Persona 6

Persona 6 is a role-playing video game developed by Atlus and is technically the seventh game in the Persona series, which is part of the Megami Tensei franchise. The game was released for PlayStation in Japan on January 11, 2024, and was released worldwide on September 1st the same year.

The game, like the other games in the series, takes place in modern-day Japan. This time around, the game follows a young transfer student from an unspecified town that moves from Osaka to the suburbs due to their father getting a new job. The student, usually referred to as simply "Green", attempts to adjust to their new life and tries to start a better life, due to being rather bored with most things. Along the way, they make many new friends and uncover a horrifying plot that places all of Japan at risk.

Gameplay
The game is similar to the previous installments. The player takes control of the main playable character, usually called Green, as they attend school and go through their regular lives, which is usually interrupted by supernatural events and combat. The game features day-night and weather cycles as well as jobs and events Green can get/trigger. Depending on what the player does, Green can raise their stats and gain items while doing this. The player can also choose to spend time with different characters, with different benefits being gained if characters like you enough. One of these benefits is romancing different characters, with almost every named character being a possible love interest.

Along with the regular everyday life, there are also supernatural events, which includes dungeon crawling. Dungeons in the game can be found in a place known as .New (dot new), which is a parallel world inside of a person's computer that manifests someone's negative aspects into a being. The .New world also contains specific story-related dungeons named Databanks, which are similar to Palaces from the previous installment, being massive dungeons that are usually led by a boss.

As with previous titles, the game features turn-based combat against creatures known as Shadows, which are warped entities that manifest all of a person's negative attributes. In combat, the player is able to summon their own personal spirit known as their Persona, which has mystical abilities, or they can simply battle the enemies themselves using different weapons in their arsenal (which disappear in the real world). If a Shadow is weak enough, the player is able to commence "Bargaining", which is similar to a Hold Up from Persona 5. The bargaining can either be the Shadow bargaining with you or vice versa. If the Shadow is bargaining with you, you can gain extra items or yen in exchange for not gaining experience points and if you are bargaining with a Shadow, you start a dialogue with it in an attempt to make it switch sides.

The fusion system also makes a return from previous installments, where the character can sacrifice two of their Personas and forge a new one in their place.

Setting and Characters
Main article: List of Persona 6 characters

The game takes place in the suburbs of Tokyo and follows a group of high school students who gain the ability to summon supernatural beings known as Personas, which are manifestations of their inner desires and wants. All of the main characters attend a school called Tenko Academy. There are a few other locations the player can visit, including a few other, much larger towns which have cinemas and much more. They are also able to enter a place known as .New, which they can access from their computer and find people's "Databanks", which are ruled over by very powerful manifestations of a person's worst parts.

The main character of the game is a mostly silent protagonist of ambiguous gender who the player can name anything they wish, though they are commonly referred to as Green, after their tendency to only wear a green jacket. Along the way, they also encounter students who are accidentally sucked into .New and gain Personas of their own, aiding the protagonist on their journey to stop the corrupt forces of Japan.

Plot
The game begins with a white wall as people arguing are heard on the other side. The wall eventually cracks and shattered, revealing a massive green abyss. Ghostly images of people float through the abyss and groan in pain, unable to remember where they are. The protagonist is then seen sitting on a floating rock in the abyss and attempts to keep their mind active by grasping on to their memories, including the most basic such as their own name. After remembering this, they attempt to recall what led them up to this moment, a blast of burning energy emitting from them as they do.

The game then rewinds time to back to the beginning of the year, where the protagonist is shown moving into a new house after their father gets a new job. While on the train to Tokyo, they find a teddybear on the ground and attempt to give it back to a little girl. The girl accepts but the mother pulls them away from the protagonist, who they appear hostile towards. The mother claims they've "heard what they did" before getting off the train at the next stop and walking as fast as possible away from the protagonist.

Development
Like the other games in the series, Persona 6 was developed by P-Studio, with development of the game beginning shortly after Persona 5 The Royal's release. Like the previous installment, development of Persona 6 lasted about five years and during that time a number of ideas were considered and scrapped.

In the first year of the game's development, many ideas came up, such as including the lesser-known Megami Tensei character YHVH as the main antagonist or several different ideas for an eighth protagonist that never happened.

A good chunk of the game's system was recycled from Persona 5 and Persona 5 The Royal in an attempt to cut down on development time. Ironically, the many changes that had to be made to the system ended up creating more development time than expected.

Another thing that added to the game's development time was rendering the Personas, as it took quite some time with the previous installment and redesigning and rerendering the Personas took just as long as last time.

Story and Themes
After the success of the previous installment, it was very difficult to try and come up with a story just as good as it. The game's story more or less floated around for a bit, with even the main theme of the game not being clear for quite some time.

However, after the design of the main protagonist was finished, the developers realized the perfect theme for their game: technology advancement and how the world is reacting to it. Due to this, the protagonist of the game was made to have a reliance on technology that they slowly overcome throughout the game. The main antagonist of the game also relied on technology, using nuclear weapons in order to accomplish his goals.

In the game, the character's Personas are meant to symbolize a certain part of their character (the only two this doesn't apply to are the main protagonist and the mascot Seth).

Kaori Fujio's Persona, Morgause, is meant to be a queen but is often overlooked, symbolizing how Kaori's ego makes her believe she is more important than she is.

Eiji Ishimura's Persona, Don Quixote, a mad man that believes he is a knight, symbolizes Eiji's inner anger and his outer face of a happy-go-lucky person.

Goro Masuya's Persona, Bass Reeves, a law martial that captured over a thousand men, is symbolic of how Goro's tough nature hides a much softer side.

Eiko Kumada's Persona, Ching Shih, a prostitute turned pirate, symbolizes how Eiko outgrew her past and forged her own destiny in life.

And Kazumi Oshio's Persona, Mulan, a woman who dressed as a man in order to join the war, is symbolic of how, despite dressing as a girl, Kazumi is incredibly tough when he wants to be.

Reception
TBA

Notes and Trivia

 * The protagonist's canon name is Hikari Nakajima, as it is used in all media where the protagonist is named.
 * The .New world is similar to that of The Wire from the anime Serial Experiments Lain, as both are virtual worlds that host a person's consciousness.
 * Keeping in the tradition of each Persona game having a slight change when it comes to genre, this game features elements inspired by science fiction.

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