| Persona 5: The Phantom X | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Release Date | Gameplay & Story | Pre-Order & DLC | Review |
Persona 5: The Phantom X (also known as P5X) is a JRPG set in the popular Persona 5 franchise (Japanese Role-Playing Game), but with a twist: gacha elements. Read our review to see what the game did right or wrong and if it's still worth playing in 2026.
This is an updated review in celebration of its 1st anniversary; heralded by the release of Hatsune Miku! Read our previous review during its initial release to see how much it has evolved as a game given its first year.
Persona 5: The Phantom X Review History
| Review | Date | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1st Anniversary | July 2026 | 
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| 1.0 Release | June 2025 | 
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Overview
What is Persona 5: The Phantom X?
In classic Persona fashion, Persona 5: The Phantom X will have you take on the role of a high school student in Japan, albeit with a society devoid of Desire due to how modernity progressed.
Persona 5: The Phantom X features:
⚫︎ Elemental ailments and character attributes
⚫︎ Fresh characters designs
⚫︎ Classic Persona turn-based combat
⚫︎ Unique team-building system
⚫︎ In-depth Story and Event Palaces
⚫︎ Guaranteed and 50/50 character gachas
For more gameplay details, read everything we know about Persona 5: The Phantom X's gameplay and story.
| Digital Storefronts | |||||
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 Steam |
 Google Play |
 App Store |
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| Free-to-play | |||||
Persona 5: The Phantom X Review: Comeback Kid
Slammin' the Story Straight
P5X, as we all know, was a massive letdown on release. Not only was it buggy, but it had one of the worst storylines of all concerning the infamous Subway Slammer. Even if it was a real-life issue going on in Japan, the way it was executed in the game was downright goofy compared to Persona standards.
When you compare Kiuchi to his mainline counterpart, Kamoshida, they are leagues apart. While you may remember Kamoshida giving you motivation to steal his heart with his heinous acts, you remember Kiuchi by chuckling at the memes and one-liners such as “The subway is mine for the slammin'!” This brought both positive and negative attention to the game, but led to people not taking the game seriously.
Considering how cinematic a Persona game should be, P5X is just really… generic; almost uninspired-like. Most of the assets are flat and downright copy-pasted from the game it is based on. However, one year later, after going through the latest updates up to the first anniversary, I can say for certain that the story has picked up significantly well after the second one in terms of quality and that their takes on the main game’s OST enhance the storytelling! So far, I believe the story itself is just going to keep getting better and well-written like the main games.
So, given the negativity and prejudice around its story, how did P5X, a game that arguably has one of the worst starts in Gacha history, manage to claw its way back to being a more than decent gacha game? Simple, take the initial plot of desires and give it to the original director.
Palace? More Like Kingdom!
Given that we're already talking about the Palaces, the latest ones are exceptionally designed and written. Since every player needs to partially finish the Palace to progress the story, and then fully complete it to gain as much currency as possible for pulls, it should be made as enjoyable as possible.
The new ones perfectly capture the inner workings of their rulers, as the visuals and puzzles themself symbolize the rulers’ psychological issues. For example, the latest Palace is centered around an ant colony, where you must transform into little ants to traverse the claustrophobic space. The ruler of the Palace sees herself as a queen, and that others should bend to her will lest they incur her wrath. A narcissist at heart, she forces you to shrink down in size, to go through tight tunnels, reminiscent of her abuse of male idols connected to her.
However, the Palaces of P5X's greatest pros are also its greatest cons. Depending on the Palace, it is simply a hassle to complete for your pulls. While their puzzle design is initially engaging when exploring a new Palace, they become stale and repetitive when it comes to completing the Meta Jewels. This aspect of the Palaces makes the process more of a chore than a fun experience, unlike in the main-line games. In summary, the grandeur of Palaces can be fun at the start, but takes a lot of time to complete, making the overall progression feel tedious, especially when you are in desperate need of limited character pulls.
City Life Has Been Searching All Along
Outside of Palaces, the City Life of P5X has improved significantly for the weirdest of reasons. Usually, we Persona players enjoy connecting with the world presented in the game. More often than not, I actually prefer the feeling of progressing through Social Links by getting to know the characters because that's what Persona does best: characterization.
However, with P5X, while most of the characters themselves are pretty well written, I find myself defaulting to skipping dialogue and story to quicken the process and gain currency for my pulls as soon as possible. In this sense, this feeling can be attributed to the gacha system of the game, where you must reach certain parts of the game in a limited time to obtain currency. With the latest updates, you can now essentially skip most, if not all, of the interactions outside the story, allowing for faster dailies and quicker payoff.
While this may be a great prospect for others, this is my main problem with this game. Given its restrictive time limit and system, it breaks that feeling of being immersed in a character's story that I so adore in other mainline games since you can be locked out of rewards for not finishing them early.
Steal Their Pulls
On the subject of spending currency to pull for characters, it is almost the same as any game of the genre. While the gacha system itself can be off-putting to some, it can be considered a blessing for other. The main difference is that P5X's take on the system is massively free-to-play friendly, where it mainly incentivizes you to play through the game and massively rewards you with currency upon doing so!
Most of the characters are already strong without duplicates and their primary 5-star weapon, and you can easily level up lower rarity weapons and transfer them over to higher rarity ones. This gives a breath of fresh air, allowing you to get all characters each update without spending a dime, as long as you play through the content.
Furthermore, the characters are pretty well designed and written. Each fills their own role, with each skill suiting multiple team compositions whilst remaining memorable through the story or their personal Synergy Bond, which gives me incentive to pull for them. As this system allows you to bond with characters, you will likely be invested in pulling for characters that you genuinely enjoy instead of chasing every new release. For me, Manaka Nagao's synergy bond made me want to pull for her, and since future banners were predictable, I could plan out my spending for her without feeling pressured by FOMO.
However, this generous system the game provides makes it all the more disappointing if you miss the limited-time events. P5X's system of low-duration events encourages active, regular play because many of its rewards are tied to completing them.
This gives a feeling of getting FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) despite the game's generosity; the sinking feeling of not getting the currency to pull for the featured character. While it is refreshing that the developers try to make rewards accessible, it is a double-edged sword as giving only one week of limited-time content pressures the player to stay active.
Tartarus Lite: the Roguelike Experience
After looking into most of the core concepts of the game mechanically and how it improved, how about the new content that the game has introduced? Over the course of the updates, there have been a total of three game modes to keep it fresh: (1) Metro of Desires, (2) Astrolabe, and most recently, with the P3R collab, (3) Tartarus.
In all honesty, the first two were a swing and a miss on their part, where I'd often play it to finish the events. However, I can say that sentiment does not apply to Tartarus. This game mode is an attempt to take the dungeon diving aspect of P3's original tower and mix it with a roguelite experience by adding permanent upgrades and being able to bring your favorite characters.
This system... simply works. It allows you to bring your favorite pulled characters, flip their power to max, and fully enjoy the content whilst progressing for currency. The cherry on top is that the events associated with it do not rush you; the missions do not expire, so you can still pursue them even after a long time. You do miss a little, but it is mainly for minmaxing equipment. That, in itself, broke that feeling of having to rush everything.
Phantom Teams of Hearts
Speaking of the characters, the way P5X handles team building compared to the mainline games is, for me, significantly better. Its system revolves more around elemental synergy and enemy adjustment than the usual formula the originals use. This is how the developers justify and use the gacha system without causing frustration, since all the characters you have pulled, in one way or another, are always meta-relevant; they can be used in a plethora of teams!
For example, with the recent release of the P3 Collab, you can slot Makoto, Yukari, and Akihiko into a team, and it will work with most content available in the game. However, for min-maxing content such as Nightmare Gateways and the Velvet Trials, this team composition will not work as they will be lacking in multiple areas. Additionally, you cannot have the same character on the second team. These aspects force you to think about multiple team compositions to obtain the highest score possible, leading to an ever-shifting meta that rewards you for spacing out your gacha pulls to try and get at least one copy of a character, incentivizing you to keep coming back on each update.
However, even with a good roster of characters with designs that hold up until now, I cannot deny that the recent characters during the P3 Collab have been nothing short of broken. They now take up most teams if you want a chance to at least rank for when doing high-end content. With this, most of the older characters, such as Yui and Messa, are getting the shorter end of the stick. This sucks because I enjoy Messa’s unique kit that only he enables. If only they had actually made Junpei a Physical character instead of a Guardian support for Makoto!
Wonder Left Me Wondering
However, there is a glaring problem with the core gameplay of P5X; it is absolutely horrendous to build around Wonder. Generally, we are used to having the MC, the Wild Card, be the person we build around. With P5X, the MC takes a backseat and lets the others shine in his place.
This can be chalked up to the game is gacha-centered; hence, they need to make their characters worth pulling for. In all honesty, I would have preferred it if the gacha itself focused on unique Personas to build around instead of characters. This is rather disappointing as a player who likes to experiment and build Personas, so it is a big negative in my compendium. Even with the omnipotent Yoshitsune, DPS Wonder is not that viable.
Speaking of Personas, the concept that was mastered through multiple titles, Fusion, has essentially been watered down. While the mechanic itself is present, it is but a shell of its former self, all while not being satisfying to pull off. The formula is as follows: (1) fight Shadows to get a chance to get them, (2) get currency to buy them, (3) fuse as needed. Now, you can even buy Skill Cards to make the process even simpler. The complexity of having to meticulously plan out the skills, arcanas, and levels to get the Persona you desire. It is like drinking Coke without the carbonation!
X Marks the Collabs
To keep the game spicy, P5X also introduces some collaborations related to the IP, such as the ongoing Persona 3 events and upcoming Persona 5 retrains. Recently, the anniversary introduced Hatsune Miku as a surprise character. I understand that this will give the game traction, but oh my God, do I abhor the decision.
Given that it is the game’s first year, it would have been better if the collab was in line with the current pattern. Instead of Miku, releasing Elizabeth would have served the traction as well while keeping the theme straight, given that P3 Collab is ongoing and Justine and Caroline were just released a few months ago. This decision to introduce an off-brand character goes against the message that you are celebrating the title’s anniversary. While there may be an argument that Hatsune Miku is a Persona 4 character given that she was in P4D, that is half-baked and is just a convenient way of putting it.
Furthermore, these collaborations are pushing back a lot of the main content as they prioritize these instead of the main story and original characters. This, in a sense, feels like a distraction from the primary goal; a ruse to bring in more players without adding much substance for the long-time players.
Mothman Is Not the Only Bug in This Game
Even if the game's vision has broadened exponentially, the upkeep to keep it going is not keeping up. Lately, the game itself is riddled with bugs on the littlest of things. For example, it was only recently that they figured out that Manaka Nagao's Synergy Bond effects were not being applied. This is frustrating as a player since you will spend a lot of time and resources on things that do not work.
The most painful one is not technically a bug, but the Global servers can be messed up at the most inopportune times, all without notice. Their servers are a massive chore, especially on update day. Imagine this: it is a normal day without updates; no issues whatsoever with the game. However, upon logging in, you find that you are not able to for 10 minutes. You reboot the game, and there is nothing. You check for any maintenance news, but still nothing. This especially becomes worse if it is near the daily reset!
Another one of my grievances with the game is the developers' scheduling of maintenance on official media. Instead of an exact, realistic time, they will set it too early or too late in the day without any meaningful compensation. Their maintenance announcements read less like firm schedules and more like broad time estimates, with no assurance that maintenance will actually begin at the stated time.
Shadowed by the Main Line UI
Lastly, another huge inclusion that the mainline games do better that P5X lacks is the overall UI. We all know that most of the modern Shin Megami Tensei JRPG games have fancy and innovative interfaces, like P3R’s seamless transitions and in-your-face thematic art. However, with P5X, it’s an in-your-face cluttered mess that shoves as much information as possible. Again, this is a recurring problem of most gacha games. While this isn’t as horrendous as other gacha games that literally put the prices of their discounted sales, it is still disappointing to see this in a Persona game.
Considering how cinematic a Persona game should be, P5X is just really… generic; almost uninspired-like. Most of the assets are flat and downright copy-pasted from the game it is based on. However, I can say that their takes on the main game’s OST are exceptional! The remix of Persona 5’s Blooming Villain during Akeshi’s Shadow fight had me take a pause and bop my head to it. This is just one example, but the other ones are nothing to scoff at.
Is Persona 5: The Phantom X Worth It?
Yes: Best to Go Back to Stealing Desires Now!
So far, and after all the highs and lows of the game, I can say it is worth getting into Persona 5: The Phantom X. Given that it is free, it is pretty easy to pick up and drop at any time. If you want a more team-focused game based on the mechanics of Persona and want a rest from all the pay-to-play variants in the gacha market right now (of course, with enough grind time), go on ahead and retake your desires! As a matter of fact, it is best to start now, given the 1st anniversary event providing a lot of Meta Jewels and a mega banner that lets you pull for multiple limited characters.
And for the players who have played since the Global Release and are looking for every bit of assurance to keep playing the game, the future is looking bright with the recent news that the P3 Female Protagonist is coming with the continued support of the P3 Collab! She’s still alive and canon!
However, do note that the game is not perfect; it is riddled with bugs and problems that will have you scratching your head. Do not go in and expect that it is the best gacha game, and you will have a grand time, especially if you are a fan of both Gacha and JRPG genres!
How to Catch Up as a New Player
New and returning players from 1.0 can expect to spend a few hours trying to catch up to the main story and some of the Synergy Bonds. Apart from that, there will be a new and returning player campaign to help you get caught up to date as soon as possible. Do note, however, that while the option of skipping the main story is there, it is generally not recommended since there will be a lot of Meta Jewels waiting for you!
Here's a general run-down of how to catch up to the current content for new players:
| New Player Catch-Up Guide |
|---|
| 1. Progress the Main Story |
| 2. Catch up on the Event Palaces |
| 3. Get Merope, Yumi Shiina, Miyu Sahara, and Manaka Nagao Synergy Bonds |
| 4. Pull and Choose up to 8 Characters and Focus On Them |
| 5. Fully Explore Main Palaces and Mementos |
| 6. Join a Companio for Help |
| 7. Finish Lufel’s Business Plan |
| 8. Do the Velvet Trials for Meta Jewels |
| 9. Increase Social Stats |
| 10. Challenge Endgame Modes |
Persona 5: The Phantom X Related Guides
 Characters |
 Personas |
 Banners |
 Tips and Tricks |
 Weapons |
 Items |
 Walkthroughs |
 Bosses |
 Synergy Bonds |
 Palaces |
 Revelation Cards |
 Skills |
 Outfits |
 Events |
 News |
 Awards |
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