Persona 4: Dancing All Night is a rhythm game spin-off based on
Persona 4, originally
for the Vita. It was later ported to PlayStation 4 and available as part of the
Endless Night Collection as a digital download along with
Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight and
Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight. Unlike the rhythm spin-offs of 3 and 5, Dancing All Night contains a full story mode. Told as a visual novel, it is a surprisingly engaging story complete with full voiceovers, animated cutscenes, excellent music and multiple dialogue options at certain points (but still the same ending).
Rhythm games aren't known for their plot but Dancing All Night merges it with the gameplay really well. At certain points in the story, the cast will have a valid reason to start dancing. The justification on not using Personas to fight the Shadows, but rather use their dancing to express their emotions is clever.
The premise is familiar to anyone who has played Persona 4 (and so you should before you start the game, as half the fun is seeing all the characters again). There is a rumor that if you look at a particular website at midnight, a grainy video of an idol who had passed away performing a dance will play. The cast is wrapped around in this because they are currently practicing in order to perform as support dancers for Rise's comeback performance.
While the story ends up devolving into a really simple "people are taken to the other world, now the characters will go and help save them", it contains familiar themes. The new characters that they save each have their suppressed feelings which must be accepted before they can be released. While most characters have their voice actors return, unfortunately, Rise has a different one (due to scheduling conflicts) and this hurts because Rise has a prominent role here.
The story mode is beefy clocking in at around 5-8 hours long if you read fairly quickly. While the second half felt like it was dragging on thanks to its tendency to repeat familiar event structures in order to fit in songs, it had a nice ending. The ending is very much Persona 4, with its message of bonds and trust, likewise with the huge amounts of cheesy dialogue. The rhythm gameplay uses six buttons: three from the d-pad, and three from the face buttons. As the button prompts overlap the icons on the side of the screen, you press the corresponding button in time with the music.
As per usual with rhythm games, there are several different types of button prompts. Hold Notes require you to hold down the button and Scratch Notes which require you to flick the analogue stick although you can map it to the shoulder buttons which is much easier on the higher difficulties. Each note has one of four ratings depending on your timing: Miss, Good, Great and Perfect. Getting a Great and Perfect will build up your combo, increasing your score multiplier. Furthermore, getting specific Scratch Notes will unlock Fever Time, a section of the track where you get better points, won't lose your combo if you don't miss and additional events.
Throughout the whole time, the background has several of the characters dancing. The crowd is comprised of Shadows and since the button prompts are yellow (the theme color of Persona 4), it can be distracting at first. However, at its core, Dancing All Night is quite easy until you get to the All Night difficulty. You'll probably breeze through the other three difficulties: Easy, Normal and Hard. The most fun can be ha din Hard as the note prompts fit the melody really well, while All Night can get very crazy.
You can tell that Dancing All Night came first and is a Vita port. This is because compared to Dancing in Starlight and Dancing in Moonlight, it is a bit rougher around the edges, with the UI being less polished. While character portraits are sharp, texts are oversized with blurry edges. The backgrounds and character models also lack the sharpness you'd expect of a PS4 game.
In addition to the Story Mode, there is Free Dance Mode. As the title implies, you can select a song to play. Initially, you only have access to a limited number of songs but as you clear them, more unlocks. This mode is also where you earn $ to use in the in-game shop for costumes and accessories. Each character has their own specific costumes which are pretty cool, but most of the accessories are shared.
Free Dance is also the only place where you can customize the partners that appear during Fever Time in each song, what they wear and use any modifiers. These modifiers can make it easier or harder, but they also come with a high score penalty or bonus when you use them.
The game features music comprised of original and remixed. It's a shame about the remixes as they are not as nostalgic and the originals always feel better. The song list is interesting in that it takes from not only the original game but from Persona 4 Golden,
Persona 4 Arena, Persona Q and the
anime series. Thus, it'll be a lot more enjoyable if you have already experienced those other titles. Playing through all the songs in Free Mode will take you another 2-4 hours, more if you want to challenge yourself and get higher scores in each song.
Finally, there is a Collection Mode where you can check out the visual novel galleries, your high scores and character models. Overall, Persona 4: Dancing All Night is a great rhythm game since it features stellar music and solid rhythm gameplay. While this is a straight port of the base game from the Vita, it still plays really well and the graphics still hold up well. If you got the Endless Night Collection, then this is definitely a nice bonus.
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