Colors Flying High - Let's Play Persona 5 Royal

[Timrod]

@drcakey

It makes sense to replace the fortuneteller’s VA, since she would need new lines for the confidant phonecalls, but does Kaneshiro have any new lines? If not, that’s kind of strange.

Kaneshiro actually does - he has a new phase to his boss fight which makes it even more tedious than it used to be. I’m almost done covering that in the new update.

The reason they had to replace the VA for Chihaya (the fortuneteller) surprisingly has nothing to do with the confidant phone calls. Most confidant events aren’t voiceacted at all. They usually play generic VO clips over the text.

No the reason they had to replace Chihaya’s VA is that Royal adds two new fully-voiced events, those being Valentine’s Day and White Day. Because Chihaya is a potential romance option, she has to be there, and that’s why they had to get a new VA.

[Timrod]

Click Here for Update 36

: “No, I was up very early, shooting a news show. I have much more work in television because of the Phantom Thieves.”

: “I have permission from my school, but it’s still tough to do both. …Ah, I can’t keep complaining. Well, let’s both do our best today.”

: She acts like it’s abnormal for it to be hot and humid in the middle of summer.

: "Oh yeah. In Japan, when the rainy season ends, we say that it ‘opens.’ "

: “But in English, it’s more common to hear people say the rainy season ‘comes to a close’. Be careful! Expressions for the weather are totally different depending on what country you’re in.”

: “Now then… Mr. Kurusu! Which of these animals is involved in an English idiom about the weather?”

: I have to wonder if questions like this are there to make up for all the ones in Persona 4 that no English speaker would be likely to know.

: “That’s right! Raining cats and dogs. ‘Raining cats and dogs’ means it’s pouring rain. The strongest theory for its origin is that the sound of rain resembles that of dogs and cats fighting.”

: “Some other European languages describe bad weather as ‘dog’s weather’ too. Additionally, in Norwegian they say it’s raining witches, and in Polish they say it’s raining frogs.”

: “Each country has its own way of describing heavy rain - and its own metaphorical substitute falling from the sky.”

: “Oh yeah, over here they say that when a cat washes its face, it rains. I clean my face every day because I like being clean, and lemme tell you, that’s a load of bull.”

: “Oh, uh, but I’m not a cat, of course.”

: The Showtime attack with Ryuji and Makoto unlocks I believe the day you send the calling card for Kaneshiro, so you won’t ever have it for the dungeon itself.

: In hindsight, I probably should’ve just made my own schedule for 100% because then I could have screenshots of this ready to go, but that’s what Youtube is for.

: All of the videos I could find of it had spoilers, so I’m not going to link a video of it.

: “Ah- Hey, Makoto!”

: “Hm? Is something wrong?”

: “Nah, nah, it’s nothin’…”

: “Well, it definitely doesn’t seem like it’s ‘nothin’ to you…”

: “Uh, so… I’ve been doin’ a little thinkin’, and… how do I put it… I guess I was thinkin’ about comin’ up with a new move - like a special tag-team move, kinda thing.”

: “So, I got this idea while playin’ a video game, and… it’s a move that’s gonna need your help…”

: “My help?”

: “Know what? Never mind. I just saw something like it in the game and thought it looked cool… when I try to say it out loud, it seems too insane…”

: “Insane, huh? So, in other words, you may have come across a special attack that outclasses any of our previous moves?”

: “I wha…?”

: “Why don’t you tell me your idea? By the way you described it, it must be a pretty good one.”

: “Uh, alright… just… don’t get mad at me, okay?”

: “I… see…”

: “Heh, so stupid, right!? Yeah, I was just jokin’! Haha… please forget what I said.”

: “…That could work.”

: “Yeah, that could work - wait, what?”

: “But, if we’re going to do this, we’ll have to push ourselves harder than ever before. Think you can keep up?”

: “Yes, ma’am! We’re gonna show 'em the real meaning of pain!”

: “We should probably get going now, though. I wouldn’t want to make everyone else wait.”

: “Yeah!”

: “I would agree, but it will not be an easy task this time.”

: “Yeah, nobody actually knows him…”

: “There’s so goddamn much I wanna write on the calling card too…”

: “Oh, Akira! So get this, I was talking with Makoto earlier and we came up with this insane move!”

: “Well… it’s a bit difficult to explain with words alone…”

: “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of everything! Alright, so the plan is…”

: Ryuji and Makoto’s Showtime is one of the few that has a similar name in both versions. The English name is “Max Moxie” while the Japanese one is “Mad Mix”. Did anyone tell Atlus that Mad Max wasn’t a spaghetti western?

: And before anyone says Mad Max was technically a western, it wasn’t a spaghetti western.

: In the English dub, Ryuji goes “Get ready for the Fist of the Phantom Star!” I’m not sure if that reference persists in the Japanese voiceacting, because all the people who recorded this on Youtube are tasteless cretins who prefer the dub.

: So like… was her elbowing him part of his plan?

: It’s hard to see in stills, but she’s doing the whole Fist of the North Star thing.

: So like, okay, which parts of that did Ryuji actually plan?

: This is probably my least favorite out of all the Showtime attacks, by the way. They should’ve done something based on The Fast and The Furious and had both of them on motorcycles.

: “So it’s just like how it reacted with Lady Ann and I last time? It doesn’t react at all at other times, though… I don’t get how this thing works.”

: “Instead of granting wishes, maybe it just offers a bit of support…? As long as it benefits us in some way, I’m happy.”

: “Then let’s give it a try when there’s an opportunity. Make sure to match my timing, okay?”

: “Yes, ma’am!”

: Today, all we’re doing is sending the calling card.

: “Now the question is, how do we deliver the calling card to him?”

: “Yeah, we don’t know where he lives…”

: “Hm? Why not use the same method as before?”

: There’s a couple of Personas that turn into some pretty good armor that opens up after the Kaneshiro arc is done, so I’ll be using that Black Robe to save some money.

: We spend the night crafting again. I’m reasonably sure we have enough lockpicks to last us the rest of the game, so I just make some useless stuff.

: “Hm? Read it.”

: “I said, read it!”

: I’m just imagining Kaneshiro meeting Joker in the boss arena and it doing the Yakuza thing where it explains what family he’s from, and all he sees is “John Persona Family Patriarch - A Division of the John Persona Clan - John Persona”

: I’m also not sure if it’s a coincidence or not, but the Yakuza games often use the title “Menacing Man” for any subquest-related enemies.

: “What of it?”

: What’s funny is that the game goes into the whole idea of Kaneshiro being a dead man even if John Persona doesn’t kill him - if he confesses he’s probably going to die in prison. Hell, if Yakuza 7 is anything like reality there’s a chance his patriarch would kill him even if he didn’t confess because of the dumb shit he was pulling.

: “Don’t waste your time worrying about this useless shit. Just keep quiet for now.”

: “Grr… all of you, bring me your earnings! If you don’t surpass your quota… I’ll kill you.”

: “Hey, we’re leaving.”

: “A good idea, no? Given the theatrical nature of this one, Kaneshiro must surely have been contacted about it.”

: “You truly are the brains of this Phantom Thieves operation! Ryuji, you should follow her example!”

: “Y’know I’m the one who went postin’ it everywhere, right!? I even had to get all dressed up so they wouldn’t notice me!”

: “Come now, we don’t have time for idle chitchat. Let us get moving.”

: “We’re going up against a truly horrible criminal this time…”

: But Ryuji, Mara isn’t in this game! At least, not in his usual form.

: “Makoto! You remember how all this works?”

: Oh, right. I’ve been playing this game called Enchanted Arms recently (I’m probably going to do an LP of it) and the main character is a dumbass to the point of being completely non-functional.

: That game also has a party member named Makoto (who is a campy gay guy) and the main character’s English VA pronounces his name like “Mac-otto”. I can’t tell if it’s on purpose or not, because the other VAs can pronounce it just fine.

: It is absolutely canon that Ryuji pronounces Makoto’s name this way. I refuse to believe it isn’t.

: “Once we steal the Treasure, the Palace will crumble and the Palace ruler’s heart will change.”

: Why they’re still telling me this when I’ve already seen it twice, I have no idea.

: “Wow, you got that quick! I think Ryuji’s still struggling to comprehend it all…”

: Just to show how pointless the last save point is, I started from before the elevator and ran all the way down here.

: “He was waitin’ for us!”

: You can actually dick around the boss arena if you want - for some reason, the game doesn’t just proceed right to the boss fight.

: “A safe!? This wasn’t here the last time we came! He changed the entire room so quickly… tch, I guess this Palace isn’t a bank for nothing.”

: The room hasn’t actually changed, apart from the back wall.

: “I’m surprised you made it here alive. It seems you are quite lucky.”

: “Lucky? Don’t be ridiculous.”

: “We’re gonna change your heart and make you confess everything you’ve done. That’ll save all those people who’re suffering 'cause of your shitty actions.”

: “Even the police’re strugglin’ to deal with you, so this’ll make the public believe in us too!”

: “Those in power work the ones below them to the bone for money. Such is the hierarchy of the world. Just accept your fate as a source of my wealth!”

: “We’ll never agree to that!”

: “And hierarchy? You have to be out of your mind.”

: “Still! Don’t you think you’re getting back at the wrong people?”

: “What a pitiful man.”

: “It doesn’t matter whether you’re clean or dirty! Only the clever come out on top! The strong and the smart devour the weak. That is the natural order of things.”

: Kaneshiro is clearly on Team Chaos, since this is almost word-for-word the way the Gaians describe their plan in SMT 1.

: “You damn brats who think you know the world through the shit you read online will make perfect prey.”

: “Hmph. He is utterly hopeless.”

: “It’s always the fools who get tricked! Fools who have to pay for their foolishness. And if those fools don’t learn, well they have to suck it up and stay as plain, stupid fools!”

: What is he, Franziska von Karma?

: “Will you just shut it already!?”

: “I guess there’s not much point saying anything to you fools! This is where my gracious lecture ends. Now then, I hope you’re ready to work as slaves here for the rest of your lives.”

: “That’s outrageous!”

: Kaneshiro starts bulging at the seams, which is kind of unnecessary given what his demon form is.

: I don’t quite understand why the goons run away when they’re constructs made by Kaneshiro’s brain, but whatever.

: Meet Bael, which is just Kaneshiro in a dumbass halloween costume.

: I like that they just mirrored the textures on the goon’s jacket so the text is backwards. Not that I’m blaming them, given this is an asset that’s in all of what, two cutscenes?

: That thing looks a lot like the time machine from the end of Earthbound.

: That cutscene was way longer than it needed to be. Welcome to the Kaneshiro fight, which was utter bullshit in the base game unless you understood the gimmick… which I kind of just ignored.

: Basically, you get a turn or two of Piggytron just sitting still and not doing anything. It’s got some pretty high magic resistance, so even Principality doesn’t do a whole lot.

: I did this fight wrong on purpose because we’re so overlevelled and I wanted to see if I could do it. Ordinarily, you wouldn’t want to bring Yusuke because Missile Party is a full-party fire attack… which Yusuke is weak to.

: If he downs anyone, Kaneshiro will then follow up with Ocular Vulcan, which spreads out a number of weaker Gun-type hits among the party. We’re so overpowered that there’s no reason to give a shit.

: This attack was the bullshit one. When you get this message, you’re supposed to change targets to Kaneshiro himself - doing enough damage will knock him off the pig and give you time to hit it.

: Instead, I just keep nuking it.

: After one turn of spinning, if you haven’t knocked Kaneshiro off, he uses March of the Pigs. March of the Pigs was a guaranteed instakill in the base game on anything that wasn’t a New Game Plus file, even through guard.

: Needless to say, the damage on it was reduced significantly for Royal, specifically because a lot of people got hit by this assuming they could guard it and didn’t know about targeting Kaneshiro himself.

: I was planning on dying just to show it off, but then I didn’t and was just like “Fuck it, I’m just gonna do this in one take”.

: At this point, I just put Joker on heals (he can bring the party to full from near-empty in two Mediaramas) and had everyone else continue nuking the pig.

: The pattern repeats from there as long as you haven’t knocked Kaneshiro off his pig - he’ll use Super VIP Form, charge, and then use March of the Pigs.

: The base game did this too… even though you had to have figured out the gimmick in order to get this far. Naturally, we’re not going to be throwing any items because fuck engaging with game mechanics.

: If you do choose to try it, you get a choice of three items and there’s a chance that Kaneshiro stops his attack.

: The problem is that the only items that work are ones you probably don’t want to throw away: things like Beads, Bead Chains, and SP restoratives.

: Basically, the only difference between doing the fight correctly and what I’m doing is that doing it correctly would take longer because we’d spend a full turn attacking Kaneshiro every three turns.

: In the base game, the fight was over when you took out Piggytron, but the developers decided that wasn’t tedious enough.

: In this form, Kaneshiro will do nothing but spam Lullaby every time his turn comes up.

: He and his bodyguards will then follow up with Technicals.

: The game does a very bad job explaining this, but basically, the “Bodyguard for Hire” (the big fly with the shields) will step in and take any damage Kaneshiro would take. The other one doesn’t do anything.

: Both of the flies resist everything, except one absorbs Curse and one absorbs Bless.

: This is about the worst way you could possibly go about doing this. Trust me, I tried it. I spent four or so turns doing nothing but using Dormina and other sleep moves on the bodyguard… and none of them landed.

: I did manage to sleep the other fly, but it just wakes up after a few turns.

: Here’s a much, much better strategy. Have everyone just use damage spells on the bodyguard and technical whenever possible. This way you’re at least doing damage to it and not wasting your turn trying to put status effects on it.

: Now, here’s where you can tell this fight was just intended to be pure tedium.

: At half health, Kaneshiro will use Make it Rain.

: This does a shit-ton of damage, but Joker completely evades it. From what I’ve read, it’s scripted to be unable to actually kill anyone.

: The next turn, he’ll use it again, only this time a single coin falls down and does nothing.

: If the other fly is still alive, it’ll leave at this point.

: Even though Kaneshiro stops fighting back once he runs out of money, you still have to kill him, because I’m not sure Atlus learned anything from the base game.

: In fact, now I’m kind of interested in seeing the changes they supposedly made to the fifth dungeon. The fifth dungeon was a lot of backtracking and the boss was a source of a lot of complaints.

: It wasn’t until after the fight that I realized there’s probably a better strategy: have Ann use Fire Break (which removes fire resistance) on the bodyguard so she does full damage.

: “I’m not gonna let anyone have it… this is my money…”

: “You stole it all from innocent people!”

: “Fine. I’ll call off the debt…”

: “Fine? You’re still soundin’ pretty condescendin’.”

: “You’re right… I’m a poor, ugly idiot… how am I supposed to live a normal life like this?”

: “It’s all because of our society! Weak people can’t lead a happy life, no matter what they do! I’m a victim too, you know!? Yeah, none of this is my fault!”

: “The more you talk, the more pathetic you sound.”

: “I just wanted a place where I could belong! You get that, don’t you!?”

: “Bullshit! All you did was surround yourself with people you could use, solely for some easy money!”

: “And you think you’re the only one who’s gotta deal with bein’ labeled? Me… and all these other guys… we’re all fightin’ against that!”

: “But don’t worry. You’ll finally have a place where you belong. Somewhere you can make amends, for the rest of your life.”

: “We’re gonna do somethin’ about that distorted heart of yours. Free of charge.”

: “I’m glad you understand. Now hurry up and return to the real Kaneshiro.”

: It sounds like there should be a line between Ryuji and Yusuke, but there isn’t. I checked both my recording and a couple others.

: “Seriously? You guys don’t have any tact. Especially with that incredible power… these Palaces could net you loads of cash! You could do whatever you wanted to people’s hearts!”

: “We’re not like you!”

: “Where do you find meaning in that naive sense of justice? You know, there’s already someone out there taking full advantage of what Palaces have to offer…”

: “What?”

: I kinda wish he’d say something we don’t already know.

: “Is that… the same person Madarame’s Shadow spoke of?”

: “Spill it! Who’re you talkin’ about!?”

: It should already be pretty obvious who it is. I knew going in because the game had been heavily spoiled pre-release, but even not knowing it should be pretty obvious.

: “Don’t even bother. You are nothing compared to them… better be careful… a chance encounter with them could prove fatal…”

: “We can think about that later! Grab the Treasure - there’s no time!”

: “In that case, we should take that large one… wait, what!?”

: “T-Treasure…”

: “What’s gotten into him!?”

: Joker immediately reaches for his air horn, and motions to everyone else that they should just forego the van and run away.

: In the Gay Joker Edition of the game, Joker does one of those slow-motion dives and blasts Morgana with a fire hose before he can reach Ann.

: “You shouldn’t throw animals, dammit!”

: “Enough, already! Let’s get it in, everyone! Hurry!”

: How they had enough time to load all those giant gold bars (which would probably need to be moved with industrial equipment) is beyond me.

: “Owww…”

: “I think I cracked my ass…”

: “Ann, are you all right!? Is yours cracked as well?”

: “Of course not!”

: “Isn’t it supposed to be though?”

: “Urgh, that’s not what I meant! More importantly, it’s dangerous for us to just charge out like that!”

: “Ack! Everyone’s staring at us!”

: RIP Morgana, killed by his own hubris.

: “That briefcase…”

: “It appears to have been the cause of Morgana’s demise…”

: “That’s not what I meant! Isn’t that Kaneshiro’s…”

: “You mean his Treasure!?”

: Joker looks at everyone and asks if anyone wants to say a few words. No one does.

: “How about at karaoke?”

: “We’d have security cameras to worry about there.”

: “Oh, I got the perfect place.”

: “That’s right!”

: “I was just in the mood for some coffee too.”

: “And we need to fix Morgana up!”

: “So… warm…”

: When I recorded this, I had no idea why Morgana was crying and then realized that it’s because Ann is applying antiseptic in the background.

: “A rotary lock, hm?”

: “…I knew it.”

: “How did you get that?”

: “I simply memorized the combination. I saw him open and close it so many times, after all.”

: This part I don’t quite get. She was on the floor for most of the initial confrontation, and Kaneshiro had the lock on the briefcase facing away from her.

: “W-Well that’s… scary. But amazin’ too!”

: “Urghhh, that burns… hey, hurry up and open it!”

: “H-How much is this?!”

: “I believe one stack is one million yen… hm?”

: “One, two, three… uhhh, there’s thirty of them in here!?”

: “You have to think bigger than that…”

: Let’s be real here, if Morgana got any of that money it’d be in Ann’s pocket within a day. Either that or spent at some kind of hostess club that allows animals.

: “Not to bring down the excited mood… but does this look like money to you?”

: If I wasn’t doing that thing where I name all the boss updates after what demon the boss is, I would have named this one “300,000 Bison Dollars”.

: “F-For real!?”

: “I guess this represents… how everything he did was an act to make himself seem tough?”

: I know writers who let their readers come their own conclusions regarding the plot, and they’re all cowards. Actually, wait, no I don’t.

: “Noooooooo!”

: “Well hey, at least it feels like we totes busted this case, right?”

: “What do you mean? Is busting a case good or bad?”

: “Both!”

: “Snrk… chuckle Ahahahaha! To think the reward for the Phantom Thieves is feeling they ‘totes busted’ the case… ahhh… how funny!”

: “Hold on a second. Even though the contents were nothing more than trash, the case itself is quite nice.”

: “All right then, let’s sell it! Glad we got that sorted!”

: “By the way Morgana, have any of your memories returned?”

: “No, not at all…”

: You know, I’m not sure what would be weirder - a world where Morgana hits his head and starts going after women of his own species, or one where he continues to thirst for human women.

: “Something like that. He does remember searching for Treasures though.”

: “Hm. I hope your memories return soon then. So… what happens next?”

: “First, we wait for Kaneshiro to have his change of heart.”

: “It’s gonna be big this time. People’re gonna make a huge deal out of it, for sure.”

: “Hey, you know what Kaneshiro said at the end there? About that ‘criminal’ using the Metaverse…”

: “Yes, I was bothered by that as well.”

: “No point mullin’ over it now. Let’s wait and see how Kaneshiro’s change of heart goes first. We should prolly just lay low for a while.”

: We’ve actually seen the last of Kaneshiro. Unlike Kamoshida or Madarame, Kaneshiro doesn’t have a breakdown scene.

: They’re talking about Kaneshiro, and I’m not sure “phishing” is how I’d describe what he was doing.

: “All we need to do now is let the results come rolling in. We did great today though! Public opinion of us should skyrocket after this!”

: Tonight, we’ll be watching ICU.

: Joker went from “Man, this daytime TV drama is kind of stupid” to “Man, this daytime TV drama is kind of stupid… but the lighting is okay.”

: “Same with Kamoshida, and Madarame too. They hurt and exploited others just to satisfy their desires… still, there were people around them who noticed their terrible deeds, weren’t there?”

: “I wonder why they turned a blind eye… why doesn’t anyone help?”

: “So it’s because they don’t have the courage. Humans are so weak. Humans… hey, do you think I’ll really be able to become a human?”

: No, because you’re merely 90% post-Persona 4 recycled content as opposed to outright being Teddie.

: “When I touched the Treasure… some memories came back. I tried to force myself to forget, but… I really may not be human…”

: “Talk about a lukewarm response. Now that I think about it, I gotta be human. I am the core of the Phantom Thieves, after all!”

: We get an ability that I will never be using. I think the only time I ever had Joker use a melee attack in the base game (once I got the SP adhesives, anyway) was against the one enemy I know of that’s actually weak to physical damage.

: “You’ve defeated the repulsive fiend of gluttony this time. chuckle Well done. I am glad to see you have devoted yourself to your rehabilitation.”

: “You are not worthy of such kind words, inmate… I suggest you treasure them.”

: “Do you recall the whispers about that strange man?”

: “Even a chicken could remember something so important! Don’t sound so cocky about it!”

: I’ve been playing through 13 Sentinels Aegis Rim recently, and it kind of sucks coming from a game where I could get invested in the plot (even if it uses way too many cliffhangers for my liking) back to this crap.

: 13 Sentinels more or less has the opposite problem P5 does: the story is pretty good, but the actual gameplay parts consist of “Set up the guy with the railgun, have him kill everything, you can’t lose”.

: Unfortunately, I can’t LP it because someone else (actually, the guy who is doing the other LP of Royal) took it.

: Not that I’d necessarily want to, because I have about 30% story completion and already know more or less what the entire story is.

: “This is about the cases of those people who shut down, is it not?”

: “Indeed… I speak of another with powers similar to yours. If you are to complete your rehabilitation, you may encounter him eventually… yet another thing for me to look forward to.”

: “It would be greatly troubling if you were to not strengthen your abilities. I shall grant you an ability befitting of your newfound growth. Consider it a gift.”

: This is going to be useful for when we finally get around to doing Caroline and Justine’s confidant.

: I might do a couple ranks of it soon, because it opens up a couple of Personas you can’t otherwise get. The problem is that most of the abilities their confidant gets you aren’t useful until the end of the game.

: Next time, we’ll be back to doing confidants again. The “More Like Yusu-gay” updates will begin soon after that. I may need to delay just a little bit (doing 2 days instead of 3 at one point) to give Eligap enough time to finish the Rank 5 cutscene.

[SpammyV]

So I’m not clear on how much control everyone had over their Phantom Thief costume. Is Makoto in on the joke or do we need that weird guy explaining meme with Makoto and Ryuji going, “SO THERE WAS A NUCLEAR WAR IN 199X AND EVERYTHING’S A WASTELAND AND THERE’S THIS DUDE NAMED KENSHIRO AND HE’S THE LAST PERSON THAT KNOWS THIS MARTIAL ART CALLED HOKUTO SHINKEN AND HE CAN LIKE PUNCH PEOPLE’S PRESSURE POINTS AND MAKE THEIR HEAD EXPLODE AND SEE HIS OLD RIVAL KIDNAPPED HIS GIRLFRIEND AND…”

[Timrod]

@SpammyV

So I’m not clear on how much control everyone had over their Phantom Thief costume.

There’s a couple of voice lines in Mementos that randomly pop up (which haven’t yet in this run, but I remember seeing in the base game) that explain that. The party has no control over their outfits. In fact, there was a bit of a controversy over the base game because Ann has a couple of Mementos-only voice lines where she says she doesn’t like her costume.

One thing I kind of wish they had done was change the costumes up when you reach a high enough confidant rank.

[drcakey]

I gotta say, when this LP started I didn’t anticipate that “fat guy dancing around on a giant piggy bank” would be a boss in this game. But ok atlus you do you ig

@Timrod

In fact, there was a bit of a controversy over the base game because Ann has a couple of Mementos-only voice lines where she says she doesn’t like her costume.

The Three Stages of Ann’s Costume:

1. Wow the Catsuit is a Bit Much Don’t You Think?
2. Actually the Bright Red is Nice I’m Kinda Into This
3. wait why is she wearing huge rubber gloves

[Timrod]

Summary

: What I love about this scene is that there’s absolutely no reason Makoto couldn’t have just used the group IM thing instead of calling.

: I mean, they’re already going the “tell, don’t show” route with Kaneshiro, as we’ll see briefly.

: “There’s something I feel I should let you know. Kaneshiro contacted me.”

: “Kaneshiro!?”

: “He said he’s calling off our debt. It seems he’s disposed of all the photographs as well. And, um… my sister and her team have taken him into custody.”

: “What!?”

: “It appears they did not want him to… disappear, if you know what I mean.”

: Strangely enough, even though the party basically delivered Kaneshiro right into the shadowy conspiracy group that would probably off him anyway, he never dies.

: “His group was called a mafia, after all… I wouldn’t put silencing him past them.”

: “Does this mean we were successful in changing his heart?”

: “It’s hard to say for sure yet.”

: No, I’m sure the amoral yakuza who was exploiting minors for cash just went to the police and turned himself in for no particular reason at all.

: “I see… what about those psychotic breakdowns that Kaneshiro mentioned?”

: Wouldn’t you know!? Your sister is the DA in charge of investigating that!

: I really would like to see what this game would’ve been like if the writing wasn’t constantly repeating itself.

: I mentioned 13 Sentinels Aegis Rim in the last update and I imagine it’d be like that - I liked it up until it started getting dumb near the end, and then completely disengaged with the plot… kind of like what happened with this game.

: “True… that said, all we can do now is wait until Kaneshiro’s change of heart becomes clear to us. Thank you.”

: “A young woman wearing all brand clothing and an older man with gold accessories were arguing. Both were on their high horse, and even though they dressed fancily, it felt noveau riche.”

: “Speaking of, the Japanese words for ‘high horse’ and ‘nouveau riche’ both originated as shogi terms. A lot of people aren’t familiar with shogi, but it’s good to know a little bit about it.”

: “So, Kurusu-kun. Have you seen this piece before?”

: I had to look it up, but this is the Knight piece. Shogi is honestly one of those things that I’ve never cared enough about to get into.

: “That’s right. The lance and the silver general also have the kanji for ‘gold’ on the back. By the way, it’s said that the ‘to’ on the back of the pawn piece is a cursive form of ‘gold’.”

: Some shoji sets apparently replace the “to” character (と) with a different one (个) that’s more similar-looking to the kanji for “gold” (全).

: “If a knight crosses into enemy territory, for instance, they can promote - becoming as mobile as a gold general. A weak piece like a pawn can become gold if you get it to the enemy’s camp, hence ‘nouveau riche’.”

: Fun fact, this is how American football works. That’s why they cut to commercial after every touchdown, because the scoring player has to go get the “gold” kanji drawn on their back.

: “By the way, nouveau riche like to wear expensive clothes because of a desire to be acknowledged. Once humans fulfill the basic needs of clothing, food, and shelter, our next desire is recognition.”

: “That’s why people try to make themselves seem bigger by flaunting their power through money.”

: I mean, maybe. My next desire is something to keep me occupied from the lingering threat of boredom.

: Makoto’s confidant is now open. We will not be touching it this update - normally we would, but I need to buy Eligap some time.

: Instead, we’re going to do a confidant event with Kasumi.

: “Since our talk, I’ve been trying to think of things besides gymnastics that I’m really invested in… and I figured something out! It’s this!”

: “Yeah. I can cook! You really need to regulate your diet in gymnastics, so I’ve been making my own food a lot. And so! Since I also wanted to thank you, I made you bento!”

: “This is actually my first time cooking for someone else besides my family… but I figured this would definitely help me get my confidence back!”

: “I made this specifically with your body type in mind, and knowing how much you exercise… do you want it?”

: I’m just picturing Joker looking into the bag and going “Hey Morgana, does watching DVDs count as exercise?”

: “And it’s all yours! The chicken and eggs are to help you with fatigue. There are some beans in there, too, and it’s on brown rice.”

: “Weight control’s important for gymnasts, but we also need to make sure we’ve got energy and stamina too. So high-protein, low-fat is usually what we go for. We also need iron to maintain stamina, and vitamin B for energy.”

: “Wait… I’m getting all focused on the gymnastics part again… Well, anyway… let’s dig in!”

: “…Why do you look so skeptical, Kurusu-senpai? I guess it might look like a lot, but this is actually a little less than my usual. Don’t worry, I’ve done the math on the calories. I’ll burn all this off at practice.”

: “C’mon, Senpai! You’ll be done before you know it!”

: They keep re-using the whole “Girl who is laughably bad at cooking” thing and I don’t know why.

: “Kurusu-senpai? You okay? Your eyes are glazing over…”

: “You think so? I don’t think it’s that weird for an athlete. Heavy seasoning would probably be bad for you, so I went easy on it. Hmm. Was it too light? Excuse me…”

: No! Curry is overrated! That was the entire point of Disgaea 5… at least, I’m pretty sure it was because I’ve forgotten everything else about that game. It was pretty bad.

: “So I decided to go for maximum curry flavoring! U-um, sorry… were you not a fan of that flavor? Or, wait - maybe you prefer the super spicy ones!”

: “I’m so sorry! I did this all wrong… I’ll go get some kind of condiment to change the flavor! Once I fix it, I’m sure you’ll enjoy it more!”

: “Should I get mayonnaise? Soy sauce…? Maybe miso? Do you think Dr. Maruki will have some salt!?”

: “Oh, you’re right! I should just buy something new you can eat right now!”

: “Um, but… well, thank you! Now, we should really eat.”

: “Thank you for completely finishing your meal, Kurusu-senpai. I’m sorry it didn’t turn out perfectly… I came up with the idea of making bento, but I couldn’t decide on the flavor…”

: “Either way, I’m really sorry! I’m so embarrassed… I thought it was so great when I presented it to you, and now…”

: And that’s how Ni no Kuni 2 was born. Or YIIK.

: “Next time, I’ll ask you what you like before I try anything too crazy. I’ll go buy that super spicy ‘Megido-sauce’ for next time!”

: Megido Sauce, guaranteed to devil bust your tastebuds or your macca back.

: “Hee hee… it seems like you’re always helping me find my way forward, Senpai. If I didn’t have you, I’d let my failures get to me and end up in some big pessimistic spiral again.”

: “…Maybe this kind of confidence can help me figure out who I really am.”

: “Okay, now that we’ve gotten all our nutrients, it’s time for the next phase! I don’t mean to be too demanding, but I’m going to train you even harder than before! Make sure you keep up!”

: Joker immediately reaches for the air horn. He’s seen this before.

: When we get back, we get a notification that the next Caroline and Justine outing is open. We’re not doing that for another week or so.

: Hifumi Togo is this game’s best girl. She still doesn’t hold a candle to Elly or Yukiko.

: Unfortunately, we won’t be touching her confidant for some time. She is well worth doing even if you’re not going for 100% because you need her to fuse Lucifer.

: I mean, maybe in the real world, but in the SMT universe churches are for one thing and that’s devil busting the Messians before they can do the whole “Thousand Year Kingdom of God” nonsense.

: “Let’s ignore that idiot. Anyway, a shogi expert, huh? Striking an enemy with but a moment’s inspiration, skillfully strategizing toward victory…”

: “They said she’s at the church in Kanda, right? We should check it out when you have the time.”

: We have a couple of things to do tonight First, we can sell all this sooty armor, which is more than I remember picking up.

: The grab bag is available again, so I take one.

: The three Old Haori are upgrades for the male characters, so I go ahead and equip them. We’ll probably wind up buying new armor from Iwai anyway, but this will work when we go into Mementos next week.

: Sakai wants a Yakisoba Pan. We’ve been carrying one around for like three months. It’s probably still good.

: He gives us another Black Robe, which I might actually save for the late-game. I think there’s a few armor pieces near the end of the game that are better than the ones you can buy.

: Speaking of Iwai, let’s go sell all the vendor trash. That’ll bring us to 667,000 yen.

: Can you guess who the next target is going to be?

: This sounds like it was written by someone who has no idea how the internet works.

: If you hadn’t guessed by now, this spells it out. Anyway, we’re just going to call Kawakami, and…

: “That voice on the phone wasn’t Kawakami. Maybe you should ask for more details?”

: I’d just like to point out how little sense this scene makes. Joker is presumably calling the maid service’s number, and somehow reached the hospital from the maid service.

: “But thanks for coming all this way to visit me. Ugh, how could I collapse at a time like this? I really need to make some money… how am I going to make today’s payment…?”

: “You contacted the school…!?”

: Takase’s family would get a D- in Extortion 101.

: “I-I’m sorry…”

: “These are Takase-kun’s guardians, the ones I mentioned the other day. They took care of him…”

: Why do they keep using “the other day”? They could just have said “I told you about them” and it’d be enough.

: Seriously though I don’t understand how they supposedly did a once-over on the script between the base game and Royal and didn’t change some of this stuff.

: “He’s one of my students. He came to visit me…”

: “I’m sorry…”

: “Kurusu-kun…”

: I feel like Persona 5 takes place in some kind of bizarro world where extortion and blackmail are legal and everyone just kinda does it.

: “That’s not…”

: “…I understand. I will pay you… so…!”

: “I have to figure out a way to make more money… I guess transferring to our sister company is the only way…”

: This is one of the reasons I feel like the whole “there is a right answer to every choice” thing is kind of a bad idea.

: If you ask her about the sister company, the game spells it out for you: it’s prostitution even by Japanese legal standards.

: “Haha… I can’t believe I’m getting scolded by my student. Why…? Why are you so interested in helping me? I’m not worth it…”

: And then a doctor walks in and beckons Joker out of the room. “I’m sorry, son. The disease has progressed too far. We’re going to need to send her to Anime Containment.”

: “…Meow. …I’m so tired. All I really want is… a way to apologize to Takase-kun. So if his guardians demand money, then I just have to pay them…”

: “Sorry, I’m not quite back to a hundred percent yet, so my thoughts are all over the place.”

: “…I’m going to get some rest. I appreciate you coming to visit me today. …It made me really happy.”

: I remember the last time I was in a hospital - I was visiting someone, and right around this point I had the Ham Sandwich of Despair.

: The person I was visiting had wanted one, so I went down to this overpriced sandwich place in the lobby and got one, and when I brought it back up they told me they didn’t want it after all. They tell me to just eat it because they’re going to order dinner from the hospital.

: So there I am, in a hospital room, eating a ham sandwich. It doesn’t taste like anything, no matter how much mustard I put on it, because of the overpowering smell of the cleaning fluids the hospital uses. It is the Ham Sandwich of Despair.

: “…Visiting hours are over. Get home safe, okay…?”

: We start the 30th with Ann asking us to go to Mementos. We’re not doing that yet, because there’s still a few more requests we need to pick up - namely Kawakami’s.

: Instead, we’re going to to see our boyfriend.

: “It is on display as we speak. Would you like to come see it with me?”

: “Then let us head to the museum. To be honest, I have yet to actually go there myself. This should be quite lovely.”

: “Hm, I believe my piece truly stands out among the sea of art here. And yet, nobody has come to see it… perhaps they are so afraid of the truth held within that they dare not take a closer look.”

: Joker glares at the old people. No one hurts his boyfriend.

: “…There is no need to worry. I am not bothered in the slightest. That was nothing more than the drivel of unrefined commoners. I needn’t pay any attention to them.”

: “As long as those who are in the know understand my work, I will be happy.”

: “Look! A knowledgeable patron has arrived!”

: “I would like your opinion, sir… what are your thoughts on this piece?”

: If I was actually writing the More Like Yusu-Gay route, I’d probably have him say something like “You’ve clearly got something interesting to say here, but it’s like you’re afraid to really put yourself into it and say it.”

: Yusuke would have a thought here which would be something like, “Doesn’t he get it? I can’t! If I do that…”

: Then there’d be a flashback of Yusuke with Madarame, where Madarame has either realized himself that Yusuke is gay or Yusuke has told him directly.

: I’m not sure exactly how I’d write it, but it’d be something like Madarame telling him that he can’t be openly gay and an artist at the same time, “because that’s how this country is. Your pieces would never sell. People wouldn’t bother to look beyond you to your art.”

: The idea is that it’s something where he’s doing it to keep Yusuke under his thumb, but also has a grain of truth to it.

: “My work is… empty?”

: “…Indeed. But… why? I put my heart and soul into this piece, captured the very essence of desire… it was supposed to lay bare the reality of the world!”

: “Perhaps… perhaps he was right. It may be empty after all… these colors, these brush strokes… they do not convey the true meaning of desire, only my conception of it!”

: “I haven’t captured desire… desire has captured me! How could I have fooled myself into believing otherwise!?”

: “This grave mistake shall be the end for me!”

: “But, I… what is going to happen to me now? Without art, what will remain of my being!?”

: “Akira… you are correct. Surrendering myself to fate after only one failure would be very much unlike me. Still, being criticized by someone with such a keen eye is truly painful…”

: “But that is all the more reason I must break out of my slump. I must prove my ability to him…!”

: “I will start by painting. After that, I shall paint, beyond which I shall paint even more. That is the only way I will learn to capture the essence of emotion.”

: “After all, you can only accomplish so much in using logic to analyze the contents of the heart. …I hope you allow me to continue my skill card services as well, Akira. I shall conquer this!”

: “Now then, let us head home. I wish to start anew.”

: “That one gentleman’s critique made me fully realize what I’ve been lacking. Now my path is clear! I will simply keep on drawing. I’m going to have ten pieces finished up by end of today!”

: That last part isn’t a typo on my end, that’s exactly how it is in the screenshot. They forgot a “the”.

: “Hah! If anything, I should be doing more. I’ll do anything to escape this slump! With your support, I was able to pick myself up rather quickly today.”

: “I hope this doesn’t discourage you from joining me again. I will get past this. Sorry for taking up so much of your time. We’ll meet again soon.”

: It’s here I figure out how the touch pad confidant tracker thing works.

: All the tracker does is steer you toward a “recommended” confidant each day. Neither the reload-heavy 100% route nor the one I’m using do this one tonight.

: There’s also a crossword tonight.

: Tonight, we’ll be starting what’s either the most or the second-most important confidant in the game.

: “You can begin by telling me your name.”

: “Ah, Akira Kurusu-san. I see. Your name is quite lucky. That aside, what type of consultation can I interest you in today?”

: “Well, um… I use tarot cards to foretell the future.”

: As it so happens, I actually have a complete deck of tarot cards with the Persona 4/Golden faces on them, but I have no idea how you’re supposed to use them.

: “Now then, let’s start with an initial reading to test the waters of your fate. O divine power… bring forth this boy’s fortune!”

: “I see. There seems to be new wealth in your future. Your financial fortune is looking good today. This wealth of which I speak will come… from your house.”

: “Head home without detour, and precisely five thousand yen will await you there!”

: If someone wants to explain to me how it is you’re supposed to do… whatever it is she’s doing… I’ll do it with the P4 cards and post it in the thread. We’re going to be coming back here a lot.

: Anyway, this is a preview of Chihaya’s first ability: the money reading. Money readings cost 5000 yen and get you twice the money if you end a battle with an All-Out.

: This is one of the reasons that the Greatest Weapon in the Phantom Thieves Arsenal is a better technique than confusion farming - you can go directly to an All-Out from the negotiation screen and double any money gained that way.

: “As you should. Fate is absolute! But… what is this? How strange. Kurusu-san, the general flow of your future seems to indicate… ruin…? And an inmate, locked away in a lonely cell…”

: “You seem to be a good person, Kurusu-san… but are you perhaps mixed up with the wrong crowd? Beyond that… my…”

: This is foreshadowing to something we could have seen, but haven’t. It’s a reference to the game over cutscene that happens if you ignore the time limit for a Palace.

: Let’s just pretend I went and actually sat through several hours of going to sleep in a loop until I ran out the timer on Kaneshiro’s dungeon.

: I took these from a video on YouTube. They’re from the base game, which is why the font is different. I kind of wish they hadn’t changed it, because I started using it for the update banners and didn’t know they had changed it when I started making them.

: This cutscene is actually a gigantic plot hole for several reasons. I’ll give you the first one: this cutscene takes place in November. By this point, Joker should know who the person with the gun is.

: “I cannot offer advice to that end… Hm. If the divination is coming to me this clearly, the truth of it is simply undeniable.”

: “Now that I think about it, there may be way you can attempt to counteract your destiny.”

: Bring a Persona that’s immune to gun damage and then light the gunman on fire?

: Remember how I said we need 100,000 yen to unlock Chihaya? This is why.

: “I typically only recommend this to my more experienced customers, but your situation is too dire to ignore. You see, the stone itself is imbued with an aura of joy that will sap away all the horrible energy surrounding you.”

: Wasn’t this a Yakuza substory? I think it was.

: “All you need to do is keep it wrapped in cloth and be sure to recharge its power in moonlight every three days.”

: The worst part is that we have to take a second day to buy the crystal. We’re going to buy it anyway, but now we need to spend two time slots on it even though we already have enough money.

: “I-It’s legitimate, I promise! So… you really don’t want it? What a shame it will be to see the flames of youth snuffed out so soon…”

: “Well, come see me again if you change your mind. I really can help you, if you’d like.”

: “The chief seems strangely happy. I wonder what’s going on.”

: “Hey Akira, how’s your pocket money situation been looking?”

: I mean, we’re only carrying around $6,200 in cash.

: “Hahaha, you’re hopeless!”

: “What? Is this… five thousand yen!?”

: “I won some money from the lotto, so I don’t mind sharing my winnings.”

: There’s a lotto stand in Shibuya we could use, but I never did in the base game.

: “Don’t worry about the details. Or what, is that five thousand yen not enough for you? Anyway, make sure you close up the shop like always.”

: “Hey, so… does this mean that fortune teller was right?”

: “She even got the amount spot on! Maybe that Chihaya lady can seriously read into the future! Wait… this is bad! Didn’t she say you’re gonna die!?”

: “Come on, we need to go talk to her again and figure out what to do! …And maybe I can have her read my compatibility fortune with-”

: It’s zero percent.

: He’s finally learning to fear the hose.

: Next time, we’re going to start Makoto’s confidant, find out Kawakami’s secret, pay 100,000 yen for a magic crystal, and most importantly see the first part of the Gay Yusuke Route. I might even write something for it. Maybe.

: Eligap already has the next part mostly done, so this should be the only time I’ll need to stall for that.

[drcakey]

@Timrod

: I had to look it up, but this is the Knight piece. Shogi is honestly one of those things that I’ve never cared enough about to get into.

The fact that all the pieces look the same makes it pretty opaque. Go is easier to learn, and also probably harder to play.

@Timrod

: They keep re-using the whole “Girl who is laughably bad at cooking” thing and I don’t know why.

One day a girl will be bad at cooking and like meat in the same scene. This will cause a double event and the entire MegaTen universe will dissolve.

@Timrod

: I mean, maybe in the real world, but in the SMT universe churches are for one thing and that’s devil busting the Messians before they can do the whole “Thousand Year Kingdom of God” nonsense.

Churches are for coffee and donuts and seniors playing bingo, I’m pretty sure. Maybe they do other things in churches in Japan.

[SpammyV]

@Timrod

: “Since our talk, I’ve been trying to think of things besides gymnastics that I’m really invested in… and I figured something out! It’s this!”

: “Yeah. I can cook! You really need to regulate your diet in gymnastics, so I’ve been making my own food a lot. And so! Since I also wanted to thank you, I made you bento!”

Is it just me or are they really trying hard and laying it on thick with Kasumi?

[Timrod]

@drcakey

One day a girl will be bad at cooking and like meat in the same scene. This will cause a double event and the entire MegaTen universe will dissolve.

Yeah that’ll probably happen in Persona 6 when they realize they’ve run out of anime archetypes and have to start combining them.

@SpammyV

Is it just me or are they really trying hard and laying it on thick with Kasumi?

Yeah, it’s not just you. I think part of it is that they really need you to be invested in Kasumi’s storyline for the parts they added for Royal, and part of it is that they really did not want to have another Marie on their hands. I think there’s also an element of “we need an age-appropriate romance option for Joker that people will actually want” because of how popular Tae and Kawakami are.

The best part is that it’s all wasted effort because she’s not in Scramble.

Anyway, I mentioned in the last update a thing about Valentine’s Day and White Day. That’s because I never actually saw how Valentine’s Day worked in the base game: it happened I think after the final boss but before the final cutscene and by that point I just turned the game off.

As it turns out, we can and will see all of the Valentine’s Day dates… though it’ll be a bit of a pain to do so. The same will happen for White Day. I’ll explain how that works when we hit 07/08 and hit Rank 9 with Kawakami.

[Timrod]

Summary

: It’s 7/1, and after something like two months we’re finally finishing The Gallant Rogue.

: We get a glorified tutorial informing us that the diner now has a drink that boosts Charm. I don’t believe we’re ever going to order it, even though it brings back memories of the Persona 3 MC drinking dozens of cups of Pheromone Coffee to boost his charm.

: By water, he means the squirt gun he’s about to blast Morgana with.

: “A variety of heroes battling for dominance - truly an epic time. Charismatic rulers and warlords with the command of a thousand men may have their own appeal…”

: “…But personally, I think that the strategists who support them can’t be ignored. Now then, Kurusu-kun. In the book, Zhuge Liang of Shu is famous for his exploits during the Battle of Red Cliffs…”

: This is one of those things they put in just for Dynasty Warriors fans, isn’t it?

: “He’s also the inventor of the baozi, a kind of round dumpling. But their original name was based on their appearance. What’s the meaning of the original Chinese phrase that these dumplings’ name came from?”

: Baozi are white dumplings that originated in China but have since migrated to a number of different areas - including the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia. There’s even a Uyghur-specific one.

: They have a number of fillings, but most of them involve pork. The Uyghurs apparently have one that’s cooked in tandoor and filled with lamb… if they offered me that in chicken I’d probably eat it.

: There’s also apparently dessert ones with custard or adzuki bean paste inside, which I’d also eat.

: “That is correct. Its original name, mantou, came from a phrase meaning ‘a barbarian’s head.’”

: “At the time, one region’s barbarians would use a person’s head as an offering to soothe the deity of a flooding river. But Zhuge Liang made a baozi in the shape of a head as a substitute.”

: They called it “the sacred swirly”.

: “These days, you can find baozi with cute faces on them. If you think about their origin, it’s not too far off the mark.”

: Now, if they had one with steak in it, I’d be all over that… even though that’s basically an empanada. The taco place near my house that used to have those closed down and I hate it.

: “I never knew strategists came up with cooking, and not just strategies… Makoto’s our strategist. Wanna see what she can cook up?”

: Right after school, we drop off The Gallant Rogue and pick up Speed Reader.

: We then make a stop at the bookstore in Shibuya and buy everything that’s on sale.

: Near the train station in Shibuya, there’s a lottery stand. You can actually do daily or weekly draws here (using the different windows) but the middle window sells Summer Mammoth tickets.

: As far as I understand it, the Mammoth tickets always win, so there’s no reason not to buy one.

: Today, we’re going to start Makoto’s confidant. You need Knowledge at Rank 3 in order to do that. Makoto is one of the five confidants that requires a max-rank social stat to finish.

: We already know about two of the others: Sojiro (who needs maxed Kindness) and Iwai (who needs maxed Guts).

: “Up until now, I’ve been the quintessential honor student. I believe I’ve been handling my position as student council president with ease as well.”

: “A-and I don’t mean that in a boasting way, that’s simply how I’ve thought about it. …But in the end, I was unable to make any kind of impact with either Suzui-san or Kaneshiro.”

: “Turns out there’s no use for a rule-abiding honor student when things get tough. Now that I’m a member of this team, I want to do everything I can to help you all.”

: Oh, that’s right! Speaking of students, I had someone contact me on Twitter to explain that I was actually right about the word “Shujin” meaning “Prisoner”. It’s apparently one of those things where there’s multiple ways to spell the word.

: According to them, it’s a painfully obvious pun that gets harped on a lot in the Japanese script.

: I’m honestly kind of glad I didn’t understand that when I played the base game. There was this period at the start of the base game, before I understood how bad the writing is, where I actually thought the writing was okay, and that kind of thing would’ve ruined it for me had I understood it.

: “I think… I-I will need to broaden my horizons somewhat.”

: “My first step will be to learn more about the other students. But… I struggle with that. There seems to be a disparity between my tastes and those of my peers…”

: “I knew it… I don’t even know where people like to go for fun… it would be nice to have a grasp of such concepts. Plus, the student council must be responsible for understanding the student body they serve, right?”

: “I-I don’t mean that in a surveillance way, I just want to know them as people. I may be a phantom thief, but that’s no excuse for me to start ignoring my presidential duties.”

: “Now, back to the topic at hand… where do people usually go for fun?”

: For some reason, this entire scene feels like it’s the writers trying to understand Kids These Days ™.

: “I enjoy the movies myself, sometimes. I think I’d prefer somewhere I’m unfamiliar with… oh, I know! How about the arcade? I’ve never actually been to one.”

: “Do you think you could take me? I’m not sure if it will broaden my horizons per se, but simply studying won’t get me anywhere.”

: How much do you want to bet that this is one of the writers trying to live out their dumbass teenage romance fantasies?

: “Thank goodness… I think I would have been totally lost in there had I gone by myself. Well, let’s get going.”

: “There are more girls here than I expected. Hey, over there… you play by aiming the gun at the screen, right? That actually seems somewhat realistic.”

: We’ll learn all about that game in a different confidant that we can’t do yet. I’m not even joking when I say there is an entire confidant about that game.

: “I-if it’s okay with you… do you think you could teach me?”

: This is incredibly painful to read. It’s incredibly reminiscent of Ready Player One and all the cringy excerpts from it that got posted when the movie got announced.

: I mean, it’s not quite as bad because if this was the RPO author Joker would start making out with Makoto right there as every single person in the arcade lines up to high-five him because he’s so awesome, and then he’d say something like “This is just like the time I got the high score in Pac-Man”.

: They could’ve, you know, put some actual visuals in here of Makoto playing the game, but instead they’re making masterful use of the Allanson “tell, don’t show” technique.

: Somehow, I knew people would want me to pick this last one.

: “Of course that was just a game, but… I wonder if I could apply some of the techniques I learned here during battle.”

: The thing is, there is a sizeable portion of the P5 fanbase who is very into Makoto. Somehow, I have a feeling they’re part of the same group that bothered to watch Ready Player One.

: It’s also too bad there’s no way to LP a book because I would dunk on that shit if I could.

: “Perhaps going somewhere I don’t normally frequent is what helped me come up with that idea. You know, it may only be a little bit… but I think I’m starting to understand how people pass time.”

: “Interesting. I would’ve never even thought about coming here before.”

: “I… Hey, do you think you could help me out again later? I might be able to give the team more ideas if I can gain increased knowledge outside of my studies.”

: “Thank you. Perhaps it won’t be immediately… but I’m sure I can be of use.”

: What’s really stupid is that it’s entirely possible that Joker is Makoto’s boyfriend when this cutscene happens.

: This ability is more about seeing enemy skills than it is about item drops - there’s no steal mechanic in this game the way there is in Final Fantasy.

: “I’d like to go there as well. No! N-Not for my own purposes… to tell you the truth, I recently got a report that one of our students was spotted there… I’m skeptical, but… I’d like to confirm firsthand for myself.”

: We haven’t been doing his confidant, but Mishima is now located in Shinjuku at night. Because of course he is.

: “Well, it’s getting late. Let’s head home.”

: “It’s always hard for me to come to places like this on my own, so you’ve been a big help. I’ve had all kinds of new experiences today… and it’s even been a little fun.”

: “Yeah, thanks. I feel a lot better with you helping me through this.”

: “Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to keep you. Careful on your way home. I’ll call you later.”

: Tonight’s a special night in that it’s one of the few nights where there’s a follow-up with a Persona 4 character on TV.

: This is another way that we know Persona 5 takes place in 2016. Rise actually just turned 21 - her birthday is June 1st, 1995.

: Tonight’s another Kawakami night.

: Joker’s like “Oh my god, I cured horny!”

: “…My boss found me a part-time job that pays better than this one.”

: “Takase-kun’s guardians keep increasing their demands… so this is just what I have to do.”

: “What I want…? Takase-kun’s guardians say the only true way to apologize to Takase-kun is by paying them. If that’s not true, then what’s the right thing to do here…?”

: “I wonder if I can escape all this if I quit being a teacher. People like me have no right being a teacher. If I quit on my own, I won’t have to pay them…”

: “That’s why I’m going to quit both my teaching job and my maid job… what do you think?”

: What he’s thinking is “I wonder if the whole maid outfit thing is part of the cure for horny. Does she get an employee discount on those? I’m gonna need a few. Do they make them small enough to fit a cat?”

: “That’s what I decided… but did I really decide it on my own…? Now that I think about it, it’s too late for me to stop being a teacher. If I really felt bad for what happened, I would’ve resigned the day he died.”

: “And yet, I still felt the need to teach… I wonder why I feel that way even now.”

: Basically, Kawakami is slowly warping into Ms. Saeko.

: “…Kurusu-kun. Oh, that’s right… I decided the way to apologize to him was to make sure there won’t ever be another student like him.”

: “Because I might’ve been able to save him if I hadn’t been afraid of rumors or labels back then. I wanted to become a teacher who takes care of her students. That’s the mindset I had!”

: “But now, I spend all my free time at part-time jobs, just so I can continue working as a teacher. I put the critical work of a teacher on the back burner, so I could make ‘apology’ money.”

: “That’s where it all went wrong… I can’t make things right with Takase-kun like this…”

: I mean, unless we’re talking anime. Anime’s one of those mistakes that I don’t think you can fix.

: “I’ll be the teacher I aspire to be… that’s the right way for me to make amends to Takase-kun. From here on, I refuse to pay them any more money!”

: “And that is my answer! …Well, what do you think?”

: “You can’t get the right answer from someone else. It can only be found from within. …I learned that from you. In a way, you’re MY teacher. …Haha, just kidding.”

: On our next visit (on 7/8) we’ll be hitting Rank 9 with Kawakami, which opens up the option to date her. Naturally, I’ll be showing off both versions of her Rank 9 and Rank 10 cutscene.

: There’s something I want to explain about dating in this game. I’ll talk about that when we get to the phone call.

: “Especially to you. I averted my eyes from you because you were labeled, just like Takase-kun was… but from now on, I’m going to protect you to. As your teacher, I will never betray you.”

: “Leave it to me! I can be decisive when it counts! I’ll speak with the Takases. I’m not going to run anymore. Everything should be fine as long as I talk to them face to face.”

: “All right, it’s time for me to go. Thank you. See you later.”

: Okay, so about the dating thing. Earlier in the LP, I had mentioned the possibility of having a vote to determine who “Straight Joker” winds up dating. As it turns out, that’s unnecessary.

: The reason is that there’s actually no penalty whatsoever for dating multiple people at once, just like in real life. This is how we’re going to be able to see all the Valentine’s/White Day cutscenes.

: While the canon route is that Joker is gay and dating Yusuke, behind the scenes I’m actually going to be dating everyone at once in what I call the “Reverse Lisa Silverman” technique.

: “Oh, wait… I was supposed to stop working as Becky by today.”

: I like to think that one of the writers was reviewing the script and just goes “Uh, boss? All the phone calls with Kawakami kind of make no sense.” and the boss going “Fuck it, just go with it.”

: “…To be honest, I always kind of knew in my heart I couldn’t go on like this forever. But I felt so stuck facing it alone. It’s thanks to you that I actually figured out what I need to do.”

: “Come on… you realize you can’t feed me lines like that anymore. …But I haven’t given you any proper appreciation yet, so… thank you, really.”

: We get some free time, so let’s read a book.

: Yes. From what I remember, this reduces all but a handful of books to one reading session, meaning we can now optimize stat gains from any day where we get a seat on the train.

: “I told them… that I’m not going to pay them any more money! I’m quitting my part-time job too! Although I’m still in talks with my boss about it.”

: “I’m going to devote myself to being a great teacher! No matter what others say, I won’t waver. So, thank you for giving me such good advice. I just thought you should be the first to know…”

: “It’s what I decided, for Takase-kun’s sake. I’m going to make sure there won’t be any more students like him, who…”

: “I’m not going to run or hide! I’m going to spend my time taking care of my students.”

: I wish the writers had come up with slightly less… I dunno, stupid situations for their characters to be in.

: Like, hear me out here. What if the case was that Takase killed himself and the guardians blame Kawakami for it, even though she reported it?

: The guardians spread this rumor about Kawakami being a “death teacher” who drove a kid to suicide, and the only place she could find a job is Shujin due to the principal being evil. He pays her a rock-bottom salary knowing she’ll never be able to find another teaching job.

: Kawakami can’t sue them because she has no money and has no way of proving that the guardians are behind the rumor, and she has to take the maid job just to survive because it’s about the only place that’ll hire her outside of Shujin.

: Oh look, I’ve just written a somewhat more believable scenario that keeps the same story elements but doesn’t make Kawakami look like a complete idiot.

: “I’ve decided that that’s the best apology I can make to Takase-kun. Paying money to you two is not the solution, to say the least!”

: I’m pretty sure the use of the term “sex worker” here exists only because the English language doesn’t really have a way to describe what Kawakami does. I explained this in a post a while back.

: I think it would’ve been more responsible to just have him say “About your little stint in fuzoku” and then explain what that term means for the people not playing in Japanese.

: “Stop… please.”

: “Haha… I guess I can’t quit my part-time job just yet.”

: “I know! But what am I supposed to do…? … What about the Phantom Thieves…? Would they even help someone like me? No, that’s impossible. Haha…”

: “I can’t do this anymore…”

: “Haha, I could never forget them. I send them money every week… wait, why? You don’t intend on doing something, do you?”

: “Please don’t. A Shujin teacher asking the Phantom Thieves for help would be… I’m sorry. I was so excited to tell you what I had decided… and then it ended up like this… just forget everything, okay?”

: “…I guess I’ll never be able to change. Y-yeah, haha… Class is about to start… I need to go.”

: And now we’ve got all but one of the Mementos requests we need to go back in there. The last one is Chihaya’s.

: We then trade in Speed Reading for Zorro, the Outlaw.

: “I am in your debt. It would be rather difficult to go by myself. Now then, our destination is Inokashira Park. Let us go.”

: Right after I finish this update, I’m going to post the first Gay Yusuke Route update, which takes place at the same time and in the same place as this event. It will attempt to show this event from Yusuke’s perspective.

: Joker is, of course, doing this just to see what Yusuke’s reaction is. His boyfriend is already in the boat with him, after all.

: “I have missed the opportunity for a truly wonderful subject… that aside, I must thank you for your help today. This is the ideal location for my next motif.”

: “Perfect… this is it. My previous painting captured only one aspect of the heart: desire. As such, I was unable to arrive at a truly authentic representation…”

: “That is why we have come today. I shall paint a second aspect… the burning passion between man and woman! Fittingly, our theme today will be… the wonders of love!”

: “You too will have an important role here. While I draw, ensure the boat remains as steady as possible amid these devilish ripples.”

: “They are akin to Adam and Eve… yet in time all lovers must come to know the pain of separation… separation is the natural end to any such relationship… but even beyond that, love endures.”

: “Precisely… this is the truth of the human heart! It will make the most wonderful painting! It shall be adored by all who gaze upon it! It may even be given top prize in the next exhibition!”

: “Wait, now is not the time to be thinking of such trivial matters!”

: “I must capture your profile!”

: “Rejoice, for I shall preserve your beautiful love so that all coming generations may bask in its glory. Once I complete this painting, you will become new legends in the art world… a modern Adam and Eve!”

: “A man and a woman intimately swaying in a dinghy of dreams… the blush of their cheeks, the bashful looks… yes, this is the love I was so emphatically searching for!”

: “Familial…? So that overflowing passion was just a figment of my imagination? It seems my bias has caused me to overlook the truth of the matter…”

: “Love is a broad, multi-faceted beast… this only serves to prove how narrow my perspective can be. Hm, romantic love and familial love… the two may be nigh indiscernible depending on one’s point of view.”

: “Perhaps… the truth of the heart lies in the eye of the beholder. Akira, I feel as though I’ve learned something today!”

: Oh wow! We’ll have to check the Cutscene Viewer as soon as this update is over.

: Joker just looks at them and nods. They’re SO CLOSE to getting it.

: This cutscene is so close to being the start of a gay romance route as-is that I have to wonder if they had planned one and scrapped it.

: Just recently, there was a group who delved through the code for Persona 4 Golden and found out there was supposed to be a gay route with Yosuke, which was cut before release but I believe had the script still in the game.

: “What are you talking about? Ah well… come, it is about time we return home. Please row us back to shore, Akira.”

: “It would seem I understand nothing of love after all. Though I’ve progressed by one step, there is no doubt I will face many difficulties moving forward.”

: “When will I fully understand the heart? Even if I ever do understand it, will I truly be able to draw it…?”

: “You’re right. I’ve no intention whatsoever of giving up. I will do everything in my power to get past this. Anyhow, today was a significant use of time. Impressive oarsmanship from your end, as well.”

: Tonight, we have to buy the stone that we could’ve bought last time, but the game wouldn’t let us.

: “I remember you… you had a very abnormal destiny, as I recall. Please, take a seat.”

: “For that much, it’d better not only change your fate, but also give you incredible luck. If you do end up buying one, we should go home and test it out.”

: Translation: Buying the stone takes time because Chihaya’s confidant is not exactly the best from a design perspective.

: The Holy Stone is an accessory, and I forget what it does. We have no reason to equip it. Also, that’s 100,000 yen down the drain.

: “It’s the smart thing to do, considering this is the only way to avoid misfortune. It’s already charged with a happiness aura, so you’ll feel the effects right away. Don’t forget to recharge it with moonlight every three days.”

: Gotta activate those almonds every three days now.

: “Please stop by again and let me know how your fate changed. Goodbye…”

: “I was just about to close up shop, but I forgot to turn the stove off. I guess you start forgetting things more the older you get…”

: “Last time we went to that fortune teller, the chief won the lottery… I wonder what kind of luck we’ll have this time around.”

: We just wasted a hundred thousand yen on a broken magic stone. You have no idea how mad I was when I played the base game and got to this part, because money in the base game was much harder to come by.

: “Hey, do you mind looking over the shop while I-”

: “Th-The stone shattered!”

: Clearly, this is Morgana’s fault for overcharging the crystal with his thirst for human women.

: “What’s gotten into you?”

: “Huh? This tastes… salty! Hey, the Holy Stone is just salt!”

: “…Akira? What’s going on?”

: “You’re salty? That reminds me, I was just about to head out and grab some salt for the shop. I’ll be back in a bit.”

: “Hm… I think this is technically rock salt. I’ve seen the chief grinding some up before. Wait, in that case… maybe the Holy Stone is supposed to help you get better at cooking!”

: I had one of those salt lamps before - not because I thought it had any health benefits but just because. Turns out, those melt all over the goddamn place when it gets humid out.

: Ruined the shelf I had it on, which was just a cheap collapsible bookshelf I didn’t pay anything for. That salt does NOT come off once it sticks to something.

: Look Morgana, you broke it with your goddamn horny and now you’ve got to replace it.

: “B-But, um… maybe if your cooking improves, your fate will change just like she said it would… … I guess it really doesn’t make any sense, huh…”

: “So, that Holy Stone was really just a phony in the end! That fortune teller’s name was Chihaya, right? She clearly has some kind of mystical power… but this is just unacceptable.”

: “…We need to go complain to her!”

: We get an invitation from Ryuji to go to Ichigaya, which I don’t believe we’d get if we were on the reload-heavy 100% route because we’d already be done with Ryuji’s confidant.

: Even on the route I’m using, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to do it, because we don’t really need the confidant points.

: I’ve seen one of these before on Game Center CX - I forget which episode it is, but there’s one where Arino goes to a fishing pond like this.

: It’s a bit too artificial for my taste - the ponds are totally man-made and the fish are stocked.

: “…Hey, doesn’t meetin’ in a place like this look like we’re talkin’ some shady business? I like it.”

: “Like, ‘we’re regular high school students durin’ the day. But at night…’ you know what I mean!? Man, this is gettin’ me pumped up!”

: “…Oh crap, she’s comin’ this way.”

: “Why are you sitting around like old men? Why don’t you go out and do something more exciting?”

: “Wha- Look who’s talkin’!”

: sigh “Adults need time to themselves to unwind and clear their thoughts. You’ll understand soon enough, when you start working in the real world.”

: “Wow… soundin’ real old there, Kawakami.”

: “That’s MS. Kawakami to you!”

: Seriously, you’d think that Atlus would tone down the whole honorific thing given that they knew they were going to exporting the game and that these lines wouldn’t translate well.

: I just realized that Kawakami is wearing a jacket in the middle of July. It’s not like this scene can happen in the winter - this is the one day it’s scripted to occur.

: I have to wonder when Smash Ultimate takes place in the Persona 5 timeline, because I’m just picturing Joker and Ryuji giving each other a thousand-yard stare and reminding each other of their shared secret - they both know Donkey Kong is real but can never tell anyone.

: Joker once asked Donkey Kong if Lanky Kong was real, and DK’s only response was “It’s better if you don’t know,” communicated entirely through a mashup of the DK Rap.

: “I see. So when you get jaded like Kawakami, you’ll just naturally attract fish… uhh, I don’t think that’s right.”

: “It’s a nice, sunny Sunday. I didn’t think I’d be stuck fishing with you two on my day off. sigh Two troublemakers, and their no-good teacher… I guess we’re perfect for each other.”

: “She keeps on gettin’ fish even as she nags… I’m impressed!”

: None of these points matter. Kawakami will automatically reach Rank 9 once we complete the Mementos request, and from there will automatically reach Rank 10 without any input from us.

: And I bet you thought I forgot to grip and sip. We had to wait until the night period because we had to accept Ryuji’s invitation last night.

: Some sip to remember, some sip to forget the time they were leaving Final Destination and overheard Diddy Kong asking Donkey Kong if Lanky was actually dead, to which DK replied “We checked the grave but it was empty”, again using a mashup of the DK Rap.

: “I, Toranosuke Yoshida, will someday find a way to address your concerns in Nagata-cho… oh, Kurusu-kun. How’s your schoolwork?”

: “By the way, what’s your opinion about our current government? I feel that they’re wrong, so I plan on addressing that during my speech.”

: “I’d like you to listen to it, so you can give me your honest opinion.”

: “However, the current administration refuses to discuss their plans for the future… can we really accept such an utter lack of transparency?”

: The game doesn’t say it outright yet, but Shido is the bald Hideki Kamiya-looking guy who showed up in Joker’s flashbacks and again on the TV in the SIU Director’s office.

: “So he’s claiming those who have made mistakes in the past shouldn’t get a second chance? What can I say to that?”

: “…Yes, I am ‘No-Good Tora’ and I have made mistakes. Yes, I am unpopular and powerless. But that has nothing to do with my arguments! These are things I learned from all my hardships.”

: “You can ridicule me all you want, but I will continue to oppose what is wrong with this world!”

: “The highlight, though, was your yelling.”

: “That’s very promising. But don’t overdo it. You should avoid making enemies whenever possible. …Okay, that is all for today.”

: This guy turning completely around after one speech is giving me flashbacks to Ni no Kuni 2.

: “Please wait! Thank you! …That is all I wanted to say.”

: “I learned something from your dauntless spirit today. I have a bad habit of getting flustered whenever someone calls me No-Good Tora.”

: We know. You’ve said so already.

: “But you see me as someone of value, so I refuse to cower to criticism in front of you. Today you taught me that I must have more confidence in my arguments.”

: No new abilities this rank, but that’s fine - we already have the best abilities Yoshida can give us. The rest are all very situational or only good if you’re not grinding at all.

: “My way of thinking changes when I’m with you. Perhaps it’s the influence of your youthful spirit. Ah, my apologies. It seems we’re out of time.”

: “Thanks to you, I’ve remembered something very important. Now that I think about it, ever since the scandal… I’ve felt alone and helpless. Like the whole world was against me.”

: “Perhaps I got too used to the constant judging and critique, but… I realized I’d overlooked something crucial. I’d forgotten the people who support me… and how encouraging it feels simply to be in their presence.”

: “Perhaps it seems too obvious, or too trite, but… I hope you remember to cherish that, too.”

: “Good. I’m glad to hear it. I will engrave it into my heart. I can’t let myself forget it again. Well, I’ll be counting on you for my next speech, too. See you soon, Kurusu-kun.”

: Next time, we’ll see ANOTHER More Like Yusu-Gay scene, get Chihaya’s Mementos request, and then go into Mementos in as painless a way as possible. Right after this update, I’ll be working on the first More Like Yusu-Gay.

[Timrod]

Summary

: Welcome to the first More Like Yusu-Gay cutscene. I apologize in advance.

: Wonderful. With his assistance, I’ll surely overcome this slump!

: “It’s so… peaceful here. I should bring a girl here sometime.”

What!? That’s impossible! He hasn’t shown any interest in Takamaki or Makoto…

“Girl…? Does that mean you have a girlfriend!? You should have mentioned sooner!”

: “As if. For such a big city, there’s no girls here that interest me. I mean, Makoto? Come on, she’d make me file a form just to ask her to dinner.”

: “That doesn’t seem to have stopped Morgana. Have you told him about Takamaki-san and Suzui-san yet?”

: “He wouldn’t listen if I told him. He’s still convinced he’s going to sweep her right off her feet.”

: “That aside, I must thank you for your help today. This is the ideal location for my next motif.”

: “Perfect… this is it.”

: Perfect for someone else, maybe. They look like they’re falling asleep.

: “?”

: “My previous painting captured only one aspect of the heart: desire. As such, I was unable to arrive at a truly authentic representation…”

: “That’s why we have come today. I shall paint a second aspect… the burning passion between two lovers!”

: If I can find any, that is…

: “Fittingly, our theme today will be… the wonders of love!”

: You know, when we saw this cutscene from Joker’s perspective, we never saw what it was that Yusuke was drawing. I wonder if this alternate cutscene will clear that up?

: Oh… maybe he did find love after all, just not where he thought he would.

: This whole time, I’ve always felt… different… around him. Like I could be myself. And now, I think I understand what that is.

: I think I’m in love.

: Anyway, the rest of the cutscene is very similar to the base one: Joker starts turning a bit and Yusuke calls out, attracting the attention of the people in the other boat.

: There’s an animation here I couldn’t capture properly where Joker reaches out for just a second and puts his hand on top of Yusuke’s.

: He still denies it at the end though.

[drcakey]

@Timrod

: I’m honestly kind of glad I didn’t understand that when I played the base game. There was this period at the start of the base game, before I understood how bad the writing is, where I actually thought the writing was okay, and that kind of thing would’ve ruined it for me had I understood it.

Shuujin Academy, not to be confused with Shujin Academy (Protagonist Academy).

@Timrod

: It’s also too bad there’s no way to LP a book because I would dunk on that shit if I could.

A screenshot LP of a book is called a chapter snark and I think it was semi-popular on blogs in the past. A video LP of a book is called a vlog, but really long.

[Timrod]

Click Here for Update 39

: This update was a lot of fun to record, because I managed to finally snap the game in two. Any semblance of balance will be pretty much out the window after this.

: We have a seat on the train, and now we can really start abusing speed reading. The only annoying part is that this message will now pop up any time we try to read a book.

: It’s also kind of confusing that they didn’t change the menu to reflect the new reading speed, but we’ll be finishing Ghost Encounters on this same time slot.

: Did they get EMF 5? Freezing temperatures? Ghost orb?

: “Whoa, why are you reading that? Whatever you do, just… don’t read it out loud, okay?”

: “So, you’ve finished reading Ghost Encounters. Ah, these stories are way too spooky for me. Don’t talk to me about any of them, okay?”

: For this, we get five points in Guts. This is about the highest stat gain we can get in one time period without using Chihaya.

: “The humidity is what kills me about Japanese summers. I miss the dry heat of California. Not to mention, July and August both have thirty-one days. Summer is long…”

: “Now then, Mr. Kurusu! Two people are responsible for July and August having 31 days. Do you know who these people are?”

: “Great! That’s right. You may already know this, but the months of July and August are named after the Roman emperors Julius and Augustus. Augustus named a month after himself, just like Julius.”

: “However, he felt like he would be losing if his month was shorter than Julius’s, so he added a day. It’s a mystery why men are so stubborn and prideful over silly things like this.”

: “Well, as far as you’re all concerned, you’re just lucky to get a long vacation. They start on the 13th of next week. Don’t forget, okay?”

: She’s talking about exams, which… I don’t quite understand how you’re supposed to infer that from what she just said.

: “Next Wednesday, huh? You’d better make sure you study.”

: “After our enlightening session, I once again attempted to paint. However, nothing I put on the canvas was to my satisfaction… before the gods of art, I am naught but a lost sheep…”

: “Ah yes, lost sheep! I have come here with you for precisely that reason. Our theme today shall be anguish! I shall paint the anguish Christ felt as he bore the sins of mankind!”

: And then Yusuke was the Demiurge.

: “Hm, I have seen various sculptures and paintings on the matter… but merely replicating them will not do. Would any believers be willing to model and help me capture the true essence of anguish?”

: “It seems not. Very well. Akira, you will have to be my model today.”

: Joker immediately grabs the air horn. No boyfriend of his is going to be horny.

: “Only a subject naked as they day they were born can convey the true anguish of birth! Now then… strip! Take it all-”

: “Actually, perhaps not. Being found stark-naked in a church would be even bigger news than the Phantom Thieves.”

: “Hm, I see… so this would be… no, perhaps… it seems this is not working. I would like to capture anguish, yet you remain calm and composed.”

: “Even the slightest wrinkle can change one’s impression of things… I shall not compromise, even for this sketch!”

: “Now, raise your hands higher! More… give me more anguish! Bring it to its upper limits! Like this!”

: I remember the part in the Bible where Jesus started Jojo posing.

: “I understand now… this is the true anguish of the Passion! It feels as though something is boiling up within me!”

: Oh great, now they’re gonna have to explain anime to a priest.

: “Ah, well… this is an art study…”

: “I am attempting to paint anguish, so I decided to use the crucifixion of Christ as a point of reference…”

: If you wanted to see anguish, all you had to do was look at me when I learned about the 1.25 patch for YIIK.

: What’s kind of funny about this is that if you have the DLC for it, you can get Jesus as a Persona. You probably wouldn’t have him for this scene given that he’s level 81.

: The thing that sucks is that Jesus (or Messiah) is one of the only sources of a skill that boosts Almighty damage. The others are also DLC-only.

: “Resurrection? Forgiveness? I’m not sure I understand… those ideas are contradictory to my conception of anguish.”

: Kind of ironic, given that two of the protagonists in this series (Tatsuya and the Persona 3 MC) are both in states of eternal anguish that are not likely to ever get better.

: “So those shocking depictions were actually meant to represent forgiveness, not pain… hm, hope from anguish… I’m not sure I understand.”

: “I must learn more about the hearts of men… Akira… do you think I will be able to capture the truth someday?”

: “…Indeed. If I do not have belief in my own abilities, I will never come to accomplish anything. Hm… this is exceedingly strange though. Spending time with you has helped me discover new aspects of myself…”

: “You are perhaps… a mirror of sorts. If there is anything I can do in return, please let me know… I wish to repay your kindness.”

: This ability here was basically useless in the base game, but in Royal we will be getting some mileage out of it… specifically once Yusuke unlocks the ability to make skill cards instantly.

: “Let us return home for today. I bid you farewell.”

: “The crucifixion supposedly symbolizes resurrection, forgiveness, and hope… but I could not grasp those connections.”

: “Once again, I made the same mistake of picking up on only the superficial meaning. The more I think about it… the further I seem to be from understanding the abyss of the heart.”

: “Ah, so my anguish is what leads me to my hope… it’s exactly what I learned earlier today. Thank you, Akira. Perhaps what I need is a change of perspective.”

: “I still have a tough road ahead, but talking to you gave me some relief. I’m truly fortunate to have you by my side. I’ll see you later.”

: Kaneshiro already admitted to Makoto that he deleted the photos.

: “I suggest you break up with him. Things are only going to get worse at this rate.”

: “Let us ask the tarot. O divine power, shed light upon her fate…”

: “Yes, I’ve seen everything. Hm… I can sense a dark presence within your boyfriend. His heart seems to be possessed by a demon.”

: Silly Chihaya, no one in the Persona universe has been possessed by a demon. That’s a main SMT series thing.

: Come to think of it, demonic possession isn’t even really a thing in SMT. Most of the time it’s either a demon in disguise (Thorman, Lucifer, Demiurge) or someone fusing themself with a demon.

: “This demon may hide itself away at times, but when it strikes, it will bring with it great misery.”

: “You will be hospitalized for severe injuries suffered in a domestic abuse incident, and he will be arrested.”

: “Wh-what? You want another?”

: Clearly the only treatment for an abusive partner is more activated almonds. Makes sense.

: Whoa, hold the fucking phone there. You’re telling me we could’ve paid in installments and then just stopped paying when we found out it was rock salt?

: “Um, truthfully, I feel breaking up with him would be the best-”

: “She really thinks her boyfriend will stop being abusive as long as she has a Holy Stone? There’s no way that could be true… right?”

: “Right. It would make our jobs way easier if you could really change someone’s heart with a Holy Stone. It’s clear that Chihaya has some fortune telling skills, but that stone isn’t going to do anything…”

: “Hey, Akira! Why don’t we change that ‘Yuya’ guy’s heart ourselves? I mean, he’s hurting this woman here, right? This is the perfect chance for the Phantom Thieves to save her!”

: “You see, some fates in this world are simply inescapable. The demon within your boyfriend’s heart… cannot be exorcised by normal human methodologies. Fate is… absolute.”

: Some fates like me breaking the game the next time we go to Mementos.

: “A-Although, I guess you might be able to control the demon’s temper if you bought another Holy Stone…”

: “Y-Yes! What do you expect to change with that meager information?”

: First he’s going to wait for this lady to die, and then he’s going to go back five minutes before her death and use a series of “ghost tricks” to change fate.

: “What? You honestly believe you can do something!?”

: “What!? You! What do you think you’re doing!? If you keep on making false accusations like that, the divine power will rain punishment down upon you!”

: Which one? I’m pretty sure most of them have been devil busted by this point, apart from maybe YHVH if you consider him to be a different entity than the Demiurge.

: “Hm, I’ve seen everything. A vision of you groveling on the ground… fate cannot be changed… and I will prove that fact to you!”

: “If that woman stays with her abusive boyfriend, she will meet a horrible injury within a year’s time. Now, if you honestly believe you can change her destiny, go ahead and try!”

: So what you’re saying is we can’t save her from her Bloody Destiny? From the night beast grabbing her right arm?

: “But once you realize the error in your thinking, come back and let a true expert handle things. I will save her… with a Holy Stone!”

: I never said Chihaya’s confidant was particularly well-written or that she’s a particularly interesting character, it’s just that her confidant perks are a necessity for 100%.

: And here’s the last Mementos request we need. We’ll be going in on the 6th. This time, I’m going to truncate a lot of it except for the boss fights and any dialog related to those.

: Unfortunately, just obtaining the Mementos request takes time, and now it’s the 5th. By the way, I looked at the other LP of this and I’m still almost two months ahead despite only starting 9 days earlier.

: We get a reminder from Yusuke to go to Mementos.

: I have to wonder if the “Club Ruby” sign (the one right above Joker’s head) is meant to be a reference to the Yakuza games. There’s a hostess club in Kamurocho called Jewel.

: “Apparently this place was a hotbed for criminals and illegal immigrants before they installed surveillance cameras… I heard there were quite a few brothels as well.”

: Uh, Makoto? The proper term is “undocumented”.

: Joker’s ignoring her and looking around to see if he can find the secret hobo casino, or the underground fighting arena.

: “Well, I heard a great deal about it from my father… this is the first time I’ve actually been here myself though. Regardless, it’s become far safer now than it used to be.”

: “Of course, the surveillance cameras played a substantial role in that… but it was mainly thanks to the police efforts to clean up the area.”

: “Even so, there’s no way to eradicate crime entirely. It seems the operations nowadays are only better hidden… anyway, seeing is believing, yes? Come on, let’s have a look around.”

: “That guy was so persistent… he must have been a scout for a hostess club. He mentioned how ‘his girls’ get paid a lot to wear cute dresses…”

: “All I wanted was to ask if any Shujin students worked there… but he nearly dragged me inside with him. If you hadn’t been there to rescue me, I…”

: “For him maybe. I thought I was going to have to knock him out… I’m glad nobody had to get hurt though. Hm, I guess that’s how they do it… I’ve learned something new today.”

: “Oh, and thanks again. It seems you have a knack for helping me out. I hope I can do the same for you someday.”

: “That aside… even though this is a shopping district, there are absolutely no students around here. And definitely no Shujin students… though I guess they wouldn’t come in uniform either way.”

: “That was… I used to be in the same class as her! But why is she here…?”

: “Do they do horny things there, because I think I need to refill my air horn before we go in if they do.”

: “I’m not sure… but it seems suspicious. I’ll have to ask her about it. Oh, and I’d like you to be there too, as my witness. Would that be okay?”

: “Well, we’ve spent quite a bit of time here. Let’s head back to the station. Thank you for today.”

: “That was the first time I’ve ever had to deal with a barker. I didn’t know they could be that persistent… today was exhausting, but I also learned a lot. I guess nothing beats practical experience.”

: “Honestly, I’ve realized I can’t solve these problems on my own. It took what happened today to make that clear.”

: Tonight, we’re going to do an outing with Caroline and Justine. We owe them that much after how much I’m going to be abusing the shit out of the Velvet Room.

: “Listen closely: the place we wish to evaluate for your rehabilitation is… where one hones both the body and spirit.”

: “Trainees gather there to test and push their limits using various pieces of equipment.”

: “I had not expected a rehabilitation facility on this side… as wardens, we must see such training for ourselves. Does such a location sound familiar to you?”

: “So, what’ll it be?”

: “So you do have an idea of where it is! Then today, you’re getting a special training regimen!”

: “If you don’t keep up the pace, you will die. Now, take us there at once.”

: I was kind of surprised they modeled the gym from multiple angles, and then I remembered you can go there at night to get extra max HP. It’s pointless.

: “This is what you use to train? It’s rather different from how I imagined it…”

: “Indeed. I imagined the equipment here as having more spikes and chains…”

: “…That’s a bench? Then show us how it works!”

: “By lifting the weight, you strengthen your arm and chest muscles.”

: “But that isn’t nearly enough for a real workout - you should increase the weight.”

: “We’re deadly serious right now. I’m insulted you would think otherwise.”

: “Well, it appears we’ve found the limit for your pathetic arms. Now, what’s that over there? Another body training device?”

: “Demonstrate its use for us.”

: “What a fascinating contraption. Perhaps we should bring one to our room?”

: “We could force the imprisoned Personas to run on it. chuckle Not a bad idea…”

: This is actually an ability they give you if you advance their confidant: you get Persona 5’s equivalent of the Pokemon Daycare. It’s mostly useful if you’re doing an Arsene-only challenge run or need to level up a Persona that’s too low-level to be usable.

: And now Joker has been Yamcha’d.

: “Out of breath already? You still have quite a ways to go.”

: “All right, on to the next one!”

: “Is that yet another tool for training?”

: I’m kind of curious as to why a gym has a training tool specifically for kung fu in it. Maybe it’s a Japanese thing.

: I also don’t quite understand… I think the way these things are made, they’re supposed to move when you hit them to simulate the resistance of a body against your strikes, but it doesn’t look like that’s the case here.

: Then again, I’m not even sure how real these things are. You can buy them, but I know that kung fu is one of those things where there’s a real martial art and then there’s all the weird jangly key man shit that kinda rides on top of that.

: “Were we to try, it would be obliterated almost immediately.”

: “You weren’t trying to destroy it? So, the real purpose is to polish your technique… that’s a pretty roundabout method, but I do see how it works.”

: “As far as physical training goes, this place leaves much to be desired…”

: “But it is admittedly sufficient for your rehabilitation. Here is your reward.”

: Both of the skills these cards teach are useless, but there is a way to make use of them - I’ll show that off tomorrow.

: Today, we break the game.

: We get a glorified alert to go visit Hifumi. We’ll do that in the next update.

: We get a free reading period before we go to Mementos, so let’s use that.

: Speaking of which, this update bought to you by some real-life Kawakami who managed to permafuck the servers at work.

: “Make sure you pay extra-close attention to how totally awesome Zorro is.”

: “So, you’ve finished reading Zorro, The Outlaw. Zorro was not only strong in mind and body, but he also cared for the common people.”

: After about five minutes of plot recaps (which will be repeated when we reach the boss fights) we’re let into Mementos.

: Seven requests. This time, I’m going to just show off the fights and skip the random dungeon bits. Why, you ask?

: Because four of these seven requests take place in an area we’ve already been in - that being the Path of Aiyatsbus (which has enemies from way back in Kamoshida’s palace).

: “Really? It seems the same to- hold up. It looks like the Nav’s reactin’ to something…”

: “What’s this?”

: “It sounds like we can go further down now. It’s because we made Madarame’s Palace disappear, right?”

: “Most likely… I think.”

: “You seem rather uncertain. How far does this… Mementos run, anyway?”

: “Uh… It’s huge! Extremely.”

: “You’re always so vague when it comes to the important stuff. It’s like he’s kinda flaky as our chief of operations. Don’t you want him to try a bit harder too?”

: I will never pass up an opportunity to dunk on the cat.

: “There, there…”

: “I don’t fully understand, but Mementos and the Palaces are related to each other, correct? Then all we must do is continue changing the hearts of evildoers to ascertain its full expanse.”

: “I don’t believe there’s a need to quarrel over it.”

: Rain doesn’t do much as far as I know, apart from activate certain skills that only work when there’s a specific weather condition. Most of those have a second skill that makes them work regardless of weather.

: I go and try Makoto’s ability…

: As well as Ryuji’s instant win ability. To get this to work, you have to dash into a shadow rather than trying to ambush it (which will give you a normal fight).

: After the second fight, I get a fusion alarm. It’s here I found out how alarm-related accidents work.

: First, I fuse a Lamia. I don’t keep her, and she’s in the next dungeon so I’ll log her there.

: Panta Rhei is fucking AMAZING, but I don’t wind up keeping it. The SP cost is simply too high - Joker’s only going to get a handful of them off before running out of SP.

: I fuse again, and get Thunderbird. Ordinarily, we’d want this, as Thunderbird is a full four levels higher than Joker is and is very useful for returning - he gives you a skill card we’ll use to break things later. I’ll log him later, when we wind up keeping him.

: For the record, I didn’t wind up keeping him.

: When you get an accident in a fusion alarm, there’s a chance this happens. I showed it off earlier, but basically there’s a couple of “packages” you can get this way. This is one of them.

: The boost skills increase damage of a particular element by 25%. There’s a better version called an amp (fire amp, ice amp, etc) that increases damage by 50% and STACKS WITH THE BOOST SKILL OF THE SAME TYPE.

: Most end-game Personas are going to have a Boost, an Amp, and two other skills we don’t have yet. One of those we’ll be getting… now.

NEW PERSONA: Koppa Tengu

Origin: Japan

First Appearance: Nocturne

Human spirits who became tengu and had ignorant or cruel hearts. Usually serve as retainers to larger and more powerful tengu.

: One thing I found out quickly is that the RNG for fusion is very hard to advance, so I dick around a bit until I get this. This is another “accident package” that’s all skills that regenerate HP and SP.

: The important skill here is Life Aid. Life Aid is a skill that you cannot otherwise get until after level 50 and cannot be itemized into a skill card. It restores 8% HP and SP after each battle.

: That’s pretty game-breaking… but that’s not enough.

NEW PERSONA: Fuu-Ki

Origin: Japan

First Appearance: Nocturne

Demon whose name literally means “Wind Oni”. Can harness powerful winds.

: So let me explain what I did here. I fused the Koppa Tengu (after registering it, of course) into Fuu-ki using… I think it was the Eligor from our earlier fusion alarm.

: Fuu-ki itemizes into a Wind Boost skill card, so what I did was register Fuu-ki and then itemize him into a card… then resummoned Fuu-ki and slapped the card on him.

: So now we’ve got Life Aid, Garudyne, and Wind Boost on one Persona. How can we make this more overpowered?

: Well, a bit later I get a second alarm. During an alarm, Fuu-ki returns a Wind Amp (it really whips the llama’s ass) skill card instead of Wind Boost. Now, are you thinking what I’m thinking?

: Why yes, that is Garudyne with a built-in 75% extra damage plus Life Aid, thank you for asking. I could’ve made this better by keeping his normal trait (which boosts single-target skills by 20%) but I didn’t.

: For reference, here’s Fuu-ki’s normal skill list. I think we came out on top here.

: Here’s another fuck-up, where you can see one of the worst accident packages: all dodges. This is easily the most useless one, because none of these are worth having. Let’s see how our Fuu-ki does.

: This first target is from before the second fusion alarm, so I had the Fuu-ki with Wind Boost and Life Aid but not Wind Amp (it really whips the llama’s ass) yet.

: This is the guy from Kichijoji we heard about way back when we first visited.

: “That’s the first thing out of his mouth… but it seems like this is the old guy who’s making trouble in Kichijoji!”

: “…He’s certainly disturbed. Let’s end this, Joker!”

: It’s just me, Gabe Newell. That’s G-A-B-E-N at valvesoftware dot com.

: I get why they went with Koropokkuru, but that’s not exactly how a koropokkuru would behave. Anyway, this is Garudyne without Wind Amp. It’s doing ~260 damage to an enemy that isn’t weak to wind.

: Ann finishes it off with a fire spell and an All-Out.

: “An unfortunate consequence of isolation…”

: “I’m certain that’s what your family wishes as well. And from now, on, instead of taking it out on others, you should communicate your needs directly to your family. Tell them that you’re lonely before it’s too late.”

: “Look at 'im… thinks he’s some kinda hotshot.”

: “He’s the guy who’s really behind all that bullying, right?”

: “Yeah. If we wanna stop the bullying, we gotta take him down.”

: “Let’s go.”

: One thing you’ll notice is that Makoto won’t show up in any of these scenes. This is because technically, we could’ve done most of these requests before even going into Kaneshiro’s palace.

: “No jerk’s got the right to go around, blackmailin’ people!”

: This guy is the leader of a bullying ring that Mishima warned us about like a month ago.

: “You gotta be kidding! You’re not strong, you’re just a coward who won’t get his hands dirty!”

: Sakoda’s shadow is a Black Frost. In most of the games Black Frost is in, it’s usually a mid-level demon (or Persona) that resists both fire and ice and is usually a three-way fusion between a Jack Frost, a Pyro Jack, and a King Frost.

: In Persona 5, Black Frost is level 67 (!) and is one of the only sources of the ultimate Ice spell: Diamond Dust. The version you can fuse also reflects Fire, but this one only resists it.

: He’s a pretty solid Persona overall so long as you have a way of getting Ice Boost (he learns Ice Amp naturally or can inherit it from King Frost, but none of his ingredients naturally learn it) and Life Aid onto him to offset the insanely high SP cost of Diamond Dust (48 SP, 24 with his trait).

: Since he resists fire, ice and nuke (the real deal repels fire, absorbs ice, and nulls nuke) I just have Ann and Yusuke gun him down.

: “Why don’t you just admit you lost? You’re acting kind of pathetic right now.”

: “All right. Now it’s time for you to get eaten. The strong eat the weak or somethin’, right? When I’m done with you, there’s gonna be nothin’ left but bone. You ready?”

: Ryuji going full-on mainline SMT negotiation mode.

: The Evil Snow Crystal is like the totem items from Persona 1 and 2 and allows us to fuse Black Frost, but doesn’t get consumed when we do.

: Such natural-sounding dialog for teenagers in 2016.

: There’s only one more target in Aiyatsbus, but I didn’t remember that they’re actually on the final level where it transitions to the next area.

: One thing I wish they had done is just have the request bosses available from the get-go without needing to actually have the request, so we wouldn’t have to backtrack.

: “She really seems like a sadist…”

: “She’s calling someone her slave and ordering him around, right?”

: “In a way, she’s denying his existence. I certainly wouldn’t want to be a victim of that.”

: “Let’s go talk to her.”

: This is another Mementos request that was basically a Yakuza substory - in this case, the one from Yakuza 0 with Erranda, who you later recruited for the cabaret club.

: “It’s 'cause you made some guy your slave! That’s all kinds of wrong right there.”

: Ryuji’s line here sounds like an out-take from whatever voiceactor they pulled off the street to voice Richter Belmont in the original dub of Symphony of the Night.

: “Uh… I don’t know where to begin to explain how you’re wrong.”

: Joker and Yusuke are looking at each other, with the unspoken “The straights are at it again” floating in the air.

: “You are so delusional.”

: Oh no, a Yaksini. Whatever will we do.

: “Why did you start treating him like that?”

: Basically, we just ruined BDSM Night for everyone.

: “More than friends? You mean like as a boyfriend!?”

: I’m just imagining Yusuke saying “Actually it’s a sex thing” and Joker clapping his hand over Yusuke’s mouth to keep Ann from hearing it.

: The Whip Sword is a small upgrade for Ann, which makes me question why I even bothered updating the party’s melee weapons.

: Path of Chemdah is the area that opens up a few weeks after Madarame is down.

: “Looks like it’ll be a new area from here on. I’m starting to understand how this place works…”

: “Yes… it is quite a marvel to find the subway system down here.”

: “Uh, Earth to Yusuke! It’s always been like that!”

: A couple of instantly won battles later, and we get our second fusion alarm this trip. Joker’s going to hit level 31 soon, so I’ll just explain what I did now rather than wait.

New Persona: Kurama Tengu

Origin: Japan

First Appearance: Nocturne

Tengu sub-species supposedly native to Mt. Kurama in Kyoto. They are said to be the most powerful of the tengu, and one is said to have personally taught Minamoto-no-Yoshitsune the art of swordsmanship.

: Kurama Tengu is hot garbage. We’re not using him the way you’d think we would. Instead, we’re going to fuse him into…

New Persona: Anzu

Origin: Mesopotamia

First Appearance: Shin Megami Tensei II

Also known as Zu, the name under which it has appeared in the Final Fantasy series. Mesopotamian demon bird known for stealing a magical tablet with the power to control the universe from Enlil, the Mesopotamian god of the wind.

: Now this is more like it. Anzu’s trait decreases the SP cost of Garudyne to 5, and I’ll be passing that along to whatever I fuse him into. He also has Wind Break, which will make sure nothing resists the Garudyne spam.

: You might ask why I did the fusion the way I did, and the answer is because it’s the path with the fewest fusions between Fuu-ki and Anzu.

: “What an unpleasant smile.”

: “It’s his customer service smile, right? Yet behind the scenes, he’s extorting his subordinates.”

: “This guy might start doin’ it to his customers, too. Who knows?”

: “That would be a disaster! Let’s go!”

: “Why’d you blackmail your own employees? That’s not normal!”

: All I know is that at the company I work for, the only signs of intelligent life are in the departments that aren’t management.

: “Property!? Who do you think you are!?”

: Setanta here goes down extremely quickly. By this point, Fuu-ki has Wind Amp (it really whips the llama’s ass) and is doing something like 400 damage per Garudyne.

: Why do I have the feeling this guy was one SMT-style apocalypse from being that guy from Dead Rising?

: “Talk about a horrible workplace.”

: “You’ve done quite a bit more, haven’t you? It’d be best if you just confess everything.”

: I missed the item name in the shot, but it’s a book titled “Chinese Sweets”.

: I’m… not sure how Yusuke gets that from the title of the book, but okay.

: “The last floor had seven areas, but the one before that only had two, right?”

: “I suppose it varies, depending upon the location…”

: “Guess that means it ain’t easy to tell how much of a floor we got left to cover, huh?”

: “That’s right. We won’t know how many areas are on a floor until we make it to the end. But judging by the vibe I’m getting from the Shadows… this floor isn’t any smaller than the last.”

: By this point, Fuu-ki is doing almost as much damage as an All-Out or Showtime with each Garudyne.

: Two floors of pointless encounters later (by which I mean we’re instant winning any battles we run into) we reach our next target. This is the one for Chihaya.

: “He’s abusing his girlfriend, right?”

: “Didn’t her fortune say she’s gonna get hurt bad? We can’t leave him like this.”

: “We need to change his heart, and fast!”

: That’s uh… that’s some dialog right there, even if it’s basically a repeat of the last three Mementos bosses.

: Because this boss is a Fuu-ki and absorbs wind, I brought Morgana back specifically to show off confusion farming. Confusion farming is really only effective against Mementos bosses.

: When an enemy is confused, it has about a 1/3rd chance of dropping a pile of money. You can theoretically do this forever.

: The thing is, it’s not as effective as the Greatest Weapon in the John Persona Arsenal, and let me show you why.

: Even though I had Uchimura dump over 70,000 yen, I only got 17,000 on the results screen. This means that Chihaya’s ability to double money when ending with an All-Out would only apply to that amount and not to the 70,000.

: With the Greatest Weapon, all the money you get from negotations is added to the final total and will be doubled when you end with an All-Out.

: The Sleep Stick is an upgrade for Ryuji, but at this point we have little reason to use him.

: I think the reason a lot of people who play this game hate Mementos is because honestly, apart from the stamps and the request bosses, this entire area is kind of useless.

: We’re barely getting EXP from instantly winning battles, and by the time the area with enemies from Kaneshiro’s palace opens up we’ll be high enough level to insta-kill the enemies there as well.

: “He looks so… bad.”

: “He’s part of a burglary ring targeting restaurants, and he’s used violence against his brother.”

: Now, I can forgive robbing a bunch of restaurants, but using violence against your brother? Can’t have any of that.

: “We have to do something about this.”

: “Let’s talk to him.”

: “Trying to make excuses now? You should be ashamed of yourself.”

: “Bad things? What are you talking about?”

: There’s this MST3K movie called “I Accuse My Parents” where a dipshit accepts a job that is very obviously with the mafia and gets away scot-free by blaming his parents for it. This reminds me a lot of that.

: “You think violence and crime is rebellion? Don’t be stupid.”

: Says the guy who holds up shadows at gunpoint for money.

: Makigami turns into Mithras, a Nuke-based Persona that we will definitely want later. If we keep grinding at the rate I am, then we should have him before the end of the third dungeon.

: The reason we want him is because Mithras is one of the only Personas to learn Nuke Amp, and is also the only way to get a Nuke Amp card.

: Unfortunately, if this fusion calculator is right, he can’t itemize into a Nuke Boost card - in fact, NOTHING does. This is one of the problems with trying to get all the Amp and Boost skills, and why that one fusion accident that gives you all the boost skills exists.

: In fact, trying to obtain any of the Boost or Amp skills that aren’t for a base element (Fire, Ice, Wind, Elec) kinda sucks without having the DLC.

: Makigami immediately summons an Oni and an Onmoraki. We don’t need to kill them to win the fight - only the Mithras has to die.

: That doesn’t mean that I don’t have Ann light the Onmoraki on fire so that I can technical it. Look at that goddamn damage! Now I’m starting to understand why the guide focuses on technical rank.

: Let me just say that even if I don’t go through the effort to get all the Boosts and Amps, just having them for the base elements is more than enough to carry you through the game.

: “You just realized that now? Wait, you already know how your brother feels, then!”

: “What!? Why would we do something like that for y-”

: “…Psh. Anything you want to tell him?”

: “What’re we gonna do about that Treasure?”

: “Yeah. It’s no use to us, anyway.”

: “What will we do? I can give it to him since he goes to my school.”

: “No, I’ll just sneak it into his house. I think that’s the best way…”

: “I hope everything resolves itself.”

: “In any case, we pretty much succeeded with our mission!”

: Jose shows up on the next floor.

: He turns Kaneshiro’s Will Crystal into a ring that’s still kinda trash, but more importantly…

: He now sells Black items, some stat boosters, and most importantly blank skill cards. I buy one of each ambergris before we leave, and a load of skill cards.

: I drive around for a while insta-killing enemies. As it turns out, weaker enemies only give you a fraction of the listed EXP values. What I want is a fusion alarm, and for Joker to hit 32.

: First, we get Kurama Tengu back.

: Next, we compendium summon a Kin-ki, which I had made earlier while screwing around with fusions.

New Persona: Kin-ki

Origin: Japan

First Appearance: Nocturne

Oni whose name literally means “Gold Oni”. Said to have a body so strong that no weapon can pierce it… hence the physical resistance.

: And now, it’s time for us to meet an old friend. For you see, Kin-ki + Kurama Tengu is the only way we can make…

RETURNING PERSONA: Lilim

Origin: Abrahamic Mythology

First Appearance: Shin Megami Tensei I

Demon said to be the children of Lilith. They’re essentially succubi.

: Congrats, Atlus. You spent four games nerfing her, and I made her bullshit overpowered again. Don’t get me wrong, her normal moveset is mediocre at best. The reason we want her is because she itemizes into an Ice Boost (Ice Amp with a fusion alarm) skill card.

: I’m also amazed that I got both Freidyne and Bufudyne on her, in addition to Garudyne and Wind Boost/Amp.

: Unfortunately, we can’t itemize Lilim into an Ice Amp card yet. Trust me, I tried.

: If we do, we get an itemization accident and get trash instead of Ice Amp. I had to settle for an Ice Boost instead and didn’t feel like getting another fusion alarm.

: Yes. Once we get a fusion alarm, Bufula is going to be replaced with Ice Amp. At 12 SP, Bufudyne is hardly cheap, but Life Aid offsets that cost a bit.

: I’m also just now now realizing that we’re one level below the red shadow of the next dungeon, and could probably do the dungeon after that one without fighting anything.

: “Those two look pretty sure of themselves. Real smug lookin’.”

: “So they’re blackmailing that teacher, Kawakami, by using that incident where their child died.”

: “But Ms. Kawakami did nothing wrong, right? We have to help her!”

: “Are you ready? Let’s go.”

: Noticing a pattern with these Mementos bosses yet?

: And now we’ve got Oberon and Titania, who in this game are both relatively high-level Personas.

: I was kind of going down the list trying to find weaknesses, because I could’ve sworn one or both of them reflects wind. Neither of them do.

: Titania is very flammable and Oberon is weak to Psychic.

: This is another case of “Why exactly are we letting these people live?”

: And we get another whip for Ann, which is an upgrade to the one we just got.

: I grab the last stamp thing before we leave, and then we’re done.

: Next time, we’ll start Chihaya’s confidant (for real this time) and do both versions of Kawakami’s Rank 9 cutscene. I will put up a vote about Kawakami immediately after this post because I need to know how I’m going to present it.

: Oh, and of course, more Yusu-Gay coming up.

[Timrod]

Okay, so here’s the vote I want to put up:

Under the normal 100% schedule, what happens is that we do Kawakami’s Rank 9 event on July 8th. Unfortunately, we don’t do her Rank 10 event until the 27th - this is because we don’t really need her ability until right before we’re about to go into the dungeon.

This presents me with a problem. There’s two different versions of the Rank 10 cutscene: one for if you’re dating Kawakami and one if you’re not. If I do the Rank 10 event as scheduled, that means I have to play through roughly three weeks of game twice.

The other problem is that I feel like the Rank 10 cutscenes lose a little bit of their impact if you don’t see them relatively soon after the Rank 9 cutscenes… and if I do it in order, there would be probably several real-time months of updates between the two.

So here’s your options:

Option 1: Non-Canon July 9th: Under this option, I’ll use footage I’ve already recorded where I do Kawakami’s Rank 10 cutscenes on the night of July 9th. Both versions of the Rank 10 cutscene would be added to the next update, leaving a hole on July 27th where I’m actually doing the Rank 10 event in the canon run.

Option 2: July 9th on July 27th: Under this option, I’ll still use the July 9th footage but save it until July 27th, so the updates will still take place purely in chronological order with no skips - the only difference will be that the date in the corner will read the 9th instead of the 27th.

Option 3: Romantic Now, Platonic Later: Under this option, we’ll do the Rank 9 Romance and Rank 10 Romance scenes (which are obviously non-canon because Joker is gay) now, and then the Rank 9 and Rank 10 Platonic scenes on the 27th.

• Non-Canon July 9th
• Chronological Order
• Romantic Now, Platonic Later

[drcakey]

@Timrod

: “You think violence and crime is rebellion? Don’t be stupid.”

I hope in Persona 6 the Phantom Thieves have Captain America in Spider-Man: Homecoming style TV spots where they’re all spins chair around “I may be a thief, but even I know that stealing is wrong”.

(As for the poll, all the options seem equally fine to me.)

[Timrod]

@drcakey

I hope in Persona 6 the Phantom Thieves have Captain America in Spider-Man: Homecoming style TV spots where they’re all spins chair around “I may be a thief, but even I know that stealing is wrong”.

Joker’s is just him going “I may not be a cat, but even I know animals being horny for human women is wrong. Spay or neuter your pets.”

In other news, I tried P5 Scramble and kind of hated it. The only good part is that it has a remix of Last Surprise that’s not bad and I grabbed a FLAC of. I’ll probably post it during the next dungeon.

[SpammyV]

@Timrod

: “Do they do horny things there, because I think I need to refill my air horn before we go in if they do.”

The police never found any leads on who deafened the entire red-light district by setting up hidden airhorns with a remote-controlled trigger throughout the area.

[Timrod]

Click Here for Update 40

: We start the 7th off with a reminder we really don’t need. I don’t know why they didn’t code it so that if you’ve already beaten the palace, the game just skips these.

: “Not like that means I’ll put up bamboo decorations and write my wish on a piece of paper though. I’m not feeling it this year.”

: “Oh, but there’s a traditional food associated with Tanabata, just like chocolate for Valentine’s Day. All right, Takamaki-san. Tell me what is traditional Tanabata food. I’ll give you a hint - it’s based on a certain motif in Tanabata’s myth…”

: Apart from that line sounding awkward as hell (“Tell me what is Tanabata food?”) it also kind of doesn’t make a whole lot of sense for her to be asking that.

: I mean, it’d be kind of like asking a room full of American students what Groundhog Day is. Everyone knows what Groundhog Day is, but no one wants to admit it.

: For the record, Groundhog Day is the day where a bunch of designated Groundhog Wizards attempt to summon their dark gods to take over the world and bring in the end times.

: “Huh!? Oh, uh, yeah! I mean-”

: “Hey, Lady Ann is obviously panicking! Be a good guy and help her out!”

: “Traditional food? Sorry, Akira. Help me out…! So Tanabata’s about gods crossing a starry sky to reunite once every year. It might have something to do with…”

: This is the part that REALLY doesn’t make sense. There’s almost no way Joker wouldn’t know what it is outright.

: “Oh yeah! They gotta cross the Milky Way to get to each other! So if the traditional food is something inspired by the Milky Way…”

: What’s strange is that neither Orihime nor Hikoboshi have ever been demons in an SMT game. You’d think they would’ve done something with that.

: What they’re talking about is flowing soumen. I wish there was some way you could do that with burgers. I mean, theoretically you could do that with hot dogs and boiling water but boiling hot dogs is a crime against humanity.

: “Yeah, I could see that! The Milky Way’s like a long white bundle of them, right? The traditional food of Tanabata’s gotta be soumen noodles!”

: “That’s right. The traditional food for Tanabata is soumen noodles. Originally, in China they ate a baked good that we call sakubei in Japanese to appease demons.”

: As far as I can tell, sakubei is some kind of cake. It doesn’t help when trying to look it up that Sakubei is also a last name.

: “Over time, that pronunciation went from sakubei, to sakumen, to soumen - a wholly different food. Going with the theme of calming demons, soumen on Tanabata is sometimes called ‘demon guts’.”

: According to Wikipedia at least, the same thing is kind of true of the word for Tanabata, which (according to them) was originally used to describe a cloth craft made by Shinto shrine maidens.

: “Go restore your strength with some seasonal food and get ready for your exams.”

: Two points to Ann’s confidant and some knowledge.

: We then go back to the library to grab a new book. I don’t know why the guide has us do this, because we don’t wind up reading it.

: “Um, I want you to come shopping with me. I don’t know if I’d be able to handle this on my own, you know? Please help me out! I’ve got to hold up my end of our deal!”

: Another thing I didn’t really think about was how half the confidants have this weird transactional quality to them.

: You have Kawakami with the whole “maid service for secrecy” deal, Maruki with his “mental training for research help” thing, Ohya with her “headlines to help John Persona for stories” bit… and it’s kind of a wonder Joker has any meaningful relationship with any of them.

: “Now, we’d better get going. The item in question is in Kichijoji. Shall we?”

: I had to get a new pair of glasses recently. My old ones looked just like Joker’s (and no, I didn’t get them because of that) but the frame broke. I wanted to just get the same frame but not broken, but they don’t make them anymore.

: “I’ve been wanting to come here for a while, but I never had the chance to drop by.”

: “Yeah! I want to get my dad a present. You seem like a real glasses buff, so I wanted to get your advice. Could you try on a couple pairs for me? I’d like to get some visual reference.”

: “Thank you so much! Let’s see… how about this pair?”

: This entire scene is full of references to Persona 4. The glasses Joker has on are the same ones the Persona 4 protagonist wears while in the TV world.

: I’m also reasonably certain that the green glasses on the rack behind Joker are Chie’s.

: “What do you think?”

: “I know, it’s so fashionable! And it’s good that it’d help your vision, too. This could be a good one… hmm…”

: “Hmm, right - maybe a little too hip for my dad. But your input’s been really helpful so far! Would you mind poking around with me for a bit longer?”

: “Thank you! This is actually kind of fun! Let’s pick up the pace!”

: I feel like these ones are also probably a reference, but I don’t know to what. They look kind of like Baofu’s glasses when we met him in Innocent Sin.

: And now we know what Joker’s shadow would look like if this was Innocent Sin.

: And here we have a slightly less anime-looking version of the Groucho glasses that Teddie gave to Chie in 4.

: “Sorry… I can’t decide. A lot of them are good, but none of them have really clinched it for me yet…”

: “You know, you’re right! I’m the one who has to make this call!”

: “I don’t know how to describe it. It just seems perfect for my dad somehow.”

: And she picks a pair that are very similar to Yukiko’s. They don’t have the little rainbow stripe on the side, but they’re the same otherwise.

: I don’t think I’ve ever seen a man wear red glasses before.

: “Yes, I think I can be confident in this one. In fact, I know he’ll like it!”

: “I ended up with a great present. All thanks to you, Kurusu-senpai!”

: “Hee hee… well, I’ve still got to make it up to you. Let’s go practice at Inokashira Park after this!”

: “…If I’m being honest, trying to pick out glasses was really setting off my anxiety. All I could think of was what’d happen if I couldn’t choose, or if I chose wrong…”

: “I mean, I already failed in gymnastics. And my cooking turned out bad, too. After cracking under pressure so many times, I kind of figured I’d just ruin everything again.”

: “The more I thought about it, the more… empty I felt. Like I wasn’t even me anymore.”

: “So even you know how that feels, Kurusu-senpai? It’s not just me… I think I’m starting to understand what my coach was telling me. It’s easy to say you’re in a slump, and write yourself off.”

: “But maybe ‘finding out who I really am’ is also about finding new depths to myself. It does make me feel a little down, but at the same time, I feel like I’m closer to getting my confidence back.”

: “And having your support makes me even more determined to make that happen.”

: “This is strange… I don’t know if I should be feeling like this. I want to give my best performance, but it’s like I’d be doing it for you as much as for myself… o-or something like that!”

: “I’m still working on it myself, but I hope we can keep helping each other, too!”

: If we didn’t already break the game enough, now there’s this. I don’t know what a Chaines Hook is and looking it up only gives me walkthroughs for Royal.

: Anyway, Chaines Hook allows us to not only ambush enemies from a distance, but also adds on a status effect - either Dizzy, Confuse, or Fear.

: I have kind of mixed opinions on this. Persona 5 is already a pretty easy game, and I feel like making the game even easier wasn’t necessarily a great idea.

: Even in the base game, by this point we would’ve already seen the hardest bits the game has to offer. It’s all kinda downhill from here in terms of difficulty, which I think is one reason that a lot of people hated all the dungeons after the one we’re about to go into in the base game.

: +5 max HP.

: “So I already gave my dad the glasses we picked out today. And it suits him even better than I imagined! He was so happy with them!”

: “Thank you! I think this helped me feel a little more confident! And thanks to you, I even feel like my gymnastics are going to go better now.”

: “I’m sick of wasting my time worrying. Whatever I’m up against, I’m just gonna give it my best shot. But actions always speak louder than words, right? I’ll prove I’m not all talk!”

: “Okay, I’d better go. I hope we can talk again later!”

: When we get back to Leblanc, Morgana gave me a reminder about “all the sooty clothes you have”, so I went to Kichijoji and discovered I had a bit of a collection from running over Shiki-Ouji in Mementos.

: I also discovered here that the clothing grab bag seems to restock once a day - but what I’m going to do is save the points for just before the final dungeon when the final tier of armor unlocks.

: We have a crossword puzzle tonight, and the answer should absolutely be “marijuana” but Atlus are cowards.

: This is probably in because of the Purdue Pharma lawsuit (yet another example of Connecticut ruining everything, as Purdue Pharma was based in Stamford) which had sprung up in 2007 but didn’t get a resolution until 2019.

: I like that we’re getting all these Thieves Den points which are absolutely useless because there’s nothing to really spend them on.

: And now it’s time to actually start Chihaya’s confidant.

: “Fine, let’s hear it. Please sit down.”

: “Her boyfriend stopped abusing her? I don’t believe it! But even if he did stop, her fate should still be heading down the path to misery, without changing!”

: “What!? The sequence of arcana has completely changed! ‘Death’ has moved far off into the future…”

: “Nrgh… no, no, no! This must be some sort of trick! What are you, a scam artist? You made a deal with her boyfriend or something, didn’t you?”

: I read this and I was like “Wow, this could be a Yakuza substory” and then I remembered that it kinda is. There’s one in Yakuza 3 with a fortune teller except you beat her sons up.

: “Then what did you do!? Did you plunge him into Tokyo Bay, or cram him into a metal drum and dump insects on him? You must’ve taken some sort of extreme measures!”

: He called Nishino Kanako. As it turns out, there actually is a fan translation group for that now, though it’s not quite as good as the ones released by the artist for the earlier volumes.

: “Well… you certainly do seem like just an ordinary high school kid. But there’s no way that could’ve happened… without you breaking the law. I mean, how could an ordinary high school student change the course of fate?”

: It’s like she hasn’t seen fully two-thirds of anime.

: “…Fine. I’m just going to have to verify your power. The very power that reversed my tarot card prediction! This is quite a serious situation for a fortune teller like me. I need to get to the bottom of this.”

: “You won’t have to do anything. Just sit next to me while I tell fortunes. And if another unopposable fate happens to appear… then I’ll test your power.”

: Translation, she has a second Mementos request that happens later. I’m not sure why she wasn’t the confidant that advances purely off Mementos requests instead of Mishima.

: “Th-this is a very serious issue on my end! Oh, I know… I’ll read your fortune! Please? I’ll even prioritize your readings over my regular customers.”

: “Besides, I’ll be able to provide much more accurate predictions once I get to know you better! How does that sound? Is it a deal? sigh Otherwise, I won’t be able to go on…”

: “You will? Really!? Okay, then, I look forward to verifying your ‘skills’! Please don’t blow me off, okay? We made a deal, after all.”

: Is she… questioning John Persona’s street cred?

: I think I said earlier that Luck Reading doubles stat gains. That’s actually incorrect - it gives you a 50% bonus. A luck reading costs 5000 yen and lasts a single day.

: Naturally, you can combine this with things like Craft of Cinema to get massive point gains from DVDs - which is why we haven’t been doing a lot of DVDs recently.

: If we were going for the reset-heavy 100% route, we’d have done this a while ago. I might still try to see if I can fit in extra readings outside of what the guide has just to get those few extra points.

: “If it’s really possible, then…”

: “Oh, it’s getting late! Let’s close up shop for today. It’s past your curfew.”

: I just got back from P5 Strikers and I’m so happy to be back.

: The PC port is borderline unplayable due to a number of known crashes and a memory leak, so I’ll be avoiding it until I can get it for around the same price as I did P5D.

: “Phew… hah… I forgot to get your contact info! Phew… there we go!”

: “I’ll be contacting you soon, so please come for the verification test, okay? I suggest you don’t try to get out of it. Or else, who knows what kind of black magic I’ll have to resort to…?”

: “Great! Now our deal is official! Sorry for taking up so much of your time. Please be careful on your way home. I’ll see you soon.”

: Instead of reading the book we just got from the library, we’re instead going to read a blatant reference to Marie Kondo. This book was in the base game, but I didn’t recognize the reference at the time because no one outside of Japan knew who she was.

: “Is this book really about cleaning? Or is it training you to become a monk?”

: Joker immediately realizes that Morgana does not bring him joy and throws him in the trash.

: “Cleaning as a way to speak to your heart… I’ve never thought of it that way…”

: Five points in Proficiency.

: The convenience store sells Soothing Soba now, which I buy only because you can trade it to the guy in Kichijoji.

: We’re spending our afternoon with Ann. Strikers establishes that Joker hates crepes, but of course that doesn’t matter because Strikers isn’t canon.

: There’s people who think it is and Royal isn’t, and they’re so very, very wrong.

: “I have the worst luck…”

: “Oh, an email. Looks like it’s from the agency. I wonder what they could want… huh…? Mika!? At Skytree…? Where’s that!?”

: “They want me to head over for a shoot now… feels pretty familiar, doesn’t it? Basically, this men’s magazine is running a Mika special to try and capitalize on her recent popularity.”

: “But apparently, she asked for me specifically to star alongside her for the shoot. I wonder why…”

: “Hold on though… why would you trick someone you admire? Well, I guess I won’t know what she wants unless I head over! Have you been to Skytree before? How do you get there…?”

: “Oh, and… c-can you come with me? Actually, I’ve already decided for you. You’re going. Come on!”

: “You asked for me, right? Wow… I barely recognize you. Did you lose weight? Or maybe change your makeup?”

: “The theme for today’s shoot is ‘the elegance of woman’. So, I conditioned my body to be more elegant.”

: “Wh-what do you mean?”

: “Controlling what you eat, how you move… that’s all. It may sound easy, but it’s pretty tough. You have to write down everything you eat, making sure to check the nutritional and caloric content.”

: “I even hired a personal trainer to take special note of my diet and oversee my exercise regimen.”

: She attempted to make the leap from Basic Bitch to Advanced Bitch. It didn’t end well.

: “Whoa… that’s amazing! Does that mean you don’t get to eat double chocolate crepes?”

: Nah, Metal Slug 3 established that it takes like six bites to get that powerup.

: “Not to mention the other stuff I do! I take herbal medication, wear warming socks, do pilates and yoga…day after day… how many squats do you think I do in a week!?”

: When I was recording this, I read the line as “herbal socks” and I was like “Shit, they make those now?”

: “Ugh, a natural beauty like you could never understand how much work I put into my modeling!”

: “You know, it’s kinda embarrassing getting complimented like that…”

: “Sorry, did I say natural beauty? What I mean was natural airhead.”

: Ah yes, the famous “my head itches” pose.

: “I see now… this is a test… well, I’m not gonna lose!”

: And of course, Ann counters with the “Mime in an invisible box” pose. Someday I hope to win a fight by just going completely silent and pretending I’m in a box.

: What the fuck are these poses?

: “M-Mika!? Why are you doing this? I thought you looked up to me!”

: “You should have known that was a lie… but I guess you’re just as naive as you look. Anyway, stupid amateurs like you really piss me off. You better not drag me down, okay?”

: And now the “I dropped my contacts and can’t find them, could you please not move?” pose.

: What I hate is that if this was Persona 1 or Persona 2, Mika would absolutely be a boss fight. I mean, she kinda is given Chisato and Kama Palace in 1.

: There’s also a boss fight in Strikers that is basically Mika only she’s Ann’s age and has this whole stupid pastel Alice in Wonderland thing going on.

: It offends me because at no point does the Alice boss ask anyone to die for her, at least not out of what I saw before I stopped playing.

: “Grrr…!”

: “Introduce me, pleeeeease? Mm-hm, mm-hm! The owner even invited me to dinner! Y’know, working with all of you just makes me so… happy! ”

: “Um… I’m heading home…”

: “Is that why she was mad at me? Wait, so the real reason she requested me was just so she could be mean… If that’s the case, I probably deserved everything she did…”

: “… I’m… I’m so pissed off! Mika had to work super hard every day to get to where she is now. She worked out, watched her diet, made friends with everyone…!”

: “She couldn’t rely on connections like I did… she didn’t become a model just for the heck of it. Her resolve, her knowledge, her fashion sense… they’re all on a totally different level from me!”

: “Mika is amazing. Mika is… Mika is strong! But me? I’m nothing! Just thinking about that makes me so angry… I feel like I could explode!”

: “This whole time, I’ve just been pretending to model. It was like the clothes were wearing me… I mean, that’s what I always thought being a model meant! …But I was totally wrong.”

: So one, this cutscene is like twice as long as it had any right to be. Two, I think Ann has modeling confused with the plot of Kill la Kill.

: “A real model draws out the beauty of the clothes they wear… casts a stunning magic on them… a real model is flexible, beautiful… and strong. Well, I’ve had enough pretending!”

: “Right! I’ll give it my all! I’m gonna take the world by storm… just you watch, Akira!”

: “This is the perfect time for sweets! But no, I won’t eat them! I mean, I will… but not today! You eat some for me, Akira! Later!”

: This is starting to feel like an Allanson Monologue. She’s talking a lot, but saying very little.

: “Well, I’ll say it again! I’m taking the modeling world by storm, and I don’t care what I have to do to get there! Obviously that means dieting, cutting back on food, and no matter how tough it is, I’ll do any workout!”

: “Yup! I’m so sick of feeling how I did today! …This is a first for me, actually. Feeling this pissed off, I mean. Usually, even if I have a crappy day, I just get over it by having snacks, watching TV and sleeping it off.”

: “But this time, it’s different… I want to change. Tomorrow, I want to be better than I am today. Okay, gotta start my stretching session! I’ll talk to you later. Bye-bye!”

: Before we do Kawakami’s upcoming Rank 10 cutscene, we first want to do a couple of things to avoid a permafuck.

: First, we need to go to Chihaya. She gives us an early look at who our next opponent is. Medjed is the Persona 5 universe’s equivalent of Anonymous.

: One thing I neglected to mention about the Luck Reading is that it only boosts one stat at a time. You’d basically need a guide to make full use of it, because there are days where you’ll get stat boosts and not know ahead of time that you’re going to get them.

: Next, we need to use the Luck Reading (picking Kindness) and feed the plant.

: In this case, we get seven points to Kindness from feeding the plant as opposed to the five we usually would.

: And now it’s time for our first Rank 9 confidant event. This will give you a pretty good idea of how the rest of them go… at least for the dateable ones.

: “Takase-kun’s guardians came to my house today and apologized to me! They told me I won’t have to send any more money! And that they’ll return everything I paid them.”

: She knows. She absolutely knows.

: “Anyway, it’s such a relief. They apologized about Takase-kun… and admitted that what they did was terrible. They even told me that I am a good teacher. And so, I decided to reall quit my part-time maid job today.”

: “I’ve been talking to my boss about it ever since I was hospitalized. It took a while to work out who would cover my shifts. I didn’t want to inconvenience anyone.”

: “Now I can finally make a fresh start as a teacher. I can take care of my students and earn their trust. That’s the ideal teacher I aspire to become. I bet I’ll be an old woman by the time I achieve my dreams.”

: Kawakami is now midway through her metamorphosis into Ms. Saeko.

: “Yeah, you’re right. I’m still within the demographic age range of what’s considered ‘young’.”

: “I was always able to rely on you, Master. You helped me come to a lot of realizations, because you were such a good listener. Thanks again.”

: Where’s the “Never do that again” option?

: “I could always become your personal maid, riiight? …Just kidding.”

: On Rank 9 events, at least with the female confidants, you will always rank up midway through the event. Once you’ve reached this point, it’s safe to discard your same-arcana Persona.

: I believe that once you hit Rank 9, you automatically hit Rank 10 the next time you meet the confidant. We are now unable to permafuck on Kawakami’s confidant.

: “Can you handle the cleaning on your own? I’m pretty worried about the state this place is in. I feel like you don’t put much thought into your diet either… besides, won’t you be lonely? Hm?”

: “giggle …I take it you get lonely easily? …But you shouldn’t say stuff like that so casually, okay? Some women may misunderstand your intentions.”

: This thought will always pop up immediately before the split between the “friendship” route and the “romance” route. We are doing the “friendship” route first.

: The top option sets us on the “friendship” route. Let’s pick that.

: “That was pretty honest of you. You’re quite the problem child, but you’re still a good person. I’ll protect you, as your homeroom teacher.”

: “Oh, and of course I’ll keep my initial promise too. The one about slacking off in class.”

: “On my way home, I remembered everything. All the old memories from when I decided to become a teacher. Like when I was going through the courses for it, or my first year as a teacher…”

: “Back then, I would’ve done anything for my students. I felt like I was capable of anything. But somewhere along the way, I forgot about all that. Reigniting your original resolve is easier said than done.”

: “Thanks. Somehow, when I hear it from you, it makes me feel like I can do anything… weird, huh? From now on, I’ll support you as your teacher, so you can rely on me as much as you want, okay?”

: You might ask where Kawakami’s other Rank 9 scene is. What I’m going to do is make a separate update for that, because I understand there are people who do not want to see it.

: I will also put her Rank 10 romance route cutscene in there, so that if you don’t want to see that, you don’t have to.

: I’ll do the same for any romance cutscenes between Joker and an adult, because again, I understand that can be unsavory to people. Any updates with content like that will have a red “CW” on the header so that you can avoid them.

: “And yet he simply turned himself in - even confessed all his crimes. The Phantom Thieves…”

: “I hope she hasn’t fallen under their influence…”

: “It seems like some of our students had been victimized by them, so we can breathe easy for now. I’m thankful to the police for arresting the perp, even though they’re just doing their job.”

: “By the way, ‘perp’ is police slang. You might have heard the stars in police procedurals say it. It’s short for ‘perpetrator’.”

: “Speaking of stars… can you answer this question, Kurusu-san?”

: What the fuck is this, Professor Layton? Are you going to make me rearrange matchsticks next?

: “That’s correct.”

: “By the way, there are rumors that the Phantom Thieves took down the perp this time - Kaneshiro. I remember their name with that bit on Madarame, as well as the incident in May. Is this a new urban legend?”

: “Anyway, please prepare for your tests starting Wednesday, and don’t be distracted by rumors like that.”

: “Looks like we succeeded in changing Kaneshiro’s heart! A lot of people are talking about the Phantom Thieves too!”

: This scene will always happen the day after you do Kawakami’s rank 9 event. It is the same regardless of which route you chose.

: “I saw a lot of errors on the previous test, so please be more careful in the future.”

: “Excuse me! No sleeping in class! Today’s examples will be on your entrance exam, so make sure you know them.”

: “People’ve been makin’ a huge deal of it since the police announcement!”

: “This is quite the turnaround. All of a sudden, people are expressing their long-standing belief in us.”

: “So this is why Makoto told us to post the calling card anywhere that might stand out.”

: “Pretty smart move on her part. Oh… where is our amazing Miss President?”

: “I’ve been called into a meeting with the principal. There’s no need to worry though. More importantly, there is a special on TV about the Phantom Thieves!”

: “Huh? What did it say!?”

: It was an hour of people being very confused as to who John Persona is.

: “They were talking all about our calling cards.”

: “For real!?”

: “Anyway, my apologies about today. I’ll have to see you all another time.”

: “Who was that?”

: Joker tells him it was John Persona calling to order a pizza.

: “I hope all this excitement doesn’t place us on the police’s radar.”

: “It’ll be fine! No way they’d find out about that weird other world!”

: “True, but… do you remember what the fake Kaneshiro said towards the end?”

: “Yeah, he said we’re not the only ones doing it…”

: “Eh, not gonna let it bother me. Far as we know, he was just pullin’ that shit out of his ass.”

: “I hope that’s the case…”

: “Anyways, in your face, Akechi! Now whaddya wanna do about our next target!?”

: “Don’t get ahead of yourself. Still, people might expect a lot from our next move considering how excited they’re getting.”

: “We can’t just pick any old schmo now.”

: And then they basically picked any old schmo. No, seriously.

: “There is no need to hurry though. Counting Kamoshida, we’ve claimed three consecutive victories, right? We should just lay low and wait for all this excitement to blow over.”

: “Good idea! We can make it a welcomin’ party for Miss President too. By the way, that briefcase? It’s pretty damn expensive! Let’s sell it and drop the cash on our party!”

: “Wow… seems like the ‘lay low and wait’ idea has gone completely out the window.”

: “So we can count you out then, Morgana?”

: “Uh… what are you talking about? I was just saying we should try and keep our party on the down low.”

: “Hahaha, that’s the spirit. Well, I’m gonna let Makoto know!”

: “…Hi, Makoto? There’s something we forgot to tell you! So- Oh…”

: “What’s wrong?”

: Joker tries to figure out the best way to signal Ann to turn off speakerphone so he can tell them not to let her know he brings Morgana to his exams.

: “If you wish not to stand out, you had best not get bad grades, okay? That is something I simply would not be able to overlook as student council president!”

: “For now, behave and concentrate on your studies. We can have fun once finals are over… understood?”

: "I believe in what I wrote. ‘The Phantom Thieves are just.’ "

: What she doesn’t talk about is that the original sentence was “The Phantom Thieves are just four high schoolers and a cat.”

: “Have you figured out who they are?”

: “No, I’m nowhere close. However, after considering all the facts, I concluded there are no errors in their acts or principles.”

: “Thus, upon deeming them to be on the side of justice, I have decided to end my investigation.”

: “But that’s impossible!”

: “Impossible? May I see the evidence you have that leads you to believe so?”

: “There will be no need for that. I intend on getting into a good college by my own merit. Please excuse me.”

: “About that… yes, I am making progress. However, I have stumbled upon some difficulties. Still, why would someone as important as you be interested in a petty case like this?”

: “N-no! That’s not what I meant! I will investigate with all the resources available to me. Of course… um, I should be able to let you know relatively soon. Yes, I will bring good news…”

: “Hi, Sis. You look tired… is everything okay?”

: “Don’t worry about me. How about you, Makoto? Have you been keeping up with your studies?”

: “Yes, of course. Though… what is the point of studying?”

: “… What do you mean?”

: “I mean, you studied and you’re not even a romance route, and then you spent an entire night asking a high school kid stupid questions.”

: “I was just wondering what will be waiting for me at the end… even if I manage to push through tough entrance exams, I’m still thrust into a competitive society…”

: Hmm… could this be foreshadowing? I feel like we saw a place where the word “Success” was plastered all over the walls… but where was that again?

: “Isn’t this the man the Phantom Thieves sent a calling card for? I heard he confessed all his crimes.”

: “Even the police couldn’t figure out why. It really… was out of nowhere. This would only make sense if his personality changed… but that would be impossible.”

: “Why does it matter? The police still caught him in the end, right?”

: “I had plans set for a promotion, but no one can take credit for his arrest now with that confession. …Not that a child would understand.”

: Who are you talking to? Is it me, because I already know what the plot is. Seriously, by this point I had kind of figured out most of the remaining plot.

: “Promotion… You’ve changed, sis. But I’ll be okay. …I finally found a place where I belong.”

: “This new teammate of ours is pretty promising! We’ll be able to do even more now!”

: Before we do the canon version of events, we’re going to do the non-canon version. Ordinarily, we’d be doing this on the 27th, but I’m going to do it early. This is so that I can record both versions of the cutscene without having to play through three in-game weeks multiple times.

: I also want to do this to explain the third item on my list of things I hate about this game. The first is the thing that caused me to not finish the plot, the second is that the writing is very repetitive and dull in spots.

: “That’s actually been happening a lot lately… I wonder if they see me in a new light now…? I need to work hard so I can make up for all the times I let my students down in the past.”

: For the record, none of the answers in the Rank 10 scenes matter - this includes the party member Rank 10 scenes, which is surprising given that the max rank for party member confidants is now 11.

: “Oh, do I sense some jealousy? Haha… that’s really cute. So, um… now, this is coming from me as your teacher…” an awful thought occurred to me the more I spent time with you."

: Oh shit. She knows.

: Joker grabs his stash of cup noodles and jumps out the window.

: “And the state of your room! You need to stop slacking. I mean, look at how dusty this place is. I put up with the mess because you were my client, but you need to thoroughly clean in here!”

: “I’m currently in the process of eating better myself. I only have cup noodles every other day now! There are just some things you have to prioritize over your studies, you know?”

: All of the adult confidants will eventually figure out that Joker is part of John Persona. Even in the canon we’re setting, Kawakami is actually not the first to do so.

: See if you can guess who it is. We’ll find out when we hit their Rank 10 in a few months.

: “That whole thing with Takase-kun’s guardians worked out way too good for me. And you’re the only one who knew about my situation.”

: “Hm, well… don’t worry. I have no intention of telling anyone. There are a lot of stories about the Phantom Thieves but in the end they help people like me, right?”

: “I just thought you were a problem child with a criminal record… but now I know better. I’ll support you 100 percent!”

: “You’re not just a student to me. You’re someone special who helped me realize my path as a teacher. A new path where I’ll never abandon any of my students…”

: “Right!? For my students… and for you!”

: Please make sure to click the next music link before reading on. I don’t normally suggest that, just please do it. I’ll tell you when to close it.

: Shoji Meguro made this song for Persona 3, and it was so good that it stuck around in both Persona 4 and Persona 5. Even Hashino couldn’t fuck that up. I’ll even post the final text thing real slow so that you can get the full effect.

: “The ultimate secret of Temperance, aka straight edge.”

: Okay, you can turn it off now. Like all confidants, reaching Rank 10 with Kawakami unlocks one of the Ultimate Personas. Ardha is level 84 and is a very solid physical/nuke Persona… though at that point you’re not far off from just fusing Lucifer.

: Now, I’ll need to apologize, because I’ve lied just a little bit. The Path is Open isn’t in Persona 5.

: You have NO IDEA how pissed I was when I found out that it wasn’t in P5 - not even a jazz version of it or something. They kept it for both Persona 4 and Golden.

: The worst part is that they didn’t replace it with anything. There’s just fucking nothing there. They turned the Rank 10 events from a special thing into… just another fucking confidant event.

: What fucking killed me about it was that they had all this really good music and then just completely dropped the fucking ball on this even though THEY HAD A SONG THEY COULD’VE USED.

: What kills me even more is that they didn’t fucking fix it for Royal, because this game’s a goddamn cash grab!

: “I don’t want you to flunk your exams. I’m going to go the distance with you!”

: “This new ally you gained was Makoto!? Just tell me the truth!”

: This scene makes less sense when you realize that there’s a good chunk of the player base that wound up dating Makoto and Sae somehow doesn’t know by this point.

: “Makoto… that’s preposterous. If what you say is true… was Makoto also running from the police when you were arrested!?”

: “Now that I think about it… she did start talking a lot about the investigation from summer onward…”

: “Makoto aside, you mentioned one other important detail. Did Kaneshiro really say there was someone using the Metaverse besides the Phantom Thieves?”

: “Those words could just be taken as you shifting blame to this other person, you know.”

: “There are two possibilites: either you’ve simply been trying to confuse me with your lies… or everything you’ve stated is true. Have you been telling me the truth from the very start?”

: “Does that mean you’re placing your trust in me? …Then again, I am investigating a ‘thief who steals hearts’. Very well. No matter how absurd it may seem, I’ll reevaluate my stance on believing you for now.”

: “In return, speak the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. It’s a fair deal… is that acceptable?”

: And now we’ve got one of the only two confidants we actually need to fuse Lucifer. Judgement gets us all the ingredients we need, and then we need to unlock Lucifer himself through a different confidant.

: “We’re running out of time. Let’s move on to your next target… actually, I should rephrase that; they targeted your group first, didn’t they?”

: “We have no pictures. Even their names and identities are unknown. If what you told me is true, then this ‘Nav’ thing you’ve mentioned wouldn’t have worked in this case. How did you target them?”

: “Tell me everything.”

: Believe it or not, we’re still not quite done with this update. We have the canon version of the events that transpired on 07/09 to go through still. Let’s meet the other confidant we need to fuse Lucifer.

: The guide I’m using doesn’t tell you to do this, but I get a Luck Reading on Knowledge. The reason for this is that most visits we’re going to make to this new confidant get us two points to Knowledge.

: At 5,000 yen per, it’s kind of a high price for one extra point… but that’ll add up and we have the money.

: Meet Hifumi Togo. I used to think she was the best girl in the game, and I have no idea why.

: “Strange, hm? I did receive approval to do so though. Experimenting with new tactics is best to do alone in a place like this. …Well, I suppose that doesn’t sound terribly plausible to someone who doesn’t play…”

: Joker replies with “Whoa, are you saying I don’t have game? I totally have game. I’ve got like five different women trying to date me and none of them realize I’m gay.”

: “Don’t mind me; please go ahead and pray.”

: Joker pulls open his jacket, revealing his “Lucifer Is My Homeboy” T-shirt.

: Hifumi Togo is a chuuni who is like, borderline Haruhi Suzumiya territory. She’s about two seconds from becoming a Yu-Gi-Oh character at any given moment.

: So anyway, let’s talk about Hifumi. There’s an art book for Persona 5 that outright states she was initially intended to be a party member.

: The idea was that she was supposed to be a sort of foil to Makoto and that Makoto wasn’t supposed to be THE SMART GIRL, but then they walked that back for some stupid reason.

: I know for a fact that there was a significant portion of the fanbase that was quite upset that Hifumi didn’t make it in as a party member in Royal, but that would require downgrading Makoto from SMART GIRL status and we can’t possibly nerf Hashino’s dumbass girlfriend character.

: Oh, right. The Megami Tensei wiki claims that Hifumi is in the church because she’s named after an actual shogi player by the name of Hifumo Kato, who is a Catholic.

: “…Huh? Um, you don’t necessarily have to learn from me, you know… there are other options… such as playing online.”

: “Well then… um… so… you like shogi?”

: By this, he means he wants a motorcycle so he can play 5Ds IRL. He’s gonna roll right over Kaiba.

: “Like me…? You’re a bit strange… but thank you. Um… okay, just a quick game then. Twenty seconds per move… if that’s all right with you.”

: “…I’ll start. …So this is your skill level, huh? The dragon which governs the blue sky has fallen into my hands. How do you intend to survive this?”

: “I play whatever the most recent ‘buy me, I’m overpowered’ card is that hasn’t yet been banlisted.”

: “To concede is an act of admitting that you have lost, with grace. If you aspire to become a shogi player, I recommend that you take your study of the game to heart.”

: “Thank you for playing… well then, that will be all for today. If it’s all right with you, may I request another match sometime?”

: This part I don’t quite understand. She wants to play shogi against a guy who has no idea what he’s doing?

: “I feel… a gambler’s spirit emanating from you. Which is strange, since your style of play is that of a complete novice…”

: “Huh…!? Oh, I-I’m sorry… however, I will instruct you under one condition. You become my playing partner so that I can research new moves. Is that agreeable?”

: I’m not sure how you’d “research” moves in a game like shogi. As far as I understand it, shogi is one of those “solved” games like chess where every possible move has been analyzed by a computer.

: “Thank you very much… well then, it’s a deal. I’ll teach you how to play, and you’ll assist me with my new moves.”

: Wait, what? The palaces are basically the definition of “going loud” except that combat is magically silent because it takes place in a separate screen.

: All of Hifumi’s abilities are named after concepts in shogi. As far as I understand it, Koma Sabaki is this idea that every piece has a role and your strategy builds around that.

: We get three points to knowledge - two base plus a third from the luck reading. I’m honestly not sure why the guide doesn’t have you do a luck reading, since we do it for aojiru a few times for the same cost-point gain ratio.

: “Before you head home, would you like to exchange IDs with me? There’s no obligation, of course…”

: “Thank you. All right then… let’s see… ah, yes, it went through. I’ll let you know if I come up with any new strategies.”

: And that’s it. Next time, we’ll spent two days going through a bunch of big long cutscenes that I would probably just skip if I could because they exist solely to justify the plot of the new content in Royal and kill the pacing.

[Timrod]

Summary

: Now that we’ve seen the platonic version of Kawakami’s Rank 9 and 10 cutscenes, let’s see what happens if we make a horrible mistake.

: Note that even if you pick the bottom option, that’s not the point of no return.

: “…Do you understand what you’re saying? This situation isn’t normal. I’m a teacher, and you’re my student, you know?”

: Picking the top option will put you back on the platonic route.

: “N-No way! Wait, um, that’s not what I meant by ‘no way’ but… whaaat!?”

: “Wait, um. Okay… okay… okay… okay… okay… time! I need more time! I mean, you’re both a student and a master, while I’m a teacher and a maid. This doesn’t make sense!”

: I mean, it did if you were one of those medieval nobles with like a dozen children not counting the ones from your spouse.

: “Right? Let’s save this discussion for next time, okay!?”

: Unlike the platonic route, there is no phone call for the romance route.

: “Well, I’m completely done with that part-time job! Oh, and my students! I’ve been giving them all a lot of advice…”

: “So… um… about that talk we had… you know, about whether or not we should date.”

: “Can’t you seem a little more sad about it!? I was so happy… when you shared your feelings the other day… I finally realized how I felt. But… I’m a teacher… and you’re my student…”

: Straight Joker has never not been horny. Even Morgana fears him.

: “You’re in a tricky situation as it is. If we get caught, suspension would be just the beginning. I’m restraining myself because you’re so special to me…”

: “No, I’m not. Considering the feelings I have for you… Arghhh! Why are you so okay with this? Now I feel dumb for trying to back away!”

: “I had every intention of saying goodbye to you… oh, fiiine.”

: The rest of the scene is word-for-word identical to the platonic version up until a point, but before I get there I’d like to talk about why you can even do this in the first place. It has to do with Persona 3.

: In Persona 3, there’s a social link where the protagonist plays an MMORPG styled after Innocent Sin. He plays as “Tatsuya” and meets “Maya”, who clearly likes him.

: At the very end of the social link, the MMO shuts down and by pure accident, the protagonist finds out that the person crushing on him in the MMO was one of his teachers.

: That event is played more as a joke than anything, and at one point the teacher almost asks the protagonist to dinner but then IMMEDIATELY rejects it as a bad idea.

: Hashino was not listed on the writing credits for Persona 3, but all he did was steal the idea and then went “What if Persona 3… but horny?”

: And I mean, in a game without Kamoshida as a villain, I could almost understand doing that, except that’s not the worst part of it.

: “I went from being a teacher to being a maid to dating a high school student. So… as someone who went from being my master to my boyfriend, do you have any requests for me?”

: “I’ll obey them, you know… even though I’m no longer a maid.”

: In the base game, Kawakami was significantly hornier than she is in Royal. There was also a scene that implied a sexual relationship between Kawakami and Joker.

: In Royal, they had to change a scene later on specifically to address that where Kawakami outright says that sex is going too far. That’s how bad it was.

: “Don’t be so conceited. You’re younger, so you should rely on me. Here… by all means.”

: I would’ve had Salty Vanilla also do a version of this scene with Yusuke in the maid outfit, but they’re busy enough as-is.

: My reaction exactly.

[Timrod]

@SpammyV

The police never found any leads on who deafened the entire red-light district by setting up hidden airhorns with a remote-controlled trigger throughout the area.

There’s a Mementos request in August that’s just called “Who’s Been Assaulting People?” and I’d like to think that at some point in late July there’s a request called “Who’s Been Setting Up Elaborate Water Traps in Shinjuku Targeting Horny People?” and Joker won’t take that one because he already knows who.