Let's get right into it: Persona 5 would not be the success story that it is without the PS4. And with that in mind, the complete lack of an upgrade path for existing PS4 players is a slap in the face. It doesn't matter if you've already paid full price for Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal on Sony's last-gen system — SEGA and Atlus are asking you to do it again for this straight PS5 port of the latter.

This port's enhancements are almost non-existent. It runs at 60 frames-per-second, which is nice, and makes an already silky smooth presentation that much smoother — but being a turn-based RPG, a higher framerate was never a necessity. Oh, and Royal was already pushing a native 4K resolution on PS4 Pro, so you aren't getting any improvements there.

But hey, at least all of the previously released DLC is included from the start. Loads of character costumes and new personas do add a bit of spice to proceedings if you never forked out for them on PS4. The added content isn't quite worth the price of (re)admission, but this port does actually get something right.

Moving on, the PS5 version has its own Trophy list (it's the same as it was on PS4), but there's no way to transfer your save data, and so there's no way to simply pop all of the Trophies that you already earned last time around. Not only are players being asked to pay up for the game again, they're being asked to start over from scratch on a 120-hour adventure that has a very comprehensive New Game+ option. It's a bit of a piss-take.

But for all of SEGA and Atlus' bullsh*t, there's no denying that Persona 5 Royal is an outstanding RPG. Playing through it again has only solidified our opinion that it's still one of the best ever, even years removed from its initial release. If you want our full thoughts on why it's so good, you should read our original Persona 5 Royal PS4 review, as all of those points still stand.

With its melding of excellent gameplay systems, married to an unmatched sense of style and an iconic soundtrack, Persona 5 Royal is a true work of art — and that makes its publisher's greed all the more shameful.

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