Sega Atlus’ Shin Megami Tensei: Persona series grew from a cult favorite RPG to offering some of the genre’s most popular and defining games. The turning point for the series was Persona 5, which offered a slick, soulful balance of social-sim and classic console role-playing systems. It immersed players into a setting that felt cozy but also daring and exciting as players took their party of high-school misfits to slay and capture rogue demons in contemporary Japan — and all while keeping up with their school work and social lives.
Persona 5 is, simply put, one of the best role-playing games ever made, and though Sega Atlus still seems coy about the next main entry of the series, the developers have made strides with their array of P5 spin-offs – which includes their recent Asia-only online game Persona 5: The Phantom X. Recently announced for an upcoming western release in June, I had the opportunity to play some online RPG and speak with the developers about the Persona series’ shift to a live-service experience.
Looking back at the slate of online games over the last two decades, some MMO spin-offs of other games have only been available in certain markets—such as Capcom’s Dragon’s Dogma Online or, interestingly enough, Shin Megami Tensei Imagine, the Shin Megami Tensei series’ first online game. The Phantom X is another example of an online spin-off released outside the West, which was released in 2024.
While Phantom X has been overseas for some time, the producers at Sega Atlus explained that they wanted to wait for the right time for the Western release. According to Atlus chief producer Yousuke Uda, during our early hands-on of the Western version of the game, he stated: “We had to take a lot of time to polish up and improve the quality of the game after the first launch of the game, and we also needed time to finish up the localization of the game.”
As a loose successor to Persona 5, The Phantom X focuses on the story of an ordinary high-school student thrust into the supernatural underworld of modern-day Japan. After being recruited by Igor, a returning supporting ally and operator of the Velvet Room, the protagonist begins their journey as a new Phantom Thief to slay demons that have invaded Japan and corrupted the hearts of people. Along the way, the protagonist will recruit new party members, including returning allies from previous games.
The Phantom X does a lot to recapture Persona 5’s style and atmosphere, but it feels like a larger playground and a celebration of sorts for the Persona series. Along with an original story produced by the core Persona dev team, Phantom X introduces a more open-ended structure that shifts from other games. While traditional Persona titles focused on guiding players through a school year and where every day mattered, The Phantom X presents a loose timeline, allowing more time to take on activities and milestone events.
The bones of a Persona game are still here, including social-sim activities like going to the movies, working a side job, attending school, and forming bonds with allies. The RPG aspect is also in full swing, which includes an extensive array of story and side missions that take the party into dungeons to level up party members and engage in turn-based battles that feel like amped-up versions of the P5 battle system with new support skills and guest assist from allies outside the party. However, Persona 5: The Phantom X embraces the structure of a gacha-style action RPG like Hoyoverse’s Zenless Zone Zero or Honkai: Star Rail.
The pairing of Persona with the gatcha-style experience works largely well, as the tone and atmosphere fit with the larger scope and content progression of a gacha-style game. I certainly can’t deny that it was enticing to see classic Persona characters to buy in the shops. However, some of the criticisms from the original release that players expressed were the heavy-handed nature of the gacha experience and some gameplay imbalances.
According to Sega development producer Jun Matsunaga, he stated that The Phantom X’s first year offered key feedback for the upcoming western launch of the game.
“We’ve done a lot of things to improve the game since its launch because the Persona series is so popular in Japan and the western markets, we put a lot of our focus on improving the game’s role-playing elements,” he said. “One of the areas we’ve improved is that of game balance [with its different systems]. We originally developed the game as an online PC title, so to give it a closer feel to the experience of the games on consoles, we had to adjust the game to match that.”
“We’ve also learned a lot of things regarding gameplay controls, going from keyboard and mouse to the touch control, we’ve overall made the gameplay experience better. On the character side of things, we’ve also done gameplay balancing for traits [for the roster] to make the game more complete for western markets.”
Persona 5: The Phantom X does well to offer options to tackle, but I felt overwhelmed by the sheer scope of the game’s packaging. There’s a vast set of activities to engage with, including building up a custom hideout with purchased accessories, a combat tower designed around familiar Persona-foes to help level parties and gain materials, and even an array of event-style missions. I was impressed with how the Persona experience has been expanded into a gacha-style game, as it does feel like a solid pairing. Still, I did think that the amount of activities and notifications about things to do made it a bit of a challenge to commit to an activity – which tends to be a usual folley for games of its style.
Admittingly, the preview period with the game may not have been the way to experience the game as a whole, so I chose to stick with the story missions for something more straightforward, which focused on the party chasing after a demon who possessed a misogynistic pro baseball player who terrorized people in the subway. The storytelling in Phantom X feels right at home with the style and tone of Persona 5, complete with anime cutscenes and set-piece moments that aim to resonate emotionally. The Phantom X certainly hits when it comes to being a Persona RPG, and I was impressed by how quickly I got into its flow.
Coming away from this hands-on, I felt that Persona 5: The Phantom X is the most ambitious Persona spin-off that we’ve seen that really nails the tone and fun vibes of P5. However, its structure as a gacha game will likely determine the mileage for many – especially with the presence of microtransactions, time-gating, and the usual mainstays of the gacha experience.
It does present hurdles for players by nature of the model of the game, even as a free-to-play game, but as a Persona experience, The Phantom X struck that same balance of feeling cozy and exciting to immerse myself in, and it’ll be interesting to see where this game goes next as it evolves in the future.
Full disclosure: Travel was provided by Atlus to and from this preview event.
