Persona 3 & FES

[Moonshadow]

This game is definately old hat to most of the playground, but I only recently found a copy here in the land of giant flightless birds, poisonous half duck thingamibobs and boxing roo's.

I think Persona 3 is a very solid J-RPG. The combat system is quite good, and the amount of Personae at your disposal adds strategy to your gameplay. I like how it isn't just "MASH X TO WIN", you actually have to think about what you do, lest ye be smacked around by your foe.

My only real gripe so far is that enemies instant death skills seem to have a much higher rate of death to your party, than yours do to them. I've had a few game overs due to enemies getting lucky shots in, but I've always bounced back.

I'm only a 1/3 or so into the game so far, but its been quite fun so far.

[Altima]

Wait until you play The Answer--many a boss will be vulnerable to a certain element only to have the evade and dodge skill for that element equipped.

I hope you picked up the quad element Lilim at the start of the game.

[Moonshadow]

I had a Tri Element Lilim for a little while, ended up shifting to a Tri element Inugami, then I stuck with Oberon for a while, and now I've got a 4 element Pale Rider.

Which is surprisngly kickass, now that he's learned Survive Light.

[Altima]

FOUR ELEMENT IS BETTER! *coughs* But yeah. I usually used my quad lilim up until around 30-ish, where you get the next quad persona. Then you can get the final one around...fifty or sixty-ish, I think.

After that, you can just use Odin.

And after that, you can just use Helel and Lucifer. Which is fun. "Hello, Death! Say hello to my little friend!"

[Moonshadow]

i didn't have them leveled high enough to get 4 elemental skills. 3 did the trick for a while, anyways.

I just wish there were more half decent Light/Dark attack spells, instead of Mudo/Hama and its higher varieties.

[Tengu_temp]

I've recently finished The Journey and am now playing The Answer, and I must say - Persona 3 FES is possibly the best jRPG I've played, and maybe even the best RPG (I'm pondering do I like Planescape: Torment more). The only thing that bothers me in it is that you have to grind enemies for money sometimes, which gets boring after a while. Some people dislike its high difficulty, but these people need to learn to play - only several bosses are stupidly difficult, the rest of the game varies between Ordinary JRPG Difficulty (read: mind-numbingly easy) and Challenging.

[Tyracus]

I have the game and do enjoy the combat system it's just that my habit of playing long blocks without saving added with the odd chance of mobs ganging up on the hero = me almost turning my PS2 controler into an anti-TV missile.

I got up a fair amount into the 2nd block before the aformentioned frustrations led me to move on to other games. I just came back to it earlier this week and after reading a few tips (namely 4 element persona) and taking what I learned before I'm finding it more enjoyable (still frustrating though, like doing 4 loops of floors 3-6 for XP to try to hit 8 for my 4 elemental lilim then dying and realizing I had forgotten to save after I hit 7. That was a head-desk moment of epic proportions.

Now I just hope that I can manage to power through that blasted floor 14 guardian then it's a bit easier up until the poison spamming one.

[Moonshadow]

Leveling in the first block is a pain, once you hit the higher levels of the second block, it starts getting easier.


God knows it took me long enough to level up to make a 4 elem Pale Rider, but once I did, I started leveling faster.

[Tyracus]

Yeah, grinding out 200 or so XP at about 4-6 per fight was time consuming but now that I'm sitting at level 9 waiting to get through the block at level 16 with a 4-element lilim, 111k yen, more chivalrous shirts than I can shake a stick at and pretty much all the available tasks in the velvet room done I think I'm in good shape for having a week until the first full moon.

[Moonshadow]

Oh, a word of advice. Unless you're playing FES, or are just a completionist, don't bother about the request that involves finding a Shadow Shard.

Its such a pain to do that request, I went up and down those floors god knows how many times, and in the end I just canceled it >_>;

[Altima]

i didn't have them leveled high enough to get 4 elemental skills. 3 did the trick for a while, anyways.

I just wish there were more half decent Light/Dark attack spells, instead of Mudo/Hama and its higher varieties.


The game becomes hilariously easy once you get Alice. Die For Me. :smallbiggrin:

But yeah, those jobs to find the gold hand drop items suck.

[Moonshadow]

The game becomes hilariously easy once you get Alice. Die For Me. :smallbiggrin:

But yeah, those jobs to find the gold hand drop items suck.


I actually found those quite easy, at least the ones I've done so far. But then again, I could have got lucky, I suppose.

I did find a few floors with nothing but gold Shadows 3-4 times.

[Cubey]

Nah, Die for Me has the drawbacks of not always working even on enemies weak to Darkness (thank you, Random Number God!), and of course it doesn't work on bosses. And costs 40 SP to use.

Which social links are your most/least favorite? Nerd-o-rama advised me to ignore Moon, because that guy is an annoying loser and, unlike other S Links where the person gets better as time passes (like Devil), he stays a loser. Unfortunately, it turns out he was just right.

[Airk]

I never really noticed that creatures being weak again Light/Dark led to an improved rate of success of those abilities, it just meant that you got another turn if you killed one with a single target light/dark effect. I could be wrong about that though.

That said, Hamaon/Mudoon with Hama Boost/Mudo Boost are actually pretty effective.

I didn't think Alice was particularly useful, myself. The game does, however, get incredibly stupid when you can finally make Lucifer. :P

In terms of social links I liked/disliked, presumably from a purely story driven perspective, I didn't like Kenji (Magician) much, really (Though I missed Moon entirely, so who knows.) I really rather liked Maiko (Hanged Man) and uh... okay, I admit it, I really like Mitsuru. -_-;

[hanzo66]

I cannot recommend this enough... (http://lparchive.org/LetsPlay/Persona3/)

[Terraoblivion]

My favorite is probably the Hermit. Who can not love Maya? Especially once you learn who she is. Least favorite of those i completed...Probably Magician. Having to encourage Kenji in his nonsense was just cringeworthy XD

[Tengu_temp]

Aw, what's bad about Kenji? His goal is noble, he pursues love! Such a pity he fails in the end, just because of social stigma.

My least favorite social link is probably Emperor - wow, students smoking in the toilet don't let this guy sleep at night, what a horrible problem! Sheesh. Most favorite is Sun - it's so sad, and yet so uplifting at the same time.

[Terraoblivion]

Yes, but i didn't finish the emperor so he doesn't count for me. I only focused on those i had finished, if it was all those i had gotten partway through the emperor would be the bottom of the heap for me.

[Nerd-o-rama]

I finished The Journey the other day

BAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWW

And decided, since I was playing a borrowed game and about to move, to just spoil The Answer for myself

BAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWW

Plot-wise, I have to agree, these are among the best RPGs ever. Gameplay-wise, it's meh. Not as boring as Final Fantasy, but most of the "difficulty" is sort of volatile: random monster fights are either Instant Win (if you have their elemental weakness, which you really ought to even without specially-bred quad-element Persona), or Instant Game Over (if they ambush you and happen to have Main Character's current weakness). Bosses are all either ludicrously easy or midly challenging; although I admit the final boss would probably have been more difficult if I didn't level-grind to 90 to get the ultimate (not really ultimate in FES) Persona. But that was made up for by having to beat the Optional Boss (Death) to get to the area where I ground levels. Death, by the way, is a son of a bitch. You're not ready to beat him until around level 70-75 with very good Persona, at which point you could beat the game just as easily.

Phew. Anyway, Social Links. I finished Moon, so I can safely say the Gourmet King freaking sucks. Takeshi (Emperor) isn't that bad, though he's another one where you have to humor a lot of BS to advance the link, much like Kenji. Kenji, however, is far more entertaining. I kinda hope he hooks up with Maya.

Favorite Social Link...Devil. Just for his epilogue. Tanaka, you magnificent bastard! Sun, Hanged Man, and Hermit similarly have awesome endings, and Justice's cameo in Persona 4 is awesome. Finally, Aeon's last link answered a question I'd been wondering about for a long time...

I finished all social links except Mitsuru, Yukari, Fuuka, Mamoru, and...boring Fortune guy. Definitely playing a New Game+ for maxed social links someday...only 3/6 girls is unacceptable for a harem lead! Oh, and Orpheus Telos sounds fun.

[Airk]

Eh. There's nothing hard about beating Death. As I said previously, the game becomes stupid once you can get Lucifer. Lucifer + Satan (who is just a normal fusion Persona) = Armageddon = 9999 damage to all targets. Sure, it uses up all your SP, but if you have Lucifer, you have Victory Cry, which restores all your SP at the end of combat.

Cheap? Sure. But the game practically drops it in your lap. I killed Death in one shot and didn't look back.

Now if you want to do it with "normal" skills or whatever, yes, it's rough, but... well, that's challenge through decision, rather than challenge through difficulty.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Yeah, but I screwed up and didn't max Star. No Star 10 = No Helel = No Lucifer = No Armageddon. And I thought Death had more than 9999 HP. Guess not.

[Cubey]

Eh. There's nothing hard about beating Death. As I said previously, the game becomes stupid once you can get Lucifer. Lucifer + Satan (who is just a normal fusion Persona) = Armageddon = 9999 damage to all targets. Sure, it uses up all your SP, but if you have Lucifer, you have Victory Cry, which restores all your SP at the end of combat.

Cheap? Sure. But the game practically drops it in your lap. I killed Death in one shot and didn't look back.

Now if you want to do it with "normal" skills or whatever, yes, it's rough, but... well, that's challenge through decision, rather than challenge through difficulty.

That doesn't work in FES anymore, as Lucifer doesn't have Victory Cry and getting both of these Persona requires a much higher level than Death is on. Not that Death is terribly difficult to start with... just takes a loooong time to beat him.

The game's battle mechanics aren't its focus, however. They're quite interesting with the elemental weakness/knockdown system, but nothing super revolutionary either. The story and characters is where it trully shines.

[Airk]

I'm glad they fixed Lucifer; But what do you mean by "requires a higher level than Death is on"? They must've changed things pretty significantly in FES (Which I haven't played through entirely yet) because Death wasn't -on- a level in P3?

[Cubey]

No, Death isn't on any particular level of Tartarus, but he HAS a level. Around 70-75. Fusing Persona required for Armageddon requires your level to be in late 80s. Such a level difference allows you to make short work of the Reaper even without Armageddon, but reaching it would require a lot of boring grinding because you can't access Monad.

[Altima]

Most people recommend taking Death on with Thunder Reign, or something similar.

My favorite S. Link? Hmm...I think I like the 'special' FES one. They're all fairly good, especially the story ones.

[Nerd-o-rama]

You mean the Aeon link?

Things I learned from the P3 Main Character: with love, anything is possible.

Even if you have to void her warranty to accomplish it.

[Moonshadow]

Except for saving the world from all the negative people.

That wall is gonna break some time. Maybe for Persona 5?



Also, the Online Game "Innocent Sin", isn't that the name for one of the other Persona games? Persona 2, IIRC.

[tyckspoon]

Except for saving the world from all the negative people.

That wall is gonna break some time. Maybe for Persona 5?

Also, the Online Game "Innocent Sin", isn't that the name for one of the other Persona games? Persona 2, IIRC.

I thought the whole point of The Answer was to go and beat the crap out of what was behind Main Character's wall so that there was no threat of any recurrence. There's still plenty of other ways for humanity to screw itself up for future Persona games, anyway.. Persona 4 deals with mankind's persistent desire to hide from life's uncertainties and complexities, although the overall 'wouldn't it be better if all of this just went away?' theme remains and if nothing else, Philemon and Nyarly could finally make their official return.

And yes, that whole Link is one big Persona 2 reference. Innocent Sin is the subtitle of the first half of the Persona 2 story.

[Moonshadow]

So, I just found Sleeping Table. He wiped me out in 2 turns.


I'm thinking of grinding to level 44, and then fusing a Decarabia to deal with him, seeing as it nulls Fire, and has Megido.


Anyone else have any other tips?

[Nerd-o-rama]

As I understand The Answer

The protagonists don't "stop" humanity from longing for death. These are both eternal things - Nyx is death itself, Erebus is humanity's collective Shadow longing for death. Their victory over Erebus is a temporary thing...but they can stop The Fall from happening again if humanity itself eventually accepts and gets over its fears and negative emotions. A tall order, and not one that can be solved just by beating up a monster. I think though, with all the lessons the characters learned from The Answer (and the lingering influence of Main Character's general Messiahness), it's on its way to possibly happening. It's also implied that, if all goes well, one day the Seal will be unnecessary, and Main Character might be able to come back and live out the rest of his life. One day. Way in the future.

I don't really know about P4, and don't spoil it for me either. I am interested in seeing this Philemon chap should he show up in a future game in this continuity...as more than a symbolic butterfly, that is.

[psycojester]

Does anybody else think that Persona 3 would have been an even better game if having the main character go down in a fight just resulted in him getting knocked out like an ordinary party member instead of it being a game over. It wouldn't ruin the games difficulty and it would cut down immensely on the number of "You've been grinding levels, haven't saved and have the wrong persona out for this random encounter? BYE BYE 2 HOURS WORK!" events.

[Cubey]

Maybe the game assumes your party members aren't smart enough to revive you after the battle.
And guess what, that's a fair assumption! You do most of the work yourself for good reason - the rest are surprisingly poor fighters. Mitsuru, you're supposed to be a genius, why do you cast Marin Karin on the boss again! Why... Marin... Karin...

[Rogue 7]

I think the Let's Play mentioned that when the protagonist goes down, he releases the whole "seal" thing inside him and Nyx shows up and eats the planet.

[Moonshadow]

I think the Let's Play mentioned that when the protagonist goes down, he releases the whole "seal" thing inside him and Nyx shows up and eats the planet.


That doesn't really make sense though, because you don't even know about Nyx until the last 1/4 of the game or so >_>

And yes, I too feel the AI is a bit lacking, but I can usually wrangle them into doing what I want most of the time.

[Nerd-o-rama]

That doesn't really make sense though, because you don't even know about Nyx until the last 1/4 of the game or so >_>But even before that, he's still holding The Appriser (Pharos) within him. With him violently released in partial form, who knows what would happen.

[Moonshadow]

So. Sleeping Table. Is there any way to not get utterly raped by him, or is it just a case of GRIND MOAR?

I can usually survive, until he starts throwing out Megidola's.

[hanzo66]

My main experience with the game was mostly from the Let's Play version, which is definitely worth a read for anybody who liked the game. Basically it takes place as the Main Character (AKA Minato Arisato, his Manga name) talking about his experiences in his own Livejournal account. There are little snippets from other characters' blogs (for some reason, even Aigis has a blog?) and is overall just plain entertaining.

Storywise, I quite liked it. The characters are mostly enjoyable, even if some of the Social Links are fairly insufferable (Fatty the Gourmet King), creepy (Kenji) or Bastardly Magnificent (Tanaka, who even gets to keep his role as TV Stuff Seller up to Persona 4). The Main Characters are likeable for the most part (Junpei is sorta sympathetic and reasonably jealous of the MC as a Gary Stu) and the voice acting is overall well-done. The Human Villains are for the most part annoying Nietzsche Wannabe Nihilists though even they (Strega at least) have fairly tragic backstories.



Then again Social Links in Persona 4 matter a bit more since your buddies themselves are main Social Links. Helps get in better touch with their characters while for the MC it's mostly the girls he can really get that close to (from what I can tell, the guys for the most part just see him as mostly a comrade of sorts).

[psycojester]

(Junpei is sorta sympathetic and reasonably jealous of the MC as a Gary Stu)

Personally i think that Junpei is my favourite Jrpg character ever. He starts off looking like a fairly generic goofy best friend character but when they start showing you his insecurities, hopes and personal problems he becomes genuinely sympathetic and somebody you can relate to. My favourite part is of the game is during the exam periods, if you talk to Junpei during the afternoon and during school he acts relaxed and flippant, but if you listen at his door during the nights you hear him berating himself for not committing himself and stressing out about where he's going in life.

At times i was really hoping that somebody was going to tell Yukari to just shut the **** up and leave the guy alone, the amount of **** he puts up with from her without giving anything back is remarkable.


Strega

The Strega would have been much more effective villians if they weren't such ridiculous pushovers whenever you fight them. It creates a really weird disconnect when the 9 members of the SEES club are sitting around stressing out over 3 guys whom any of them could splatter all over the pavement without breaking a sweat, its even worse when Takaya seems to be willfully ignoring all the previous arse kickings he's received and is determined that THIS TIME! he'll defeat you. It stops the Strega being vaguely sympathetic and just turns them into Emo-Team Rocket.

[Nerd-o-rama]

So. Sleeping Table. Is there any way to not get utterly raped by him, or is it just a case of GRIND MOAR?

I can usually survive, until he starts throwing out Megidola's.If you're getting killed by Megidolas, you have three options:

1. Heal moar
2. Have HP moar
3. Damage moar (to kill it before it can kill you, as it only casts that at low HP anyway)

Any one of these requires either grinding, fusing better Persona, or buying better weapons/armor/HP +X% rings.

Oh, and if you haven't been doing it, Tarukunda is a great call here; Akihiko learns it, along with the other debuff spells; I usually bring him along and set him to Heal/Support on bosses just for debuffing purposes.

[Cubey]

Personally i think that Junpei is my favourite Jrpg character ever. He starts off looking like a fairly generic goofy best friend character but when they start showing you his insecurities, hopes and personal problems he becomes genuinely sympathetic and somebody you can relate to. My favourite part is of the game is during the exam periods, if you talk to Junpei during the afternoon and during school he acts relaxed and flippant, but if you listen at his door during the nights you hear him berating himself for not committing himself and stressing out about where he's going in life.
Yes. Junpei is the Clown character type, done realistically. He fools around not because he's goofy by nature, but because he seeks acceptance this way. And he really grows during the course of the series. Also, about him berating himself for the results - it's funny, but during the exam he did that, he actually scored his lifetime record, average and not poor grades. Maybe he was just too depressed to check the results board?


At times i was really hoping that somebody was going to tell Yukari to just shut the **** up and leave the guy alone, the amount of **** he puts up with from her without giving anything back is remarkable.

What's wrong with Yukari? Her and Junpei's quarrels are mostly friendly teasing. Besides, Yukari is a Tsundere and Junpei knows his anime character turn-ons. He likes maids too. And robot girls.

[psycojester]

It varies in some places it was clearly friendly teasing but at some of the later stages of the game when things were getting serious and we get to see more of Junpei's feelings i was just thinking "Jeez, lay off the guy you're just being a bitch now"

[Raroy]

So I got FES a little while ago, and since I just got the true ending for P4 I'm almost ready for this. After a break, of course. You can only play so many one hundred hour rpgs in a row.

So what are the main differences in the two? What should I keep in mind?

[hanzo66]

The Strega would have been much more effective villians if they weren't such ridiculous pushovers whenever you fight them. It creates a really weird disconnect when the 9 members of the SEES club are sitting around stressing out over 3 guys whom any of them could splatter all over the pavement without breaking a sweat, its even worse when Takaya seems to be willfully ignoring all the previous arse kickings he's received and is determined that THIS TIME! he'll defeat you. It stops the Strega being vaguely sympathetic and just turns them into Emo-Team Rocket.

Yeah, from what I've heard, gameplay-wise they weren't all that tough. That and I've never been too fond of Nietzsche Wannabes as villains. They usually come off as somewhat pretentious and whiny in my eyes, often spouting semi-philosophical crap that don't really amount to much.

[tyckspoon]

So what are the main differences in the two? What should I keep in mind?

Persona 4 is better in pretty much every way besides not having Mitsuru. P3 is still an excellent game, especially the FES edition, but you may find it harder to deal with its particular quirks after coming from P4. In particular, Tartarus is much longer and much duller than P4's dungeons, and there are many more checkpoint bosses who will kill you many times. And every female S-Link is a romance, and they get jealous of each other in much more dangerous ways than P4's links. Much harder to max all or even just most of the links in P3.

[psycojester]

Yeah, they're back story made them a bit sympathetic but Takaya and Jin burnt through their supply of sympathy damn quick, if you're going for tragic villains you probably don't want the players reaction to be "HAHA! GOOD! You deserve to have twisted inhuman experiments that leave you in constant agony, you pricks"

[Moonshadow]

Ditched Sleeping Table for now, decided to do the next full moon mission.


I think the Fortune/Strength fight is rigged, no matter where I hit the button, the Roulette gave it to the Shadows :smallfurious:

[tyckspoon]

Fortune's roulette stops on whatever was opposite the pointer when you hit the button. It's pretty easy to tag the slower spins/larger sections, and do try to remember that Blue means good and Red is bad. Aim for blue sections and whatever the result is it will at least not hurt you.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Yep. Not rigged, just hit the button when the blue result is directly opposite the pointer.

But if you just fought Strength and Fortune, that means...

SHINJIROOOOOOOOOOOO!!
As I recall.

[Moonshadow]

Yep. Not rigged, just hit the button when the blue result is directly opposite the pointer.

But if you just fought Strength and Fortune, that means...

SHINJIROOOOOOOOOOOO!!
As I recall.

Yeah. I beat them, and thats my reward? That really blows.

I liked him too.


Still gotta kill that sodding table though.

[Tengu_temp]

I liked him too.


Who didn't?

[Nerd-o-rama]

Who didn't?Well, Takaya and Ken, to name two.

[Moonshadow]

Yeah, but Ken is annoying anyways >>

[Tengu_temp]

I like Ken. He starts as a generic token shota, and then it turns out that underneath it there is a complex character, with very good motivation for his actions. Not my favorite SEES member ever (all of them are great characters I like a lot), but still good.

[Phaedra]

Question for you all - I have the original version of Persona 3 and I've just ordered the FES version, will my save file for the original work in FES, or am I going to have to start the game over again?

[Nerd-o-rama]

I know it'll transfer your Compendium data over, at least. Possibly stats, level, and other stuff you normally get from a New Game+.