I've never played the original Persona 4 or any other Persona games so I don't have anything to compare it to, but I think I read somewhere that the original didn't have Direct Control for the other characters? Which sounds like it'd be more difficult. (Ni No Kuni was HARD! Though it had real-time combat, so maybe it's not quite that comparable.)
Anyways I love this game! After I started playing P4G I pretty much haven't played much PC and "normal console" games. My save file is on something lik 87hours by now and I'm still not tired of it, unlike many other RPGs where the game ends up being massive grinding near the endgame.
But a friend asked me if I would recommend it, and I was saying something like it's really not like "normal" RPGs because there are lots of visual novel parts, so it's not certain that he would like it too. Heh.
The original did have direct controls for your party. I think you mean the original Persona 3 game on PS2 which did not let you control your party at all (Making the game much harder than the PSP port/remake/whatever and both Persona 4 games).