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RPGFan claimed that Atlus said they'd have new info on this on their site days ago. It never happened. I e-mailed their press e-mail, but I'm not home to see if they responded. We'll see.

Honestly, I never played a traditional pen and paper RPG in my life, but this caught my attention for obvious reasons. You certainly put a lot of work into it. I have to admit at certain points it kind of went over my head since I'm not familiar with this system, lol.

As for senarios, were you just thinking about sticking to something similar to the last few games? In the sense of, say, average students stuck in an extraordinary situation... or are you thinking about breaking out of that?

Sorry for the late reply on this. :buh:

Awesome. I wonder what that leaves for them to announce at E3... an interview I read made it sound like they had at least a handful of surprises for it. Between this, Contact, the Super Robot Taisen games and that othe GBA title I forget, they're pretty stacked this year.

Thanks for joining. I was glancing over your post about that HERO system you came up with... I'll definitely be commenting on that when I have the time to really sit down and read it all. Looks very interesting.

Thanks for signing up. Hope you're able to visit pretty often.

Also, Kirby is becoming really underrated. I hope that GameCube one still comes out...

The official site is now up for those interested. It has screens, character information and other such things in Japanese. There's also a wallpaper for download.

http://www.atlus.co.jp/cs/game/pstation2/persona3/index.html

I am not disagreeing with you at all.  My point is that the edits you are speaking of are minor compared to something that may be a large component of the story.

Oh no, I'm not disagreeing with you either. I'm just talking/discussing/blabbing, really lol. We'll see what happens... My thought on the whole gun thing was largely that it was just supposed to symbolize the "death" of one mask/Persona to give way for another. Maybe something to that effect wouldn't be looked down upon by outside groups as much as right out suicide? Don't ask me lol.

My main point, I guess, is that I'm not really in the habit of playing imports and I don't want to start with this title. I hope it comes here in some form. :)

To be honest, I didn't think most of them were that bad in comparison to things out there in both games and anime... most of which haven't really made a major splash in terms of parental/political uprisings. GTA largely only mattered because it sold millions upon millions of copies; same as other titles they rely on like Doom. In terms of the level of this stuff, I suppose it depends on one's perspective. We'll see, I guess.

Sprite alterations are one thing, editing entire animated sequences is another.  I do agree though...Megaten is under the radar and there are other titles with grim content.  Hopefully those guns-to-the-head-shots won't hinder a localization.  I am concerned about the apparent lack of demon negotiations......guns:

Well, for example, within Dragon Quest VIII, the model for the main character when he's fully psyched up is different from the one in Japan. Nintendo itself has changed things such as the fairies in Ocarina of Time between the continents... Atlus is obviously smaller, but I would think that if they were really interested in pushing Megaten related games in the West, they'd either go with it or work with Atlus of Japan for a compromise. I hope, anyway.

I really don't know that that whole "suicide" aspect of this title will be a major issue. It's hard to say. If this was Final Fantasy and selling 3 million copies in each territory, it would be more of a problem... but we're talking about a Megaten related game that would, at best, be an underground hit in the US. Considering some of the things about God in Nocturne and DDS2, really nothing was discussed or argued against about it at all.

For one, he obviously doesn't really shoot himself in a normal sense. The video shows that much and obviously shows him doing things afterwards. I've played a few games where there's a possibility of the character killing himself (Indigo Prophecy, Call of the Cthulu, etc) and no one really talked about it at all. Granted, they involved adults, but if the game came out here it would be rated M either way and possibly avoid this.

I mean, honestly, is this really much worse than running over forty cops in GTA? Shooting arms off and slicing corpses up till your heart's content in Soldier of Forture? Shooting people and monsters with shotguns until they explode in countless other games? I honestly don't think so.

There's also the possibility of changing that. I mean, we are talking about the company that made Mark into a black kid with a yellow baseball cap. The release of DQ8 was substantially altered as well; going so far as altering the main character in battle in certain situations. It's not out of the realm of possibility.

http://www.rpgfan.com/news/2006/1129.html

This pretty much lines up everything you need to know. Even if I don't know Japanese, I'm glad some one like Chris does lol.

 Following a candid remark by Kazuyuki Yamai hinting at a brand new Persona game, Atlus today revealed what is now officially known as Persona 3. The PlayStation 2 title is produced and directed by Atlus veteran Katsura Hashino (who has worked on the Shin Megami Tensei series since Shin Megami Tensei ...if and served as director of Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne), while Shigenori Soejima (whose track record includes Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers, Persona 2, and Stella Deus) serves as character designer and art director.

 The game's protagonist is a high school student attending a private school on an island located close to the harbor city of Iwatodai. At first glance he lives a normal life as he attends school in the morning and then heads for the city to hang out with his friends in the afternoon. However, in the world of Persona 3 a day does not have 24 hours. In fact, every day at midnight the so-called Shadow Time begins. The lord of this time is the game's villain: A monster by the name of Shadow. While normal human beings don't realize its existence, the protagonist and his friends are apt at moving around in this Shadow Time. After being attacked by Shadow, the 17-year old acquires this ability and because of his extraordinary capability becomes the leader of a unit set up to defeat Shadow. Other playable characters include the protagonist's fellow Junpei Iori (who can summon the Persona Hermes) and the optimstic and cheerful heroine Yukari (whose Persona is known as Io).

 
During the day players will attend school and after the club activities in the afternoon they are able to move around freely in town, visiting various locations, such as the school, the station or the local Shinto Shrine.
At night, when the Shadow Time begins, the world around the protagonists changes and the battle for the future begins. A mysterious tower known as Tartaros Director also exists in this world. Hashino explains that the Shadow Time is basically an extension of the spiritual world highlighted in previous Persona games. Character designer Soejima mentions that it was his aim to create a world that was neither science-fiction nor fantasy-themed from the very beginning. Instead he wanted to create a stylish modern-day world. In total the game will cover a one-year period which translates into a playing time of more than 50 hours, according to Atlus. The game will try to emulate a student's life in a realistic way, by throwing exams, school festivals and illnesses such as a cold at the player.

 
An important aspect of the game are so-called Communities. If the player manages to befriend community NPCs, he can level up his community levels. A high community level will translate into being able to raise more powerful Personas.

 
Persona 3 will let players fuse multiple Personas. Therefore the player needs to bring two or more Persona cards to the Velvet Room. Those Persona cards can be obtained by defeating Shadow in battle. Once the player obtains a new Persona card, the creature residing within the card can be summoned. After a victorious fight, players might have to choose among five different Persona cards. Up to four party members can take part in a battle.

 
Persona 3 is currently 75% complete and on track for a July 13th release in Japan.  

In some ways it sounds interesting, in some ways I'm sceptical... It does kind of sound like a random anime to me, which is a bit of a turn-off. At the same time, I suppose the other titles in the series pretty much did too. It's surprising that Kaneko wasn't more involved... Although, if anything, I'd imagine a lot of it had to do with his heavier work on Devil Summoner for PS2 -- if this game is 75% done, their development time would have obviously been overlapping at points.

You guys are very good at destroying my hopes for this game before I even get to see the movie :buh:

The trailer:
@ Youtube:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=M1Ie0uHI9jA

Zipped (not my webspace, please use gently):
http://www.shinetworks.net/cgi-bin/snup/src/up17440.zip_q5Xvub06qgdVy0ipXUi5/up17440.zip

90~MBs.

Cool, thanks. I don't have a problem hosting that on D3 later on once I get home. Can't wait to see it.

Edit - The file is linked to on www.digitaldevildb.com . I put it in a RAR this time and got it down to 80 MBs packed.

Wow, I didn't expect to hear about this so soon. I was reading comments by Atlus recently that the next Persona title might go to PS2 instead of PS3 and here we are. Freaking awesome.

Thanks for posting this :D

I posted the images on www.digitaldevildb.com so that they're on something a bit more stable. Too many times I go back to an image like that on a free image host only to find it blocked for bandwidth use...

I severely doubt any one here is remotely upset at you (well, not Argilla or myself, who run the place lol). Every one has their moments I guess and considering the circumstances at the time, I'm sure a lot of people understood it.

It's nice to see you back on here. Hopefully you'll find the time and interest to continue posting again.

:cheers: