An image in the latest edition of Japanese gaming mag Famitsu seems to be teasing the next game in Atlus’ Persona series.
As far as teasers go, it’s remarkably light (though a welcome change from, say, Hideo Kojima’s endless countdown clocks). The image shows three characters on a featureless white background – one being the protagonist of Persona 3, one being the protagonist of Persona 4, and one being the main character of the Persona: Trinity Soul anime spinoff.
That’s… pretty much it. The only other information is a cryptic line of text on the left that (apparently) reads: Subete no hito no tamashii ni sasagu… or “Dedicated to the spirits of all people.” What that means, uh, I have no idea. Though it’s not like Japan hasn’t ever used random pseudo-intellectual text to tease its RPGs before.
Poking at JRPGs aside, I really liked Persona 4. It was a game that actually restored my faith in Japan to tell an intriguing story with compelling characters that kept me interested and invested in what happened to them. The writing and localization were great, and even the dubbing was above average. So, color me psyched.
Now, to hazard some totally wild guesses about this potential title: The game will feature an unnamed, silent protagonist who happens to be a student at a Japanese high school. His actions and social networking are totally under the control of the player, and he (and his friends) will have the ability to summon monsters from mythology that represent their inner psyches to fight for them, and whose strength in battle will be based as much on how much time they spend hanging out with each other after school as on their RPG stats.
Totally out of left field, I know.
Given that Persona 4 was one of the PS2’s last great hurrahs, it wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect Persona 5 to be for a next-generation system. But we’ll have to wait and see.
Update: Looks like this was just wishful thinking. Whoever posted the scan apparently didn’t include the part where it explicitly said that this was an advertisement for … a soundtrack. Oh well. Guess a Persona 5 announcement so soon isn’t in the cards … this time.
