Persona 3 Reload Episode Aigis: The Answer launches Sept 10 – hands-on report

You’ve spent dozens of hours in Tartarus, you’ve maxed out numerous social links, and you’ve finally conquered all of the challenges Persona 3 Reload has to offer–or so you thought. In the upcoming Persona 3 Recharger: Episode Aigis DLC coming to PS5 and PS4 on September 10, you’ll meet a new companion, face a new onslaught of threats, and tie up many of the loose ends of the story. At the heart of it all stands Aigis, an android who has come to know human feeling and the grief of loss.

A wrap gone awry

At the end of your challenging, emotionally fraught journey in Persona 3 Recharger, you put the embodiment of death to bed and ended an unforgettable school year–at great cost. Now it’s March 31st, a few weeks post-graduation day, and all of the former S.E.E.S. members are getting ready to pack their bags and leave the dorm for good. At the low-key but somber goodbye dinner gathering, android Aigis reveals she’s going back to the lab that originally built her.

But as soon as the clock strikes midnight, the day starts over. It’s discovered that nobody can leave the dorm. Et alors, a strange assailant attacks the remaining S.E.E.S. team out of nowhere…

A disastrous family reunion

The strange assailant turns out to be another android named Metis, and she seems to be of a similar model to Aigis. So similar, en fait, that she’s claiming she’s Aigis’ sœur. She also makes it clear that she is very attached to and protective of her “sibling” — en fait, that’s why she attacked the dorm: to protect Aigis.

This is all news to Aigis, who has been encountering her own strange occurrences lately, capped off by a trip to the famous Velvet Room after repelling Metis’s initial attack. When she wakes up back in the dorm, she’s got new armor, a new Persona, and a massive problem in the form of a combination time loop, barrier from the outside, and huge mystery door in the dorm’s floor.

These ominous doors lead into the Abyss of Time, the cause of all these bizarre happenings. First stop is the Desert of Doors, a place that looks exactly like the name suggests. And who’s that strange figure seen entering one of the doors? Qu'une seule façon de le savoir: make a party and make chase.

A door to mystery

The focus of Episode Aigis is on the heroic android. She assumes the leading role easily, taking center stage on the title and status screen, and assumes the Persona-changing power of the Wild Card herself with ease. Being stuck in the dorm means she won’t be able to go out and do activities or forge Social Links, but there’s still plenty of story and character development to dive into throughout the DLC’s roughly 30-hour runtime as Aigis and the S.E.E.S. members face the emotional baggage their initial adventure left behind.

After playing through Persona 3 Recharger, you are probably familiar with the flow and feel of the game’s dungeons, and Episode Aigis continues to build on that foundation. Unlike the original protagonist, Aigis wields firepower as her weapon, making her method of getting the jump on enemies different: she’ll try to snipe them at a distance before they fully realize her presence. Malheureusement, gunfire is quite loud, so if there are several enemies in a small area her bullets may alert them to the party’s presence.

As the new bearer of the Wild Card, Aigis can gather and change Personas freely (in combat, you’re still limited to one swap per turn) as well as make use of synergistic Persona Theurgies. Because the rest of S.E.E.S.’ members haven’t been in combat recently, they are a smidge rusty, so their levels and stats don’t quite match up to where they were at the end of P3R’s story.

Metis assumes parts of the party role Aigis previously held, including the use of the special Orgia mode that grants her combat benefits at the cost of being stunned when the boost ends. Metis’s Persona, Psyché, wields ice and physical skills, making her a strong offensive companion.

We only got to play through one of the DLC dungeons in our session, which was about 8 floors deep, and battled the fierce shadow lurking at the bottom. But as Aigis and her friends re-emerged in the Desert of Doors, it became very clear that there are still plenty of trials for the team to overcome–and some very big mysteries to unravel. Persona 3 Recharger: Episode Aigis will be available to experience September 10 on PS5 and PS4. That’s not far off, so hold tight–all of your questions will be given the answers you seek.