Look, before you say it, I know. Persona 4 Golden is considered by some to be one of the best and most important RPGs ever made. After all, this was the Final Fantasy 7 moment in the series, where many of the mechanical and thematic threads from the previous games finally tied together and became something bigger than their parts. You step into the shoes of Yu Narukami, a Japanese transfer student who has recently arrived in Inaba. There, you use your limited time to make friends, study for your exams, and delve into a metaphysical dimension to combat turn-based literal manifestations of your friends and rivals’ twisted perceptions of themselves. Its story and characters are especially famous for their honest and painful looks at the parts of ourselves that are better left unseen. I’m a fraud for not having played it yet, that sin only compounded by having it in my Steam Family Sharing library for years. I have no excuses. I will eventually face the shadow version of myself, filled with shame.
Okay, I’m glad we got this out of the way early, because at Gamescom I played a bit of his remake of Persona 4 Revival, while also interviewing series producer Kazuhisa Wada (via an interpreter) to glean new information and perspectives on the remake of a game like Persona 4. When I mention that this is my first time playing Persona 4 with Wada, I receive a humorous eyebrow raise and reassurance that “We wanted this to be a great entry point for those who want to get their first taste of the game, but to do that we need to get to the essence of what made Persona 4 great, and to do that we need to capture the hearts of existing fans and make this game something they’ll remember.
My limited time with Revival allowed me to play a bit of the main story, early in the game. As transfer student Yu Narukami, partying alongside his bumbling classmate Yosuke, we fight off a few mooks before encountering Yosuke’s Shadow form. In the real world, Yosuke, also a recent transfer student, struggles to make friends. In the metaphysical realm, his shadow form manifests as a representation of his despair hidden behind a class clown mask to hide his fear of loneliness. His shadow, his repressed inner self, is only defeated if Yosuke accepts his inner and outer self together.
In a separate section, we delve into a realm created by the subconscious of Yu’s friend Yukiko – and confront Chie’s Shadow, another of Yu’s classmates. Enveloped by his lust for the conventionally beautiful Yukiko, the dominatrix-themed shadow form claims that the girls’ friendship is a lie, and only for Chie’s gain.
With quite a bit of time spent on combat in this demo, I can happily say that it’s fantastic, and boy, is it beautiful. Persona 4, for the strength of its art style, is ultimately a PS2/PS Vita game, so it’s remarkable to see this incredible art direction that brings the modern touch of models and effects with the same fidelity as those of Persona 3 Reload and Persona 5 Royal. I’m about twenty years late in saying that Persona 4 offers excellent turn-based combat, I know, but the pace of finding weaknesses and manipulating patterns keeps me engaged and even led me, as a newcomer, to a touch of Shadow Chie fighting. Little subtleties like choosing between spending mana or health on spells kept me on my toes, especially with such limited options so early in the game. In his approach to the remake’s combat, Wada lets me know that “as the original system is quite old now, especially compared to the modern standards of Persona 3 Reload and Persona 5 Royal, there are elements that will feel a little frustrating. We’ve done our best to remove these stressful moments from the combat systems and bring it up to date. day to meet modern expectations.” To their credit, I think the system seems fair – minus a moment where Shadow Yosuke obliterates me with two critical hits in a row thanks to the “One More” system allowing an extra turn on a critical hit or weakness. Still, I guess that’s just luck in a turn-based RPG. So it goes.
Between battles, I have the joy of experiencing Persona 4’s writing and story for the first time. Because of the cultural osmosis inherent in being a girl who grew up on the internet, I have a good grasp of Persona 4’s contract, its overarching themes of accepting the true self or slowly decaying, its arcing narrative and characters; Still, being able to sit back and enjoy it via a preview of its remake is something special. The central conflict between the inner and outer self instantly draws me in, and I’m impressed by how uncompromising the writing is about how denying and demeaning your inner self will destroy you from the inside out. Yosuke kindly admits “Deep down it’s all me” and Chie shouts “Don’t look at me!” as their Shadows took over, these were brilliant and effective glimpses into their different approaches to themselves and both touched my heart.
On a lighter note, after the battle sections, I was also able to take the mysterious Marie on a date to the sleepy town of Inaba. Witnessing Yu’s attempt to make his date with Marie exciting in their quiet town during his social bond was as touching as it was painfully funny; I was Yu in this situation! It’s an uphill battle! Social Links, a bonding mechanic that not only builds relationships between Yu and his party members/friends but also makes party members more effective in combat, is at the heart of Persona 4 and apparently won’t change much. The story and Social Links themselves will remain pretty much the same in Revival, according to Wada, with some minor differences: “Our approach was to leave the things that made the game really special untouched, so that the characters and story would be exactly as they were. That said, there were some things that when we looked at the script didn’t seem clear or didn’t have as much information as we wanted, so we tweaked things slightly for more nuance. Social Links are, you know, the core elements of the characters that you befriend in the game, so we didn’t really change anything.
Wada’s note that the story and social connections will remain intact, aside from some nuance tweaks, interests me, because I was curious if he would clarify what might be worth looking at again. Previously, he brought up Yosuke’s characterization as being “a bit insensitive” (thanks Oisin!), which I take to be a mild way of saying “a homophobic asshole”, so some changes wouldn’t be unwelcome. As for changes, Revival has also seen a complete overhaul of its voice actors; From what I’ve heard about Revival’s new performances, they’re great, but it’s hard to ignore the fact that several members of the original cast openly stated that they had asked to return. Or in the case of original Yosuke actor Yuri Lowenthal, specifically, “begged” – so much for a second chance. As such, I am equally conflicted knowing that Wada declared in an interview with GamesRadar, “there were quite a few people we couldn’t recruit.” During our conversation, Wada didn’t shed light on this disconnect, but revealed that the auditions for Revival weren’t labeled as such for the actors auditioning, but that the team “listened to the auditions and tried to pick people who fit the vibe of the characters, while still giving them room to take them in their own direction.”
To conclude the interview, I ask Wada a question that I don’t think is adequately addressed in the current zeitgeist of remasters and remakes being the reliable source of revenue for studios: why remake Persona 4? “When we initially conceived the idea for Persona 3 Reload, we knew we wanted to do P4R as well; we had to put it on the back burner, but it’s something we thought about at the same time. For me, I think a remaster or remake is a kind of cultural preservation. As a creator, it’s your duty to take the things you’ve done and make sure they’re not lost and that they’re still around today. From that same point of view. View, Persona 1 and 2 are something we’ll probably end up doing too.
I can’t tell you I was expecting some gentle confirmation of the remakes of the first two games coming out of this interview, but I’m not going to complain. I appreciate Wada’s response that cultural preservation is the driving force behind remaking their older works for its genuine recognition that remakes need a reason to exist other than just “money.” I’m grateful for my time with Revival and Wada, and I think that experience is what ultimately convinced me to give Persona 4 Golden a shot. I promise, I’ll install it as I write this!
Travel and accommodation to Gamescom was provided by Hooded Horse.
