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iconsumeheadcanons · 4 years

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P4 x P5 crossover

there are very slight p5r spoilers but its kinda just using some lines from the bad end like just a little ref...so up to you i guess :p

Ren (our protag) goes home to Inaba with Mona. Kinda connected to my other headcanons: his ‘family’ includes his mother, his step-dad, his younger half-brother (step bro? idk), and his twin brother Akira. Akira usually lives with their mother’s ex husband, but something is going on court-wise that he has been deemed unfit for child care, which is why Akira is back with his mother. For now Akira sleeps in the room where his father used to practice tea ceremonies.

The twins kinda reconnect but things are very different and they didn’t have contact at all last year so Ren is surprised to see Akira. Ren is still kinda (not) dealing with all of the stuff from the last very many months, and Akira is still kinda not dealing with how messed up things are with his dad and the fact that he’s pretty sure his brother is The Phantom Thief but absolutely no one in the Amamiya household will acknowledge it so he feels like he’s going crazy. Especially the weird cat Ren brought back home that he keeps talking to.

Anyway, Akira’s not really going to school and Ren’s going to Yasogami (the high school he didn’t get expelled from) so Akira doesn’t know what is going on until he comes back from his part-time to see his mother and her husband arguing over the whereabouts of Ren. Apparently he skipped school that day. Ren doesn’t come home that night and the adults argue over calling the police since Ren won’t answer his phone. Akira avoids them and instead searches Ren’s bedroom for his cat or any sign that he might’ve packed up and left. He finds neither so he goes to bed and tries to remind himself that Ren survived in Tokyo kinda on his own and that this is not the first time he’s gone off to be stupid.

Ren still doesn’t show up at school or the house the next day. Step-dad wants to call the police because Ren is missing and he’s causing trouble and stress for the family. (“Clearly last year taught him nothing.”). Mother doesn’t want to call the police because she’s tired of police stuff and she doesn’t want this kind of stuff to keep affecting their family. Mostly she’s worried about how this will affect her youngest son. She’s losing the argument mostly because she’s losing conviction in herself as a ‘good mother’.

Akira can’t handle their argument so he goes upstairs and finds Morgana trying to paw open the sliding door of Ren’s bedroom and meowing a whole lot. Akira opens the door for the kitty wondering if the talkative kitty just wants to sleep in Ren’s room like usual. Instead the cat paws at Ren’s laptop. Akira opens it and stares at the very intelligent looking animal. Mona unlocks the laptop (“Wait--is that his password?! That’s stupid as hell.” “Meow...”) and tries to get Akira to do something but Akira is mostly shocked so Mona uses a pen on paper to write, “Video Futaba.”

Akira doesn’t know who Futaba is, but he follows Mona’s instructions. He doesn’t find a Futaba in Ren’s contacts but Mona gestures at the one called ‘lil sis :3c’ so Akira calls.

In Tokyo, Futaba’s on a people-watching walk with Yusuke late afterschool when she gets a video call from the recent ghost Ren. She asks the person who she thinks is her pseudo brother where he's been and if he’s all good, but Mona jumps in before Akira can say anything and Mona starts talking away. Curious about the existence of a twin brother that they never knew existed before but more concerned for Ren’s safety, Futaba and Yusuke ask Akira to convince the adults to NOT call the police because Ren will definitely freak out while they call the rest of the group together to figure out what they can do. Futaba says she hasn’t been able to track Ren at all in the past two days and she’s worried he’s gone somewhere service doesn’t matter (like the metaverse). Akira tentatively asks if they and Morgana are part of the Phantom Thieves and Futaba’s like, “Duhhhhh,” and Yusuke very intimidatingly informs Akira not to get the authorities involved in any manner. Futaba says they’ll call back in an hour and hangs up, so Akira decides to get right to work (bc Phantom thieves can be very scary even if they arent trying).

Downstairs Akira tries to appeal with emotions. He warns the adults how calling the police to find Ren will not end well because Ren has had so many bad experiences already and anything that happens will not help Ren try to stay out of more trouble. Step-dad is mad that Ren wouldn’t trust law enforcement and Mother is just so-so tired of the whole mess. Akira doesn’t normally stand up against bullshit (normally Ren’s thing) but Akira is done with this so he’s like, “Of course he doesn’t trust the police! He’s the Leader of the Phantom Thieves and the police put him in fucking solitary! He’s never gonna trust you again after this either!” something like that.

Step-dad and mom are upset and they say Ren was doing the wrong things as a Phantom blah blah. Akira argues that the Thieves exposed bad people including the wrong-doings in the government where the law enforcement works, but the adults won’t hear it so Akira stops talking, turns and grabs a jacket, and leaves the house. It’s late, it’s raining, and Mona follows behind even when Akira climbs on his bike to go out and try to find Ren by himself.

The two end up at Samegawa after checking under bridges, mostly soaked and irritated when they spot a group of people up on the road with three umbrellas. Souji and Yosuke, Yukiko and Chie, and Kanji and Teddie are strolling around, hanging out, and what-not when they spot a teenager, a cat, and a ruined bike by the water. Souji goes down to help them because of course, and everyone follows because of course. Akira recognises like half of them and he’s wary these random adults just seem to bypass the distrust in the air by collectively worrying over him and his poor poor kitty.

Teddie thinks he recognizes the teen because he’s like, “Ren-kun? Why aren’t you at work today! You abeardoned me to unpack the freezer by my lonesome!” And Akira stares because he didn’t know Ren works at Junes. Yosuke tries to hop in but Akira cuts them off and explains that Ren has been missing for two days and he’s trying to find him before the police get involved. If these adults want to help out so bad then maybe they can look for Ren too. Yosuke and Teddie get confused though because they both saw Ren at work yesterday. The rest of the adults also mention seeing him around town yesterday as well, including when they went into Junes before they…

Akira is confused about all the glances they give each other, but Yukiko quickly catches on and asks if Akira thinks Ren might have been stalking them, and Akira gets offended. (Yukiko wasn’t making a serious accusation, she was just trying to distract Akira from the fact that they almost admitted to the existence of the TV World.) Chie asks what would be wrong with calling the police, and Akira says, “Bad experience,” ready to ditch these random people and continue his search, but Yosuke goes wide-eyed and urges Akira to wait. Yosuke clearly understands some of what Akira meant and says they’ll help out, especially since they were the last to see Ren.

They go to Junes where Yosuke unlocks the back door (after Kanji searches around any place in the area that delinquents like to hide. It’s raining too much for anyone to be out.) They check the worker room to look through any of Ren’s stuff. They don’t find anything weird until Souji points out that Ren signed into work yesterday but never signed out. Now that doesn’t indicate everything, but the weird hours he worked yesterday do, mostly because they line up with the time that the group went to Junes yesterday. Chie investigates on the security footage and finds video of Ren sneakily following the group around the department store until they finally end up at...the electronics section.

All the adults + Teddie get real quiet and Akira and Morgana get real angry about all the silence. Akira asks why the camera is angled so weird over the TVs, and why the adults had gone into the electronic section and had not come out until an hour later, or why they don’t see footage of his brother away he followed them into the TV area. No one says anything right away so he asks if they hurt him or if they did something magic to them, like put him some place where his team couldn’t track him. Kanji jumps up to defend them all to say they didn’t even know Ren was actually following them and that they would never hurt a kid, but of course Akira has many reasons to not believe a stranger, so they’re both very tense. Souji tries to stop the fighting when suddenly the old CR in the room turns on.

P5R spoilers sorta!!! But the Midnight Channel shows an Asia-based fantasy world where Ren (with horns because you know he would want them) is in a version of Leblanc soaking dishes in a pail of water when Sojiro (plain but nice human) walks over and mentions that he wishes Ren wouldn’t have to go back to his hometown. Ren asks to stay forever and Sojiro agrees, talking about how happy their little weird family is now. They tease each other over the honesty, but they both look happy. The Midnight Channel shows this like a scene in a drama and the camera does a close up of Ren’s genuine happiness until there are sudden distorted voices telling their vile prisoner to focus. The camera pans out to show Ren alone in a dark, gross, blue prison cell wearing ragged clothes and his hands bound behind him. Someone opens a cell door, and judging by Ren’s unmasked trepidation, whatever follows next will not be good. The clip ends with an echoing slam of the bar doors behind the visitor.

In the darkness following the end of the clip, the IT members all freak out over the recurrence of the whole thing while Akira numbly checks his phone . He didn’t realise he had gotten messages, but they are all from someone who is somehow in his phone as Alibaba. The messages are asking where the hell is he and that there better not be police involved and that the only reason he shouldn’t be looking at his phone is because he fell asleep or something. Judging by the (loud, knowing) reactions around him and Morgana scratching at the door, Akira thinks he understands what is going on and why that Phantom Thief said that she hadn’t been able to track Ren. Akira leaves a message that says, “I think I know where he is,” and then he turns to the others and says that it's obviously some sort of magic that they know about and if they won’t help him out further, than he and his brother’s magic cat will do it on their own.

Of course that is a problem so the IT goes nonono we’ll do this this is our job let’s go, and Akira successfully swindled the IT into shutting up and helping. They all go inside the TV where Morgana can stand on two legs, Teddie is in a bearsuit, and the world is gorgeous and bright. The IT gets straight to work, Teddie sniffing, everyone putting on glasses, and trying to explain things to Mona and Akira. They don’t have to explain much because Mona understands most of it already and he’ll likely ask Lady Lavenza later. Akira is so confused about talking cat-shaped embodiment of hope and this entire night, so Souji urges them to focus on at least finding Ren.

Teddie can only confirm that someone is in the World, just not who or where, so they need more info. Chie suggests leaving for the night and coming back with more info or maybe sleep? Guys? But Akira is worried out of his shit and Morgana is angry at Ren for running off so they start saying as much as they can think of. Akira mentions Ren’s obsession (big ol’ crush) with Naoto when they were in middle school (to everyone’s great discomfort), Ren’s average grades, and Ren’s favorite color. Mona mentions that Ren is a phantom thief (to the IT’s great surprise) and that recently they had a...disagreement.

Two days ago, Ren decided to skip school. Morgana had said that if he didn’t keep his grade up and/or his attendance, Ren would get in trouble and his mom would never let him go back to see everyone in Tokyo. Ren, who had been oddly quiet and down the past few days, suddenly got angry and said if Morgana wanted to go back to everyone so bad, then he should have never followed Ren to Inaba. Morgana said he came home with Ren to watch over him and keep him out of trouble, but Ren said there was no trouble that he hadn’t gotten into already and that he doesn’t need anyone breathing down his neck. Mona got pissed and asked why Ren wouldn’t want him (his roommate for a whole year!!) here when no one else was friendly, but Ren didn’t answer and left.

Morgana hadn’t seen Ren since they argued, and he didn’t understand why Ren had been so angry all of a sudden, but Akira realized quickly. Yes, the twins aren’t very close anymore, but Akira says that Ren won’t ever ask for help even from people he trusts. Ren stands up for others all the time, but rarely does anything for himself. When their parents divorced and the twins were split up, Ren only got mad for Akira’s sake. Ren definitely doesn’t see Inaba as home anymore (maybe not even since Akira and Dad left), but he’d rather send a friend home (his REAL home) than both deal with his feelings and drag friends into it.

This is plenty of info for Teddie but before they go Souji reassures Mona and Akira that they’ll find Ren, help him talk, and help him be some place where he’ll be happy and supported. (Souji works as a social worker so kids can find homes like he did when he came to Inaba.) They all set off in a direction and they find what seems to be a fantasy village of similar looks to the clip from the Mayonaka TV. Morgana starts to recognise some of the streets as streets in Yongenjaya so he leads the way to the street Leblanc is on. They get interrupted by the guy who owns the second-hand shop. He starts talking to Akira and Mona like he knows them (he’s assuming they were hit by a witch’s spell that changed their appearances) and says he’ll always give them a discount for everything they do for the community.

This is confusing wording so Mona points out that the man sells them materials for tools when they can’t get enough from the Metaverse. The man shouldn’t know what Ren does with those tools. Souji points out that this area they’re in does not seem to be wealthy, so maybe their Phantom Thievery has supported the area. They head to Leblanc to investigate more.

#thats all i have so far #my writing #..kinda #p5 #persona 5 #im soso sorry if read more doesnt work 4 u #i didnt think it would be this long #wip #ren #boop.txt

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pikaiscool · 6 years

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Yosuke Hanamura

I’ve been thinking a lot lately, since I’ve seen a lot of people talk to me about my love for Yosuke and my views, so I decided to throw together a little character study/theory for him that I honestly believe comes for Yosuke. I’m going to put it under the cut and fix it up a little later since it’s just things I’ve written from discord.

The one thing I kept thinking about today was...why does Yosuke act the way he does? Why does he say the certain things he does? I kept dwelling on it.. and there could be so many explanations behind it.

Well honestly it all kinda reigns further back when it comes to the entire magician comic: Yosuke is a kid who came from the city, mixed into a group of boys who he saw as his friends. In reference to that he had parents who seem to be incredibly distant whenever it comes to Yosuke except for his dad, but we hear of him only when it comes to work or disciplining Yosuke and Teddie

Yosuke being an only child has a lot of expectations shoved onto his shoulders: be a good boy in school, have friends, make it through, do anything to not disappoint his elders, so his biggest influences were his parents and his friends.

Part of me believes is that Yosuke's dad is strict, incredibly strict when it comes to work or have Yosuke do things for him because he is their son, all he can do is comply, he is definitely carefree but it's a lot more contained with the friend group he's in

At the end of the comic you see that Yosuke loses all contact with his former friends, which makes it pretty obvious that they never were keen on keeping him as a friend to begin with. Abandonment, I can say from experience, hurts deeply, it makes you feel like you don’t matter to begin with; like you’re not worth the effort. Probably something Youske felt when it happened.

In PQ there is a part where even Ken goes on about "Guys marrying in Japan is illegal! You can't! They teach that in social studies!"

So when that topic comes up in school in the city he only gets that view of the law, his friends who are probably against guys marrying and go on about the "guys being together is wrong/disgusting/weird".

Then his parents, who you can puzzle together with how strict they are and how high of expectations they have of Yosuke they PROBABLY have a pretty nasty view of same sex relationships.

Being influenced by your parents opinions and the opinions of your 'friends' then shaped some of Yosuke's beliefs,

Kanji's shadow didn't help.

His entire dungeon didn't help.

it only engaged Yosuke's view of it more.

The shadow was overfly flamboyant and came on strong, something that Yosuke was told multiples times was the stereotype for homosexual men. Acting feminine, showing off a lot of skin, being incredibly uncomfortably close and all the sorts, it’s not Kanji’s fault, his believes weren’t that he is scared of liking men but that he’s scared of being rejected in general, Yosuke obviously doesn’t get that vibe from the dungeon so he sticks with his first assumption.

Yosuke at this point doesn't KNOW what is morally okay to say because in his eyes it's wrong, in his beliefs he is 'supposed' to be scared because all he's seen for now is the stereotypes.

It doesn't make it okay, but he doesn't know that, he doesn't have the correct judgement for that because until he met Yu he's never had a different view on it.

If you take his removed romance route into consideration he will have an incredibly hard time coming to terms with it, he is scared to become something that he's been told to fear, but at the same time his feelings for Yu don't seem to be wrong at all.

Yu isn't this flamboyant. weird, or highly sexual person, at the same time, neither is Yosuke, so he doesn’t know what to make out of this realization.

Not only is he confused, but he has all these other emotions he has to deal with, abandonment issues, caring about someone who died and then finding out they disliked you, all the stress from Junes... it pretty much throws it all into Yosuke's 8th social link where he just breaks down and cries.

He CRIES in front of you, a boy who's so sick and tired and confused. A boy who just wants to live a normal life suddenly has everything in the world go wrong for him and he can't take it.

I also strongly believe Yosuke definitely does suffer from depression but he never shows it to anyone, he wants to be carefree, he wants people to like him and he'll do anything even put himself to shame just to keep that, but who can blame him? He’s obviously desperate for friends through all of the things he’s experienced. It’s not pathetic or low, he needs the contact.

Nobody of the IT has seen Yosuke's shadow expect for Yu, the entire team knows each other incredibly well since they are also pretty open about their emotions, but Yosuke is that weird outside spot who only has Yu to trust when it comes to the emotional stuff.

it shows that Yosuke does, because he lets the others bully him around or use his money or even call him a disappointment and rolls with it. He only sometimes goes against it but in the end the others still manage to get the upper hand and Yosuke has no other choice but to take the punch.

Then at the same time we can't disregard that he is still a kid, along with all the others. His judgement isn't going to be as perfect as an adults (and not even adults have good judgement sometimes). Kids mess up, kids learn from their mistakes and what Yosuke and the others experience is something no kid should go through.

hhhh I’m so sorry for this super long text post but it’s all the thoughts I dished together when it came to analyzing Yosuke. I could be 100% wrong, but this is truly what I believe.

#Persona 4 #Yosuke Hanamura #Discussion #Character Analysis

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badlydrawndrawnings · 7 years

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semi-formal critique of p2/p5 similarities

When the first Persona 5 PV came out, almost everyone agreed that Persona 5 was going to be the Persona 2 duology of the modern games based off what we saw (or at least, that’s what it felt like). This belief only grew more when more (playable) characters were introduced and known characters info was release, and even later PVs showed everyone something big was going to happen in the story. In fact, some thought that Persona 5 is exactly like Persona 2 (mostly Innocent Sin) due to their apparent similarities in darkness and maturity. Now that the game is out, do these claims hold true?

I’m not sure about you, but I personally think it’s not. I’m not saying Persona 5 isn’t dark and mature (because it is), but it’s not handle like it was in Persona 2. The problem I have is that it seems people are trying to claim that the two games were handle the same way (mostly with Innocent Sin) via characters and certain plot points, which I honestly think it ranges from ‘I can see it’ to ‘yeah, no’, because both games handle these similarities differently to suit their perspective game.

The Ann(e) & Lisa comparisons is one I can get behind due to the fact are foreigner (1/4 mix for Ann[e]) and treated differently by their peers and have few friends. In fact, TV Tropes even has this in her character folder: Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Of Lisa Silverman, who expresses distaste in her own game about being considered "exotic" because of her ethnicity, as well as both being of the Lovers Arcana. However, both games portrays and handle it differently. For Lisa, being the only white girl caused her to be bullied as a child until she found friends in Tatsuya, Eikichi, Jun, and Maya (before things went up to literal flames and smoke). As a teenager, Lisa actually call out the new friends she made for using her background for their idol group Muses, because they want her to sing an English solo. Lisa was all “Oh, when I was young no one wanted to hang out with me because of my looks, but now due to my looks you want me because you think I speak English? Well guess what? I don’t speak English!” (not the exact words she used, but that’s the jist of it). For Ann(e), her mix background pretty much made her a pariah once she entered high school, since students think she’s loose and easy. It’s not helped by the fact rumors has students believe she’s in a relationship of sort with Kamoshida, which what he’s doing is pretty much sexual harassment. However, once he gets push into jail (basically, end of Castle Palace), Ann(e)’s background and problem get pushed aside and becomes a footnote for the main game. Regarding her Co-Op/Confidant, I honestly don’t think (or maybe I don’t remember it well) it was barely there either despite the fact it’s all about Ann(e)’s job as a model (along with her relationship with Shiho). While both Lisa and Ann(e) have problems with their background, Lisa’s was more about being bullied + stereotypes (kind of) , while Ann(e)’s was more on being negatively stereotype.

The Ryuji & Eikichi comparisons, while not as common as they used to be, I can kind of see due to certain traits they share. Both are delinquents/troublemakers with good hearts, granted Eikichi really deserve the title of delinquent/troublemaker since he did does go to a school that dealt mostly with ‘troublemakers’. Ryuji honestly doesn’t deserve his label of being a delinquent, but Kamoshida certainly influence it.But if I have to bring up another character to compare Ryuji too, it would have to be Anna Yoshizaka. Anna was a star sport player (UPDATE: Anna was apparently in track, just like Ryuji) at Seven Sisters until she got into an accident that made her unable continue, and as a result, she became a delinquent. My memory about IS is fuzzy, but I believe she used Joker’s wishing service to heal her injury, and it lead to her joining the Masked Circle as Lady Scorpio (UPDATE: According to two official yet untranslated novels, Anna just joined the Masked Circle without wishing for her leg to get better) EP!Anna still went through the same events, but she became a normal student with friends (no joining villainy here). Minus the obvious, Ryuji shares a whole lot with her regarding their school background, and it’s a shame not a lot of people aren’t bringing it up more. I guess Eikichi is the popular one for the picking because he, like Ryuji, is the ‘everyday average (best) friend character that’s comic relief’ like Junpei and Yosuke, making him an easy target for these comparisons. That, and I think Anna is kind of forgotten in the fandom (HA) and such, few comparisons had been made regarding her.

Like, Ann(e) & Lisa, Yusuke & Jun has this trope in his character folder: Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Bears more than a passing resemblance to Jun from Persona 2, with a similar hairstyle, school uniform, and tragic family backstory”, and a majority of fans believed this to be so pre-game release and post-release (not as much as pre-game, but it’s still high). I personally believe that out of all the character comparisons I have seen, these comparisons makes no sense and superficial. I will try to explain why. Jun is the ‘sweet’ (term is subjective because he does have a petty side) flower loving boy who is the potential boyfriend to Tatsuya. Jun is also one of the main villain/antagonist of Innocent Sin and had a burning desire for revenge on Tatsuya and company for 2/3 of the game because Jun thought (wrong) that Tatsuya and friends killed Maya (by letting her die in a shrine fire). Jun’s parents not only fought, he was embarrass by his father (who later died, and this is important), and his mother didn’t want much to Jun because she misses her life as a celebrity/actress (this is also important) and became neglected to him. Because of his mess up family situation, Jun was manipulated by a god, er, supernatural being who pretended to be his dead father, and his mother used Joker’s wishing service to make her young forever (I think?) and joined the Masked Circle as Queen Aquarius, and never realizes her son was Joker until late in game and takes a hit for him, and she die realizing she was a terrible mother. EP!Jun is much more happy since his parents are loving and caring and alive (no villainy here for mother and son). Yusuke, while antagonistic to the PT in civilian form, joined them to take down his Madarame after seeing how the truth from his Shadow and could no longer deny his abuse. The reason why Yusuke put up for it for as long as he did was became Madrame was the only parent he knew, so Yusuke didn’t take it well when he learns that Madarame indirectly let his mother died. After that, Yusuke spends most of his main game as the quirky art friend, while his Co-Op/Confidant has him being the starving artist trying to survive the [art] world (and dealing with the aftermath of Madarame). Despite fandom’s claim he is a soft boy, the guy can be a total dick (again, I bring up the fact he was antagonistic to the PT in civilian form, being rude as hell to Joker/Akira and Ryuji mostly). Yusuke and Jun don’t share the same role in their perspective games and their so call ‘similar tragic family situations’ isn’t similar at all. The only thing they have similar is their physical appearance, and I can’t figure out why fans claim with the others thing I brought up.

(The character that does share similarities to Jun is Goro, but because there are countless of post analysis/arguments on this already [I did so too, but I was stating how Goro has many similarities to other Persona and one SMT characters], I’ll just end the topic with this: there’s a reason Atlus why didn’t give the Kasugayama Uniform to Yusuke and gave it to Goro instead.)

I would say I have seen Futaba & Bafou comparisons...but that would a damn lie. Okay, so I have seen people talking about the traits they share like their computer hacking skills (not to mention Ultimate Personas with Prometheus) but I have never seen people actually compare compare the two characters in detail like the others characters I mention. On the other hand, I have seen people theorizing Bafou is either Futaba’s biological father (it’s second popular after the ‘Shido is Futaba’s biological father’ theory) or is actually Sojiro , which makes me wonder if that has to do with anything. So...NEXT!

The Sae & Katsuya comparisons is quite fun to discuss since I believe they make better foils to each other. Both are adults that have jobs with the law (public prosecutor for Sae, detective for Katsuya) with strain relationship with their younger siblings due to family issues (mainly, their dad). The way they are foils is due to their relationship with their younger siblings. In IS, Tatsuya sees Katsuya as an annoyance, granted there are a few moments he seems to know his brother does means well. In EP, Katsuya’s annoyance is pretty much explained by the fact Tatsuya is in some ways, a little shit, and Katsuya wants to fix their relationship because of the trouble their dad got when he lost his job via frame up (there is resentment because Katsuya had to give up his dream of being a patissier, but in the end, they still love each other). Makoto wants to make Sae proud, but the way their father died is affecting it (Sae kind of...doesn’t hold him in the same pedestal as Makoto does, which causes some strain on their relationship). To make the foils part clearer, Katsuya is a Persona User and hero/protagonist from beginning to end, and Sae is a non-Persona User and Palace Host Target who becomes their ally near the end.

Leaving character comparisons and onto plot points, Persona 5 has some similarities with them, and it the way they handle it also affects how dark and mature the game is. The main plot point people bring up is that Persona 2 and Persona 5′s main villain made a bet on humanity. I can’t spell their names to save my life, so I’m calling them Nyary and Yababadoo. One minor plot point is that in some way or form, both were able to manipulate a group of people to do his bidding (one person in Yababadoo’s case but it turn into a group so...), but said group usually fall apart and the villain then takes control. The one thing that separates the two gods is that, Nyary, unlike Yababadoo, won his bet in Innocent Sin. Nyary tricks the heroes into getting one of their party member to die, and they pretty much ended the world. The only reason Nyary ‘lost’ is because Philemon did some time travel BS/made an alternate universe to reset everything at the cost of the Innocent Sin cast never becoming friends. What Philemon did drove the point that the player lost. They weren’t successful, and to ‘win’, they had to lose everything. There was nothing they could do about it, and because of Tatsuya’s refusal to forget, the exact same shit in Innocent Sin almost happen in Eternal Punishment. In Persona 5, the PT were always successful with their heists, and they won against Yababadoo’s game. They never screwed up, and the one time they did ‘screw’ up by ‘killing’ someone was a frame job. This wouldn’t be a problem if they weren’t supposed to anti-heroes thieves, and frankly, most anti-heroes I know screw up at one point leading to them to fix it. I’m not saying I don’t want Persona 5 to end with Yababadoo winning and Igor going ‘welp time to pull a Philemon’, but if Persona 5 wanted pull the dark and mature P2 level or show they are the anti-heroes thieves taking risks with that they are doing, they could have let the PT screw up by actually accidentally kill Okumura and feeling guilty for it. The game could show the player they’re not holding back punches allowing them to think “Shit, here I thought I was successful and invincible.”

This part sounds like it’s going off topic, but I swear it’s not. As much as the fans love Persona 2, it feels like they forget Persona 2 was two games that made up the full story. Persona 5, while telling a story, has some parts that feel empty. It’s not empty enough to make another game, but enough to make a DLC to explain something within the game itself (unless Altus plans on doing it in the inevitable remake). In fact, the data mine from 4chan last September and some Youtube videos show four things: Goro has casual voice clips (English and Japanese) that backs up Atlus claim from the new book they wanted him to be a regular Co-Op/Confidant early in development, Goro has Loki voice clips (English and Japanese) that aren’t him going berserk which makes things weirder since mods and hacks can make Goro playable with Loki past the Casino Palace, the fact Goro has a mouse form and mouse voice clips (English and Japanese), and that there’s a file (datamined from a copy of the Japanese game) that show Atlus planned a ‘true end’ (I made a post about it here, and it also has some of the Loki clips but I think they’re dead links, so you got stuck with them and a small-ass image from 4chan talking about the files). If you’re still not convinced, the official art book that Japan released last year shows cut-in not used in the game (I think you can find them in the game files itself?) for several characters (Goro is one such character). One surprising character that has them is Lavenza, the true form of Caroline and Justine who get little screen time. Going by the fact the game does a minor time skip before properly ending, it’s easy to theorize *tinhat on* Atlus planned something with the true end with both characters within that time frame, but when Goro was made an automatic Co-Op/Confidant during development, they cut out the month and made ‘true end’ in December, and left Lavenza as minor NPC *tinhat off*.

Eternal Punishment may have crushed fans’ hopes and dreams of the Innocent Sin cast remembering and reuniting (excluding the bad choices you did that made them remember), but the game gave its purpose of finishing the story of Innocent Sin. The story didn’t felt empty regarding story. It felt complete. Sure, the story has a bittersweet ending since no one will remember sans Maya and her crew (they know shit happened on the other side after all), but the world is still there, and it’s message to the player is that sometimes, you need to move on to change for the better (at least that’s what I got.) Another thing to note is while Tatsuya tries to stop the end of the world from happening (again), he was only successful because he teamed up with Maya, Katsuya, Ulala, and Baofu to defeat Nyary. It was the adults that save the world. It was Maya, and adult, and her team, who were also adults, running around most of the game figuring out what the hell was going on and doing part of the work to save the world. The adults, in some way, had to clean up the mistakes the mostly teenage Innocent Sin cast did. What Eternal Punishment did made the story come in a full circle of sorts. Persona 2 starts with inexperience teenagers trying to save the world, and it ends with experience adults saving the world. I know the point of having a teenage cast in Persona 5 is to set the theme of having the younger generation changing and fighting back against the old fashion and (partly) corrupt society for the better, but I bet there are adults (twenties and thirties) that want to do the same thing too. I’m not saying all of PT should have been adults in their twenties to their thirties, but it would be interesting if one of your party members was an adult that not only want to change society for the better, but (going off the idea if the PT actually screwed up on the job) had to fix the mistakes the PT did for them to learn and grow.

I guess what I’m trying to say P5, while a good game and dark and mature in its own right, is not and can not be compared to P2 dark and mature levels. Think of this like this: P2 was the cake that won first prize at the baking competition and people loves it, talking about it for years after it was eaten. A new baker did the same thing for P5. While still winning first prize, it doesn’t reach the level of the cake everyone remembers yet people compare it for reasons that makes no sense because they are unique cakes.

#persona 2 #persona 5 #persona 5 spoilers #persona 2 spoilers #this is a text post #comparison and contrast #be warn though #my memory of both p2 and p5 is fuzzy #so things are probably incorrect #that's what i get for having sucky memory

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