Playing Persona 4 Makes You A Better Person: I was recently very sick. I got a cold that knocked me on my ass, and I was confined to my couch for days and days. When this happens, you try to find anything that will keep you entertained. I stumbled upon a let’s play of Persona 4 Golden by Nico B and proceeded to watch over 40 hours of it :s. I had never played a Persona game before and have been eagerly anticipating the release of the 5th game since I found out about the series (damn delays!). I decided to watch a lets play because I didn’t have a system that could play any of the games, but I still wanted to see the play style and story. I was not disappointed, the game revolves around a teenage boy who has moved from the city to the country side to live with his uncle and cousin. He is there to complete his second year of high school. Murders start happening in the small town, and without spoiling anything your character gets involved and he along with his friends become the only people that are able to find the killer and stop him. The game has the story and feel of an anime, which is what captivated me for so many hours. It plays as two complementary, but almost separate games. First the classic turn based dungeon crawler, and second, almost more interesting, is the relationship building, day in the life of a teenager, side.
You become more powerful in battle by developing relationships with other characters in the game. Developing those relationships requires you to spend time together, go on dates, and/or help them with various tasks etc. The cool part about this is you have 5 skills (social qualities) you must master in order to be able to progress your relationships with other people: Courage, Knowledge, Expression, Understanding, Diligence
I thought this was really interesting and something one could apply to the real world. In the game there would be situations that you could not progress through, or speech options you could not choose until you improved these skills, which is true in real life as well, it’s hard to ask for a raise from your employer, or stand up to the bully if you don’t have the courage to do it. Some of the ways the game has you build these social qualities is:
This reminds me of a simplified version of Benjamin Franklin’s thirteen virtues. In a quest to become a better person Franklin devised a list of thirteen virtues, created a chart to track them, and at the end of every day he would right down where he went wrong in each. Think about where you would like to be, and how being better in these categories could help you. Finally I’ll leave you with Benjamin Franklin’s list to read and think about (interpret them in whatever way makes sense to you):
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