Everything About Persona 5 is Bleeding with Style

 The Persona series has capitative the JRPG fans with a mix of a deep battle system and a robust life-simulation that all ties together. This has been the staple of every Persona game, but one thing that Persona always does amazingly well is the aesthetic style with every iteration, especially with Persona 5. Everything from the character models to the menus has a pleasingly well designed style.

The 5th iteration of Persona has made me realize that aesthetic and style can go a long way for a 100-hour long videogame. One of the first things I notice when I watched the first gameplay trailer was how the menus open during battle situations. The way the UI is laid-out and the colors associated with it makes the repetitive nature of this game feels more enjoyable and less repetitive, this is not the case of most JRPGs. I don’t mind going into the battles because I know that the art and music is great.

The character models are the first thing you get introduced to. Your character doesn’t talk much, this make the character model play a huge part in portraying his life before moving to Shibuya. On the surface, he looks like a generic stylish high school student – but once school is over another part of him emerges. Going into the “metaverse” (where people hide their corrupted hearts) he becomes a vigilante that corrects those hearts in great fashion. The mask plays a major role in portraying that stylish look and character desires.

Persona’s dungeon (Palaces) has changed in many ways. This time dungeons are carefully designed, but with as the other iterations were all randomly generated – which became repetitive fast. Because of the hand-crafting dungeons, each of them has a different aesthetic depending on what the enemy sees that world – for example, a castle, or a museum. I’m still very early and very excited that there are more of these dungeons.

Art and style is nothing new to the persona franchise, it’s more noticeable because they’re more vivid, bright, and can’t go anywhere without seeing something visually pleasing. This game makes me grin the whole time, and it’s not just the gameplay but how everything is so inviting and approachable. Persona 5 so far is a masterpiece in my mind a big part of that is the art style and how Atlus emphasized it to the player.