Persona Producer explains why most of the main characters are male students

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Summary

  • The male protagonists of the Persona series reflect the theme of growing up in coming-of-age stories – high school years symbolizing the transition to adulthood.
  • Producer Kazuhisa Wada explains that male protagonists in Persona games reflect the perception of female students' higher mental age and maturity.
  • Fans suggest that the next Persona game could feature an older protagonist as the series evolves with the player base; potential for college aged characters.



Over the many years Persona series has been around, some fans have wondered why the majority of the games' protagonists are male students, and the producer has now offered an answer to that. This trend continued during Personas latest post, Persona 5which took the world by storm upon release.

Persona has been a popular RPG series that spread from the original Megami Tensei game. Since both series have continued side by side, Persona have almost always had a male protagonist, with the only exceptions Persona 2: Eternal Punishment, Persona 3 Portableand Personas 3s epilogue. However, even in Persona 3 Portableis the female protagonist technically non-canon in the series, meaning the only non-male and non-student protagonists are from Persona 2: Eternal Punishment and Personas 3s epilogue.


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Now the producer is off Persona series, Kazuhisa Wada, has explained why this tends to be the case. Speaking at the CEDEC + KYUSHU 2024 conference, Wada said that Persona Games are meant to be coming-of-age stories, with the theme of growing up. As such, choosing high school students to be the majority of Persona main characters and party members just makes sense, as junior high and high school tend to be when people start getting a taste of adulthood.


What about the gender of the persona protagonists?

Regarding the gender of the main characters, Wada said it was mostly due to the perceived differences in mental maturity of girls and boys. Wada noted that female high school students tend to have a “higher mental age” or be more mature than their male counterparts. As such, the males have more room to grow and develop, making them a better choice for the protagonist in this context. Having said that, Wada states that it is not out of the question that the protagonists of the games are either female or non-students.


At the moment, it remains to be seen Persona 6 will shake up this usual form in the series. Many players have asked for an elder Persona protagonist, perhaps as the fandom that has been with the series since its inception has grown older themselves. Based on Wada's reasoning, there is still room for even adults to continue to grow and mature throughout life. A main character in college or just after college age, for example, might be interesting.

Unfortunately though Persona 5 is now eight years old, no real reveals have been made regarding a sixth main entry in the franchise. However, Atlus has kept fans of the fifth entry busy introducing Persona 5 Royalan expansion of the original game's story, Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight, Persona 5 Striker, Persona 5 Tacticsand even one Persona 5 mobile games.

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