With the announcement of the internet show DEATH BATTLE doing Joker VS Giorno as their second independent episode, I decided to finally try a Persona game, as the franchise had interested me for a while, and seeing as its protagonist was staring in the episode that had incited me starting the franchise to begging with, I decided to go with Persona 5. I ended up loving the game for exactly the reason I thought I would, the palace infiltration mixed with the slice of life moments made for a fun and entertaining balance that is designed to truly reach its potential on subsequent playthroughs.
So first of all, the Persona gameplay loop is a mix between infiltrating a palace to steal your targets heart, and daily life activities that will either raise your social stats, or hang out with various characters in the world, otherwise known as confidants, which usually have a restriction placed on its progression that depends on the players specific social stats. This restriction is why I consider the first playthrough of a Persona game to be more of an introduction to the world, and subsequent playthroughs are for really diving into the depth of the world for yourself, since all progress on social stats can carry over to new game plus runs. On my first playthrough, I was only able to complete so many confidants because I was either grinding my social stats, or grinding other stats, like strength or leveling in Mementos. I still had fun with the game, but upon completion, I did end up having some unfinished confidant routes that I regretted not being able to complete, which compelled me to start a new game plus route to experience those routes for myself, thanks to my social stats being high enough to complete them
Confidants offer plenty of useful benefits, such as in combat abilities, or better results when fusing Personas, but many of the confidants are so well written that completing them feels like a reward in and of itself. Highlights I experienced in my first run were Yusuke trying to rediscover his passion for art after his corrupt mentor Madarame tainted it for him, Kawakami rediscovering her passion for teaching after a tragic incident with a former student, Futaba’s journey to get over her social anxiety and her struggles with her family presented through Sojiro’s story, who is grappling with feelings of being unworthy of being Futaba’s guardian due to lingering guilt over her mothers death. Seeing these stories play out, and getting to see them resolved with the characters that I came to grow to care about was satisfying enough, even without the external awards
Overall as a fan of story in games, confidants became one of my favorite aspects of Persona, and completing them only served to enhance my experience even more. While there are very welcome tangible rewards for completing the confidant missions, for me at least, the fantastic stories these confidants tell are more than enough incentive to experience them
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