The first Persona game I ever saw was Persona 4 and that was because Giantbomb did an Endurance Run of it. I thought the game was actually pretty fascinating in that I haven't seen a style of JRPG similar to it in my life. It had many features that are popular from JRPGS such as turn based combat, and spells cast from summons, as well as collection feature that can be considered similar to Pokemon, although then again Pokemon is also one of the few titles that I know of that actually does that feature well, others I can think of that do it similarly are Digimon, and Monster Rancher, but I haven't really seen any of their games out at all for quite awhile. Back onto the topic, Persona 4 also had a very anime feel to it that a lot of games don't really carry as well, save for a few such as Tales of Vesperia, Tales of Symphonia, and Eternal Sonata, while there's plenty of games that have their roots after anime, or are distinctly JRPGish, they don't have the art style that tries to stay more animelike (Tales of Vesperia for example) over CG-like (Final Fantasy). Persona 4 also had a lot of features that I personally haven't ever seen in a JRPG such as dialog choices even though their influence is very limited except for a few key moments, and it also had social simulation elements (more commonly considered “dating sim” elements) plus school sessions that were short but it captured the feeling of being in school well enough, even complete with a few quiz answers, although most of them are trivia. All of these things make the Persona series unique and popular, but at the same time also makes the series good enough to be considered for multiple remakes, and that's where things get somewhat iffy for me.
The Persona series has done a number of remakes including Persona 3 FES for the PlayStation 2, Persona 3 Portable for the PlayStation Portable, Persona for the PSP, and now Persona 2 : Innocent Sin for the PlayStation Portable, and arguably Persona 4 : The Animation for the TV. I know for a fact that other series such as the Final Fantasy series have done more remakes of a single game, so Persona isn't exactly that infamous but it does bring the issue of adding enough stuff to attract enough people to replay it again, or to even warrant a remake in the first place.
I personally didn't play P3 until it came out for the PSP where I bought a PSP just to play it, and that was after I watched the fourth game being played entirely though. I also especially enjoyed the new features that came with P3P, mainly being able to choose to play as a female protagonist. When I first saw P3 years ago I never thought about playing it because it kind of scared me with the way the characters summoned their Persona to cast spells (which is taking a “evoker” which looks like a gun, and shooting themselves in the head, complete with a breaking sound), I also didn't really find playing as the standard main character very appealing either, but if I heard from others or saw more story elements about it, I might have given it a shot anyway. Without all of that however, I didn't really see a lot of incentive to trying it out. I only got that motivation later on when I heard it was being re-released for the PSP, and after I had to see the entirety of P4 being played, I probably was on board with P3 pretty quickly after seeing 4, but by the time P3P actually released I was super eager to play it.
On the other hand, the way the Persona team is releasing games, it seems very rare that I'll ever see a remake like that for P4 especially since they seem to be moving onto new projects on the PS3 which I probably wouldn't have a problem with if I had a PS3, it would be nice to have the same experience as I did with P3 for 4 though. There is also a Persona 4 animation coming out which doesn't really take up the Persona team's time I believe, since it's being done by a different company. It does however, take the time of a few people I know for certain that worked on the game such as the art composer and music director, that possibly could have an impact on any future remakes of P4, or the persona series in general, at least for awhile. I think releasing the TV series as well as a new remake would probably get people to play it, but getting them to really like it and remember it would probably have to wait for a longer period of time, without any other source of current Persona entertainment.
In the end however Persona 2 is still coming to the PSP, and while that doesn't interest me as much as a remake of P4 would mainly because I read somewhere that the styles of game play changed drastically between the second and third games in the series, and I've grown to really like the current style of Persona games. It's art work also seems to be developing into the more colorful style of today's Persona games which is a plus, but it still seems to have somewhat of the old style, possibly to keep the game close to it's classic status. So while I'm bummed that there probably won't be any sign of P4 on the PSP for awhile or even a remake on the PS3, The Persona team is still both making games to keep the interest alive, and hiding others to keep the surprises coming.
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