What They Say:
Step into the shoes of a transfer student thrust into an unexpected fate when entering the hour “hidden” between one day and the next. Awaken an incredible power and chase the mysteries of the Dark Hour, fight for your friends, and leave a mark on their memories forever. Persona 3 Reload is a captivating reimagining of the genre-defining RPG, reborn for the modern era.
Content:
Persona 3 Reload is the highly anticipated latest entry in the beloved Persona franchise. As a remake of the original Persona 3, Reload brings to series up a level by incorporating all new mechanics while keeping the story elements faithful to the original. After spending many many hours on the remake after playing the original, I can say that the game while not perfect, is satisfying in many ways.
Persona 3, like its successors, includes several features many fans are well acquainted with but it is still notably very different from the other games in terms of narrative. The game follows the protagonist, who can be given any name. He travels to the small Japanese city of Tatsumi Port Island, in order to transfer to his new school, Gekkoukan High. Shortly after arriving on the island on his first day from school, he arrives late from the train station one day and notices the whole town is empty, with nothing but blood and coffins populating the streets. Upon arriving at Iwatodai Dorm and meeting his new dorm mates, he learns that the odd occurrences in town result from the Dark Hour, a time period where malicious creatures known as Shadows appear and prey on humans. One thing leads to another, and the protagonist learns he has the ability to call upon his Persona, which he can use to fight against the Shadows. Upon gaining this ability, he’s quickly recruited into the Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad (SEES), a group consisting of his dorm mates that aims to fend off the shadows and find out how to stop the Dark Hour.
Persona 3 Reload does not change the game’s story in any way. However, the narrative is arguably the best part of the game. Players follow the protagonist’s journey as he juggles meeting people, forming bonds, and attending classes with his responsibilities of saving the world. Throughout his journey, you’ll see him and his teammates go through tragic events and make sacrifices and tough decisions all in order to accomplish their goals.
What distinguishes Persona 3 ‘s story from its successors is that it notably features more depressing themes. Most characters have complex and rough backgrounds or circumstances. This ranges from a character being overworked and another being bullied to characters with rough family situations. The protagonist is also notably more mysterious than other protagonists from the series, as his origins are shrouded in mystery for most of the game, and eventually, you’ll find that there’s a reason for this. However, while darker than most games, the narrative is still incredibly engaging and is one of the most captivating stories the series has to offer, even a decade and a half later. The only negative that’s worth pointing out is that, unlike its successors, Persona 3’s story takes a long time to actually get rolling. You won’t get to the first major part of the story and its first boss until over ten hours into the game. Even then, it won’t be a lot of story progression as the major ones take even more time to get to. Additionally, because the story is incredibly faithful to its source, if you’ve played any version of the game recently, there won’t be much to engage you narratively.
In terms of gameplay, Persona 3 Reload brings fresh changes with its movements and additional features. Playing the Xbox Series X version grants you consistent 60FPS, great load times, reflections, up to 4K resolution with fast load times, and much more. As a result, if you’re a Series X player, then you’ll have no issues playing the remake.
Additionally, the game adds new animations mostly seen while exploring Tartarus, the game’s combat hub and main mega-dungeon. Players can now swing their swords multiple times at an enemy and move faster than ever with new noticeable animations for running, stopping, and more.
Speaking of Tartarus, the dungeon now has an improved look with detailed reflections, improved lighting, and newer models. However, it is worth pointing out that the procedural generated one-dungeon-system does not age well. This is true especially for players who’ve played the other titles and have been spoiled with different dynamic dungeons to navigate and explore. In contrast, Tartarus is quite the opposite. While different areas have slightly different looks and color palettes, the structure is still very much the same throughout, and as such, exploring several samey floors throughout the game gets old quickly.
The actual gameplay in Reload remains the same as the original. Players fight turn-based battles with the option to control each party member using their Persona’s skills. These skills can either be magic or physical, and each character also has the option of using their melee weapons on enemies.
Players also gather XP by defeating enemies and bosses and collect Personas with the same random Shuffle Time system seen in Persona 4. The mechanic provides players with health XP, stat boosts, or new Personas if they’re lucky after specific requirements have been met at the end of each battle. It’s worth noting that Persona 3’s combat is one of the most challenging in the series, especially when playing on the more advanced difficulty settings. Enemies won’t be afraid to chase you down once they’ve spotted you or exploit your party’s weaknesses relentlessly when given the opportunity.
Along with the quality of life changes, the remake also adds the critical Shift mechanic, which lets players pass their turn to another party member for more strategic options. It also adds Theurgy, a new combat feature that lets players perform a devastating version of an All-Out-Attack once its bar has been filled up. Overall, the combat system is still excellent, and if you’re a Persona fan, you won’t find any faults with it.
Other notable changes include the removal of the annoying fatigue mechanic, which previously saw party members leaving when they’re out of SP. The remake also adds new character conversations in dungeons, the new Twilight Fragment item which unlocks items, a Rewind system that lets players go back to a free period in a save slot to redo things if needed, and more. These changes make the game less intense and more functional, accessible, and engaging.
Outside Tartarus, players can spend time with characters and progress their Social Links for gameplay bonuses or increase their social stats to unlock more gameplay options. This includes working in a cafe to increase your charm, singing karaoke alone to increase courage, or just playing random video games in an arcade to increase random stats. While short-lived, these activities make the game more entertaining with their variety.
An interesting activity players indulge in Persona 3 Reload is using the shared computer. Players use it to get programs that increase stats and expose new secrets about the town. This, in turn, allows them to unlock new dialogue options and areas and collect new items. The computer can be a godsend, especially to players who pay attention to what it offers.
Other additions include the new Dorm Activities, which players use to get closer to their dorm mates which can be done through cooking or reading. As a bonus, doing them also rewards you with items that help out in battles. The Dorm Activities greatly expand the game and allow players to learn more about their favorite characters.
All that said, I’d still be remiss if I didn’t point out that Persona 3 Reload still lacks much to do compared to other Persona games. This mainly stems from the fact that Iwatodai Port Island is quite small, so the activities are limited. As such, some players, especially returning Persona players, will likely get tired of these activities after the first twenty hours or so.
The obvious new change players will notice is the new visuals. Persona 3 Reload updates the game’s look with an incredible new blend of 2D and 3D models, newly made animated cutscenes, a fresh new beautiful and dynamic UI, new textures, newly designed areas, more vibrant colors, and more flashy effects. The team at Atlus did an impeccable job of updating the game’s looks with new visual features. Because of this, the remake is now in tow with a modern game like Persona 5 Royal despite all the character and monster designs mainly remaining the same since the game’s original launch. The only noticeably disappointing aspects of the visuals are the background character models. These models are incredibly dull and are sorely lacking in detail, as some don’t even have faces, making it quite jarring when you enter locations like the game’s night club, Escapade.
Aside from that, the game’s remade soundtrack is just fantastic. It features remade tracks of songs seen in the original release, new songs for several times during the day and for specific locations, and dynamic versions of songs, specifically for background music for Tartarus, which changes with each scenario. For example, a different song will play if you get an advantage over a shadow that’s different from the regular song you hear when you start combat. These new changes make the remake feel unique, refreshing, and downright engaging.
In Summary:
Overall, Persona 3 Reload while far from perfect, it’s still one of the best remakes released in recent years. It includes tons of new quality-of-life features the original sorely lacked as well as new major changes that still respect the original. While all the extra features seen in other games would’ve been nice the remake still an amazing title on its own that JRPG fans, especially those playing on Xbox Series will love.
Grade: A
Developer: Atlus, P-Studio
Publisher: Atlus
Age Rating: Mature 17+
Release Date: February 2, 2024
MSRP: $69.99
Platform: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series (reviewed), PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC
