Persona 3 Reload datamine points to The Answer expansion being reinstated as DLC
A Merciless discovery.
Fans are hopeful that expansion The Answer will come to Persona 3 Reload after dataminers discovered references to DLC.
Persona 3 Reload released last month as a remake of the 2006 original. However, it was criticised for being incomplete without the inclusion of The Answer expansion and the female protagonist featured in revised versions Persona 3 FES and Persona 3 Portable.
The latest hint to an expansion comes from YouTuber Faz (thanks PCGamer), who discovered an in-game message for completing the game on the highest Merciless difficulty (or at least using a cheat engine to skip ahead).
Upon finishing the game on Merciless, the character Elizabeth delivers a blue envelope item, which when opened includes a message to the protagonist reading: "At the end of a great trial, the answer illuminates my path."
Could this simply be a reward for the playthrough, or does the mention of "the answer" hint at possible forthcoming DLC?
Fans have been speculating in the comments to Faz's video, claiming The Answer is too integral to the story to be ignored, as well as noting recent datamining.
That comes courtesy of dataminer ruinedstego0, who claimed via a post on social media platform X that six pieces of DLC are in the works as a P3R Expansion Pass.
Some of this is simply costume and music sets, but there's also seemingly a reference to Episode Aigis - with Aigis being the main character of The Answer.
It appears to add up and would provide fans with the complete edition they're craving.
Atlus - and publisher Sega - however previously stated extra content wouldn't be included in Persona 3 Reload. Producer Ryota Niitsuma told Famitsu: "Persona 3 Reload started out as a project to remake the original release of Persona 3 for current platforms. This means the continuation to the main story added in FES and the female protagonist added in [Persona 3] Portable are not included."
Our Eurogamer Persona 3 Reload review praises new modernisations to the game, though adds there's still no definitive version of the game.
A week after release, Persona 3 Reload had reached 1m sales to become the fastest-selling game in the series and the fastest-selling Atlus game ever.