Persona 3 Portable Review - One Step Forward, One Step Back

now how's this for a little deja vu about one year ago i released my video on persona 3 fast for the playstation 2. a video that despite its flaws is one that i'm ultimately still proud of admittedly however part of me always thought my look at persona 3 was somewhat incomplete i know it might sound weird to some people due to the fact that i covered both their journey and the answer what exactly is there left to talk about involving persona 3. the answer is quite simple i still haven't covered the psp port that was released back in 2009 you see persona 3 portable is far more than just a handheld version of an already existing game there are a lot of additions and changes made from persona 3 fest that at the end of the day make this its own separate experience entirely my thoughts on persona 3 fest are basically unchanged since i released that original video the changes that persona 3 portable introduces range from the smaller ones such as changing how overworld exploration works to something major such as a brand new female protagonist option this is far more than just a skin swap because the female protagonist in this game comes equipped with her own exclusive content for the purposes of this video i'll mostly be discussing and evaluating what persona 3 portable adds so only be talking about the female protagonist this time around the male protagonist row is the exact same as its ps2 counterpart so if you're interested in hearing my thoughts regarding that you can check out my original video on fess for this video i'm going to assume that you've either already watched that video or have played the game yourself there's going to be a lot of spoiler discussion for both fess as well as the additions that the female protagonist brings to the table so here's your spoiler warning now with that out of the way let's get acquainted with persona 3 again really quickly persona 3 follows a group of high school students known as seas trying to find a way to eliminate the 25th hour of the day known as the dark hour during the dark hour any normal human transforms into a coffin and are oblivious to this time's existence there are a few unlucky people who don't go through this transformation have to explore this twisted version of our own world where they're at risk of being attacked by these creatures known as shadows seize makes it their goal to harness the power of their personas so they can defeat the shadows and eventually discover the truth behind what caused the dark hour the main backbone of persona 3 story is the exact same whether or not you pick the male or female protagonist your character is still a transfer student who after many years of being moved around returns to their hometown only to discover that they have the persona potential not too long after joining seas your character is appointed leader of the team due to their above average skills and their ability to wield multiple personas where the main differences lie are in the way that this story is presented persona 3 portable right off the bat has a lot of visual downgrades this was due to the limitations of the playstation portable cutscenes are now presented in this visual novel style rather than the way we're used to instead of having a fully explorable overworld we now have this point-and-click setup to work with there's a lot of discussion online debating the quality between persona 3 fest and persona 3 portable this change is usually the first one that's brought up and while there's no depth the psp version of the game looks worse i can't help but feel as though these downgrades aren't exactly that big of a deal minus a few line changes here and there the only difference between the story of fast and portable is the lack of 3d models and cutscenes this is more so true to the mail route because the content here is the exact same as featured in best there is still plenty to enjoy in the story due to how strong the script of the game is but if i'm going to be fair the cutscenes can end up feeling very visually uninteresting this is especially true when there are multiple scenes that take place in the same location there's also the fact that fess features animated fmvs and key moments of the story to emphasize the importance of those events which the game succeeds at for me personally i do agree that the visual aspect of portable can hinder some of the more emotional moments of the story but that doesn't mean that the storytelling in portable is any different than fess it's visually less engaging but all of the characters you know and love are still here and accounted for this is why the downgrade didn't bother me too much persona 3 is very much a dialogue driven narrative not so much a visually driven one the visuals do add to the story sure but i don't really think that it's a requirement to enjoy it but if the only difference between fest and portal were the cutscenes then this debate wouldn't exist to begin with what makes portable a good alternative to fess are the mechanical differences alongside the game's brand new content persona 3's main structure has been altered to be more in line with persona 4's a lot of persona 3's original dna still exists in this version of the game for example the way that the tiredness mechanic works is different in the original persona 3 your party members will grow tired after spending too long inside of tartarus when a character becomes tired they're far less useful as a party member this is only a huge annoyance at the start of the game because i believe that the character level is what determines how fast they'll become tired once they reach a certain level it won't be much of an issue the way this system works in portable is far more preferable in my eyes instead of becoming tired while exploring tartarus the characters will instead only become tired once you leave the dark hour in order to keep this system balanced the first floor of tartarus no longer restores your hp and sp for free much like persona 4 you have to pay a fee in order to do this i enjoy having more control over when i should leave tartarus rather than the game deciding me it's time to go home because you can essentially stay in the dark hour for as long as you want if you play your cards right it's very easy to reach the current highest point of tartarus as early as the first time you visit it the main gameplay mechanics are also taken right from persona 4. there were the smaller ones such as the protagonists having their own dedicated weapon class and the sea social link giving the party members combat benefits but the biggest change added to this game is the fact that you can now directly control your party members instead of using the tactic system this is a huge addition persona 3 is the odd one out in the series due to the fact that it's the only game where you have to rely on ai controlled party members there is some limited control offer here with the tactic system but at the most all this does is narrow down the skills that ai can potentially use i personally wasn't a big fan of this system due to the fact that it was somewhat unreliable because the tactics were sort of vague rules to give to your party there was no way to ensure that a party member would use a debuff skill over healing magic because certain requirements needed to be met for that action to be performed the tactics system in persona 3 is certainly unique there is fun that can be had with giving out the proper orders to your teammates and watching them pull off the strategy you had in mind but this system can end up becoming very frustrating once you realize how limited it actually is i went into this more in my persona 3 fest video so i won't dwell on the subject here but something that i want to discuss is the effect this change has on the overall balance of persona 3. it's a pretty big deal to give direct control over the party members in persona 3 because the game was designed with a tactic system in mind none of the enemies or bosses were redesigned to fit in this new combat system this undoubtedly makes the game easier because now you can adjust your strategy on the fly instead of praying that your current tactics would fit the job so there's an obvious question that needs to be asked was persona 3's original challenge due to smart design or was it hard because of the intentional limitations put on the player in my personal experience persona 3 fast is the most difficult game in the mainline persona series because no matter how you slice it it's the game that has the most amount of random elements to it sure every turn-based rpg has some amount of luck to it for example even something as simple as landing your basic attack has some sort of rng to it but there is no other persona game where the skills that your party members will even use rely on rng the tactics menu does increase the odds of getting what you want but the fact of the matter is that there's always a chance the ai will make a decision that you won't agree with persona 3 portable's direct party member control eliminates a lot of the rng with the combat system you're able to use skills and items in more creative ways thanks to having full access to your arsenal at all times a character like akihiko went from a party member that i used a lot at the start of the game before benching ended up becoming someone that stuck with me throughout my entire playthrough mitsuru is far more useful because you can control when you want her to use mine charge and status ailments instead of relying on the game to do so in terms of overall challenge i think portable is a game that you still have to think and strategize in but it's hard to deny that fess is a far more difficult experience overall for me personally i always thought that fess's challenge was more so due to the limitations of the combat system than having a legitimately tough enemy the raw stats of the shadows you fight are unchanged from fest to portable but i always found the battles to be more difficult in the former due to the handicaps that are forced on you it's not exactly what i would call a fair challenge to limit the way you play the game even though portable is a far easier experience because of controllable party members it's a lot more fun because of how i'm able to take advantage of the party members move sets but anyways the main reason as to why i wanted to talk about persona 3 portable wasn't because of the changed combat the female protagonist route gives access to a lot of exclusive content the main draw for me personally is the set of brand new social links and new story events for the most part the social links between the male and female protagonists are the exact same there are a few differences here and there with the ones involving the female party members such as fuka is almost entirely focusing on the cooking aspect of her social link but it's not enough for me to change my original verdict on them i mostly want to focus on the 8 brand new social links that were added specifically for the female protagonist that ended up replacing some of the old ones but before we jump in i quickly want to discuss how good of a job atlas did at making the male and female routes distinct from each other i'm not just talking about the exclusive content because there are a few more subtle ways that they achieve this the female protagonist katoni shiomi has a far more outgoing personality than makoto yuki makoto was very reserved as a protagonist what i mean is that he rarely would ever speak his mind or is the one to instigate conversation he's very much an introvert he's much more the type of the person who's willing to listen and offer his own thoughts only when asked which is why i find it very striking that katone is the complete opposite of makoto kotone's dialogue options are very energetic and just overall have an optimistic aura to them but one of my favorite additions to keep these two distinct from each other is the fact that katoni has brand new music exclusive to her route she has a different battle theme tartarus boss theme overworld music and summertime music this is just one of those changes that the developers really didn't need to implement at all but all these new tracks are fantastic in my eyes i especially like the track's danger zone and sun i know that this is a bit of a weird diversion but it's something i wanted to talk about briefly anyways the new socialists for ketone are for the most part pretty solid with only a few exceptions some of these social links are ones that i personally believe should have been in the normal game such as the ones with the male party members but there are a couple here that were added that i wasn't expecting and were a pleasant surprise to say the least so i'm going to discuss them in no particular order number one the chariot ryo iwasaki if we're going to start off with anyone it may as well be with our fellow classmates from gekko khan high school more specifically let's take a look at our extracurricular activities while playing as makoto you have the choice between either participating in swimming kendo or track and field this is how you unlock the social link with the character kazushi miyamoto as kotone you still have access to sporting events but the character you end up starting a social link with is a girl named rio in my playthrough i ended up joining the volleyball team but the social link is the same no matter which team you join rio is very serious when it comes to sports to the point where her strictness begins to affect the relationships she has with the other team members it eventually gets to the point where the other teammates decide to quit the sport and begin to resent rio on the surface her attitude and overachieving personality may seem as though it comes from passion but it actually comes from a place of frustration it turns out that rio is childhood friends with a boy named kenji and has developed romantic feelings towards him deep down ryo knows that kenju doesn't return those feelings for her because he's only interested in older women so she keeps her emotions bottled up the last thing she wants is a potentially damageable relationship the two already have ria would end up taking her frustrations out while she played sports which would eventually boil over to her teammates thanks to the help of the team's coach everyone is able to reconcile and the team manages to convince rio to confess her feelings for kenji it doesn't exactly go over too well because the young boy is oblivious to her advances even though it's not the result that rio wanted she does feel a lot better and less stressed out than before by the end of the social link rio admits to ketone that before she joined the club volleyball was nothing more than an instrument to relieve her frustration but it's because of the time she spent with a protagonist she was able to find genuine enjoyment from the sport i gotta say i'm not really a big fan of the social link this is mostly due to the fact that for the most part not a whole lot happens there are multiple ranks that are dedicated to katona and rio just practicing together alone it's a small story that feels as though it was forcibly stretched to fit the standard 10 rank format if i'm being honest here i wasn't really expecting the social links story to go in this direction at the start we get a glimpse of the kind of attitude that rio has towards her teammates and how she constantly expects so much out of them she gets very frustrated at the idea of them even taking time off for their own enjoyment what i thought this story was going to focus on was how destructive the idea of perfectionism is my first impression of this character led me to believe that we were going to see a character who's obsessed with the idea of being the best in their field that they would end up putting barriers between themselves and their loved ones this could lead to its natural conclusion of learning when to take a step back after becoming self-aware of their actions that's an idea i'd personally find compelling and i only have these expectations because kazushi's socialing from the mail route was very well done in my eyes in that story kazushi ends up pushing himself to the absolute physical limit and runs the risk of permanently damaging his leg kazushi puts himself through this pain in order to inspire his nephew to go through his own physical therapy it's more interesting to me because there are more stakes involved and there's more time spent with kazushi as a person i think comparing ryu to kazushi doesn't do her any favors and if i were to look at this social link on its own i think it's only just okay number 2 the hermit sayori hasagawa sayori is a second year student who lived overseas for a few years as a result she's a few years older than ketone despite being in the same grade sayori is the oldest student attending gekko gone high school and because of her age difference with the rest of the student she has troubles interacting with them sayori is a very passive and distant person this ends up making her a prime target for bullying the main focus for this social link is seeing how cellular's passive attitude eventually lands her in hot water not too long after the social link begins a boy asks sayori out on a date while this invitation was an innocent one on the outside it turns out that the boy is a rotten cheater and when this guy's girlfriend finds out about him going on a date with sayori he puts the blame on her this ends up severely damaging sayori's image because later on she's featured in the school's newspaper with an article slandering her claiming that siori is the kind of person who parties all night long and seduces men eventually the school staff gets involved and sayori is shamed and temporarily suspended from the school but wait it gets even worse for sayori after her suspension is over she reveals the ketone that she'll be transferring to a private school and that her parents think she's a disgrace to them holy this social link focuses so much on kicking this poor girl into the ground which is a very great way to make me feel immediately bad for her this is especially true when you consider that a core aspect of her character is the fact she doesn't like to instigate any trouble with people sayori is the exact opposite of the way people portray her hell we learned that she never even said a curse word until she was hanging out with katone and even then it was just to see what the feeling is like sayori just rolls with the punches and tries not to let it negatively affect her but she doesn't really take a stand to try to stop it herself this isn't a critique mind you because it's the entire point of her character she doesn't want to experience more conflict so it would be easier for her just to keep her mouth shut it's because of the time she spends with katoni and seeing the way that she reacts to these situations is the reason as to why siora is able to learn to speak up for herself even though her reputation at genki khan high school is permanently ruined and her transfer cannot be stopped sayori is able to muster up the courage and go on the pa and tell everyone that what they heard of her were lies this is an important moment for her character the main theme of sayori social link is how dangerous public opinion can be if enough people believe a lie it'll eventually become the truth in their eyes while the lies bother sayori she lacked the courage to speak out against them but it's thanks to the time she spent with katoni that she's able to find her strength the ending of the social link while bleak still has an optimistic feeling to it sayori is transferring to another school because of the rumors but she promises to keep the lessons she learned in the new environment if ceora feels weak she'll think about the time she spent with kotone and the courage she had to speak up against the entire school it's safe to say that i like this social link a lot and i personally feel as though it's a bit underrated i really don't see a lot of people talk about sayori much but i'm not sure if that's because fans haven't played through it or are just uninterested in this story but this social and kept me engaged from beginning to end it's a very solid one number three the magician junpei iori now this is the stuff i was looking forward to a very odd admission with persona 3 social links is that none of the male party members got one to this day i'm not sure why this was the case but the femme c route fixes this one of the first social links in the game is with june pay who just so happens to one of the first party members you get jinpe gets a lot of character development through the main story so as social link mostly focuses on building the friendship he shares with the protagonist the socially does a great job at foreshadowing certain aspects of june pay's character in the main plot we get to see his desire to play the hero very early on when he becomes very protective kitone turns out that someone's been taking very provocative photos of kitone behind her back and junpei wants to get to the bottom of this and put a stop to it while this is partially the focus of the social link the main goal that's accomplished here is showing us a side of june pay that isn't really expressed in the main story we learned throughout the link that junpei has a hard time expressing himself to others he wants to be seen as an unshakeable wall used to protect everyone but eventually he learns that he can rely on others jinpe learns that he is able to speak his mind with his friends and he doesn't have to be the class clown of the group and that's thanks to the time he spends with katone something very interesting about june pai is the fact that you can't start a romantic relationship with him the persona series is somewhat known for its dating sim mechanics which is something i always found strange mostly because these mechanics are very shallow i'm not criticizing the game for this but dating characters isn't a big focus sure you can have some cute events with characters but at the end of the day it's just an option that was added for fun i just find it interesting that jun pai is excluded from this mechanic this is most likely due to the fact that his relationship with the character chidori is integral to his character development but even after her unfortunate death jinpe doesn't have any interest in katoni romantically at all even in his main social link he's more interested with just being friends than to start a relationship with her it's a refreshing change of pace in a series that's become very notorious for constant twitter wars because of this system speaking of their friendship i think that june pays social link really makes that rooftop scene in january have more of a payoff when jupiter admits to the player that he considers you his best friend it originally didn't really feel earned because we barely had any one-on-one time with the guy but thanks to the social link for the female route this scene has much more meaning behind it while not a whole lot happens in this social link i think that the character development here really helps flesh june pay out more than he already was it's not an essential social link to his character but helps give a new perspective i like it number four the star akihiko sonata akihiko was the captain of the school's boxing team and to put it lightly didn't have a great childhood due to past trauma he has a hard time interacting with others and spends a lot of his free time training by himself one of his first steps into opening himself up is by spending more time with kotone once you have a high enough charmstat after kitone spends enough time with akihiko he eventually reveals to her that he's actually an orphan child when akihiko was young he and his sister had moved into an orphanage after the death of their parents though this wasn't the only loss for akihiko as his sister would also eventually pass away in an accident akihiko blamed himself because he felt that he was powerless to save his sister which is why he dedicates himself to the intense training akihiko doesn't want to feel powerless again so he's trying to improve himself akihiko eventually begins to grow anxious about kitone's safety on the front lines of battle even though he knows that she's capable of taking care of herself he can't help but feel as though to associate her with his deceased sister akihiko was eventually able to admit his fiance katone while he accepted the reality that the sister was gone he can't escape the pain and anger that he feels akiko has a deep fear of losing what's important to him so his own solution was to close himself off from others but what akihiko learns isn't to shut himself off emotionally but rather that he should be fighting to protect the things that are dearest to him honestly i'm very disappointed with the social link we don't really learn anything new about akihiko's character because the stuff involving his sister's tragic death is already addressed in the main story and since this is the primary motivation for his social link it feels as though it's a retread rather than an evolution of his character i really like akihiko in the main plot of this game i think he has the most heart pulling development because of the losses he goes through after the death of his childhood friend shinjiro akiko was able to admit to himself that he was too distracted on his quest for power to acknowledge what was going on around him he is able to find a new resolve because of those events and grows as a person this socially acts as though the new result was thanks to it and not the actual story while we do get some new details on what exactly happened to akihiko's sister it's ultimately unnecessary because it doesn't change the way i look at his character arc unlike june pace social link where we get to learn more about his family life and see the side of him that was never expressed in the main story i enjoy the early ranks of this social link because we get to see akihiko in unfamiliar situations to him and get to see how he would react he's shy gets flustered and overall just tries his best for katone i'm sorry but the actual story of the social link doesn't really do it for me personally maybe if they focus on something else it could have been better number five the strength korumaru so this was a surprise i legitimately had no idea that kara romaro had a social link before going into this game and when i found out that he was going to be replacing yuko with social link i honestly had no idea what they would do with him a lot of you took notice that in my original persona 3 video i didn't spend any time talking about kawamaru this is mostly because i didn't really have anything interesting to say about him i mean everything you need to know about korramar was told to the player in his introduction kuromaru's master was a priest at the naganaki shrine but he would eventually pass away due to being involved in a car accident korramara would now live as a stray dog spending most of his time at the shrine protecting his master's memory it's eventually discovered that koromaru actually has the potential to summon a person of his own and he joins seas in their battle to end the dark hour after his introduction koramaru just sort of hangs around and doesn't really do a whole lot in the main story i mean i wasn't really expecting him to have much importance because he can't even speak on his own so other than just mentioning that he exists i didn't really find much of a reason to talk about him but giving korumaru a social link was the last thing i expected for the developers to add but is it any good well i'm honestly shocked at how much i enjoyed it this social link is mostly used to get a good idea as to how korramara feels after the passing of his master this is a story that's told without any dialogue with karamaru we learned that he misses his master dearly and that he feels more alone than ever after his passing komaru is loyal until the end he's willing to protect the shrine from anything that could harm it whether that be from shadows to disrespectful teenagers something that's brought up near the end of the social link is that korramaru is having a hard time accepting the death of his master and while sis tries to act as a good replacement for him that's not what koromaru wants what he desires is to be treated as an equal disease and not as a pet not much character growth happens in this social link but i believe that this is excusable because we instead focus on coramaru's feelings and for a character that lacked much to do in the main story this really does help us understand his feelings a lot more though the presentation for this story did end up becoming very visually boring to me this is one of the few social links in the series that would have benefited a lot if we were able to get the full visual experience what i mean is that the game goes out of its way to describe a lot of korramara's actions so the player has an idea of what's going on since coromaru doesn't speak we're supposed to rely on the way coramara reacts to events to get a feel for his character but it doesn't work so well when there's no real visuals to accompany this and while i said earlier in the video that the lack of 3d cutscenes isn't that bad this is one of the few exceptions i think that if this social link was infested then the storytelling could have been a lot stronger thanks to the visual aspect i am aware that this socially can be seen as just a joke conclusion because it follows the funny dog but it's clear that there were some good ideas here but it's just limited in the visual aspect it might sound strange to praise korramara's social link while at the same time being disappointed in akihikos but that's mostly because akihiko socially dwelt on an aspect that was unnecessarily fleshed out compare this to korramaru where his social link is what really fleshes out his character one expands in an underutilized character while the other one bloats an already complete one while i don't think that this link is perfect i think that it at least somewhat accomplishes what it sets out to do number six the justice ken amada all right i guess i have to talk about this one huh ken is a very shy child so much so that he doesn't seem to have many friends his age when he first joins seas ken spends a lot of time alone and it isn't until katona invites him out for dinner that he begins to feel more comfortable at first ken is very evasive katona's questions about his life even down to the point where he's afraid of showing his interests to her but after a few ranks ken slowly begins to open up about himself the thing that ken hates the most is being treated as a kid he's someone who wants to skip over his childhood and move right into his teenage years this results in him being pretty insecure about the way he is now he doesn't think he's worth spending time with kitone because in his eyes he believes she'd rather be spending time with someone like akihiko because there's less of an age gap but what ken learns throughout the social link is that it's okay for him to just be himself there's no use acting like someone you're not because even though he didn't see it at first his friends at seas already do appreciate him it's a very simple story that's actually resolved very early on into social link normally this sort of revelation would be had at the end of the story but there's still a lot of ranks left after this happens and let me just say the remainder of ken's social link takes a very very strange direction it's at this point where ketone becomes a motherly figure for ken in case you need a reminder two years prior to the game beginning his mother died in an accident caused by the character shinjiro's persona ken's main motivation throughout the story is avenging the death of his mother since she was the only family he had left so katona takes care of ken in a lot of ways mostly by getting him different dinners and always lending an ear to the young boy but eventually ken develops romantic feelings towards katone which he hides away at first because he believes the age gap between the two characters is too significant but at some point these feelings become too strong for him to hide away and he'll eventually admit them to katone as long as she returns them i'm sorry what apparently if you pick certain dialogue options for ken you could eventually turn your relationship into a romantic one uh why i mean i made the joke in the original persona 3 video that miko's social link had some strange undertones and even then i was mostly kidding but this is just hard to excuse or even to justify its inclusion for that matter the remainder of the social link just makes me uncomfortable because ken and ketone have to hide the relationship from the rest of seas you can even go as far as spending christmas with just the two of you this really did not need to be in the game and thankfully i'm not alone in thinking this number 7 the moon shinjiro aragaki shinji was the last character to join the party he used to be a member of sis but ended up leaving the group when he lost control of his persona this ended up killing ken's mother so shinji stepped down from the group due to the guilt he felt though his retirement is only temporary as he rejoins seas once the villain group striga begins to become more of a problem in all honesty i always thought shinjuku was a character that needed a social link because outside of his involvement in the main story we didn't learn a lot about him which is why when he dies in the story i personally was more sad for akihiko than i was for the loss of him as a comrade shinji's social link to jump right into my opinion of it does a great job at fletching out his character beyond what the story showed us underneath his tough and serious exterior lies a man who's actually very caring for the people around him he worries a lot about the diets of the members of seas and is even a fantastic cook this stuff was only hinted at in fess but portable goes all the way with it by showing us there's a lot more to shinji than his depressing past yes he's tough on the other members and can be very intimidating but he only wants what's best for them shinji begins to open up more to katone as the social link progresses and you can really see that her company has left a huge impact on him because other than akihiko he doesn't really have any other friends and while the two may bicker a lot he's glad that he has someone like akihiko in his life shinji is someone who doesn't fear his own death but he doesn't want anyone to be saddened when he's gone he even goes as far as telling katoni not to cry when it happens he doesn't explicitly say he's going to die soon but it's heavily implied he's prepared to pass away during the october 4th events not gonna lie this scene really made me feel for shinji he's the first character in the entire party to accept the reality of life and the fact that it's eventually going to end it's what the entire game's about after all and it's only fitting that shinji eventually ends up being the character to inspire the rest of the party i think that this social link does a great job at fleshing out shinji's character but this social link comes with one fatal flaw and unfortunately it's one that you cannot avoid unless you decide to not finish it you see at the end of the rank 9 event shinji will tell kitone that he lost his pocket watch you can actually find this watch for yourself at the police station and return to shinji in order to max out a social link but be warned if you do this you'll severely alter the events of the story normally shinji would die on the night of october 4th after taking a bullet to save ken's life it was shinji's way of atoning for what he did so you'll never believe what giving him back his pocket watch actually does the scene plays out as normal but instead of takaya's bullet killing shinji the pocket watch that he now has actually absorbs the bullet saving his life what a load of what sort of indiana jones luck does shinji have to keep his watch in the exact spot that takaya would shoot him sure he's in a coma for the rest of the game but it's confirmed that he eventually leaves the hospital and you can even get an exclusive ending with him if you play on new game plus this is on the same level as the chidori revival event that's featured in both fess and portable but in some ways i find it worse here because it makes two character arcs much much weaker now this more so applies to ken but akihiko's character arc suffers because of this as well shinjiro's death is a core aspect to both of these characters akihiko admits they lost sight on what's important on his never-ending quest for power and we get this emotional scene of him breaking down at his best friend's memorial akihiko knows that shinju would want him to carry on and he's able to discover his new resolve ken on the other hand is completely wrapped up in the guilt it isn't until akihiko talks to him one on one when ken realizes his quest to avenge his mother was a coping mechanism he used for the isolation he felt what ken decides he's going to do is return to season order to end the dark hour but he's now not only fighting for the memory of his mother but also to honor the last words of the man who gave his life for him and while the actual text is unchanged the context is now completely different and far worse than before to explain why i'm going to use a bit of an odd example we all know the origin story of the character spider-man right how when peter parker had the chance to use his power to stop a robbery he instead ignores it because he believes it's not his problem until he eventually finds out that his actions inadvertently cause the death of his uncle ben through his own actions he learns that since he has the power to help people that it's his responsibility to do so the reason why this works so well is because his uncle died from what happened not hospitalized he died the same rule applies to kenzark at persona 3 fast shinjiro the person who ken wanted to get his revenge on for years ended up saving his life at the cost of his own shinji's last words are about telling ken to not waste his life and the young boy takes that to heart and after all isn't that the main theme of the game that death isn't something to fear and we should all live our lives to the fullest fighting for what we believe in and the worst part is this is required to do if you want to max out a social link at the very least the chidori revival scene can be ignored hell a lot of people in my comments section didn't even know it existed until they watched my video this decision makes me disappointed that the very least i enjoy the actual social link ramifications notwithstanding i honestly think it would have been better if they kept the social link in but have the story still play out with his death i think that it would have made it more impactful because we got to spend a lot of time with shinji and seeing him die after getting to know him would tug out our heartstrings more but hey what do i know number 8 the fortune ryoji mochizuki ryoji was a very important character in persona 3's narrative because it turns out he's actually the appriser of death his role was to become a beacon that the goddess of death nyx would use in order to end the world but as a character we didn't get a lot of time to spend with him which is a shame because i actually really liked his personality while he was around ryoji's social link is very unique in the sense that you have a very strict time limit to maximo you can't afford to miss a single day he's available so his social link should be your top priority anyways ryoji's social link is mostly used to foreshadow his real purpose in the context of the story ryoji has no idea that he's the appriser in fact he seems to have severe amnesia because he doesn't remember much about his life before transferring to gekko khan high throughout ryoji's social link he slowly begins to regain his own memories while he can't fully piece them together he has the feeling that he's no katone for a long time this is supposed to hint that ryoji's true identity is a young boy pharaoh so you have a social link with throughout the game but other than that there's honestly not a whole lot to this social link i mean if you're a fan of ryoji like i am then it's nice to have extra time dedicated to him it makes ryoji's proposition near the end of the game have more meaning to it if that means anything i always thought it was strange that he said he loved what he experienced of the world when we didn't actually get to see any of what he experienced but having a social link with him makes his inevitable turn into the next avatar have a lot more meaning but at the end of the day it doesn't really change a whole lot it's a nice addition but not one that i think is required to enjoy his story part of me thinks that they could have done a lot more with ryoji's social link its mere existence doesn't really add much to his character other than giving him more screen time at the very least the other member of the fortune arcana kaisuke actually attempted to tell a story about forging your own path instead of following what would make other people happy my overall opinions on the execution notwithstanding there was an attempt at telling a story with kaisuke one that had the potential to speak with a lot of people ryoji's in comparison isn't nearly as interesting or compelling even though i like the character in question a lot more and that's all for the major additions included in persona 3 portable there were a few things i didn't talk about like skill cards and whatnot but that's most of the things i wanted to talk about so what do i think about the female protagonist as a whole well for the most part i largely think that both routes are the same quality but if i have to pick which route i find more fulfilling i think i would have to pick the mail route at the end of the day i think the female route is nice and the exclusive content on offer here ranges from being really good really bad to really strange but at the end of the day this is more of an alternative experience to the male protagonist than an outright replacement this is something that the game even acknowledges the intended experience even for portable is the play through the mail route but there are a few things here in the female route that i think would have been great to see in the mail route social links with the male party members is a great idea but the way it's executed in the female route is a bit mixed for me but hey i'd rather do akihiko social length than someone like momaru's or god forbid nozomi's but the real comparison for me lies in how the themes of persona 3 are represented between the two protagonists from the way i see it the concept of death is represented differently in portable than it is from fess this is down to the fact that the protagonists have different personalities in portable there's more of an optimistic tone overall i'd say the music is far more cheering and ketone has a lot of dialogue options that lean on the positive way of thinking contrast this with fess's darker color scheme somber atmosphere and overall more depressing tone both of these ways of portraying the message are effective in their own ways but i believe that portable's more optimistic outlook clashes too heavily with persona 3's original story at certain points that's not to say that i think fess is perfect in the way it presents its own theme i can't stand the idea that chidori can come back to life for example but the overall downer feeling of persona 3 fest is what makes the small moments of happiness and hope stand out more the female protagonist tone feels at odds with itself a lot of the time because it leans too far into the happy tone that's not to say i dislike lighthearted moments in these games persona 4 is my favorite game and it's not nearly as dark as the rest but the problem is that the original story of persona 3 doesn't fit too well with this new tone and there are more discrepancies here because of the previously mentioned chidori revival being included alongside shinji's fake out death i would still rather play through the male route because it doesn't have nearly as many tonal inconsistencies even if some of the social links are worse but if i were to choose playing between fess and portable from my ideal way of playing persona 3 i still think i would pick portable because of the quality of life editions and gameplay improvements plus portable doesn't come with the answer so it's automatically better in every way but if it's your first time playing through persona 3 i think fess is the better option because it's closer to the developer's artistic vision while it is technically more flawed in my eyes it's the experience that atlas wanted players to have don't get me wrong portable has some great additions but there are also a lot of things that hold the game back from being a total improvement over fast and in some ways make the game worse as a result but no matter which version persona 3 is absolutely worth your time even though it is rough in a lot of areas it's not my favorite in this series but it really does stand out who knows with the success of persona 4 golden on steam maybe we're due for a port that features all content from portable keeping the visuals and tone from fest probably not but i can dream can i as to where persona 3 falls on my personal list i'd place it right smack in the middle it's a bit better than innocent sin as an overall package but i think eternal punishment just beats it out slightly i know that this video was somewhat different in structure than the other ones but it's really important that you've seen my persona 3 videos to get full context for this one you can find a link to that in the card at the top as well as in the description but no matter how many complaints i may have with persona 3 it doesn't change the fact that it's a special game to a lot of people the game is special to me too in a way it's thanks to this game i was able to find an audience that was willing to listen to my opinions about the series that i love so much so thanks persona 3 i think you may be flawed but you'll always be remembered for what you did exceptionally well hey everyone thanks for watching i'm honestly surprised at how quickly i finished this video it's the first time in months since i managed to get out of video this quickly there's just something about persona 3 that triggers something inside me as always i'd like to give a special thanks to all my patrons whose names are on screen now if you would like to become a patron yourself and gain access to my videos two days early among other things please click the link in the description or the pinned comment to help get you started you can also find a link to my discord server as well as to my social media down below if you want to see more frequent updates on projects and that's all i have to say for now so thank you very much for watching and take care

Channel: Nam’s Compendium

Views: 93,185

Rating: 4.9356723 out of 5

Keywords: persona 3 portable, persona 3 portable review, persona 3 portable analysis, persona 3 review, persona 3 analysis, nam's compendium persona, nam's compendium persona 3, nam's compendium persona 3 analysis, persona 3 portable review one step forward one step back, persona 3 portable one step forward one step back, nam persona 3, nams compendium smt, nams compendium persona 4, persona 3 fes vs portable, persona 3 portable critique, persona 3 fes critique

Id: HGTXRyhva2I

Length: 38min 15sec (2295 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 09 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/MyMouthisCancerous]

I honestly still think P3P is the best version of the game

Not even because of my feelings towards the Answer but I can honestly get past the VN presentation with how much they just improved the gameplay and adjusted the game to be closer in line with Persona 4

[u/reds147]

Hey Nam, just saying you make pretty solid persona videos!