Did I mention Nanako’s, like, six or seven years old? No? Well, she is. Dojima’s a workaholic’s workaholic, often leaving his daughter Nanako at the drop of a hat to take care of everything-schoolwork, housework, herself-on her own. He’s a difficult person to even want to hang out with, because not only is he the protagonist’s uncle (as opposed to other characters closer to the protagonist’s age), and not only do they just meet as the game begins, but because he’s kind of an asshole. Like real people, certain characters are harder to bond with than others-like P4’s Ryotaro Dojima. The impact isn’t always immediate, but sometimes that’s the point. If they did, they wouldn’t be nearly as impactful. Unless you’re playing Persona purely for the gameplay and don’t care who you hang out with so long as you get the best upgrades, Social Links rarely (if ever) feel transactional.
It’s very “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours”-yet it’s more than that simple give and take. By “maxing out” a Social Link, you gain new abilities and open up the door for stronger Personas.
That sort of hopelessness often grows as Persona stories progress (they are JRPGs, after all, which means there’s always going to be some god-like being to defeat), but seeing how smaller-scale problems can be overcome through Social Links is often what helps you push through. Even after you pass the “seeing is believing” threshold, it can be difficult to know what you can (or even should) do next. Without that personal connection, it’s all too easy to slip into apathy-to believe that just because something isn’t happening to you, it isn’t happening at all. Many of them, however, hammer home how individuals are affected by what’s happening around them. That’s not an excuse for bad writing, as there are also a few Social Links that are just fun to do-nothing more, nothing less. Not every Social Link is so successful in turning Persona’s big ideas into personal stories, of course (lookin’ at you, Kenji Tomochika, Shu Nakajima, and Shinya Oda), but then, not everyone you meet in life affects you in profound or unexpected ways. By the time Persona 6 comes out, who knows? There may be a mechanic dedicated to controlling the protagonist’s breathing patterns. Persona 4 and Persona 5 progressively worked out the kinks and added even more ways to fill in the gaps between battles, bolstering the franchise’s reputation and popularity worldwide.
#Persona games full#
It wasn’t until Persona 3-released a full 10 years after the first game-that the series allowed players to more or less schedule the protagonist’s everyday life, from study habits to club activities. You can walk around freely, but there’s only so much to do outside of shopping for new equipment and sniffing out rumors.
#Persona games free#
The first two entries in the series (technically the first three, since Persona 2: Innocent Sin and Persona 2: Eternal Punishment are two halves of one plotline) feature incredible stories, characters, and music, yet free time is much less “free” than it would be in future games.
Everyone and their Mother Harlot knows the Persona games as half-JRPGs, half-social simulators-but it wasn’t always that way.
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