Persona Q - Wild Card Edition (GS exclusive 3DSXL bundle)

[demi]

http://gematsu.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/PQ-First-Print-Wild-Cards_002.jpg

- Tarot Card Set #2 – The collection of the iconic Tarot Cards used as evokers in Persona 4 are being released as a collector’s set across Persona 4 Arena Ultimax and Persona Q Set #2 will include the Tarot Cards of Arcanas XI – XXI
 - Art Booklet – Collection of some of the amazing new artwork that went into Persona Q
 - Soundtrack CD – CD with the Persona Q soundtrack highlights by the ATLUS sound team
 - Deluxe Hard Case for 3DS XL – This hard case, previously available only in Japan,is coming to North America and features Persona Q designs and will house a 3DS XL

Link to Pre-Order on Amazon

There is also a regular first print version

- Tarot Card Set #2 – Same as above
 - Special Packaging – The first run of Persona Q items will come in a special package.

It says Tarot Card Set #2 because you have to buy Persona 4 Arena Ultimax for Set #1

Pre-Order on Amazon - Regular Edition

[Himu]

How much Persona charm is in Q, Bebsy?

[Bebpo]

It's EO with Persona colors/music.

Playing it I realized the biggest difference between EO and Megaten is in progression speed.  EO is slow as fuck.  You do part of a dungeon floor, warp back to base, sell materials/heal/upgrade, do another part of a dungeon floor, warp back to base, repeat... probably takes like 5 hours to get through a single 5 floor dungeon.  Whereas in Megaten or a normal jrpg you run through a dungeon in an hour or two.

Enjoying it, but it's EO, not Persona.  You like EO or you don't by this point.

[Himu]

Ugh.

I like EO but are there any gimmicks or any story moments to separate this from regular eo?

[Bebpo]

Got to the 2nd dungeon at around 8 hours in.  Seems like there's either 4 or 5 dungeons total so only 4 or 5 bosses total.


The game starts pretty EO, but as you get further in and get access to more SMT spells/attacks/skills and have more personas to fuse and work with (seems like there's about 180-190 persona) the normal battles get a lot more strategic and dungeon crawling gets pretty fun.  You're also not so scrapped for cash or stuck with low max SPs which helps.  When quests come in that helps a bit too.

It's still nowhere near as good as a megaten game, but it's a good EO game that's got a strategic Persona-ish battle system and fusion system.


My only complaints are the F.O.E.s and bosses are total fucking boredom HP grinds.  The first boss didn't have any weakpoints so it was just chipping away at its health for over 20 mins until it died; endurance boss which is the kind of boss I hate.  The first F.O.E. I killed was the same, no weakpoints so just HP grind for 10+ mins.  The problem was neither of these fights were challenging in any way other than through endurance because you run out of SP after a while which are the most boring kinds of fights.  Pretty worried all the bosses will suck and be a chore, luckily if you don't count F.O.E.s the boss count seems rather low at maybe 5 bosses or so total and that's it.  So I'll deal with 30 min boring boss fights a handful of times and enjoy the crawling.


Also the story and banter starts increeeedible dull and skip-worthy since there's not much of a plot to this and what's there is zzz, but when the P3 and P4 crew all combine the banter gets a lot more interesting because it's cross-series interactions and there's some neat moments like how:

spoiler (click to show/hide)

It's revealed that Yousuke from P4's gf was one of the dead victims...so then Ken from P3 pulls him aside and has a heartfelt talk where he questions Yousuke about the morality of revenge vs. moving on.

[close]

also some of the P3 cast is cool, some is eh, some of the P4 cast is cool, some is eh, but combined there's a lot of great characters so it gets a lot more fun to watch when everyone's assembled.

Enjoying it at this point.  It's not amazing or anything, and I've played better dungeon crawlers (honestly I think I like EO better when it was 2d because everything moved faster) and better megaten, but it's got addictive qualities to it.  Will probably be the first EO game I play to the end though if the bosses are just going to be HP chipping I'm going to drop the difficulty for those few fights just to speed things up a bit.

[thisismyusername]

Kinda want the Tarot cards. But $50 for EO... 

[demi]

The battle music tho

[demi]

THIS CAROUSEEELLLLLL

[Himu]

Got to the 2nd dungeon at around 8 hours in.  Seems like there's either 4 or 5 dungeons total so only 4 or 5 bosses total.


The game starts pretty EO, but as you get further in and get access to more SMT spells/attacks/skills and have more personas to fuse and work with (seems like there's about 180-190 persona) the normal battles get a lot more strategic and dungeon crawling gets pretty fun.  You're also not so scrapped for cash or stuck with low max SPs which helps.  When quests come in that helps a bit too.

It's still nowhere near as good as a megaten game, but it's a good EO game that's got a strategic Persona-ish battle system and fusion system.


My only complaints are the F.O.E.s and bosses are total fucking boredom HP grinds.  The first boss didn't have any weakpoints so it was just chipping away at its health for over 20 mins until it died; endurance boss which is the kind of boss I hate.  The first F.O.E. I killed was the same, no weakpoints so just HP grind for 10+ mins.  The problem was neither of these fights were challenging in any way other than through endurance because you run out of SP after a while which are the most boring kinds of fights.  Pretty worried all the bosses will suck and be a chore, luckily if you don't count F.O.E.s the boss count seems rather low at maybe 5 bosses or so total and that's it.  So I'll deal with 30 min boring boss fights a handful of times and enjoy the crawling.


Also the story and banter starts increeeedible dull and skip-worthy since there's not much of a plot to this and what's there is zzz, but when the P3 and P4 crew all combine the banter gets a lot more interesting because it's cross-series interactions and there's some neat moments like how:

spoiler (click to show/hide)

It's revealed that Yousuke from P4's gf was one of the dead victims...so then Ken from P3 pulls him aside and has a heartfelt talk where he questions Yousuke about the morality of revenge vs. moving on.

[close]

also some of the P3 cast is cool, some is eh, some of the P4 cast is cool, some is eh, but combined there's a lot of great characters so it gets a lot more fun to watch when everyone's assembled.

Enjoying it at this point.  It's not amazing or anything, and I've played better dungeon crawlers (honestly I think I like EO better when it was 2d because everything moved faster) and better megaten, but it's got addictive qualities to it.  Will probably be the first EO game I play to the end though if the bosses are just going to be HP chipping I'm going to drop the difficulty for those few fights just to speed things up a bit.

Skip.

Will get soundtrack tho.

[Takuan]

Sounds kind of shit.

Selling my pre-order, then.

[Himu]

It doesn't sound like shit at all. EO is pretty good, but I'm not seeing much reason to play it over say, EO4.

[Takuan]

It doesn't sound like shit at all. EO is pretty good, but I'm not seeing much reason to play it over say, EO4.

HP grind bosses sound awful.

[magus]

It doesn't sound like shit at all. EO is pretty good, but I'm not seeing much reason to play it over say, EO4.

Well sure, if you haven't finished EO4 in the last year and a half.  If you have, and you finished Millennium Girl in the year it'll have been out, then there are plenty of reasons to play the next decent J-dungeon crawler that doesn't involve raping lolis.

you mean himuro should get elminage gothic when it comes on steam?

i agree!

[demi]

Why you would want to play PQ instead of say, EO4.

- You like Persona

[Himu]

But it's just persona in name only. And only encompasses 3 and 4, two games you have touted as shit.

[demi]

PQ contains no mundane waifu building. Superior version. Finally a true sequel to P2

[Himu]

[Bebpo]

It doesn't sound like shit at all. EO is pretty good, but I'm not seeing much reason to play it over say, EO4.

Well sure, if you haven't finished EO4 in the last year and a half.  If you have, and you finished Millennium Girl in the year it'll have been out, then there are plenty of reasons to play the next decent J-dungeon crawler that doesn't involve raping lolis.

I think the yearly EO is part of the reason why some people, like myself, eventually get bored of them.  They're good games, but it's just way too often considering they're pretty lengthy and fairly similar.  Easy to get behind a game or two and then get burnt out.

I think if they had made an EO game every 2-3 years with substantial upgrades it'd be easier and more rewarding to be a fan.  But I guess yearly EO makes them some pocket change and throwing on Persona fanservice/battles just made them even more money so Sega/Atlus are happy

[Freyj]

EO "seems" a lot longer than your standard JRPG because there's so much more uninterrupted dungeon crawling.

Personally, I've played about 25 hours each of EO1, EO3 and EO4, but I've never finished any of them. I enjoy what I played, but that's about as long as the games hold my interest.

[Himu]

I enjoyed Strange journey MUCH more than any EO. SMT SJ and EO aren't really comparable to me. SJ strived to be an SMT game. Persona Q is an EO game with Persona flavoring.

[magus]

but the way you describe them, they seem like 1000 hour slogs.  That's a guy who isn't having fun, imo.

i think one of the reason is because progress in EO is so slow, heck when you kill a new F.O.E, there isn't even a chance he will drop what you need, when he does drop what you need, he doesn't even drop a new weapon, he drops the material for a new weapon,which you have to buy, which take so much money you have to make several farming trips with a team full of farmer which is pure unadulterated bullshit

EO

I enjoyed Strange journey MUCH more than any EO. SMT SJ and EO aren't really comparable to me. SJ strived to be an SMT game. Persona Q is an EO game with Persona flavoring.

yes, SJ is cool, it's like playing EO without all of the EO bullshit AND the cool bits from nocturne

[Himu]

I like EO. It isn't bad. I haven't played 4 except the demo but I own it and loved every bit of that demo. The formula works for me, but I like other type of dungeon crawlers - notably SMT - a lot more. The fusions, alignment systems, and stories help make the games more appealing to me. I also enjoy the dungeon crawling more. But I totally get the appeal of EO and I don't think they have much "bullshit" in them.

[Himu]

SMT and DQ are everything I like about jrpgs. We all probably have that one series that you think is perfect to our tastes. I don't think you have to defend your love for EO.

[Himu]

Depends on the game I think. I find the main series very focused. I dunno, it just works for me. Something like DevSur feels all over the place and it's why I didn't enjoy it or buy its sequel, but something like Persona 3 is very consistent in its methodology.

[larrydavid]

Loving SJ and SMT1 but having SMT3 do nothing for you is very very intriguing to me, Oscar maybe you just have anti-console racism??

Devil Survivor is the only localized Megaten series that does nothing for me, otherwise in love with everything about the franchise and there's no question at all that it's head and shoulders above any other RPG series for me, and I love a lot of RPGs!

[larrydavid]

Dude you gotta give it another shot when you can sneak in the time. SMT3 is like a master class in design, everything builds toward that incredible isolated atmosphere, finding your way post apocalypse. Especially with your SMT1 context now I bet you'd really take to it.

[tiesto]

What didn't you like about the DDS games, Oscar? Those are my favorite out of all the (admittedly few) SMT games I played. And of course Soul Hackers because of that setting...

[Himu]

It should be noted I tend to have issues with non-linear games, haha.  Himuro and I talk about this a lot.

Smt3 isn't that non linear though. aside from amala it is pretty much a straight trek unless you want to backtrack and get new demons you missed for fusion recipes and a few side quests.

[Himu]

Haha!

[larrydavid]

haha yeah I was gonna say, SMT3 just tricks you into thinking it's non-linear. Amala aside it's a super gated straight shot.

if non-linearity scares you (it scares me too honestly) how the heck are you able to play Kawazu games then, or am I getting you mixed up with RevenantKioku? Only one of those I could ever beat was Saga Frontier 2, the super linear one.

[Himu]

Rofl can't wait to see Oscars reaction to getting mixed up with rk

[Himu]

I like Kawazu's games for some reason.  They're like the opposite of SMT3, I think.  They're utterly non-linear but they feel very linear?  I'm never confused about my goals or where I need to go, even if everything else is super-obtuse.

Really? I tried romancing saga on ps2 and had no clue what the fuck, and I love open ended games

[Himu]

Naw, a good friend once told me people remember differences more than similarities.

[Bebpo]

I just wanna say I'm cool with Oscar liking EO and I agree his interpretation that I'm not super big on EO.  I'm not. 


2 things for my defense of why I'm not big on EO and just enjoy that 10-20 hours with it and then shelve it:

-A single floor takes a lot longer than a single dungeon floor in SJ or Persona or most other games.  The first dungeon in Persona EO was 3 floors and it took me 8 hours.  Even with 1 hour for intro, 30 mins for boss and some fluff that's still 6 / 3 = 2 hours a floor.  2 hours is a long time!  The reason why is that the floors are big, you get in fights every 10-20 steps and it's impossible at this point to do an entire floor in 1 run or even 2 runs or maybe even in 3 runs if you're going for 100% mapping (my 100% OCD probably doesn't help with these games).  So you do a little, go back and sell material & heal, maybe buy some better equip, go back in and do a bit more until your MP runs low, go back sell material & heal, maybe buy some better equip, repeat 3-6 times to get through a floor...and then it's time to do another floor!  And it doesn't help that the floors in a single dungeon are all pretty similar (at least in separate dungeons there are new themes, new puzzles, new traps).  All that just makes the game feel "slow" to me.  Also 3d battles are slower (even with battle speed on "very fast") because you have to watch the 3d models do their animations when they attack or are hit.  Also^2 unlike SJ or most megaten games where you can end a battle on the first turn or two by hitting weakpoints, the enemies in this game have quite a bit of HP, so even hitting weakpoints it takes 3-5 battle rounds to finish a normal battle so about 2-4 minutes a random battle on very fast speed.

-I'm actually kind of curious what the substantial improvements to the EO formula there's been since I've only really played EO1 and Persona Q.  I dabbled in EO2 and EO1 remake a few hours but don't remember them much and only played the demo of EO4.  Going from EO1 to Persona Q the only things I notice different are 1) Can start from furthest floor you've reached each time you go in the dungeon, and 2) There's an auto-mapping feature that does a half-assed job and still makes you draw in all the icons like doors/chests/traps but at least will draw the wall lines for you.  And 3) It's 3d battles instead of 2d battles now so they move slower.  That's the only differences I notice so far from EO1.  It's possible that Persona Q is a step back from EO4 though as it's trying to be a hybrid EO x Persona.

[Bebpo]

Thanks.  Yeah, uh PQ doesn't seem to have any of the E03 beyond improvements outside whenever auto-mapping came in and EO4's difficulty levels.  It has the EO2 improvements (forgot that only rangers could collect resources in EO1).

Sounds like I should play EO3 & EO4 someday as playing EO1/a bit of EO2/a bit of Millenium Girl/and now PQ is all a bit same-y whereas EO3 & EO4 seem like they have some new stuff to mix things up with sailing/overworlds/mini-dungeons.

Also doesn't help that PQ lacks the job system which is one of EO's biggest strengths and instead everyone is the same just with different stats since everyone can equip persona now and you get most of your good attacks from the equipped persona.

[magus]

I like Kawazu's games for some reason.

:'(

that's like... -infinity gamer points

death of a legend for me

[Freyj]

I'm a bitch for SaGa

[Himu]

That's because all people who like SaGa are Kawazu's bitch.

[Freyj]

That's because all people who like SaGa are Kawazu's bitch.

 

[a slime appears]

Yo I like EO but I've never played Persona. I own Persona 4 though so I should probably check that out at some point. SHOULD I BE HYPED FOR THIS SHITTTTTTTTTT?

[a slime appears]

If you like EO, you should definitely be hyped.

YEAAAAAAAAAH!

[Bebpo]

Game is pretty addictive.  I sit down to play 30 mins and end up playing half the day.  Battles are a lot more megaten as you get further in and there's more skills at play.  Progression is still pretty slow.  I've cleared 6 dungeon floors in 15 hours so far and my characters are about lvl.25 which matches up to the 60 hour game length I've been hearing from those who've finished it.

I guess if I had to have a real complaint, it's that there's a ton of re-use from P3/P4.  There's no real plot, just banter (so even though I love the stories in megaten games I've started skipping through the non-plot relevant text in this one cause it's just zzz stuff), the enemies are almost all lifted from P3/P4, the music is mainly P3/P4 remixes.  The personas are the personas, but fewer.

Actually the biggest praise I can give it and what makes it feel fresh and a good gameplay game is that there are many, many new attacks unique to the EOxPQ battle system.  New physical attacks, new support attacks.  I'd say probably 50% of the attack/magic/support skills are new in this game.

[thisismyusername]

Yo I like EO but I've never played Persona. I own Persona 4 though so I should probably check that out at some point. SHOULD I BE HYPED FOR THIS SHITTTTTTTTTT?

Yes, but you should play P4 (and P4U) before this, since this apparently going to be canon.

[recursivelyenumerable]

I've enjoyed what I've played of EO (2) but I can't conceive of having the patience to get anywhere near finishing any of those games.

[Bebpo]

Yo I like EO but I've never played Persona. I own Persona 4 though so I should probably check that out at some point. SHOULD I BE HYPED FOR THIS SHITTTTTTTTTT?

Yes, but you should play P4 (and P4U) before this, since this apparently going to be canon.

The "canon" thing is a joke.  This game takes place midway through P3 & P4 with both casts teleported when you weren't looking to Q-land where they have a little romp together and probably lose their memories and forget it all when they leave hence why none of it was referenced in P3/P4.

Whether it's canon or not canon doesn't make a lick of difference in this game.  But yeah, you should play P3 & P4 first since the characters talk about stuff happening in their games.

[Bebpo]

You know, I finally "got" EO and its yearly releases (with EO2 remake up next, then probably EO5, then EO3 remake, then PQ2) today when I had to wait at a lab to do a blood test and I knew it'd be a bit of a wait so I brought my 3DS.  Ended up waiting like 30 mins, but I just did my dungeon crawling, got through 1/3rd of the current floor I'm on, gained levels, got loot; time went by in an enjoyable way.

For a country like Japan where a large percentage of the population spends a lot of time on public transportation, the EO games make a lot of sense as they're great time killers.  It's fun and relaxing to do some dungeon exploration while on the go.  When I lived in Japan I remember playing the heck out of the DS and PSP launch lineup while on trains and buses and EO is A LOT better than dozens of hours of Yoshi's Touch n' Go & Feel the Rhythm.

[Bebpo]

So...I really need to take down my OCD because it's slowing things up a lot.  About to finish the 2nd major dungeon with all floors so far 100% and all quests done at around 18+ hours now.  I think I'm gonna call it OCD quits after this dungeon and not bother with 100%-ing for the remaining dungeon floors.  Quests...well, they're still good because it's the only way the HUGE PLAYABLE CAST that you never ever use gains levels to keep relatively useful in case you need them.  But yeah, 100%-ing just takes too damn long in this game and the 100% treasure chests aren't that great so far so it's just a waste of time outside OCD.

[demi]

November 25th (!)

[Joe Molotov]

lol @ everybody hugging and shaking hands and Kanji gets the damn dog.  :xbone

[Himu]

That trailer

[chronovore]

So...I really need to take down my OCD because it's slowing things up a lot.  About to finish the 2nd major dungeon with all floors so far 100% and all quests done at around 18+ hours now.  I think I'm gonna call it OCD quits after this dungeon and not bother with 100%-ing for the remaining dungeon floors.  Quests...well, they're still good because it's the only way the HUGE PLAYABLE CAST that you never ever use gains levels to keep relatively useful in case you need them.  But yeah, 100%-ing just takes too damn long in this game and the 100% treasure chests aren't that great so far so it's just a waste of time outside OCD.

What's "OCD quits"?

Is it having 100%'d the portion you played, even if that's not the whole game?

[tiesto]

WTF at the price? Went to Gamestop to see some release dates of shit I might be interested in... and $50 for the game, $80 for the collector's edition? Fuuuuu~

[demi]

worth it. good CE.

[Joe Molotov]

Soon I'll have a Persona case for my Vita and my 3DS.

[Bebpo]

So...I really need to take down my OCD because it's slowing things up a lot.  About to finish the 2nd major dungeon with all floors so far 100% and all quests done at around 18+ hours now.  I think I'm gonna call it OCD quits after this dungeon and not bother with 100%-ing for the remaining dungeon floors.  Quests...well, they're still good because it's the only way the HUGE PLAYABLE CAST that you never ever use gains levels to keep relatively useful in case you need them.  But yeah, 100%-ing just takes too damn long in this game and the 100% treasure chests aren't that great so far so it's just a waste of time outside OCD.

What's "OCD quits"?

Is it having 100%'d the portion you played, even if that's not the whole game?

OCD rpg-ing is having to 100% explore every dungeon out & do every timed sidequest along the way, slowing down the pace of the game in some titles.

[chronovore]

So...I really need to take down my OCD because it's slowing things up a lot.  About to finish the 2nd major dungeon with all floors so far 100% and all quests done at around 18+ hours now.  I think I'm gonna call it OCD quits after this dungeon and not bother with 100%-ing for the remaining dungeon floors.  Quests...well, they're still good because it's the only way the HUGE PLAYABLE CAST that you never ever use gains levels to keep relatively useful in case you need them.  But yeah, 100%-ing just takes too damn long in this game and the 100% treasure chests aren't that great so far so it's just a waste of time outside OCD.

What's "OCD quits"?

Is it having 100%'d the portion you played, even if that's not the whole game?

OCD rpg-ing is having to 100% explore every dungeon out & do every timed sidequest along the way, slowing down the pace of the game in some titles.

Yeah, I get that, but what's the "quits" part -- if you're OCD, it's hard to quit before 100%, but you're quitting so how is it OCD?

[Bebpo]

So...I really need to take down my OCD because it's slowing things up a lot.  About to finish the 2nd major dungeon with all floors so far 100% and all quests done at around 18+ hours now.  I think I'm gonna call it OCD quits after this dungeon and not bother with 100%-ing for the remaining dungeon floors.  Quests...well, they're still good because it's the only way the HUGE PLAYABLE CAST that you never ever use gains levels to keep relatively useful in case you need them.  But yeah, 100%-ing just takes too damn long in this game and the 100% treasure chests aren't that great so far so it's just a waste of time outside OCD.

What's "OCD quits"?

Is it having 100%'d the portion you played, even if that's not the whole game?

OCD rpg-ing is having to 100% explore every dungeon out & do every timed sidequest along the way, slowing down the pace of the game in some titles.

Yeah, I get that, but what's the "quits" part -- if you're OCD, it's hard to quit before 100%, but you're quitting so how is it OCD?

Well, I couldn't quit haha   Still been 100%-ing the game.  Taking a break from it right now around 40 hours in and almost at the final 20+ hour dungeon.  Game's good but kind of slow and easy but dungeon puzzles are frustrating in the last 1/3rd.  I heard EO games had more and more complex FoE puzzles and PQ seems to follow with that.  The actual battles are fairly easy, even bosses, for a megaten related title, but getting through the dungeon floors can be brain stumpers and ridiculously complex.  Not a huge fan of that stuff and PQ's definitely turning me off from giving anymore EO games a shot when I'm done with it. 

[demi]

[Joe Molotov]

I FIGHT FOR MY FRIENDS WHO FIGHT FOR ME WHO BELIEVES IN YOU.

[bork]

All over that.