Best of the Best
Starting with the story and characters, I'd have to say that as soon as the story picks up, you won't be able to drop your controller. At the beginning you'll probably fear that its your typical murder mystery story, starring its own gang of meddling kids. But as you crawl deeper and deeper into the mysteries of the game, you'll find yourself hooked. The game's story features a lot of surprising twist and "wtf I didn't see that coming from a mile away" moments. Another interesting thing about the story would be the scenes where each of the character's "face themselves". These scenes are filled with emotion and, if you're really philosophical, might even make you think about that about one's place in life and accepting yourself. You'll almost not want the game to end.
The characters are all, for the most part, fun, interesting, and well voiced. As you max out each character's social link and progress through the story, you begin to learn more about them, their habits, their lives, their likes, and later on, their deepest thoughts and fears. Outside of the main cast, you'll even meet some quirky and entertaining characters that you can even develop social links with.
The graphics aren't anything breathtakingly spectacular. In fact most of the cutscenes involve dialogue boxes, with a few anime cutscenes. I personally like them this way though. The characters look very cute and cartoony. If you like that sort of thing, its fine, but others may be put off by it.
The gameplay is very similar to persona 3, with some much needed tweaks. You now have the option of controlling your other party members directly, or allowing them to act freely, fight defensively, or act as a healer. You have the option of controlling multiple personas, that you can easily switch between in the middle of battle. Instead of continuously trekking through 1 dungeon like in Persona 3, you have multiple dungeons to go through now. You can even revisit old dungeons to fight an extra boss or find an item for a quest. The only qualm I have with the battle system is that you get a game over if your leader goes down, no exceptions. Its annoying how you could possibly have 3 other healthy members that can simply throw a revival bead your way, but you get a game over anyway.
But battles and exploring dungeons is only 1/2 of the game. The other 1/2 involves you building relationships or social links with the different characters of the game. There are 21 social links in all, and maxing out social links gives you tremendous boosts in experience when fusing personas, so its well worth your while to seek out each link and max it out. The scenes shown when interacting with your social linkees range from hilarious to touching to melodramatic. You even have the choice of pursuing a romantic relationship with a few of links, and while you are no longer penalized for having multiple girlfriends, it does pose for some hilariously awkward conversations between your girlfriends.
There are also other little tidbits to check out, such as the quests, fusing personas, and developing your individual skills, such as courage, expression, knowledge, etc by doing various activities.
The only other problem I really have with this game is that it takes a little while to pick up. The beginning of the game (maybe 1 or 2 hours to be precise) is all dialogue. Nothing terribly interesting either, just an introduction to the setting and the characters. You have one little battle inbetween, but after that is more dialogue. I found myself asking multiple times in the beginning "WHEN DO I GET TO PWN SOME SHADOWS!?" But its a small complaint. Once you gain access to the first dungeon is when the gameplay and story really pick up.
Overall, Persona 4 is a solid, entertaining, and interesting game that definitely sticks out among JRPGs. Any fan of JRPGs should definetly give this game a shot. Its amazing story, charm, and addictive gameplay will draw just about anyone in.