Persona 3 / Tropes O to Z

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Persona 3 provides examples of the following tropes:

Tropes O-R

• Obfuscating Stupidity: Subverted with Ikutsuki. After The Reveal, it seems that all of his terrible jokes were just an act to throw off suspicion. However, a video of him in FES shows that he still makes those jokes when no one is around, and he finds them genuinely funny.
• Ojou Ringlets: Mitsuru comes from a wealthy family and kept her hair up in curls until junior high, as seen in FES's flashbacks. Even in high school, she keeps one loose curl.
• Old Save Bonus: Creating a new game in FES when you have save data from the original Persona 3 lets you carry over the following from that save; Your Academics, Charm, and Courage rankings, discovered Fusion Spells list, any key items you possess that unlock Persona fusions, and your Persona compendium - however, the Personas in your compendium will be reset to their base level, stats, and skills.
• One-Winged Angel: The final boss was human 31 days before the encounter. As of January 31, he looks strongly similar to another Persona you might have, of the Death Arcana.
• One Track Mind: Mr Ono, the history teacher, is absolutely obsessed with the Sengoku era of Japan and triest to turn every lesson and conversation into a lecture about it.
• Only the Leads Get a Downer Ending: The game ends with the Fall successfully averted and Nyx sealed away, but it comes at the cost of the protagonist sacrificing their life in the process. The Answer campaign deals with the fallout of said sacrifice among their friends and allies in SEES.
• Optional Sexual Encounter: Heavily implied to be the ending to the romantic social links, and to a side-quest from Elizabeth.
• Overly Long Gag: One of Elizabeth's requests in FES has you bring her a Sengoku-era helm from Mr. Ono. The first time you talk to him, he tells you he'll see if he has any he can part with at home, and to come back another day. The next day, Mr. Ono won't be there, and you'll instead get an extracurricular lecture from another named teacher. This happens five times until you finally run into Mr. Ono again on your seventh visit to the faculty office.
• Painting the Fourth Wall: When lecturing about summoning magic, Mr. Edogawa says "It's widely seen in books, movies, better video games, and so on..."
• Palette Swap: The enemies you encounter have several variations scattered along the blocks of Tartarus, which use the same models, but of different colors depending on the current block's color scheme.
• Panthera Awesome: A few of the fusable personas are these. Ose is a bipedal, dual-sword wielding, cape-wearing cheetah while Gdon, available around the same level, is a tiger that has flames rising from his back. The White Tiger Byakko, one of the four heavenly beasts, is also available for fusion.
• Parental Abandonment: The main character, Akihiko and Shinjiro are all orphans, Yukari's mom is cold and unsupportive and her dad is dead, Junpei's dad is a drunk, Mitsuru's father is caring but distant and dies in the story, Fuuka's parents are excessively demanding and distant, Ken's mom is dead, and Koromaru's owner died. People with single parents don't even mention the other parent. Even Aigis' creators died ten years prior to the games events.
• Permanently Missable Content:
  • Certain personas need key items to be accessed. Unfortunately, you must complete Elizabeth's requests for these items. While going on a date with Elizabeth seems like an easy request, forgetting to claim your reward by the deadline not only ensures that you will not get that key item, but also ensures that you will not be able to complete any more of the Elizabeth Date quests. Ouch. There goes your 100% completion.
  • The Female protagonist has quite a few of these concerning Social Links, resulting in some very Guide Dang It! moments. Chief among them is Shinjiro's small window of availability and the fact that you can't not hang out with Ryoji whenever he's available or invites you out, under penalty of not being able to complete his S. Link. Also, if you don't speak directly to Rio and Saori before certain rank ups, you will never be able to start Tower and Devil.
  • Another request: "I'd Like to Sip Oden Juice". The drink-loving girl at school has it, but she'll only give it to you in exchange for a "rare drink". What she means is one of the drinks only available in Kyoto, and you're only in Kyoto at one point in the game. Not that hard if you know what to do, but if you don't, it's Permanently missable. (Annoyingly, the game taunts you by giving the quest no deadline, when it really does have one)
  • Forgetting to initiate the Temperance S. Link before the third Full Moon will render it unavailable for the rest of the current playthrough.
  • In Portable, two S. Link characters can end up lost in Tartarus. The Hierophant and the Hanged Man S. Links can be lost (thus freezing their progresses entirely) in the current save file if the player does not rescue the corresponding characters before the next respective Full Moon. If the S. Link(s) reached MAX prior to losing them, the corresponding characters themselves will not show up in the epilogue unlike most other maxed out S. Links.
• Personality Powers: Quite literally, since a Persona is a manifestation of its user's psyche. At one point, Akihiko notes that his Persona is weak against Mitsuru's favored element and wonders (uncomfortably) if that means something.
• Pervert Revenge Mode: Can we say that it's one of the results for the Hot Springs Episode and leave it at that?
• Phantom Zone: Though normal humans are unaware of anything that goes on in the Dark Hour, damage to buildings (and people) carries over into the real world, which is why SEES has to stop the Shadows rampaging outside of Tartarus.
• Pieces of God:
  • Not obvious at first, but the twelve Full Moon Shadows qualify. Each of the twelve is a fragment of a thirteenth Arcana Shadow, Death, which was sealed inside the Protagonist and takes the form of Pharos. Defeating the others allows them to reintegrate, which is a very bad thing as a completed Death has no choice but to trigger The Fall and summon Nyx to wipe out all life on earth, whether he wants to or not.
  • Supplemental materials also reveal that all Shadows are actually fragments of Nyx which conscious minds on Earth have evolved to lock inside themselves. Personas are the result of a strong-willed person controlling their personal Shadow, which makes them fragments of Nyx as well.
• Pink Girl, Blue Boy:
  • Junpei and Yukari invoke this in their designs, with the duo always having at least one item of clothing in the appropriate color.
  • The PSP rerelease changes all of the blue menus to pink for the female protagonist. This extends to their respective personalities and, more obviously, their color schemes—the male protagonist has improbable blue hair, while the female protagonist has improbable red eyes.
• Pin-Pulling Teeth: Upon being defeated near the top of Tartarus, a wounded Jin stays behind and does this to blow up the Shadows climbing up from lower floors.
• Playable Epilogue:
  • After defeating the Final Boss, the game gives you a few playable days to see how things turn out for your maxed-out Social Links before it wraps up proper.
  • The Answer takes place a few months after The Journey, dealing with how the end of the main game has affected the rest of the party members.
• Please Put Some Clothes On:
  • When the party is split up during the July 7th operation in the female route, the player can pick the option that tells either Junpei or Akihiko to put their clothes on when they step out of the shower.
  • Equipping the female protagonist with the "Battle Panties" and talking to her love interest while she's wearing them in Tartarus inevitably gets some form of this reaction. The bikini gets similarly amusing reactions.
• Plotline Death: Shinjiro and Chidori both die in the course of the game.
• Point of No Return: You are required to go to Tartarus on the final day, January 31. Once the Dark Hour comes on that day, you will not be able to exit Tartarus, even to stock up, sell your loot, or trade gems. As the Fated Day approaches, your characters remind you that you won't be able to leave once you enter.
• Police Are Useless: Due to the nature of the Dark Hour, the police aren't able to really do anything. One of them, Officer Kurosawa, does provide weapons to SEES, presumably due to the Kirijo Group's influence, and he actually takes a more active role in assisting both the Group and the Shadow Operatives (what the remnants of SEES become after high school) in Persona 4: Arena.
• Poor Communication Kills: Despite the Rule of Funny being in play, couldn't the guys have avoided execution at the hot springs if someone had just called out and said, "Don't come in yet!"?
  • Junpei mentions that that they could have told them it was a misunderstanding, then Akihiko mentions that Mitsuru would not have thought of it as an accident regardless and probably would have still have "executed" them.
  • Strega initially becomes SEES's enemy because they're told that the defeat of the twelve major arcana shadows will result in the end of Tartarus and the Dark Hour; they immediately assume that that also means the end of the power of Persona. Mitsuru and Aigis (at least) are both well aware that this isn't the case.
• Post-Final Boss: After defeating the final boss, the Nyx Avatar, the Player Character travels to fight Nyx. Although its attacks deal the cap of 9,999, the MC is able to persevere through and through The Power of Friendship and a Heroic Sacrifice, is able to forge the Great Seal and avert the Fall for good.
• Post-Victory Collapse: The main character collapses into a coma for an entire week after his first battle against the Shadows. Don't get us started on the good ending, either.
• The Power of Friendship:
  • The Social Link system: the main character can form relationships called Social Links with significant people. Each one is associated with one of the Major Arcana and will power up Persona of the matching Tarot class when fused in the Velvet Room.
  • The Power Of Friendship literally empowers the Protagonist at the end, giving him a new Arcanum and allowing him to seal Nyx.
• Power of the God Hand: The single strongest Strike attack is named God's Hand and depicted as a giant golden fist striking from the sky.
• Power Up Letdown: In FES, specifically in The Journey, the Vorpal Blade skill obtained from accepting a Persona skill change that randomly happens after level-ups is bugged. It costs very little HP to cast, does 1 damage, and has no damage bonus from the main character's "Great" condition.^ExplanationFES runs two separate files for skill stats to take account of the moon phase and condition mechanics, which are available in The Journey but not in The Answer. However, while trying to retain Vorpal Blade and Weary Thrust (skills that are powered up depending on the user's condition) in The Answer, the game is forced to define them twice as skill names and descriptions are kept in a single file each unlike the stats, but in the process, The Answer version of Vorpal Blade is left unfinished. An oversight causes any skill change in The Journey that results in Vorpal Blade to instead call the unfinished Answer version. Thankfully, passing this bugged skill down through fusion will turn it into the proper version.
• Pre-existing Encounters: Tartarus and other areas with Mooks use the skippable variety.
• Product Placement: The protagonist's headphones and MP3 player were a real product from Audio Technica, and a real Sony Walkman, respectively. Unfortunately, they both long went out of production.
• Production Foreshadowing: Vincent from Catherine makes an Early-Bird Cameo in the Portable, drinking alone at Club Escapade PSP version. He makes references to events that involve his own then-upcoming adventure.
• Progressive Instrumentation: The music in Tartarus works like this. The first block (of 6) has a simple beat in the background. Each new block has an additional instrument added.
• Prolonged Prologue: The game has a little over an hour of cutscenes (and one battle sequence) between the start of the game and when you get the ability to fully decide what to do with your day. You do get a few opportunities to save in the interim.
• Pungeon Master: Shuji Ikutsuki demonstrates a love for puns in his introductory cutscene, to the chagrin of the other SEES members. The first unlockable secret recording in the console also features Ikutsuki coming up with a Hurricane of Puns and loving it.
• Put on a Bus: Most of your Social Links end with this. Some of them come back during the last few days, though.
  • The sports club student, Kazushi withdraws from the championship to have his failing knee operated on.
  • The culture club student, Keisuke leaves the club to study to be a doctor.
  • The girl at the shrine, Maiko moves away with her mother after her parents divorce.
  • The transfer student, Bebe moves back to France, albeit by choice.
  • The businessman, Tanaka doesn't go anywhere, but straight up tells the protagonist to stop hanging out with him. Sure enough, he quits appearing on the overworld when you complete his link.
  • The unusual monk, Mutatsu quits hanging at the night club to go find his family and apologize for his actions.
  • The rival athlete, Mamoru moves away and takes a factory job to support his family, since his father is dead and his mother is unable to work.
  • The gourmet king, Nozomi leaves to become a food critic.
  • The dying young man, Akinari mysteriously fades from existance. It is later revealed that he died later in the link.
  • The online game player, "Maya" logs off of Innocent Sin Online for good before the servers shut down. Subverted because it's later revealed that she was the protagonist's teacher Ms. Toriumi all along.
  • The mysterious boy, Pharos fades away. He isn't gone for long though because he re-appears soon afterwards as Ryoji Mochizuki, who is in-turn revealed to be the Appriser of Nyx.
• Putting the Band Back Together: The Answer has the remnants of SEES team up to explore the Abyss of Time and deal with their grief over the Protagonist's death.
• Puzzle Boss:
  • The final Full Moon Shadow is untouchable until you destroy its three statues, and even then it can re-summon them to regain this protection.
  • The Vision Quests in Portable — The Full Moon Shadow rematches impose restrictions on your party, and even have hidden objectives to achieve for additional rewards. The Attribute Tests have fixed battle conditions and bosses with rotating affinities, and you have to figure out the route to victory within its terms.
• Pyrrhic Victory: The main game. Congratulations, you saved the world and your friends from Nyx, and ended the Dark Hour... at the cost of you pulling a Heroic Sacrifice and leaving your friends behind, and it's shown in The Answer they don't take it well at first.
• Rage Against the Mentor: Yukari calls out Mitsuru at one SEES meeting for hiding information about the Shadow threat from them. Mitsuru's reasoning: "It never seemed relevant." That and Mitsuru was still traumatized from being a guinea pig in the events that led to the present crisis. Junpei goes into a period of this after the main character leads several successful missions.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: We've got a New Transfer Student, a School Idol, the Class Clown, the Big Man on Campus, the Ojou, a Techno Wizard, a Robot Girl, an Intellectual Animal, an Adorably Precocious Child, and finally, a Jerk with a Heart of Gold. All of them were brought together for the purpose of defeating blob monsters with the physical manifestations of their psyches.
• Rain of Arrows: The "Arrow Rain" and "Myriad Arrows" physical skill usable by both the players and enemies alike rains arrows on the battlefield.
• Ramen Slurp: Really loudly, whenever the characters are in ramen shops.
• Randomly Generated Levels: The game randomly generates most of the non-boss floors of Tartarus, although it follows a few design rules. For instance, floors between a Tartarus Boss and a plot-determined barrier will invariably be smaller than the norm, and the party will usually appear extremely close to the stairs to the next floor (with the small inconvenience that The Reaper will spawn that much faster, too.)
• Random Number God: If you're unlucky you'll be mercilessly killed by bosses by random chance, i. e., getting Mudo'd by the Intrepid Knight or charmed the whole battle by the 4th full moon boss. At higher difficulties, getting back attacked meant the Protagonist getting attacked several times in a row and dying before you can do anything.
• Rare Candy: The Incense cards you earn over the course of the game. Wand cards drawn in Shuffle Time also have a slight chance of increasing a random stat(s) instead of granting bonus EXP. Notably, incense card boosts carry over in fusion. In Portable, the Incense cards are replaced with Minor Arcana Royalty cards (Queen of Wands, King of Swords, etc.) which you do not use during Fusion, but any time you please on whatever Persona you have equipped.
• Real Men Take It Black: Ken Amada says even he drinks coffee black in a random optional conversation you can have with him (which you can even joke you like it with hot sauce)
• Recurring Riff:
  • There are bits and pieces of "Burn My Dread" and "Memories of You" (the opening and ending themes) scattered everywhere in the soundtrack.
  • "Soul Phrase", the opening theme to Persona 3 Portable, is incorporated into several of the new soundtrack pieces included in the Female Protagonist route.
• Red Armband of Leadership:
  • All members of SEES wear one when participating in "club activities" - even the dog.
  • Student Council disciplinary officer Hidetoshi wears a yellow armband of leadership, presumably to distinguish it from the red SEES armbands.
• Redemption Demotion: In The Answer. Your party members suddenly develop 2000 HP, immunities to their favored element, Light, and Dark, and skills like Megidolaon when you fight them as bosses in Colosseo Purgatorio. At least Akihiko, Yukari, and Mitsuru lose their healing spells.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The now-two Protagonists of Persona 3 Portable form a rare Distaff Counterpart version of this.
• Relationship Values: Cultivating your Social Links allows you to make better Personas.
• Rescue Arc: How Fuuka ends up joining the team - she gets locked in the school overnight, and then trapped in Tartarus when the Dark Hour occurs. SEES then head
• Revolvers Are Just Better: The Grim Reaper Optional Boss dual-wields revolvers with five-foot long barrels.
• Revolving Door Casting: Igor is the only true consistent in the whole Persona series; while Philemon appears from time to time; he doesn't play a crucial role outside of Persona.
• Right for the Wrong Reasons: Strega, when it came to pursuing the Full Moon Shadows
• Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory: Comes up in both endings:
  • In the Good Ending, everyone in SEES (temporarily) forgets about the Dark Hour, and how it effected their relationships with one another, with the exception of the Protagonist and Aigis.
  • In the Bad Ending, Aigis is the only one who remembers the Dark Hour and that the Fall is imminent, as the rest of SEES blissfully go about the end of the school year. Unlike the Good Ending, however, the characters aren’t even vaguely aware that something isn’t right and all of their Character Development is undone.
• Robo Family: Aigis and Metis are said to be sisters, as were all of the anti-shadow weapons that were built with Aigis.
• Rousing Speech: You will hear the voices of your maxed-out Social Links right before finishing the final boss.
• Rule of Drama: A solid rule for the Dark Hour is that electricity doesn't work (with the exception of Mitsuru's bike and the dorm computer, explained as "special"). The streetlights however are still on when Shinjiro dies. Naturally fans have poked fun at it.
• Running Gag:
  • Akihiko's tendency to mention that he must "train to become stronger", as well as taking protein-filled food will sometimes be commented by other S.E.E.S. (particularly Mitsuru) as a sign of his recklessness.
  • Mr. Edogawa giving the player character "concoctions" if the he/she is affected by the Tired status. Sometimes it helps you, sometimes it doesn't. But the description of the drink makes it sound like it is made from rituals.
  • There will always be at least two students getting bored at the events in the school auditorium.

Tropes S & T

• Sacrificial Revival Spell: Chidori revives Junpei after the latter was fatally wounded, at the cost of their own life.
• Sad Battle Music: "Heartful Cry", which plays then you're forced to fight the SEES members themselves in "The Answer". But bloody hell is it awesome.
• Sarcastic Devotee: Shinjiro's battle quotes indicate this.
• Scam Religion: The Male Protagonist's Moon Social Link revolves around one.
• Scary Flashlight Face: Junpei does this when explaining a ghost story
• School Club Front: The Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad (known as SEES) is registered as a school club with Chairman Ikutsuki as its advisor, and members even stay in the same dorm. However, the true purpose of the "club" is to investigate the Shadows, Tartarus and the Dark Hour. All members possess the ability to summon a Persona, which is the only known weapon against the Shadows.
• School Festival: The Culture Festival, subverted (unfortunately for some).
• School Uniforms are the New Black: The SEES team chooses to wear their winter uniforms whenever they explore Tartarus even during weekends and holidays. You can't really hold it against them.
• Schrödinger's Gun:
  • The player has the choice of multiple sports clubs to join at the beginning of the school year - swimming, track, or kendo on the Male route, and volleyball or tennis on the Female route. The focus of the sports-related Social Links (Both Chariot and the Male's Strength) will always be in the same club no matter what.
  • The player can join either music, photo, or art club later on in the year. Both Fuuka and Keisuke, the subject of the Fortune Social Link, will always be in the same club the player joins.
  • In a New Game+ ending on Portable, if the player romanced at least one SEES member during the course of the game, they may choose one of them to meet the protagonist on the school roof during the ending, even though logically there should be no way to influence who is arriving. More specifically, the game narrates that the protagonist hears someone's voice and asks the player to identify whose it is.
• Screw Destiny: Ultimately, what the choice to spare Ryoji and fight Nyx comes down to. It's made abundantly clear to the members of SEES that Nyx cannot be defeated - everyone ultimately decides to go face the emodiment of Death regardless.
• Scripted Battle: After beating the Final Boss, you get one last fight with the Post-Final Boss, Nyx's true form, with the protagonist alone. You can't lose the battle, but your options are highly restricted.
• Secret A.I. Moves: In the endgame of The Answer, the shadow of the Protagonist will use your party's Personas against you, and he can use skills they don't normally learn. Also, when SEES splits up and fights each other, they can also use skills that they don't normally learn against you, such as Yukari and Mitsuru dropping Megidolaon on you.
• Secret Project Refugee Family: Strega's members consist of three Persona users whose powers were artificially awakened by the Kirijo Group's experiments.
• Self-Damaging Attack Backfire: Rarely, when going for a regular attack, there is a chance of the attacker overshooting their attack and stumbling, which leaves them in the same state as if their weakness had been attacked - and in the case the shadows, open to an all-out attack. Ranged weapons won't cause this, giving them a small extra benefit.
• Self-Deprecation: When lecturing about summoning magic, Mr. Edogawa says "It's widely seen in books, movies, better video games, and so on..." Notice the "better", implying "better than this one".
• Sequential Boss: The final boss, Nyx Avatar, takes this to extremes. You fight a whopping fourteen forms of this boss. The first thirteen are not difficult, varying only in the elemental resistances and types of attacks used, but the fourteenth and final form has greatly increased HP, attack power, and defense, and can pose significant issues barring Level Grinding.
• Sexy Discretion Shot: Whenever you max out with a girl, the camera fades to black and says "You spend a tender moment with her." In Portable, it's "You spend a long time with" them.
• Sexy Man, Instant Harem:
  • Early on, Akihiko asks you and Junpei to meet him at the police station...while surrounded by a group of (according to Junpei) very attractive girls. Humourously, Akihiko completely ignores them for the whole event, implying that he's used to this trope and even finds it rather annoying. The Female Protagonist's Social Link with him deconstructs the trope - while Akihiko may find a lot of girls who are attracted to him, it's been a long time since he's found anyone who has affection for him.
  • Happens a second time when Ryoji arrives in the Fall semester, although it's only made prominent in his Social Link with the Female Protagonist.
• Sexy Santa Dress: One of the armor outfit sets in Portable is this, and it's not only visible armor, it's different for every girl.
• Shielded Core Boss: The Hanged Man boss has its three statues. Sometimes the only hit you get on it is the All Out Attack after it falls as it regenerates them immediately after their destruction.
• Shoot the Medic First:
  • Frequently a viable strategy, especially against the bosses who come with minions. On the flip side, if all four of your party members can heal...
  • During the Strength-Chariot Full Moon Boss, this trope is subverted as both of the bosses can revive the other one if one of them is beaten. The trick is to kill both of them at the same turn.
• Shop Fodder: Coins you get by killing the game's Metal Slime are usually worth a lot of money, and some of the items dropped by bosses are only there for you to sell.
• Shout-Out: Has its own page.
• Showdown at High Noon: The gunfight between Takeharu Kirijo and Shuji Ikutsuki. Literally inverted in that it takes place during the Dark Hour, and thus at midnight. Subverted in that each man kills the other.
• Shown Their Work: All over the place, but particularly with the Tarot Motifs. Is Persona 3 the only example to get Lovers and Death right?
  • The Female Protagonist's hair pins, spell out the Roman numerals "XXII" or 22, which, along with 0, is the number given for the Fool.
  • Thanatos, a form which Death gains after being sealed into the protagonist, along with his identities as Pharos and Ryoji. Thanatos was the bringer of peaceful death and Ryoji's offer on December 31st can be seen as a way for the protagonists to accept the Fall/Death with relative ease.
• Show Within a Show: Phoenix Ranger Featherman R returns from Persona 2. The show can be watched on the dorm TV every Sunday, most of the episodes direct references to ones from Choujin Sentai Jetman, the real bird Sentai.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: On January 31, just below the top of Tartarus, Takaya confronts the heroes one final time, suggests that the end of the world is nigh and cannot be stopped, and asks why they are not celebrating the end of the world. Yukari responds succinctly, and when he doesn't and continues his nihilistic Motive Rant about "shining a light upon this darkened world", Junpei takes up the debate instead.
  Yukari: Will you shut up already!?
  ...
  Junpei: You're so full of shit! I'm not dying so you can have a friggin' night-light!
• Sickly Green Glow: One radiates from the moon during the Dark Hour, giving the world an ominous green hue over everything outside Tartarus.
• Signature Move: There are spells and abilities that are exclusive to specific Personae, a majority of which cannot be passed through Fusion:
  • Alice has her regularly possessing the destructive "Die For Me!" attack. She summons armies of corrupted Wonderland soldiers and has them skewering her enemies from the sky. Its counter-part is the "Samsara" which is exclusive to Daisoujou.
  • Surt, the fire giant from Norse Mythology has his signature Fire spell Ragnarok. Sometimes, Loki, Thor and Odin join in the fun with Niflheim, Thunder Reign and Panta Rhei.
  • Mara and "Maralagidyne", a "Severe"-tier Fire spell that targets all enemies, is a play on its name, and is infamous for its squicky animation.
• Sitting on the Roof: Some Social Link stages have the characters go up to Gekkoukan High's rooftop for contemplation purposes.
• Situational Damage Attack:
  • Getsu-ei is a Slash attack that deals more damage on a Full Moon. Zan-ei does the same but on a New Moon.
  • Vorpal Blade deals even more damage when you're feeling Great. Weary Thrust hits harder if you're feeling Tired.
  • Vile Assault and Cruel Attack inflict even more damage on Downed enemies.
• Skirts and Ladders: When climbing up onto the monorail in the first full moon, Yukari - wearing the short skirt that she wears as part of her school uniform - goes first and pre-empts this with a "Don't look up!"
• Slice of Life: The game takes a page from this genre and defaults to this for Character Development during the breather scenes.
• Small Name, Big Ego: Subverted with Junpei; he actually comes to realize his status as one and suffers a major inferiority complex as a result.
• Smug Snake: Shuji Ikutsuki, during his Motive Rant.
• Snobby Hobbies: Mitsuru Kirijo is the heiress to the Kirijo Group and is in Gekkoukan's fencing club, and rides a sports motorcycle that helps her get around during the Dark Hour.
• Soft Reboot: This game can be considered this to the Persona series, being released 6 years after the previous entry in the franchise and with a new director and writer. Persona 3 was the game that introduced many of the elements that the series would continue to use going forward; the protagonist being a wildcard and assigned the Fool Arcana, Igor being the in charge of the Velvet Room, Social Links, and emphasis on the day-today school life of the protagonists. In-Universe, the first three games of the series have gotten the occasional Easter egg or reference, but 3 is effectively the "first" game in the modern Persona universe.
• So Long, and Thanks for All the Gear: Averted when Shinjiro dies. You can go through his stuff in his old room in the dorm and take back the equipment you lent him.
• Someone Has to Die: Played straight by the Protagonist, when they sacrifices their soul to become the Great Seal.
• Soundtrack Dissonance:
  • Averted and played straight. During the daytime when the protagonist is exploring Port Island and attending school, the music is very cheery and upbeat J-pop, which is pretty strange for such a serious game. However, when night rolls around and the party heads out to Tartarus or a dungeon, the music becomes significantly darker, more frantic electronic/rap tunes.
  • Completely averted later on, where the happy-sounding exploration music of Port Island, the school, and the dorm are replaced with piano instrumentals for the final month - bleak in the former two's case, triumphant in the latter's.
• So Unfunny, It's Funny: Ikutsuki's jokes are so incredibly lame that it might be difficult not to laugh at them.
• So What Do We Do Now?:
  • After defeating the 12 Shadows, the entire group experiences this and cannot be bothered to go to Tartarus for quite some time. This is not due to completion but rather the discovery your entire party was being used by Shuji Ikutsuki to bring The Fall. Mitsuru is gone for almost a month due to the death of her father.
  • Moreover, one of the main themes of The Answer is how the ex-SEES members are going to move on with their lives after the Main Character's Heroic Sacrifice.
• Speak Ill of the Dead: After one of your True Companions dies, the school holds a memorial service. During this, you overhear some of the students talking shit about the recently deceased, and can choose to confront them. Junpei will no matter what.
• Spirit Advisor: Pharos appears during the Dark Hour across the first two thirds of the game, warning you of impending Full Moon Shadows and offering commentary of your current situation.
• Spoiler Opening:
  • The words that flash up on the screen during the opening heavily imply that the main character will die by the end of the game. In addition, there is a fair bit of Foreshadowing of the connection between the protagonist, Pharos and Ryoji, shows some vague imagery of Shinjiro's and Ikutsuki's deaths, and the lyrics of the theme song hint at the main character's death, with references to a "ticking clock".
  • The opening of FES shows some sequences of the Tournament Arc of The Answer, and the very last shot of the opening is the protagonist activating the Great Seal at the end of the game.
  • Again in Portable's unique opening. Both protagonists at the end are seen over a coffin and are about to use their evokers and the screen turns red when they shoot. Also some double imagery is seen with regards to October 4th. In one half of the screen Ken is calmly standing but in the other half, he's putting his evoker to his head and Shinjiro can be seen in an escalator behind him. Also in the "rapid montage" the group shot of SEES is sandwiched by the love interests in the group.
• Spoiler Title: Parodied in the Show Within a Show Phoenix Ranger Featherman R, with one of its episodes being titled "Death of a Condor! Get your Tissues Ready, Kids!", referencing the semi-infamous last episode of Choujin Sentai Jetman.
• Stalker with a Crush
  • Early in the game, Aigis — for reasons she doesn't fully understand herself — seems to have an obsession with the main character, taking it to the point that she actually breaks into his dorm room to monitor him. We later find out that it's because ten years ago she sealed away the Cosmic Horror's herald inside his body. Her memories of the event were corrupted, which is why she can't explain her desire to be near him.
  • There's an entertaining mini-saga that unfolds between two NPCs: at the start of the year, a girl is stalking a guy she has a massive crush on and slowly becomes repulsed by him. But while she's doing this, he's slowly falling in love with her. Within a month or two, he's the one stalking her. He finally asks her out at the end, gets turned down, and in the epilogue she's back to stalking him while he's not interested.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: Female Protagonist and Ryoji if you opt for Lovers path in his S link.
• Start Screen:
  • The original release featured a shot of a full moon through a blue window pane, behind the Protagonist's silhouette as "The Voice Someone Calls" (The music from the entrance to Tartarus) plays.
  • FES updated this menu by switching from blue to the Sickly Green Glow of the Dark Hour, swapping the Protagonist out for Aigis and incorporating a piano arrangement of "Brand New Days" as the title theme.
  • Portable swapped the title screen out entirely, instead focusing on a shot of Tartarus and a full moon behind a portrait of the Male Protagonist, before swapping to the Female Protagonist after pressing start. Every time the player subsequently returns to the title screen in the same session, the order of the Protagonists swaps.
• Starts with a Suicide: Subverted in two ways. Yukari is seen brandishing a gun to her head and is apparently trying to kill herself in the opening scene, but drops it and starts crying when she's unable to go through with it. Subverted again when it's later learned it was an Evoker and not a real gun, and that she was trying to summon her Persona, which she couldn't go through with out of fear.
• Status Effects: Most of them are consistent with the rest of the series. In addition to regular battle effects (Poison, Charm, Panic, which is similar to Silence, Rage, Fear, Distress, Freeze and Shock - the latter three reduce evasion to zero and make the character more prone to a critical hit), there's also your characters' Condition, which will change depending on how long you do a Tartarus run. Being in Tartarus for too long will make you tired, and overexerting yourself more will make you sick. A sick character in particular's battle performance will greatly suffer. Performing certain tasks can put a character in "Great" condition, which improves battle performance. The Endurance stat in this game is important because a higher endurance allows for a longer run, and by the final two months of the game, one would be hard-pressed to have characters get tired from a long run.
  • The Portable version of the game eases this by only having characters get tired after they complete a run, and resting times to improve Condition are shortened, so in context, one can do a long grinding session from the get-go that would have been impossible in the original and FES games. The Answer does away with Conditions all together.
  • Also in Portable, "Downed" (knocked down from either a critical hit or exposed to an elemental weakness) characters recover and can attack on the same turn (this was lifted from Persona 4), whereas originally, a turn had to be wasted getting back up. The Dizzy status effect is also exclusive to Portable.
• Stealth Pun:
  • Akihiko fights Shadows with various fist weapons, including gloves. So basically, he's a Shadow Boxer.
  • Much of Mara's stats and innate skills are a variety of thinly veiled dick jokes (weak against ice, belongs to the Tower arcana, has the strongest Pierce type attack in the game, etc) and Messiah (who's basically Jesus) comes equipped with Absorb Pierce.
  • The whole time you are taking down the 12 shadows you are leveling up the Fool arcana that represents SEES. Which contrary to what you are led to believe does not stop the Dark Hour, the Shadows, etc. In other words,it's a Fool's Errand. Reversed when you judge the world is worth saving despite it being the harder path and start leveling up the Judgement arcana by ascending the final block with your reformed team to defeat Nyx.
• The Stinger: A brief one in both endings. A "Fin" is displayed on the final shot of both, though both were removed from Persona 3 Portable as that version of the game lacked animated cutscenes.
  • In the bad ending, Akihiko and Mitsuru leaving school on graduation day, before cutting to Yukari, the Male Protagonist, and Junpei partying inside a karaoke booth, ignorant of the upcoming apocalypse.
  • In the good ending, the Male Protagonist and Aigis are joined on the roof of the school by the rest of the party, presumably only moments after his death. Aigis looks at the group and smiles.
• Student Council President: Mitsuru Kirijo.
• Stupidity Is the Only Option: The only way to start the Devil Social Link is to pay the man clearly trying to rip you off 40,000 yen over a period of three visits. He even points this out after you pay the third time
• Summon Magic: The "Evoking" of one's Persona in battle, mainly carried out by shooting oneself in the head with a gun-shaped Evoker.
• Superboss:
  • The Reaper, who huts the party down in Tartarus if they spend too much time on a specific floor.
  • Upon defeating the Reaper, the player unlocks the Monad Depths and a request to defeat the ultimate enemy - Elizabeth. In Persona 3 Portable, Theodore can replace the latter depending on choices made at the start of the game.
  • Persona 3 Portable opens an entire roomful of bonus bosses during the final month, presided over by Margaret from Persona 4; most of these are harder variations on the Full Moon bosses with vastly increased stats and other limiting conditions for each fight. Defeat all of those, and you can fight Margaret herself.
• Super Mode: Aigis's "Orgia Mode" gives her increased firepower for a few turns. Metis also has this functionality, with the added bonus of making her skills free to cast.
• Super Move Portrait Attack: The game shows a close-up of the hero every time a Fusion Spell is used. Portraits of the Personas involved will appear to his sides. It also randomly shows a cut-in of a character's eyes when their Persona either hits a weakness or gets a Critical Hit (and the very first time they summon in battle as part of the story). This applies both to party members and enemy Persona-users (plus the optional superboss). Finally, when all enemies are knocked down, a character will suggest (via portrait pop-up and a voice-over) initiating an All-Out Attack. Agree, and the screen will throw up the portraits of all characters participating in the attack.
• Supernatural Gold Eyes:
  • Elizabeth and Theodore, who have only a nodding acquaintance with humanity. Their origins are never explained, but the use of golden eyes to mark someone's Shadow self in Persona 2 and Persona 4 has had some interesting implications.
  • In a similar vein, Takaya, who isn't a Shadow or a supernatural entity himself, but has supernatural powers nonetheless. Persona 4 also demonstrated that people possessed by their own Shadows exhibit this trait, possibly implying the same about him.
  • In the movie adaptation, Makoto briefly has his eyes turn gold after he summons his Ultimate Persona, Messiah.
• Super Title 64 Advance: Persona 3 Portable. Its official abbreviation of "P3P" visually resembles "PSP."
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • The Logical Weakness of a Persona user is that when they are not focused enough to evoke and maintain the presence of their Personas to protect themselves, they are no different from a normal human. Thus, it is no surprise gunfire can easily kill one in cutscenes when they would have normally shrugged it off in battles.
  • Social Links requires you to form bonds with various people in order to maximize Persona fusions. Unfortunately, in order to maximize efficiency, the protagonist usually has to pick dialogue options that agrees to their thinking no matter how self-destructive they are (Kazuchi and Hidetoshi) or how unsavory they are (Nozomi and Tanaka) lest the player wants to waste more time gaining points. At one point, you are forced to say something critical to Nozomi which results in him immediately cutting ties with you and by extension reversing the Social Link. Fortunately, the Social Link is immediately restored after an untimely event.
• Suspiciously Apropos Music: The remix of "Burn My Dread" used for the final battle is an in-universe song, as the protagonist is seen listening to it in the opening. The song contains lyrics about how the game is almost over, the hardships the protagonist had to go through to reach this point, and that this is the hero's last chance to save the world.
• Suspicious Video-Game Generosity: Be wary if you're suddenly encountering nothing but Golden Shadows. Death is likely on his way. Be even warier if you come across a floor with no shadows and lots of rare golden chests. Death is likely to be around the next corner.
• Take a Third Option: Aigis's decision in the PC arena battles in The Answer. Yukari and Mitsuru want to use the time key to go back and see the Main Character again, Akihiko and Ken want to respect the decisions the main character made, and Junpei and Koromaru want to beat the crap out of everyone until they listen to reason. Aigis takes a fourth option — to watch the miracle being performed so they can figure out what, exactly, the Main Character knew when he made his sacrifice.
• Takes One to Kill One: During a flashback in "The Answer", when a young Mitsuru and her father's entourage first entered Tartarus, one of officers note Shadows are completely unaffected by conventional weapons. However, mundane weapons in the hands of Persona users are capable of harming Shadows just fine. It is subsequently explained by Metis that Personas operate under the same powers and laws as Shadows, and it extends to any weapon a Persona user has at hand.
• Take Your Time:
  • Nefariously played straight with the Dark Hour. It's a proverbial twenty-fifth hour, and yet the player can take as much time as they need grinding in Tartarus. The only thing that they need to keep an eye on is the condition of their party members, which does wear down over time, but by the time October rolls around, it takes a lot of effort for the party to tire out. In Portable, the mid-dungeon tiring function is removed, so you can go for long runs right from the beginning of the game. The only part of the game where there's any urgency (the game's only Timed Mission in this case) is the first Full Moon boss, and it's because the train you're riding on is about to crash, not because of the Dark Hour ending.
  • On the other hand, because the game runs on a calendar-driven school year, the "day" portion of the game averts this; this also applies to Social Links and most of Elizabeth/Theodore's requests.
• Taking the Bullet:
  • Shinjiro literally takes a bullet for Ken, after he had already been shot once. By a high caliber round, at that.
  • In Portable, after reaching certain level of Social Link with SEES, there is a chance that one of your teammates will take damage from attack that would kill the MC. Since losing the leader means Game Over, it's pretty helpful.
• Tarot Motifs: Absolutely pervade the game.
  • Each Persona and each Shadow in the game is associated with a particular Arcana. Additionally, the game's protagonist can develop Social Links with other characters; each of these characters is also associated with a particular Arcana—the higher level a particular Social Link is, the more of a boost you'll get when fusing a Persona of that Arcana.
  • The Minor Arcana also appear when dungeon crawling (you can draw cards after battles that have various effects based on the suit) and as Rare Candy items in the Portable rererlease.
• Teaser Equipment: Alternate clothing can be purchased from the police station early on. Sadly, by the time you'll be able to afford it, more effective armor is already available.
• Tempting Fate: During the October 4th Full Moon, Yukari jests that the team won't have to face the remaining three shadows within three full moons if they don't appear as one on one battles. Cue Fuuka, who confirmed that her hunch was right - Strength and Fortune appear at the same time.
• That Came Out Wrong: During the Protagonist's first day at Gekkoukan, Yukari tells them "Seriously, don't say anything about last night" - right in front of a very surprised Junpei, who is not yet a SEES member at this point. She was referring, of course, to their awkward first encounter at the dorm which happened in the last few moments of the Dark Hour, but Junpei immediately latches onto the less innocent interpretation, a situation further exacerbated on the Male Protagonist route by the fact their classmates have started spreading rumours about the two because they seen arriving at school together. Cue stereotypical reaction from Yukari when she realizes exactly what she said.
• Theme Music Power-Up: In the opening scene of the game, the protagonist has his headphones on listening to the song Burn My Dread-Last Battle- while the audience only gets the muffled version that comes as a result. During the final sealing of Nyx, the song finally plays as the background music in its full glory to represent the fact that you will win this fight no matter what, though at the ultimate price.
• Theme Naming:
  • Igor and his assistants are named after characters in the novel Frankenstein.
  • Also the mythology used; in this game, most of the main characters' personas are derived from Greek Mythology.
• These Are Things Man Was Not Meant to Know: Elizabeth/Theo's response if you ask what's in Octopia's takoyaki.
• This Is a Drill: An... interesting set of pictures on the Japanese Persona 3:Portable blog was released on 9 October 2009, one of which.
• This Is Reality: To quote Mitsuru early on: "This isn't a game, Akihiko." (Right)
• Through His Stomach: Of the various gifts the protagonist can give to S.Links, the ones most guaranteed to go over well are the various homemade foods made at cooking club. Additionally, starting Koromaru's S.Link in the female protagonist's route involves feeding him.
• Timed Mission:
  • In the second full moon event, the Boss Of The Month takes control of a monorail and traps the party inside, forcing you to fight your way through to the front and defeat said boss before the train crashes.
  • Margaret's superboss battle in Portable involves needing to deal enough damage within ten turns to force her to change phases. If you don't, she forces a Total Party Kill.
• Time Skip: Happens if the player chooses to kill Ryoji in the bad ending, the game will skip 3 months into graduation day. Otherwise, on the normal ending, the game will skip from January 31st to the month of March.
• Time Travel: Prominently featured in Persona 3: FES, with numerous iterations.
  • Intangible Time Travel: Most of the "Doors of Time" only allow the party to view the event in question without being able to interact with it.
  • Portal to the Past: One of the "Doors of Time" leads to a past version of Paulownia Mall, allowing the team to buy supplies.
  • Temporal Paradox: At one point late in the game, Junpei voices the worry that by traveling back in time to see the Main Character one more time, they'll undo their defeat of Nyx in the previous time.
• Title Drop: The Answer side story, and the last line of its Game Over message.
  He who had been your proof... your life itself... The answer has has been lost, never to be found again."''
• Took a Level in Badass:
  • Level 6 Courage bestows upon you, quite literally, the title of Badass.
  • Happens to S.E.E.S (except Koromaru) as they obtain their respective Ultimate Persona, especially Junpei who receives his in the middle of a fight against Strega, while the others simply obtain theirs in their free time. This upgrade is also reflected in gameplay as their resistance upgrades into an immunity and they begin learning stronger skills in the higher levels.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Yukari in The Answer. She gets better.
• Tournament Arc: In The Answer, the splintered party members organize a short tournament to settle their differences. Naturally, the main character's faction winds up fighting everybody else, two at a time.
• Tragic Monster: Ryoji, who is the avatar of Nyx.
• Trauma Conga Line:
  • Think of Shinjiro, about what happened to him. And every single thing that he's gone through is actually very serious and manages to totally avoid going overboard, which is what makes it so incredibly awful.
  • SEES in general gets hit with this very hard. Especially later in the game, starting in October and ending in the Answer.
• Traumatic Superpower Awakening: Apparently required in order to summon a Persona.
• Triple Shifter: Battling in Tartarus does affect you if you stay in there too long; characters can become "Tired" or "Sick," both affecting combat performance as long as the effect lasts.
• Triumphant Reprise:
  • The dorm theme in the final month of the game changes to a remix of "Living with Determination". While the main piano melody remains unchanged, the addition of an upbeat drumbeat gives the song a fitting climactic feel, representing the party's resolve to avert the upcoming apocalypse.
  • The main theme, "Burn My Dread", gets a hip-hop remix that was first heard in the game's opening cutscene for the post-final boss sequence.
• Troubled, but Cute: Shinjiro. Gets elevated to levels way beyond eleven in his Social Link, which was added for the female's story in Portable (complete with a romance option).
• Troubling Unchildlike Behaviour: The imagery of children and teenagers committing mock-suicide is more than a little unsettling at first, is likely the single biggest reason behind the game's M rating in North America. (Well, that and Mara.)
• True Art Is Angsty: Akinari's pink alligator story is a sad one, with the eponymous character's difficulty in life due to being born an unnatural color, the loss of its only friend, and its Bittersweet Ending. He felt that makes a good, hopeful story.
• True Companions:
  • As mentioned above. Surprisingly for a Shin Megami Tensei game, the Gekkoukan team is a very pure example of the trope. It's explicitly mentioned when they begin their Fool's Journey as SEES (Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad) and their determination to fight a Cosmic Horror makes them change their name to Nyx Annihilation Team, empowered by the Judgement Arcana.
  • Though its played with a bit in that unlike the Persona 4 cast, they aren't all best friends with each other. The second years and the third years of the group tend to keep to themselves most of the time and they do fight a fair amount as tension rises. And aside from Yukari and Mitsuru, it seems none of them become best friends by the end. That said, on a professional level they trust each other completely by the end of the game.
• Tsundere: The MC's homeroom teacher, Ms. Toriumi, if the protagonist completes the Hermit S. Link. Upon discovering who "Tatsuya" is, she flips out, asks the MC out to dinner, then throws a dictionary on the ground and runs away while beet red in the face yelling "To hell with this!"
• Turns Red: A few bosses do this, but most notably, the Final Boss, on its last form, begins using a technique that grants it "Repel" status against everything (including the supposedly unblockable Almighty spells) for a few turns, and then it starts using the Night Queen attack, which deals massive Almighty damage to the party and has the capability of inflicting any status effect on the party..
• Two Guys and a Girl:
  • The dynamic between the Protagonist, Junpei, and Yukari. Tellingly, this relationship is maintained even in the Bad Ending, wherein everyone loses their memories of the past year.
  • Akihiko, Mitsuru, and Shinjiro were also the original founding members of SEES. Interesting enough, they're also the only two characters Mitsuru is on first name basis with as well.
  • Downplayed with Strega - whilst Takaya, Jin and Chidori fit on a surface level, they only share three scenes together as a trio, and Chidori's relationships with Takaya and Jin aren't fleshed out before her death. Expanded materials, such as a Drama CD and a novelization, would further develop their group dynamic.

Tropes U-Z

• Unbroken Vigil: Yukari keeps one for the Protagonist, after they collapse and spend a week in a coma after awakening to their power.
• Undying Loyalty: Koromaru is a Fictional Counterpart of Hachikō. Even a year after his owner was killed, Koromaru would still go on the same walk that his owner used to take him on every day. Koromaru is eventually revealed have a human-like intelligence and joins the party as a Team Pet to avenge his master, who turns out to have been killed by Shadows.
• Unintentionally Unwinnable: Because advancing the story line is irrespective of how much time the party has actually spent dungeon crawling and gaining levels, this can happen if the next Full Moon area is accessed too early: if SEES isn't leveled up enough, beating the Full Moon boss can be practically impossible, and there are rarely ever enemies to grind out levels on in the Full Moon areas. Thankfully, this isn't a fatal example, as save files can always be reloaded. The developers were obviously aware of this and made steps to avoid it, as stated in the Developer's Foresight entry above.
• Updated Re-release:
  • Persona 3 FES added a Social Link for Aigis, the ability to take Koromaru for walks, the ability to revive Chidori and new story events to accommodate this, video recordings of the S.E.E.S. members in their free time, and a variety of quality of life changes such as more Personas and a harder diffculty mode. It also included "The Answer" - a Playable Epilogue to the main story.
  • Persona 3 Portable reworked the 'FES version of the game as a Visual Novel due to technical limitations, with only the Full Moon operations and Tartarus exploration retaining the 3D overworld. Whilst lacking "The Answer" and anime cutscenes of the console version, Portable added a Female Protagonist that offered a different path through the narrative. It also backported a number of quality of life changes from Persona 4, which had released in the interim.
• Urban Fantasy: The game is set in a city of 2009 Japan, where a strange phenomenon occurs at midnight, monsters known as Shadows hunt helpless victims, and scientists have developed Anti-Shadow weapons in the form of androids.
• Useless Useful Spell:
  • Averted, as per MegaTen fare; though some enemies (and all bosses) are immune or resistant to some, bad status effect skills and instant death spells are completely viable. A VERY lethal combination is a Fear inducing skill followed by Ghastly Wail, which will NEVER miss. Ever. Bonus points if you first use a skill that increases suceptibility to status effects. This makes boss encounters like Fortune & Strength even more anticlimax than they already are...
  • Still played straight thanks to your teammates using said spells at the worst possible times. Even if the spells aren't useless, they're tremendously situational. The straightest example is Yukari keeping Charmdi the entire game. A team member's skill slot being permanently taken by a single-target status heal that only works for one status is obviously a bad idea. On the useful side, Charm is probably the single most devastating status you can have and when it's a threat you will be glad it's there.
• Use Your Head: Shinjiro uses this as part of his critical animation, and to easily knock down a thug that was charging at him... right before challenging the thug to try and kill him. The thug's reaction?
  Thug: Screw This, I'm Outta Here!
• Verbal Tic: In the Japanese version Aigis ends most of her sentences with the formal "de arimasu." She drops it after her Character Development.
• The Very Definitely Final Dungeon:
  • Averted in the traditional sense, as Tartarus is the only dungeon in the game. That being said, it's divided into six blocks (and a basement), with the sixth and topmost block only unlocking in the final month of the game if you've fulfilled the requirements for the good ending. Even then, the topmost floors of the tower which lead to the final few bosses only become accessible on the final playable day of the game.
  • The Empyrean section of The Answer marks the final leg of dungeon crawling, as the end of this segment holds the protagonist's Shadow, which then cues SEES's infighting and then the final boss of The Answer.
• Victory Pose: Whoever lands the killing blow will pull a victory pose. If the final blow was an All-Out Attack, the game treats it as the main character landing the kill.
• Video Game Caring Potential: Most of the social links involve helping each of the NPCs overcome their problems. Since the Female Protagonist in P3P has a new set of social links, including all the male members of SEES, the caring potential's practically doubled.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential:
  • Forcing your allies to kill themselves on various barriers is very effective for at least one boss.
  • What's that? Death is coming and you aren't near a stairway or access point? Quick! Split the team up on the floor and hope the Reaper chases down one of your teammates while you flee to safety!
• Video Game Cruelty Punishment: Some of the more callous dialogue choices in your Social Link events are bound to tick off the other party. Too many missteps and you may even reverse the Link!
• Virtual Paper Doll: You can purchase (for ludicrously high prices, mind) or find some special outfits that will change a character's outfit in battle. For both genders, they include each character's summer and winter casual outfits, and swimsuits for whoever went on the Yakushima trip (Aigis instead has her iconic blue sundress). For the boys, they get a Shirt of Chivalry (clothing inspired by Japanese peasant wear) with a different kanji on the back derived from each guy's personality, and for the girls, all of them get maid outfits, and Yukari and Mitsuru get high-cut armor (renamed "Battle Panties" in the PSP version), which looks like something you'd find in the closet of the love hotel from the July full moon mission. The Portable version also adds butler suits for the boys, Santa dresses for the girls, and if you're playing as the female protagonist, she can also wear the Battle Panties.
• Visual Initiative Queue: Hold down R1 during battle and everyone involved will have a number appear next to them showing their turn in battle.
• Visual Novel: Portable exchanges full 3D environments and models in the downtime cutscenes for static sprites and backgrounds, making the game feel more like a visual novel to compensate for the portable console's limits. This also does mean that nearly every character gets a conversation sprite.
• Visual Pun: The persona Mara is a rather NSFW example of this. The Persona/Demon is also a Running Gag for the series.
• Wake-Up Call Boss:
  • The Hierophant. It's the first boss in the entire game that shows just how much status effects are going to fuck you over, having an attack that causes Fear against the part and following up with a party scaled physical attack, and if more than one character has Fear and you don't have Junpei with you, or you do have Junpei and he gets affected and skips his turn, it's going to cause some massive damage, as well as getting a guaranteed bonus turn in P3P. While there are harder bosses in the game, including before this one, it really is the first boss that shows just how insane some of the battles can get and how one turn can screw with your strategy.
  • Early on, there's the third Guardian Shadow, Rampage Drive. It nullifies all physical attacks (and also repels Strike), is resistant to Fire (what Junpei excels in), and can use the Electric Skill Mazio (Yukari's weakness). Unless if you can use Persona Fusion efficiently to get Omoikane (resists Elec, decent Magic stat), or level up Pixie enough to learn Pulinpa (inflicts Panic, preventing Skills to be cast), you might have to sacrifice quite a bit to get the first Old Document.
• Wake Up, Go to School & Save the World: The game's main premise in a nutshell. Mitsuru will often remind you that, as a student, your studies are every bit as important as your duties at SEES. Conversely, Yukari and Junpei will complain about having exams so soon after a grueling plot-driven boss battle.
• Weak, but Skilled: The Michael Persona has a full-team heal, two ma-dyne spells, repels his weakness, and learns the unique move Heaven's Blade, which has the highest critical rate in the game and will do almost as much damage as Brave Blade. However, he has very low stats that don't grow easily.
• Weapon Specialization: With most of them connecting to a personality trait of each party member, while some don't.
  • The Male Protagonist can use any weapon type, but he usually prefers one-handed swords, unsurprisingly. He's locked into that option for Persona 3 Portable.
  • The Female Protagonist from the PSP version wields naginatas, possibly to evoke the image of the wives of samurai who wielded them.
  • Yukari uses bows; she's a member of the archery club.
  • Junpei uses two-handed swords, wielding them like a baseball bat. He offhandedly mentions that he wanted to be a baseball player as a kid.
  • Akihiko, captain of Gekkoukan's boxing team, fights with his fists, with his equipment including gloves and spurs.
  • Mitsuru is a member of Gekkoukan's fencing team; she can use any sort of one-handed sword in the original and FES games, but is locked to rapiers in the Portable version.
  • Aigis, a robot, uses gun attachments on her arms.
  • Koromaru uses a small knife that he holds in his mouth, probably to avoid directly biting the Shadows.
  • Ken uses large, unwieldy spears. He says he does so to compensate for his shorter stature against foes.
  • Shinjiro, the resident heavy hitter, uses axes. Metis in The Answer also uses them.
• We Cannot Go On Without You: If the Protagonist kicks the bucket, the game is over. Although it's not apparent at first, it turns out there's a storyline reason for this: the Protagonist is the human vessel for the cosmic force of Death. If they were to be killed in battle, Death would be released, and all would be lost.
• Weird Moon: Like most of the SMT games, bad mojo brews when the moon is full. In Persona 3, which is unique in that it has a set amount of time before the world ends, there's a set number of full moons and each calls forth one or more extremely powerful Shadows themed after a specific Arcana of the Tarot - beginning with the Warmup Boss, The Magician.
• We Used to Be Friends: Akihiko and Mitsuru with Shinjiro.
• We Were Your Team: After the death of the MC, the remaining members of S.E.E.S. went their separate ways. The separation itself was not all that unusual: after all, the group no longer had a reason to exist and two of its members had just finished high school. However, during the events of The Answer in FES, it's made clear that the MC was the only person who could keep the group together and that everyone was devastated by his sudden and unexplained death. The void left behind by his departure not only ended up trapping the remaining members of S.E.E.S. in a "Groundhog Day" Loop, but also led them to fight among themselves.
• We Would Have Told You, But...: Mitsuru knows more about Tartarus and the Dark Hour than she initially lets on.
• Wham Episode: The full moons towards the end of 2009 carry many big revelations with them.
  • On October 4th, Ken confronts Shinji over the death of his mother, and as Strega intervenes, Shinji dies taking a bullet for Ken.
  • On November 4th, you find out the Dark Hour hasn't gone away despite defeating all the Full Moon Shadows, and Ikutsuki's been playing all of S.E.E.S. to bring about The Fall.
  • On December 2nd, you learn that Ryoji is the embodiment of the Death Arcana Shadow that had been sealed away within the protagonist, and was involved with the death of the protagonist's parents ten years ago.
• Wham Line: The Post-Final Boss drops one when it comes time to use your ultimate skill to seal away Nyx: The "Great Seal" skill's HP cost, which is all of your hit points.
• Wham Shot:
  • The usual Dark Hour intro animation playing on 11.04, when you were led to believe you'd got rid of it for good.
  • At the beginning of The Answer, Aigis attempting to summon Athena to protect Ken from Metis, only for Orpheus to emerge instead.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: What happened to Takaya after he collapsed in laughter atop Tartarus during the ending sequence? Everyone else was sent to the foot of the tower as it went away, so where did he go?
• What the Hell, Hero?: Mitsuru will lecture you if you don't go into Tartarus within the first 10 days of being recruited after you come back to the dorms.
• What the Hell, Player?: In Portable, failing (or not bothering) to rescue Bunkichi or Maiko while their respective Social Link is maxed out will cause Mitsuko or Maiko's father respectively to leave an unpleasant remark during the Playable Epilogue.
• What You Are in the Dark: The choice regarding whether to kill Ryoji or try to fight Nyx ultimately comes down to this, since if the protagonist goes against the rest of the team's wishes and kills him, nobody will remember that it was ever even an issue.
• When the Clock Strikes Twelve: The plot of the game literally revolves around this due to the occurrence of the Dark Hour. If you go to Tartarus, or during scripted Dark Hour events, a clock appears, ticking towards 12 o'clock before breaking apart.
• Where Does He Get All Those Wonderful Toys?: Officer Kurosawa sells the main characters weapons and armor. This doesn't explain where he gets all these functional medieval weapons, however.
• Whole-Plot Reference:
  • The entire plot is very familar to those who've played Persona at least with the Snow Queen Quest. Nietzsche Wannabe who wants to bring about the end of the world through a sacrifice, check. Not to metion that the Snow Queen IS Nyx. Also the main aesop of the main game (Don't run away from your problems) is mirrored in Ken's Character Development.
  • The game also shares many similarities with Neon Genesis Evangelion, mainly its theme of fighting against an unknown threat (Angels/Shadows), the approaching end of the world (Instrumentality/The Fall) and how people deal with death. Now if you add in the fact that the Protagonist shares quite a few characteristics with Shinji (even the headphones!), Aigis with Rei, Yukari with Asuka, and Ryoji with Kaworu, the game feels very different.
  • The game is also very similar to the original four .hack games. In .hack, The Cursed Wave, a sentient computer virus, puts people into a vegetative state to herald the coming of 8 bosses who are parts of one big super boss, Morganna, who threatens to end the world. In Persona 3, The Shadows, sentient manifestations of the human psyche, put people into a vegetative state to herald the coming of 12 bosses who are parts of one big super boss, Death, who threatens to end the world via two bigger super bosses, Nyx and Erebus. There is also the appearance of an unrelated third party in both; .hack has Cubia, a downright Eldritch Abomination, while Persona 3 has a group of Persona users called Strega who use Personas for pleasure and excitement. However, in .hack, Corbenik, the last of the eight bosses, is the Final Boss, while here, Corbenik's counterpart, the Hanged Man, is not. Afterwards, it is also revealed that Strega is connected to the plot, unlike Cubia, who was his own case. Even the gameplay is fairly similar, from the controlling of your party members through generic tactics and listening to their squeals of delight when they gain levels to the in-universe names for elements and types of spells, where Repth in the .hack universe becomes Dia. The social links can even be seen as extended, more central to the plot versions of the e-mails you could send your teammates in the .hack games.
• Wistful Amnesia: As an act of mercy to let the party die peacefully, Ryoji gives them the choice of killing him, which causes them to forget about everything related to the Dark Hour and lets them lead peaceful lives until The Fall happens. It doesn't work on Aigis, though, and she has no choice but to wait for the end to come, knowing she cannot do a thing about it.
• With This Herring: Unlike other Persona games where it's just a group of teenagers who've stumbled onto the plot and have to do everything themselves, in Persona 3 there's an actual organization that the protagonist is working with, but you're still expected to mostly pay for your own gear out of pocket, even though Kirijo is loaded and could easily afford to buy the team's gear herself even if S.E.E.S. somehow couldn't.
• Wrench Wench: Fuuka Yamagishi likes to work on electronics.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: It is not until The Answer that SEES learns that Shadows are not invaders from another world but people's dark psyche taking physical form.
• Yakuza:
  • The Kirijo Group, complete with a company-owned High School (that doubled as a Shadow research facility, a (presumably) company-owned hospital capable of holding its patients hostage without raising eyebrows, and access to military-grade weaponry, is either this or a very corrupt and powerful local corporation... And in Japan, there's usually very little to separate the former from the latter.
  • There's also officer Kurosawa's 'connections'... Which appear to have no problem giving a police officer access to lethal weaponry to sell off-the-counter to schoolchildren. It's vaguely implied that his 'connections' are Kirijo pulling strings, too.
• Year Outside, Hour Inside: Akihiko theorizes this about Tartarus, which only shows up during the Dark Hour. When Fuuka is trapped inside, she claims to have only been there for a few hours, when in reality she's been missing for several days.
• Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe:
  • Averted, surprisingly. "Thou art I, and I am thou..." looks awkward, but is a legitimate use of subject complements.
  • An equivalent of this is in the Japanese version as well (it uses "nanji"), though the Japanese version isn't grammatically incorrect.
• You Killed My Father:
  • A subdued version plays out as Yukari's convinced that the Kirijo Group is hiding the truth about her father's death, and she's spent the past few years trying to find out what really happened. Once she learns the answer, it doesn't help.
  • And the whole October 4th affair is that Shinjiro accidentally murdered Ken's mom when going after a shadow with his newly found Persona. Ken wasn't very happy about that.
• Your Princess Is in Another Castle!: Hooray, you've destroyed the last of the Full Moon shadows and destroyed the Dark Hour! ...right?

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