Persona 3 Reload has been out for a year now, and it is soon coming to the Nintendo Switch 2. At Tokyo Game Show, we got to ask questions to Kazuhisa Wada (P-STUDIO Director) and Yoshihiro Komori (Persona 3 Reload Nintendo Switch 2 ver. Director), and they shared their thoughts on this version’s development.
“Our fans have definitely said their warm words, and we are very happy to receive those. It has almost been 20 years since the original Persona 3 was released–I personally really wanted to do it for a very long time,” Director Wada said. “The development process had been a pretty long road, but we were able to provide the original appeal of the Persona 3 game to a wider range of audiences, and so we are very happy to be able to do that.”
He also added that with this multiplatform development, their main concern was the fans of the original game, whether they would embrace the new Persona 3 Reload.
Director Yoshihiro Komori says that they had a lot of guesswork to do with the third-party software and its quality for the graphics.
“For the Nintendo Switch 2 hardware, we started development before the hardware was actually released, and we didn’t have a great idea about third-party software [as well]. After the release of the Switch 2 came a lot of new titles, so that was sort of unexpected, but it also works in our favor. But after it has been released, we are sure that our graphics quality has definitely matched the standards.”
Director Wada then shared that UI is a very big element in terms of graphics, and they have put a lot of work into it for all of their games. “We asked our art director Komagai-san (Tomohiro)–he told us that they basically built upon the blue theme from the original P3. And there’s also a sub-theme called the ‘Sea of Hearts’.”
They describe the theme as having a sort of sub, oceanic, water-themed elements in the game, to which they also imagined the UI akin to going into the deeper consciousness of the protagonist.
“We definitely think UI is one of our strengths as a developer, and we kept in mind to make a contrast between our previous titles like Persona 5,” Wada explained. “P5 uses a lot of warm colors, whereas we [P3R] use a lot of cold colors. There’s a lot of movement vs. stillness as well. We try to make these contrasts.”
Director Komori also shared that he has previously worked on the original Persona 3 game and counts his new responsibility as a porting director akin to a ‘strange fate’ for being involved in the game once again.
“I actually played P3R [as a player myself] and I really feel a lot of passion, soul put into all the details by the developers. It’s not just that they upgraded the quality. The characters are more themselves…the menu / UI isn’t just comfortable…I think all these people [the staff/ developers] were equally moved by Persona 3, the original, and I think they wanted to convey the same feeling [to] modern users,” Komori said. “As a porting director, I was really moved by the Persona 3 Reload, so I really wanted to convey the same surprise, the same extent of movement of my emotions. So I really tried to perfect the graphics, or to play the [same feelings].”
Director Komori shares that he tried to perfect the graphics and replicate the same feelings so that the game is of the quality they like, so that all users/players can dive into the game smoothly. “I wish that [for] all the players in the Switch 2 versions as well.”
To close the interview, Director Wada shared his deep appreciation for fans. “What motivates us and what moves us forward is the fans and their warm appraisals and support. We are very lucky to have fans in Southeast Asia, and us as developers, we definitely like to continue on development for much more exciting games to come as the Persona series and as Atlus as a whole.”