Persona 4 Gold review: A welcome change of pace from Persona 5

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A calming atmosphere permeates the beginning of Persona 4 Golden. The protagonist doesn’t navigate sprawling Shibuya or the Sanjinjaya-inspired streets that lead to Café LeBlanc in Persona 5. Instead, he’s on a train headed in the opposite direction, leaving behind the busy city to spend a year in the countryside.

Persona 4 was first released on PlayStation 2 in 2008, and will soon be available on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation consoles, and Xbox consoles, the latter via Game Pass. It marks a new era for Japanese role-playing classics, which, apart from the 2020 PC port, were completely inaccessible to anyone without a PS2 or PlayStation Vita disc. It’s a foreboding pastoral adventure, and it strikes a very different tone from its urban sequel.

Inaba is not like Tokyo. You can easily see all that the city has to offer in a single day – or over a few minutes within a game. But its slower pace makes the seemingly mundane aspects of rural life more urgent. As a result, your contacts, both with the people and with the city itself, become more intimate. And once danger begins to play out in the background, the dangers become personal as a result.

It helps that the protagonist has a more ingrained backstory than the Joker 5 character. He wasn’t taken because of taking an audition, but because his parents moved abroad for work purposes. His uncle, Ryotaro Dojima, along with his cousin Nanako, welcome him with open arms into a comfortable home. He is not forced to live in the attic, nor is he resented by everyone he meets due to his “criminal” background. If it weren’t for the series of murders and disappearances that occurred soon after his arrival, it might have been a fun country escape.

Image: Atlus/Sega via Polygon

Ominous events come as a shock to the residents of Inaba City – especially the students of Yasugami High School. The party’s first new member, or confidant, Yusuke Hanamura was particularly close to one of the murder victims. This motivates the protagonist, along with Yosuke and several other students, to form a group and investigate.

The team soon discovers something called the “Midnight Channel”, which foreshadows the death of anyone who appears on the screen. Thus begins the countdown in your calendar, the period when you will need to fully explore the dungeon and defeat the last boss before the deadly fog begins. Instead of exploring the mansions of corrupt adults and stupid political figures à la Persona 5, the dungeons here focus (mostly) on the people closest to you.

Persona 5 Mansions is equal parts extravagant and ominous, often with set pieces and puzzle trappings to break up turn-based combat encounters. On the other hand, Persona 4 Golden’s dungeons will look more like Persona 5’s Mementos sections – procedurally generated labyrinths with intermittent battles. In 2023, they felt a little monotonous. But by thrusting you into the psychic emotions of your best friends, who are forced to hold up a mirror to live up to their hopes, fears, and goals, Persona 4 delivers an experience that’s more inwardly than its sequel. It’s a cathartic story about self-reflection and honesty.

Image: Atlus/Sega via Polygon

When you’re not delving into dungeons, going to school, or investigating crime, you’re free to spend your evenings and days off however you like. There is a wide range of activities at your disposal, from sports and cultural clubs to a long list of secondary tasks. Some focus solely on increasing your stats, while others, like some specific part-time jobs, can unlock entirely new social connections. Often, you’ll earn points toward both progression systems at once, synergistically resulting in a satisfying use of time.

In the sprawling Persona 5 game, you skip activities and even secondary locations entirely. In Persona 4 Golden, it’s easier to set aside time for regular tasks with those close to you. It’s also easier to linger in the nooks and crannies of Inaba, growing attached to the quiet nooks where you talked to a confidant: the rather plain riverbank where you and Xi practice fighting together; The restaurant I’ve eaten at dozens of times sells a special bowl during rainy days; Or that table in the Junes dining hall where the group’s heroes triumph and reflect on past mistakes.

If you missed Persona 4 Golden on PlayStation Vita or Steam, you’ll feel right at home on Nintendo Switch (the version I tried myself). The visuals are crisp in both handheld and vertical modes, there are plenty of quality-of-life tweaks around the difficulty and save options, and it runs at 60fps most of the time, except for scenes involving fog.

Image: Atlus/Sega via Polygon

Unfortunately, the most problematic content in Persona 4 has not been updated or revised in the new iteration. Still steeped in sexual tropes, its representation of queer characters remains imperfect at best, and harmful at worst. Picking up and playing may be easier than ever, but its content can still be intermittently difficult to absorb.

Some people will be put off by all of this for understandable reasons. However, despite all the flaws in its script, Persona 4 Golden manages to extract heartfelt stories from other veins. Persona 5 Royale is a real theme park of side activities that can be overwhelming at times. In Inaba, however, minimizing distractions allows you to focus on your links more closely. It will take some time to adjust to being away from the city, especially without a smartphone constantly ringing to let you know where everyone is at all times. But no one is needed. You are bound to stumble upon a friendly face on your way to the riverbank.

Persona 4 Golden will be released on January 19th on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X. The game was reviewed on Switch using a pre-release download code provided by Sega. Vox Media has affiliate partnerships. These do not influence editorial content, although Vox Media may earn commissions for products purchased via affiliate links. You can find additional information about Polygon’s ethics policy here.

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