If you love JRPGs and Anime then you absolutely MUST get this game! Otherwise it's a sin!
Story: You are a young student who just transferred to a city at an island, once arrived at the dorm you are greeted by a mysterious young boy who makes you sign a contract, you are then after that introduced to the characters of the dorm, there are many strange things happening at the dorm and the dorm mates are obviously hiding something.
After officially transferring to your school and returned to the dorm a strange night phenomenon happens and you are attacked by weird beings, at a desperate situation you managed to summon an inner power that instantly eliminated the mysterious attackers, later you learn from your dorm mate (who introduce themselves as an organization called SEED) that those creatures were called "Shadows" and they devour those who do not sleep during a time period called "The Dark Hour" and the creature you summoned from within you was called a "Persona" that are accessible only to those with "The Potential" and are the only means of defend one self against Shadows, you agreed to join SEED in order to bring peace back to the city.
Thus far nothing is known about the Shadows or the dark hour and the only place that has the answer is a giant tower called Tartarus, which appears during the Dark hour, the tower seems to be very high and it is up to you and SEED to discover what awaits at the top and what connection does it have with the Shadows and the Night Hour.
Game design: Graphically speaking the game is very average so there won't be much eye candy around here, however the game does contain plenty of anime cut scenes which look absolutely amazing as if you are watching an anime on TV!
Dialogues will be viewed with voice texts and character images, which show various expressions depending on the scenario.
Unlike traditional RPGs the game is linear, but not linear in a generic way, the game runs through a calendar time line system, starting from January and ultimately ends by next year, so basically you will have 365 (or so) days limit in the game, you will have a bunch of things to do each day so its of up most importance that you carefully manage your time, otherwise you could find yourself facing enemies too strong to defeat amongst other consequences for lack of preparation.
During day time at weekdays you will be attending school, during school you will be developing your personal status suck as Knowledge, Courage, Charm and etc, these status affect how people interact with you socially, during weekends you will have free time to do what ever you want, you can either choose to spend the day studying or hanging out with others and further increase your social link.
During interaction there will be situations where you will be given the choice on how to respond to certain moments, a good response can speed up your bond and some can hurt NPCs feeling and may decide to become hostel to you, which can hurt your social link, so its best to understand what kind of characters they are and respond accordingly.
What you will be doing at night is venturing through a smilingly endless tower called Tarturus, everyday you will try to ascend higher and higher in order to solve the mystery of the game, the higher you go the tougher enemies get, the tower will not only serve as a way to help you advance in the story but also serves as a good training ground.
The story progresses in accordance to the moon, once every month or couple of weeks when the moon becomes a full moon story sensitive events will be trigger of which you MUST complete in order to advance in the game, if you are not prepared before then you will have a hard time continuing the game, so again you must carefully choose how you want to use your time in between the time periods when the moon fades and rises, checking the calendar every once in a while would prove to be very useful.
Game play:
The battles take place during the Dark Hour, during the dark hour you will face enemies in real time, attacking the enemy will start the battle, if you hit them without them noticing you will have a chance for pre-emptive strike, however if the enemy hits you first then you will be at a disadvantage.
The battle is traditional turn based, normal attacks will allow you to hit enemies with equipped weapons, selecting "Skill" will allow you to summon your Persona and attack using their powers and magic, some enemies are either weak or strong against certain elemental attacks, you can use items to aid you through battles and you can add basic tactics to your team mates, telling them to prioritize on healing or attacking and analyzing enemies, more tactics will be available as you progress through the story, you won't have any control over the other characters for the rest of the game though or how they manage their skills.
The most unique feature about this game is the Persona system, while other characters have specific Personas assigned to them for the rest of the game you are blessed with the power of the "Wild Card" meaning you are able to assign and use multiple Personas, stronger Personas can be accessed according to your level, the higher your level the more Personas you will be able to access.
After every battle you will gain experience points and will also enter a shuffle mode where you have the option between boosting money, exp, gaining health or a new Persona.
Once you have access to an area called "The Velvet Room" you will be able to fuse Personas together and create new Personas, by fusing Personas you can also bestow them with additional powers gained from their respective Arcanas, which are basically the class of the Personas.
Through out the game you will develop Social links with other NPCs, each NPC will provide you access to their own Arcanas, further developing relationships with others will allow you to give Personas even more power with fusion based on their Arcanas, in other words the stronger your bond is with others the more powerful your Personas will become, so interacting with characters during school times is very important.
Sound: The game has a huge cast of voice locals and all do a great job in following their scrips, in fact i can honestly say that you can even feel connecting to these characters as they pretty much talk like normal people do (without trying to hold back on language sencorship like you see in Final Fantasy).
Music in the game is very funky and anime-sc and can be nice to listen to, I know I enjoy it since I loved it so much I got the game's OST!
Persona 3 FES is an amazing JRPG, if you love JRPGs and most importantly love Anime then this game will not disappoint you.
It offers a deep compelling story, has lots of memorable characters and is above all a blast to play through and an experience you definitely want to play through again since not only there is an alternate ending to the game but you can also transfer data from the previous play to your new game if you want.
Having the game go based on a daily cycle surely adds the pressure of being prepared and makes grinding a lot more interesting than just merely going around killing countless enemies.
The game has two optional story modes, "The Journey" which is the main story mode that can last for over 60 hours and a sequel called "The Answer" which adds another additional 30 hours to the game.
I feel though the game had a few issues.
First off, once you die you will start all over from the title screen (an issue that I have with every single JRPGs and I'm shocked that to this day and age they STILL haven't fixed this issue) so if you are unlucky and didn't save you will have to grind all over again, having careful grinding as a main concept I hoped that the developers could at least allow you to start from the previous battle or dungeon so that you can correct any immediate mistakes, but starting all over again is a great pain, especially when considering if your main character dies during battle its game over, practically making every encounter risky, and that's because you don't have control over your ally since they might not be smart enough to revive you.
Also regarding the story mode "The Answer", while it is a nice extra, the story feels more like a filler as there really isn't much creativity put into the story and having the game's permanent setting as "Difficult" can discourage non-fans of the franchise or hardcore fans that don't want to ruin the magic of the mains story's ending.
Regardless of a few flaws Persona 3 FES is an incredible game and JRPG and Anime fans absolutely MUST pick up!