Admittedly, I'm not much of a theist. I'm not necessarily a bad person, but the closest I come to an acceptable means of salvation is probably mumbling Namu Amida Butsu on my deathbed and being whisked to the Pure Land to become a Buddha. Good times. Call it lazy, if you like. I'm probably an agnostic on my best day. I suppose that's why I've always been interested in certain kinds of skeptical philosphies, which, of course, like all good dorks, I was introduced to via video games.

I'm not sure if my first exposure to this kind of theory first came from Masa and Mune's stupid sister telling me about the famous Bowling Ball-Plate of Sashimi Hypothesis or from the hideously(hilariously?)-awful-in-retrospect Doom novels. My guess is the former, but the latter did have the protagonist questioning his place in the universe while fighting demons and a capitulating US Military (the generals no doubt retroactively written as Clinton (either of them) appointees.) Also thrill as flamethrower-wielding IRS troopers menace a band of WOLVERINES!-esque holdouts. No doubt they summon the Invisible Hand to smack down taxes in the name of Small Government and Jesus.

Of course, we're probably all familiar with The (Fucking) Matrix and its ideas of mass simulated realities, though a particular episode of Red Dwarf probably pulled it off better in under 30 minutes. The Red Dwarf example is quite interesting, because in what turns out to be a hallucination, the crew of Red Dwarf are revealed to have been playing a simulated reality video game entitled "Red Dwarf" for the past 4 years, and were perhaps the worst players ever to have a shot at it.

I can't speak for everyone, but probably well until I was 21 I was quite convinced that my life would amount to something quite interesting. I mean, as far as I know, I'm the only person in the world I know of that can think. I'm the only person I know of in the world that can make a decision. All of you out there could be automata, or an endless series of If Statements revolving around the decisions I make in my life. My life took 3,000,000 lines of BASIC to create, etc. etc. Which brings us to Persona 3.

Persona 3 is an unlikely addition to my personal pantheon of existence-questioning media, which is interesting because I highly doubt (being not very far into the game) that at any point the game brings up the question of 'why is life'? Persona 3 more or less addresses this by being one of the first Role Playing Games I've played that gives quite a literal definition to the genre term of "Role Playing Game."

In Persona 3, the player assumes the role of the usual, speechless protagonist who can do naught but make a decision. And no one else. There is a party, but they act quite independent of you in many senses of the term. In battle, you are the leader, but you can only issue general commands. (It works better than it sounds.) Outside of battle, you exist as an individual, free to live your own life, make friends (not necessarily party members), go shopping, study, do whatever the hell you want. You don't even have to buy new equipment for your fellow party members if you don't feel like it. Occasionally they'll show up sporting new duds. You also need to figure out what to do with your weekends. Mundane life has never been so entertaining.

At points, Persona 3 skirts close to the genre of Dating Simulation that is the topic of many a "JAPAN SURE IS WEIRD" article on this here internet. You can choose to become closer to fellow students, party members, and other individuals who inhabit the town you live in. That friendship can turn romantic, which adds what I would consider a more realistic element to the story. Though for some it just might exist as an opportunity to have a watery-eyed .png backed by a collection of If Statements develop feelings for the player by-proxy of his in-game avatar.

Persona 3 is important to me not just because it makes for an entertaining play, but it brings a new twist into the formulaic, and in retrospect, unrealistic methods of party-based dungeon crawling. Just as I am not a group of people, Persona 3 reminds us that even if we are a member of a group, we make our own decisions and have our own lives outside of whatever employment, school, or other collective we find ourselves in. It also quite blatantly reminded me that for all I know, I could be starring in my very own excessively boring video game, where my decisions are not my own, but made at the hands of some cosmic dork who possibly writes terrible slash fanfiction about me when the game is off/when I'm sleeping.

Final Thoughts: This is directed to whoever is hitting the 'X' button to confirm decisions in my life: Cut it out with all these expenses. I don't need any more shredded fucking tires, plz. kthx. Also, when I play Video Games, are those just minigames to you?