There was a hype topic about this awhile ago, and the game is out now.  I don't really go to sites like RPGamer very often anymore so I am not certain how people who are into RPGs are reacting to the game, but I have been playing it and I assume that someone is playing it here also.

Persona 4 is a Japanese RPG for Playstation 2.  It is a straight-up sequel to Persona 3.  It feels like a yearly iteration on Persona 3 in the spirit of American games like Gears of War 2 or whatever.  So, your feelings for Persona 3 will probably be the same as for Persona 4.

For those of you who haven't played Persona 3, I will give a rundown of both games because they have the same structure.  In Persona 4, you spend half of your time in a high school life sim that is pretty self-aware and funny (but is still a Japanese life sim so watch out), and half of your time dungeon crawling.  The dungeon crawling is pretty hardcore and is more like Wizardry than Final Fantasy.  What you do in the day-to-day life stuff affects your statistics and character interactions in battles, so aside from the reasonably good writing and clever dialog, the life sim offers some tangible benefits too.  If you don't like the life sim portions much you can skimp on them just as easily as you can skimp on dungeon crawling by not exploring very thoroughly.  Either way, Persona 4 is ripe with Japanese pop art, and that sort of thing can either make it or break it.

Being that Persona 4 is a Shin Megami Tensei game, there is plenty of monster collecting and breeding.  The nomenclature is a little different, but basically you are collecting monsters, fusing them together, and bringing them with you into battle.  The monster breeding and leveling system is pretty robust.

Persona 4's premise sets your mute hero in a small Japanese farming community.  I don't recall why but he is going to high school there and living with his uncle.  The city has been plagued by a rash of creepy murders.  Not too far into the game, the hero gets sucked into a bizarre alternative universe inside of the television that is filled with monsters and evil (this is very post-modern).  The writing is pretty decent and takes advantage of its unusual setting.  As an aside, Japan's standard of a small farming community is much different from what I am used to in America!

The thing that interests me the most about Persona 4 is that the game-breaking crap that dragged down Persona 3 is more or less all completely gone.  Most significantly you can control your party members in battle.  This is such a big deal that it is advertised as a feature on the box.  Dungeons are streamlined and I don't think they are randomly generated anymore, you go to more than one location, you can fast travel around town, there are more save points etc.  The interface is much more functional and gives you a lot more information.  If Persona 3 were a PC game these would have all been fixed in a patch, so I guess I am taking Persona 4 as an expansion pack with gameplay fixes.

I am not very far into the game but I love it.  Is anyone else playing it?  I remember a lot of people here played Persona 3, so I am curious.

Screens:

Still haven't played this yet.

Is there only one dungeon in this game? I swear I hated Persona 3 because the dungeon design was so terrible and all that happened was going up this tower just fighting the whole time. The sim part wasn't actually bad, and I enjoyed the dialogue. Battles were pretty fun too. Just the dungeon is so...bad. It reminds me of Shining in the Darkness on Genesis where the walls would change color but the dungeon still looked exactly the same.

I tried really hard to like Persona 3. It's kind of weird because I used to like dungeon crawler games, but this just didn't do it for me. By the way if there is a Shin Megami game where you actually have diverse dungeons, I must know.

when will japan create a realistic portrayal of black people...

Despite its look, this is not a normal jrpg game ​ 

I don't like the dungeon design in P3 too, but they fix that in P4.  No stupid random dungeon crawler which change only the texture of the wall/floor/ceiling ! There are some dungeon's gimmicks like in Nocturne (For example, the warp floor.)

They've also improved the Social Link system so that it isn't boring anymore. Social Link also play a more important role than in P3, since your party member will learn new skill through Social Link.

Basically, they've fixed a lot of flaws in P3.  I guess it's because P3 is more like an experiment game to breakthrough the same old jrpg. The story is also really really good in my opinion. I cried at the ending, since you really feel attached to all the characters.

Of course I could be a bit bias because I'm a big megaten fan but that doesn't change the fact that this is a great game! 

Still haven't played this yet.

Is there only one dungeon in this game? I swear I hated Persona 3 because the dungeon design was so terrible and all that happened was going up this tower just fighting the whole time. The sim part wasn't actually bad, and I enjoyed the dialogue. Battles were pretty fun too. Just the dungeon is so...bad. It reminds me of Shining in the Darkness on Genesis where the walls would change color but the dungeon still looked exactly the same.

I tried really hard to like Persona 3. It's kind of weird because I used to like dungeon crawler games, but this just didn't do it for me. By the way if there is a Shin Megami game where you actually have diverse dungeons, I must know.

maybe you skipped maladroithim's post because he pretty much explained all of that:

The thing that interests me the most about Persona 4 is that the game-breaking crap that dragged down Persona 3 is more or less all completely gone.  Most significantly you can control your party members in battle.  This is such a big deal that it is advertised as a feature on the box.  Dungeons are streamlined and I don't think they are randomly generated anymore, you go to more than one location, you can fast travel around town, there are more save points etc. The interface is much more functional and gives you a lot more information.  If Persona 3 were a PC game these would have all been fixed in a patch, so I guess I am taking Persona 4 as an expansion pack with gameplay fixes.

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You did not say much about the story besides the PORTAL/ALTERNATE UNIVERSE and MURDERS (i guess the party members are mute too?!?) so i can't really say much about this.  the screenshots doesn't tell

much!

Taken from Wikipedia.org

Persona 4 takes place in the same universe as Persona 3 in a rural town named Inaba. There have been mysterious murders occurring whenever there was fog after heavy rain.

There were also rumors about a channel on television airing only at midnight called Mayonaka TV (The Midnight Channel in the English version), during which it is said that one can see his/her "other half" when staring at the TV screen. After hearing about a recent unsolved murder which occurred during the fog, the characters—the main character, Chie, and Yōsuke—discuss how each of them had attempted to watch the mysterious TV channel and witnessed the murder victim.

The protagonist later realizes that during midnight when the channel is on, his body can phase into his television set as a gateway to enter another world infested with shadows. After discovering this, they all decide to explore. When first completely entering the world, dazed and confused, the main character meets Teddie.

Mayonaka TV and the town murders seem to have a connection. The murder victims may be merely victims of Mayonaka TV. Everyone decides that they will together try to solve the mysterious murders by exploring the hidden world of Mayonaka TV.

Despite the brightness of the yellow which is the main color scheme of the game, the story itself is pretty dark. I'd say it's darker than P3. At least in P3 nobody is dead from falling from the sky and stabbed by the antenna!

So, your feelings for Persona 3 will probably be the same as for Persona 4.

oh, rabid contempt then? EXCELLENT. just what i was in the mood for

daDAdaDAAAAAA!!  junpei has leveled up!!!

man i remember bort had that faggot as his avatar for a while before persona 3 came out. after i finally had the opportunity to play the miserable game i went around gw for a week wanting to verbally abuse bort everytime i saw him.

he looks like a pokemon trainer.

gonna catch those pokemon
cause im a real goody
gonna catch the pokemon
while my face is moody!

~junpei, bort's avatar

also if he had it pre-persona 3's release maybe he just liked the picture?

Yeah, Junpei is a really annoying character and Yosuke in 4 is almost exactly the same, but a little bit more tolerable.

I seriously hated Junpei, especially that bullshit love story involving that apathetic artist girl who hates everyone.

did you even play the game

also no not moody more like CONFUSED.  it matched the character art from earlier games but that was about the only similarity.

nah im just an ass and was hoping to start a derail where i convinced people i thought "goody" and "moody" rhymed perfectly

but no if he had it before the game came out maybe he didn't know!

Played the game for 50 minutes.

It's better than I thought. There has literally been one fight for the first hour and it somehow got me interested with the storyline. It's very well done so far, and the dialogue and voice acting is pretty much better than any jrpg out there. The problem I have right now is that most of the characters act the exact same way as the ones from Persona 3. Yosuke is EXACTLY like Junpei, and the black haired girl is just like the chick from the last one too. Most popular girl in school, hangs out with the new guy, has no boyfriend. Things kind of play out the same way too, it would have been nice if they had different personalities. Thankfully there are more characters like your uncle and his daughter who make up for it.

It's really up to how the dungeons feel and how good the battles are to see if I like it or not.