When you think of role-playing games, you think of epic stories, lots of battles and, in certain cases, angsty teens with giant swords and spiky hair. What you generally don't think of is musical rhythm-action - yet it's quickly becoming the done thing when you want to make a spin-off of one of your popular franchises. First Final Fantasy led to Theatrhythm, a cutesy musical take on the famous Japanese series - and now quirky Persona's getting a go, with its disco-themed dance-em-up. What'll be next though - Dancing Stage: Dragon Quest? A Skyrim karaoke game? So you can Fus Ro Dah along to all those majestic-sounding orchestral pieces?
But we digress. Easily one of the best games on the Vita, Persona 4: Golden is part dungeon crawling role-playing game and part dating/life sim. Following the exploits of a group of teens in a town racked by a series of grisly murders, the game follows a familiar story, as our heroes accidentally stumble on the root cause of the mystery - someone is chucking people into a terrifying TV world, where the victims live out their final hours, facing off against the living embodiment of their worst fears. A giant dungeon inhabited by creepy 'shadow' enemies, you'll need to draw on the power of your 'persona' to battle your way to saving each of the killer's next victims, whilst simultaneously keeping up with your school work, extra-curricular activities and part-time jobs. Cultivating the relationships with those closest to you is also key, as it can help strengthen your Personas and make battles easier - whether that's turning up to band practice, planting vegetables with your younger cousin or simply letting a friend get something off their chest.
Yosuke doesn't look particularly keen on this whole dancing thing...
Persona 4: Dancing All Night features all your favourite Persona 4 characters - from the perpetually hungry, constantly upbeat, kung-fu obsessive Chie to the tough-looking biker with a penchant for needlework, Kanji, and of course, the comedic, wannabe playboy of the group, Teddie - and the gang now have a new rescue mission on their hands. Members of mega-idol Rise's Kanamin Kitchen group have disappeared into the mysterious 'Midnight Stage', a world inhabited by the same Shadows that terrorised the Midnight Channel in Persona 4, so it's up to you and your team of teens to rescue them. But with the new world comes a new problem - the moves you relied on before no longer work, and you now need to defeat the Shadows with dance. What follows is a button-matching rhythm-action title, with new remixes and original tracks from series composer, Shoji Meguro, spread across a fully-voiced, thirty hour story mode, promising more epic Persona, but with a musical twist.
Dancing All Night will be available in two versions - a standard boxed release/digital download (depending on which format you prefer), and a special 'Disco Fever EU Edition' limited edition, which comes with a whole host of Persona-themed extras:
- Two disc soundtrack, chock full of Persona 4 remixes
- PS Vita Pouch, an enamelled pouch with a full-colour picture of Elvis jump-suited Teddie on the front and an embossed logo on the reverse
- Golden Teddie Keychain (not real gold, obviously)
- PS Vita Skin, a sticky cover for your console, emblazoned with Persona 4: Dancing All Night artwork (designed to fit the "most recent model of PS Vita", which we assume is the slim)
- Collectable box covered in disco ball art
Persona 4: Dancing All Night will be shimmying it's way onto the PS Vita later this year, sometime in the autumn. In the meantime, why not check out the trailer below:
