Colors Flying High - Let's Play Persona 5 Royal

[Timrod]

Click Here for Update 16

: May 14th, and now we’re headed straight into another long cutscene. I feel like Royal kind of destroyed the pacing by basically doubling the length of a lot of cutscenes. By the way, I wound up re-doing all the portraits for this update because I realized that webp as a format is a fucking mistake.

: “I ended up pullin’ an all-nighter once I realized today’s the last day of exams.”

: In the original, that entire cutscene with the school assembly and the two meetings with Maruki weren’t there. Here we get the sort of weird pacing of having three days of exams, then Maruki, and now another day of exams.

: “You? Staying up studying?”

: “Nah, I gave up on the exam. I was playin’ some games, and then before I knew it, it was morning.”

: yawn “Morning…”

: “Yo, look who else is yawnin’.”

: “Exams are almost over, so I thought I’d make one last effort across the finish line.”

: “Impressive, Lady Ann. You’re quite different from this stupid monkey I know.”

: “Huh? Don’t gimme that crap. Your brain’s tiny compared to mine.”

: “Size is meaningless if there’s nothing inside, you know.”

: “What was that!?”

: “Ugh, will you please shut up!? You’re gonna make me forget everything I memo-”

: “…!?”

: “Am I imagining things?”

: “What, you see a groper or something?”

: “No, that’s not it. It’s.. nothing.”

: I like how Joker has this weird cat-like expression, like he’s just seen a ball of yarn in Ann’s hoodie and he wants to bat at it.

: This is kind of where I wish they had gone with Joker actually being some kind of reincarnation of Tatsuya Sudou, because the imagery of a guy who spent two entire games stalking a woman turning around and protecting one from a stalker would be kind of cool.

: This would be Yusuke. If you saw the P5D stream, he was in the background video for Last Surprise. He’s one of the only characters to not be an archetype seen in Persona 1 or 2, though I guess you could make the comparison to Nanjo. Instead, he’s more or less Goemon from Lupin III. No points for guessing his choice of weapon or who his Persona is.

: His Japanese voiceactor is basically trying to do a Goemon impression at all times.

: And here’s our villain. This is also kind of ripped from Lupin III: both Green Jacket and Red Jacket have stories where Goemon’s old master turns evil and tries to kill him.

: “I didn’t even notice the calls from Sensei… but thank goodness, I caught up to you.”

: “Okay…”

: “What!?”

: “…Model?”

: “All that I’ve drawn till now has been lacking, but I feel a passion from you unlike anyone else.”

: “This man’s highly suspicious!”

: “Ain’t this a recruit for some shady business?”

: “Will you cooperate with me? What do you say?”

: I also noticed now that I’ve played Innocent Sin that Yusuke looks a lot like Jun. The fans definitely picked up on this because the vast majority of fanart for Yusuke either pairs him with Ryuji or pairs him with Joker.

: “Hold your horses! Who’re you anyways?”

: Oh god dammit, this is the dumbest fucking pun. The Japanese word for high schooler is “kou-kousei”. This is something I absolutely fucking hate, especially when the game otherwise takes itself fairly seriously.

: “I’m Madarame-sensei’s pupil, and I am being allowed residence at his place. I’m striving to become an artist.”

: “Huh!? Do you mean THAT Madarame? The one who was on Good Morning Japan the other day?”

: “The very same.”

: “You know who that is?”

: “He was introduced as a super-famous Japanese-style artist who’s been recognized all over the world. But we heard that name the other day in Mementos..”

: “That old guy’s Madarame?”

: “Madarame-sensei’s exhibition will begin at the department store near the station tomorrow. I’ll be there to help out on opening day. Please come by.”

: “It’d be great if you could give me your answer in regard to being a model then.. I bet you have no interest in the fine arts, but I’ll give you tickets too.”

: “Well then, I hope to see you there tomorrow!”

: “That guy’s as easy to read as a book. You’re not plannin’ on goin’, are ya?”

: “…I think I will.”

: “That’s a little too convenient. It makes me wonder if you’re even telling the truth. So be it. What I want to know about most is your method.”

: “It’s true that Madarame was an unforgivable criminal worthy of the scorn thrown at him. He was an adult who cultivated his own fame and fortune by sacrificing the livelihood of children.”

: Madarame is more or less the Andrew Allanson of the art world, in that he’s a serial plagiarist who steals his students work.

: “But he’d been covering his tracks for years. How did you uncover the truth in such a short span of time?”

: I’m not sure whether this is terrible writing, or kind of brilliant writing. On one hand, Sae should already know exactly how the whole Palace thing works from the story he told her about Kamoshida. On the other, what she’s doing is exactly what an attorney would do in a deposition like this: try to trip the person up and find inconsistencies in their story.

: “This ‘metaverse’ business again? …Fine. Let’s suppose that people’s hearts can be changed by stealing their Treasure, like you’ve said. If so, a different suspicion arises.”

: “People have gone mad or lost consciousness, never to recover… like the subway accident in April. Depending on how you look at it, that could be taken as a phenomenon for a sudden change of heart, too.”

: You’d think she would understand that Joker didn’t even have his Persona at that point in April, but what she’s actually referring to are a couple of other shutdowns that happen between then and November, when the interrogation takes place.

: “…Were you related to those as well?”

: I’m not entirely sure why “No” isn’t an option.

: “..I see. Tch.. fine. Let’s get back to Madarame’s case. Keep it concise, and stick to the facts.”

: “Seemed like some of those were kind of tough. Well, it wasn’t too bad. You should have gotten a decent score, right?”

: We didn’t get the highest score, that’s for sure.

: “How 'bout you?”

: They should’ve given you an option to have Morgana go with Ryuji instead of Joker, which would result in a harder exam for Joker but would make Ryuji like you more.

: I mean, of course he is, he had a magic talking cat talking him through everything.

: “You traitor!”

: “Anyways, can we stop talkin’ about the exams? Like it or not, they’re gonna come back graded next week. Rather than focus on stuff that’s over with..”

: “What’re you looking at?”

: "..It’s no use. There ain’t any useful info. The number of posts are gettin’ less and less too…’

: “I am not letting this end as a one-hit wonder, okay?”

: “There’s no point in getting antsy though. I know! Why don’t we go eat lunch somewhere? We still have some money left over from the other day.”

: “I want sushi then! Or domestic-raised eel!”

: “We don’t have THAT much left.”

: Joker hides the roughly $1500 he has on him so that Ann doesn’t see it.

: “Oh right. There are those tickets to Madrame’s exhibit! Wait, that’s tomorrow.”

: “Don’t tell me.. was it love at first sight with that Yusuke guy?”

: “It’s not like that.”

: “O-Of course not.”

: “When I was watching that special on TV, his artwork was pretty nice. Plus, we’ve got free tickets.”

: “Besides, this could also be related to what we heard in Mementos.”

: “…Madarame, was it?”

: “Hrmm…”

: I swear, I’d just pack Morgana into a goddamn box and mail his horny ass to Abu Dhabi.

: “That aside, what should I do about the other two tickets? Wanna go appreciate some fine arts for once?”

: “Fine arts, huh…”

: “I suggest we should all go together! Appreciating the fine arts builds character. A phantom thief who can’t identify an original is lame.”

: Something tells me Morgana couldn’t tell a Monet from a Picasso.

: “Well, if everyone’s going..”

: “It’s settled then!”

: “Just the phrase ‘going to an art exhibit’ sounds kinda mature. Let’s meet at the exhibit entrance tomorrow.”

: Tonight, we’ll appreciate some fine ar- I can’t even finish that sentence with a straight face.

: Yes, just like I’m sure Japanese high schoolers all have magical brain ghosts that can light people on fire. I was watching a stream of Silent Hill 4 a few days ago in bed and my cat climbed up in that weird position that Morgana uses in these scenes where he sits upright like a human to watch. Needless to say, I do not trust my cat anymore.

: I didn’t catch it in a screenshot, but one of the comments that can appear in the bottom-right is “Sauce plz” which is a direct reference to a 4chan meme: because 4chan is an imageboard, most people just post images directly instead of posting links to them like you would on Reddit or retweeting them on Twitter. “Sauce plz” is their way of asking for the source of an image.. or used to be, before the site got taken over by uncreative fucks who do nothing but spam fucking Pepe and Wojak.

: This caught on so much that there’s actually a reverse image search site called “Saucenao” which I believe is run by a 4channer.

: “It’ll be a pain in the ass if someone sees you, so don’t stick your head out too much, all right?”

: “Um… yeah.”

: “You really came.”

: “What’d you expect when you left us those tickets!?”

: “Make sure that you don’t get in the way of the other visitors.”

: “Come now, I’ll show you around. I’d like to speak more about the picture I’d like to draw too.”

: “Well, see you guys later.”

: “I told you not to come out! Are we really gonna ‘appreciate’ the fine arts? Can’t we just go home?”

: “Well, we did come all this way and stuff. Uh.. which way are we supposed to start?”

: “It’s that old man from the other day.”

: My atelier (if you can call it that) is a basement. It really helped me get in touch with the natural mindset for YIIK, which is to say that it should also be buried deep under the ground.

: “…A shack?”

: “Wasn’t the word ‘shack’ something…”

: “There’s way too many people!”

: “I’m getting crushed…”

: “Anyways, we gotta head for the exit! Don’t die on us, all right!?”

: “Usually, one concentrates on their own style. However, Sensei creates all this by himself. He’s special.”

: “There you are, Yusuke.”

: “Sensei!”

: “Ah, the girl from yesterday. Are you enjoying the exhibit?”

: “I don’t how how to put it into words… but it’s really amazing.”

: Oh, right. I forgot to mention it up until now, but the wiki claims that Madarame is a composite of two people. The first is a composer by the name of Mamoru Samuragochi. You might’ve heard of him if you’ve ever played Resident Evil - he “composed” a couple of the themes for the Director’s Cut of RE1 (it’s the one with the fart trumpets) and for Onimusha: Warlords.

: Samuragochi claimed that he was deaf, and got all kinds of attention for it: he had a profile in Time Magazine and a documentary made about him on NHK. In reality, he was a fraud - all of his compositions were in fact ghostwritten by another artist named Takashi Niigaki. The revelations about Samuragochi happened in 2014.

: “You’re sensing something from the artwork… that alone is enough to give us artists satisfaction.”

: The other person is Yoshihiko Wada, a painter who won a national-level prize for his painting… until it was discovered that he’d actually been plagiarizing another artist: an Italian painter by the name of Alberto Sughi. Wada at first made the claim that he had studied under Sughi, but then it came out that he had basically flown to Italy, passed himself off as a fan, took dozens of photos of Sughi’s paintings and then copied them.

: “I hope this becomes a wonderful piece, Yusuke. Well then, if you’ll excuse me.”

: “Indeed.”

: “Oh, this is it - the painting I wanted to see in person.”

: “I guess it’s the painter’s anger? I’m not sure, but I sense this… strong frustration from it. To think such a cheerful and gentlemanly person could make such a piece…”

: “Something wrong?”

: “Don’t mind me. There are better pieces than.. this one. Come now, this way!”

: Don’t mind me. There are definitely better LPs than.. this one. CirclMastr’s LP of MLB 2007 The Show for instance, or RJWaters2’s recently updated Metal Gear Solid LP. The fact that I’ve plugged RJ’s LP in like… three of mine shows how much effort he puts into that.

: “H-Hey!”

: “…But thanks to that, I remember now.”

: “Let’s not worry about it for now. It’s about a post online.”

: “Here, look at this.”

: “You got it all wrong; we got dragged into this huge crowd and-”

: “..Eh, anyways. You gotta look at this too. This post might be about Madarame.”

: “What’s it say?”

: “A master of the Japanese arts is plagiarizing his pupil’s work. Only his public face is shown on TV.”

: Whoa there. I don’t know that I’d call Andrew Allanson a master of anything, let alone Japanese art. Has he been on TV?

: “Plagiarizing!?”

: “I didn’t think much of it when I first saw it, but hearing ‘shack’ and ‘Madarame’ triggered it.”

: Now, here’s something I’d like for you to keep in mind, because the plot is about to fall down the idiot hole. They’ve now had two different people tell them that Madarame is a serial plagiarist and also probably an abuser.

: While not quite as over-the-top as Kamoshida was, Madarame is still like, borderline cartoonishly evil.

: “Abuse on top of plagiarism, hm?”

: “If this is real, it’ll be a huge scandal.”

: “I wonder if Kitagawa-kun posted this. I mean, he IS a pupil of his.”

: “Who knows? It’s anonymous and all.”

: “In that case.. it’s possible the Madarame we heard about in Mementos is referring to the same one.”

: “A man like that, doing such a thing? I wonder if we can ask that Shadow from earlier about this. Oh. Actually, we just need to talk to him in reality.”

: “And how are we gonna go about that? Are we gonna explain it all, startin’ with Mementos?”

: I mean, you could just use parallel construction. That’s the term used by Federal law enforcement where they get information without a warrant (such as through the NSA’s surveillance programs or from another government agency) that wouldn’t be admissible in court and then use that information to build a case that hides where they got the information from.

: “Besides, if we make a move out in the open, there’s the possibility that Madarame will find out.”

: “Oh.. yeah, right.”

: “Hey, what do you think about Madarame? Doesn’t he seem suspicious?”

: “I know, right? This all fits way too well to just be a coincidence. If this post is legit, ain’t this the kinda target we’ve been waitin’ for?”

: “Well, yeah, but.. is it really true?”

: “By the way, what did you do about the whole modeling thing?”

: “Kitagawa-kun gave me his contact info. And the address to his sensei’s atelier.”

: “He said he lives there, right? Perfect timing. Let’s try goin’ tomorrow. We’re off to Madarame’s house after school!”

: “Huh? You want me to model tomorrow!? This is too sudden…”

: “What? We’re just gonna go talk to Kitagawa.”

: “Oh, that’s what you meant…”

: Oh fuck! It’s Sunday and we haven’t gripped and sipped!

: Fuck you, cat!

: Instead, we have to study. Next time, we’ve got two more days of pure plot dump.