So you just beat Persona 3, now what? You could go back and play the first two Persona games or you could go and buy a Japanese copy of Persona 3: FES and get a translation guide, or just wait twiddling your thumbs for FES to come stateside.
Or if you're like me you can start watching the anime Persona-Trinity Soul. I believe the series started off in the beginning of January and already has 4 Episodes out so far. Having watched all four episodes, I felt I should/could give a brief synopsis on it.
The story takes place 10 years after Persona 3. Two boys, Shin and Jun, move home with their brother Ryo after the boys caretaker, their aunt, can't take care of them anymore. Ryo, chief of police and a Persona user, is investigating murders of possible Persona users who are stripped of their Persona and as a result of it stripped of their skin.
Shin, out for a walk one night, stumbles onto one of these Persona users and is attacked. By reflex Shin somehow manages to release his Persona and destroy the enemy's persona.
I tried not to get too into detail with the story but knowing anime and Persona you can probably fill in the blanks that I left out. From what I have seen though there isn't too much similar between Persona-Trinity Soul and Persona 3. Evokers aren't present, perhaps they were worried about kids shooting themselves in the head on TV and there aren't any other characters present at the moment except for Igor and he is shown briefly.
Still, there is plenty of potential for the story. Such as the presence of the "Outsiders" the organization out to "Devour" Persona to make their own stronger and the conflict between Shin and Jun towards their brother Ryo since Ryo is too busy with his work and wants nothing to do with his siblings.
The animation is very nice (but what animation doesn't have it) and the voice acting is well done. I can recognize some of the voices from other Anime but I can't quite put my finger on it. The combat via Persona is really cool looking as well, the Persona have a sort of astral look to them as they fight.
Only problem at the moment is that it is starting rather slow, despite the early fight scenes. I should expect this from most anime since they all seem to start off this slow (building up characters and plots and so forth) but I was hoping a more stable conflict would have been built sooner.
Nevertheless, I am looking forward to more episodes and anticipating more Persona goodness and possibly cameos (if somehow Akihiko managed to show up that would be so awesome). So give it a shot. I have provided a link below to animesuki.com, kind of a web hub for most anime translation groups who seed episodes.
Enjoy!
*note: You will need BitTorrent or if I may suggest Utorrent to download these episodes. Go to
http://www.download.com and search for either of those and they should give a result*
Click here to go to the Persona-Trinity Soul Page