have this as part of the game. It was a small detail that made me remember all those great school memories at Gekkoukan High School and Tatsumi Port Island, even though what happens at the nightclub was a little bit too weird for my personal enjoyment.
I found it bit disheartening that there was no funky exam music for this game. The cue ‘Specialist’ would play as if it were a normal school lesson.
Persona 4 GOLDEN
Like Persona 3, 4 got a remake that added story events, new music and a new character, who is (a second resident of The Velvet Room) called Marie. This is a PS Vita exclusive game. In order to find out what that was all about, I had to watch a YouTube Lets Play of that as I do not own a Vita and don’t intend to anytime soon. I will not go on too much about it, because I know I have stomped on this point for almost the entirety of this blog, but it is far too happy!
I did not feel Marie added much to the overall game (Who only just beats Margret as the weakest Velvet Room attendant in terms of character design). I am not fond of any of the new music for this game either, which is just painful for me to write. I am especially not fond of the opening, but it is far more fitting than the original one knowing how happy it is.
I am not a huge fan of Adachi’s social link but I do like the really bad ending that you can only get if you max out his social link, even though it really makes no sense whatsoever. If I am presented with the choice to be either a saint or a complete fiend, I will take the fiend route and join the villain, as the perks one usually gets in games for being a monster are much more entertaining than the goodie two shoes powers/perks. That said, this is not the case here, as the final cutscene that plays once you have achieved that route hints regret, which I don’t think was the intention, but I could be wrong of course. I am a sadistic bastard (when playing video games) who would have preferred to see them cause havoc on the world than the angsty departure filled with regret that I got here.
Before I wrap everything up, I just want stress that I don’t think Persona 4 is a bad game. I love it, I just don’t like with how it’s characters respond to the world sometimes. At times, it was great to see The Investigation Team enjoy themselves and were all the best of friends. I don’t there was a great balance between seriousness and happiness that’s all. I love what they did with this and mad a murder mystery as I love those sort of stories. It may not the strongest story by any means, but I still loved it. I don’t want anyone to think I am being pretentious or moaning for the sake of moaning, as that is the last thing I would want anyone to think.
Here are a few of my favourite cues from the game, as well some of the tracks from the ‘Never More Reincarnation’ arrangement album that I have not mentioned already for you to listen to.
Coda.
If you have read all three Persona blogs of mine, you have my thanks. If you haven’t, I insist you go and read those two as I think you will find them rather interesting.
I am glad that I took the plunge with Persona 5 last year as it truly a fantastic game. I am also glad that it encouraged me to try Persona 3 and 4 as they too are excellent. I would strongly recommend you experiencing each of these games, preferably in chromatic order but I think the order that I played them (5,3,4) works as well too. If I were to rank the games from what I believe is strongest to weakest, it would have to be 3,5,4.
Their soundtracks are fantastic and I look forward to what ATLUS and their sound team, fronted by Shoji Meguro, will come up with next. If I were to put the soundtracks in order of the ones I enjoyed listening to the most, it would be 5,3,4. However, if I were to rank them in the order of how effective each soundtrack is in its respective game, I would have to say 3,4,5. As much as I love Persona 5’s soundtrack, there are moments where some of the cues become very repetitive, one of the biggest offenders is the cue ‘Disquiet’, which is used whenever something bad is looming…which is pretty much all of the time in this game.
If you have played these games, which one is your favourite? Which one do you think has the best soundtrack? Dare I ask who is your ultimate Persona waifu? How would you rank the games and how would you rank their soundtracks? Finally, have you played Persona 1 & 2? If so, how do they compare with Persona 3–5?
Let’s start a conversation, people!
