CONTENT WARNING: References to trauma and suicide. Story spoilers for Persona 5 Royal and Persona 5 Strikers.
While both games do their best to show their lighter side when it’s needed, both games are able to acknowledge the mood turns, particularly when both games get particularly dark. Persona games are generally not above just dropping the deaths of characters onto the player. “Alleycat” is a song that appears across both P5R and P5S, and represents the feeling of sadness, you always get the idea that something upsetting is about to happen, most clearly shown in P5R, as Sojiro explains Futaba’s past and the suicide of her mother. “Alleycat” while sad, does always feel like there is a happier side to it, a hope that things are going to get better. That hope is probably best encapsulated by “Sunset Bridge”, a track that is played upon clearing the games Palace’s (P5R) or Jails (P5S) and also whenever the player maxes out the confidant ranks with their friends, marking the conclusion to these arcs mostly filled with conflict, but also a large amount of self-discovery, and that aforementioned hope. I have to highlight Zenkichi in P5S for this one. After clearing the Jail where his own daughter is the boss, we see Zenkichi sat by her bed, comforting her, and promising that the man that killed her mother is going to get caught.
Persona has a way of getting the exact emotional response from the player whenever they need it, but this is without even going into the battle music. P5R follows a traditional RPG style of fights, with your party and the enemies you fight launching moves in turn, whereas P5S uses the Warriors beat ‘em up style of gameplay, where everyone is fighting all at once. To compensate for this, P5R uses a much more jazzy, and slightly slower style of music for its fights, in stark contrast to the rock tunes ever present in P5S. Each game does have its own songs, but it also shares “Last Surprise”, “Blooming Villian”, “Keeper of Lust”, and “Rivers in the Desert” across both games, each track getting the styling of the two games. All of these are worth listening to in their own right, but I want to draw attention to “Last Surprise” in particular. Some of the battle themes, including “Last Surprise” have vocals by Lyn, a Japanese singer, managing to sing the songs in English, despite not speaking the language, and it has to be said, she nails them. Particularly when you’ve heard the tracks before in P5R, when you hear the guitar or drums start in P5S you know exactly what’s coming. The first time P5S‘ version of “Last Surprise” started playing, my smile just grew and grew, it did not disappoint.
Overall though, P5S is home to two of my all-time favourite video game songs. “Daredevil” and Counter Strike”. Both come with lyrics again from Lyn, and both come at some of the most intense moments of the game. “Daredevil” plays when you’re carrying out the final infiltration to get access to the boss fight, and it contains probably my favourite guitar solo of all time, you’ll know it when it hits if you give it a listen, it's that good. Timing an All-Out Attack to Lyn’s battlecry in the song is also up there with one of my favourite moments across the series. “Counter Strike” is one of the endgame boss themes. Energetic, determined and provides the backing track to possibly the coldest video game moment of all time, watching the villain walk from the wreckage of his flaming mech.
Persona can be a very difficult game series to get into. The games are very long, and mentally they can take a lot out of you, they pull absolutely no punches with the story. However, the music is a constant throughout, helping you to process the emotions, and letting you know when its time to move on. The battle music is engaging throughout, alongside entertaining dungeon music to keep you hooked in.