I really don't think the hate for calendar system is justified, it feels more like hate by association because its "personas thing", or because existing example makes some people think it can ONLY be done poorly. I can think of a ton of ways in which a calendar system could genuinely enrich a non persona megaten title, but you just have to:
>make sure to write the story well around it
>enrich the days with enough things to do that won't grow monotonous
>not be overzealous with the length (I do think close to a year is too much)
>have a clear reason for its being within the games structure/theme (can say this about any mechanic really(
Nobody really shits on devil survivors calendar system, because I'd argue it was mostly successful in those former things and its also super short
One type of story/game that I think could really play off a calendar system type thing is a elaboration on the idea of the opening of SMT1. A setting that starts off with the regular contemporary thing but society starts to slowly fall apart. A lot of megaten titles will create some sort of hard divide between the contemporary part and the apocalyptic setting.
In SMT1 the nuke falls, ending society in a flash and you're sent 30 years into the future into the apocalypse. In Nocturne the conception turns the contemporary world into the vortex world. V goes for a persona type thing where you jump back and forth between the contemporary setting and the other world repeatedly throughout the game.
But I think it would be so cool to have a game where the transition from society to apocalypse is happening literally throughout the entire game, gradually. You see it all crumble in real time and live through it. Its not a quick apocalypse brought by the hammer of god or anything, it IS the game.
I think being able to see the gameworld and setting around you constantly change until by the end its completely unfamiliar and gone to shit would be so cool.
But thats just my 2 cents straight from my arse