Persona 5 Royal is a huge game. Friends demand your attention, bosses want you to work, you need to study for finals, and you have to save the world from all these terrible adults. It might be possible to do it all in one playthrough, with perfect time management and a good guide, but realistically, you're going to need more time to appreciate or complete the full game.
After you finish your first playthrough, you'll be presented with the option to save your current game as a New Game+ file. This will save some of the progress you've already made, and carry it over into a new file. Having a stepping stone when you start over can save you a lot of time when you want to experience new parts of the game rather than grinding through everything again.
10 Earn Some Money
Money makes the world go round, and while you start off relatively poor at the beginning of the game, you can quickly earn money through work and defeating shadows in Mementos. And once you have all the big stuff, you can watch your savings grow.
A stash of cash will make it easy in the next playthrough to immediately start stocking up on healing items and other equipment you'll need. Unfortunately, you still can't offer to help Yusuke. Not even a rich friend can save him from poor money management.
9 Work On Your Social Stats
Building up your knowledge, charm, guts, proficiency, and kindness can take up a large chunk of time. However, they're also necessary for progressing certain confidant ranks, and worth the time you put into them.
It's worth it to get them all maxed out as soon as possible in the first playthrough and then never have to worry about them again. You need guts to talk to Iwai? You got them. Need a certain level of kindness to approach Ann? Already done. Having these complete will free up your time significantly in subsequent playthroughs. Never choose between studying or hanging out with a confidant ever again.
8 Stock Up On Gear
One thing that will carry over from save to save is your equipment. If you're looking for an easy time to enjoy the story more, stock up on good weapons, and protectors and equip them as soon as you have a new teammate.
Those high-powered items are great for wiping out low-level shadows quickly and advancing your progress through a palace. An added bonus to this is that you can immediately sell the rest of the gear you get throughout the game, and quickly rack up that yen.
7 Max Out Confidant Ranks
The game stresses the importance of confidant ranks, but when it comes down to it, some ranks are just more important than others. A completionist will want to get them all, but there are big ones that will really help you in repeated playthroughs. While completed ranks don't carry over, you do regain the perks you get from each rank as soon as you unlock the confidant in your new playthrough.
All confidants offer unique perks, but the ones you'll really want to focus on are Takemi, Iwai, Yusuke, and the twins, Justine and Caroline. Takemi will immediately offer her highest discount on HP and SP items, as well as unlocking her entire supply. Iwai will give you free upgrades on guns. Yusuke will offer skill card creation/duplication. Finally, the twins will give you discounts on summoning Personas, as well as allowing you to fuse higher-level Personas without delay.
6 Locate Some Skill Cards
Skill cards are everywhere in the Metaverse. They're easily created with Yusuke's confidant perks, and blank ones can be found or bought from Jose.
Having the right cards is essential for maxing out the twin's confidant rank - if you have the Persona they want but not the right move, you can teach that Persona the correct move right there in the cell, then present it to them with no hassle.
5 Collect Some Essential Items
Not all items carry over, but there are a couple of important ones that you'll want to get before you start over.
Perma-Pick
Tired of choosing between making lockpicks and doing something that will help you progress the story? Don't want to worry about not having enough lockpicks to get through a palace?
The perma-pick is the answer to all your lockpick-related problems. It's an infiltration tool you can create after reaching rank six with Morgana, and it carries over in the New Game+ file. Those locked chests will never taunt you again.
SP Adhesive 3
The other important item is the SP Adhesive 3. It's an accessory that can be equipped by yourself or any teammate, and will restore seven SP to the wearer on each turn.
They'll run you about ¥100,000 (¥50,000 when you max out Takemi's rank), but are well worth the price. Having them in the early game can make grinding through the palaces much smoother and faster.
4 Work On The Persona Compendium
Filling out the Persona Compendium can seem easy - at least until you realize there are only so many Personas you can catch in the Metaverse. A majority of them have to be fused, and you can only fuse up beyond your level after reaching rank five with Justine and Caroline.
Building up the Compendium as much as you can in the first playthrough will save you time later when you're trying to reach those higher-leveled Personas. No more worrying about having to negotiate with temperamental shadows; you can make your own!
3 Collect The Mementos Stamps
When you first meet Jose, he'll give you two new optional side-quests for your Mementos journey - collecting flowers and stamps. The stamps can be somewhat difficult to find sometimes, especially in the bigger areas, but the good news is that you only have to collect them once.
Your new game+ will start you off with all the stamps, and you can go to Jose as soon as he's available to boost up the experience, money, and item drops in Mementos.
2 SP And HP Bonuses
There are a lot of small ways to increase your SP and HP in Persona 5 Royal. You can go to the temple and meditate, train in your room, or train in the gym. The bonuses are small, but they stack, and you get to keep those when you start again.
These are things that pass time, but they're worth it, especially if you want to start ramping up the difficulty on your next playthrough. Those extra few points of HP and SP can make a huge difference at higher difficulty levels.
1 Keep Your Own Notes
Nothing slows down a game like having to solve a palace puzzle. Kaneshiro's palace in particular presents the tedious task of finding journal pages and decoding his passcodes to move forward. However, there's a shortcut if you don't want to repeat that in another playthrough - write down the letters and corresponding numbers. Then you can go straight to the passcode box and put the number in, unlocking the vaults without having to go through the fuss of re-finding everything.
Of course, the alternative is to use some of our guides and walkthroughs, but on a second playthrough, you can often remember most things, except that pesky door code.