Persona Dancing: Endless Night Collection (PS4)

So, a while back I fell into the Hatsune Miku rabbit hole and ended up purchasing Project Diva X and Project Diva Future Tone on PS4. Addictive, catchy fun. Different. I really enjoyed them both (and still do). Good for my hand-eye coordination (which, as a would-be gamer, has always been absolutely terrible - hence why I don't play anything online) and strangely relaxing, with little of the mental stress so many games seem to give me. I managed to master most of the tracks on their easiest settings and even ventured into some of the more difficult modes.

I remember seeing something about the Persona Dancing series a while back - perhaps the start of this year - and noticing that the publisher was intending to release a rhythm-action spin-off featuring characters from Persona 5. That piqued my interest, although (and I know this is odd) I have never actually played my copy of Persona 5. I just liked the art, the character designs, etc, and thought 'well, they'd look good in a rhythm-action game'. And then I watched a few old YT of Persona 4: Dancing All Night, some months passed and I pretty much forgot all about it.



Then the Endless Night Collection arrived, without much if any fanfare onto the PlayStation Store. Three games in one bundle (Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight, Persona 4: Dancing All Night and Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight). It's expensive at £81 (and that's with £9 off the RRP). I won't excuse my behaviour, save to say it's a genre I know (from my Hatsune Miku experience) and - more importantly - one I will actually play. So I got the Endless Night Collection. I dunno, that's roughly £27 per game, with some additional launch DLC across P3 and P5 thrown in for the price.

First impressions? The art is exactly what I'd hoped it would be - character designs and dance animations are impressive (and more pleasing to my eye than those of the Hatsune Miku games) and customisation of both characters and the game systems themselves are satisfying. I was immediately able to get the game (I started with P3) dialled-back to a difficulty level I found manageable, with lots of room to bump things up to a tougher notch when I'm feeling cocky. Across all three games in the collection, there are around 80 tunes in total. Not exactly brimming with content, then. Many of those I've so far unlocked are remixes, too, just to rub salt into the wound. Personally, I don't think any of them catch my ear (so far) the way so many from the Hatsune Miku games did (especially stand-outs like 'Last Night, Good Night' and 'Gemini'). Too many tracks just seem bereft of catchy hooks, hummable melodies and so on. Could just be me and my preference for melody and a distinct beat - plenty of Persona fans seem to love the music in these games, after all - so what the hell do I know, right?

Still, early days - I've pretty much opened up all the tracks on the first game I played (P3). Hopefully, things will improve in the music department in 4 and 5, but if not there's always the gorgeous art style to fall back on.

Way too expensive for most right now at launch. Give it a few months and this might (because we know how Japanese games seem to stay more expensive, more of the time) be worth picking up if you have an interest in rhythm-action games and/or the Persona series. It's a collection of oddities - well-made, enjoyable (and obviously brimming with cheese), but it is intended for a pretty specific audience. I wouldn't actually count myself as one of them - in the same way I know nothing about the Persona series, I hadn't ever heard of Hatsune Miku until I played a free demo of Project Diva X on the PlayStation Store. For me, these are little more than accidental finds; eye-catching curiosities - and guilty (if expensive) pleasures.

The Persona 5 video for Last Surprise is certainly.....something.

I'm a big fan of the Persona series, and I love rhythm games - especially Hatsune Miku. So you'd think the Persona dancing games would be made for me.

I bought Persona 4 Dancing on Vita on release, and quite enjoyed it. I downloaded P3Dancing and P5Dancing to my Vita from Japan a while back, but found them rather lacking unfortunately. Not enough good songs, and pretty bare-bones games without the story mode from 4.

If I see the PS4 collection going cheap, I still might buy it though. The artbook looks quite cool.

Cal wrote:...customisation of both characters and the game systems themselves are satisfying. I was immediately able to get the game (I started with P3) dialled-back to a difficulty level I found manageable, with lots of room to bump things up to a tougher notch when I'm feeling cocky...

I'd wondered about this collection but the thought of it perhaps being too tough had put me off. It's great to hear that the difficulty can be adjusted as, whilst I have terrible rhythm and co-ordination, I love the style and fun of these kinda games.

Cal wrote:...Way too expensive for most right now at launch. Give it a few months and this might (because we know how Japanese games seem to stay more expensive, more of the time) be worth picking up if you have an interest in rhythm-action games and/or the Persona series...

...and the price has now been reduced in the PS Store "Big in Japan" sale . It's still not cheap at £49.99 but it's a decent cut. Hmmn... am I ready to go dancing all night?

£49.99 is still too much for me.

Pass.

Wedgie wrote:£49.99 is still too much for me...

Yeah, same here, Wedgie. I'm not gonna be dancing unless that price comes down further.