i think when you play this game, you really have to go into it with a certain mindset. yes, the PS1 version's translation is dogshit (there are several typos and just outright awful translations, and some things were not vetted (i.e. the art director being listed as "Kazma Kaneko" instead of "Kazuma Kaneko")), there's a very large lack of conveyance for what the game mechanics are and how they function, and a lot of mechanics, such as demon/persona management and demon negotiation, are very, very rough here.
but, i still enjoyed it. i think a lot of it has to do with the fact that persona 1 lives and dies by its tone. there's a much greater emphasis on feeling out of place, on abandonment, on vulnerability (including the unwillingness to embrace it), and on human fragility. i don't think everything in the narrative is done perfectly, but for 1996? this is very complex, intricate, heady, and intimate.
i will disclose that it took me a while to warm up to this game. there were several points where i debated dropping it, and i'd be outright lying if i didn't state that it was one of the games i looked forward to the least in my game rotation for a good deal of time. i think a very large part of this is in the lack of conveyance i mentioned earlier. it felt like only about 75% of the way through the game that i actually got a competent grasp of the mechanics (mostly because the game never explains them to you, the translation is awful, and decent persona 1 guides are hard to come by).
that should also inform you of the fact that this game is very lop-sided with its difficulty. i was able to essentially brute-force my way through the lion's share of the game because SP recovers as you navigate in the overworld. this means that you can basically use healall (mediarama) in every fight and barely feel any cost. i can name the two instances where i saw a game over screen, but for the sake of keeping this review spoiler-free, i'll just say that they didn't feel like organic points of challenge and were sproadically unfair moments. i suspect that regenerating SP was a late addition to the gameplay formula because of how utterly broken it is and how it invalidates the need to use healing springs. i can't say i blame them. i shudder to imagine how much more agonizing navigation would be in this game and its dungeons without it.
also, this is an aside, but i extremely dislike the way this game distributes experience. instead of dividing it evenly amongst all party members, they base it on how active party members are and what they do during battle, but it's completely arbitrary and will just result in 1-2 characters being experience hogs while everyone else falls behind. it's very clunky, and although it's intuitive, it makes the game needlessly tedious. it's a missed opportunity. i could see them doing something similar to Final Fantasy II with it, but it's just not transparent enough for the player to figure out to be worth doing, at least in this state.
if you go into this game with "overlooked PS1 JRPG" expectations, you will probably enjoy this. again, it's very rough around the edges, but it's enjoyable, and it did a lot with very little. this game has a very specific feeling to it that a lot of games haven't given me, and part of it is probably 90s iconography nostalgia on my part, but it's also something unique in its favor. honestly, if the translation were better, i'd probably have bumped this rating up higher. all i can say is that i am now extremely interested in getting my hands on the PSP remake of this game, because i would love to see what this looks like with better execution.
but, i still enjoyed it. i think a lot of it has to do with the fact that persona 1 lives and dies by its tone. there's a much greater emphasis on feeling out of place, on abandonment, on vulnerability (including the unwillingness to embrace it), and on human fragility. i don't think everything in the narrative is done perfectly, but for 1996? this is very complex, intricate, heady, and intimate.
i will disclose that it took me a while to warm up to this game. there were several points where i debated dropping it, and i'd be outright lying if i didn't state that it was one of the games i looked forward to the least in my game rotation for a good deal of time. i think a very large part of this is in the lack of conveyance i mentioned earlier. it felt like only about 75% of the way through the game that i actually got a competent grasp of the mechanics (mostly because the game never explains them to you, the translation is awful, and decent persona 1 guides are hard to come by).
that should also inform you of the fact that this game is very lop-sided with its difficulty. i was able to essentially brute-force my way through the lion's share of the game because SP recovers as you navigate in the overworld. this means that you can basically use healall (mediarama) in every fight and barely feel any cost. i can name the two instances where i saw a game over screen, but for the sake of keeping this review spoiler-free, i'll just say that they didn't feel like organic points of challenge and were sproadically unfair moments. i suspect that regenerating SP was a late addition to the gameplay formula because of how utterly broken it is and how it invalidates the need to use healing springs. i can't say i blame them. i shudder to imagine how much more agonizing navigation would be in this game and its dungeons without it.
also, this is an aside, but i extremely dislike the way this game distributes experience. instead of dividing it evenly amongst all party members, they base it on how active party members are and what they do during battle, but it's completely arbitrary and will just result in 1-2 characters being experience hogs while everyone else falls behind. it's very clunky, and although it's intuitive, it makes the game needlessly tedious. it's a missed opportunity. i could see them doing something similar to Final Fantasy II with it, but it's just not transparent enough for the player to figure out to be worth doing, at least in this state.
if you go into this game with "overlooked PS1 JRPG" expectations, you will probably enjoy this. again, it's very rough around the edges, but it's enjoyable, and it did a lot with very little. this game has a very specific feeling to it that a lot of games haven't given me, and part of it is probably 90s iconography nostalgia on my part, but it's also something unique in its favor. honestly, if the translation were better, i'd probably have bumped this rating up higher. all i can say is that i am now extremely interested in getting my hands on the PSP remake of this game, because i would love to see what this looks like with better execution.