Protagonist (Persona 3)

The protagonist
Persona character
The protagonist in Persona 3
First game	Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 (2006)
Created by	Shigenori Soejima
Designed by	Shigenori Soejima
Voiced by (English)	Yuri Lowenthal
Voiced by (Japanese)	Akira Ishida

The protagonist (Japanese: 主人公, Hepburn: Shujinkō) is a player-named character from Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3, a role-playing video game developed by Atlus. In the game, the protagonist is an orphan who transfers to Gekkoukan High School in Iwatodai City and discovers a phenomenon called the Dark Hour during which supernatural entities called Shadows roam freely. After awakening an ability within himself called Persona, the protagonist finds himself intertwined in the ongoing struggle against the Shadows with his new schoolmates.

He was designed by Shigenori Soejima, who aimed to create an ordinary youth who the player could relate to. In the manga adaptation, he goes by the name Minato Arisato (有里 湊, Arisato Minato). His character was reworked for the animated film adaptation where director Noriaki Akitaya explained pressure in giving the silent character his own personality. In the movie adaptation, he goes by the name Makoto Yuki (結城 理, Yūki Makoto). The protagonist later appeared the spin-off game: Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth as well. Critical reception to the protagonist's character has been generally positive for both his role in the games for how he handles his social life. His development in the film gathered similar responses. He is voiced by Akira Ishida in Japanese and by Yuri Lowenthal in English.

The Persona 3 protagonist was the first character Shigenori Soejima designed for the game. Early designs of the character made him look mature and collected since the artist viewed him as a "cliche[d] cool guy." Soejima took longer to design the protagonist than any other character as the game's other characters would be made to complement his design. In Art of Persona 3, Soejima remarked that "Initially, he looked more honest, like an ordinary, handsome young man. But, I worked to achieve greater ambiguity in his expression." He further noted that the character managed to have a "hidden coolness." In retrospect, he found that the character was not ambiguous enough and thus when creating the Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 protagonist, Soejima made Yu Narukami with the idea that his entire personality be decided and portrayed by the player's in-game actions and decisions.