Click Here for Update 26
: The game just kind of goes right into a cutscene. What do you mean I look different? I’ve always looked like this.
: “Plainly put… I, um… plagiarized work… I-I… tainted this - this country’s art world… and… even ‘Sayuri’!”
: Madarame’s face here is a reference to a Japanese politician by the name of Ryutaro Nonomura. Nonomura was an assemblyman for Hyogo Prefecture in Kansai who was convicted of embezzling 3 million yen (just under $30,000) on things like hot springs trips and gift certificates out of public campaign funds.
: He initially insisted that the money had been spent on stamps for campaign mailings, but investigators quickly proved that to be a lie. Nonomura then went on TV and cried like, well… the video’s linked above so you can see for yourself.
: The press conference video went viral pretty quickly, and was also parodied in Gintama (apparently, I’ve never actually watched it). The worst part is that it kinda worked: he avoided a prison sentence, but that was also because he’d already paid back all the money he’d embezzled.
: Makoto is definitely saying this the way Kazuhira Miller screams out “CIPHER!” every time he stubs his toe.
: Wouldn’t it be kind of impossible for them not to? They’re maybe one street away from the giant TV we just saw.
: “And they mentioned the Phantom Thieves!”
: “Man, this is startin’ to get interesting… if we do it right, we can change people’s hearts. With this power… we might be able to do more than just gettin’ back at society. It’ll be a big deal!”
: He says this like he doesn’t realize they’ve already done it twice now.
: I like to think that Joker is the only one smart enough to realize how easy it would be to pinpoint them as John Persona.
: “Man, you’re so indifferent.”
: “Then again, doesn’t that make him more trustworthy as our leader?”
: “As for me, I hope we just keep gettin’ more and more famous!”
: “If we continue doing this, we’ll definitely be able to give courage to everyone who needs it.”
: “Do you know them?”
: “You moron! Those’re attendance officers!”
: Why is that guy in the suit just Johnny Gat?
: “That monotonous acting of hers never fails to send a chill down my spine.”
: “We were just discussing where we should go…”
: This actually has to do with the next dungeon - there’s a reason that truancy officers are out on a Sunday morning.
: “We’ll be careful!”
: “Hey, don’t go making stuff up on the spot like that, okay!? I totally panicked 'cause of you!”
: “From now on, we’ll need to be even more cautious than before. Look at us! Right after the second Thieves incident, both prior victims are meeting up.”
: “Wait, you mean people might be listening to us?”
: “Eh, it’ll be fine. Look around. We’re the only people worryin’ about it.”
: “I guess you’re right…”
: “By the way, Yusuke… you able to get anything out of Madarame? Remember how he was talkin’ about that suspicious person in the black mask?”
: “Well… I pressed him for answers, but he doesn’t even understand what happened to him to begin with.”
: “It’s not like he actually saw his desires get stolen, after all.”
: I was talking a couple updates ago about how a lot of the scenes with the boss shadows don’t really work because the real person is never aware of it, and this kinda confirms it.
: “It’s rumored that he may be sent to prison. In that case, gaining information will be difficult.”
: “So, what’re you gonna do now?”
: “I’ll be leaving that house. I can’t draw in such a place anymore.”
: “Do you have somewhere to go?”
: “The school dorms. I can stay there free of charge thanks to my fine arts scholarship.”
: “A scholarship!? Wait, you’re that good?”
: “Although, Takamaki-san’s house would do as well.”
: I think we all know where he actually wants to go, and it’s not Ann’s house. Inside, he’s sweating because he almost said “Kurusu-san’s house”.
: “…Wait, WHAT!?”
: “Then again, now that Yusuke’ll be livin’ alone, it’ll be easier for us to meet up whenever we want.”
: “For the time being, we should wait and see how this case plays out.”
: “And it’ll prolly take some time findin’ a target as big as Madarame.”
: “Anyway, we should just act like normal students while we look for our next target, okay?”
: “We’ll be entrusting that to you again, Ryuji.”
: “All right. Guess it’s just more prep 'til then.”
: “You were sent away twice, almost reported to the police… and yet you still wanted to save him? Moreover, you ended up in a museum instead of a castle this time…”
: “You’re still going to maintain this rubbish about changing someone’s heart by stealing their Treasure?”
: “Very well. The truth behind this tale of yours will be clear once your conspirators are in custody. Now then, tell me about this new member who joined your group.”
: “There’s no point in being stubborn. It will only damage your position. The identity of Madarame’s pupil can be easily discovered with a little investigation.”
: Of all the party members, even the ones we haven’t met yet, the last one Joker would ever betray is his boyfriend.
: “So you won’t sell out your accomplice? …Fine. There’s still much more that I want to hear.”
: “It was around this time that the Phantom Thieves began to truly gain popularity. Lies flooded the internet - things like, ‘The Phantom Thieves saved me too,’ or ‘I got a calling card’…”
: “For heaven’s sake… those lies made the collection of intel take almost ten times longer.”
: This reminds me of my favorite dialog line in Alpha Protocol, where if you’ve been perfectly stealthy there’s a conversation with the final boss where he goes “Up until 20 minutes ago, we had no idea you were even in the country.”
: “Now, your next target was this man…”
: If you’re playing this in Japanese, you will IMMEDIATELY know what Kaneshiro’s deal is because his name has the “money” kanji in it. The wiki claims that the “jun” kanji in his first name is also part of the word “profit”.
: If this was Working Designs in the 90s, his name would absolutely be Profit McMoneybags.
: “I’ve found a number of points of commonality between the two. Both, for example, were sent a ‘calling card’ before their unforeseen changes of heart.”
: “Now isn’t the time to be worrying about things like jurisdiction and honor! We need to dig deeper and find a correlation among the incidents these past two, three years.”
: “Thank you, sir.”
: And now we know who the guy Joker hit really is.
: “Looks like Yusuke’s textin’ me. I think you’re getting 'em too.”
: I’m pretty sure this is Yusuke trying to text Joker for a date and then accidentally submitting it to the group chat.
: “Anyways, that went well for our first job, huh? It was a huge success! So, that said… you got time after this?”
: “Well, thing is, I got some free tickets to a darts lounge from this guy I know. But, I totally forgot that they expire today. So… you wanna go right now?”
: “Ryuji… didn’t we just finish talking about how we need to be on guard?”
: I mean, Ryuji only practically shouts “HEY EVERYBODY, WE’RE JOHN PERSONA!” at everyone he sees when he’s not drunk. Maybe some liquor will fix that.
: “C’mon, it’s just darts! Don’t you wanna play too, Morgana? …I mean, if you can actually throw anything.”
: “If you’re just going to play, then I guess it shouldn’t be a problem… all right, then let’s head to this darts lounge or whatever it is. Lead the way, Ryuji!”
: What he doesn’t realize is that everyone in the party has a fake ID in the name of John Persona. Even Ann. Especially Ann.
: “Hell yeah, I’m on it! Oh, right. The place is in Kichijoji, so we gotta take the train first.”
: Yes. This is what I’ve been waiting for. Kichijoji is something that was added for Royal, and is how we’re going to get rid of all that dirty armor we’ve been accumulating.
: “What, for real? There’s a buncha different shops right outside the station there. It’s just one stop away from Shibuya, so let’s head for the Inogami Line first.”
: There’s a tutorial popup here, and I believe I mentioned it before, but any area that isn’t Shibuya, Yongen-Jaya or Aoyama is not covered by Joker’s free commuter pass, so we have to pay.
: Makoto is confused because her shipping chart had Joker solidly with Yusuke, but now she’s starting to question if there’s some kind of gay love triangle going on with Ryuji.
: “You can tell it’s nothing like Shibuya, just from the atmosphere alone.”
: “Well, yeah. Looks like there’re a lot of shops here you can’t find in Shibuya… not that I’d really know.”
: “Oh, it’s got your attention now, huh? Ann’s not here 'cause she’s busy, but I bet it’d be fun to come here with some more people. I think the darts lounge is one block up from the main street.”
: Kichijoji is home to a lot of unnecessary battle boosts that take time to get.
: “But since we’re here, I won’t say no to checkin’ out a bunch of the other shops on the way.”
: This is the one time I will ever be excited to visit a clothing store.
: I sell all of the dirty armor and make a fuckload of money.
: It’s about 50,000 yen when everything is said and done.
: Each item of clothing you sell gets you 10 points, which you can use to buy stuff. Unfortunately, you can only buy one of each item.
: In the 4-pack, we got three Old Cheongsams, which only Ann can equip…
: And an Old Mythical Scarf, which is for Morgana. The reason the defense is so high is because I didn’t buy armor for Morgana last time.
: Next door is a stationery store, which… I honestly have no idea what these gifts do. I think they’re for if you’d be otherwise permafucked, you can use these to buy more confidant points.
: We can get a free knowledge point by going here and asking the person behind the desk every single question.
: I did, and I took screenshots, but they boil down to “there are lots of stores here”.
: Most places I looked at when looking for information about the real place said that it’s kind of a trendy neighborhood which is considered a suburb but looks just as densely-packed as the rest of Tokyo.
: Technically, Joker’s been here twice already - Inokashira Park is actually located in Kichijoji. They consider it a “green area” because the park is there.
: They should see Connecticut, where up until a few years ago my house looked like it was in the middle of a forest from the sky. It probably still would, except that we got hit with a lot of major storms over the last 10 or so years.
: There’s a place that sells meat, but only at night. There’s no real reason to ever buy them as far as I’m aware, but I did anyway.
: There’s an incense store in a back alley that we can’t do anything with yet.
: I don’t know why there’s this weird connection between penguins and sniper rifles in Japanese media - there’s a character in one of the Ace Attorney games who has two penguins named Sniper and Rifle.
: “It says… ‘Penguin Sniper’? Huh? Why’d you give one of those doofy birds a gun?”
: Morgana wasn’t talking about the name of the building. He thought someone was accusing him of thirsting for human women again.
: “Still, if you’re comin’ up with a good name… well, whatever. Let’s check it out!”
: “Oh man, I’m getting kind of nervous…”
: “Ha, you’re such a child. Try not to embarrass the rest of us, would you?”
: Joker pulls out his cellphone and threatens to play the video of Morgana talking about how he wants to kiss Ann with his sandpapery cat tongue.
: “You don’t gotta tell me that! So what’s the plan? You wanna head inside?”
: I was wondering why Dartslive is in like every Sega game, and as it turns out they were acquired by Sammy at some point either before or around the time they acquired Sega.
: This next part is basically viral marketing for expensive dartboards - even the home ones go for like $300-$400.
: “All right, bull! That’s a new high score!”
: “The center of the target’s called the bullseye. If you land a dart there, it’s called ‘bull’! …I know because I looked up the rules online last night.”
: “Anyway, this game’s called “01”. You win by getting your score all the way down to 0 points before the other player.”
: Who the fuck plays darts anymore? Let alone on some big expensive dartboard?
: “Oh, so you’re not trying to get a high score, but get rd of your score? That’s pretty different.”
: I’ve never actually played it, but I think all the Dartslive boards are set up specifically for this or something because this is how it worked in the Yakuza games as well.
: “We both start with the same score, then you lose points based on the number on the board where your dart lands… and you can only win if you get your score down to 0, exactly.”
: “You can’t even be off by a single point! How’s that sound? Pretty sick, right?”
: Seriously though, I want to see the one real-life teenager who actually gives a shit about darts. No one gives a shit about darts.
: “So you have to be able to calculate your score properly while making sure you hit the right numbers on the board… this game seems like it takes a lot of concentration.”
:The best part is, I have zero idea why the fuck they’re going over all of this other than for marketing purposes. There’s no darts minigame as far as I know - it basically works like any other confidant event.
: Wait a second, how does the cat know anything about darts technique when he didn’t even know how to play not even minutes ago? What the fuck is this shit?
: “Hey, Ryuji, what’s up?”
: “Ah, I was just readin’ this flier. It says ‘Darts is a party when you play in pairs!’ You team up with someone and alternate throwers when it’s your turn. You still use the same rules I told you, though.”
: “Hey, whaddya say we give it a try?”
: “Hell yeah, that’s what I’m talkin’ about! Let’s do this!”
: “Here goes! Don’t underestimate an ex-athlete!”
: “Whoa, he hit such a tiny spot! Quite impressive - especially for you, Ryuji.”
: “We’re almost down to 0 points! Let’s really focus for this last round!”
: “Woohoooo! 0 points, right on the dot! Ain’t we badass!?”
: “That’s no easy feat! You really do have something special going on!”
: This is like all those “high school club” mangas where they go on about some specific topic no one cares about and in the end it was actually about everyone being gay.
: “Man, this is so fun. When you’re on the line, the pressure’s insane, but it makes you wanna do your best for your partner!”
:: Is he talking about darts or relationships? The world will never know.
: Anyway, here’s what darts does. Each character can rank up in Baton Pass twice - the second level gets you SP regeneration as well as HP regen. We will never use this.
: Just in case you’re wondering, apparently all the scenes for this are generic, so I don’t think anyone counts them as confidant events. Just in case they’re not, I can make a save near where the base game ends and do them all.
: “Even if it is just a game, it can be some kinda training, depending on how you play…”
: I don’t know if you could count Two Brothers as training for anything beyond spotting typos.
: “Heh… well, I do always have the Phantom Thieves on the brain.”
: I mean, I guess that’s technically true since Ann is a Phantom Thief and that’s all he ever thinks about.
: “Let’s keep practicing together here - Ooh, ooh! Let’s invite everybody next time!”
: “Man… all this, just from me askin’ you to meet me here! This is, like, y’know… one of those strikes of good luck!”
: “A ‘stroke’ of good luck! Why would it be a strike? Who would protest having good luck?”
: Unlike darts, we will definitely be doing pool at night. Let me explain why.
: Darts doesn’t get you anything outside of the boost to baton passing, which is kind of pointless in the first place. Pool not only gets you 3 points in a random social stat, it also improves the damage you do if you get a Technical hit (hits against enemies who are under a status effect).
: “It’s already pretty late, though. We can come back and play it later.”
: I’m gonna cut a few lines from this because this is already just a glorified tutorial.
: “Wow. It’s really gotten that unsafe, huh? That said, you still want to check out Kichijoji at night, don’t you?”
: “Don’t worry, Akira. Worst comes to worst, I’ve got your back! Besides, there’s a certain delicious smell on that street that bears investigating… myeh heh heh.”
: Before we do that, you might have realized it’s Sunday and there’s something very important we haven’t done.
: Anyway, we have to find the old man’s name, and on the way there I saw an “examine” prompt outside this cafe. I think we all know why Joker is looking at him like that.
: “An old man making trouble?”
: Does that guy have a license plate on his hat?
: “All right, we got the name of our target!”
: He says this like it’s winter and not the start of summer.
: Actually, come to think of it, why is Joker still wearing that jacket? It’s JUNE!
: “His joints hurt on rainy days? Poor guy.”
: I stopped at the meat market on the way back and got a thing of katsu - it’s basically just breaded chicken. No real reason for it, just kind of wanted to see what it did.
: We’re going to do Yoshida’s confidant tonight.
: “Is not right! It will take time to solve this problem! However, we must start by making small changes!”
: “We need to erect a man-sized trash bin and toss Shinzo Abe in there!”
: “Regardless of the audience’s size, you must convey your thoughts as if you’re talking one on one. By the way, I forgot to ask you last time we spoke. Why do you want to become a politician?”
: So that I could send military assistance to Australia and finally win the Great Emu War for humanity.
: “Ambitious, indeed, if a little ambiguous. Well, I’m sure you’ll iron out the details as you go along. May I ask you one more question?”
: “What kind of politician do you want to be?”
: This kind.
: We all know Joker just wants a giant mech with a beam on it that makes people stop being horny.
: “Yes, don’t ever forget that. Although, what’s important is what lies within. Allow me to give you some advice. If you aspire to get into politics, you must possess a central philosophy.”
: “What is it that you wish to accomplish? That is the foundation of a great speech. You’d do well to remember that.”
: “I’m glad. By the way, my philosophy is… never give up until your voice is heard…!”
: “To get your message across, be tenacious in conveying your thoughts to the audience. Have a firm point of view, and communicate it clearly - that’s the first rule of negotiating.”
: “Haha! You have me reliving the fighting spirit I had when I first became a politician.”
: This ability isn’t too bad, especially if you’re mass-farming red shadows before confusion farming becomes effective. I think it stacks with another confidant ability we have coming up that increases the amount of money you get per battle.
: “They’re right… I am no good… ah, my apologies. We’re done for today.”
: “I’m sorry you had to see me acting like such a coward. Right after I gave you that self-important lecture, too… but I’m quite a stubborn individual myself.”
: “What did you think? Did you take anything useful from it?”
: It changed his whole outlook in that instead of holding up old man demons with a gun, he’s now going to hold them up and also shout at them for more money.
: “What, really? I wasn’t expecting to have such an impact… but I’m glad if I helped somehow. I hope our talks from now on will keep giving you the direction you need.”
: “The response to Madarame’s press conference was huge! Everyone’s talkin’ about the calling card. Girls are checkin’ me out today… maybe they can’t help but sense my overflowing phantom thief charisma?”
: “Oh shit, am I finally startin’ to be popular with all the fly hon- …oh no!”
: “I knew people were lookin’ at me… oh, goddammit!”
: “I gotta go home and change, so you go on ahead!”
: The other guy looks at him and goes “Wait, is John Persona the name of the group? Is it one person? What the shit is going on?”
: I swear when I saw this scene in the base game, I thought his shirt said “Homo Rules”.
: “Welp, that’s definitely my personal best… by a lot…”
: “I have nothing to report yet…”
: “Nothing at all? How many students are there who could provoke a teacher?”
: He says this like teachers are some kind of separate species.
: “I’ve already narrowed it down. I just can’t get any solid evidence…”
: “What will come of you asking that?”
: Actually, that’s a good question - why hasn’t anyone asked whether the principal knew anything?
: “This investigation is for a just cause, right?”
: Nah, it’s more of a Far Cry thing.
: “I believe I understand how flustered this must be making you. I’m sure it was truly shocking for you as student council president to see a peer attempt suicide.”
: “Yes…”
: “We must provide a school environment where all students can feel at ease. That is the most pressing issue we have to tackle at the moment.”
: “So that’s your reason behind this investigation on the Phantom Thieves of Hearts? We don’t even know if they truly exist. Why are you-”
: “You heard about the incident with that Madarame fellow, I assume?”
: “…They said there was a similar calling card to the one used in Mr. Kamoshida’s case.”
: “I wish to believe that this is unrelated to our students.”
: “Yes…”
: “That is where I stand. I suggest you devote your energy to the task at hand, not unnecessary questions.”
: There’s no dialog here that I missed or anything, it just does Ryuji’s cut-in.
: “I just started lookin’ yesterday. No way I’m gonna find one that quick.”
: “Oh yeah. I guess that’s true. By the way, I decided on the TV station. What about you two?”
: “Huh? Oh crap, the social studies trip! Ugh I just wanna ditch it…”
: “You’d better go to your school activities. Didn’t I tell you not to draw attention to yourselves?”
: “Wouldn’t me suddenly turnin’ into a good student stand out more?”
: “Quit bickering and go.”
: Let’s be real here, Morgana wants to go in order to find new human women to be horny for.
: “Then let’s all choose the TV station! I heard we’re gonna get to watch them tape a show! Maybe there’ll be actresses there!”
: “Oh well. Not like I got anything better to do than waitin’ for info to come in online. Plus, Morgana’s right. Showin’ up’ll keep the teachers from gettin’ all suspicious of me.”
: “All right, I’m gonna head back. TV, huh… maybe I should get a haircut…”
: “That guy is such an idiot… I hope nothing happens…”
: The background in the last shot is different because I accidentally closed the the IM and couldn’t open it back up until after school.
: Ushimaru, apparently back from his mid-life crisis of being a Cessna, returns to throw chalk at Joker’s head. We still can’t dodge that even with proficiency 3.
: “What a pleasant surprise.”
: “It’s really pouring down, isn’t it?”
: “I thought something like this would happen… so I snuck a collapsible umbrella into your bag!”
: You just know he did that to hide the pictures of Ann he keeps in there.
: “Well, you do carry me around in your bag all the time. I’ve gotta show my appreciation somehow!”
: “Well, see you around.”
: “Unfortunately, I forgot it. But it’s fine. I’ll barely get wet if I run to the station! If anything, it’ll make for good training.”
: “Huh? But how are… oh, are you offering to share your umbrella? That’d be wonderful! Thank you so much!”
: “To be honest, prelims are coming up soon, so I didn’t want to take any chances of getting sick.”
: “Yeah, that’s right. Two huge competitions are coming up - one at the beginning of summer and one near the end. If I’m going to participate in the prelims, I have to be selected as my club’s representative…”
: “And there’s a qualifier meet to determine who that rep will be. It’s my dream to compete in gymnastics on the global level. So, I plan on maintaining a strict training regimen with my coach.”
: She wants to be the star of Gymkata II: Gymkata Harder.
: “I’d be invincible if I had you cheering me on, Senpai! * giggle * Oh, we’re already at the station…”
: “I can’t thank you enough for today. I swear I’ll return the favor some-”
: “I’m sorry. You shouldn’t have to deal with a misunderstanding like that.”
: “Oh no! If anything, it’s my own fault. The same thing happens in class, too. People are often wary of me because I’m an honor student.”
: “The school’s expecting me to attain strong results in the upcoming competitions, too. They even told me I didn’t have to participate in the cleanup event… but I just don’t like getting special treatment.”
: “Hello? Dad? …What was that? Sorry, my phone’s been acting up lately. It’s okay, thanks. Mmhm. I’ll see you later.”
: “Sorry about that. He asked if I needed a ride since it’s raining. A bit overprotective, don’t you think?”
: “Well, I have to get to practice, so it’s time for me to go. Thanks so much for today. Excuse me!”
: In an ideal world, Joker would just drop Mishima’s number in Dr. Femdom’s lap.
: “What did he mean by S and M? Those are shirt sizes, right? Is it the size of clothes?”
: How are you that horny and you don’t even know…
: I got a Thieves Den popup after this, and now we can turn it into Madarame’s Palace if we want.
:: I bought a thing of vending machines for no apparent reason.
: Oh, and then I got a copy of the room where Madarame confesses.
: Today, we need to go to the sports store in the Shibuya Underground Mall and buy an Imported Protein. These are super expensive for what they are, but we’ll be using it to trade for a weapon later.
: Imported Protein is only sold on rainy days, so this is the only chance we have to do it for a while.
: Finally, we need to do one of Maruki’s godawful plot dumps.
: “I spotted a kitten that had gotten itself stuck up in a tree. I tried rescuing it since I felt bad for it, but I ended up with the clawing of a lifetime for the effort. I had no idea a cat’s claws were so sharp…”
: “Speaking from experience, eh? It really does hurt a lot. But I was able to rescue the kitten, so it was all still worthwhile. All I really have to do is make sure to put antibiotics on the scratches, anyway.”
: And that’s how you get MRSA.
: “Well, let’s move on and talk about a different kind of pain. We discussed this for a bit last time when we talked, actually: the pain felt within one’s heart.”
: “There are all sorts of ways to identify and diagnose physical injuries and illnesses. But when it comes to pains of the heart, we’re working in unknown territory. There’s so much we haven’t learned yet.”
: “Treating trauma sure is difficult when it’s invisible. If only we could somehow directly reduce emotional pain in a healthy way - like putting antibiotics on a scratch.”
: It’s kind of wildly irresponsible that he’s a doctor of some sort and is recommending that.
: “Oh, how astute of you! As a matter of fact, you’re not too far off the mark. Unfortunate as it may be, there’s no topical medicine that can properly heal a heartache.”
: “Not only that, psychological issues are even more complex. Here, allow me to demonstrate.”
: Good. When you finally drop dead, can you call Maki so we can do this confidant the right way?
: “…Sorry, that was a poor attempt at acting. Please don’t look at me like that. But uhhh, basically what I’m getting at is, our own emotional pain is the only kind we can fully comprehend.”
: “That seems obvious, right? But it’s absolutely vital to understand. A person’s ‘heart’ - their pain - cannot be seen.”
: “Even if they spent their whole lives expressing it to others… there is no way for them to truly grasp it. It’s not like we can directly look at their hearts and remove the root causes of their pain…”
: I think what he’s trying to get at is a Jungian thing involving the idea that you can never see someone else’s Self except through the Persona, except they kind of threw Jung out the window after Persona 4.
: “But for me to do any good in that area, I need to conduct further research into the heart… more specifically, I need to learn how the heart reacts to the world around it.”
: So okay get this, all you have to do is question your own sanity for several years until the magic jangly key man shows up in your dreams and reveals the true nature of reality.
: “That’s the first stepping stone to a breathrough in the field. Once that’s been figured out, we’ll not only comprehend psychological pains that were once unknowable… but we’ll be able to perform more effective treatment for those people with wounded hearts.”
: I mean, it’s not like a machine that let you enter people’s hearts was half the plot of Persona 1 or anything.
: “It’s nothing so grandiose. But hey, if we can get rid of people’s pain, that’d be for the best, right? I’m no fan of pain, myself.”
: “On the other hand, people have laughed off my idea as just a silly, pointless dream… and I can’t say I blame them. But still, you take the time to listen to what I have to say, and you actually try to understand…”
: “Thanks to you, I can tell I’m actually getting somewhere with my theories. How can I phrase it… I guess I could say you’re making this hazy, hard-to-grasp idea finally appear before me?”
: You mean like… gasp a Treasure?
: “You know, you could very well become a counselor yourself someday. Say, would you like to try being my assistant? Of course, I’m on a shoestring budget, so I wouldn’t be able to pay you!”
: “Ooh, surprisingly eager! Maybe you really WILL become a skilled counselor in the future! Joking aside, I truly am grateful for your assistance. Thank you, Kurusu-kun.”
: No reward, just a rank up.
: “Let’s put a pin in that for today, shall we? I hope you’ll lend an ear again when you’ve got time to spare. Now! I know you’ve been waiting for this, so let’s get to the mental training.”
: 5 extra max SP and a healing item, as usual.
: “Today got pretty one-sided… I just ended up rambling again. This keeps happening.”
: Even the writers admit this confidant sucks.
: “I should’ve asked this sooner, but… is this leaving you with any mental fatigue? Is your schoolwork being affected?”
: I’m struggling to get through this. This confidant event actually made me so tired I wound up permafucking right after it. And of course, I forgot to save.
: “Really? Thank goodness… I was worried. Not every guy wants a middle-aged weirdo rambling to them about a bunch of philosophical abstracts.”
: “I know it’s asking a lot, but it’d be great if we could keep- …what? Er, the station…? Sorry - I think this tourist needs help. I’d better go.”
: Joker looks at this and immediately imagines having Yusuke rest his head on his shoulder while they’re both on the couch in his room watching a movie.
: No I’m not. I did see someone livetweet a read-through of the YIIK LP though. I was funnier back then.
: “Inmate, come to the entrance of the Velvet Room before we change our minds.”
: “That’s the door only we can see in your world! You’d better not go to the wrong place!”
: “We’ll be waiting for you. We expect great haste and enthusiasm from you.”
: And this is where I permafucked. There are confidant events with Caroline and Justine which don’t count toward their confidant - and we want to do them because they ARE confidant events - but I forgot to feed the fucking plant first.
: Since the closest Velvet Room door is just outside the weapon shop, I stop and sell all the vendor trash from the museum. This brings us back up to around 560,000 yen.
: “You’re late! Next time we expect you in front of us within two seconds of our calling!”
: “We’ve got some new duties lined up for you. To the point: there are a number of places in your reality’s society that may foster your rehabilitation. You will prove the value of these places to us - in person.”
: “We will select various locations that we suspect could be vital to your rehabilitation. Should you recognize a place that we mention, then you are to escort us there.”
: Persona 3 and Persona 4 had this with the Velvet Room attendants, but Persona 5 did not. This was something that was added for Royal.
: We need to do this because there is a scene much later (past where the base game ends) that you can only see if you have done all but two of these outings. I will point out the optional ones.
: “Are those ears of your just for decoration? These are special assignments for the sake of your rehabilitation. Work just as hard at them as you do the rest of your duties.”
: “We will await you in front of the door - like this - whenever a special assignment is available.”
: “Should you meet our expectations, we’ll scrape together some sort of reward for you - so no slacking off!”
: I should mention that not doing these is NOT a permafuck as far as I know - you can still max every confidant and never do them, because the Strength confidant is totally separate from this.
: It also takes time, so if you for some reason ever permafuck and save in such a way that you can’t re-do it, just skip these events.
: “You are also required to continue working towards your rehabilitation to earn these assignments.”
: “We’re really going out of the way for you here - don’t tell us we never did anything special for you!”
: “The first location we have chosen is… one that has grown quite popular lately. It’s purported to offer foods that simulate the feeling of being in space.”
: “The food is apparently massive enough to rival the size of the universe itself and resembles a mysterious spacecraft.”
: “If this food exemplifies both the unknown and the vast nothingness of space, it is sure to stimulate the heart.”
: “Well? If you know where it is, then escort us there immediately! So, what’ll it be?”
: “Big Bang Burger? The name is fitting, I suppose.”
: “We shall confirm the intel for ourselves. Lead the way.”
: I had a lot of questions about this scene when I first saw it. Normally, no one can see Caroline and Justine - we’ve seen that everyone else sees Joker going to the Velvet Room as him just kind of going braindead for a few minutes.
: But then you have the problem of why no one finds it strange that you have a high schooler hanging around with a couple of foreign-looking kids dressed in police cosplay.
: “Is this the meal they boasted to be as immense as the cosmos? I’m quite disappointed.”
: “Hey, inmate - you don’t really expect some kind of reward out of this, do you?”
: There’s also the question of why no one would find it weird that Joker is there with two kids and didn’t order anything for them, unless we’re dealing with some kind of selective invisibility.
: Or maybe this is one of those things where Joker is actually 12 and only sees himself as a high-schooler, which would make the whole “got sent to probation for beating a guy up” thing far more amusing.
: Now that I think about it, the entire Metal Gear franchise makes way more sense if you assume that all the characters are kids pretending to be super-spies.
: “So, humanity intends to generate its own universes now, does it?”
: So what you’re saying is that we’re becoming gods? There’s a new master of creation, and it’s us?
: “Oh, so they can get THAT large?”
: “The Big Bang Challenge… what an intriguing concept. For the sake of your rehabilitation, you are to take this challenge. Of course, you will take the largest they offer.”
: “Any objections, inmate?”
: “The last burger was downright insignificant by comparison…”
: “It’s bigger than the inmate’s entire stomach… perhaps the moniker implies that any diner’s stomach will suffer its own Big Bang?”
: “This is your rehabilitation, not ours.”
: “We are here only to observe you - and don’t forget it!”
: “I predict this challenge shall be a fairly difficult one… be that as it may, you must finish the food tower in its entirely. Failing to join the clean plate club is a grave offense…”
: “But you’ve only just begun…”
: I’m wondering now if this scene is different if you choose to do these later in the game when you have the social stats to handle the biggest burger.
: That’s one thing I wanted to mention - these events aren’t time-locked, apart from two which are not necessary to get the final reward.
: “You’re stopping?”
: “Who said you could stop!? No breaks! Work that jaw!”
: “Hmm, don’t his eyes look rather… dead to you?”
: “Perhaps he is glimpsing the vast emptiness of outer space?”
: “Uh, hey… is he really all right? He’s not about to keel over, is he?”
: “I think he’s about to pass out.”
: “…It appears this truly was too much for him to handle. Very well, let us pitch in.”
: “You’re hopeless, inmate! You’d better be grateful that we’re bailing you out of this!”
: “I have to say, you really held your own in there.”
: "You almost didn’t make it through, but we’ll call this a success since your stomach didn’t burst. I must say though, I’m rather dissatisfied with this place’s usage of the moniker ‘Big Bang Burger’. "
: “They certainly craft a meal of impressive size, but when compared to what the big bang generated, it’s not grand in the least. Do humans have some sort of compulsion for exaggerating the sizes of things?”
: “Good question. In fact, this challenge raises quite a few of them. You took the challenge for the sake of your rehabilitation, but who in their right mind would willingly consume that much food?”
: This is very, very close to being one of the negotiation questions in Innocent Sin.
: That was one thing I didn’t like about this game - the negotiation questions suck compared to Innocent Sin’s.
: “How preposterous… the simple inmate speaks as if he’s an expert on humanity.”
: “Hey, Justine. Maybe we should take the challenge ourselves.”
: “I just had the very same thought. If we were to thrust ourselves into this ordeal, perhaps we would discover some answers.”
: Wait, wouldn’t she have seen them eating the giant burger? Are they actually selectively invisible? What the fuck is going on here?
: “…A spaceship?”
: “Wait! We didn’t ask for…”
: “It’s too late now - let’s just settle for that today… I admit I’m intrigued by the diminuitive spaceship.”
: “You seemed much more excited by the toy than the taste, anyway.”
: “Sh-shut up!”
: “I see. Well, they didn’t taste bad. But seriously, what are they!? I ate all of mine, you know!”
: “Calm down, Caroline. We’re getting off track.”
: “Grr… well, at any rate, we’ve determined that hamburgers are incapable of conveying the majesty of space.”
: “While the toy spaceship helped to soften the blow, there’s no denying the truth. Now we will formally acknowledge the completion of your task.”
: This makes it REALLY easy to finish their first confidant event - I could just compendium summon a Jack Frost and slap a Mabufu card on him. It’d be a waste since Jack Frost learns that move naturally and we could just fuse one to get it, but still.
: “You better work just as hard next time! We know about all sorts of locations that would aid your rehabilitation!”
: “I’m still taken aback by the truth… your world is absolutely full of these ‘shop’ places. For a reasonable fee, nearly every desire can be fulfilled, all as if it were nothing.”
: Yeah, except a consolized Naomi 2 where I don’t have to solder everything myself. Or the Pizza Burger which I can’t get anymore.
: Speaking of shit you can’t get in stores, I managed to secure a PS5 for myself earlier this week. In case you’re reading this in the future, this is when it’s impossible to get one.
: I didn’t resort to anything that dramatic, but I can confirm I am NOT migrating the LP to the PS5. We are doing this on original hardware the way it was at launch… plus I don’t want to update my PS4 so I can copy the save over.
: “That does sound interesting. I believe it may merit further research.”
: I should point out that Big Bang Burger is like… two buildings down the street from the Velvet Room in Shibuya.
: Well, that about does it for this update. Next time, I’ll go back and fix that unfortunate permafuck, we’ll babysit Caroline and Justine again, and then end right before the next big cutscene dump.
: “Ahem. I have an announcement to make. Thank you all for coming.”
: “He was someone who represented Japan. They probably trusted him based on his name alone. Indeed, we’re easily manipulated by the names we see.”
: “Info has started pouring into the Phan-Site too. I’m gonna be a busy bee! So, you did the request I asked you to do. Thanks!”
: “I happened to be passing by, so it seemed polite to greet you. We’ll be filming together, after all. Ah, where are my manners? My name is Goro Akechi.”
: “Hm? Who’re they?”
