>>3775358 (OP)>best story2 duology
>best cast 2 IS has the best upfront dynamic and fun individual members while 3 has the best group arc and growth in dynamic over time. I'll give it to 3.
>best MC4 has some of the best unique dialogue options, a clean design, and his spin-off personality is solid to hilarious.
>best visuals5 for stylistic design and fidelity, but I personally like the character and persona designs in 3 most. Could go either way.
>best music4 overall, but all of them have some absolutely killer tracks.
>best gameplay5, but not Royal. I would almost say 4 (base, not Golden) beats out 5 but there are some really good QoL additions and conceptual battle ideas that just barely missed in execution. In terms of dungeon design, 5 is a slog to replay though and I would much rather play through 3 or 4 again over 5. 1 is surprisingly nice and I like a good dungeon crawler, but it's not the kind of gameplay I play Persona for.
I think it's pretty telling that all of the games do one or two of these things best, but there isn't any one Persona game that gets them all just right yet.