3/5 ★ – Hijinkis's review of Persona 5.

Persona 5 is one massive interactive anime. It’s basically a visual novel on steroids and not really good at anything. First off, I didn’t beat the game but I put 11+ hours into it so I feel a review is justified. I initially wanted to play the game because I’ve heard nothing but good things about it. For example, people have praised the story, characters, music and style of the game to no end and I’ve come away feeling that Persona 5 may just be one of the most overhyped PS game ever. The story is okay, it’s nothing amazing. The characters are also just okay, they act like the nearly any character from a generic anime. Dialogue is nothing spectacular in fact it’s pretty repetitive and mundane and can get annoying after you’ve been told for the 100th time how bad a kid you are. The music is like 3 songs all on repeat and the equivalent to fancy elevator music, that’s not bad persay but after 11+ hours of hearing it you want off the elevator. Now gameplay. The strongest aspect of this game is the visual novel factor not the actual gameplay. It’s very straight forward that has you taking turns with the enemy taking pot shots at each other. The game tries to make it sound like it’s having you do something unique and cool but it boils down to using you the right personas to weaken the enemy and put them down for a hold up. Once they are in the hold up you can take money from them, items or just kick the shit outta them. If you choose to just beat em up a cutscene plays you don’t actually do it yourself. The enemies are few and far between and when you aren’t killing the same enemies 100 times over you are divvying up your day doing mundane chores that are just you watching the characters do. It’s just a massive slog fest. The cover system and the ambush system is extremely janky as well as the camera. However the user interface and character animated designs are all very flashy and well done. I really don’t know what else to say about this game but if you want to actually play a game then look elsewhere because with P5 you’ll mainly be watching a long and not too interesting anime show. If you really like that then this is the perfect game for you.