Persona 3 FES is a certified masterpiece. Persona 4 and 5 are more popular, Persona 5 especially, but holy SHIT is Persona 3 probably better than both, and Persona 4 Golden is my favorite game of all time, so that's pretty high praise.

At first, the game is MID AS FUCK. All the Persona games are like that, and honestly, I don't think P3FES gets TRULY epic until around September in game. Once it get started though, honestly it doesn't stop. The September-December stretch of the game is in my opinion like a 9/10 and the January portion is like an 11/10. I won't get into story details, but it's perfect overall I think, the ending especially is like a 24/10.

Most of the Persona series (starting from this one, I think) consists of 2 major gameplay settings: the overworld and whatever the dungeon(s) of the game is/are. I think the overworld gameplay is good and the dungeon gameplay is OK. that's all I have to say. The non-controllable party members bothered me a lot less by the end than I was expecting.

My favorite part of Persona 3 that isn't the story are the social links. I don't think they're as good overall as P4's, but they are leagues better than P5's overall S.L. quality. My favorites were Maiko and Akinari, or the hangman and sun respectively. I didn't finish it, but Aigis' social link seemed really interesting and perfectly connected with the theme of the game.

In conclusion, play Persona 3 FES. It's a masterpiece. Certified 10/10 for real!