Persona 3 Reload

I can see why they recommend playing this one first

Why

Why Not

Impressions

Reload is a great game in a vacuum and a good one no matter the context, but it struggles to get out from under Royal's looming shadow. It has the series' signature blend of JRPG dungeon crawling, creature collecting and high school social life; no surprise given this was the first of the modern Persona games. It set the template 4 and 5 followed to great success, which is a fantastic accomplishment but also its biggest weakness.

As the 'first' game of the series it misses out on years worth of polish in storytelling, writing compelling characters, dungeon design and additional gameplay systems. While Royal pulled me into every arc with comically evil but realistic villains who were out to get my friends, Reload's "boss of them month" formula provided more nebulous, "lots of people will maybe die" threats. Social Links were uniformly worse than Confidants with pretty basic stories and relatively bland/one-note characters. It's absolutely crazy to me that Royal has basically Tartarus IN ADDITION to per-antagonist palaces reflecting their unique warped desires. And despite shadows offering some visual variety compared to just fighting the same Personas you can use, the loss of negotiations is definitely felt. Rounding out my complaints is the ambiguous ending only clarified by a DLC (only purchasable in a bundle with other stuff you don't want) which removes half the game and sends you on another tens of hours grinding Tartarus with no breaks for regular life.

With all these complaints, why is this still a positive review? Because despite the unavoidable comparisons to Royal I had a good time with Reload; the core Persona experience holds up even when reduced to this nascent state. If I'd started here rather than with 5 I'd almost certainly have a much higher opinion of it, and I suggest you do just that if you think you're at all likely to play the whole series. From what I've heard of 4 following release order in your series playthrough should provide a smooth escalation in quality; especially with Revival dropping early next year. Reload is absolutely worth your time, just don't cheapen the experience by splaying Royal first if at all possible.