Zeik56

I wouldn't be surprised if Shadow Labrys was not unlocked until after you beat the story mode.

It's always out but I doubt it's always active. I'm sure it works like Nirvana where you can't actually hit it unless it's doing something.

The problem with Mitsuru's DP is that it's almost impossible to safely punish it when she has meter. You're in blockstun while she's in the air and if you try to rush in and punish her on the ground you risk a Bufula to the face. You can try to anticipate the Bufula and dodge to the other side, but if you guess wrong then she can punish you. If you don't do anything then she simply gets out for free. A little blue life and some potential SP is negligible for such a low risk option that gets you out of pressure. Anyway, I don't want to focus on that too much, as I don't want to imply that it's the sole factor that contributes to her being OP. (If she wasn't so good in every other way it might be excusable.) As for Chie, yeah, she has to be in the corner to combo off it for free, but since it carries so far that's not that hard to do. Though even without a combo it does 1.8k or so, which is still rather strong considering Yosuke gets like 500 total. I don't think Naoto can get much off her's, since it knocks them away so far, but maybe in the corner. She does get some good options off her throw though.

I'd consider that a downside if it wasn't so easy to get meter in this game. (And Mitsuru even has extra ways to gain meter.) Also Chie's counter is still really good even ignoring how spammable it is, simply given how much damage she is able to get off of it. She's the only character that can get like 4k directly off their R-action.

The super would have to have been severely overpowered to a ridiculous degree to make Akihiko "too good". It's not like that super is his one and only flaw, even if it was ridiculously good he'd still likely be worse than Mitsuru. And I do consider those things stupid. Obviously deadlines are an issue and can cause issues with balance, but the fact that some of these things got put in the game at all in such a state makes me question things. (There's no logical reason a DP should be as hard to punish as Mitsuru's. That's simply not how DP's are meant to work.) I certainly don't consider ArcSys "incompetent", but I don't think everything can just be excused away. Hopefully they'll be fixed as time goes by and all will be well, but it doesn't change the fact that they made some poor decisions going in. I'm not trying to put down the game or ArcSys, just so we're clear. ArcSys is a great developer and this honestly looks to be one of their best games to date, but it has plenty of room for improvement and I want to see those improvements made.

It may be impossible to perfectly balance a game on the first try (or ever for that matter) but there are still things like Akihiko's worthless super, Mitsuru's practically un-punishable DP, Chie's fatal counter poke, etc, that are stupid any way you look at it and a company as experienced as ArcSys really should know better. I don't know what makes people think Marie is so important that she is going to be in this game. I have yet to see anything to suggest she's more than a new S. Link with a possible (probable) connection to the Velvet Room. I'll honestly be surprised if she is even mentioned in this game at all.

I'd say Akihiko is worse than he should be though. They made some inexplicable decisions when they designed him, like giving him the worst range in the game and then not even giving him decent mixups. Or a power up super that's inferior in every way to the other power up supers in the game. (It gives him one mediocre effect that goes away as soon as he's touched and it can't even be used as a combo extender like the already superior Power Charge and Sukukaja...) Akihiko and Mitsuru are the two characters that sometimes makes me question what the hell was going through their mind over at ArcSys.

Teddie has been moving up the tiers lately I believe. He's like mid/upper-mid right now.

Well yeah, tier lists are opinions, but that doesn't mean they're entirely irrelevant either. Mitsuru and Chie being consistently placed in S+/S tier definitely means something, same goes for Yukiko and Akihiko being consistently placed at the bottom. It's the mid-tiers that get messy and most heavily debated.

Maybe you could link to where you've been finding this info? I just find it really hard to believe people are seriously placing her in B tier.

Naoto's placement varies, but I have never seen her placed below Aigis, Teddie, Akihiko or Yukiko. At worst she ends up about the same level as Aigis and Teddie. (When they're placed around A tier.) No way she's as bad as Akihiko though.

What the hell are you talking about? All the Japanese tier lists I've seen have put Naoto high tier, just below the top 3 alongside Kanji. She's no Mitsuru, but who is? Anyone who puts her below Akihiko on a tier list is not to be trusted.

Maybe if it was actually his Shadow.

Well technically he kind of is, but not in the way that I presume you're thinking.

She's not officially on the roster for a few more weeks. Boss form is all we've got until then.

She sounds way harder actually. In P3 it was mostly about preparation and a bit of luck. Now you have to be like be a fighting game god. D:

They're representations of the psyche. Much like a lot of things in Persona, it's based on Jungian concepts, specifically the idea of the "collective unconscious" in this case. If Yu was summoning the actual god Izanagi I'm sure Izanami would have had a lot more to say on the subject.