Click Here for Update 32
: It’s 6/19, and I’m fresh off having a household COVID scare. No one actually had it.
: “What are you talking about?”
: “Nothing! Just start it up, Yusuke.”
: “Okay, I entered Kaneshiro’s name into the Nav - and just as expected, it’s a hit.”
: “All we need now are the two other keywords: what he thinks of as his Palace, and where it is. But we don’t have any clues other than people falling victim around here… we’ll just have to try whatever keywords we can come up with.”
: “Urgh, that’s gonna be impossible… how many buildings do you think there are in Shibuya?”
: “No complaining.”
: “If we can figure out what the Palace is, we may be able to guess where it is by association.”
: “Hmmm… it’s prolly somewhere he’s got complete control over… maybe a garden?”
: The navigation app thing has a voice that plays every time someone makes a wrong guess, but it’s not subtitled.
: “No… not even close. How about it, Akira? Can you think of anything?”
: I like the thought of Joker just going “Wait, money bath? What the fuck is she talking about?”
: “So, he thinks of somewhere in this city as his own bank!”
: “I thought it’d be something less realistic. That’s all it is, huh?”
: “Now then, what location would Kaneshiro think of as his bank?”
: “If we’re talkin’ about a place where he keeps his cash, maybe his own hideout?”
: “How about… a real bank?”
: “His cognition wouldn’t be distorted in that case.”
: “Dammit, we ain’t gettin’ anywhere…”
: My problem with this scene is that it should have happened a week ago. Or more.
: “This may be difficult to explain… but doesn’t it seem like we’re thinking a little too inside the box? Palaces emanate a passionate madness… it feels as though we’re missing that aspect.”
: “The hell’re you talkin’ about?”
: “This Palace is a bank for someone who extorts money with criminal acts. It’s something more…”
: “But what other ways can we think about it? Oh, could it mean a place you withdraw money?”
: “Hold on! Do you think it might have something to do with the victims? He’s taking money from his victim’s wallets, right? That means his bank is wherever they are!”
: “That’s terrible… but you may just be right.”
: “What!? Like, the entire city?”
: The whole city… through that door… everything trapped in one palace?
: “I see. That’s certainly where his victims are… it turns out he really is a terrible criminal.”
: “But wait, is it okay for us to go into the Palace right out in front of a crowd like this?”
: Nice self-own there. Also, they kind of totally forgot about the whole thing where they drew Ann into Kamoshida’s palace just by her being close enough to them, because the writers for this game are not at all terrible at their jobs.
: “In that case… let’s go.”
: There was apparently an iteration of the Persona 5 stage play (yes, there were multiple iterations) that covered this part of the story, and they actually had people in walking ATM costumes. That play must’ve been fucking riveting and I’m glad I’ve never seen it.
: Seriously though I’m just imagining some dipshit stage director who realizes that what’s actually in the play doesn’t matter so long as it’s Persona 5 because people will go fucking nuts for it either way and going “This is the part we need to do.”
: “So this is what Kaneshiro considers a ‘bank’…”
: “I never thought it would be the entire district. Look around us… the distortion is affecting the whole of Shibuya.”
: “Huh? Whaddya mean?”
: “Ohh, that’s right! Even when we were in the castle and the museum, the city outside looked normal.”
: “He sees everyone in Shibuya as his patron.”
: “No surprise for a mafia boss.”
: “It’s best we focus on finding Kaneshiro’s location and stealing his Treasure as soon as possible.”
: “Yeah, his hideout’s gotta be somewhere around here. Let’s go look for it.”
: “Uh, do these guys even have mouths?”
: “Excuse me, can we-”
: “Whoa, cool it. We’re not tryin 'to mug you or anything.”
: “Were you assaulted?”
: “There’s no doubt he’s a victim, but he can’t even hold a goddamn conversation. Let’s try someone else.”
: The writers have basically forgotten the whole “the people in the palaces aren’t actually real” bit.
: “This is effed up…”
: “I don’t think we can talk to any of the ones here…”
: What’s funny is that the game will give you a “talk to” prompt if you go near the dead ATMs. It just spawns a line of Morgana dialogue.
: “Excuse me, can we have a word? We are–”
: This is also weird, because I thought the whole point was that no one knew who the boss was.
: “Hm, what could that mean?”
: “Hey, you gotta tell us a little more than-”
: “Kaneshiro leaves no tracks…? Does he meant that literally, or could it be figurative?”
: “Hey, why don’t we go over all the intel we have now?”
: “Wait a second… they’ve ‘fallen’ from a place where Kaneshiro doesn’t leave any tracks…? Could that mean… they were actually thrown down from somewhere high up?”
: “What, y’mean like a skyscraper? Uhh, there ain’t any of those around here, I don’t think.”
: I have no idea what the fuck he’s talking about, there are a TON of tall buildings in Shibuya.
: I hate that they treat the player like an idiot who can’t process even the smallest plot threads without having it explained to them. There’s times when over-explaining things makes sense - like when you’re doing a story in a setting where they have stuff that doesn’t exist in the real world and the reader needs to understand how certain things work.
: They could have cut a bunch of dialogue and just had the bank fly overhead.
: " ‘Kaneshiro doesn’t leave any tracks,’ huh? Figures it’d be floating."
: “So, how do we get up there? Can you turn into a helicopter, Morgana?”
: You’ll notice that Ann slips up on Morgana’s codename here, and even the writers didn’t realize it. This is why most writers will either use a character’s codename exclusively (see: Metal Gear Solid, Golgo 13) if they have one, because this kind of thing is a pain in the ass to memorize.
: “No… just a car.”
: Read: He’s not Doraemon. Doraemon would’ve pulled out an F-22 from that internal compartment of his that is somehow a five-seater.
: “I mean, I’m not a cat at all!”
: “This may be the limit of what we can do today.”
: “We gotta find a way to get up there…”
: “Let’s think about it some more tomorrow, okay?”
: “All right, we should get out of here for now! Run for it!”
: I also don’t know why they’re going to so much trouble to introduce this palace when it’s basically a throwaway.
: We know who she is! We met her not even a day ago! You might think this is a thing they put in for people who had to put the game down for a while, but they have a story synopsis that already exists in the menu - complete with character profiles.
: “Shady connections…”
: We’re apparently too tired to grip and sip, but not to study.
: This gets us to Knowledge 4, one day behind schedule - though again, I’m not sure if that’s a typo on the guide’s part or not.
: “About those Phantom Thieves, I mean. If Dad were still alive…”
: Just like Tatsuya and Katsuya, Makoto’s parents are dead. Now if only she was half the character Tatsuya is in Eternal Punishment…
: “Sorry, I… I shouldn’t bring this up while we’re eating.”
: “It’s okay. Keep going.”
: “I just wonder if he would’ve been on their side… that’s all…”
: “That’s not-”
: “You don’t have to do a single thing, and you’re provided with food, clothes, and a home… I’ve had no time to think on such ridiculous thoughts. Would Dad have been happy with them? I don’t care. He died upholding some lofty sense of righteousness, leaving all his responsibilities on us.”
: Sae is kind of a bitch.
: “A-all I was trying to say was-”
: Have I mentioned that in the original draft of the script, Joker was meant to be staying with Sae and Makoto?
: “Isn’t it about time you grew up and acknowledged our situation!? Right now, you’re useless to me. All you do is eat away at my life.”
: “…I’ll be eating dinner out from tomorrow on.”
: I miss when the cop character really only wanted to be a pastry chef and baked cakes for his younger brother.
: “I just wonder, why bother stealing hearts? You can’t do anything with them. They have no monetary value, either. If I were them, I would go for something with a concrete, clear value - like gold.”
: Usami strikes me as one of those people who has all of their money in an alternative cryptocurrency based around something stupid.
: “…Speaking of, there’s another kind of metal that’s very valuable in its own way. They’re called minor metals, and they’re used in many electronics.”
: I thought she was talking about rare earth metals and that this was one of those weird Katakana transliterations that got taken literally, but no.
: Basically, all rare earth metals are minor metals, but not all minor metals are considered rare earths. As an example, titanium is considered a minor metal but not normally considered a rare earth.
: “In fact, most of you probably have some on your person right now. In your pockets, in your purses… were you listening, Takamaki-san? Give me one example of something most of you have that contains minor metals.”
: “Huh!? Oh, uh, yeah! I mean-”
: “Hey, Lady Ann is obviously panicking! Be a good guy and help her out!”
: “Wow, I don’t know at all… sorry, Akira, can you help me out? Something that uses minor metals… and all of us have something like that on us…?”
: As much as Ann strikes me as the kind of person who would jump for some dumb bullshit like “healing rare earth lipstick”, it’s her phone.
: “My smartphone…? Oh yeah, she said something about electronics, right? So the answer must be my smartphone!”
: Who even says “smartphone” in that context anymore? I mean, even in 2016 people would just say “my phone”.
: “Precisely. A lot of minor metals are excavated in China. Some countries simply produce more than others. 90% of the minor metals used in Japan are imported.”
: “But a lot of the recyclable trash we throw away contains minor metals too. In other words, a junkyard is much more valuable than someone else’s heart.”
: “Phew, thanks for the help!”
: This gives us two points to knowledge and two points to Ann’s confidant.
: “Are we out of luck?”
: “It’s no fair his palace is up in the sky…”
: “If only we could contact the real Kaneshiro…”
: “Nothing in particular. I just saw you all together here.”
: “That so?”
: “You seem to be having quite a bit of trouble.”
: “So you’re here to check up on us? You may be the student council president, but when it comes to what we do, you’re useless.”
: “Useless?”
: Cue flashback to a scene we just got done with for… what is this, the third time now?
: “To be frank, yes.”
: “Just stay on your high horse and watch. Or do you wanna eavesdrop, since you’re so good at it?”
: “… So you wish to get in contact with Kaneshiro. That is what you were just discussing, weren’t you? It seemed you just needed to find out where he is.”
: I like that she responds to Ann claiming she’s an annoying eavesdropper… by being an annoying eavesdropper. Also, wait a second… no one has said Kaneshiro’s name and we haven’t seen any contact between Joker and Makoto since then. How does she know his name?
: “Hey, you don’t gotta answer her honestly!”
: Double flashback! To the same scene, no less! I wonder if the writers got bonuses every time they stuck in pointless extra dialog.
: What you are about to witness is Makoto being the smart girl.
: “What was that?”
: “Fine. I’ll help you meet Kaneshiro.”
: “What exactly is she planning on doing?”
: “She had a dead-serious look in her eyes…”
: “Does this mean she has an idea as to where Kaneshiro might be?”
: “I highly doubt that.”
: “I didn’t like her stern face…”
: “Just stay on the phone and listen. Make sure you record the call as well.”
: “Huh? Who is it?”
: “Do you guys know Kaneshiro?”
: SMART GIRL
: “That idiot! What’s she doin’!?”
: “I heard I could find someone named Kaneshiro if I came to Central Street.”
: SO VERY SMART
: “Central Street!”
: “He’s blackmailing the students of Shujin Academy, is he not? Tell him if he doesn’t want me talking to the police about it, he’d better agree to meet with me.”
: She’s the smart girl.
: “It’s the guys who messed with us the other day! So they were connected to Kaneshiro!”
: No fucking shit! Can you imagine if during the bomb sequence in Innocent Sin, Tatsuya and Maya took like five minutes to wonder whether Sudou was behind it?
: “She still on!?”
: Unlike the US, where even before the gig economy taxis were fairly cheap, in Japan they’re so expensive that high schoolers probably wouldn’t be able to afford the rates for more than a very short trip.
: Even with things like Uber and Lyft, taxis are still incredibly expensive due to Japan having very strict regulations on ride-sharing. In fact, Uber is just now starting to offer ride-shares in Tokyo, and they’re still being forced to work with the existing cab companies.
: I get that Ryuji isn’t supposed to be the smart one, but there’s a difference between stupidity and having no sense of self-preservation.
: “Ryuji!”
: “Hurry up and get in!”
: Kaneshiro is fat (because of course he is, this is Atlus and fat people have to be evil) and also has a comically tiny face. The Persona 5 anime tried to fix this to mixed results. The wiki has a photo of the guy who played Kaneshiro in the stage play and honestly he’s the only one that looks like an actual yakuza and not a caricature.
: I also don’t get why it is that the yakuza are allowed to say fuck, but Ryuji isn’t.
: “Niijima-san!”
: “What the hell’d you to do her!?”
: “Ohh, I get it. You got followed, you dumbshits!”
: Three million yen is a bit under $30,000 - which is way overpriced. You can get bags made of actual crocodile for somewhere between $2000 and $3000 in the US… not that you should, because you know there’s some animal cruelty going on there. Plus they’re ugly.
: “Better thank those guys.”
: “What?”
: “It’s you goddamn brats sniffing around like dogs and barging in here like you own the joint! See this empty space? I’m so pissed that now there’s a three million yen gap there.”
: “It pisses me off even more if I don’t fill it up. I’m a perfectionist. So, good luck.”
: I also don’t get why people with briefcases full of money is a thing. I had a briefcase once, shit’s annoying to lug around. I just donated it to a thrift store, actually.
: “What is that supposed to mean?”
: “That’s-”
: Oh no, a photo of some high school kids standing by a cart with what appears to be some cheap wine and an ashtray on it! The horror!
: I remember when I was in college I roomed with some idiot freshmen (both underage) who kept individual gallon jugs of cheap vodka out in the open. In front of a window, no less.
: “Ahh… this is so hilarious. I feed on dumbshits like you… understand, pretty little student council president?”
: “Now listen up. Run your mouth to the police, and I’ll break all of you, starting with your families. I want to give you the usual month, but well, you have such a large group here…”
: “Three weeks. Bring three million yen by then. No less. Summer bonuses are right around the corner, you know? It’ll be easy if you beg your mommies and daddies.”
: “What!? To hell with that!”
: Whoa there, hold on. Fun? There’s actual fun in this game? Where?
: “Don’t bother with him. Makoto’s safety is more important right now.”
: No wait seriously where’s the fucking fun? All I’ve done for the last probably five hours is just cutscenes and confidant events.
: “I didn’t mean to drag you in like this…”
: “For real.”
: “I was stupid…”
: She’s the smart girl.
: “I must agree. You should’ve easily imagined this happening.”
: “Hey, Yusuke…”
: “I was so caught up in trying to be useful…”
: “All right, enough of the blame game! What’s done is done.”
: “I’m going to cause trouble for Sis too…”
: “Sis?”
: “My older sister has a commendable job, and she’s a much more remarkable person than me… a lot happened after we lost our father three years ago, so it’s just us living together… but I’m still a child, so all I am is a burden to her…”
: “I just wanted to be useful in some way to someone…”
: “Y’know, I might not get your whole situation, but ain’t it a bit off saying that you’re useless to her?”
: “It’s the truth though… in particular, I have to apologize for what happened to you.”
: “Eh?”
: Makoto just admitted that she did in fact know about Kamoshida the entire time and didn’t do anything, exactly as Ann suspected. Facing consequences for your actions? That’s only for “shitty adults”.
: “People like me… must really be what others call scum of the earth.”
: But yeah, this kind of thing is why when I played the base game, I more or less skimmed the cutscenes that weren’t confidant events where I had to avoid a permafuck.
: “Real scum wouldn’t call themselves that.”
: “…Huh?”
: “I’m the same. It’s just like you said before: I was closest to Shiho, but I didn’t do anything… besides, Kamoshida’s the one to blame. Shiho understands that… and I do too.”
: Here’s what I don’t get though, right? The game goes through fucking hoops to defang everything, but for some reason doesn’t defang the one thing where it would kind of make sense to do that.
: Hell, have a thing where Makoto explains that she tried to have something done about Kamoshida, except Sae wouldn’t listen and the principal threatened her with expulsion if she ever said anything.
: “Takamaki-san…”
: “Me either?”
: “And that’s why you were so reckless?”
: “We won’t let anyone fall victim again. Now, what should we do from here?”
: “I’ll do something about the money! So can we please just drop the case with Kaneshiro?”
: Do what, exactly? Go to your sister?
: “No can do. We’re all caught up in this.”
: “We can’t have you rushing things on your own anymore and making the situation worse.”
: “If only we could do something about that bank…”
: “Ryuji!”
: “Bank?”
: “Oh, right, the bank! She isn’t useless at all! She may be our key in! Hear me out, you guys!”
: “Our key in? What do you mean?”
: “A cat? Um… are you all okay?”
: “We’ve all become Kaneshiro’s targets. That means we’ve become customers of Kaneshiro’s bank!”
: So, okay, where does Makoto come into this? If you’re all “customers” at the bank, why do you need her?
: “I see. The reason why we couldn’t enter before was because we weren’t considered his customers…”
: "And wouldn’t you say that she in particular is a special customer?
: Oh, I get it! He’s thirsty for Makoto as well, because he thirsts for human women in general and not just Ann.
: “Whoa, I don’t follow this at all…”
: “She risked her life doing something so reckless. At the very least, she has the right to know. Won’t you come with us?”
: “What? …Wait. To where?”
: “Yeah, where are we goin’?”
: “Beats me…”
: “That’s Morgana, the cat that was in Akira’s bag. This is what happens when we come here.”
: Another slip on the codename.
: “That voice… Takamaki-san? Where are we?”
: “We’re inside Kaneshiro’s… well, the ‘world’ inside his heart.”
: “…What?”
: “It’s another reality in which Kaneshiro’s distorted desires have materialized.”
: “…Another reality? It’s floating in the air!? Th-this is reality!? My goodness…”
: Smart girl switch… activate! Divert all power from Ann and Ryuji!
: “A reality that one’s heart shows… is it like the application of optical illusions in social cognitive psychology?”
: “That’s something we have no idea about…”
: “That may be like overwriting their cognition… I think I kind of get the logic behind it…”
: Makoto instantly gets everything, and I understand why - it’s specifically to avoid the kind of shit we saw in Two Brothers. I still feel like it’s kind of a characterization flaw, which this game is full of.
: “Ain’t she more amazing than you?”
: “W-We’re about the same!”
: “Then, does that mean there’s an ATM version of myself somewhere in this world too?”
: “Perhaps. Regardless, we can change Kaneshiro’s heart and make him confess if we steal his Treasure… if it all goes well, that is.”
: “We’ll make it go well. Everyone’ll notice us for sure if we take someone like Kaneshiro down!”
: “Our justice will also become resolute.”
: “Think we’d be able to give courage to those in need if it happens?”
: “For the sake of those in need, huh… you sound like my father.”
: “Your father?”
: “…No, don’t mind me. You want to go to that bank, right? Let’s go then. If I’ve become a customer of that bank, then they’ll have to let me in.”
: “It’s just as I calculated.”
: What about this was calculated? What about ANY of this was calculated? This is like that one scene in Death Note where after a whole bunch of events entirely dependent on luck, Light picks up the Death Note and does the whole “JUST AS ACCORDING TO KEIKAKU*” thing.
*TL note: Keikaku means plan
: No, not really. I haven’t physically been to the bank in over a year, but I know they definitely don’t offer after-hours service. It’s probably different in Japan, but with every bank I’ve seen in the US they expect you to mostly use online banking unless you’re depositing or withdrawing cash or like… cashing in a physical savings bond or something.
: “I thought that I’d be able to get in since I have the same identity as such customers. I’m Kaneshiro’s source of revenue, after all.”
: “Ah, that makes sense.”
: I mean, it does, but at the same time it doesn’t.
: “But wow… this place is huge.”
: “I rarely gotta go to the bank, so… this’s makin’ me kinda nervous.”
: “Being in a bank with costumes like these is so obvious - we’re totally robbers.”
: I dunno, it could be one of those metaphors for capitalism.
: “You got that right…”
: “It seems there will be a lot of Shadows from here on.”
: “Huh? What’s that about?”
: I’m surprised her answer wasn’t like “Shadows? You mean like the term from Jungian psychology?”
: “Enemies attack us here.”
: “I see… I’ve trained in aikido. Dont worry; I can defend myself.”
: Someday, I want to see a character in an RPG where the party goes “Can you fight?” and the character just goes “Yeah, I got a sock full of quarters” and their entire weapon specialty is just improvised bludgeons.
: Have a weapon upgrade mechanic where they upgrade by finding a bigger sock and filling it with more quarters. The final upgrade is a pair of military-grade carbon fiber thigh highs full of half-dollar coins.
: “Self-defense won’t do much good against Shadows, but then again, it’s better than nothing.”
: I wound up unintentionally posting the update early, and I have to record the rest of 6/20 (due to stopping here because I thought I had permafucked) so I’ll just stop here since everyone already read this.
: Next time, we’ll go in to Kaneshiro’s palace, do another godawful Maruki confidant, and then reload pool a bunch until I get knowledge points in order to resolve a permafuck before it happens.