Colors Flying High - Let's Play Persona 5 Royal

[Timrod]

Click Here for Update 21

: It’s Sunday, and I think you all know what that means.

: This week, we get Onsen Aojiru, which is absolutely just Gamer Girl Bath Water.

: With our grips sipped, it’s time to buy Yusuke some equipment.

: From what I remember, Yusuke is the best gunner in the game - he uses assault rifles, which have hefty magazine sizes but aren’t random like Ann’s SMGs. The downside is their low accuracy.

: I also realized I forgot to do a thing that happened a few updates ago, so let’s do that now.

: “You just gotta show us the Persona we ask for!”

: “First off, we would like for you to bring us a Jack Frost.”

: “That’s too easy, Justine! It should be a challenge. Hmm.. I want it to have Mabufu too! You got that, inmate? Bring us a Jack Frost with Mabufu.”

: If you’ve played Persona 3 and Persona 4, you’ll remember Elizabeth/Margaret’s social links. Caroline and Justine’s work exactly the same way - they want to see a Persona with specific skills on it.

: Because this does not take time to do, most people opt to do it on the last day: this is because a lot of their requests require transferring skills from Personas that have levelled up several times, and the easiest way to do that is at the end when you have all or most of the confidants maxed out.

: We could actually do this in two ways. We could just fuse a Jack Frost, who will automatically learn Mabufu because of the bonus experience from Morgana’s confidant, or we could get one in Madarame’s dungeon and level it up manually.

: We can meet Ryuji in the arcade in Shibuya. I actually found out that the one arcade we had in Connecticut (which was attached to a mini-golf place that closed down years ago) just got a new owner. I might go there and try it someday.

: “You wanna grab some ramen? I’ll show you my go-to place. It’s kinda far, but it’s totally worth. The flavor’s outta this world.”

: We now have access to Ogikubo, which is Ryuji’s special hangout spot.

: “This shit’s the best, man! Ramen is life! Light soup like this really gets your body goin’ again after a good run, y’know. We used to come all the way out here after practice and…”

: “Uh, I guess that’s all in the past. By the way, I’ve seen Nakaoka around a few times.. but for some reason it don’t look like he’s gettin’ along with the others.”

: You might be asking who Nakaoka is. He’s one of the ex-track team people we met way back when we did Rank 3 of Ryuji’s confidant.

: “Yeah… kinda. I’ve been thinkin’ about what he said.. how the whole track team was puttin’ up with Kamoshida’s shit.. and how I effed it all up for 'em. I think he was right.”

: “They don’t even got a club room anymore, so they’ve been storin’ all their stuff behind the gym. They can’t use any school gear either, so they just run laps around the block for practice.”

: “There ain’t really a place for outcasts like that. I should know that better than anyone.. It’s good they’re keepin’ their heads low now though. I don’t want ‘em endin’ up like me.”

: “Y’know what? You’re right. I guess now that I’m thinkin’ about it, tryin’ to fit in is a real pain in the ass. I mean, I’d never’ve met you guys if I wasn’t an outcast, right? So, uh.. it’s all good.”

: Ryuji gives us a new ability, which is only kind of useful but helps in situations like farming Shiki-Ouji (which I am definitely going to do more of).

: “…I just hope there’s something I can do to help those track guys. Though it’d probably mess ‘em up if I tried to butt in. Oh yeah, we still gotta find a new spot for our trainin’.”

: “Hm.. I’ll think about it. No slackin’ off 'til then, mkay?”

: Somehow, there’s no phone call, so we just go right to the bathhouse for five points to charm.

: “Madarame was talking to a lawyer. I suppose he’s serious about suing. I think we should advance our plans. Why don’t we go to the Palace today?”

: I rarely do this, but this time I go ahead and commit to the dungeon after school - it’s on the schedule anyway.

: “Artists with that good of an eye are rare in Japan. I wonder if he has synesthesia. Yes, regarding synesthesia.. one of many English terms that come from Greek root words.”

: “Haven’t you heard of it? It’s a condition where your senses can cross over each other, like seeing music as color.”

: “There are all kinds of varieties, though some sense combinations are more common than others. We call people who experience this phenomenon ‘synesthetes’.”

: I’m not gonna lie, I read that at “synth-testes” the first time I read it, which sounds like something you’d hear in a sci-fi novel where they build a giant robotic dick to fight crime.

: “Mr. Kurusu. You were staring off into space, weren’t you? Well, your number’s up. The root words of synesthesia are “syn” and “aisthesis”. What do they mean?”

: “She wants to know what the root words mean..? It’s all Greek to me, but I can give it a try.. here, let’s think about this. It’ll be easier if we put our heads together.”

: “Okay, so.. let’s start with ‘syn’. I think that’s in a lot of other words, too. Like.. synergy, and synchronicity, and synthesis. If we think about what those words have in common, then maybe ‘syn’ means..”

: I somehow forgot to capture the answer, but it’s “together”.

: “That’s it! ‘Syn’ means ‘together,’ or a combination of something. And ‘aisthesis’, huh? That’s a little like the word aesthetics. I wonder if it means..”

: “Yeah! That’s it! Sounds like we know the definitions of the root words. So that means the full word basically means…”

: “Yeah, that’s it! Phew.. we really gotta stay on our toes in this class. I could use a snack after all that brain power.. let’s get a treat after this!”

: Dammit cat, no. You’re not getting the goddamn dry food, stop sitting outside the cabinet and meowing. The vet says you’re fat.

: “You’ve been studying! Unfortunately, synesthesia’s something you have to be born with.. you can’t learn it.”

: I’d almost argue you can. Let me ask you this: what does purple taste like? What about green? Orange? Not everyone is going to have the same answer, but I’m willing to bet everyone has an answer.

: In order: that artificial grape flavor they use in Life Savers, Asparagus, and either the Mexicoke version of Fanta (the kind with actual sugar in it that comes in a glass bottle) or the Turkish knockoff of it I got at a bodega one time.

: “Some of the geniuses over the course of history have had synesthesia. The composer Franz Liszt instructed his orchestra to play the color purple.”

: While I don’t know exactly what purple would sound like, I have a pretty good idea - it’s one of the lower notes on a French horn.

: “The poet Arthur Rimbaud was also said to see colors in letters. Seeing colors in sounds and letters, and feeling shapes in flavors and numbers.. geniuses and common people see the world differently. Were you able to understand that?”

: “Synesthesia, huh.. that’s fascinating. Although, the reason Madarame sees the world differently is because of his distorted desires.”

: There’s a segment I’m going to skip entirely, because it’s a recap of things we already know - like what a Palace is.

: “It has to be Kitsune. You know, with that kitsune mask and everything.”

: “Hell yeah. That really leaves an impression.”

: “Are you talking about me?”

: “What do you want your name over here to be?”

: “I’d say ‘Da Vinci’.”

: “Nope. Well, you’ve got that mask like Ann said.. and then there’s that weird tail.. all right! You’re Abura-age!”

: This is a kind of nonsensical culture reference that will take me a minute to explain.

: Abura-age is a kind of thin, deep-fried tofu. It’s primarily used in a dish called Inari-zushi, which is vinegar-soaked rice wrapped in abura-age.

: The Japanese harvest deity is a fox called Inari, which has shrines everywhere: this is why the fox is a thing in Persona 4. The legend is that foxes like deep-fried mice, only that’d be gross so people made offerings of Inari-Zushi instead.

: This is also why you can ask Tamamo for fried tofu in Monster Girl Quest in the infamous “thin fried tofu/touch fluffy tail” scene. Let me LP Monster Girl Quest, you cowards!

: Anyway, there’s one character who will repeatedly call Yusuke “Inari” so that’s why.

: “Snrk…”

: “Very well.”

: “He’s agreed to it!?”

: “It’s decided then! Abura-age!”

: “Nuh-uh! Not happening! Do you have any ideas, Joker?”

: Joker immediately wraps his arm around Yusuke’s shoulder and goes “Boyfriend”.

: “Ohh… just keep it literal, huh? Sounds good to me.”

: “What do you think, Fox?”

: “It’s acceptable.”

: “It’s set then. Let’s go.”

: I had to take my cat to the vet today, and basically had to wrestle him into his carrier because he started running the second I brought it out. The entire time, I was just picturing Morgana in the pose my cat was in, legs splayed out as far as they’d go to stop me putting him in the carrier.

: Anyway, we can pick our party now.

: By default, the game puts Joker alone, so I take Ryuji, Ann, and Yusuke.

: I did a very brief run that ended in a reset because I ran into another Regent, forgetting that you can just compendium summon them, and couldn’t capture it because I already had one. So instead, I fuse the nightmare of everyone who has ever played Nocturne, using Mokoi and Regent.

New Persona: Matador

Origin: Spain

First Appearance: Shin Megami Tensei II

Not an actual mythological figure so much as a cultural one. Name of the performers in bullfighting events in Spain who ultimately kill the bull, having one of the riskiest and most life-threatening jobs of all the performers. Nocturne re-imagined him as a Spanish equivalent of the Reaper.

: Regent lets us choose a few extra options for traits - I picked Mighty Gaze, because Regent also comes with every basic multi-target spell except Mafrei. I wind up giving him Maragi, Mabufu, Maeiha and Makouha (bless damage).

: We start back at the room before the barrier.

: “* sigh * Thanks to all my hard work..”

: “..What do you mean by that?”

: “Don’t worry about that! C’mon, let’s keep going!”

: Not far past where the barrier was, we find the second map.

: “Ooh, do you think that could be another pamphlet? Let’s take it with us, Joker!”

: “Now we can use it to figure out where the Treasure is, right?”

: “I suspect it’s in the innermost point of this place. If that’s the case…”

: “Hm, we will need to pass through the lounge and the gallery in order to reach it..”

: “The deeper in we go, the tighter security’s going to be. We need to advance carefully, okay?”

: This is another laser grid puzzle, which is mostly just there to force you into some new encounters.

: One of those is Onmoraki. Never let these fuckers get a turn. They will always open with a spell that causes Fear. Fear makes anyone hit with it randomly run away from battle, meaning they won’t get EXP.

: The other is Jack Frost. Ideally, you probably don’t want Ann in your party for this room, since you can switch on the fly and I believe this is the only room in which Jack Frost can spawn.

: This is because they can spam Mabufu (which she’s weak to) and get an extra press turn to spam it again.

: Past the laser room is a box with nothing good in it, and then…

: “His stance conveys the notion that he is no ordinary foe.”

: “I think the control room’s behind him. He’s probably guarding it to make sure nobody gets too close. However, we’ll need to disarm the security if we want to ensure we have a safe infiltration route. Forcing our way through seems to be our only option…”

: And now we’ve got a mini-boss battle against a Kurama Tengu and two Koppa Tengu.

: Ann nearly kills the two Koppa Tengu in one go. This was kind of a waste.

: As I found out, Matador does like 200 damage with Makouha, and the Koppa Tengu are weak to Bless damage. This would’ve wiped them in one hit.

: We get enough EXP to get Yusuke to level 16, as well as a skill card. If you’ve read the Persona 1 or Innocent Sin LPs, you’ll know all about these - you can use them to make a Persona learn new abilities.. but only on Joker’s Persona.

: “It really was on a totally different level from the other enemies though..”

: “Hm, he dropped some sort of card.”

: Yusuke’s thing, once we establish his confidant, is that he can duplicate skill cards. It takes time and blank skill cards, and it’s pretty useless because we can’t do anything crazy with it like the old 5-Megidolaon strategy in Persona 1.

: The security room the tengus were guarding has a locked box on one side with a new sword for Yusuke. This is why I didn’t bother getting him one at Iwai’s.

: God dammit.

: “Ugh, another one…?”

: “We’ll just have to look for someone else who might know it..”

: This shutter, by the way, is right outside the security room. I’m pretty sure you can’t miss the cutscene trigger, because it’s in the hallway you’d need to take to go back to the laser room.

: “Maybe.. his shoe size?”

: “Yo, Fox. You know that bastard’s shoe size?”

: “Unfortunately, I have never heard him mention it. Are we sure that is the proper password..?”

: “Madarame’s feet.. what do you think that could mean..?”

: It means we need to go back to the statue near the barrier control room.

: Unfortunately, there’s an encounter with a Nue and two Onmoraki on the way.

: Joker gets inflicted with Fear, which sucks.

: And then this happens, because I forgot to equip Shiki-Ouji after farming him a bunch the last time we were here.

: By the time I got the situation under control, Joker was almost dead.

: There’s a Shiki-Ouji who patrols right in front of the statue, so you’re probably going to have to take him out to do this. I already did it on the way in.

: “Pffft! He’s really puffin’ his chest out here, ain’t he…?”

: “Hold on a moment… could this be the spot of ‘Madarame’s feet’ that the security guard mentioned?”

: “It’s at his feet… oh, right! But isn’t the password supposed to be a number of some kind?”

: “Hm, I do believe there are numbers here though.. ‘one’ ray of hope stands ‘alone’ with ‘two adept hands’. ‘None’ shall match him. That means..”

: “Yeah, that must be it!”

: “Sweet! Let’s head back and shut down the security!”

: On the way back, I hit the other encounter where that Nue was. Inugami is another annoying demon - they’re immune to guns.

: I’ll be honest, I wasn’t planning on getting either Inugami or Jack Frost - Inugami is Hanged Man, and we won’t be going anywhere near Iwai’s confidant until July.

: Ann killed the Jack Frost in one hit, so I had to negotiate with the Inugami. This was probably for the better, seeing as we’ll need to fuse a Jack Frost later anyway.

New Persona: Inugami

Origin: Japan

First Appearance: Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne

Japanese animal spirit (usually a dog, hence the “inu”, but can also be raccoons, weasels, wolves and other similar animals). Often associated with Onmyo mages, and capable of possessing humans. SMT Imagine’s entry states that they were once a thing that was checked for during marriages, because once an inugami possesses a family, they won’t leave it.

: I should note that the skill list is from the base game - I believe it was changed in Royal, but I tossed Inugami before I realized this.

: There’s a locked chest we couldn’t get to in the laser room which has a Bead Chain in it - these restore full HP to the entire party.

: “Indeed. It bears such a bizarre texture as well. It’s as though I could simply slip inside..”

: “Wh-What the-!?”

: “M-My hand.. it actually entered the painting…”

: “So we can go inside of it…? Well, I don’t see any other path for us to take. Let’s give it a try!”

: “What the heck was that…!?”

: “We’re probably just hearing Madarame’s thoughts. There’s no need to panic.”

: “Madarame…”

: “Hm… so this space is not merely one, but a multitude of paintings.”

: “You tellin’ me they’re all connected? Which one goes where?”

: “That, we will have to continue walking to find out.”

: “Hey Joker, can’t you spot the connections with your skills?”

: “The one who has sullied the very nature of art itself has no right to accuse us of such a thing..!”

: “Save your emotions for later. We have to keep moving!”

: There’s a vent here we can use to progress, and a kind of interesting dialog that happens inside.

: The vent opens up into a disappointingly huge room that is really just a hallway - there’s a bunch of screens here and absolutely nothing hidden behind them.

: “There is something off about these though…”

: “Why don’t we go take a closer look?”

: “Ain’t this just like last time? Y’know, with the secret passage inside and everything.”

: “Hm… it looks like these ones are all completely different.”

: “There are even frames with no paintings at all…”

: This game just loves repeating itself.

: “That is strange.. but we don’t have a choice. Let’s go, Joker.”

: “So he’s gonna blame the world for his declinin’ skill? Heh, that bastard never had any real talent to begin with!”

: “Huh!? Even if that’s true, that doesn’t give you the right to be deceiving people!”

: This painting is the only one with an actual trick to it. The trick is that there’s two exits - one from going through the Torii gate, and one from going to the right. We want to go through the gate.

: “What the heck? He’s basically saying he’s jealous of young talent… look at me! I was turned into a cat, but I’m still fighting. Age isn’t a valid excuse.”

: You can go two ways in the jungle painting - the right side (rather than going up) takes you to a button.

: “Look! Another painting!”

: “So passing through one hidden route leads to the formation of another… what an elaborate ruse. It’s highly likely there is a new path through the paintings. We should investigate, Joker.”

: “So they’re not connected exactly as they seem.. we’ll have to keep trying until we find the right way.”

: I could’ve gone back through the jungle on the left, but going to anywhere that would take you to an empty frame sends you back to the camels.

: “So he’s usin’ all those pretty words, but he’s basically sayin’ people are like steppin’ stones. That’s just like what he did to all those kids - crushed 'em for his ‘art’! What a piece of shit!”

: Game, I feel like maybe we’ve heard this twice already.

: This kicks us out of the painting, but there’s a reason I wanted to do this - there’s stealables down here.

: Oh, and a Shiki-Ouji spawn. I should mention I still haven’t finished recording this day as I write this, mostly because I farmed a LOT of money at the end - something like 370,000 yen, all off Shiki-Ouji.

: Instead of running into the octopus, we instead want to go down.

: This puts us by another button we can use to open the last painting.

: Unfortunately, we can’t go back through here, so we have to go all the way down and start over. The order is Desert → Mountain (going through the gate) → Jungle (climbing the rock) and then to the final painting.

: “So running your atelier out of a shabby, run-down shack was simply an act after all… how foolish I was to have been deceived for so long…”

: “Fox…”

: “How despicable.. we have encountered so many of his paintings, yet not once did he mention a love for art. These are no ‘paintings’… they are just meaningless self-assertions placed into picture frames!”

: “I’m excited to see how the change of heart alters him. Now, let’s hurry!”

: The second you walk into this box maze, you can hear a will seed room.

: Before we do that, there’s another female shadow in this room, which I believe is unique to this particular room.

: I had to spend some SP on this fight because of the Inugami, but once I did..

Returning Persona: Ame-no-Uzume

Origin: Japan

First Appearance: Shin Megami Tensei I

Shinto goddess of dawn and revelry. Lured Amaterasu out of a cave.

: Ame-no-Uzume is good for exactly one thing, and that thing is lightning - she can cast Mazio for just over what a regular Zio would cost.

: The will seed door is accessed by going through a giant… is this a vent? I’m not entirely sure what this is.

: You can then drop down to where the room is..

: Only it’s barred, so we have to find a button to open it.

: The button is at the top of a very finicky grappling hook point on the other side of the room.

: “There’s so much gold…! It’s hurting my eyes…”

: “The distortion is especially bad here. It’s barely holding up. Plus, it’s not even on our map…”

: “So we must ascertain the truth through our eyes alone.”

: Welcome to the MC Escher room, where we have to do a teleporter maze. I remember the old days when “teleporter maze” meant “better break out the guide, fucker” but this one’s super simple.

: “So, like, which way are we supposed to go? I didn’t see any other ways forward, did you?”

: “I see. So it was camouflaged. We may have been trapped in here for eternity had you not noticed that.”

: The game’s kind of inconsistent about how it handles entry and exit from the palaces. We saw Yusuke and Ann just kinda fall in near the barrier point, and presumably there’s a way to exit from the app while in a palace that we just never see. It seems like it’d be hard to get stuck forever.

: “Ooh! Nice work, Skull! You did it!”

: “Uh, sure… you know I just got lucky, right?”

: There’s a chest up here with an accessory in it. Any “black” items are used for this game’s equivalent of returning Personas - the same way we did in Persona 1 and Innocent Sin.

: “It’s probably some kind of illusion. We’re in a Palace, after all. Well, I guess the painting itself might be correct though.”

: “You say ‘correct’ but aren’t they all counterfeit? Although maybe the real one’s here too…”

: This part, and the next few, are kind of weirdly designed. The idea is we’re supposed to look for the real Sayuri, which will open up the next teleporter. You might think that what you’re supposed to do is go to the exit nearest the real Sayuri, but no - you have to actually confirm it’s real first.

: “Isn’t that a fake? I mean, this is Madarame’s Palace…”

: “There are obvious differences if you look closely. It shouldn’t be too difficult to tell them apart.”

: “Yeah, maybe it’s obvious for you… what do you think, Joker?”

: This one’s the fake - the real Sayuri is red, not blue.

: “Indeed, this is a fake. The real Sayuri is cloaked in vibrant crimson garments.”

: “O-Oh, right.. now that you mention it..”

: The thing is, there’s something they could’ve done here that would’ve made more sense, but they didn’t. We’ll see what that is when we get to the boss fight.

: “Some fools would pay a fortune and never know it was a fake.. but you are quite impressive, Joker.”

: “…I’m thinkin’ I might be one of those fools.”

: I try going in the door near the real Sayuri, but it just warps you back to the start.

: “That is correct. It seems you have quite the eye for detail, Joker.”

: “For real…? That’s amazin’…”

: “The vibrant crimson clothes, her beautiful hair, the sublime balance between subject and background.. this may only be an illusion, but it is without a doubt a spitting image of the true Sayuri.”

: Hitting the real one causes it to turn into a spark..

: Which turns the door we’re supposed to go through orange, because Portal.

: He’s incredibly wrong, but I can’t explain why until the boss fight. It has to do with the painting.

: “And here, just as in reality, he entraps those who cannot see through his lying facade..”

: “You might be right.. no wonder the distortion is so strong here.”

: “Hey, so… what does that mean?”

: That boy needs therapy. Psychosomatic.

: “I think it means finding the real Sayuri should break through the distortion and open a path.”

: “So do we just gotta check all of 'em?”

: “Why would we do that…? Let’s just look for the real one.. assuming we can differentiate it.”

: Both of the paintings on this platform are fake - there’s no cherry branch behind her head.

: The real one is obvious - it’s the only one with a branch.

: The hidden room on the first platform has an SP recovery item. What I probably should’ve done is burn all of the SP items in this dungeon, since SP will largely stop being a concern after this.

: The next room has four paintings, but if you look, you can probably figure out where the real one is (the third one from the left is a convincing fake).

: The real one is, of course, hidden because Madarame. I think we get it already, game. This feels a lot more like something you’d see in Paper Mario.

: The new orange portal is the one down the stairs and to the right of where Joker is.

: “Just be careful, okay? The distortion is growing much stronger the deeper we go..”

: Down the stairs is a blank skill card, which we can either give to Yusuke to duplicate a card, or use in returning a Persona. I had to use it to return a Persona, because unfortunately there’s no way to just delete a Persona and I kind of fucked up when doing fusion a little. We’ll see that later.

: “Then is the Treasure behind him?”

: “It’s kinda hard to tell from here. Let’s get a closer look!”

: “Doesn’t it look a bit hazy?”

: "For the time being. Once we send the card and make Madarame aware it’ll be stolen, it’ll materialize like ‘Yoohoo!’ "

: I don’t know what kind of fridge Morgana has if Yoohoo just materalizes in it. I can’t believe they still make that stuff - I’ve never actually had it, but I know kids used to bring it to school for lunch when I was in middle school.

: “I wonder what form it will take..”

: “Who knows? Bet it’s something like a self-portrait.”

: “The source of what distorted Madarame’s reality this much..”

: “So what now? Think it’s safe to say we got our route set?”

: “Hmm.. we know where the Treasure is, but I’m not sure that we’ve necessarily secured the route..”

: “Huh? Why’s that?”

: “You must be talking about the infrared lasers surrounding it.”

: “That, and the outer perimeter is swarming with guards. Forcing our way through will be difficult.”

: Morgana fails to realize that the entire party is nearly level 20 at this point, and will be 21 by the time I leave the museum (except Yusuke). The boss is level 17.

: “So we’ll need to find a way to steal it too.. this is tougher than it was with Kamoshida..”

: “We just have to make one final push. Let’s check this floor!”

: “Hm.. could this also be..? Hey, someone!”

: “Yes, and the infrared lasers remained active even during the power outage.”

: “So we’ll only be able to turn the power off in there for a few seconds..”

: “Wait a second.. arent’ those guards that just ran out headed this way!? What else should we try? We might be in trouble if we don’t hurry…”

: “The heck? There was no point in even comin’ here then!”

: “Hm, it seems disabling the infrared lasers is not within the realm of possibility for us.”

: “All right!”

: “Now there are more places we can explore..”

: This is Makami. We ABSOLUTELY NEED a Makami or it will be a permafuck - Makami is the only Temperance Persona we can get right now, and we need that for an upcoming confidant.

: Unfortunately, I mis-read the weakness chart. Makami is not weak to fire, Makami is weak to lightning.

: Makami is also a “tough guy” demon like Shiki-Ouji and Berith, where they won’t negotiate until their HP is below a certain level.

: Unfortunately, I was in a bad spot - after the Maragi from Ann, they were too high on HP to negotiate with after being knocked down, but too low to survive another knockdown. I had to kill them.

: “All we really managed to do was open the shutters.”

: “On top of that, we can only turn the lights off briefly, while the lasers remain unaffected.”

: “Oh well.. guess we just gotta go see what’s past those shutters.”

: The last Will Seed is here, and we definitely want it - not only for the SP recovery, but also because the accessory it makes is kind of amazing.

: The Zen Outfit is a really good armor that boosts Agility by 3. I equip it on Yusuke because he has the lowest agility.

: The vent also leads to the grappling point we can use to get to the Will Seed. I went to check the archive LP because I forget how this room originally worked before the grappling hook.

: In the original game, there was a whole room up here with a couple of Shiki-Oujis in it. I wish it was still here, because that would’ve made the grind a lot faster.

: Madarame’s Palace as a whole was actually nerfed pretty significantly from the base game.

: Arahabaki here is weak to Nuclear, so this fight is basically a Shiki-Ouji wth more HP: use Frei, use an All-Out, use Frei again, repeat until dead.

: It uses a move that causes Brainwash, which is this game’s equivalent of Charm.

: Fortunately, Joker has like a 50% chance of just outright removing it because of Maruki’s confidant ability.

: The entire party is now level 20.

: The Crystal of Vanity is actually a pretty great accessory early on, as it nulls any weaknesses the user has. All of our party members will eventually have their weaknesses mitigated via abilities, but for now it’s pretty good for boss fights.

: We then have to go all the way around to reach this button, which opens a door to progress.

: On the other side, I almost immediately run into two Makami and a Nue. We’re actually high enough level that we could get Nue as a Persona - Nue is level 20 - but he’s Moon arcana.

New Persona: Makami

Origin: Japan

First Appearance: Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne

Japanese wolf god who protects the good and punishes evil. Known for eating people. Often drawn on prayer boards, where it is believed to protect against fire and thieves - possibly in exchange for crops. “Makami” is a romanization of its actual name, Oguchi-no-Magami.

: Magami isn’t as good at nuclear damage as Shiisaa - it doesn’t have the passive Shiisaa does that reduces the cost of nuclear spells. However, this means we can get rid of Shiisaa entirely.

: This is also the last of the four arcana we need for upcoming confidants: Emperor, Justice, Councillor and Temperance.

: “No, it is most likely where all of the mechanisms in the exhibition hall are controlled from. Given the number of hanging works, it would make sense to have a room dedicated to controlling them.”

: “The observational skills of an artist are out of this world.”

: “It looks like Fox’s deduction was on point!”

: “Oh, look! There aren’t any lasers above it!”

: “This is quite a large hole in their security.. but what do we do? Jump down to retrieve it?”

: “We wouldn’t be able to get out if we did that though. Look up.”

: “Didn’t we see something earlier that looked like it could be a set of controls for that crane? Let’s go back and check it out!”

: “Do you plan on descending on that hook? Would they not spot you the moment you were lowered down?”

: “No… not necessarily. There’s something I can do to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

: “Exactly! That’s our Joker!”

: “Oh right.. we were able to turn the lights off over in that other control room!”

: “Only for a few seconds though. There would not be enough time to make it all the way here.”

: “That’s why we’re going to split up the tasks and work together to pull off this heist! One person will shut the power off here, one person will lower the crane, and I’ll grab the Treasure!”

: “You sure that’s gonna work? Seems like they’d realize what’s goin’ on at some point.”

: “Sometimes bold moves have the greatest payout. Unless someone has a better idea?”

: You’d think that they could just use the hook as a distraction - lower it so that Madarame sees it and then run in once all the guards go up to the hook control room.

: “Well said, Joker! You understand what being a phantom thief really means! All right, it’s settled. Our infiltration route is secured!”

: “You gotta be kiddin’ me..”

: “Now then, it’s time for the calling card!”

: There’s just one little problem. We don’t have nearly enough money. I did the math, and we need something like 340,000 yen until the next dungeon - not counting equipment.

: I’ve mentioned this before, but here’s the breakdown: Dr. Femdom has three different accessories she sells which are absolutely vital for this run. We want the best ones, which are 100,000 yen each (50,000 with the discount we’ll get one day before the third dungeon) for a total of 200,000 yen

: We also need around 140,000 for confidants. This means I still have a lot of farming to do.

: Back at the Velvet Room, we get a tutorial on how returning Personas works. I’ll explain it myself since it’s faster.

: Basically, it works the same way it did in the old games - except now, we have to pay in “black” items of the appropriate type to get the item from returning. I had to blow the blank card on Shiisaa to get him out.

: Here’s where I made a dumb move. Instead of just buying another Regent, I fused Eligor.

New Persona: Eligor

Origin: Ars Goetia

First Appearance: Megami Tensei II

Demon lord from the Ars Goetia, a fallen angel known as the Great Duke of Hades. Usually depicted as a knight riding a skeletal horse. Knows everything about warfare, but also love for some reason. This is technically not his first appearance in a Persona game - he was an enemy in Persona 1.

: This meant I had to buy back Angel and one other Persona (I forget which) and it was a pain in the ass all around for a completely useless Persona.

: So yeah, that’s what the electric chair looks like.

: I also found out while grinding that Yusuke apparently has unique lines of dialog for some of the portraits in the portrait gallery, if you bring him back that far.

: After copious amounts of grind, I get everyone to level 21 (Yusuke to 18) and grind out a total of around 450,000 yen (after selling the vendor trash, which I do in the next update). This should be plenty for what we need.

: We spend the night crafting. I was kind of worried that I’d have to buy more lockpick materials, but… yeah, we’ll have enough lockpicks to probably bring us past the next dungeon.

: Next time, we’ll send the calling card and take on Madarame - without any time skip in between, because that’s how the routing is.