After spending 113 hours on a single playthrough (not counting the 50+ hours I had to do over because my PS3 screwed up a previous file), I have to say that Persona 3 is one of the best, most addicting RPGs I’ve played since the SNES days. There was just so much in the game that kept me hooked from day one, and I don’t regret the enormous amount of time I spent playing through it.

First off, the story is incredibly engaging, and despite the sometimes horrendous English voice-acting (Fuuka… oh god!), you definitely begin to care about the characters in the game, even the ones that don’t play that big of a role. That’s because half of the game is spent going to school and improving your Social Links – bonds you share between certain characters in order to boost your Persona powers. It’s in your best interest to max out all your relationship stats, especially if you want to create the best Personas.

The other half of the game involves hours of dungeon-crawling, which – admittedly – didn’t appeal to me as much as the simulation aspects. Still, battles are fairly straightforward and strategic due to the game’s elemental mechanics, and towards the end the boss battles can be grueling if you’re not prepared; the final battle alone took me about an hour or so to finish on Normal difficulty and at fairly high levels.

The few negative elements I found with P3 were relatively minor. Certain things about the battles, from the fact that you can only control the protagonist while the rest of your party is AI-controlled; to the random one-shot kills that can ruin an hours’ worth of grinding. Also, as mentioned, the voice-acting can sometimes be cringe-worthy, and despite the hip, catchy soundtrack by series composer Shoji Meguro, the songs get repetitive after the 50-70 hour mark.

All in all, if you haven’t played this game before and are itching for a lengthy RPG that will suck you in, this is one of the finest.

…and that’s not even counting “The Answer” portion, an addition that was included with Persona 3: FES. Personally though, now that I’m finished with the main story, I’m already itching for more.