Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4

The most cheerfully upbeat game about murder you'll ever play.

very energetic and youthful with a sort of interesting murder mystery going on, but the juvenile characters positively brimming with overbearing optimism get rather irritating after a while. whatever homophobic shithead designed kanji should be shot.

I use to love this game but the more I look back at in hindsight the less impressed I am with it. A lot of themes are handled awkwardly (such as Kanji's sexuality) and various conflicts are brought up then ignored to return things back to the status quo. When compared to P3, I view it as a downgrade in terms of structure and small things like how relationships are handled. Gameplay wise it's no less shallow than P3, but the gameplay loop is amusing enough to not be totally boring.

It took me a lot of tries to realize there's a good game here because the intro's pacing makes you sit through 5 hours of kids going to school.

Rating based on having played Persona 4 Golden.