Persona 5 Royal (2019 Video Game) User Reviews

One of the greatest jrpg's ever made

[P97 · 10/10 · 7 May 2020]

Everything from the stylish combat, colorful environments, the freakin' music and with a unique cast of characters calling themselves the phantom thieves make this not only a great experience but one of the best and longest that you can ever have with a videogame.

The game specifically this version has even more content over the original and it's going to take at least 85 to 100 hours of your time and after completing it i can tell you that it's all worth it and i didn't regret a second of it, the only problem i had with the game was the fact that sometimes the dialog and the texts can be a bit too much specially when there is no voice acting over it which there are a lot but other than that the game is really immersive, heartfelt and satisfying to complete.

The best game I've ever played

[lordaphrodite · 10/10 · 8 January 2021]

This is the best game I've ever played in my life. I personally felt a connection with it and it's just so f awesome

A Stylistic Masterpiece

[TheDragonfly44 · 10/10 · 21 May 2020]

This game is just so perfect in so many ways. Both the life Sim and actual combat are insanely fun, the music, story and characters are spectacular and everything about this game oozes style and perfection. The introductory sequence is a little long and sometimes the main character feels pushed off to the side but otherwise the only problem I've had with this game is that there's too many top tier waifus to choose from. 100/100

Refining a Masterpiece.

[giannisspirou · 10/10 · 12 January 2020]

Persona 5 Royal was my most anticipated videogame for some time, so I decided to preorder the Ultimate Edition... was it worth? The story remains mostly the same, but it's been expanded with 2 additional characters, a new Palace and a third semester, which is undoubtedly the best story arc in the entire game by far! The gameplay is improved in almost every way! There are new mechanics like the grappling hook and the showtimes but there are also minor improvements over the baton pass and the guns, which made the combat system even more fun. Same with the characters; In Persona 5 Royal, not only there are 2 additional major characters, but there's also a proper confidant and more screentime for a vital character as well. The Palaces have received some changes; there are new areas to explore, new items to collect and some frustrating parts have been removed. The music is absolutely phenomenal; Shoji Meguro strikes again with a unique "Royal" touch this time! Lastly, there's new music and additions for Mementos, interesting changes to the boss battles, more free time & content, a ton of other QoL improvements and faster loading times. Unfortunately though, all these changes made the game much easier; even on harder difficulties, the game is still quite easy. Other than that... what more could I ask for?

Pros: + Expanded story + Refined gameplay + Additional characters + Major improvements + Minor tweaks + More content

Cons:

• Pacing issues
• Balancing issues

Narrative: 10/10 Gameplay: 9/10 Content: 10/10 Characters: 10/10 Music: 10/10 Art Style: 10/10

Final Rating: 10/10

• Masterpiece -

Persona 5 Royal is Persona 5 at it's finest; by improving upon the original game in almost every way while adding stuff that I consider essential to be in the game, it's exactly how I wanted Persona 5 to be in the first place.

Persona 5 Royal is a dream come true for fans and newcomers alike; it's the perfect videogame experience.

Do I recommend it?: If you've played Persona 5 before, yes!

If you haven't played Persona 5 before, then it's a must-play!

The best game ever made

[lukeanegus · 10/10 · 24 July 2020]

This game can only be called a masterpiece. It has an interesting story, loveable characters, fun and unique gameplay, and the changes compared to the original are substantial enough to be bought. Everything about this game deserves a 10. If I could give 11 stars I would.

Everything we can ask for

[mtctabet · 10/10 · 4 February 2022]

This game contains as much content as the previous persona titles combined. From the royal exclusive third semester(which elevates the game significant in terms of its overall theme) to the realistic and adorable characters and the interesting mini games, Persona 5 Royal is one of the most expansive and thought-provoking games I have ever played. I believe it shall remain one of the greatest games ever made for the foreseeable future.

persona 5 royal

[auuwws · 10/10 · 27 March 2022]

The best game I ever played from long time, The game take everything I love in the original game and make it better, Yoshizawa was my favourite character in the game, akechi in the game was better than the original game, I recommend playing it.

Masterpiece

[Halalhabibi69 · 10/10 · 3 July 2022]

Persona 5 Royal is my favourite video game of all time. It has a unique story, fun gameplay, awesome characters and the best OST i've ever heard. With almost 150 hours of gameplay this game is worth any price.

Must have for all RPG fans.

Best story mode game ever made!

[hunterpanahi · 10/10 · 12 June 2022]

The absolute best game I've every played, best story, best jrpg, best soundtrack. 10/10 across everything. I recommend this game for anyone who loves a long story with tons of action and emotion to keep you interested for the full 100+ hours of gameplay.

9/10

[Dream-Traveller · 9/10 · 19 November 2022]

Persona 5 introduced me into a new world of possibilities for how AWESOME a game can be. A visual marvel, from character design, to the mind-blowing UI, to the incredible All-Out Attacks, and much more that often left me staring at my screen in awe. There is simply so much artistic talent poured into this project... I thoroughly enjoyed many, many hours of this game.

Personally, however, I cannot dub this game a masterpiece. There are certainly issues, and the most glaring ones are found in the story: plot holes, abandoned threads, dry morality, jumps in logic (sometimes huge ones)... Persona 5 is an INSANELY long game, and unfortunately that leaves much room for error. Don't get me wrong, there are many good moments for the story, and notably the first and last story arcs were really good. But in between, both the story and characters of this game can (and will) fall flat on their faces.

It is obvious that this game wasn't made in one go. Development lasted about five years, so we're talking about multiple revisions and adjustments for characters and plot. As you might understand, this makes achieving coherency quite a daunting objective, especially for a game of this scale (we are talking more than a hundred hours of gameplay). This, in turn, is maybe why the story has the issues that it has.

At the end of it all, however, I have nothing but love for this game. The visuals and the OST, the combat sequences, the characters, the voice work (speaking about the Japanese dub), they all work together to capture you in the mood, be it the relaxing ambience of a rainy Tokyo, or the hype of the group rushing in a Palace to steal the "Treasure"... I love watching this game, I love listening to it, and I will keep writing and talking for all the reasons I love and hate it.

The most overrated and shallow piece of media ever made

[frosttyler-47992 · 4/10 · 10 February 2023]

This game is NOT as good as everyone says, it falls apart once you look at it.

The story and themes are the first contention, the main cast only receives development in the dungeons they are introduced in, after that, they are relegated to be a colorful piece of cardboard as they spit their lines of dialogue out in service of only the ongoing story - in contrast to Persona 3, which had some amazing character moments - moments where they are the focus after being introduced, characters that fight with each other, characters that are jealous of your status. It's really uneasy and serves the plot well as they realistically don't trust you right away. Compare that back to Persona 5 where every character (i.e party members) is a yes man and doesn't challenge your judgement at all.

The story beats are horrible, while the first palace was serviceable and set up relatively well, the rest are basically the same thing but 7 more times, which goes right into the real issue with these palaces. Taking someone's heart and making them confess their crimes is one of the most plot convenient garbage I've ever seen in a game and it directly trashes the main themes of the game, every single issue is taken care of by using magic... Oh a predatory teacher who is going to expel the main characters, ohhh well change their heart, Madarame abuses his students, lets Yusuke's mom die of a seizure, a guy is cheating at a video game - erm, change his heart, I guess? Changing someone's heart just seems like a cop out, beat the shadow, make them confess in the real world, the way the person acts in the real world after the fact is as if the were swapped out with a different person, which doesn't make sense why they would willingly confess their sins that would put them away for years - or sometimes life in prison.

A couple of ways that I have thought about could make this better would be to use the metaverse to gather evidence that would be so damning and catastrophic that it would back them into a corner AND it will be known to the public, which makes more sense for rebel to do, posting scandalous images or relevant evidence all over town, opposed to magically changing the way they think and forcing them to confess, which is closer to a therapist I'd say. Or maybe instead of that, what if the target's sins suddenly weigh upon them and cripple them, keeping their personality, but making them go to their own conclusion, which is at least marginally better than what we got.

There are moments in the story where characters will ignore incredibly important information despite the fact that it would be incredibly out of character for them to do so, take the Akechi pancake situation, you're lead to believe that Ryuji interjecting, "uhhh what are you talking about?" to a comment that would surely scream to anyone else that Akechi has knowledge of the Metaverse, was him genuinely reacting in confusion, which doesn't make sense for him to do in this position. It isn't made clear if he reacted instinctively to this or noticed and never talked or said anything about it until October, each of them are equally bad I think, it doesn't matter because memory juice wipes Joker's brain away conveniently so he forgets that detail while talking to Sae in the interrogation room. The other time that something is ignored is when the knowledge of a strange palace Joker and Morgana stumble upon which is just brushed off almost immediately after, I don't expect them to act immediately, but I do ask for justification for their decision other than, we busy with Sae palace.

That amounts most of the problems with the story and characters, besides some smaller moments like Morgana's whole contrived 3rd act falling out moment, Ryuji seemingly dying for the sake of the team, only to reappear seconds later and for the team to beat him up, Morgana appearing back after there being no explainable reason in lore for him to be back. The rest of the issues lie in the fact that every characters 'confidant' usually revolves around a completely different person and not the person you're talking to, it gets worse since more times than not you're going to need to go to Mementos to solve their issues for them, none of the previous games had this, but P5 does and it messes up any kind of development that the confidant was having up til that point, and it's really annoying and not interesting because most of these confidants are in a position where they can overcome it with your support as a person, and it happens for most normal confidant in the game.

So in short, this game has plenty of moments that break the entire story and themes of the game, as well as the characters, leaving the game flawed in nearly every way.

My favourite game ever

[aaronwadala · 10/10 · 22 January 2023]

I originally was a big fan of the original Persona 5 game, but this new version is so much better! It adds an extra secret semester (which adds a whole lot more depth and detail as well), a few new characters and the best part of it is the gun mechanic. In the original game you could only use the gun once per infiltration but now you get to use it every fight!

I think the worst part of the game is that I'll never get to play it for the first time again. Also if you wanna play Persona 5 Strikers, it follows off the original Persona 5 so you'll have to know that before you play Persona 5 Strikers.

I played the new port version for the Nintendo Switch and while it is still 30fps (I think) it's still 120fps (I think) on other platforms. Also it looks expensive but it's worth the price in my opinion.

Massive Masterpiece

[cchenders40 · 10/10 · 19 December 2022]

This game blew me away!

Here are the positives.

• Style and substance: this game is so stylistic and artistic, it is beautiful to look at. Just the menu screen alone makes a statement.

• The characters: the characters are brilliant, getting to know them all, helping them through their problems, and seeing how their arcs finish is so satisfying, I got misty eyed multiple times during this game.

• The story: what a crazy story with so many great twists and turns! Make sure you do what is required for the true ending, it adds another 30 hours of content and gives you the best story beats!

• The combat: I love the combat in this game. This might be the most fluid feeling turn based combat system I've ever played! It feels so good and you can get so much momentum!

• The game design and mechanics: everything you do has purpose. For instance if you go hand out with one of the other characters in the game and progress their arc you gain perks for combat or access to the side mini games that gives you consumable items for combat. So even your social endeavors connects to and benefits your combat in a meaningful way because those perks come from the fact that your bonded with another character and that is represented in combat dialogue even! It's brilliant!

Negatives

• the final boss of the bank palace is horribly unbalanced.

• the 8th palace is too long and drags on and on.

• some of the palaces can just feel grindy.

This game is brilliant and you need to play it! JRPG lover or not! Give it a go it's on gamepass even! Also one more note make sure you get the Royal true ending, it is worth it and gives you way more content, with that special ending expect a 120 hour plus play through!

Ex-con go schizo, fights off his demons with talking cat

[cdymxn · 10/10 · 23 March 2024]

Persona 5 is a game that I would recommend to those not into anime or JRPGs. Its a great introduction to the genre, if you see yourself wanting that, but if not its also a great game. Amazing character arcs, very solid gameplay, endless replay-ability with the arcana system, good visuals, stellar soundtrack, plot twists are great, very suspenseful, unpredictable, story. True as an American it does have a certain level of its out of touch Japanese moments, but for the most part Persona 5 has topics that are both synonymous with the real world and carry over to the AAA games most are used to. The game does tend to deal with heavy topics like depression, suicide, and others so if queazy about that I would stem clear. Overall, big favorite of mine and a truly perfect video game.

Not a game as much as a comic book

[heath-jeffrey · 4/10 · 1 April 2023]

The design is a bit quirky and unique with menu text looking more like the action scenes in a comic, than a traditional game or app menu. There also seems to be a potentially interesting story here, centred on a weird kind of alternate version of the world exists. Characters are creepy and people are keeping secrets, even those that seem to be victims of whatever conspiracy is going on.

The combat seems as if it could be quite interesting, if there was more of it. It's turn-based, with many of the traditional options: attack, defend, use abilities/magic, and use items. But there are a few twists to it.

Unfortunately, you don't really get to play much. It's practically just a comic book, except that instead of having to turn a page of 12-16 panels of story, you have to click a button for every single line/speech bubble. Occasionally you get to control the character in between, but it's usually just to run up or downstairs, only to start the next conversation.

In the approx 10-12 hours I've played, I'd guess about 15% has been gameplay, and 85% has been reading a story.

To make matters worse, the exploration side of the gameplay is very linear. You might be in a kind of 'dungeon' and it seems like you get to explore. But actually, most of the clickable items are repetitive (eg. There could be 10 locked doors you can click, but all give the same message). And it's just one room into the next, in predetermined sequence.

Maybe it leads into more gameplay and opens up to more exploration later, but 10-12 hours of clicking a button to read the next line in a speech-bubble based story makes it not worth finding out. Better off buying a book.