Originally posted on Meteor Media.
Despite being known as a more lighthearted game, the Persona series has always been grounded in its story. That’s why it was so surprising that they decided to take Persona 4, and make it into a dancing game.
Persona 4: Dancing All Night is a rhythm-action game developed and published by Atlus, and was released first on the PlayStation Vita 5 years ago. It’s a spin-off from Persona 4 but still follows the main cast of characters as they have to get down and boogie to defeat shadows. Yes, that's actually what they have to do.
It’s all about Yu
Roughly taking place a month after the epilogue of Persona 4 Golden, the story follows Rise Kujikawa and the rest of the Persona 4 crew as they help her for a big concert called Love Meets Bonds Festival.
Instead of being the silent protagonist like in Persona 4, players now take control of Yu Narakami as a fully developed character with wit and personality.
The Persona 4 gang soon learn that another group of idols have gone missing through mysterious circumstances. It’s up to the investigation team to find out how to save these idols and how it’s connected to the shadow world from Persona 4.
So Yu think you can dance?
There are two main modes to play; Story Mode and Free Dance. Story Mode is pretty self-explanatory as you spend the game dancing to rescue the missing idols.
Free Dance, players can pick any song they have unlocked and perform them at various difficulties earning them in-game currency to buy new clothes, accessories and items to change the difficulty.
Persona 4: Dancing All Night is surprisingly all about dancing! Players must match notes to their corresponding area and that’s about it. They bring across original songs from Persona 4, but add remixes to the roster which is very hit and miss. Nanako dancing to Junes' theme song and the surreal experience of personas playing instruments are definitely hits.
Does it hit the mark?
The main cast of Persona 4 definitely feel like their characters but more sexualised. This can be distracting as it can be a little out of character, especially when Naoto and Chie are sexualised when they were so against that in Persona 4.
During story mode, we are given a huge text dump of the story. Compared to the voice acting dialogue, it feels cheap. The story itself is weak and the focus on the Kanamin Kitchen idols just isn’t entertaining. They're boring and in the Persona world which prides itself on great characters they are too generic.
Overall, the game feels like a lot of effort was put in but it just doesn’t have the magic of Persona 4. Even characters we liked, such as Dojima and Nanako, just felt out of place and were not given enough interesting material.
Persona 4: Dancing All Night is a fun party game but that’s about it. Don’t expect to be hooked into the game like the main title, but it’s a must-play for fans of Persona 4.
6/10
Charlie Vogelsang