7 out of 10 sounds fair to me, Ichirou. I'd give Devil Summoner the same, though I personally like it more. Fuck Himuro saying to skip it. It's definitely a low budget SMT game, and it shows with the prerendered backgrounds and what not, but it's still got a mostly fun, fast, and simple battle system. The game is brief enough that it never had the time to wear on me.
My problems with Persona that keep it from being great:
1) The S.Link system isn't well designed. You never know what sort of persona you are going to need before you actually need them, so you have no idea what S.Link's are best to pursue, aside from going for the ones you think are most amusing or most entertaining. That's not a very intelligent way to plan out your monster strategy,
2) The social aspect of the game is completely under developed. There's only one correct path through each social event cut scene, if you want to get your point bonus credit. This is stupid, it allows you to waste time, and due to the nature of the S.Link System, it doesn't even make sense. If I choose the incorrect dialogue choice, I should not get no credit at all, but possibly get credit in an opposing S.Link. What's the point of being a clownass in this game if you are going to be penalized? If I want to play the game as a badass asshole, the game should let me.
3) The dungeon exploring isn't as much of a focus as it should be, and it is shallow. The game has a shitty fatigue system that prevents you from dungeon crawling as much as you want. This would be a problem, except that the dungeons are so simplistic and samey that you might not even feel like crawling much. I thought this was going to be like mysterious dungeon style crawling, and while it's cleary derived from that, it doesn't stand within 50 feet of the variety those games offer. Traps, treasures, even monster variety--you will find little to none of that here. The combat system is nice, an easier take on the system from previous PS2 SMT games. I still groan about not having complete control over all characters (you just have the main, and AI handles the rest), but the AI is truthfully pretty good.
The game is also significantly easier than any of the other PS2 SMT games. Devil Summoner aside, which is also on the easier side of the spectrum.
4) It is slow paced. Since you only go to the dungeon once or twice a week, and since you spend like a full half (or more) of your time playing the game reading NPC interactions and watching cut scenes, the game has the tendency to feel like you are watching it more than you are playing it. Yes, even worse than FF at its worst. Luckily, the localization is as good as it's gotten for SMT (it's a really good loc job, aside from a few imperfect voices. Sorry, had to mentiont hat, Heavenly Sword has ruined me with its perfect voicing!), so if that's your kind of thing, you're going to like this. For me, it got kind of grating. Other elements of the game do not help this feeling. This has bar none the worst soundtrack of any SMT game I can recall (that has made it to the US), and worse than being disappointing, it is downright annoying. Repeated, brief vocal samples are reminiscent of house music at its worst, mixed with terrible, horn-y J-Pop sensibilities. The music associated with the tower is good, but again, you don't spend much time there.
In conclusion, the game's got problems. Ignore fucking Himuro, Devil Summoner is just as good. It's more of a "slight" game, with not as much focus in things like dialogue or crazy production values, but it doesn't have nearly as many problems as Persona 3. Persona 3 is very close to being a Bad Game, and for my money, it's the worst SMT game to hit US shores, on basis of its many flaws, puzzling design, and oh so much wasted potential. I am trying to be kind of objective, though.
