Persona 5 Royal Review

It’s not unusual to have an upgraded version of a Persona game get released a year or two after it originally dropped. We’ve seen this with Persona 3 FEES Edition which added more Personas and a new endgame chapter, as well as Persona 4 Golden, which added more social links, new characters and events. In both cases, these were the definitive versions of the RPG, improving on so many different aspects of the games that you almost didn’t realize that was needed.The same can be said for Persona 5 Royal. Royal serves as a major upgrade to the 2016 RPG, adding new social links, an added storyline, new personas and so much more that makes it feel like its worth your time to dive back in.

Persona 5 Royal follows much of the same story of the original. You take on the role of Joker – who in the real world is a student who has been unfairly placed under probation after interfering with a dispute between a man and a woman. As part of his probation, he is sent to the city to be watched for. Things change after finding an app on his phone that unlocks the Metaverse which opens up another world where people’s distorted desires create palaces.

While the core story of the game hasn’t changed that much compared to the original, the game does add an additional 15-30 hours of gameplay with more story content thanks to the new Phantom Thief, a new social hub, an additional confidant and a new school semester.

A lot of the content that I was surprised about actually came from the gameplay, which saw the most improvements. The first of which would only be noticed if you played through the original title, as Palaces and Persona roster, along with the shadows you’d have to fight, has been expanded. The palace expansions come thanks to a new grappling hook ability which will help you get to higher ground, which will also help you find the new WillSeeds, a special item that you’ll be able to collect and form a powerful item.

The other major improvement is the guns. In the original, guns had a limited amount of ammo and would only refill after exiting the Palace, now they refill after every battle, making it easier to justify using your characters’ guns to take down multiple foes. Combat has also improved by adding the Baton Pass – a move in which you switch characters with a bonus stat to your attacks – as a basic skill rather than one that would be unlocked after hanging out with your party members.

Finally, we also got a new Thieves Den social hub, which players can view movies, concept art, play darts and cards with other members of the Phantom Thieves. It’s a cool feature but not one that I actively, it mainly serves as a gallery to show off everything you’ve seen so far.

I’ve found it hard to find something bad to say about Persona 5 Royal, as most of the game’s annoyances has been cleared up thanks to the updated quality of life improvements, gameplay enhancements and additions. Even Morgana forcing you to sleep has been fixed and players can still do some events even after dealing with Palaces or Mementos, which helps a lot when it comes to building up social rankings, stats or making new thief tools.

But the main question is – is this upgrade worth your money, especially at a full price?

The first thing that you need to know is that I love the original, I think it is a great RPG with a cool concept, uniquely stylized and probably the most satisfying combat system in any turn-based RPG. Persona 5 Royal improves on this tenfold by adding and fixing content that you didn’t even realize needed fixing.

So if you played and loved Persona 5 and want to dive back into it – Royal scratches that itch and the added content will give it a familiar feeling that still feels new and fresh. If you’re a new-comer to the series, you’re essentially getting the best version of the game available – so yes, completely worth it.