The Besties - Persona 3 Reload, Lysfanga, and Some Big Besties News

Episode Date: February 16, 2024

This week's episode is all about two games: Persona 3 Reload, the from-the-ground remake of Atlus' groundbreaking RPG, and Lysfanga: The Time Shift Warrior, a clever arena action game with a time-turning twist. Also, some big news about the future of The Besties! (No, we're not ending the show. Again.)Also discussed: The Connector, Zoey Ashe Trilogy, Helldivers 2, Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor Get the full list of games (and other stuff) discussed at www.besties.fan. Want more episodes? Join us at patreon.com/thebesties for three bonus episodes each month!

Russ, what's your favorite joke? Oh, fuck you, Justin. Russ, what's your favorite joke? Sorry, I know that I was just asking you cold, but like, it's a cold open. You couldn't ask me colder than that. What's your favorite joke? I mean, I like when's the best time to go to the dentist. That is like my go-to.

Jesus Christ. 230, it runs all ages. You should legally change your name to the answer to that question because I think it tells people everything they need to know about you. That'd be cool if your name was 230, like a cyborg or some shit.

Hey, hey, I think we need to be nice to Fresh because he lives in New York City, and do you know why New York City looks terrible in the mornings? Why? Because it's the city that never sleeps. Jesus Christ. Did you see, Russ, the commitment?

It wasn't a half measure there. That was a killing blow from a man who was never killed. This actually reminds me of something, though. Seriously. Oh, I'm sorry. Let's bring the tone down a little bit. Seriously. Where do eggs go on vacation?

Where do eggs go on vacation? Yeah, I was reading a Malcolm Gladwell essay about this, so I don't want to ruin the answer. They go to New York. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Do you guys think... More delights.

What do you guys think... Guys, I don't have internet. I can't look at jokes. I need you guys to keep them coming. What do you guys think the actual intro to this episode

is going to be like? It's going to be so funny. Like, when we do... Like, obviously, this one's going right in the toilet can. And then it's never going to be discussed or spoken of like obviously this one's going right in the toilet can and then it's never gonna be discussed or spoken of again and then we'll do like the real intro so like what do you guys think that one's gonna be like i don't know like i don't think

it's gonna be i it's gonna be so funny though i disagree i think considering what this episode contains this is the perfect way to separate the wheat from the chaff. Let's do it early. Let's drive the fairweather fans off of their perch. If you're still listening, check your pocket. It's the Real Besties Fan gold medal, and you can wear that. I'm sorry, but I just have one more thing to ask you.

Oh, I'm playing. We keep goofing around. I'm playing with you. Give it around. I'm so sorry, dude. So this is pretty serious. Eve. Yeah, sorry. Of Adam and Eve fame.

This is weird that you're talking about this. Yeah, that's weird. Eve wanted to leave Eden, and she wanted to move to New York, but do you know why? Why? Because she just loves the Big Apple. So, there's a lot of New York jokes. I feel like you wrote that. You know what? I actually legit love that joke.

So, let's start it up. That is actually great. Okay. So, that should be the back of your t-shirt. The front of your t-shirt is your favorite joke. The front of your t-shirt is your favorite. The back of your t-shirt is like, I also love this one. Let me recite it. My name is Justin McElroy, and I know the best game of the week.

My name is Griffin McElroy, and I know the best game of the week. My name is Christopher Thomas Plant, and I know the best game of the week. Do your best, Bob, Dale, and Russ. My name is Russ Bustick, and I know the best game of the week. Welcome to The Besties, where we talk about the latest and greatest in home interactive entertainment It is a video game club And just by listening you have joined our illustrious ranks I'm so thrilled to have you here This week on this particular club we are talking about Lysfonga and Persona 3

Again, Chris Plant, what are those? Lysfonga is, imagine like a 10-player multiplayer game where you are solving puzzles and using action, but twist, you're the only person. You're playing all those characters at once. And Persona 3 is a remake of Persona 3, which is a beloved RPG that is absolutely batshit.

And I'm very curious to hear specifically from Griffin more about it. Yep. We also have some very big news coming after the break, which, get excited. You can't just fire me like that. You can't do it on the show.

You can't. We had a good run with Justin. The four of us are having a baby. And it's you. And it's you're the baby. Come here, little guy. We'll be right back. Whoa.

We're back. We're back. Welcome back. Okay. whoa we're back what we're back welcome back uh okay i think we should because we teased it we should start with the big big old news we told them yeah the baby they're the baby they're they're the baby you're the baby in a way they are the baby yeah they are uh both the baby and the mama and not the mama at the same time. Here's the deal. We I don't know how to get into this. So we're just launching, we're launching a Patreon. It's happening.

There's been requests over the years. Don't sound so apologetic in the way that you say it. Yeah, I'm excited to say it. We're launching a Patreon at last at your request. And I'm gonna start by saying, if you listen to normal, straight-up besties every week, all week,

that will not be changing. It's not going away. It's not going behind a paywall or anything like that. So worry not. But the good news is we are doing additional things for people that feel like they should subscribe to our patreon um and uh we're gonna get into that in a second yeah how about i talk about why we're doing this yeah i was gonna say before we do that let's let's jump into the why yeah i mean if you've

been listening to besties from the beginning i mean first, first, brave. That's fucking wild, man. That's so bonkers. Yeah, that's the real take a look back at your life. But we've been trying to find... Don't forget your fiber pills. I'm more of a flaxseed man. We've been trying to figure out a way to make Besties stable

from the top. And that has been everything from, you know, the weekly episodes back at Polygon to when we went kind of independent to when we were at Spotify, to when we have been ad supported. And ads were okay for a while. But last year, the market sort of crumbled, and they became very, very inconsistent. So we've said this before, but every time you didn't hear an ad slot filled

that was a sign that something went unsold and when they are unsold the rates are much lower than they used to be so uh for the time that is required to make the show which is time that we are not with our families and uh and all that it got it got rough it got like really rough and we just kept it going because we hoped that everything would just kind of naturally even itself out i guess um but it didn't naturally even itself out so we started thinking about things that we can do to keep this stable and healthy and that is a patreon so uh go from there okay as i mentioned at the top main besties exactly the same it's still going to be free for everyone there's going to be a minimal ads uh but everything

else stays exactly the same for everyone it doesn't matter great um for those who pay the subscription fee we're good we're setting it at five dollars a month pretty straight up standard patreon fee um or 50 if you do the whole year it's 50 so you get a bit of a discount incredible save again it actually works out you just gotta you pretend like you're talking to like the sharks when you say shit like that oh it's like yes you gotta sell them on it i've tried to get on that show so many times and i never for the idea. For the besties, specifically. It's weird. Mark is like, why do I care?

I don't like video games. I like ball games. This is why we're coming to you. Why is Mark Cuban always talking like the Scarlet Pimpernel? I've been meaning to ask you guys. Sounds! Hadn't be my FAA. I do want to mention if you do the full year it only costs 420 a month which seems

nice nice which is pretty cool anyway here's here's what we're doing for subscribers these are going to be bonus episodes just for subscribers number one we are going to be doing a monthly bonus bracket episode in the style of our Game of the Year episodes where the topic will change every single month as voted on by you, the people who subscribe. You'll be able to decide which group kind of goes against head to head. Obviously, for the first one, which we've already recorded and is already live. Y'all, we record these in the evening. They are spicy. They got big sleepover energy.

Late night, big sleepover energy. Can we tell them what it is? Can we tell them what the first one is? Yeah, tell them what it is. The first one is the best boss, which includes the fight. Final boss. Best final boss encounter in all of video game history. Y'all, there are some matchups in there that should not exist.

And I know what you're wondering. Is there physical dominance over one another factor? And yes, my friends, it is. At one point, two of Chiboy's bring boss fights against one another, each with their own touching personal anecdote associated with them, which that means we have to decide who has the best touching personal anecdote. It's fucking good.

I'm so excited to do this every month. Yeah, that's going to be super, super fun. And again, that first episode is already live. Resties will also be going subscriber only. It's going to be two episodes per month as per usual for the resties will also be going subscriber only uh it's going to be two episodes

per month uh as per usual for the resties but those are just going to be subscribed for subscribers moving forward anything that's already been published for resties will still remain available to everyone but if you'd like to follow plant and i on our resties journey uh those are also going to be subscriber only episodes uh we've loved making that show we continue to love making that show we also have the first two already live if you want to listen to them one of them is about the indies

that changed our lives and the other one is the history of the original Metroid which was super fun for that I'm sure there are some folks asking you know why is that behind the Patreon the reality is having two different shows that need to be ad supported uh not a great idea and if we're gonna keep one

of these um you know free and uh easy and just keep it going it makes a lot more sense for it to be the one that has been going for you know the entirety of the run um so the the rest takes a lot of work and and we want to make sure that core besties still remains available to everybody so that's where can people go to become members of this honored that is such a great question uh that is a great question the link is patreon.com slash thebesties. It's just that simple. Nice. That's a great link.

And not only that, I have a special treat for you guys. Here is a clip from the bonus bracket episode that is already live right now. We're going to throw to it, and it's going to be hilarious. I just want to say, maybe the first time I ever wanted to kill a guy in a video game was sephiroth i remember when i started fighting sephiroth i was like i can't wait to fucking kill this i can't wait to punch this guy's ticket and snuff him out for the world is the first time a member of my rpg party has been killed that i had invested quite a bit of time into so i was personally affronted by this long hair gentleman and i would i just could not wait to fucking kill this every time i fought him i was like is this it is this the time is this the time and then god dang guys when you do finish him off with that like omni slash in the you know void at the center of the

world that's pretty good shit i don't't think anything tops that in the year 1997 or whatever year Final Fantasy VII came out. And was he dead? Did we confirm, like, was he fully dead or did he show up again in, like, Advent Children or something? I mean, he shows up in Advent Children, of course, but it's like a weird projection of him or something. Right, okay.

Yeah, it's, yeah. Doesn't count fucking great guys except you feel at the time like that like he killed your your your first girlfriend is that it oh no i definitely had lots of girlfriends before yeah yeah yeah yeah no no no no i think you're right like i would have not felt the same way if like my wife and harvest moon had been killed by a man with a picture right i would have not felt the same way if like my wife and Harvest Moon had been killed by a man with a big sword. Sure, right? I would have not felt the same way.

See, Rachel, who edited that in, Rachel is somebody else that gets paid by the besties. That's somebody else who you're supporting with your donation. Yes. Thank you, Rachel. And thank you, everyone. That's pretty much it in terms of the business. everyone uh that's pretty much it in terms of the business uh if you have any questions about the patreon stuff that we haven't covered uh we also have a a fac on the patreon website there's like a whole blog welcoming you explaining a lot of the stuff we already covered

but um also uh in the newsletter you can drop in questions or comments or anything like that obviously this is a big shift for us and it's been a lot of work getting it all set up and coordinating it um so hopefully everyone is cool uh we don't want anyone to feel left out but we also need to get this show into a stable happy place so that is the end goal here yeah i hope y'all understand like once you are are balancing so much, families and stuff like this, it's not just about what you want to do, but what makes sense for you and the people that count on you.

And it's really, honestly, this for me, the reason I'm excited about it is I want Besties to keep making as much sense as possible. I want it to be something that we can sustain in perpetuity. So I'm really excited that we are able to do this. And I'm already very appreciative to the people that have been around with us this long and may support us in this.

Totally. What the fuck is Lisfanga? I was excited, man. Chris Plant is, he and Frush both, honestly, are killer, but Plant will bring some really deep, deep cut recommendations completely off my radar. But this was one that he just dropped in the chat. He's like, this seems like a besties game. And yeah, I think it definitely seemed like one.

Yeah. Does somebody want to try to take a shot at describing how this game works sure i can do it do it so lisfanga is i think at a glance if you played hades it'll look very much like hades uh it's a kind of isometric action game where you're like a little character that's running around and having to beat like a bunch of monsters in an environment pretty straightforward arena when you start sort of that same sort of arena too where it's like x number of enemies to clear you know this room

correct where it immediately becomes obvious that it's a very different game is in the very first fight because when you die everything that you had done in that life it might be a 30 second or a 10 second like life is recorded and when you start a new life that previous recording will continue playing and continue doing the actions that you already did. So for example, if- Like a ghost. Like a ghost. Yeah. Sorry guys, this game scared the shit out of me so far. So if that ghost kills like three enemies,

those three enemies you do not have to interact with on future runs in that arena, they're gonna be dead forever. So the idea is- They're demarcated with a little skull so you can tell at a glance so you don't need to mess with them. So it is actually, at a glance it seems like an action game,

but it's closer to a puzzle game where you're trying to maximize these lives that you have to basically clear the arena. There is no way to clear any of the arenas without dying, as far as I'm aware. Also, it's not just that you die it's that there's a timer that right it's going to kill you no matter what you

also have a trigger where you can restart your loop like at on on at your command basically on the fly without dying yes yeah yeah yeah systematically it is unlike any game i've really seen and it's such a clever idea um that that like really expands in interesting ways as it goes yeah i was really impressed how it does the nintendo thing of introducing everything to you in just the right amount each kind of round so yeah at the very beginning it feels like okay there are 20 enemies here and i can't kill them all within the i don't know a minute and a half or however long it gives me to do this i think it's actually way less than that maybe like 30 seconds um so i'm just gonna do it two or three times and that's how i'll get rid of everybody and then after that uh you do a few rounds and

suddenly you have enemies that uh have big shields so you need one of your ghosts to draw attention that way on the next round you can get behind the enemy and poke them and off them and then later on there are switch enemies and by that I mean like you have to knock two of them out at the exact same time kind of as like a switch mechanism to be able to kill either of them so you have to figure okay I, I'm going to have my first ghost. Halfway through the run, they're going to go for the switch. That way, with my next run through, I'll know halfway through that run, I'll get the other switch, and that's how I'll take care of that enemy. And it becomes, yeah, I mean, you're right.

A puzzle game, a time management game, you feel also just like kind of like an action movie choreographer because you're thinking of like what is the most badass and streamlined way to go through an arena. Yeah, by the time you're done with a run and you've programmed like five of your alter know alter egos to go do crap it really looks awesome especially if you've done like a really good sequence since when you've run a lot like it really looks awesome the last time to see like six fights happening simultaneously and sometimes in concert uh is is very satisfying when you pull it all together yeah i also like the fact that they um it's not as straightforward as it seems so plant mentioned the shield guy earlier and the first three or so times that you fight the shield guy you're always pretty much doing the same thing you use one life

to distract them and then you use another life to like attack them from the rear later on you uh they start layering in like power-ups that'll allow you to break some of those rules so you can spend a resource in the middle of a-ups that'll allow you to break some of those rules so you can spend a resource in the middle of a fight and that'll allow you to basically solo the shield guy without having to distract him and so you're constantly kind of having to reevaluate how am i going to maximize this using these resources in a really smart way um without kind of falling into these same routines of, oh, it's this enemy,

so I have to do this thing every single time. You also have a spell that you could equip that you choose one spell that you take into a fight, and there looks to be a wide variety of them, but each one is pretty mechanically different from the others to where, you know, you can slot it into your puzzle flow you know things like uh stun these enemies or uh shoot a ball out that explodes and that kind of gives you like a

ranged option if you are in a match where like you need to get a small group of enemies far away so you have like flexibility to to plug in there too as well as like there's a i think there's what they call auras which are basically like equippable perks that also change your your style yeah one of those spells actually every time you cast it it is cast on all of your clones all of your ghosts so like that adds a whole other element where like all these previous runs will then be changed because you're casting that spell on a future run yeah so if you have like six characters out there and you you hit that spell at the exact right moment you just like detonate the entire arena right all of this seems very very overwhelming and complicated but i think the game does a really good job of

like easing you in uh plant mentioned like Nintendo thing of teaching you new mechanics slowly. So I never felt like, oh, I have no idea how to tackle this thing. This seems impossible, which is a really tough thing to pull off while still kind of maintaining my level of interest in it. Not only does it not feel overwhelming while you're playing it, you feel powerful. It feels more creative than anything else. I feel like you always have enough resources

between powers and extra kind of ghost characters to get through any run pretty much the first time. But beating it under a certain amount of time and like really nailing the run, that's where it gets more difficult. And that I always felt personally incentivized to figure out how to do the fastest possible run was a testament to how much fun I was having with the game rather than me feeling, yes, like overwhelmed or lost. Yeah. I had – I will say I had one pretty major issue with the game and I would love to to hear

your guys thoughts on it because it seems like maybe in different places uh well the title is is tough to remember I will say um and I really enjoy I I was admiring everything about the game I really enjoy like the moment to moment of it I think is very cool. I found myself weirdly, like not super compelled to keep playing it. And I was trying to figure out why. And I think there is a, and it's very understandable because this is such a new idea, right? But we talked about the way that it kind of straddles a puzzle and action game. And I think that I was kind of falling into that gap a little bit, a satisfaction gap, where if it's a puzzle, it's too finicky to be a puzzle. There's things like, I know that one of the important parts of this run is I need to hit this exploding eyeball and send it flying towards this other guy right um and it

because it is an action game at heart sometimes you just miss that shot you know the enemy ai is maybe different or the angle's a little off or whatever and if you blow that shot even though you know what you want to do it it may not work and you have to kind of and it's not while it's easy to start an individual life over starting like an entire arena over takes a few button presses and is a little clunkier than I'd like it to be. But on the other hand, like the, the number of powers and number of like mechanics that they're giving to you when you're really trying to like find a quote unquote solution to it because it is structured very much like a puzzle there are so many variables that i was constantly thinking like am i not good enough at this or is there some power like some combination of powers that i could be using here that would make it more effective like it increases the variables if

you're trying to find a quote unquote solution. And I don't know, there's something in the gap between those two that I was struggling with. Yeah, I think some of it is just that there is a relative lack of progression in this game. You are unlocking a lot of new tools as you go on, but you don't necessarily feel like your expertise in earlier levels grants you an easier game in later levels which i do think can power like you know hades for example if you've been doing great in hades by the time you get to the final boss in hades it's a much easier battle than it would be otherwise you don't really get that here so the so the um the difficulty curve is actually kind of flatter than you would normally

see in this sort of game so maybe that's part of it as well yeah the way that you're describing it justin i think that's right i think it also for some people is going to be what's special about it and that it's kind of baby's first speed run the game um because because of all of that stuff that it is that is the challenge of speedrunning. It is both a puzzle of cracking a game, and it is also having to just really nail finesse controls. I think that's something they could update to that would help significantly if there was a single button press to start an arena over. Because I was doing that constantly. You know what I mean? If I missed the first sequence of hits, it's like, well, fuck, I'm not going to do this arena over. Because I was doing that constantly. You know what I mean?

If I missed the first sequence of hits, it's like, well, fuck, I'm not going to do this entire thing. I'm going to restart it. And I wish that was as, like, you have to choose it and then you have to like confirm your choice. And it's like, I just want to start it.

Like, just let me do it quickly. Yeah, it made me, it reminded me of Hotline Miami in that way. But obviously Hotline, you start a run in like half a second, and you're on a new run. Obviously that doesn't quite work here because you are doing like multiple runs per arena,

but I agree with Justin, like there should be just like a hold down Y kind of thing to start a new run and, you know, that kind of thing. But otherwise, yeah, I think it's a really really interesting game, not something that I've seen before, and I think a of people uh will find like the art style really appealing and just like the overall presentation i thought they did a really good job with it um are you

playing on steam deck i've played on both steam deck and on like a full-on pc uh steam deck worked fine um yeah i had to i think i ran it at 40 FPS or something like that, but it was totally playable. I mean, it's not the sort of game where you need 60. I do think it'll probably stabilize further as new patches come out, but definitely very playable. Something I did want to ask you guys about real quick, what did you think about the way

that these arenas were connected? I thought it was kind of unusual that like there were large swaths of the game that weren't necessarily like mechanical other than like, I guess looking for, they have collectibles that I'm still not sure what they're for the like magic moats or whatever. Sometimes you find these, but it's,

it's not like there's very little in the way of like platforming or, or what have you like outside of the fights yeah so you'll do a fight and then it'll be just be like probably like 30 seconds to a minute of just like walking through the environment and as justin mentioned there will be these like hidden collectibles some of them i know like will be like if you collect four of these things you'll get another life to use in battle so there is definitely a combat there's a shop that makes itself available and there's a shop yeah um yeah i think it's interesting that they all the arenas are connected i do like that uh sort of synergy to it but i do agree with justin

i think i would have liked to have seen a little more, I think, engagement in those environments rather than just like kind of walking around. Yeah, I kind of enjoyed it as a break between everything. And the environments are certainly pretty. They're these big kind of white cities. But yes, it feels, it reminds me of No More Heroes, weirdly, which is a big open world that is completely empty. open world um that is completely empty and i couldn't tell like that was what they were going for is you know trying to create this sense of wow this world is completely void of life except for these like violent showdowns um yeah it reminds me of ducat as well there's like chunks of duchat where the ducat where you're just like there's no like swinging or climbing or anything. You just sort of like have this quiet little moment

walking down a hallway. I will say also the story, I feel like there's exactly as much story as there needs to be. Yeah. Coming off of like, I'm still playing Prince of Persia and having these like long chunks of dialogue

that really are all variations of the same conversation. It is nice to have a game that's just like I don't know, mysterious keep playing, I don't know you'll figure it out buddy you'll get it all in due time, just keep playing y'all, I really want to hear

Griffin's thoughts on Persona 3 you mind if we take a break? hey Griffin, I have a question you didn't play this right because you're playing persona does this sound from our descriptions like the a game that you would play uh yeah i think i think this sounds really sick i like uh you know i like this type of game and this sounds like a very clever hook uh like i feel like like we set up at the beginning of the year when uh here on the besties there i can't remember a time where my uh gaming time has been more competitive um yeah

it's especially for freaking february man right now but i do i've got this downloaded and and and ready to rock um it's great on deck so uh i i am sure uh it's it sounds like a type of game i will definitely come back to cool all right um well yeah let's say let's take a break and then let's hear some about uh persona 3 reblasted yeah that's the name persona 3 griffin persona uh i gotta be honest i'm i'm genuinely happy not i i actually wanted to play this a lot but i am genuinely happy that i didn't have to rush play it for besties because as much as i've like really tried to get in persona game it hasn't happened yet for me but i'm very excited to hear your perspective on it, given that you are the Captain Persona expert.

That's what they call me. The Captain Persona expert right here. To set this up a little bit, have you guys played Persona 3 in any of its original iterations? I don't think so. Yes, you did. The portable one, I'm guessing? Probably, yes.

Yes, yes, yes. I had to put a ton of time into that one, yeah. Okay. Yeah, that's right. I remember that era. Persona 3 was about as groundbreaking of an RPG as it does exist in this industry. A lot of the stuff that you know and love about about persona games really started in in three the persona games that preceded it uh confusingly there were three three of them i think um did not have things

like social links or the uh i think like the daily calendar system um they they were very sort of they were very cool and amongst some people in the the community like beloved uh games but persona 3 really set up the franchise for what it is now um there were and like inspired a lot of other stuff right like i feel like even playing even playing infinite wealth i was thinking about that a lot like wow this is a lot to persona yeah i mean it explored character dynamics and relationships in a way that that no rpg before really had um and so yeah i think uh playing this right after infinite wealth like there's so much about the you know the drink links and balder's gate too i mean sure yeah i mean yeah the the kind of like like episodic development of like character relationships and stuff.

Like a lot of that comes back to Persona 3. There's the original Persona 3. There's Persona 3 FES, which added sort of an epilogue to the original game as well as a few gameplay features. And then Persona 3 Portable was sort of the big iteration before this one. It was out on PSP. It simplified. I feel like more people played that of the big iteration before this one. It was out on PSP. It simplified. I feel like more people played that than the original. That's probably my skewed perspective, but it was big.

Yeah, and that's a great version of it. It simplifies a lot of stuff like for a lot of the daily life things like you are looking at a static screen that you kind of move a cursor over to decide what you want to do instead of like running around a 3d environment big thing with that game is it added a female protagonist that you could choose from at the beginning of the game and it sort of sets up like two completely different uh like routes there are some social links that change completely depending on uh which character you play as uh and to date i mean that hasn't happened again in the Persona series. Sadly, that element of it has not been included in Persona 3 Reload. You just play as the dude. And there's a few other things like the epilogue from Persona 3 FES is not in Persona 3 Reload either. There is a little bit of disappointment, I feel, that in making the, you know, comprehensive version like of of this game, like it's not particularly comprehensive. That said, the extent to which Persona 3 has been polished and spit shined and sort of evolved to keep up with uh specifically persona 5 is genuinely very impressive uh from a like an aesthetic standpoint like it is a it is i mean honestly it looks like blue persona 5 sometimes in the way just sort of the user interface rocks and like you know the

stylish all-out attack animations and uh you know, whenever you get a attack an enemy's weakness, you get like a flash of the character's like face that like zooms across the screen. It looks very, very, very much like Persona 5, which a lot of people who are like kind of purists have sort of slammed the game for. I think it looks fucking fantastic. The big thing with Persona 3 is you have your daily life, your social link stuff. Uh, and then at night you can go to Tartarus, which is this gigantic, like, I think, I forget how many floors are in Tartarus.

I want to say like 250 floor dungeon. Six, seven at least. Six, at least six or seven. Uh, and it is the same kind of dungeon crawly gameplay that you know from 4 and 5. You go into these randomized floors and defeat shadows and look for treasures and just dive your way into the dungeon, which kind of periodically unfolds as time passes on. Basically every month a new sort of chunk of levels will open up to you. Tartarus is, I would say,

the most kind of boring version of the gameplay side of Persona between 3, 4, and 5 especially. It is very, very repetitive, but they have sort of added in some stuff to spice it up from like, you know, adding a little bit more distinctiveness between the different chunks of the dungeon so that you're not just like constantly pounding through the same floor over and over and over again. There's some like challenge rooms and other stuff that you can find to to to sort of spice things up a little bit um and then like also the combat different the combat is is dramatically different there is uh again from

persona 5 in the same way that you could do the baton pass uh whenever you got a a critical hit or attacked an enemy's weakness you could pass your turn off to another party member uh and it would show like hey if you pass it uh you know to to Junpei, he can hit the hit the weakness. And so you just do the baton pass and then it, you know, he can go and it makes it much easier to knock down the whole, you know, field of enemies and go in for one of those big, stylish all out attacks. There's like a super meter sort of thing that also charges up as you play as as each character. And it's different depending on like which character you play as what kind of boosts them up um so like the gameplay side of things is i've dramatically improved like it is it is uh much more uh entertaining to just kind of

like play the dungeon crawly side of things this time around. Not like, not to the level that Persona 5 gets to, I don't think. Because Persona 5, like the dungeons are so, you know, manicured and designed and there's like a puzzle to it as you kind of conduct each heist. The set pieces are much bigger and more exciting. You don't really get that. It's still sort of a, you know, randomized dungeon crawl sort of experience that you are going to be doing over and over and over and over again. So, you know, your mileage may vary there.

Griff, question. Do you know if the dialogue has been updated at all? Were you written, re-recorded, anything like that? Yeah, so there is one sort of fault of Persona 3 is the way that it kind of handles its social links, right? You think about 4 and 5. Each of your main party members gets their own social link, right? Which makes sense, right?

You're going to be spending a lot of time with these people. Junpei is one of your first party members. Of course, you kind of want to know about him, but you don't get a social link with him. He just doesn't have one. Unless I think actually if you play Persona 3 Portable, the female main character route, I think he does actually have one.

So that's always been kind of like a weird oversight, right? What this game adds are called link episodes, I believe is what they're called. And those sort of exist outside of the ecosystem of social links, which as in every other Persona game, you boost those up and it lets you make stronger and stronger Personas in the like Velvet Room fusion side of things. Instead, like you just get these like mini arcs

with specific characters or groups of characters that are fully voiced, fully new, fully written. They provide some like, you know, benefits written. They provide some benefits to that character and what they can do in battle and as they explore the dungeons. It's not quite as fleshed out as a full-blown traditional social link, but it does add, I think, a ton of depth

to characters that otherwise are just kind of like, I don't know, throwaway characters, despite the fact that you may have them in your party every single time you go to Tartarus. So like if you are looking for an upgrade to the story side of things, there's certainly a lot here. It has been such a long time

since I've played Persona 3 Portable that I can't really comment on like how much of the core plot has been changed. But I mean, in terms of new content there is a lot there uh the game's tone is pretty profoundly different from four and five uh persona three is a game about uh death and mortality and that is reflected in a lot of the like social link storylines from like a character who is like a young author who is terminally ill or an elderly couple that runs a bookstore who lost their son. Like there is some really, really heavy shit. And then like the whole game is also kind of about the end of the world sort of and your attempts to thwart it at great cost

um and so like that's kind of that is kind of a rough ride it is not as like uh footloose fancy free anime fun as uh particularly persona 4 is um but like i don't know i also think that that sets it very much apart from those games and it does have genuinely a lot of interesting and it has a lot you came into the franchise always kind of has a special spot um for me it was persona 4 golden which is like maybe my favorite game ever uh and persona 3 portable and in this case i guess persona 3 reload doesn't quite hit the mark of that or um or persona 5 um it is a slow start uh it really does not pick up until you are honestly a couple months in and you have like a wide range of fuck that's fuck in game months yes uh yeah but i mean depending on the length depending on how much uh time you're willing to put into it it may actually take you a couple yeah once once you have like a huge slate of social links to kind of like

explore and follow like what is interesting to you and the dungeons have evolved and you have more characters to choose from to take in there and there's more stuff for you to do then i the the game has has hooked me it definitely didn't at first because like you know just pounding into Tartarus without much to do there is repetitive and uh it would get to the point where like I would clear Tartarus in like a couple of nights and then like my nights every single night would be like well I guess I'll go work at the cafe again um because there's fucking not anything else to do uh which has always kind of been a problem for this franchise but like in persona 5 royal it's like

fuck i'm gonna go play darts with my homies and uh you know increase their baton pass capabilities all that jazz um persona 3 reload gets gets there it gets to that point and um you know is it gets it gets to what you want a persona game to be but it uh it really it really drags its heels getting there which is especially kind of galling juice and i were talking a little bit about some other games we've been playing like after playing again like a dragon infinite wealth which is just from the fucking jump like pretty entertaining and enjoyable with like delightful characters from from minute one it is kind of that is a tough putt i feel like it's really it's really one of the biggest bummers i think with persona and i'm somebody who classifies myself as like i like these

games like i've i finished four i think i i like them in theory but i haven't nearly spent as much time with them as i as i'd like to because they make – I really like everything they're doing. They make such a huge encumbrance on your time. They're like such a time sink to get to the good stuff. I would love to see them try to make a pass at this structure and this idea that is like a more condensed, digestible version for people that like the ideas like all of it just don't like committing you know 80 hours to right like what is a 10 hour persona game yeah i don't know i mean that is that you're talking about such a fundamentally different yeah i mean i mean i'd be happy with 40 y'all i mean seriously like i played that i played infinite wealth about that long but

it was all rewarding right they weren They weren't wasting my time. Right. Yeah, and I would even add, like, you look at a season of TV. No, yeah, I mean, it doesn't compare, right? Like, if you play Persona games and you want to get really into them, like, that's what you want. I think there's a huge swath of people who would be very frustrated with even a 40-hour Persona game. who would not who would be very frustrated with even a 40-hour persona game i think people i think i think what justin is sort of getting at and i agree with is i want more people to be able to experience the franchise and there are a lot of walls that prevent that from happening yeah

definitely i but there but those walls are the same things that like people who love the franchise totally love about persona so it's i don't know how you get around that you get into also like it matters of taste right like i i uh persona 4 is the no pun intended gold standard for me of like every character in that game is great the tone of it is like almost zany sitcom at times which is like and and and the world of that game is like this unique sort of rural setting that isn't really like anything else i've played games of that game is like this unique sort of rural setting that isn't really like anything else I've played. Like that game has a very special place in my heart. I don't necessarily vibe with the characters

as much in this game or the setting. It doesn't have that sort of special, unique quality for me, but also there's, I'm sure, people who feel the reverse. I've seen a lot of people say that persona 3 reload is like a great way to get into the franchise but like i don't know what that is because i think what is going to be best like the best game for you to get into the franchise depends on like what kind of like story and characters and tone and shit you you enjoy um i will say that it is probably i mean

not probably it is definitely the most enjoyable version of persona 3 to play despite the stuff that it is missing um i do again like not to hammer it too hard but i do think it is a bummer to not include that stuff in the 70 dollar uh remake of of this game i think that's that kind of sucks uh and also like it really feels like we're gonna get a second version of it just because we've we have so much history reload i'm doing that yeah maybe yeah or or dlc or something it's it is possible but uh yeah uh yeah i'm it is i think it's great and I am enjoying my time with it much more now maybe 10 or 12 hours in than I was starting out but it has it has not hooked me in the way that I was kind of hoping it would which is sort of a bummer you played three before right like you play yeah sure

yeah I played three portable do you think that this hooking this issue of like being hooked early on would be better like is it better now than it would have been in that version is it worse for you oh yes yeah no for sure okay so an improvement just not quite as much of an improvement as if if for nothing else like all of the additional story stuff is great. If for nothing else, like Tartarus is a million times more fun to explore and play this time around. I didn't even touch on a lot of the stuff that it kind of, that it is also added. There's like a lot to do. There's a lot more stuff to do in Tartarus and a lot more stuff to do in every fight than any than any of the persona 3 versions that have come before

it so like that makes it a pretty easy recommendation over over the other ones it also looks great the soundtrack is fucking amazing as is always the case um but during that first like you know 10 hours that i played the game like it was hard to stave off the feeling of like, man, I kind of just wish that persona six had been fast tracked a little bit more because this is, this is not necessarily hooking me, but it is, it is now, I don't know if I'm going to stick with it to the end because it is a

ginormous like time commitment to get through it. But Griffin, we don't need persona six. We need metaphor. refantasio we do need metaphor refantasio yeah we'll we'll see about that um that's out pretty soon right it's supposed to be this year i believe oh okay that's that could mean anything can't wait yeah that's true well griffin thank you for the for the reporting live from the floor of please don't make me play any more rpgs i think i think we're good for uh at least a week we are talking about

an rpg next week mother we are uh we have a little bit of rear mail which we'll get through this letter comes from michael bjork plant i read your polygon article about the dune popcorn bucket you're a gifted comedic writer so nice plant do you have anything to share about the dune popcorn bucket you're a gifted comedic writer so nice plant do you have anything to share about the dune popcorn bucket um so i'll be honest i i feel like i'm much better on the page than i am like coming up with oh yeah live so so i um i turned to like google and reddit for some like new dune jokes um do you mind if i share a few with you we've had a lot of really great jokes this episode so far so this should be the jokes per minute here is a very high end this episode for sure um so um how do you circumcise a fremen i don't know what a fremen is it's like the

the people who live on the you use a brisk knife okay that's great. That's a really good one that eight people are going to get. Okay, wait, wait. Chris, sorry, sorry. I'll do like a more like kind of like, that was, you're right. That was like for the real thing. A little deep cut, so to speak. What do you call a sandworm that never breaches the surface? What?

Shy halude. Okay. Okay. That one person that you had with the first joke, Chris, has turned on you. And they actually had, you know what's funny? They had patreon.com slash the besties open in a new tab. They just closed it. They somehow took money from us.

I get to do one now. I get to do one now. Where do the Na'vi go when they're sick? Oh, right. ICU. Oh, my God. doing now where did the navi go when they're sick oh right i see you oh my god so we have to do an avatar this is a rule on the bib baby for every piece of content we do we have to feed justin a little bit hey guys i don't have internet i wrote that joke on the fly i wrote that joke now in the moment where the Navi go when they're sick. I see you.

I see you. It's so good. We have another letter. This comes from Slifer Jam. I'm actually really liking the Suicide Squad game after 30 hours. It's obviously lots of love went into the small details in the game. The cut scenes are great and the mocap and the facial animations are all incredible. I'd agree with all of that for what it's worth.

Yeah, for sure. Somewhat repetitive gameplay aside, which i would also agree with um maybe remove the somewhat out of that i find the traversal and the combat very fluid and fun you know what honestly it makes me thrilled that people are getting enjoyment out of this game like it wasn't for me i know justin wasn't a huge fan of it either, nor was Griffin. But legit, it brings me joy that other people are brought joy by a project that, like, so many people blood, sweat, and tears over to make this thing. So it's great that people are enjoying it. And you can still pick up, if you're into this, I think Anthem is really affordable now. You could go grab that I'm just recommending

other games that might be to their taste that's all Duke Nukem Forever anyway we have this last letter from Madeline hey besties great episode this week I'm writing in to give a shout out to a Stardew like game that I've been playing a lot this week

Pallia that's P-A-l-i-a it's an indie free to play that's still in beta it's extremely good i especially think griffin would like it it's sort of a blend between stardew valley and the exploration and visual style of breath of the wild holy shit that sounds amazing uh highly recommend checking it out if you have the time thanks for all you do uh i've actually i've played played this one a little bit uh oh yeah out uh wildly it's out on windows and switch you can get it on switch if you want to uh it i i had some trouble with the performance on switch uh and on steam deck so i've just kind of not really uh latched on to it as as as much as a lot of other people but there's uh quite a few folks who are deeply into this one. So there's like farming in it?

Yeah, there's like farming and building and exploration and all that jazz. From what I've heard, like it has an issue with like the amount of content and stuff there is to do in the game so far, but it is gorgeous. And I mean, I think if that description sounds good to you, like you will get something out of it.

But I kind of have filed this one away to like let them cook a little bit more. But I am also, you know, I have not given this as fair of a shake as I probably should. Since you've had time with it and probably learned a fair bit about farming from it, what farm animal would you say is best at keeping the time?

Why have we done this? Would you say it's a watchdog? Okay, so honorable mentions. Russ sounded like he just opened the ark of the covenant oh god brist knife okay honorable mentions we have uh a game that i've been playing and plant has actually most of us have been playing it i think justin hasn't gotten in there yet uh we're gonna talk more fully about it next week but this came legit out of nowhere for me i was not expecting to love this game as much as i fucking do and this game is called hell divers

too fuck yes dog yes don't even know how much i want to say about it i i will say the the elevator pitch is basically it is starship troopers meets uh what do we describe it as deep rock galactic right dna in it yes 100 it is a it's if you play the first hell divers all of the sort of madcap hilarity of that game vis-a-vis accidentally like mowing down your teammates or dropping like in like outer space drop pods uh on them uh while running away from like overwhelming hordes of monsters that is all here uh only in a like third person shooter perspective and the camera makes it even funnier because you have moments where i was playing with Frush and he was all about to die. I'm like, hey, don't worry.

I got this big, heavy weapon. I'm going to get right in front of you. I'm going to protect you. You're my best bud. I'm mowing down all the bugs. But now there's dozens of them and they're coming up right on top of me. So I'm backing up, trying to protect my best friend who I think has my back. And as I'm backing up, I see a giant blue pillar of light encase my body.

Because Frush had just thrown a support stratagem that airdropped a giant brick of death onto my head. I had done everything that he needed. Now I didn't need to exist anymore. Yeah. I had a great three-player session yesterday where one of my teammates went down, so I threw a revival beacon down, which basically drops them back from a drop pod from space. Only that drop pod landed on the other surviving player.

So I just saw this guy running away from a horde of bugs just get splattered, and then a different guy climbed out of the pod that squished him. It rules, and I cannot wait to talk more about it next week. Yeah, I'm very excited to talk about it. I think they definitely had some server issues at launch, which they're slowly smoothing out. But I think this game is going to be—it's already pretty huge.

It's about 10x more popular on steam than the original game was and i think it's really going to stick around for quite a while real quick ps5 too which is great and it's ps5 as well yeah we mentioned deep rock galactic there is a deep rock galactic vampire survivor style spinoff called deep rock galactic survivor naturally and i cannot wait for justin to have his life destroyed by this game yeah it sounds rough honestly that's holy i'm not sure y'all it's oh i'm playing on steam deck right now um but like right now yeah right now uh sorry um the the absolute killer thing about it is there are um picture vampire survive right and then there are these rock barriers everywhere but because you are a miner you can carve through that so you can use the rocks kind

of as defense to get away from enemies you can also use the rocks as funnels to create choke points so you kind of will like steer enemies towards a big pile of rocks then create a funnel through it in which all of them are now channeling through this tiny little hole that you get onto the other side and just start pulverizing them with grenades and heavy fire. It feels so good. That sounds great and all. Can you say Rock and Stone? I'm sure you can. You must be able to.

It's killer, and I really can't wait for more people to play it. And I know we have so many Deep Rock Galactic fans who listen to the show, and you're going to be really pleased. Rock and Stone. By the way, Helldivers has a Rock and Stone uh, you're really pleased. Rock and stone. By the way, hell divers has a rock and stone equivalent. It is for democracy. It's so fun.

Yeah. So fucking managed, managed. Um, what did you name your ship? Oh, good question. You can name your ship and hell divers too.

Mine is the, uh, founding father of family values. Yeah, mine's the beacon of democracy. It's true. Or well, yeah. It's all very ironically fascist, which we love here at the Besties.

Justin, do you have anything to add in terms of honorable mentions? Yeah, I've finished a three-book series. It's the Zoe Ash Trilogy. These are written by Jason Pargan, who used to write on the name David Wong as his pen name, most notably with a book called John Dies at the End was sort of his biggest hit back in the future that is basically a worse Las Vegas, same principle, but it is completely corrupt and overrun with crime and attention seekers and basically lawless. And it is a town that is so sort of wild and outlandish and insular that it makes for a

easy way of talking about the internet without it being a book about the internet. Like it is a, you see very clearly some of the like line, dividing lines and habits and rituals. For example, everyone has what's called a blink camera, which is a tiny pinhole camera that basically everyone's wearing all the time. And these feeds are live basically constantly. Uh, so everyone's competing

for viewers competing for, uh, um, you know, attention, but basically a woman, a young woman named Zoe Ash, uh, who is the sort of person that I think would typically be targeted a lot on the internet. She is a woman. She is lower income. She is in a bigger body. They mention throughout the book. Suddenly, because her estranged father, who she didn't know was her dad, passes away, she becomes basically the most powerful person in the city with a team of expert bodyguards

and intelligence experts and all these other people that are charged with basically helping to protect her. And it is about how a normal person who is basically instantly hated by a large portion of the mainly men in the city who are all uniquely terrible in different ways, how they sort of, she makes it through that world. There is also an aspect of people have just begun equipping themselves with sort of like superhuman abilities, which is another thing her company is responsible for. The company that she takes over from her dad has a terrible legacy. They basically built the city, but is also extremely corrupt. And Zoe Ash is not.

She's a decent human being who tries to set that right. So seeing how she reckons with that power and being in this world is fascinating. It's a three book series. I think the first is Futuristic Violence and Fancy Suits. The second is Zoe Punches the Future in the Dick. And the third is Zoee is too drunk for this dystopia so it's a three book series and they are uh really hilarious have really interesting

things to say about the internet without it being a book about the internet uh and uh i just got a huge kick out of it they're they're, really fun reads. I have a fun recommendation real quick. I went to New York City this past weekend to go see a musical called The Connector and it rocked my ass apart and it's only running for a little bit longer.

I think it wraps up beginning of March. It's called The Connector. It is about, uh, these two journalists, a man and a woman in the late nineties, uh,

working for a sort of independent, uh, magazine called the connector. Uh, and it sort of explores the wild divergence that they, uh, that they experience based on, I mean, mostly their gender. It focuses on how this dude is treated like this golden boy while she is sort of largely neglected.

But it also explores journalistic ethics in a way that was very chilling, I will say in the uh given my personal experience in the sort of landscape of media and post-truth uh the post-truth world that we exist in today this this musical has a turn in it that is that sent a wave of uh anxiety i think through the crowd i it is the only time i think i've ever seen a musical that gave me a high heart rate warning on my apple watch several times throughout the second half of it uh the music is all by jason robert brown who did um parade and last five years and songs for a new world uh so the music is all like fucking incredible uh it stars scott bacula who we got to meet after the show which was very uh particularly for my wife you recommend that i recommend meeting scott bacula who we got to meet after the show which was very uh particularly for my wife you recommend that i recommend meeting scott bacula he's incredibly incredibly kind uh

him rachel my wife is a huge quantum leap fan always has been and uh scott bacula is from basically like the the uh like neighborhood next over to the one she grew up in so they had a lot to talk about um but yeah if you can get there you should go see it because it is it is it is a remarkable show that made me feel things that i don't i don't think uh any sort of broadway show or anything like that has has ever kind of gotten out of me before which is to say anxiety but uh you know the good guy hopefully this play will not be his last because that's it like his that's not it's like a mangling of the original in such a way that makes what you're doing absolutely just threatening 100 yeah it sounded

really menacing i don't even know what you're going so menacing uh i uh chris pine do you want to recap the games real quick that we talked about I don't even know what you're going through. So menacing. Chris Pine, do you want to recap the games real quick that we talked about? Oh, yeah. I should do that. So we've talked about a lot of stuff today. We talked about Lasfanga. We talked about Persona 3.

We also talked about some other stuff we've been playing, like Helldivers 2 and Deep Rock Galactic Survivor. We talked about books with the Zoe Ash trilogy. We talked about musicals this time with The Connector, now playing in New York. And I think that's it in terms of what we've been playing. We also talked about the Patreon that we've launched.

It's live right now. There's basically three hours of brand new content for people who have subscribed to the Patreon and uh yeah we really greatly hugely massively appreciate your support not only in supporting the patreon but also just over the years everything you guys have done to listen to the show and share the show and tell people about it uh it really wouldn't exist without you so we met and obviously this will be a learning process for us this This is our first time doing this.

So, uh, this show has always been sort of a collaboration, a conversation, if you will. So please like, let us know if there's any. Yeah.

If you have any, uh, thoughts or questions or anything, uh, please put them in the comments of the newsletter. What's next week. And for 20 bucks, New York draft will do your voicemail and cameo.

So if you need that, that's another option for you to support. He just really needs a slice of pizza. That's true. He'll give you a discount. I wanted to thank the following people for writing reviews for the besties on Apple Podcasts. We have Herd House. We have Leadamus.

And we have I.M. Squillis. Thank you for writing reviews for the besties on Apple Podcasts. Maybe we'll drop in some Patreon backers next episode. Maybe should switch to that yeah maybe we'll switch to that that sounds good um next week we have a one-two punch of final fantasy 7 rebirth the aforementioned rpg uh and hell divers 2 for these double header guys once we hit the doldrums, they're going to seem so callous. We're going to be so resentful of our past selves for gobbling up two big games. For Final Fantasy, we will be very mindful of spoilers.

It is a 30-year-old video game. No, no. It's doing different things. The whole point of the last game was saying anything could happen in this game. So anything can happen in this game. So we're not going to spoil anything. But we are going to talk a bit about it. And yeah.

So get excited. You can romance the dog. Hey, thanks so much for listening to our podcast, The Besties. Thanks for your support over the years And be sure to join us again next time for the besties Because shouldn't the world's best friends Pick the world's best games Besties!