Persona 5 is a very long game. My first playthrough was about 120 hours, so you can imagine how much time I’ll be putting into Persona 5 Royal–an expanded version of the base game–which I am in the process of reviewing. Thankfully, every hour of P5R has been (and continues to be) an absolute joy and a tremendous reminder of why I loved the original in the first place. It’s a game that wears its heart on its sleeve, for better or worse, but when it fires on all cylinders, with style, music, gameplay, and narrative in harmony, there’s nothing quite like it.
As of this writing, I’ve clocked in 60 hours and I’m about to head into the fifth palace, which is in September in the game’s calendar–so I’m roughly halfway through. This means I’ve yet to see the more significant story changes in Royal, since they come later down the line. So far however, some great quality-of-life and gameplay additions, along with a few narrative touches, have improved what is an already rich RPG that brings heart and soul to its social sim and dungeon crawling mix.
Kasumi Yoshizawa has been touted as the star addition to P5R–a new playable character who gets involved with the Phantom Thieves and seems to have a major role in how the story progresses later on. There hasn’t been anything dramatic with her quite yet, except in the opening casino heist that alludes to late-game events. In that moment, she shows off her combat style and has a cryptic exchange with Joker about a deal they’ve made before they part ways.
Source: GameSpot
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