*does the "new Persona" dance*

Scans of Persona 3 from the new Famitsu. It will be released in Japan on 13 July, which means (hopefully) we'll get it by the end of the year. ROCK.

Things to note:
- Kazuma Kaneko is NOT the character designer this time around, Shigeki Soejima is. (He did the character design for Stella Deus. He also did the bust-ups - character portraits - in Persona 2, as well as I think the character design for the minor characters, like shopkeepers and such.)
- The nameless main character's Persona is Orpheus.
- The heroine is named Yukari Takeba, and her Persona is Io. She's voiced by Megumi Toyoguchi. (Thanks to bobthetrout for the correct romanization of the last names!)
- The scruffy guy with the hat is Junpei Iori (thank you furigana!), and his Persona is Hermes (they're reusing main character personae now? or does he have some affiliation with Jun? for the record, the kanji for "jun" are completely different in their names). Also, he's voiced by Kousuke Toriumi (a.k.a. Eikichi from P2), hee hee. >D
- Also, Shadows are back.
- Of course so is the Velvet Room and Igor (Belladonna and the rest of the gang seem to be MIA in the screenshots though).

AWESOMEOSITY!

Edit: Also, apparently Famitsu gave FFXII a 40/40 score. Given all the bad press it's gotten, this makes me curious. Hm.

Edit 2: Apparently the full trailer is up. And it does indeed look like it will rock. :D

Edit 3: An IGN article on Persona 3. (I know, I know, it's IGN, but it's still worth a look!)