So. I recently finally got around to checking out Persona 3 Portable (I have to admit, having more fun playing as the female MC in contrast to previously playing P3 and P3 FES as the male MC) and I've fallen back in love with the Persona series and have started to check out the other PSP updates (I don't currently have a Vita, but will have one soon so I can check out Persona 4 Golden for the differences to the original PS2 version) and have been picking up Persona merchandise (mainly soundtracks/remix albums official and fan remix albums, doujinshi) but I just can't decide if I should start fully collecting it as well. I already had some old 90s GFantasy issues that had the original Persona manga chapters in them as well. I mean, I really enjoy the series and MT/SMT but I was wondering if there were any Persona or MT/SMT collectors on here for some input as I veered away from collecting Final Fantasy stuff (too much stuff for me to keep track of) as if most of the stuff is worth collecting for content quality or if it's mainly bloated crap. I'm always amazed by some of the awesome collection rooms I see on here quite a bit, but the majority of my collections tend to live in a couple of boxes near my desk in my workspace as they never really had massive amounts of retail stuff and I've mainly been picking up marketing materials or fan made-stuff like doujinshi as of late because there's not been anything happening with the series for a couple of years (though, Drakengard has Drag-on Dragoon 3 so that's given me some new stuff, like the awesome DoD 10th Anniversary Box to order) but I've been wary of collecting after seeing the sheer amount of stuff with say.... Final Fantasy or Resident Evil can have, but I've found that a lot of the items tend to have reissues that tend to just bloat out stuff to collect. TL; DR - Is Persona and/or Megami Tensei and/or Shin Megami Tensei a decent series as a whole to start getting into collecting properly given that I enjoy it, or does it seem like there's a massive bloating of merchandise for them as a whole, including constant reissues to the extent that collecting would be ridiculous? I just don't know any Persona or MT/SMT collectors to ask, so hearing the opinion of other collectors' in general would be a great help as I'm used to collecting and documenting game series merchandise that tend to be a lot smaller. ^^;
I kinda shy away from "collecting" SMT because of what you bring up. There's so much good stuff out there that I know I won't be able to spend money on all of it. If you are in Japan, it would be easier, but there's a lot of awesome stuff that gets made in limited quantities, etc. That doesn't mean I don't want to pick up the odd thing here & there (like that Teddy Nendoroid), but man, if I committed myself to everything, I'd be flat broke in a minute. P.S., if you like a female MC, go get yourself a copy of Persona 2: Eternal Punishment now! I think it was rereleased on PSP if the Playstation prices are too high.
I noticed that they do quite a lot of limited edition stuff. I already had a copy of one of the Persona 3 cds that had a limited edition release, but I was looking at a deluxe edition of some sort that some of the older PS1 versions had as I'm more of a soundtrack/artbook type of collector but as the other series' that I collect stuff of never really have that much to collect is how I've ended up with piles of guidebooks, marketing and so-on. I saw how many of the little cute Nendoroid and other figures there are when I went to two conventions recently and saw nothing but walls of mini Persona figures that were way too overpriced in my opinion. I have the PSN versions of the originals as PS1 classics and the PSP updated versions, I just haven't gotten around to checking out the updated Persona 2 versions as I recall only playing one of the PS1 Persona games beforehand and a bit of the Digital Devil Saga games as I mainly recall them being a pain to track down good condition copies around where I was living at the time. I'm bummed out that there's no Theodore figures or stuff as of yet but Elizabeth has a decent amount of figures and statues already.
How is SMT IV so far? No spoilers if possible outside of cameos or references to the older games. ^^; I haven't been able to try it out as at both the conventions I've been to this year in Sydney and Melbourne, both the Nintendo booths had everything but the SMT IV demos out, none of the shops nearby have had any 3DS test units out either. I'm probably getting a Vita first due to the price drop, but I'm importing from the US either way as I'm most likely moving to the US at some point next year so I've been avoiding buying handhelds and the like partially due to price and region locking. So in the meantime, I've been catching up on my backlog of games and that's how I ended up rekindling my love for the series. Feels nice to play a good RPG for a change compared to the last couple of years I've been going over survival horror and other stuff.
Well, I think you can see as to why it's a bit confusing given... Anyway, just really wondering as I do enjoy the games and I tend to pick up merchandise for particular titles I like but I don't know any Persona or SMT collectors to ask about them as I know that some item categories are a bit bloated (statues/figures/device covers/book sleeves for Persona 4 stuff at the moment) but I like the overall stylization of the series and would love to get most of the stuff just on the fence about staying with what I've been doing in terms of collecting - just picking up stuff I've been interested in for certain titles as I go. So I've got currently: Persona manga, original GFantasy issues before they were put into volumes Persona 2 manga Persona 3 manga Persona 3 Portable manga Persona 3 Desktop Disc (pre-order disc with the JPN version) Persona 3 artbook P3P Fanbook Persona 2 IS/EP OST P3 EU/US P3 FES US P3P JPN, US P4 EU, US P3 OST (including the sampler one with the US version) P3 FES OST P3P OST P3P Voice Mix Arrange Burn My Dread -Reincarnation: PERSONA3- LE CD AT1st ~Persona3&Persona4~ Club Arrange (well, pre-ordered but waiting for it to arrive) All of the P3, P3 Character Drama, P3P Drama CDs [Noesis] Velvetroom Arrange CD Persona 4 OSTs (including the sampler one with the EU version) Official keyrings like the Velvet Key A couple of the little cute statues, action figures of characters I like as well. I did have copies of the older MT/SMT and Persona games somewhere too, but that's about all I can think of at the moment. I just really can't make up my mind about it. Argh. Driving me nuts.
I am the super fan that did get a 3ds for SMT4 (I just happen to get one from work a week after SMT 4 came out). I like it better than all the other DS SMT games so far. Do I like it better than the PS2 games? Very close!. For a while I couldn't put it down. If I were you, I'd just stick to picking up the things you're interested in. I missed out on a few things because shipping was ridiculous or it was a tiny Japan only release type of release. It's not worth losing sleep over. For example, it was something like $30 + shipping from japan for a Junes t-shirt. That money was much better spent on buying SMT4.
i love the persona series to death even though i only own persona 3 persona 4 and persona 4 arena ive played them enouth to be a fan of the series and because u dont realy need to be a fan of the actual SMT series to enjoy them that makes it better as for the actualy SMT series i dont really care they seem more complicated to me but i might try them because i like giving games a chance ^^
Thank you very much mate. I'll probably be importing a Vita, 3DS, SMT4, P4G, P4A (as that is also region locked) in a couple of weeks. I would have this week but I've had to get shitty tenants forcibly removed from a property and fork out money to get a couple of pairs of glasses as it turns out, I actually need glasses. I was just kinda half-half on it as I've seen a couple of neat stuff labeled as limited edition stuff but some of the pricing has been ridiculous. $300+ for a Persona 3 pre-order partial tarot card set? Some of the stuff I've seen so far I haven't been sure if they're real or not as I've seen more fanmade stuff of tarot cards and the like than official ones like the Persona 4 Tarot Playing Cards (mind you, I've been making my own full tarot deck by taking photos whilst I've been playing P3P and redoing everything in Photoshop so I already have the Major Arcana, half of the Minor Arcana made and will be starting on the Persona cards and eventually my own Le Grimoire De Coeur for display and cosplay purposes - my husband has agreed to cosplay Theodore for me). I've been looking at the guidebooks for Persona 3, I haven't unwrapped my Persona 3 artbook or P3P fanbook so I'm not sure which would be best but if you've gotten any of the Persona 3 guidebooks - is there a particular one which has the majority of the actual artwork of the Personas used in the game? I've mainly seen scans with rendered art of them and just wanted to put them towards my own project so I can make some high res scans to use for it.
