Persona 4
Persona 4 is a role-playing video game developed and published by Atlus for Sony's PlayStation 2, and chronologically the fifth installment in the "Persona" series, itself a part of the larger "Megami Tensei" franchise. The game was released in Japan in July 2008, North America in December 2008, and Europe in March 2009. "Persona 4" takes place in a fictional Japanese countryside and is indirectly related to earlier "Persona" games. The player-named protagonist is a high-school student who moved into the countryside from the city for a year. During his year-long stay, he becomes involved in investigating mysterious murders while harnessing the power of summoning Persona. The game features a weather forecast system with events happening on foggy days to replace the moon phase system implemented in the previous games.
Persona (series)
The music of the "Persona" series has been handled by multiple composers. The one most associated with the series is Shoji Meguro, who began working on "Persona" shortly after he joined Atlus in 1995. His very first composition for the game was "Aria of the Soul", the theme for the velvet room that became a recurring track throughout the series. During his initial work on the series, Meguro felt restricted by the limited storage space of the PlayStation's disc system, and so when he began composing for "Persona 3", which allowed for sound streaming due to increased hardware capacity, he was able to fully express his musical style. His main worry for his music in "Persona 3" and "4" was the singers' pronunciation of the English lyrics. He was unable to work on the "Persona 2" games as he was tied up with other projects, including "Maken X". The music for "Innocent Sin" and "Eternal Punishment" was handled by Toshiko Tasaki, Kenichi Tsuchiya, and Masaki Kurokawa. Tsuchiya had originally done minor work on "Persona", and found composing for the games a strenuous experience. Meguro also wrote the theme song for "Persona Q", while the rest of the soundtrack was handled by Atsushi Kitajoh and Toshiki Konishi. Meguro also served as the lead composer in "Persona 5", using elements of acid jazz and the game's themes for inspiration to achieve the right mood.