Every Persona game has its own themes which you can relate to, whenever you can connect with the themes the game has to offer is up to you, some people preffer Persona 4 because of the accept yourself messsage, some other preffer Persona 5 because they relate to the fact that characters are being opressed by adults and some others like me relate to Persona 3 which themes are death, the fear of death and how death doesn´t stop for anynoe, the fear you feel when you realize time is passing and death is closer to you, more than you think.
Memento Mori is a quote that Persona 3 uses often, it means ¨remember you will die¨ or ¨remember your death¨, Persona 3 wants you to remember all the time that we are all going to die sooner or later, time is precious and you should know how to spend it and not losing sight of what is important in your life. Memento Mori also ¨remember thar you are mortal¨, I know it sounds all depressing but I like to see the other way around, it´s true that we are all going to die and nothing can stop us from that but that doesn´t mean you have to live in fear because of that, live your life to the fullest and do everything you want to do, don´t waste your potential so once you die, you can feel at peace with yourself.
Persona 3 does a try to implement all of that in the gameplay, for example, in order to call a Persona, the character must use a Evoker which is basically a gun, you have to shoot yourself at the head as if the character was killing himself, this is an allegory to suicide and I think it´s pretty obvious, you don´t need to be 600 IQ to realize that, the game even begins with a girl who is pointing an Evoker to her head, as if she tried to kill herself.
Persona 3 is a dark game and is not shy to show that, there are good amount of religious symbolism in the game, one of my favorite moments related to the religious symbolism is when the characters are literally crucified, there are some enemies or bosses who resemble said symbolism as well.
Persona 3 is not only a game that talks about death, it talks about loss as well, the way loss can consume your life and how it might destroy you, there are many circumstances where the game tries to represent loss like for example through the characters which are punished by the pain of loss, there are character arcs which are about loss and how they live their day-to-day. The same way Persona 3 wants you to remember you are going to die, it remembers you the pain of loss as well and not gonna lie, it´s painful to see them suffering because of that.
What is the meaning of life, what is our purpose in life, why do we even exist in the first place, those are things that Persona 3 tries to talk about through the story and its characters, if there is even a reason to wake up everyday, what do we do in order to makes us feel alive, all complicated matters and themes that the game talks about in a respectful way, we can see people who suffer from mental diseases and their struggle to keep going or people with terminal disease and how they try to find a meaning in life.
Persona 3 has one of my favorite that I´ve ever played, I just love the atmosphere of the moment, you are supposed to beat something that is imspossible to die because what you have to kill is death itself, I feel like the whole world is over my shoulders at this moment, the moon behind the boss and said boss laughing at you because of its arrogancy and telling all of these quotes abou life and death, the way is a long boss fight around 30 minutes or more, I love everything about this fight, it really makes me feel I´m agains´t THE final boss. The boss is so big and yet your party is so small, I think it determines how you should feel at this fight, unless you are lvl 99 that is hahaha.
Persona 3 is a videogame which I needed in this moment of my life and served as a way of therapy to me, the dialogues from the game are so powerful and I´m not lying when I´m saying there´s been some time that the dialogues from a game marked on me that much, every word felt like a punch to the heart and every sad moment left me at the edge of tears, every character is well written and so relatable, the way you can empathize with all of them because they are so human is breath taking. Persona 3 is a beautiful game that tells you not to run out of time to enjoy life, I think it´s a beautiful game anyone should try at least once in their life.
All of the screenshots were taken by me
Since the release of the portable version for Steam I've wanted to play, to start the Persona saga. But it's very expensive so I'll have to wait until further notice :')))
I love the graphic novel format but if it includes fights, it's like a double prize.
It´s understandable if you don´t have the money right now, I hope you can save money and then buying the game someday :)
Ugh, I generally LOVE madly the stories that inspire the characters in Persona, and 3 is no slouch, I think it's also designed to include us quite a bit in it. I love the dark hour thing, it's definitely too scary all that, reminds me a bit of the Dark series haha, maybe it has nothing to do with it but in my head it does XD
If you ask me, I think Persona 3 has the best story of all Persona games but that´s just me hahaha : ) yup the dark hour thing is cool.
I don't know why the game deals with death in such a deep way, maybe it's to make the endgame boss more impressive. I've never tried any Persona game before but your review was impressive for me man. I'll try it if I get the chance.
I won´t complain tho I love when games try to be deeper regarding story and stuff and Persona 3 is one game that really left a mark within me this year, I hope you play the game someday if you have the chance :)