Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 Comments by Rob Fahey

The subtitle is wonderfully blunt.

Good review :) Think I'll be buying this.

Does it have ye olde 60hz mode?

Great game, will have to get a copy to play when I have finished FFXII and Valkyrie Profile Silmeria.

Looking forward to this but, doesn't it play on the PS3? I know the american PS3 played it when I was over there. Though I'm not sure what kversion of the machine I was playing on as it belonged to some american developer (GDC).

"(PS3 owners take note, it looks especially gorgeous when upscaled.)"

I have an original 60gb PS3 is this going to work ok?

Ah, I knew I could rely on EG to deliver a great review of this brilliant game. I totally agree with your assessment of the dungeon crawling: it should get boring but the battle system is fast yet engaging and continually presents new challenges. And this is a game in which the absence of random encounters is an absolute godsend.

Absolutely correct... I love this game! :)

Now to actually finish it... :P

Hang on. I see you actually do understand great RPGs here nowadays.

And since I agree that this is a bloody good game I request that you re-review Folklore. It's also a game of pure quality.

Wow, I've never heard of this game or series before. Am half tempted to get it

"Euro"gamer.. aah.. I remember when I used to go here to find out if stuff had 60hz modes or not, and now I can pretty much count on reviews being of the NTSC version and no mention of all sorts of anomalities in the mandatory raped PAL port.

That aside, I'm getting this game today (imported, ironically, because I didn't want to take a chance on the PAL version having a 60hz mode) and I've heard all kinds of great things about it. Nice to see it's further emphasised as a good game on here.

I shall be picking this up this week, for sure. My first game since.... last September? Jeez.

Looks awesome. I'm happy shit like this actually reaches Europe nowadays.

Are you saying it's in PAL territory!?

...Crap. How in the hell am I going to get some more money now?

And I just got FFXII!

Kato: This is surprisingly a lot more fun than FF XII.

Kato - I'm guessing we have very different tastes, then. That's the joy of having writer names on reviews, you can look at our earlier reviews and work out if our tastes match. Looks like ours don't :)

Oh, also - this was reviewed from the PAL version, not NTSC. Honestly can't recall offhand if there was a 60Hz mode, but I'll check later for you. No nasty borders, slowdown or anything like that evident in the conversion. I pretty much take that stuff for granted with PAL games these days to be honest - it's something that it'd only be worth mentioning in the review if it was broken, since the vast majority of games are fine.

@Shinji - Did you try it on a 60gb PS3? I am hovering over the order button but would like confirmation :)

Cheers

lennon - The PS3 I tried it on is a Test model (it was a gold disc from the publisher so wouldn't work on a retail PS3), so it's one of the ones with full hardware emulation. I honestly don't know if it'll work okay on a software emulation model - we'll have to wait to get retail code to check that, sorry. I'd imagine it'll be fine, but I can't give you 100% on that.

Kato - I'm playing through Lost Odyssey right now, in fact. It's... Hmm. I like it a lot, because it's got fantastic presentation and visuals, and a really solid storyline. The battle system is a bit rough around the edges but it's good enough to keep me entertained as I progress, I guess. On the other hand, the wildly spiking difficulty curve and the random battles, along with a host of other hangovers, keep pulling me out of the experience and wondering why the hell designers working on 2006 hardware are so determined to make a 1996 game. It's still a seven or an eight from me thus far, despite the problems, but it's frustrating that it's so bloody close to being brilliant and only misses it because of some bone-headed traditionalism. :/

"bone-headed traditionalism"

Hmm... I rather like how "traditional" Lost Odyssey is. I'm rather bored of the attitude that every new game must do something "fresh" and "innovative" to be a worthwhile experience. :-\

Rob did say that he's enjoying the game despite the old school design, and that he'd still rate it 7 or 8.

There's nothing wrong with LO's battle system but I can't think of a good reason for the random encounters. All JRPGs should have visibly roaming enemies, perhaps with a random encounter option for the masochistic types :P

Persona 3 is so good that even 9 is an insultingly low score.

According to Amazon PAL version supports 60hz mode. Yay!

/Orders

Seems like Rob's fairly conservative with his 10's... I'll definitely have to get this (not owning either a ps3, wii or 360 means I'm still in the minority of console owners).

Sounds brilliant, like I've been hearing, Definitely thinking about pickig it up. Any news on when we'll get FES, if ever?

FES is currently rumoured to be getting a US release towards the end of April.

Nice review, this game is indeed brilliant. RPG fans that want something a bit different can't go wrong with this one.

Without doubt I going to buy this game if comes here with the sound track or at least the art book.

PS2 FTW.

So many games still to play, not bothered at all by the lo-def.

PS3 unfortunately sort of gathering dust, at least until I can cheaply get Folklore from somewhere.

it's less then £30 new and so even cheaper second hand.

That's already pretty cheap in my book!

@Loser

If you're talking about my comment on Folklore, then I'm from a different country and your money != my money and 30 pounds is too much for my money.

It's very hard to finish this game in less than 100 hours. So even though Persona 3 is one of the best games I've ever played, I don't recommend it to anyone with severe time constraints.

Awesome. It seems you can always count on the Shin Megami Tensei series to pull something truely fantastic out of the bag every so often.

One of the reasons I haven't joined the current gen yet is the high standard still maintained on the PS2. Are there anymore notable titles to come or is this the console's swansong?

Odin Sphere is pretty good, too.

Not a 9 or 10 game to me. it is worth mentioning that the semi-fixed camera can be annoying. when you are exiting a room into a hallway (and there are lots of generic-looking cookie-cutter hallways with every hallway at right angles) you have to re-orient yourself everytime. Its gets old having to call up the map and firgure out which door is the door you need to go in next, when every hallway and door looks the same. Its also a VERY long RPG and I wonder how many will manage to finish it. Personally I had enough after 18 hours. A 10 rating game for me in this genre would have had more varied and interesting environments. The persona-RPG elements are good indded, but the game is intentionally wayyyyyyy drawn out in length and it suffers as a result.

I DON'T HAVE THE TIME.

/wants.

persona 3 is making me forget to eat and pee.... and I have vague memories of being a student.

Jesus, I'll never jump on the next gen bandwagon at this rate.

Ah, who am I kidding. I love it this way.

yeah fuck the next gen bandwagon, i can't afford a new bloody console. most recent thing i have is a DS (original version) and i'm still perfectly happy with that and my PS2. its just a shame that publishers (in the west at least) seem to be abandoning the PS2 much faster than the PS1 before it, especially when none of the next-current-new-arse-gen consoles are really filling its shoes in any meaningful way.

“And since I agree that this is a bloody good game I request that you re-review Folklore. It's also a game of pure quality.”

Fully agree. That review was one of the worst I’ve ever read on EG (which unfortunately is saying less and less).

Will definitely get this if it works on the (partly) software emulated PS3 (my two SCART slots on the HDTV are already occupied and I'm growing rather attached to my wireless SIXAXIS and DS3 controllers). So far the ‘new’ (released after the PS3 was introduced) titles that I was interested in (e.g. Rogue Galaxy, God of War 2) all work fine. Does anyone know of a recent PS2 game that won’t work on a EU 60gb PS3?

But as long as this is not clear I won’t get it, especially since the region locked PS2 games cost me more than brand new PS3 games.

I just cancelled my PAL order so I can buy FES instead. What's the point in paying more for less?

@Les - I had an email from someone at Koie earlier today saying that they had tested it and it worked on a 60gb PS3. I know its not a difinitive but its good enough for me to take the chance with Game. At least I should be able to exchange it if it doesnt work.

Easily one of the best RPGs ever. I played this for 120 hours+ easy!

Unfortunately I think this (and Mass Effect) are to blame for me getting bored of other (more traditional) RPGs lately. One thing I'll always remember fondly is the battle music and the constant commentary from Mitsuru as you fight. I was rather disapointed when she became one of the fighting characters and someone else took over the commentary.

Seriously, one of the all time greats.

Yeah. Fuuka isn't quite the same. But the party characters do shout messages of encourgement to one another during battle, which is a nice touch.

Well, shit. Now I'm not sure whether to buy the UK version so I don't have to go through a stupid rigmarole to play my import copy, or just wait to import the rumoured FES version - which might never materialise.

This is one of the few games that is genuinely worth buying twice, though. One of the best RPGs on the PS2, and that's saying something.

EDIT: Oh, and the camera stopped bothering me after about half an hour, when I'd figured out where all the rooms I regularly needed to go into were. It's really not a big problem in any way, or at least it didn't strike me as such.

So the special edition of persona 3, the game and the expansion for a reduced price is confirmed for a realease in the US.

And that's been announced right before this old, much more limited edition is going on sale here.
Best to wait a bit longer until the full package is on sale here too, unless you don't mind buying the game twice.

hell. 50€ for a game with zero extras when you can buy it for 30$ with all the in-game extras...

No way.

@ caoslayer

40€, according to play.com Seems there's a bit of a price drop in these late ps2 releases. Odin Sphere is listed for 40€ too.

If it ever reaches this shore off course. Which will undoubtely be a no if the sales for this one are shite. I ordered this. Can't really afford to miss it if it sells out. One of those games you'd hunt like a madman on Ebay in 5 years.

@Chtulie

50€ at the GAME store around the corner. Checked today.