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Persona 4

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Man I'm so happy I just got my copy of Persona 4 yesterday! For those of you who didn't know, Persona 4 is the next game in the Persona RPG series (the last game was Persona 3 on the PS2 and it came out last year). Persona 3 FES (the expansion to P3) is one of my all time favorite JRPGs of all time and helped to make Atlas my new favorite RPG developer/ publisher (sorry Bioware you were out done). So yah I picked up my preorder copy yesterday and was shocked to see that the game came with an art booklet and a CD with games sound track on it all for free! Man Atlas really knows how to take care of it's fans

The Story

Well I'm only about 3 hours into the game so I don't know that much so far or if the events in this game are in any way connected to any of the past Persona games (all though I don't think they are). The basic premise is that you are a transfer student from the big city who has come to the little village of Inaba because of your parents having to go over sees for a year thanks to their job (your left to stay with your Uncle). On your way home from your first day at the new school, you and your new friends come across a crime scene. Apparently a popular TV announcer was found by a student hanging up side down from a antennae on some one's roof. The Police are baffled by the bizarre scene and can't even tell for sure if it is a homicide or an accident. Naturally this causes all kinds of gossip at school the next few days, not least of which is a roomer about a TV channel that only appears at midnight when your TV is off that is supposed to show you your soul mate. After even more strange events, a second death, and a third person missing; you and your friends decide to try and solve the mystery your selves and this is when the game really picks up.

Game Play

The game play in Persona 4 is very much like that in P3 or FES. In the day you go to school and work on forming your friendships (which help make your Personas stronger in battle), and after school you and your team mates venture into the...well I don't want to give too much away, but you battle together to help piece together what's going on in the Inaba. The battles are turn based like in many JRPGs, but you can see and avoid enemies on the field (in other words there are no random battles). One nice touch the Persona games have in battle is most enemies have some form of weakness that if exploited will give you an extra move before they attack. This gives you some flexibility and helps every thing move faster so that leveling up isn't that much of a chore unlike most other games in this genre. Also unlike Persona 3, you can now control each member in your party or if you liked the old way the A.I. can still control them for you. Over all from what I've played so far, Persona 4 is an improvement to an all ready amazing series. If you are a fan of RPGs you owe it to your self to check out both this game and Persona 3 if you haven't played it yet. Besides this most likely will be the last great PS2 game to ever come out.

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Song of the Day

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Meh, call me lazy but for todays song i'm going to just post a link to the opening video for Persona 4. Hope you enjoy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LImlLqB-QE8