The legend isn’t wrong, per se, as falling into the world behind the television is how people meet a Shadowy version of their inner self and, by accepting that self and coming to a deeper understanding of the persona they show to the world, unlock the magical power of that persona. Supposedly looking into a turned-off television at midnight on a rainy night reveals your soulmate. As Yu and his friends Chie and Yosuke investigate the murders, they begin to learn that they are connected to a local urban legend called the Midnight Channel. Yu’s arrival in the normally sleepy town seems to herald trouble as a series of murders begins to take place immediately after. Your character (whose canon name is funnily enough ‘Yu’) came from an unnamed big city to live in Inaba while his parents are traveling internationally due to their jobs. So as I mentioned, Persona 4 Golden is set in a town called Inaba. “Heartbeat, Heartbeat” and “Studio Backlot” have been playing in my head on repeat with no signs of stopping, with the latter making a great ‘get pumped’ song for chores or other unpleasant matters of real life significance. And while it is hard to beat Last Surprise as a battle theme, P4G’s theme is still solid and there are lots of memorable numbers to be enjoyed. Walking around the overworld is a blast as there are multiple vocalized musical themes that play as you navigate the small town of Inaba. Persona 4 and 5 are distinct thematically and as a result the musical styles that define them are different as well, but the execution is stellar no matter the genre. One thing that is not different between the two games is the quality of the soundtrack. While these broad strokes are similar, there are a lot of differences between P4G and P5R in terms of the theme and tone of the mysteries, the nature of the supernatural forces at play, and of course practical differences in terms of gameplay. ![]() The real life disasters and metaphysical adventures eventually come together and you finally hit the core loop of the game. Soon, terrible things start happening around you, and on top of those terrible things you’re also having strange dreams of eerie supernatural phenomena. You begin their school life and meet their new friends. You have a main character displaced from their home and going to live with a guardian. P4 starts out similarly to P5 in that you spend a significant chunk of time learning the setup. With that advice taken to heart, I decided to stick my hand into the TV screen and fall fully into the world of Persona 4 Golden for the first time. ![]() I ultimately decided to post about it on Twitter and the feedback I got was essentially unanimous: while P4G may have some gameplay disadvantages against P5R, it’s not so drastic a difference that it makes the game unplayable. It is a genre infamous for not respecting your time, and while most of the positives I’d heard about P4G were related to the quality of the story and characters, I didn’t want to put up with lousy mechanics just to try to fight my way to a decent story. Compared to a game like Yakuza, JRPGs can get really rough when you go backwards and start to lose QOL features. It’s a game I have heard wonderful things about from longtime Persona fans, but as someone who joined the series with 5 I had a hard time imagining that there would be much it could to in order to grab my attention. ![]() The absence of those features made older Yakuza games feel dated in a way that was hard for me to push through, and I felt like I’d ruined my chances at becoming interested in the series by playing them in an order that didn’t work for me.īecause of this experience and others like it, I was hesitant to dive into Persona 4 Golden. The problem was, even though the RPG aspects of Like a Dragon weren’t great, there were meaningful quality of life touches to parts of the formula that had remained the same. Occasionally though I’ll jump into a series that is new to me, and with that decision comes the burning question: do I start from the beginning or the most recent game? I did this dance with the Yakuza series back in 2020, scooping up Like a Dragon and then trying to go backwards to an older game when I heard that the older ones had better gameplay. I’ve experienced them as they went on and had the opportunity to watch them improve over time or lament that they will probably never be what they once were. As someone who has been gaming since the early 90’s, most of the series I play are ones that have grown alongside me.
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