Kendo: ||||||||||||||||
Swim: ||||
Track: |||||
Alright so I’m gonna call it here. Hopefully get the update done and ready for Monday but no promises. It does kind of depend on how often I fall into the Metaverse after all.
Today is a very important day… Very, very important.
Yeah, why?
Man, I knew it. I heard from Junpei that you’re pretty close with Yukari-san.
…What’s up with that?
There’s a morning assembly, so we better hurry.
Next, we’ll hear a word from the Student Council.
Thank you.
Well… I guess she IS the most popular girl in school.
You can say that again! There’s like some kinda aura around her…
Yeah, I try not to think about that.
It is my firm belief that each of us must accept the responsibility of bettering our school.
However, change cannot occur without sustained effort and an unprecedented level of commitment.
That is why we must restructure our daily lives to accommodate this lofty goal.
…To imagine a bold new future without losing sight of the realities around you. That is the key.
I am certain that many of you have your own visions of the future… For us to reap the full benefits of our education, your participation, ideas, and enthusiasm are essential.
Thank you.
So… Do you have any idea what she just said?
Sort of.
Sure didn’t sound like somethin’ a high-schooler would say…
If it was anyone else, we’d be laughin’ our asses off.
…You know what? I’m tired of these textbooks. I just went over this novel in the last class.
I’ve got a great poem we can cover instead. Close your textbooks, everyone, and listen…
All right, Kenji, you’d better not be sleeping back there! You should be ashamed of yourself, taking a nap while I pour my heart into reading this poem!
For that, you get another essay along with your regular assignment tonight!
I’ll expect a slice of cake when you turn it in, too! And don’t cheap out with the store-bought stuff like last time!
This is nice and all, but what makes today so important?
This train be off the rails at long last! We’ve finally got the freedom to do whatever we want during downtime. Hurray!
…There’s not much we can do today, though. That’ll very quickly change, but we’ll deal with that when we can. Same with looking around the school proper. For now, let’s just leave and see what we find.
And what we find… is a cutscene. Great.
Where!? …Oh, there he is!
…
I didn’t use to talk to him much, but now I’ve got a good excuse.
I know he’s the captain of the boxing team, but… Who woulda thought he’d be such a chick magnet!?
I mean, come on! You don’t even see girls flock like that on TV! I wonder where they’re going…
Normally I’d truncate this and combine the latter 2 into one image like before, but that heart icon over Junpei’s head is kind of hilarious I dunno.
I want the two of you to meet me at Paulownia Mall.
You know where it is, right? I’ll be at the police station. See ya there.
Th-The police station? You mean, we’re not hangin’ out with your friends…?
Who, these girls?
Anyway, I’m gonna head out. …Don’t keep me waiting.
…Oh well, let’s go.
Akihiko asked you to meet him at the Paulownia Mall police station…
You decide to head over there…
Fortunately, we’re not forced there immediately so we can do something else first.
Namely, talk to this guy. We’ll probably be seeing him around a lot. Call it a bit of a hunch, there.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
We could try and do other things, but we’re sort of not allowed (…free time…) and it’s a good idea to get this out of the way quicker anyway.
Oh, these are the guys I was talking about earlier.
I was waiting for you guys. This is Officer Kurosawa. He helps keep our squad well-equipped.
And, this is from Ikutsuki-san…
R-Really!? Sweet!
You can’t fight something empty-handed, so find something you like. Officer Kurosawa has connections…
But, these things still cost money.
Of course they do. Nothing in life is free.
I realize that.
Well, I’ll see you later. Thanks again.
My job is to maintain peace in this city, regardless of the circumstances.
I’m just an ordinary police officer, but it doesn’t take a genius to know something strange is going on here. I’m only doing what I think is right.
So, Kurosawa here runs the Weapon/Armor store out of the Police Station.
We can buy an upgrade for anyone/everyone if we have the funds but thats 9600 Yen for the weapons alone and we’d have 8000 flat if I didn’t buy soda so…
Instead, I’m just not gonna buy anything right now. They’re all upgrades across the board, sure, but we can get anything he sells for free in Tartarus and we can find BETTER stuff in general too.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
I’m gonna take off, since I’m in a bad mood now…
Later.
Junpei has left.
So, NOW we have actual real free time. Finally.
_Since we’re already here, we might as well look around the mall a bit first. _
Since Kurosawa won’t sell accessories, we need to find somewhere else to buy them. Fortunately that’s next door! I do appreciate here how the HP/SP increases are proportional and not what they do in later games when it’s just “oh this thing gives you a whole 10 points of SP!” or whatever.
That said the other stat boosters are just +1 and that’s real bad so whatever.
…Honestly, for the most part I kind of forget that the actual stores in the mall exist after a while.
Speaking of forgetting, every shopkeeper has normal dialogue too but it’s not exciting or anything. Kurosawa just tells us his “store” is only open during the day, for example.
I guess since we’re going clockwise, we’ll finish off that way too. Gonna make a note of this to come back in about 2 months when it’s open.
…So, basically, there’s no point to shopping at the Pharmacy when it’s not a Saturday. Gotcha.
_Being a Pharmacy, it sells restoratives… and hoity-toity cat food. _
I dunno, I just love that this is here and it describes the cat food as being snobbish.
Nothing else in the mall worth our time right now (sadly Tower Power Records is not a store we can buy things in), so we’ll just leave and go… somewhere. The station over by our dorm seems like a good first stop. We’ll go everywhere here repeatedly over time, don’t worry.
For sensible reasons, it drops us off at the train station but that’s not why we’re here!
No, off-screen to the south-west we can find a path to the strip mall here. We’ve seen it twice already so we have an idea of what’s out here. I’m sure we’ll see what’s in all these stores later but for now…
I feel like grabbing a cheap and easy snack. It’s only 400 yen so the Chairman’s paid for this already, if you think about it.
It’s weird because it doesn’t have octopus in it. At all. I would think that means it isn’t even takoyaki but I guess I’m wrong.
Moving swiftly on, we’ll head over to the other station. This is a small area with one important thing in it.
_This guy right here. _
It shows movies on a bit of a rotation with each one increasing a social stat. This is our first chance to boost Courage and it only costs 1500 yen!
It does use up our afternoon free time but that’s okay. There’s not really much else we COULD do with it anyway.
More important is that since right now our Charm and Academics are at 4 and our Courage is at 0 it might seem like it has a bit of catching up to do.
It’s already done so. The movie theatre is a pretty nice bonus for social stats since it IS a +4 gain. It’s just… not actually worth using outside of the really early stuff because we have better things to spend time on soon enough.
Regarding our exploration of Tartarus…
Akihiko is still on the mend, so for now, I’d like you to lead the team.
You never know when a powerful enemy might appear, like the one you faced the other day.
It’s best to be prepared, or else you may find yourself in a difficult situation.
So, whenever you’d like to explore Tartarus, just let me know, and I’ll gather everyone there.
Also, since I’m sure there are other things you will need to take care of, you may go out at night if you need to.
Well, that’s it. Keep up the good work.
Simply put: we can leave on an Evening now.
But first…
Tell me, what did you think about it?
It was w a piece of cake.
Why, that’s absolutely remarkable! Would you like to apply to become the next chairman?
But, he knows about us and helps out when he can.
Why does he help us?
But, he’s a police officer, so he’s dedicated his life to helping people.
Plus, he’s a pretty cool guy.
Does everyone go there?
How did you meet him?
He’s someone you can count on.
Anything else I should know?
…so you won’t be able to buy equipment during those times.
They appear as coffins.
Shadows are quite enigmatic… They only attack thoe who have not been Transmogrified.
Shadows feed on the minds of their victims, leaving them unable to speak.
We call this Apathy Syndrome.
And those who suffer from this incapactitating afflication are known as…
…The Lost.
I feel like I spent all day hiking up Mount Fuji.
What about you, Makoto-kun?
I feel fine.
Really? You don’t look like you have that much endurance.
Well, I was thinking, why does it have to look like a gun?
I mean, you gotta be a little nutty to point a gun at your head and pull the trigger, ya know?
Investigators are facing a difficult case, since there were no witnesses. This is the 12th instance of the mysterious incident. A team of investigators is working hard to track down any leads.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
_Welp, no point in hanging around the dorm if we don’t have to. We COULD go to Tartarus right away but I’ll give it a bit of time first. _
Our nighttime exploration options are even more limited than normal. I guess we’ll be spending a lot of time in the mall.
So, there’s a thing back here that I skipped over earlier since I didn’t think it’d be relevant right now. It still isn’t, but let’s just get it out of the way now.
Silence
It’s the door to the Velvet Room! This will prove pretty dang handy to have quick access to later, since this is the only spot it turns up in outside of Tartarus.
Welcome to the Velvet Room.
Well… I suppose it’s time for me to explain what I really do here.
But in order to do so, I must fuse your Persona cards together…
In other words, I shall merge them into a single Persona.
The number of Personas you have buried within you is approximately 170…
We’ve never seen a visitor with this many possibilities before…
Heh heh heh… This should prove veeery interesting,.
So, as you accumulate cards, please bring them to me.
We could fuse Orpheua and Pixie but right now that wouldn’t be the best idea. So, we’ll just leave for now…
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
And check out the Arcade. We’re gonna be spending a lot of money and time here, for a simple reason.
Every day, there are two different game available. We’re gonna be focusing on the more expensive one almost exclusively.
So, for today we’ll be checking out the, uh, Haunted House I guess.
Mainly because it gives us a Courage boost. We want to get as much Courage as possible in as short a time as possible, so…
Silence
Provided we don’t go to Tartarus, we can spend extra night time Studying if we really want to.
Needless to say, yes, we’re going to study here very often. There’s little reason not to, really.
It’s an easy and consistent Academics increase, after all.
Although, sometimes this happens which is a good thing in itself. I just wish it happened later than the first possible day…
Because it lasts through to Wednesday and that’s not a good thing but only in this particular instance.
Dude, I thought the rumor about you and Yukari-san was true…
It is what it is.
You keep saying that, Kenji. I think you do care.
But, you’ve sure had some bad luck since you transferred here.
…You know, dude, all the weird stuff that’s been happening…
How everyone’s been saying they’re hearing strange voices…
Well, I guess since you’re always listening to your headphones, you probably haven’t heard anything.
It’s the classmate you were talking to earlier this morning…
Why are you asking me?
No reason, really. I just don’t have anything to do later…
…and I thought we could finish our conversation from this morning.
So whaddya say, man? Let’s get some ramen and talk.
You accepted your classmate’s offer.
Super unsubtle ulterior motive… makes sense here, really.
You have decided to go with him.
…Whew! Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about!
…Well, was I right, or was I right? This ramen tastes great, doesn’t it?
I bet they put a special ingredient in it–something no other ramen shop uses.
It’s probably some sort of secret spice…
Oh, sorry. My bad. I get all geeked up when I eat here.
I agree with you.
…Wow, you don’t look like the type of guy I’d normally hang around with… But I guess looks aren’t everything.
…By the way, man, I hear you and Yukari are close.
Damn, boy, you move fast! I mean, you just transferred here.
…I can’t blame you, though. A man’s gotta be aggressive nowadays.
Even in 2009, huh? I guess there really is nothing new under the sun. Hopefully Kenji is going to end up being more likable than most people with this mindset…
Hey, let’s hang out after school again sometime.
Kenji seems to like you…
You have become friends with Kenji.
A mysterious voice rings in your head…
Well, I guess today could’ve been used less productively…
What, it’s already nighttime? …Damn, I missed my favorite TV show!
Man, you’re one serious dude… Oh well, let’s get going.
You decided to return to the dorm.
Exploring Tartarus can be very tiring. If the exploration becomes too long, you might get exhausted.
There’s a chance you might not be able to recuperate fully before whatever’s going to happen.
The others’ conditions will vary as well, so make sure you take that into consideration before you begin exploring.
If you want my evaluation of everyone’s condition, don’t hesitate to ask.
Mitsuru remains so consistently bad at tutorials in this instance she outright got it wrong. Good job, Mitsuru.
You should return to your room and rest for the remainder of the day.
Don’t push yourself too hard if you’re not feeling well.
Right, so we’re currently Tired from getting a bad RNG when Studying. It happens. Since we can only check our own status easily (because while it makes sense in terms of plot, Persona 3 is a mechanical pain in the ass), Mitsuru exists to at least make this part somewhat easier. Bascally, we could talk to everyone separately when in Tartarus or we could talk to Mitsuru. One of these is the better option, yes.
But we’re not checking stats since we’ve only been in Tartarus once and that was a tutorial and so it didn’t even count anyway. We’re just going to normally Talk.
there is a possibility you may falter.
However, continuous attacks with a sword will inflict a great amount of damage.
Contrarily, there is no danger of stumbling when you use a far-range weapon such as a bow.
However, a bow is nowhere near as powerful as a sword.
And not just because Yukari has low Strength. Though that doesn’t help.
No, see, ranged attacks don’t have a penalty for missing so they deal shit damage AND miss constantly because of their massively reduced accuracy (12% miss rate is a lot). Balancing!
I see that you can use both types of weapons.
it is importantto think about these advantages and disadvantages when choosing between the two.
And if you don’t get up fast enough, you’ll become the enemy’s main target.
I’m not wearing a nurse’s uniform, but you can come to me if ya need healing!
What, is that funny?
You need to be hot to pull off a nurse’s uniform, and you’re definitely–cough–NOT.
Why you little–!
…Moving ever so swiftly on.
Everyone else can only use one type of weapon. For me, it’s the two-handed sword.
That’s because real men fight with katanas!
With a katana you can sometimes hit an enemy over and over… and it’s super strong!
Consider me the main attacker of the team! I’m one baaad mutha!
Although, sometimes I fall down when an enemy dodges my attack… but don’t worry about that.
The man has regained consciousness, but due to his condition, has been unable to speak. Police are awaiting the man’s recovery before questioning him. And that’s the news for today.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
Well, there’s no reason to stay in the dorm at Night. Being Tired doesn’t mean anything out here, so we’ll be going to the mall every night except when we go to Tartarus for obvious reasons.
Although, today we’re not playing arcade games. Instead, we’re checking out the place with the empty orchestra sign.
800 yen is relatively cheap for what this does, really.
Even without the arcade machine, there are ways in the mall to increase Courage and Charm which is nice.
Silence
There’s basically no reason to not study so…!
…Well, okay there is this. Since we’re Tired, we can’t actually get anything out of studying right now. This was just a waste of time, really.
And now we’re no longer tired, and that’s a bad thing right now. It ISN’T bad normally but there’s something special you can do in a bad condition at school.
Listening: You’re talking about the Apathy Syndrome, right? My neighbor has that… He grosses me out. Sometimes I think I might have it too, and it depresses me.
Gossiping: Maybe you just need some exercise.
The first bell has rung.
_We could go and join a school club right now, or we could, uh, not. _
_Kenji’s right here and though I don’t exactly like it, he did tease us with something of maybe interest. Plus he’s a Social Link and we probably should deal with those. _
_We can still decide to not spend time with him though, or we can get reminded what our rank is. Which is also in the menu, so that’s just pointless here. _
…Still, we’ve got no real reason to bail.
Contrary to its simple appearance, the soup has a complex flavor that is accentuated by the noodles.
Hey, dude, your dorm’s co-ed, right?
So, can you, like, go into Yukari-san’s room and stuff?
No.
…No, huh? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
So, a lot of dialogue choices in most S.Link scenes matter. They affect how quickly you’ll reach the next rank, which is kind of important for a couple reasons. We’ll get to those when we get to those though.
Well, I’m not interested in girls her age, anyway.
When it comes to women, I like them to be older than me. What about you?
I like girls my age.
…Psh, you don’t know what you’re missing, man.
Older women are smart, sexy, and sophisticated.
Damn, dude. I thought you’d understand.
Anyway, so, the music note from before is how you know you picked “right” and this one is a clear sign of choosing the “wrong” option. In this instance, it doesn’t even matter though. You need 1 point to get Kenji up from here and getting either one correct gives 5 points (7 if you use a semi-hidden mechanic).
…Well, to tell you the truth, I–wait, this is just between us, okay?–I have my eye on someone.
This is the “secret plan” I was talking about. I’m going to ask her out.
Anyways, I want you to be there when I ask her out. But you gotta promise you won’t tell anyone, okay?
…On the one hand, I so want no part of anything that’s going to happen from here. On the other hand, I cannot wait to see (and most likely laugh at) everything that happens out of this.
Cuz if people find out they’ll be all like, “That’s inappropriate” or whatever…
Kenji told you his secret plan…
Your relationship is stronger now!
And this scene plays every single time we get a rank up in the S.Link it’s dumb. I’m just gonna cut it out from now on, honestly.
Your power to creat Personas of the Magician Arcana has grown!
It’s not like you’re going to forget who represents which Arcana anyway.
You decide to return to the dorm.
…Y’know, I do wonder if Junpei knows about Kenji’s “secret plan” or not. He has to, right?
He said you’re a pretty cool guy…
Are you two friends too?
Well, sort of… I’ve known him for a long time, even though we don’t usually hang out.
He’s a good guy… and, man, he has no fear when it comes to the ladies…
Understatement, yes.
By the way, let’s go to Tartarus tonight…
I hear the Lost are increasing, so we better kick some Shadow ass.
Eh, there’s no need to go to Tartarus just yet. We’ll be fine if we leave it a couple days more.
By the way, have you joined any clubs?
Sure have.
Good, I hope you enjoy it.
It’s tough to attend all the time, but you’ll really get a lot out of it if you do.
Teammates who are sick or tired should not be permitted to explore the tower.
That’s why mine only learns physical skills.
Among others, though since we’re only like level 3 you don’t know that yet I guess.
…Because dudes are supposed to fight with their fists! Mano a mano!
Oh, that’s right… I use a sword.
I’d have thought those two things would be the other way around, but whatever.
What’s great about a bow is you don’t fall down if an enemy dodges one of your arrows.
Although… a bow doesn’t do very much damage, and it misses a lot…
But, you can always balance those negatives with your Persona.
So, no worries.
Hey guys, do you maybe get it yet? There are mechanical differences between weapons! And not just the fact that there are three different Physical elements!
Our next story is about the release of the spring carp. Over 10,000 were released into the river this year. The next carp-release ceremony will be held in June.
As interesting as carp is, let’s see… today is Thursday, so that means…
Karaoke, I guess. Let that Courage sour ever-higher!
And then late night studying for good measure. Academics is slowly, slowly creeping up to where we’re going to want it.
Don’t worry, I have a stupid plan for certain things in mind anyway.
Gossiping: I got seriously hooked on that punching game.
Yeah, so, uh, the games that I’m not bothering with at the arcade don’t increase Social stats. They increase your actual Stats.
Listening: That’s at Paulownia Mall, right? Game Panic has a good selection, but it’s always packed.
Gossiping: Oh, really? Let’s go see what cabs are open today.
Gossiping: That is… if you can spot me some change.
Listening: No way! You still owe me for that game of Super Neo all the way back in 2003!
The first bell has rung.
So, this is probably the first and last time we’ll see this here. I’ll see it a lot though…
You doing anything after school?
Maybe.
Oh…
Well, if you’re looking for something to do, come talk to me, man. I’ll be at my desk.
Well, I guess I should go study…
…NOT! Who needs to study, right? Hahaha…
Maybe you should talk to him after school…
Maybe, yeah. This scene just means he’s going to rank up if we hang out with him. If this scene plays, that’s definitely going to happen but the reverse is not necessarily true. It should be obvious why I’m going to skip this whenever it plays in the future.
Anyway, we COULD hang out with Kenji again but we’re sure not gonna today.
We’re not really going to check out much of the school, but there’s one specific area we’re heading to.
…First though, I see someone we didn’t do anything with yesterday.
Um, why am I telling you this?
Well, whatever… You have to admit, he IS a hottie…
Oh yeah, dude, she’s DEFINITELY checking me out…
This isn’t exactly the only NPC mini-threadline but it’s certainly one that exists right now.
But what I do know is that we’re off through this door next to the bulletin board that we couldn’t before.
It’s hard to read… It doesn’t look like English…
And if you listen close, you can hear mysterious voices inside…
It’s one awfully mysterious home economics class, let me tell you.
Huh, that’s a little too specifically odd. Wonder if it’ll come up again.
We’re going to be going through this fire exit, but those stairs there? Lead to our classroom, basically. We could’ve come down there and be done quicker, but then we’d miss out on Creepy Stalker and… whatever is going on with the home ec class.
Out through the fire exit, there’s this… tree. That really does stand out, alright.
_And since this is a Japanese high school, this path also leads to the Gym. _
From here, we can pick which sports club we join. Track is the door dead ahead, swimming is to the left and kendo is to the right.
Now, let’s see…
Kendo: ||||||||||||||||_
_ Swim: ||||_
_Track: |||||
Alright, that works for me; kendo it is.
This is Yuko, our manager.
You’re a junior, right? SInce we’re the same year, you can just call me “Yuko.”
…That might be one of the most Japanese sentences I have ever seen in an official English release of a thing, wow. See, basically, just referring to someone by their first name is either a signifier of closeness or that you’re absurdly ridiculously rude. Yuko’s cool though, so she don’t mind which is nice I guess.
…Hey! Kazushi!
This is the future captain of this team. He’s a great athlete and scores well in competitions.
You two are in the same class, right? Kazushi, keep an eye on the new guy here, okay?
You got it.
You’re the guy who went out with Yukari Takeba on the first day of school, right?
You’re practically famous.
I’m Kazushi Miyamoto. You’ve seen me around, right?
Yeah.
Just because you joined mid-season, don’t think I’ll go easy on you!
You have made friends with Kazushi…
You joined the Kendo Team and befriended your new teammates.
I’ll make sure your uniform is ready for next time.
After looking around, you decided to go back to the dorm.
Nope.
Well, don’t wait too long, cuz they fill up quickly.
Oh, by the way, maybe we should go to Tartarus tonight…
Plus, I didn’t have practice today, so I could use the exercise…
Just don’t take it lightly, okay? It’s dangerous there.
I’m aware of that.
We’ll leave Tartarus be for the moment, of course. Before we consider doing anything else…
Equipping one of them will affect your status, dude!
I think only Persona-users can use them, though.
Hmm… I wonder why you don’t notice you’ve been infected until after the battle…
Must be because you’re concentrating so hard on fighting… Well, anyway, just don’t come near me if you get sick.
Let me rephrase that… WE don’t have weaknesses, our Personas do.
My Persona seems to be weak against electricity, but strong against wind. sigh She’ll probably never learn any electricity skills…
Our next story is about a strange animal from overseas.
The platypus, an animal native to Australia, is an egg-laying mammal. And behind the male playpus’ feet are poisonous spurs! What a strange animal!
…Why is “hey guys, platypi exist!” a PS2-era Persona running joke? It’s here and it was a big deal in Persona 4 for no apparent reason. I don’t get it.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
So, we can’t go to Karaoke right now. That’s fine though, let’s see…
Okay, good, the arcade does have what we want. But we can’t afford it (and that’s not because I bought Soda and Takoyaki either). Hrm. Gotta flip some of this stuff from our first Tartarus run I guess.
It’s worth it though. Because not only does this give us a Courage boost…
It pushes our Courage up to Rank 2 already! We can actually do something with this in the future now.
…Still not good enough, though.
Academics is just a tedious, long grind that isn’t even close to rank 2 yet…
Plus we’re out of money now. I guess we should go to Tartarus tomorrow.
1 Like
We’re nearly done with April already, but we won’t be making much progress on that front today.
Gossiping: Huh? A bookstore?
Listening: Yeah, leave Iwatodai Station, go straight for a while, and it’s after you cross the crosswalk. We’ve been at this school for a while… You should explore more often!
The first bell has rung.
In terms of the actual day, a lot of them are going to go like this for a while. Fixed start of day chatter, maybe a small scene for class stuff, day over have fun.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
I will gladly take it up on its offer to do whatever. 'Cept today is a Saturday, so we can’t hang out with Kenji or Kaz. I know, it’s such a shame. Suppose we’ve got no choice but to check out the new bookstore or something.
Oh, but Kenji’s here, huh…?
I was just about to head home, but I don’t really feel like walking.
…Hey, that doesn’t mean I’m looking for an unlocked bicycle, alright?
Oh don’t worry Kenji, I totally believe you.
More importantly, we have the bookstore just over in the strip mall. Nice that this one opens up pretty quickly, at least… one day, Antiques Store. One day…
An old man and woman are behind the counter.
What would you like today? We have fresh mackerel…!
Hey, you’re a student, aren’t you? You must be from Gekkoukan High, right?
That means you’ve probably seen the persimmon tree there…
Huh?
It was planted right beside a walkway in a courtyard at the school.
But, it’s not clear how the tree and this old couple are connected…
I’m sorry. He’s rambling on like an old man. Just ignore him.
After saying goodbye to the old couple, you decided to leave the bookstore.
Well, that was a scene alright. It didn’t give us anything and it didn’t even advance time…
But we’ve seen a tree at the school before, briefly. It was just by the gym, so it’s right through here.
It must be the persimmon tree that the old couple at the bookstore were talking about.
You found a leaf on the ground.
Despite having the regular item icon, the leaf is actually a key item. Hmm, I wonder… is this really the right tree?
How many guests? Smoking or non-smoking?
Hm? Excuse me, but may I see that leaf in your hand…
It must have grown quite a bit to produce such splendid leaves…
…Wait, so you didn’t come here to buy books? Did you come here just to show us this?
Um, no…
Nah-uh, I don’t believe you.
The old man is showering you with praise.
I’ve been meaning to go see that tree for a while now,
but I’m not sure if these stumpy old legs will make it that far…
…That wasn’t meant to be a pun. You know, “stumpy,” “tree stump.” Catch my drift?
Very clever, dear.
If you don’t mind, would you tell us your name?
Then, we’ll call you Makoto-chan from now on!
You got to know the old couple a little better.
A mysterious voice rings in your head…
Come visit us if you get bored.
After saying goodbye to Bunkichi and Mitsuko, you decided to go back to the dorm.
If anything happens, it’ll be you guys who have to deal with it.
Hm, I don’t see anyone around except Akihiko. I suppose that makes sense…
But, if you stumble across an enemy, you might have to fight it by yourself.
That can be pretty dangerous…
But if you’re strong enough, the enemy will be afraid of you, so you won’t have to worry.
I still don’t really see anyone else around here.
It’s a popular vacation choice this year, it seems. Airports are filled with air travelers…
Well, that makes sense. Hawai’i is apparently pretty great. I’ve heard especially great things about Waikiki.
Anyway, there’s clearly no one else around and we have no money (a whopping 10 yen!) so I guess we’ll just go study and slee-
Oh, well, Yukari and Junpei are up on the second floor at least.
When you’re tired, you don’t hit as hard, so it takes longer to beat an enemy. Plus, you get hit more easily.
“You youngin’s don’t know what’s good fer ya… Back in my day, we knew when ta rest!”
I understand your point, but what’s with the corny impersonation…?
Oh, that’s the room up on the fourth floor. We’ve been there twice before, technically.
Oh, but if you wanna go to Tartarus, she said it was alright.
It’s the only way we’ll achieve our objective in Tartarus.
Okay, so folks ARE around but we do have no money at all left. This presents a problem.
Fortunately, Tartarus exists and so we can hopefully fix a bunch of problems at once.
So, this place at the base is the ideal spot to change equipment and check stats for everyone that isn’t the main character. Since, y’know, they’re static and aren’t getting in the way.
We’ll also briefly check out our allies’ Personae. Unlike Makoto, they both are stuck with one each. Yukari only has Io, who is really not that great early on. Low Agility, overall worse Strength on average, and no offense until level 5 presents a problem for the moment. Her resistance to Wind is semi-useful and weakness to Elec doesn’t matter at the moment. Yukari also happens to have the lowest HP out of everyone period which is going to be especially nasty in the long-term.
Junpei, meanwhile, has Hermes and he’s very much the opposite. Generally tankier and much more of a Strength based offense. He has nothing BUT offense for a while, and Cleave doesn’t vary his elements at all unfortunately. He can only uses 2h Swords and Cleave also deals Slash damage, but at least if/when it misses he won’t eat shit. His resistance to Fire will boost his already fairly good survivability even further but that weakness to Wind might prove to be a big liability in this first trip.
A few floots up, there’s a barricade preventing you from going any higher.
The tower seems to have a number of these interspersed amongst its floors.
I know I told you that the layout changes each day, but these barriers seem to be in fixed locations.
While this is VERY EASY to do in the first trip on Maniac difficulty on Portable (honest Maniac is absurdly easy…), it might as well be actively impossible to do so here. We’ll do as much as we can, before we functionally have to leave.
So, the first time we step foot in a new floor (second time for 2F because of the tutorial), Mitsuru chimes in with something. Sometimes it’s to give you an idea of where the next boss fight it (like here), sometimes it’s even less useful.
Anyway, welcome to Tartarus! For real this time! It sucks and I dislike it. A lot.
Fortunately for you, this place being a randomised piece of shit means while I get to slog through it all, you get selected highlights instead.
So, despite being in Tartarus, the location listed is Thebel. As you might recall from before, this is the first block of Tartarus which is a worrying concept. Thebel is a minor mistranslation (albeit not from Japanese) and is intended to be Thevel, which is a Hebrew word that means “the world.”
This seems like a stretch, even with the Japanese B/V mess-up in the same line as L/R stuff, I appreciate. HOWEVER! It also has a subtitle: The Garden of Worldliness.
Since almost every floor is randomised, sometimes you get the stairs immediately. Sometimes you have to slog through a large area. Sometimes you don’t even get an access point and can’t leave easily.
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
So, let’s talk about the Shadows in this area. It’s very, VERY important to Analyse them as soon as possible.
Not necessarily for your benefit, although that too, but because it makes your party members better because they’re AI only. And the AI is… very inconsistent but secretly really unfairly good when setup correctly. See, from this they know not just the elemetal affinities but things like “does ailment work” despite that not being listed anywhere.
Annoyingly, Analyzing Shadows doesn’t list enemy skills or the like. Makes it a bit inconvenient to try and determine what Persona to have Makoto use, though you can generally intuit the broadstrokes from their Arcana and the elemental resistances. Also Analyzing isn’t an immediate thing either, so you generally have a round or so of waiting for it to kick in. It’s kinda dumb.
Like how the Cowardly Maya is weak to all primary elements except Ice and is a Magician so of course it uses Bufu.
A nasty thing that’ll become apparent here is that half the Shadows (right now) are Resistant to Fire. That means Orpheus can only be useful via Bash, which is also our only means of Strike elemental damage right now for if/when that matters.
That they also end up being weak to other elements doesn’t necessarily matter. We have no easy way of doing Elec damage until level, uh, 7 at the earliest for example. We CAN get Ice damage from an Apsaras but that requires getting rid of both Pixie AND Orpheus and it’s not worth it this early.
Though there IS a thing that isn’t the Cowardly Maya that is weak to Fire. It’s kinda weird that the two Magician arcana Shadows are weak to Fire, since Fire magic is what the arcana specialises in.
Oh and with this being on Hard mode, right now we take - from Neutral damage no less - around about half our max HP if we’re lucky from any given skill. This happens a lot right now, so I just reload whenever it happens for convenience.
So, there’s nothing else exciting or interesting on 2F so we’ll head on up to 3. Maybe something useful will spawn or whatever.
Like this, this is nice. Sadly, this is pseudo-rogue-lite so while the general idea of the contents is determined fairly early, the specifics are determined when you open it. It’s weird and confusing, yes. This case, for example, would always contain Yen in this instance but it would be a semi-randomised amount; it could be anywhere from a little under 200 to around 3000.
…As REALLY NICE as seeing a Gold Shadow immediately is, it’s also a mean trap. Not only is it already aware of us and thus will get away, if we did catch it it’d escape then instead. Very tanky, lots of HP (100 flat for the one here), runs, gives good exp etc. etc. A Metal Slime in many regards.
So, let’s talk about one of my least favourite things about Hard mode. This Shadow spotted us at the exact moment as my sword hit it.
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
That means we get Ambushed. If you don’t get the Advantage, but you hit the enemy on Normal or Easy then no one gets the advantage. This CAN happen on Hard mode but it’s rarer. If the enemy is aware of you, even if you get the first hit on the map, you will still get ambushed. It’s really dumb and kind of annoying but we’ll get around it eventually.
Although, Junpei is not filling me with confidence. Especially with the way knockdowns work in Vanilla and FES…
Skipping on up to 4F now and Mitsuru lets us know, albeit vaguely, that the first boss is on the next floor. There is a non-zero chance that we won’t even get to it this trip…
Not much on this floor right now either, so we’ll look over the Shuffle Time!! rewards. We can get new Persona this way, and for a little while is the only way to get ones we’ve fused away. But we can also get Minor Arcana cards which no longer have Persona attached to them (which they did in 2 and only 2 for some reason).
Honestly, the Suit of Cups is a nice thing to get just for general survivability and preserving SP. It’s not a GREAT HP heal right now, but it’s not nothing and can help make a difference.
Suit of Wands is pretty important because holy fuck do we get no EXP from fights here.
It’s a very, VERY small gain right now but it pushed that particular fight up to 5. From a whopping 4!
4 is the average from any and every fight right now, but we get 2 an offputtingly common amount of times too. This isn’t a Hard mode thing; this is just the early game kind of has broken EXP scaling. It gets better later on, thankfully.
Of course, this leaves the Suit of Pentacles, or Coins, which just straight up gives you money. Not great amounts right now, but money is money.
We already know about the Persona gains, and while it’s most commonly Pixie it can be other stuff too. Apsaras is a nice pull since she makes useful fusion fodder (though Pixie has better skills if you can get her up a level) and…
She has Bufu! And better Magic than either Pixie or Orpheus! Her resistance to Ice is a nice boon too, though that weakness to Slash means if anything (except the Hand) hits Makoto, that procs a One More.
Through pure luck, we managed to get some nice footwear from a briefcase too. These are way better than our default gear, so I’m slapping them on Makoto right away. Increased Evasion is always a good thing.
…But that’s still a common pull. That, right there, is a gold chest. That means rare loot! These only have a real chance to spawn on specific floors but they can contain very nice things. This one is on 4F so it has something we’ll want 2 of maybe.
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
But it IS guarded by a random Shadow, through pure chance. Since we have Apsaras as our active Persona and Orpheus in our stock, they can let us use a special Fusion Skill.
If you’re wondering what Apsaras and Orpheus have to do with each other, the answer is nothing really. Sure, Apsaras is a non-specific Hindu woman because it’s a plural. Apsara is just the name for a nymph of cloud and water. Orpheus, of course, is a Greek guy who got tricked hardcore by Hades. The connection is musical, as an Apsara is usually married to a heavenly musician. Hence why the skill is called Cadenza, yes.
It’s half a Sukukaja with proportional healing that doesn’t help right now. The evasion boost is nice but I wouldn’t bother outside of weird niche situations. Honestly, if it wasn’t for the game having a way in which it tells you outright how to make every Fusion skill, you’d be forgiven for not realising most of them exist because they’re really dumb.
Portable mercifully adjusted the way Fusion Skills work and I greatly prefer its system, which we’ll get to later on don’t worry.
…And because I haven’t had good enough luck yet, the Shuffle Time drop included a weapon card. Which netted a Practice Bow instead of a Rapier again. Sure, this is Yukari’s default weapon but that’s not why I want it.
The rare chest on 4F means it contains a Juzumaru. This is a useful 2h Sword that I’m giving to Junpei right away.
It’s stronger than the Imitation Katana AND increases his accuracy ever-so-slightly. That’s nice and all, but that +20HP is the real benefit here. Making the closest thing we have to a tank even tankier seems like a weird decision, but this could prove useful later.
Makoto, meanwhile, gets the Practice Bow. An odd choice but having someone with access to Pierce damage who isn’t Yukari (and thus will mess it up) is going to be useful later.
Floor 5 is a very special floor. It’s layout is predetermined, and it has no random Shadows crawling around. It has fixed locations for the stairs, entrance, chests… everything.
It doesn’t have an Access Point though. Not really. It has this thing, instead.
There is actively zero reason to ignore this since it helps with a couple things.
It’s a checkpoint within Tartarus and gives us a place to warp back to later on if we so choose, and it lets us warp to any other Terminal Points we’ve activated too.
The one on the first floor is always active, since it’s where access points kick us out after all. Oh and it’s not immediately obvious but returning here is an automatic full restore of all HP and SP. You can bet that was removed in Portable!
Gonna throw down a fresh save, get annoyed by the fact that I’m not level 5 in FES yet and then just roll with it anyway and take on the boss.
Master of Tartarus / Danger Zone
Yeah, so this is absolutely true but Mitsuru is neglecting something important.
We have two people with bows. This makes the fight way easier, because they’re eagles. And that means in grand SMT/RPG tradition, they’re weak to being shot. Which means Pierce damage!
Although bows are bad and miss a lot. It’s kind of annoying but we’ll deal.
Really, the most annoying thing about the AI is that our control over it right now is limited. As a result they mainly focus fire on one target when attacking. Since one of the Eagles was Down, Junpei opted to Cleave her. Downed targets take slightly more damage than normal, you see, but in return they’re no longer prone.
These particular Eagles have this nasty trick up their sleeve. Garu in itself isn’t particularly strong, but…
This is what it does to someone who’s Neutral with decent Magic for this stage.
This is what it does to someone who’s weak. Not much of a difference, huh? Junpei having gotten a lucky Magic gain with his stats during the tutorial seems to helped him out here, I guess.
But this? This is what it does on a resistance. If we could actually rely on Yukari, she could probably solo this fight without really having to try. Sadly that’s not an option. And not just because her AI is rock stupid right now.
See, as a weird thing vanilla and FES have… interesting ways they deal with the way Down works as a mechanic. As a result of that, they are the only (modern-ish) Persona game(s) where you sometimes want to not do All-Out Attacks. It’s weird and feels backwards and wrong…
But when something gets up, that uses its entire turn. This was changed immediately for Persona 4 and thus was backported into Portable as well. This is insanely exploitable and you bet I will be using this to makes things go much easier and quicker.
The Eagles being, well, eagles slash dudes with their claws when attacking normally. So definitely don’t bring Apsaras as your main Persona for this fight, not anything with a Wind weakness (which while 100% possible here is unrealistic to get). They can also cast Magaru just to fuck with you further, but that’s rarer and didn’t happen on either the FES nor Portable fight so whatever.
Junpei gets “actually” tired now, which is annoying and a severe limitation to our Tartarus treks right now but because this is tied to our level will quickly stop being relevant later on. Around the second block or so, you can be forgiven for forgetting that this mechanic even exists.
Oh, uh, and the Eagles have 150HP ad 100SP each, and along with being weak to Pierce are immune to Wind, Bless/Expel and Curse (they use Wind and are a boss so you can’t instant kill them)… and drain Fire just because. That’s a nasty trick on the first boss/miniboss but that’s not even close to the nastiest trick in the first block alone.
Those Empress Masks will also come in handy sometime down the line. Don’t worry about it until then.
End
Since treasure on this floor is fixed, we’ll always get a Bead Chain which is insanely nice and I’m already terrified about it being wasted frivolously. If we get low on HP but not in a situation worth using this, the AI will still use this. Yukari and Junpei might have their own item stashes we can’t touch, but the reverse is emphatically not true.
Going up to the 6th floor is a thoroughly bad idea without dipping back to the ground floor for our guaranteed full heal… but if we do that, Junpei will leave now that he’s tired.
So bad ideas it is! We won’t be here long, because Mitsuru is accurate here. There’s a couple new Shadows around from this floor onwards.
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
Like this guy, who I swore was from a higher floor… Well, we can’t hurt him easily, so we’ll decrease his defense for 3 turns at least.
He’s basically Reverse-Yukari in a lot of ways. Sadly, we can’t even take advantage of that Wind weakness right now. If we gave up Apsaras and Orpheus, then Makoto could have Garu but Yukari gets it at level 5 and the Eagles finally let her reach level 4, so…
It’s still not a difficult enemy normally, though it’s gotten more dangerous now. Since Junpei got tired, that’s going to snowball just as a matter of course. It’s sort of inevitable since our levels were identical when we entered and all.
Oh and the Grave Beetle gives 7EXP base, so I wanted to Wand it up to 8. The game had other ideas and decided to proc Wand’s secondary effect and give Apsaras a stat boost.
Later on, I decided to grab this now just to get it over with. Sometimes cards have this skull on 'em. That means they generally are slightly better for their rank than average…
But they’re also cursed to shit. This doesn’t do anything immediately, though.
It does make Mitsuru spout this line earlier than normal, but it still doesn’t do anything. She says this twice or so, by the way.
And then she says this… and then in the audio, you hear constant chains rattling. And if you pay attention to the minimap, there’ll be a Shadow dot moving around. Specifically beelining right for you.
That would be this kind-looking fellow right here. Rather than a generic blob, his actual model is out and about on the map. Complete with his dual-wielded revolvers. Alright, let’s see what we’re dealing with then.
Death The Reaper Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
Because he’s always VERY aware of our presence, it is actively impossible for us to get the Advantage. But because Hard mode hates you, he’ll almost always get it. Not like he needs it, since he has 99 Agility in every version of P3. In fact, it’s his only stat that is a consistent 99.
I’m sure we can take him, though. I mean he’s only using a Heavy Elec spell. How bad could it be?
Oh, just basically quadruple our hypothetical HP cap no big deal. Sure, Yukari won’t ever actually get 999HP but even if she did it wouldn’t help.
Yeah, so, uh, The Reaper is (in theory) a very end-game Optional Boss who appears on almost every floor (ones like the 5th floor are excluded). Usually, that’s because you lingered for too long, so he’s like a soft-time limit to minimise grinding, for some reason, but things like Cursed Cards and special other things can make him spawn sooner.
In vanilla, he has 4444HP (because 4 is Death) and 9999SP. To cap it off, he has 66 in all stats except Agility which is 99. FES and Portable change that a bit to give him 5000HP flat (because 4444 is boring) and 12000SP. Oh and he has 99 in Magic now too.
Needless to say, yes, we will be fighting him for real later on.
But until then, just gonna be avoiding the fuck outta this guy. Occasionally he’ll still pop up and then I’ll get to kite him around like an annoying MMO trash mob or whatever.
Back in the real world (where the only difference is that Death didn’t just casually waltz in and shoot magic bullets), everyone is shattered and leaves immediately. This is also a thing that was removed in Portable, I guess to make up for having to pay for healing now.
Now, we COULD leave as well with our progress to 6F secure and ready for next time. But this presents a problem for Makoto. See, he needs to be level 6 before Tuesday or so. Plus we need at least 9600 Yen to finance the week ahead. So far, we have neither of these things…
Solo and Tired. Well, at least he’ll gain EXP quicker but what could POSSIBLY go wrong with this?
Two Deaths appear this time. There doesn’t even need to be two, they just feel like being cruel.
1 Like
OH BOY OH BOY OH BOY.
Man, am I glad I play Portable. Sure you don’t get auto heals but you also don’t get this!
Alright, so, during the solo half of the Tartarus excursion, not much of interest happens. Even Tired, we’re in no real danger after all; that’s what happens when you stick to the lower floors because they’re convenient enough for our purposes.
Hit level 5 really quickly, which lets us make Nekomata so that Makoto can be still lagging behind where Kotone… was… before the Eagles. At least she has Rakunda inherited from the Pixie. That’s useful.
Bonus EXP pushes her up to level 6 and almost, but not quite, level 7. As a general rule, you get enough EXP to give levels equal to half the Social Link rank.
End
During the real grind for getting from 5 to 6, we get a lot of money, trash weapons to sell later, regain Pixie and Apsaras from Shuffle Time and… get this gal. She’ll be useful later on and let Makoto grind easier since he has Garu access now. Wind helps tear through Grave Beetles after all. Plus, they always come alone…
But, the real reason we care about Angel is that she lets us fuse an Ara Mitama without giving up Nekomata.
This is important because we’re going to need both Nekomata AND Ara Mitama this week. Ara is really good for this stage in general because of his resistance to Strike, that he has Bash and good Strength, both Rakukaja AND Rakunda…
And then he gets Sukukaja at level 8 as well, just because he wasn’t useful enough already. So long as we don’t get (too) Tired on the way up, he can hopefully carry us through the rest of this part of Tartarus. Uh, next time we come here I mean.
Oh and this is what I was banking on happening. It seems like a terrible thing, and it usually is, but we want it. It’ll help speed something up ever-so-slightly.
So, Sunday is the only day of a normal week that is free. See, back until like 2003(ish) Japan had 6 day school weeks. Then it changed to the 5 day system that is somewhat more common. Persona 3, 4 and 5 all use the 6-day system because that’s probably what the dev team is more accustomed to.
It’s kind of annoying to have to deal with in gameplay terms, but we can still manage.
Yeah, I’m outta here.
Yeah, go out and have some fun.
You can study or go out. It’s up to you.
Cool.
Just be careful not to get injured.
Not gonna lie, I would absolutely wear Mitsuru’s winter-ish casual clothes. They’re pretty cool.
…wait shit we spent too much time messing around and we ended up missing Phoenix Ranger Featherman R!
And now, the news. Our first story is about the many youngsters with only part-time employment…
Phoenix Ranger Featherman is one of the few consistent ties between the PS1 Persona games and now, since this was originally in Persona 2 Innocent Sin. Phoenix Ranger Featherman R is a pastiche of a real Sentai show, Chojin Sentai Jetman, which ran every week for a full year from 1991 to 1992. Someone at Atlus clearly really liked that show but I personally cannot speak for its actual quality or anything.
The reason I know it’s that particular series and not anything else is… well, I don’t know for sure but it’s the closest by far. The whole bird theme and what the in-universe Phoenix Rangers are called makes it a reasonable presumption. Some of them are even lifted wholesale from Chojin Sentai Jetman, no less!
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
I’m just wandering around.
You don’t know this place? You should explore the city some more.
Honestly, the city really isn’t that big. There ARE a few places that we haven’t seen yet, but we’ll get there in time I’m sure.
Nothing. What’s up?
I just ate, man. All that exercise in Tartarus makes me hungry.
We could absolutely head into Wild Duck Burger right now ourselves, but that uses up our day so that’s not happening yet. Maybe later.
What’s annoying is that our S.Links are really limited right now, so we’re just meandering around without much to do on Sunday. This’ll change later but this week we’re just gonna head over to the movies again.
Really, this is all we CAN do today of substance so the stat gain is mostly irrelevant. Like, it’s NOT but it wouldn’t matter which stat it was.
In a nice change, when we return home in the evening we don’t get talked at immediately. It’s not going to change anything from our perspective, mind.
All you need to do is perform a surprise attack on it.
However, if the enemy’s ability level is equal to yours, there is a lesser chance it will become distressed.
but its special effect may be more important. Even if two pieces of equipment are the same, if their special effects are different, then their uses will be different as well.
So if the properties on a piece of equipment aren’t very good, it might still be useful, depending on what its special effect is.
Okay, then when you get hurt, I’ll heal you with either an item or a skill.
But, there may be times when I won’t be able to heal you. So don’t get mad at me if that happens.
Y’know, we might actually be using Heal/Support on Junpei before Yukari.
I’m en fuego, baby!
But, it’s weak against wind…
sigh I guess my flame gets blown out by the breeze, huh…
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
The TV hasn’t updated with anything worthwhile since earlier in the day, so we’ll just head on out. Despite being Sick, we can do things like normal which is semi-unexpected I guess. We absolutely should not go to Tartarus like this, though.
So, we won’t. Instead, we’ll just go croakily sing for a couple hours and grind out more Courage. I’m focussing on this one over the other two for a reason, yes.
This is a good thing. I was kind of worried that this might get cured overnight, but thankfully it didn’t.
Listening: Didn’t you say the same thing last week? Is that special morning assembly today? How come we’re having one? We just had one last week…
Gossiping: Remember how great Kirijo-senpai’s speech was last week?
Listening: Oh yeah, that speech was awesome! Although, I didn’t understand most of it…
Gossiping: What I heard was, the principal got jealous, so he scheduled his own speech to compete with her.
Listening: Seriously!? What’s up with that? Why do we have to suffer because of his ego!?
The first bell has rung.
First, our principal has some words he’d like to share with you. Please give him a warm welcome.
…Thank you.
…You think it’s about the recent incidents?
Who cares? The Principal doesn’t know anything about the Shadows, anyway.
I just hope this doesn’t take too long…
I know. His speeches always drag.
As you are aware, strange incidents have been reported on the news lately. It is my firm belief that none of you are involved.
However, if we want to better our school, then we all need to accept responsibility for change.
As they say, “There’s no use crying over spilt milk.”
This is the key to reaping all the rewards that school has to offer…
The Principal continues with his speech…
Yeah, you’re right…
What’s up with that!?
Man, it’s one already bad thing to be jealous of your students. It’s kind of another to just plagiarise them so blatantly, and so quickly no less!
I’m sorry, but I need to talk to you after school. I have a special request for you.
Why me?
I apologize for being in a rush, but I don’t feel comfortable asking anyone else.
I’ll tell you more about it after school, okay? Au revoir.
Hmm? It isn’t? Oh, I see, this becomes 11, so… I’m sorry, you’re right. X=2. Wait… is that right?
Okay, uh, your assignment is to figure this one out. Anyway… Wasn’t that incredible?
What I’m getting at is, math is fun! Don’t you think so? Civilization owes its very existence to math!
All right. Today is the 27th, so that works out to… your turn, Makoto. Do you know when numbers were invented?
Oh shit, uh, I… I’m mashing select but the Network is failing me. It won’t tell me the answe–
Wait, hang on, no. I actually do genuinely know this one.
6000 years ago.
Later, Arabic numerals were invented in India, which brought us the number 0 and countless equations!
Ahh… the beauty and wonder of it all! Math is MAGNIFICENT!
You gave the correct answer!
While I still don’t believe the logic for this at all, it still makes more sense than what 4 and 5 do. Get the question wrong, nothing happens. Get the question right, you gain points towards Knowledge because you learned the right answer. It’s so dumb and I don’t get it at all.
To make a long story short, I want you to join Student Council.
Why all of a sudden…?
Well, it’s not like you have to participate in every activity.
Why me?
…Because of your leadership ability. Being President is very time consuming. I’d like to have additional help available in the event of an emergency.
You understand my situation… I’m asking you since you know what it’s like to be a leader.
Fine…
I knew I could count on you.
But, you’ll have to go to the Faculty Office on your own.
We’ll probably do this eventually, I guess.
I’m sorry I made the arrangements without your permission, but I hope you understand the position I’m in.
Please go to the Faculty Office, Yuki. I’ll be waiting for you in the Student Council Room.
We’re not going to bother with that for a while. We’ll do it sooner or later, though. Could duck in now since we’re passing by the Faculty Office but eh, we’ve got enough going on as-is for the moment.
Just opposite the Library, we can find the Nurse’s Office. We ARE Sick right now, so this seems like a good time to visit the nurse…
Well now, what do we have here? You seem unwell. Is it a wound? A virus? A curse? Or is it love?
This is the perfect opportunity to try my new concoction… Ehehehehehehe.
Mr. Edogawa has a huge grin on his face.
Here, try this…
I’m really not sure about this any more…
Even Hakusan’s finest alchemist would be astonished by the ingredients.
I shall treat your illness right here and now. Now, drink this… Come on… Drink up!
Well, bottoms up I guess…
After drinking the concoction, your condition doesn’t seem to be any better…
…Phew, well done.
The FUCK, Edogawa?!
Cheers to your bravery. …Sorry to have deceived you.
…But, well, at least it’s a free Courage boost. It takes up no actual time, so definitely gonna be taking advantage of this whenever realistically possible, though this might be the only time until near the end of May. Might.
Huh. Didn’t expect these to be here yet. Thought they were added later on. They’re pretty cool looking, for their simplicity and have a nice little reminder that whatever you can do alone can be done easier and better with even one person helping.
Anyway, Kaz is not the most studious of guys so he just slept through class. Figures, really.
But we have Ara Mitama, so we can gain 1.5x the normal amount of points in any given S.Link scene for Kaz so long as he’s in our stock.
We have no reason not to go to Kendo practice, really, so let’s do just that.
The Kendo Team is giving it everything they’ve got.
The workout is tough, but fun.
Toughen up.
Toughen up, eh? Hmph,… Alright!
…How ‘bout you? pant You okay? You’ve been workin’ pretty hard…
You don’t even look tired… pant Wh-What kind of training have you been doing?
The usual.
Tch… pant You act lie… it’s no big deal… pant Well, I’m beat… Makoto… pant You’re crazy.
I knew the Bay Area competition would be tough, but I never expected to be going up against someone like you…
…I’ve made up my mind!
Sure, whatever you say Kaz.
Your relationship is stronger now!
Let’s get go–ugh!?
…What’s wrong?
…Oh, sorry. Let’s go.
You decided to go back to the dorm.
What, just like that? I guess we did just establish that Edogawa is terrible at his job but maaaaaybe getting that looked at by someone would be a good idea?
Or, I guess not. Whatever.
Now, see, this part is stupid and requires making Makoto act super out-of-character. It’s obvious what you’re expected to do but it’s still dumb.
Now, we don’t know Yuko. We have no reason to suspect she likes us at all in any way.
So, of course, you have to ask her to walk home together. That just makes perfect sense.
Nah, I’m in a hurry today. Bye-bye.
You decided to go back to the dorm by yourself.
Senpai, are you sure you wanna let this slacker in?
I simply asked for his assistance. I don’t intend to burden him with too many responsibilities.
Why, are you interested in helping too, Iori?
Oh, uhhh… I’ll pass. But, thanks for the offer.
In fact, I don’t even have time to rest.
I would be grateful if you could help out sometime.
Just stop by the Student Council Room when you have the chance.
Well, as exciting as THAT sounds… I think I’ll pass.
Sorry if it felt like you were forced to join. But any help you could give her would be appreciated…
Every minute is either spent studying, attending club, or fighting Shadows.
Speaking of which, you know about Mitsuru-senpai’s–
Oh, never mind. Forget I said anything.
The shifting economy has strengthened the dollar against the yen. The current exchange rate is 1 USD to 115 yen. The change marks the yen’s 1.4 percent weakening from yesterday.
Gotta admit, of all the things I expected to get out of this, economic analysis was not one of them. I’unno, it just doesn’t seem to fit really.
But constantly visiting the same Empty Orchestra bar to… presumably sing the same song offscreen to get braver? Nah, that’s legit.
Shame that this happens, though. Can’t get more easy points off Edogawa, but it’s fair enough I guess.
Sure have.
I see. Your ability to adapt to new situations and environments is very impressive. By the way, there’s something I forgot to tell you…
Most times you can find me in the lounge. However, I won’t be there if there is something I must attend to.
Uh, okay? I legitimately don’t remember this coming up at all, ever, but I could be wrong and forgetting something.
Much more important is that we’re going to hang out with Kaz again today. We need Ara Mitama for this one; we need 15 points from this scene. Problem is, without him we get 10 at most. With him, we get can 14. Still not enough, but it’ll be fixed in time…
The Kendo Team is giving it everything they’ve got.
The workout is tough, but fun.
I’ll show you what I’m made of!
…Hm?
…!?
Dammit, y-you serious…!?
JV: C’mon… We’re counting on you to be captain next year…
Varsity: The big meet is next year, but don’t push yourself too hard. Makoto, can you take him home?
…Sorry, Senpai.
Exeunt nameless dudes.
Um… My astma’s just acting up…
Are you sure you’re OK?
Of-Of course. It’s just my astma…
…Argh! I can’t do it! I can’t lie to you!
Makoto… I…
Even if I put medicine on it, or massage it, the pain won’t go away.
Will it heal?
Of course. But I can’t afford to stop training, so I’ll work through the pain!
…Next year, there’s a national competition.
There will be participants from all over Japan. The regional meet pales in comparison.
I have to win that meet! I can’t afford to put my training on hold!
I’ve watched a lot of sports anime. It’s cool. I know all about the importance of Going To Nationals.
There are a lot of nosy guys on the team. If they find out, they’ll keep bugging me about it…
Makoto, please keep it a secret, alright!?
Your relationship is stronger now!
Don’t worry about me. Go back to training.
Well, I guess that’s that then. At least Kaz finally got to the nurse’s office, even if it was too late.
Anyway, since we asked at the last scene and failed…
Wanna walk home together?
…Okay, sure. Why don’t we stop somewhere along the way?
Sure.
Okay, then let’s go.
The rich arome of coffee fills the air.
Huh, we haven’t been here yet. Guess we should do that sometime.
The guys on the team all act like little kids.
“Where’s my towel?” “Can you wash this for me?” …I’m not their mother.
…How about you, Makoto-kun? Are you enjoying the kendo team?
Yeah, it’s a lot of fun.
Clowning on the best guy in the team without breaking a sweat and then watching him sit around injured is a hoot!
That’s good.
I thought it might be boring for you, since you’re so much better than everyone else…
You’ve got your own style… You don’t waste much energy.
You guys are in the same class, so I’m sure he’d be willing to help you.
You can ask me, too, if you want, since I’m the team manager.
Yuko seems to be concerned about you.
Your relationship is stronger now!
A mysterious voice rings in your head…
So, there are a couple ways that S.Links can be locked off. Stat locks are semi-frequent, since there are 3 for each stat (one at 2, one at 4 and one at max). Others, like Bunkichi and Mitsuko, are gated off solely by time. The last ones are blocked off by other S.Links. They usually don’t quite work out like this one did, but this is nice streamlining that I appreciate.
However, you’re still just casual acquaintances.
Oh god and we’re already hinting at the worst mechanic. Fortunately it won’t rear it’s messy, ugly head for real for a while…
See you at school.
After saying goodbye to Yuko, you decided to go back to the dorm.
The internet line which was ripped apart by the Shadow will be fixed tomorrow. If you have a computer in your room, you should be able to connect.
…Well, that takes care of everything that was damaged…
…except, of course, Akihiko’s rib cage.
You play any online games, dude?
Online games?
You know, those games you play with a buncha people ya never met before. I was totally addicted to this one game, but then I got burned out…
Here, you can have it…
Only in English. It’s actual original name is “Devil Busters Online” in order to reference real old-school MegaTen stuff.
And by real old, I mean Megami Tensei 2. For the Famicom. Which you haven’t played. (You should, it’s really cool and good.)
Really good.
Excellent. Then, continue the good work.
You should probably use it when you’re waiting for an analysis or when you want to defeat an enemy.
It’s a pretty boring tactic, though, if you ask me…
Since tomorrow is a holiday… You should play it, dude.
First, if all your enemies have been knocked down, you can perform an All-Out Attack on them.
Second, an enemy that has been knocked down will be unable to dodge an attack.
Third, you can alter the attack order of an enemy that is down.
Fourth, you make it waste its turn getting up.
Fifth, downed enemies take extra damage.
Sixth, knocking down an enemy is what gives you a One More letting you chain attacks.
Mitsuru is really bad at tutorials.
Remember: in addition to attacking an enemy’s weakness, you should also know your next course of action.
For example, Dia is only half as effective on you. So try not to get sick, 'kay?
Due to the Golden Week holiday, the highways are expected to be jammed bumper-to-bumper. Traffic conditions are expected to worsen from tomorrow until May 3. Officials expect the roads to be cleared by May 4th. From all of us at Action News, have a happy Golden Week!
Golden Week is a week of four national holidays that starts on April 29th. April 29th is called Showa Day in celebration of the birthday of the previous Emperor of Japan, Emperor Hirohito who was Emperor from 1926 until 1989.
Courage is already rank 3, which is good but still not good enough. It doesn’t even give us anything new later on down the line at this rank!
Academics is, at least, fairly close to a rank up now. Probably not going to happen soon enough to matter but we’ll see…
There’s also nothing worthwhile on the TV in our room either. Boring.
Whether you want to attack an enemy or dodge an enemy’s attack, you’ll need to be quick.
Are you well equipped?
I’m good to go.
That’s good to hear. Just don’t get careless.
Coming up next, more traffic reports. There seems to be no problem at this section, but the highway in the other direction seems to be packed. Officials are hoping the congestion will be relieved by May 4th.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
Make sure you don’t catch a cold. If you feel sick, or if you’re tired, take a break.
They’ve got that new weapon smell.
So, uh, normally you can’t leave the dorm and head back in afterwards without losing game time. I already planned around that, though.
Which is why we can still do this. We could go to the bookstore but…
Let’s be honest, who doesn’t wanna play an SMT MMO? RIP Imagine
You have 1 message.
Phil, of course, is short for “Philemon” a major NPC from Persona 1 and both halves of 2. He’s technically around in every game - even 3 onwards - just… less explicitly than in those three.
Reality is just a series of events and players acting out what they believe is real. When we accept that fact, our world becomes “reality.”
Reality is but a reflection of our thoughts and expectations. But, what if we were merely reflections in another’s mirror? Are you prepared to look through that mirror to discover the truth?
There are 1 player(s) in the area.
Man, that was FAST.
oh wow, u haven’t even finished generating your char yet… o_O
welcome to teh game! good thing i’m usng my low level alt
i think its jus u an me, this is kind of a dead MMO these days xD
It’s not popular anymore?
we r supposed to be our “alternate selves” right? uhhhh… yeah =/
sooo… what r u gonna call ur char? we can meet up later
hm… hey, i got a good name for u =3
Of course, this only applies to the English releases of the game. In the Japanese releases, the given character names are “N-jima” and “Y-ko”.
“N-jima” is short for Nakajima, referring to Akemi Nakajima, the main protagonist of… the entire series, really. He was the lead role for the novels that proceeeded the games, the male player character for Megami Tensei 1 on the Famicom and kind of the entire reason the series happened and turns up here and there in later games in weird ways that don’t really make sense if you think about it. He was made the original main character so that they could be a boring everyman… but whoops, that’s super wrong! He’s actually the reincarnation of Izanagi, for one thing.
“Y-ko,” likewise, is short for Yumiko Shirasagi. She’s where the series name comes from. Yes. Megami Tensei, as you may or may not know, means “Reincarnation of the Goddess.” Yumiko is the reincarcation of Izanami, so she’s the titular Megami. She’s also the main heroine for the original (terrible) novels and Megami Tensei 1. She doesn’t turn up anywhere near as often as Nakajima in later games, because of course she doesn’t.
…Wow, that’s a lot of words to explain a localisation change. It was a sensible one, though, because Digital Devil Monogatari 1/2/3 and Megami Tensei 1 and 2 weren’t released in English (and officially never have been). As a result, the references would go over everyone’s head. So they changed it from things that weren’t released in English to Innocent Sin which… also wasn’t released in English. At least the charatcer names are fine because Eternal Punishment was.
Oh, uh, and because she was described as wearing grey before deciding to go with Maya, she was probably meant to make you think of Yukino first. (I’m sure you remember her from the first episode of Who’s Who.)
have a little deja vu? 
I don’t get it…
oops. hope u can’t figure out how old i am–rofl!!
ne way, i’m usually idling here on my days off… >_>
so if ur bored, maybe we can level together. it sux to be lonely =P
You met a person online who uses a character named Maya.
A mysterious voice rings in your head…
remember, let’s positive thinking! traesto! xD
Maya’s player signed off.
You decided to log out as well.
…Yeah, that used up our entire day. No evening excursions allowed, for whatever reason.
I dunno, do you think any of this is relevant? I mean, I can make better tomb decorations than the ancients.
I can’t wait until we get to the Sengoku era… It’s so exciting!
Speaking of the Sengoku era, there was a general who was called “the war hawk of the battlefield.”
The teacher keeps talking about the Sengoku era…
Huh? You want to hear more about the ancient tombs…?
Well, if you insist… Study the Kitora Tomb in Nara, because it’ll go on the exam.
You stayed up and listened to the lecture…
So, what to do today…
Kaz won’t rank up yet, and even though lacking a Strength or Hierophant Persona right now doesn’t matter it will quickly enough…
But we have Nekomata, and she’s necessary for Kenji from this point onwards so…
What, life?
Life? Dude, you watch too much reality TV.
…But, yeah, I guess you could say I’m sick of life.
I mean, I wake up, go to scool, listen to lame-ass lectures, come home, eat, watch TV, go to sleep…
Kenji is deep in thought.
Hey, so, Kenji there are these things called “laws”…
You can’t do it.
What’re you saying, dude? I’m a smooth operator; I got skills!
Well, I guess I’m gonna go ahead with my secret plan, dude.
I told you, right? I’m going after a teacher. I’m gonna ask her out and make her fall in love with me.
She’s not the most beautiful woman, but she’s really cute. She has pretty eyes, a nice little body, and…
Kenji is going on and on about Ms. Kanou’s finer points.
kenji. kenji please. shut up.
Hey, man, don’t tell anyone about this, okay? You’re the only one who knows.
Your relationship is stronger now!
You walked home with Kenji and talked about his plan.
Please come to the Velvet Room. There is a matter we need to discuss.
You may use the alternate entrance located in Paulownia Mall. All you must do is find the door. I’ll see you soon.
We’ll see what she has to say soon enough, so that’s fine.
But, you can only do that when you’re able to move. If you’ve been knocked down, or have an ailment, you won’t be able to do an All-Out Attack.
And remember, we can’t do anything if our leader isn’t around.
When you use it, you will need to assign a team member to attack a particular enemy.
By efficiently allocating the strength of each member, you can fully utilize the collective power of the team.
If a targeted enemy has been defeated, the team member will revert to his or her normal fighting style.
And remember, if an enemy’s been analyzed before, then we already have its information.
So, make sure you analyze our enemies so we can kick their asses!
But, her skills seem to get more powerful… So just keep that in mind.
We here at Action News recommend getting some fresh air and exercise during Golden Week.
So, before we do anything else tonight we’ll go see what Elizabeth wants.
I have a big favor to ask. I have been looking for someone with exceptional strength. If you don’t mind, will you accept my requests?
Of course, once each request is completed, I will have a reward for you. I anxiously await your cooperation.
You are now able to accept Elizabeth’s requests!
Oh god, there are so many of these things. That number is the numerical ID of the quest, yes, so that top one being 92 is a worrying sign. Most of them are easy, at least, so we’ll clear out as many of them as I can be bothered to do.
I can’t guarantee it’ll be all of them, because there’s too many of the things, but I’ll do the ones that at least seem worthwhile.
Like this one. One Muscle Drink for 3 Revival Beads? Don’t mind if I do! We even have a Muscle Drink already.
Oh, my… I’ve never tried a Muscle Drink before… Is it safe? Well, you have my thanks. I look forward to tasting it.
Please accept your reward.
This one’s important for many reasons, and so we’ll be doing it at the earliest opportunity. It explicitly has to be during the day, though, so either After School or on a free day.
That’s about it for today though. We can’t clear out any more requests without going back to Tartarus (or waiting until a specific date) so we have a reason to do that again soon.
That and it’s a good idea to get to the barrier Mitsuru mentioned before the plot decides to happen again. If we can’t do that, we might have trouble down the line…
I hope our end of the conversation was the word “don’t” over and over again.
The longest, most drawn-out sigh in human history.
1 Like
April is now over, so it’s time to once again see what happens in an alternative timeline…
A weird detail to change, but Kotone doesn’t wake up from the Magician stuff until the 19th. You probably wouldn’t normally notice or care that this IS different, though (Makoto woke up on the 17th).
In a weird bit of streamlining, Junpei also joins SEES on a different day; the 21st here as opposed to the 19th before.
And we then IMMEDIATELY go to Tartarus for the tutorial. During the forced entry of the Velvet Room at this point…
Tell me… When you think of this person, what do you see?
Is it a man?
I see… Then let’s bring him out for a proper introduction.
So, we have a choice of Attendant here. Still no return of the classics, like Belladonna or Nameless though. Theo is pretty great and it’s a crime that the only way we know this route technically happened is that he turns up in Persona Q.
Anyway, here he’s voiced by Travis Willingham. Who, in completely random trivia that you probably already know, is married to Laura Bailey.
And now we’ll just skip ahead to after the tutorial is done, because we don’t needta see that twice.
One thing I appreciate is that this game stole the rank up graphical style from Persona 4. It’s not quite as cool as Persona 5’s but it’s a bit more streamlined and I appreciate that it’s here.
One of the weirder changes is that Be Blue V doesn’t sell accessories now. It’s not a big deal and it won’t even matter really, but it sure threw me off at first.
Mercifully, Kurosawa sells them at his totally legitimate arms dealer second job. The nebulous “connections” aside, the only way I see this really working is if he’s selling us stuff out of the evidence locker or what have you.
First day of free time doesn’t have much for anyone to do, so we’ll spend that at the movies too. Next day, however…
I know someplace that’s really good! It’ll be my treat! C’mon, let’s go!
Sweet, let’s go!
Alright, now you’re talkin’.
I’m pretty sure you’re not allowed to be surprised by this.
It’s crowded, but luckily you were able to get in without much waiting.
That sounds good.
Well… I’m sure it’ll be better than you’re expecting.
After a few moments, the waiter brings two ramen bowls to you.
The fragrant smell rising from the bowls makes your stomach growl…
C’mon, try it.
You take a bite…
The distinct taste of the soup blends well with the thick noodles…
I’ve never had anything like this.
Haha! Good, right? Well then, I’m digging in too. Chow time!
Ahh, hot hot hot…
Man, this is great!
Although Junpei eats noisily, he seems to be enjoying his ramen…
Hey… Do you feel okay now?
Thanks…
Huh? Oh, um… No need to thank me…
I had some problems myself when I transferred here, too.
I was wondering if you weren’t accustomed to school or whatever…
Then again, I think you’ll do just fine.
Junpei seems embarrassed and laughs…
You can sense Junpei’s thoughtfulness towards you…
I love that Junpei is the character that represents the Junpei Social Link. I dunno, it’s just perfect in its simplicity.
Stop smirking like that.
Aww… I can’t help it.
Oh, but I don’t drag love into my work.
Then again, I can’t guarantee that I won’t fall for somebody, mwahaha!
You and Junpei chatted for a while, then headed back.
So, yeah, this is a pretty significant difference. New S.Links! You can probably guess some of the others at this point (if you don’t already know them).
Also we’re going to Tartarus immediately. Not so much for the money (no, Kotone’s money problems come LATER because Maniac’s only point of difficulty is economic inflation) but because this is the best chance for a while.
So, uh, we’ll be glossing over most of the actual Tartarus trip here. This is a big deal though; I forget its here a bunch, but it makes the Terminal Points kind of irrelevant for their primary purpose. This can even take you to floors like, say, floor 6 which is just a random floor that you normally can’t warp to. I appreciate it but I also dislike it.
I’unno, I’m kind of weirdly fickle like that.
Also, Mitsuru gives us all this shit. Decent healing items, SP recovery, items that let you warp out of Tartarus/guaranteed escape from randoms and… Cadenza. Yeah, so, Fusion Spells here are just items that you can use. This is both better and much, much worse than what vanilla/FES do.
Oh, uh, Skill Cards! Right. They’re a thing backported from 4 as well. Get a Persona up to a specific level and gain the listed card; it just teaches one of your Persona the listed skill. Some are way, WAY better than others, yes…
Also, uh, the EXP scaling is way, way different here. I’d call it “fixed” but it feels a bit too much in the other direction now. This is on the upper end for the first few floors but the lower end is like 9 so…
And this is with the 1 of Wands. Jeez. Haven’t even gotten to the Venus Eagles yet!
Nekomata is still Nekomata, but we need to get her to level 11 for her card. We won’t; it takes a ton of grinding even in the best case scenario. Provoke is not good enough for that.
Also on floor 6, we find this. It, uh. I reset at this point to NOT get this. Because getting this here is ridiculous.
Anyway, Kotone and co EASILY get to the barrier Mitsuru mentioned so we’ll just split the timestream here and come back to that later…
So, sports teams! Tennis is cool and good and I really like tennis.
The only alternative is volleyball and that is ALSO cool and good. Hrm. This is tricky.
Well, let’s think… we’re doing Kendo in the other timeline, so…
She’s Kotone Shiomi from class 2-F. Everybody be nice to her, okay?
Nice to meet you all!
This club seems to have a rather friendly atmosphere.
At the very least it seems that you’re welcome here…
Um, who was the leader for the juniors?
Ohey, it’s… uh… that girl. You know the one! Yeah, her!
Oh, good. I’ll leave the rest to you. I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do here anyway. giggle
…All right.
Ms. Kanou left…
Tanned: Haaa! That sounds exactly like her. She’s too old to try to act cute like that.
…C’mon, let’s get back to practice!
I’m in charge of the juniors in the club, so don’t hesitate to ask me anything.
Man, these days are different. That’s nice and all but it’s one of the many things that means I need a completely different schedule for this…
Thanks.
Well then, we’re gonna concentrate on doing basic exercises today, so come on and join in.
Just keep up as much as you can.
I keep telling you all that the fundamentals are important! Let’s start off with some running.
Club Members: Alright…
Kotone-san, you stand in this line.
If you start getting worn out, just keep your mind focused and you’ll be able to pull through.
I’ll be all right!
Ahaha, you sound promising.
Rio seems to be taking her role in the club seriously…
Club Members: One, two…
After running laps, you went through a series of muscle exercises…
Then you diligently went through basic drills in serving and receiving.
You decided to go back to the dorm after practice ended.
[i]The Hierophant S.Link is started and plays out completely identical to before, so we’ll just skip over it for now.
But this? This is important. Also different again, dammit.
So, what does this mean in practice?
Kotone comes back tomorrow and it gets to rank 2. This didn’t happen before because Sunday is the closed day for Makoto, and he went to the movies instead. (We’ll see the actual scene for this later, don’t worry.)[/i]
So, let’s completely mess up time itself for a moment…
Wanna go somewhere?
Hmm… okay. I wasn’t doing anything today, anyway. Alright, let’s go.
You stopped somewhere on the way home with Yukari…
Still haven’t come here outside of these sorts of scenes. Hmm.
U-Um, well…
There’s… something I need to say to you.
What is it?
Um… You probably might not remember, but…
Um… When you woke up in the hospital…
You know how I said all those things to you right after you woke up?
Like, “you’re the same as me,” and “you’re alone,” and stuff about your parents…
I mean, I lost my dad, but in your case it’s both your parents…
And even though things may seem the same, people react to them differently…
But I ignored how you might’ve felt and forced my own opinions onto you.
I’ve been worrying all this time that I might’ve said some unfair things to you that day.
…And I want to properly apologize for it. I’m sorry.
You might not like it, since it’s teh fact that we’re both missing parents…
Still, I’ve never had anyone who could understand it around me before…
It’s different for everyone else at school. They have both their parents at home…
They can complain about how they’ll get yelled at if they come home late…
I… When I hear stuff like that, I feel jealous.
But I hate that feeling that way, so I hide it… And because I can’t tell anyone that, I feel distant.
I felt lonely.
…Yiked! Sorry! I’m being selfish again, I know.
But, the fact that you’re part of our group now makes me feel a lot better.
Haha, I’m just going around in circles with this pity party, aren’t I?
But… That’s how I really feel.
Yukari confided in you.
You feel as if you’ve gotten a little closer to Yukari…
So, Yukari is not unique to this route. Getting the S.Link this early, however, is. For the “main” run, we’ll need to wait several more in-game months before we can even attempt to start it. As a result of that, the initial scene for it (at minimum) is significantly different. Hence why we broke time to do this one now.
…You decide to go back to the dorm.
So, Junpei doesn’t give us ISO and instead considers about playing it himself. I guess (in his head) girls just don’t play games or MMOs or something??
Next school day, rather than waiting 'til evening to tell us about sidequests Theo opts to do it in the afternoon. This matters. This matters a lot!
The sidequests available are almost identical to before, but we don’t have one to perform a Cadenza. Makes sense, since it’s just an item here.
Naturally, to accomodate the skill cards a few rewards are changed around. Oh and this one gives us armor instead of Revival Beads.
What makes this important though is that we can accept the quest to show Theo around Paulownia Mall and this option appears immediately. Well, no time like the present!
A Date With Theo
definitely watch this if you can/want to/whatever
…Indeed, it’s exactly as I imagined.
Despite these words, Theo’s eyes are clearly glimmering with excitement…
Are you excited to be here?
Theo is mumbling…
…? What is that over there?
Theo is pointing to the water fountain.
…
The dwellers of this world must get thirsty easily.
I don’t think that’s it.
…
I-I know its true purpose, of course.
Oh Theo, you poor boy.
That’s not it.
…!
…
…It was only my small joke.
…
So… Wh-What is it actually for?
A bit of scenery…?
…I see.
Theo seems distraught for some reason…
Hm…? And what, pray tell, is this facility here?
Theo headed towards the police station.
These photographs…
I see… So the concept of subjugation requests is not unknown here.
We don’t kill them.
Ah? In that case, you mus have to capture them alive… Only a skilled hunter could accomplish it.
Theo is nodding triumphantly…
If there are hunters of such talent in this world as well, I may want to make a few requests of my own…
Hm…? What is that?
Could this be “club” of rumor…?
You know about it?
Yes, I heard no end of it…
…Though this marks my first time seeing it in person.
Well then, let us venture in…
…It’s closed…!?
This can’t be…
Theo is in utter shock…
It seems… I have no choice but to turn back…
Theo is slightly tearing up.
…You decide to show him the arcade.
Ar…cade…?
Theo, please. I have so much to teach you…
Hmm… A-All right, let us investigate.
“Bird controlling game”…?
The things inside this case… Those are birds?
They look to my eye more like stuffed animals made of cloth…
Theo is lost in thought…
Ah… Excuse me. I note another aquatic pool over here.
Theo headed towards the fountain in the corner of Paulownia Mall…
He seems restless for some reason…
He’s looking around as well…
…He abruptly stuck his hand into the water.
It’s 8 degrees Celsius.
You can tell?
Of course I can.
…This world has its charms.
I… would relish the chance to visit it again sometime.
Thank you very much for today.
You returned to the Velvet Room with Theo.
End
We’ll also clear out almost all the remaining quests here, since we can. There’s only two we can’t, because Grave Beetles don’t drop a shell if we don’t have the quest active and the other one left can ONLY be done on May 2nd.
Oh and going out with Theo doesn’t use time. How nice! So, let’s hang out with Junpei as well.
I’ve been looking forward to this coming out!
Junpei’s eyes are lit up…
C’mon, let’s go in!
Ooh, are you looking forward to it too? Alright, let’s get some good seats!
You and Junpei watched the movie “Double-Barreled Justice” together.
Seeing the action scenes on the big screen was overwhelming…
…The story was surprisingly complex.
It was… kinda not what I was expecting.
Junpei cocks his head…
The villain wasn’t all that evil. It kinda killed it for me when he started talking about his tragic past…
It isn’t cool if you have to beat somebody who didn’t want to be a bad guy.
Bad guys should be evil all the way to the core. It’s just more satisfying.
Junpei shrugs…
Oh, you still got time, right? Let’s grab something to eat on the way back.
You came here with Junpei.
I sort of figured it’d be a bit longer 'til we came here. Guess not, huh? Thanks Junpei.
Oh, crap… The guys at school might say some stuff if they see us together.
Plus, the famous Yuka-tan and Mitsuru-senpai live in the same dorm, too.
There are a lot of dudes who envy me because of that…
I’m… sorry?
Yeah, it’s your fault!
I mean, you’re not all excited and asking me who’s saying all this stuff.
…I mean, of curse you aren’t. No girl would be that desperate.
Junpei nods triumphantly.
Also, I know you’ve probably got your hands full with your own stuff now.
Actually, the same goes for me, too…
Junpei’s expression suddenly turns serious…
Want more fries? You don’t mind sharing with me, right?
You and Junpei chatted for a while before heading back.
1 Like
Fun fact, BOTH of the VA for Makoto are wedded to their Velvet attendants. Lowenthal and Platt are married as well. An amusing thing to know.
Alright, let’s see what May has for us. A new month means new opportunity!
Well, it IS May already. It’s amazing how time flies…
I guess.
So much has been happening…
Ya know, it doesn’t seem like the number of Apathy Syndrome cases has been decreasing lately…
We’re the only ones who can fight the Shadows, so…
I guess we should train more, so that we’re ready if anything like THAT comes up again.
…Me especially. I don’t wanna be a burden on everyone else.
Though we skip straight to after school, today’s taken up with something else…
He called me earlier, and asked me to bring him something.
Yup, he knows who to count on.
I’m kind of surprised, but also not really, that Junpei’s a member of the good ol’ Going Home Club…
H-Hey, I resent that.
giggle I’m just kidding. So, what’d he want you to bring?
What’s he want that for?
…Well, I don’t have practice today, so I’ll go with you.
You’re coming too, right?
Sure.
Cool.
W-Wait a minute…
What? Is there a problem?
Well, it was ME he asked…
…in this room? By any chance?
We came to see you!
But… it doesn’t look like anything’s wrong with you.
I’m just here for a checkup.
So, Akihiko’s visitor here is voiced by Grant George. As far as Persona cares, he was also Boy with Earring/Naoyo Toudou/The Protagonist of Persona 1 in the PSP remake. which is also good and you should totally at least check it out
Yeah, thanks.
Tch… I don’t have time for this shit.
A friend from school… sort of.
You know how the number of Apathy Syndrome cases have been increasing?
Hey Junpei, did you bring what I asked?
Of course, Senpai.
Uh, you shouldn’t move your arm…
It’s nothing. I’ve wasted enough time already. I need to get back to my training.
Yeah! Gekkoukan’s golden boy! He was born to be in the ring!
Sometimes, I really don’t get you.
By the way, Senpai, why boxing?
You mean, why did I choose that sport? Well…
…and I don’t want to feel that way again.
Besides, I’m curious to see how strong I can get. It’s like a game, only I’m competing against myself.
That’s an interesting way of looking at it.
Ya know, I’m into games too…
Yeah, VIDEO games.
Hey, they’re good for hand-eye coordination!
It’s good to know that Junpei is That Guy who uses this as an excuse for why playing video games is totally worthwhile and important honest.
End
It may take some time for Akihiko to fully heal, and I don’t want anything like that to happen again.
Besides, the number of victims seems to have been increasing.
…I have a bad feeling about that.
We had best muster as much strength as we can.
So, don’t worry. Heal, support, attack… Whatever you need, we got your back!
Huh? Which enemy would we attack first? …The one that’s about to die, of course!
Listen, if you don’t know what to do, just choose Act Freely.
Disagree very heavily. Act Freely is bad and leads to people coming up with arbitrary complaints that aren’t actual complaints. Its real problem is that it’s just not as efficient as any of the more dedicated tactics.
This is all Mitsuru has to say right now, so uh, yeah. I guess she did have a point earlier re: Tartarus though. We’re not gonna go today, mind you.
Yeah, I think so.
Akihiko-senpai said that guy goes to our school, but I’ve never seen him there before…
A-And that’s the latest word from the man on the street. Now, back to the studio for more news…
So, what to do today? Let’s see, it’s Friday so…
The arcade seems like a good plan to me. We’re going to put this Courage to use sooner than you think, but it’s still a bit of a ways away…
Listening: Ehh… Not really. But I’m not gonna miss tomorrow’s show!
Gossiping: When I hear that jingle, I can’t resist buying something… I never miss it when it’s on Sunday afternoons. I’m about to go broke!
The first bell had rung.
Tanaka’s show turns up in one way or another in every single Persona game from 3 onwards. Since it’s only around once a week, you’d think it’d be easy to forget it exists. You’d be wrong. Very, very wrong…
So, what to do today… well, this is our first chance to show Elizabeth around. Let’s do just that!
A Date With Elizabeth
really gonna recommend just watching this instead trust me
This must be a “fountain”…
It makes sport of water, well known to all to be the foundation of life… How wicked!
It’s rumored that its enchanting nature grants wishes to those who sacrifice a few coins…
That’s a superstition.
…Is that so?
Is it possible that the worth of the coins wasn’t sufficient to pique the fountain spirit’s interest…?
Fortunately, I anticipated this, and brought a good supply of coins.
I shall make an opening bid to the fountain spirit of 1,000,000 yen.
Um…!
So yeah, uh, Liz is VERY different to Theo…
The torrent of coins is like a waterfall…
Ah…!
This won’t do…
I shall give it more careful consideration before I return here in the near future…
There are some stern-faced gentlemen inside…
And these photgraphs displayed so prominently…
Most Wanted… Reward…
You don’t kill them…
I see… So they must be captured alive.
You’ve sated my curiosity.
It can’t be… Is this… A “club”!?
Dancers, dictated by the sway of one’s inner passions… A subterranean garden of uninhibited spectacle…
…Such a pity. I had hoped to join in the wild ritual…
Ooh! That was quite satisfying.
But I’m overwhelmed… Everything looks so new and inviting. Everywhere I look, something catches the eye.
…If you wouldn’t mind, perhaps you could recommend our next activity?
Karaoke.
Karaoke… is that…?
It seems the time has come to show you my hidden talents…
…Y’know I’m really unsure on whether Theo just casually being able to get the exact temperature is better or worse than Liz dumping in 1mil.
Hm!? Yet another fountain, on the opposite side…
I think it’s the quantity of these incidents that does it; if she did the 1mil once, it’d win out handily.
I see… so this place is host to a trinity of fountain spirits.
I’m kind of very disappointed we don’t get to see even a little bit of that.
I consider this mission fully accomplished.
This may sound forward, but… I’d like to accompany you again sometime.
You headed back to the Velvet Room with Elizabeth.
End
That fountain… I still haven’t made a decision on what to wish for.
And I was so set on it, that thinking of something else is proving to be… difficult.
…Oh! I’ve finally come up with something.
I’ll wish to think of a wish. There… that wasn’t so hard.
Now as for a reward, I’ve prepared something special.
Can, won’t. Not because she’s bad (whe we DO make her, she’ll probably be really good!) but because she’s level 20…
She is a charming Persona, combining the looks of a sweet girl with powerful abilities.
So, uh, now that we’ve kind of got to know Liz and Theo somewhat, let’s get weird. And by weird I mean you probably already knew this, but… their names are taken from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. And, uh, associated materials thereof.
Elizabeth is named after Elizabeth Lavenza, the wife and, uh, adopted sister of Dr. Victor Frankenstein. It was the 1800s, but even Mary Shelley knew that was weird so she removed the marriage thing in later versions.
Theo is a bit less clear cut. He’s got two potential namesakes, though neither of them are characters from the book. Dr Theodore Bohmer is a character from the 1942 film The Ghost of Frankenstein and the alternative is Theodor con Holst, the first illustrator of the novel. I don’t buy the latter, because no Attendant has been named after Mary Shelley herself and that would happen first by far.
…Yeah, and, Igor himself totally falls into this pattern as well being arguably named after Ygor from the 1931 Universal movie. Ygor was an invention for the film, and let’s be honest Bela Lugosi did such a great job that it’s super-easy to forget that Ygor isn’t even in the book. The pattern didn’t formally start until 3 though, so I would be surprised if they didn’t decide to just run with it when wiping the slate clean.
Uh, anyway. Cadenza is a thing that was cast at some point or another I guess. I can’t say I remember doing it but whatever. This nets us some Agilao Gems which is going to prove very important. No, really.
This unlocks another request for a Fusion Skill, but we can’t do this one for a while. It clearly requires Jack Frost and Pyro Jack but Frosty is level 8 and Pyro Jack’s even higher…
Fortunately, despite the last line implying that Liz’s hangout takes time, it doesn’t. So we can head back to school and see if we can find someone there.
Hmm… How should I deal with this?
Just seeing him makes me smile.
You can see someone else in this corridor too, in fact. I wonder who that could be…
Ah, so THIS is where Mitsuru hangs out, huh?
Yeah. Want to join me?
…Sorry, I’m busy. I’m going to study for a while before I go back.
Make sure you don’t neglect your own studies.
I know you have other things to worry about, but studying should be a student’s number one priority.
Kind of a shame we can’t hang out with Mitsuru right now, but maybe one day. Hmm, so for now…
Sure, Yuko’ll do. We don’t have a Strength Persona even remotely close to being available right now though. The first one is level, uh, 11…
And now we can even check out the “proper” version of Wild-Duck Burger. I’m sure this is what you were really interested in, after all.
What happened?
Well, nothing major. Maybe I exaggerated a bit…
But seriously, I have been feeling kind of down lately…
…Mr. Ekoda asked to speak with me. He wanted to know why I turned in a blank quiz.
Getting a bit too real here, game…
Then, he got pissed off! He even yelled at me about the length of my skirt!
Who cares about Classic Literature anyway!? Besides, I didn’t do anything wrong!
Right, Makoto-kun!?
Do your school work, Yuko.
I agree.
Exactly.
Doesn’t he realize we’re only teenagers? Now’s the time to enjoy life!
Who cares about stories by a bunch of dead guys!?
Maybe I should be a science major. Then, I wouldn’t have to take Classic Literature…
Wait! Then, I’d have to take Physics…
My reputation as an “intellectual” would be ruined. blush
That’s true.
That was a joke… Y-You’re supposed to play along!
I didn’t mean to trick you! …Is my nose getting longer!?
You’re so gullible… You shouldn’t believe everything people say.
Mr. Ekoda asked me to write a 3-page essay, reflecting on my performance in his class…
Three pages!? Is he serious!? What does he expect me to say!?
But I guess I have no choice, if I want to graduate. Otherwise, I’ll have to repeat his class.
I can’t wait to celebrate graduation with everyone, especially the team…
And you too, Makoto-kun.
…Or, am I getting ahead of myself?
It seems Yuko has taken a liking to you.
Your relationship is stronger now!
Bye-bye.
After saying goodbye to Yuko, you decided to go back to the dorm.
I asked some peeps if they wanted to hang out, but the only ones interested were guys…
Man, I don’t want no sausage fest…
You had best use your time wisely.
sigh You HAD to remind me…
Yeah, uh, midterms start on 5/18 for reference (you can see this at any-time on the Calendar in your room or in the menu!) and… to get the best score possible you need an Academics that’s at least at rank 3 which is absurd. It’s possible, sure, but it generally requires spending time studying that could be best used on anything else. We probably won’t get it (yet) is what I’m saying, sorry.
Some Personas have skills, other Personas have physical abilities.
Remember, it’s important to use a Persona that suits your style.
Akihiko’s advice here seems really weirdly out of place. Like it would make a lot more sense if this was like Persona 1 or 2 where everyone can change freely, but here it’s just a sort-of tutorial that kind of stretches suspension of disbelief somewhat.
Therefore, fighting an enemy by yourself will gain you the most experience.
The more experience you gain from fighting, the stronger you and your Persona will become.
Considering EXP scales, this isn’t necessarily as useful as it sounds later. It has a resurgence in a big way far, FAR down the line… but until then, it’s just a good thing to keep in mind to potentially grind up other people easier.
Well, those are the best times to go to Tartarus, dude.
You’ll definitely kick a lot of ass!
So naturally, they scheduled midtersm right after the break… It sucks!
The Hachiju Hachiya means “88th Night.” It marks the beginning of the late dew season. It’s widely known that this time of tear is when the best tea leaves are picked. There were many tea parties thrown around town in celebration.
Let’s see, it’s 5/2 now and according to one quest’s description we can really only finish it today so…
You need some? Why would I have pine resin…?
…! Ohhh, okay… You mean the powder we use in Archery Club, right? The yellow stuff?
We use it even in practices, so it runs out quick…
But I think I have some left. Hang on.
What did you need it for, anyway? Got a bow to take care of? Well, whatever.
Well, we could immediately go to Paulownia and give this to Elizabeth there but… there might be a better way.
Like, say, let’s go to Tartarus. It IS Saturday and all…
And THEN give Elizabeth the Pine Resin!
Ah, no… it must be the pine resin I requested.
It does look like soybean powder, though…
Your reward for this assignment will be soybean powder.
Ah, excuse me. I was just cooking something with soybean powder, so…
…Hmm. Which hand was the pine resin in… my right, or my left…?
They look so similar…
Please accept your reward.
This is an item equivalent of an instant-kill spell. It has its uses for sure, but of course being Expel elemental anything worth using it on is immune.
So, let’s see if we can finish off Thebel this time. Since we don’t have much left in terms of unique content, this should (appear to) be brief at least!
This is kind of nice, but Elemental Gems have a secret downside that means we probably won’t use them all that much. It’s worth it just for the functionally free multi-target attack at least.
Once we hit floor 7, Mitsuru chimes in with information that there is indeed a boss fight upstairs… somewhere. Useful!
That’s a pretty small Shadow. That means it’s probably just one thing… Grave Beetles always come alone…
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
Since we crept up on it from directly behind, this was nice and easy to snag at least. Sure enough, it IS a Grave Beetle too!
Thanks to Angel giving us actual Wind capability, we can drop it reasonably quickly as well. As for the cut-ins that will inevitably keep cropping up, they sure look cool… but that’s all they do. They don’t guarantee your attack to hit (at least here), they don’t ensure extra damage, they’re just style not substance. Which is kinda disappointing, but whatever I’m super okay with that.
Since we have the quest to get a Beetle Shell active, the Grave Beetle actually does drop it too. I do believe they’re guaranteed so long as the quest is active, so you COULD get more than 1. I don’t know why you would though…
Oh and from 6F+ we can also encounter these guys. They’re basically miniature enemy versions of Yukari, without the ability to heal. They use bows to attack and cast Garu. They do have a weakness that’s actually exploitable at least.
On 8F, Mitsuru just gives us good advice and recommends we bail if we’re too injured/Tired. While I totally agree with that, I am far too arrogant and overly confident for my own good and almost never do so unless it’s actively a liability. You’d think the extra damage received and reduced damage dealt would be incentive enough…
But, see, it really isn’t. In fact for a lot of trash Shadows I just kite them around at this point and see what I can get out of it. Sometimes it’s useful. Others… it’s, uh, Medicine.
Absolutely nothing of substance happens on the 9th floor so we’ll skip to the 10th!
Definitely going to want to active the Terminal Point just in case…
And then take this thing back to Elizabeth!
It is by far one of the most lucrative things we can do at this stage after all.
Anyway, uh, how about that boss fight?
Magician Dancing Hand x3 b[/b]
Master of Tartarus / Danger Zone
Yeah, uh, no. These guys are kind of easy compared to the Venus Eagle. Honestly, there’s only one reason I reckon they aren’t the other way around…
That they’re weak to Strike sure doesn’t hurt, but it does mean we’d normally need to ditch Orpheus and pray that Bash gets inherited on fusion for it to be viably exploitable. But! Ara Mitama comes with it by default!
As for what these guys can do, they can cast all the single target first tier Elemental spells.
…And apparently they can cast this? That’s the meanest thing about this fight, right there.
Tentarafoo is a multi-target ailment spell that has a base 25% chance to inflict Panic. Fortunately, it isn’t quite as mean as it is in later Persona games since this just closes off skills and that’s basically it here. But, uh, that can potentially be bad enough if it hits Makoto.
Anyway, my main plan for these guys is really simple. Knock 'em all down, don’t All Out Attack, make sure Yukari doesn’t ruin anything and hope to God that Junpei doesn’t miss and kills one.
Thankfully, the AI obliges provided thigns go as planned. This makes the remaining two hands waste their turns getting back up and then we knock 'em flat onto their… palms?.. again and then we do AOA and end the fight. Nice and easy.
At least that’s what we WOULD do if I didn’t have a cunning plan…
They give okay EXP and 3 Mazio Gems is potentially nice. Resistance-wise, they’re relatively tame there being immune to Expel/Curse (for sensible reasons) and resistant to Fire/Ice/Elec/Wind. That’s it. They have 220HP and 120SP so we can’t realistically run them out of spellcasting anytime quickly.
End
A dumb thing about vanilla and FES is that it doesn’t tell you if your party members level up following a boss fight. So you have to manually check and, sure enough, they did. This is pretty important since now Yukari and Junpei can actually hit weaknesses sometimes. It’s kind of hilarious that Yukari learns her first three skills at levels 4, 5 and 16 though.
Fixed treasure on this floor is a pair of higher-end SP restoratives. Once again, I feel like this is weirdly paced and doesn’t necessarily make sense. It’s fitting for the boss fight and all, but maybe like 5 Snuff Souls would’ve been more level appropriate? Not like I’m complaining all that much though!
From 11 onwards, we get some new Shadows added to the rotation again. We’ll see them in time, I’m sure.
As an added bonus, we find a rare treasure chest that gives us a Juzumaru as well. I will need one more before I’m satisfied enough with this, though…
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
Floors 11 onwards add this one new Shadow. Yep. One. It’s two humanoids that are connected by skewers which is kinda hardcore I guess?
They can do this which is pretty mean. Even meaner is the AI explicitly cheating with its targetting here.
Trance Twins ARE weak to Fire and Junpei has Agi now, but he’d never used it before.
Neither aspect of this winning plan was exactly known by the AI at the time…
On the 12th floor, Mitsuru tells us where the next boss fight is. Exactly. Impressive! I also think the dialogue here got messed up and this should be on the 13th…
Ah well, while looking for the stairs leading on up to the 13th, we find this. A Traesto Gem might be useful at some point as a quick means of leaving Tartarus without finding an Access Point.
On the 13th floor, Mitsuru decides to get vague again. This is why I’m pretty sure the dialogue here is backwards. It’s really clearer the other way around after all.
Ah well, it’s not like it matters too much. At least the 13th lets us find a nice piece of armor.
It’s flatout better than anything else we have AND gives a Strength boost? Definitely giving this to Junpei then.
Speaking of armor, there is some… special armor around the middle of the block (from 6+) that I’ll definitely go back and get because it’s worth seeing.
Anyway, we’ll worry about that later! For now, the 14th floor awaits and with it the boss fight against… one Shadow? Well, this should be easy.
…Ahahaha noooo. At this point, everyone is Tired, I’m missing a key element to make this fight viable and I don’t want to get Sick today so we’re going to just bail. Having the Terminal Point active will save time getting back here later though!
You again?
It’s been a while. Are you well?
Be careful. A new ordeal awaits you…
What kind of ordeal?
You must prepare for the ordeal, but time is of the essence… I’m sure you’re aware of that, of course.
The older I get, the more I identify with Yuko. (Or something something depression)
I can’t tell if I like Elizabeth or Theo more. I want them both in the same room, they’d be great.
After last night’s… interesting heads-up from that one weird kid, I guess that explains why there’s moons on the day calendar here and a constant reminder on the main HUD too…
So, first day of Golden Week! It’s a 3 day holiday, though really it’s just 2 since the first is a Sunday.
Hmm, Sunday… that reminds me.
Current Net Price Tanaka
super recommended double plus pro click
[quote]Current Net Price Tanaka in your television
Everyone’s friend of desire[/quote]
Hmm, translating it sounds rather clunky huh. Oh well, that’s what the opening actually says (though it’s not translated in-game).
We’ll show you great items at unbeatable prices! Ooh, you won’t be able to touch that dial!
Let’s bring out our item of the day!
[quote]Current Net Price Tanaka in your television
Shop, it’s now or never[/quote]
Oh my goodness! I can’t believe its wondefulness!
But wait, there’s more!
We could totally not buy this, but if we either can’t afford it or opt to not but it then we lose the chance permanently.
Honestly, Tanaka’s is such a good deal in general, that missing out here sucks so much. Granted we don’t get the stuff until Tuesday…
See you next Sunday, same time, same channel!
The catchy song starts up again…
The shopping program is over.
Welp, that’s it for this week. Now to find something less important to do…
Sure am.
Damn you, you backstabber!
Well, go right ahead then. The door’s right there. Don’t worry 'bout me. I’ll just be here, doing nothing.
The bigger it is, the more enemies there are inside it.
And watch out for those red Shadows.
Know what you’re getting into before you attack one.
How do you know about that, Akihiko? They sure don’t appear at the start of Tartarus and none are in Thebel at all…
Will you be able to fight with only three members until he returns?
Of course.
C’est magnifique! Then, I’ll be counting on you.
Oh wait, it’s Sunday! Damn I nearly forgo–
Nooooooo!!
And now, the news.
Today we’ll look at the epidemic of youth depression, including an interview with the leader of the…
And then it just ends. Welp, okay.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
Alright, so, while we’re out ever-so-briefly we could totally sell all this trash gear we’ve picked up. Getting it from Shuffle Time isn’t quite as efficient as just taking the money outright but it’s not really bad either.
Oh and those Empress’s Masks are just for use here flipping them for an easy 6k. Gonna have to remember to do that sometime.
Although she’s late… Hmm. I wonder where she is…
But, uh, it’s a Sunday so we’re limited in what we can do right now. That means I guess we can stay inside and study, go to the movies or do the needful and play an MMO.
Let’s be real, there’s only one option here.
You don’t see any other players.
The girl in gray signs on.
u remember me rite? =/
…Have we met?
The other player seems sad.
Hey, if you’re going to reference Persona 2 and then try and act like it’s clever, you’re not allowed to get mad when I do it too!
hmm… what kinda people r we, playing inside on such a beautiful day?
Sunshine is overrated.
HahaHAha!! dman straight! XD
It seems like Maya is amused.
lol… we’re s’posed to be leveling, but we jus keep on chatting =3
but hey, grinding gets old rite? its more fun talking to u, tatsuya.
Maya opened up to you.
Your relationship is stronger now!
Oh shit, I figured it out. It’s Sunday which means sales day which means… Maya is Saitama!
Ace detective!
Maya’s player signed off.
You decided to log out as well.
Honestly, it’s amazing that we’re even capable of putting up with this thing even if it IS for S.Link purposes. Makoto always looks so bored in these scenes, moreso than at any other time.
Also Maya does indeed just steal our nighttime slot too. For some unexplained reason. It’s kinda very dumb!
Let’s see, today is a Monday which means we can’t Tanaka again. We could spend today with Maya as well, but that’s not really ideal. Hmm…
During these times, you may encounter an enemy. So if you think you’re in danger, use Request Help immediately.
When you do, I will contact the others and request that they assist you.
Honestly, I’m impressed that Akihiko can sleep with something on his face like that. Just like in general.
Today’s subject is a 20-year-old girl with bright blond hair.
…Next is the news. Pain, pain, go away!
So the second guest we’ve seen on Who’s Who is Lisa “Ginko” Silverman, an American girl who… can’t actually speak English because she wasn’t taught it. Because her dad is a weeb. Really. She’s got a super-obvious crush on Tatsuya, is super into Bruce Lee and kung-fu movies in general and decided to try to learn Cantonese in lieu of Japanese to spite her shitty parents. Lisa’s primary Arcana was the Lovers, and her default Persona is Eros, the overtly on the nose Greek God of Love. She’s a playable character… in Innocent Sin… and only an NPC in Eternal Punishment.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
Hanging out with friends is nice, but it’s important to get some alone time too.
So, that’s today down the drain. We’re gonna try again tomorrow.
I always have the worst luck on my days off…
'Sunfortunate, that. We’re also fairly limited on what we can do today right now, but it’s fine since we have just the thing.
We could totally do Maya again, but this is a day that gives us effectively guaranteed bookstore time so we’d be a fool (no, the bad kind) to not take it.
What was your name again?
Makoto…
I’m just joking. I know who you are. I’m not that old.
My wife and I were just talking about you, Makoto-chan.
Makoto-chan, do you like Melon Breads?
Someone gave them to me, but I have more than enough. Go ahead, take one.
Thanks.
Don’t worry about it; it’s just a Melon Bread. There’s no need to thank me.
Makoto-chan, you’re so polite. I wish HE had been that way…
Do you want one for a friend too?
…Because it’ll take us forever to finish them all.
Thanks.
Alright, here ya go. Um… uh… err…
What was your name again…?
Remember, dear? This is Makoto-chan.
I’m sorry, Makoto-chan. He’s terribly forgetful lately.
Here you go.
…Where did he run off to, dear?
Who’s “he”?
Let’s not play the pronoun game for once, maybe.
Our spoiled son. He hasn’t been back in a while.
Bunkichi seems lonely.
Where did he go, dear?
Mitsuko seems sad.
What are you talking about?
My apologies, Makoto-chan. I hope I’m not making you feel uncomfortable.
Bunkichi and Mitsuko shared their painful past with you.
Your relationship is stronger now!
H-Hey, hey, why the gloomy faces?
It’s dark outside. I don’t need it to be dark in here too.
…Please come again. We’ll be waiting for you, Makoto-chan.
After saying goodbye to Bunkichi and Mitsuko, you decided to go back to the dorm.
You’ll have to carry it with you, even when you’re not in battle.
A one-handed sword is probably the easiest to use.
It’s not too hard to swing, and it has decent range.
But if you want to go to Tartarus, you can go and tell her.
Let’s see, it’s a Monday so that’s probably out but… the next Saturday IS the night of the full moon…
Sorry Junpei, already know. Hold R1 and it displays until you let go! Already used it, even.
There’s no excuse for being unprepared.
We can’t afford to let ourselves be surprised.
Now I’m not putting complete stock in what that kid said, but if he’s telling the truth and we have to deal with One Of THEM, then we’re limited on time to go to Tartarus…
So this is our first opportunity since we last went. Might as well take it and see if we can at least finish Thebel at last.
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
Goddamn, a Gold Shadow! This wasn’t supposed to happen! I was meant to get to secretly finish grinding without needing to do anything here on-screen.
But, yeah, these guys are Metal Slimes through and through. Nimble bastards, tank hits real good, almost always go first and run if given any chance. Stat-wise, Wealth Hands are level 1, have 100HP, 100SP, 1 Strength, 1 Magic, 1 Endurance… and 99 Agility and 99 Luck. They’re immune to Expel, so whoops that’s out. Resitant to everything else though.
Thankfully, Elizabeth gave us these Agilao Gems otherwise we sure wouldn’t be killing this thing anytime soon.
Don’t even give any EXP but that’s fine since that Wealth Coin is very important. Because it’s vendor trash. It’s another 3000 on top of whatever else we can get, which is pretty great.
…At some point I apparently did pick up a 3rd Juzumaru. How about that.
Ahh, and the hilt has beadwork laid in… That’s why it’s called the katana of evil’s bane.
It’s a good-sized sword, too.
Approximately… 81.08 centimeters, with a 3-centimeter curve, measuring about 3.96 centimeters in width.
Cards like this are semi-rare but useful to get whenever you can, since they’re statboosters. They all increase Luck and a second stat based on the Lesser Arcana represented. Cups are Endurance so this Lu+1/En+2 which isn’t exactly my preferred stat gain.
And while we’re here, let’s make the first boss of Nocturne. He’s going to theoretically end up being really useful for what we need him for. Gonna stick Pixie and Nekomata together for this one to get best chances of Pulinpa and anything useful.
Pulinpa (ST Panic; base 25% chance) is only available on Pixie at this point and she needs grinding to level 4 to get it, you see, hence swapping her in at the end of the Dancing Hands. Jack Frost DOES have it by default but he’s level 8 and if you can grind enough to get him here you’re a more patient person than I. Or playing Portable since it requires no grinding to manage that there.
Now then, let’s just head right on back to the 14th floor.
There’s only one Shadow here, but man can this guy be a bit of a doozy if you don’t know what to expect…
Master of Tartarus / Danger Zone
Nice to see that Mitsuru has learned how to read the number on the mask, without needing to analyze the Shadow first.
Anyway, Rampage Drive is a meanie poopiehead and I’m so hardcore I’m fighting him with the main character tired. (thanks pixie)
Mercifully, he’s a big ol’ strong dude with no elemental weaknesses so he’s susceptible to ailments somewhat. Panic is the best we’ve got at this stage, the only easy early alternative being Rage and oh dear god no that sounds like a fucking terrible idea.
The early-game really hates Junpei though, so this guy is just that writ large. On top of being immune to Expel and Curse, he resists Fire and nulls Slash and Pierce.
That doesn’t mean Strike is a good idea though. No, that’s worse. Asshole reflects Strike!
If it is was just that, he’d be kind of annoying but takable in a straight fight. You’re ultimately going to be leaving either damage or healing (or potentially both!) to Yukari because Junpei can’t contribute to either well, so this guy has a counter for that too. Remember how getting knocked down eats your turn when you get back up? Elec just so happens to be the only magical element this guy has…
Suddenly that susceptibility to Panic is a damned good thing to use, huh. If he wasn’t Panicked, he’d deal ~70 damage to Yukari alone, so uh, yeah. Bad times. Strangely he doesn’t get One Mores outside of Portable which is not at all a bad thing.
But if “almost one-shotting Yukari” isn’t scary enough (which, let’s be fair, it kind of isn’t), he can also do this make it “almost one-shot EVERYONE” instead. That 70 goes to breaking triple digits. Yeesh.
Mazio is Rampage Drive’s only multi-target attack though, but let’s pretend he got to use something. Assault Dive is light Strike damage. Bash is also light, for reference, but the difference is quite pronounced as Bash has a Power of 30 whereas Assault Dive is 90. Rampage Drive has 9 Strength and he sure knows how to use it.
Fortunately, there’s other means of dealing with this thing albeit they’re riskier. Cadenza is a good alternative since it’s both a multi-target heal AND an evasion boost. It’s not quite as sure a bet as inflicting Panic though. It’s still helpful if you don’t have a thing that can cast Sukukaja (you almost certainly don’t)…
Since remember what I said before about Panic sealing skills? Yeah, his basic attack still goes through. And it’s Pierce elemental just to mess up anyone who thought Ara Mitama was a safe bet to solo this thing or whatever.
So, yeah, Rampage Drive is the first “real” roadblock and one hell of a step-up after some eagles and hands that probably don’t even get real turns. And that’s a good thing. It gives a fight that has some degree of tension since Panic only removes 2 turns and then he gets to do SOMETHING.
Another alternative is to wait until later and then just dunk on the bastard with stronger things and party members that can contribute better but, uh, nope. That’s not my speed and is a bad idea in general.
End
Balms of Life are revives that put someone back up with 100% HP instead of the 50% that Revival Beads do. And since Rampage Drive dropped one, we got two out of that guy. How nice. That other briefcase though…
Full party restore. For all HP. And all SP. If they’re giving this NOW, I can only imagine what’s waiting on higher floors…
Speaking of which, 15F let’s go why not!
It ends up being really, really tiny though. There’s the stairs basically right in front of where we spawn, one whole Shadow but there’s nothing new here, an access point by the stairs because uhhh random generation is dumb and one item (it’s a Muscle Drink here, great).
Good work. Return to the entrance.
16F is… as far as we can go. We’ll leave in a moment, but first: fixed loot!
Not quite what I was expecting, but Elizabeth wants to at least see this for the last request we can do. It’s also on a time limit that is very, VERY close to expiring so I’m glad we got this outta the way now.
We can even read it in the menu if we want, though it’s not so much a “document” as it is a “paragraph.” Following in the survival horror trend of documentation, I see.
Also, I appreocate that the barricade is formed entirely out of school chairs. And also a magical aura. It just gives it that extra touch.
Have you already read it? It’s quite interesting…
If not, then I definitely recommend you take a look.
A Bead Chain is always nice for sure, but I feel like this wasn’t necessarily reflective of the work required to get it considering we got a Bead Chain and a Soma en route as it is.
Only request remaining now is to have both a Jack Frost and Pyro Jack at the same time and that’s not happening for a while. No reason to stick around here, so back to the daily life of being a high school boy it is…
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Nothing left in Tartarus right now, so we’ll be hanging out with a bunch of folks this time, I guess.
Tuesday being a holiday drastically limits our options, though…
The Minister of Public Management has reported the number of children under 15 years of age. According to the report, 9.8% of the population is aged 15 years or younger. The report marks the first time Japan’s child population has been under 10%. The aging population is slowly becoming a problem in some areas… The government has called for more data regarding the situation, and ordered a study into the matter.
Mitsuru’s dialogue hasn’t updated since yesterday and Akihiko is still dead on the couch. Still not gonna deal with Maya because of sensible time-management reasons.
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
But dude, no one’s showed up yet. Maybe I’m just early, but…
Hmm, so there’s not much to do today really so… back to the bookstore it is!
But, I can’t seem to find it.
Looking for something?
How’d you know I was looking for something? Are you psychic?
I’m looking for my glasses… No, not my glasses–my wallet… I can’t seem to find it.
I’ll help you look.
Wow! Makoto-chan, you really can read minds!
I was just thinking it’d be nice if someone gave us a hand.
You search for the wallet with Bunkichi and Mitsuko.
…Wait, what were we looking for?
The mysterious foreigner handed a wallet to Bunkichi.
Wow! This is it! I’ve been looking for this wallet everywhere!
Well, it’s not a golden wallet, but I’m still happy to have it back!
Sumimasen, excuse me…
Aren’t you ze transfer student everyone eez talking about?
I go to ze same school–Gekkoukan!
…Who are you?
Wait, how do you get from that to… but that’s… I don’t…
…
Hajime mashite, it eez nice to meet you too!
Remember a while back there was an NPC who mentioned that room? Yeah, now that makes sense. Though this scene is only one requirement for getting in there. We still need more Academics…
I 'ope to see you zere. Sayonara, goodbye!
Bebe has left the store.
Hmm… I thought I put it in my wallet so I wouldn’t lose it…
Ah, here it is! I knew it was in here!
…Dear? Is that key for…?
Seeing Makoto-chan reminded me of how things used to be…
I haven’t heard the roar of the engine in a long time. How do I look, dear?
Why must you get into a car!? Do you want me to end up all alone!?
What’s so bad about a car?
Um, Makoto-chan…
I’m sorry for raising my voice. Did I scare you?
Our son… Remember what I told you? How he passed away…
I’m sorry to hear that.
Makoto-chan, please punch me… Punch me for being so insensitive…
With all my excitement, I forgot to consider how my wife might feel… I’m such a… I’m such a…
It seems like Bunkichi feels guilty.
Bunkichi and Mitsuko told you the truth about their son’s death.
Your relationship is stronger now!
Since I found my wallet, why don’t we eat out, dear?
Thanks for searching with us. Makoto-chan. Consider this your allowance.
Bunkichi stuffed a Medicine into your pocket.
After saying goodbye to Bunkichi and Mitsuko, you decided to go back to the dorm.
Yuka-tan said she’s gonna study… But not me, man. I’m gonna find something fun to do.
Yeah, Mitsuru and Akihiko aren’t anywhere in the dorm today. So this is the first time we explicitly can’t go to Tartarus isn’t of just opting to not do so.
I didn’t study at all over the weekend, so I’m getting it done now.
Maybe next time?
Yukari IS around, but uh she’s shut herself up in her room to study. Well, we DO have exams in 2 weeks…
We can’t do much about that for the moment, so we’ll just do whatever we can I guess.
It’s the thing you bought from the TV show!
The Slash Ward will be useful later, but the Sappy Jelly is basically useless really. It’s fine, we weren’t after that anyway.
Now this? This is gonna be useful if it sticks around 'til the 7th. Extra Courage from Edogawa isn’t a bad thing.
Listening: You know, rabbits can die from sadness.
Gossiping: Okay… First, you’re not a rabbit. And second, that’s just a rumor.
Listening: What? No way! I thought it was scientific fact…
Listening: She looked so sad playing all by herself. I felt sorry for her…
The first bell has rung.
I was watching TV last night, and there was a special on weight loss. “The more you drink, the thinner you get!” Yeah, right!
What about the osmotic pressure, huh? It’s misinformation, but people believe what they see on TV…
A lot of companies say stuff like “Our product contains minerals!” But that’s a load of hooey. There’s hardly more than trace elements of whatever they’re talking about. It’s meaningless.
Did you know that there are different names for water depending on its calcium or magnesium content? You look like you know the answer. Makoto… Surprise me.
Soft water.
That’s right. You’re better-informed than I thought! Most of the water in Japan is soft water.
That’s why many Japanese find it strange to drink hard water, because they’re used to the other kind.
Remember. cooking rice with hard water ruins the flavor. Now. let’s look at the various ions in water…
You gave the correct answer!
Alright, so now what are we going to actually do with our day? Hmm.
Well, first we’ll gladly take our Courage boost and then, uh, since we’re in the area…
Should probably go talk to Ms. Toriumi about student council before I forget entirely.
About Student Council…
Oh, yes. I heard from Mitsuru. All you need to do is read this and sign here.
You signed the papers that Ms. Toriumi handed you.
Makoto Yuki… Alright, then.
Leave the rest to me. Good luck in Student Council.
You now have access to the Student Council Room.
Now we can do something with that, I guess? But for now, we’ve got something more important to do. Gonna head on over to that shrine to see what’s going on over there. Something weird about that and all…
When The Moon’s Reaching Out Stars
Who are you?
Mom and Dad said not to talk to bad people… Are you bad?
Yeah, real bad.
Maiko looks as if she wants something.
I can’t play right now because I’m hungry.
There’s something I really want…
We already have the right thing for this, so we don’t get told quite what she wants but it’s fine.
This is my favorite! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
This is the easy bit at least, since if you don’t have it you can just go to the strip mall and buy it.
That was so yummy I ate them all!
But, now I’m thirsty…
Maiko looks as if she wants something.
This is my favorite! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
This one is a legitimate timekiller though. If you don’t have this, too bad. Only place to get it is the vending machines in the dorm so you can’t just go and get it as easily.
Wow! I’m having so much fun!
You’re nice. Will you be my friend?
Come play with me again, okay?
Of course.
There ARE options to be a dick to the actual child who seems to have no friends but, uh, lines. Try not to cross them.
You better not be lying!
Social Link… no…? Huh. Weird. Sure feels like one would trigger here, but no dice. This didn’t even take up time!
But we WILL get one here now that we’ve done this, but that’s a way down the line right now. We need to come back at a later date, which is why the timekill from missing the Mad Bull can matter so much. You only have like 3 days of leeway when it comes to maxing every link so there’s one gone right there. So far so good, though…
But anyway, let’s see. What are we going to spend actual time on? Kenji (haha) isn’t around, Kaz isn’t around, Yuko isn’t worth our time without a Strength Persona now and that’s a long way off…
I suppose we’ll get this done then, yeah?
He’s the one I’ve been talking about the past few days. He’ll be joining us in Student Council.
Makoto-kun, huh…
I’m a sophomore, and um… I’m still learning the ropes, so… please be patient with me, Makoto-san.
Nice to meet you.
Again. We saw Chihiro very, VERY briefly on our first day of school.
Hidetoshi is sizing you up.
…You must be talented if the President hand-picked you.
It seems Hidetoshi wants to learn more about you.
You’re getting to know the members of Student Council.
A mysterious voice rings in your head…
So, uh, fun fact about this link. In the original vanilla version, it’s glitched. The boost you get from having a Persona of the relevant Arcana didn’t work here, which made charting an already tight route even harsher by accident. Fortunately it was fixed in FES and Portable so we don’t have that issue to deal with.
It’ll be your job to help us, Yuki.
From now on, you have my permission to enter the Student Council Room whenever you need to.
That includes after school, too. Thank you, Yuki, for joining us today.
You decided to go back to the dorm.
I’m getting worried since nothing’s happened since that one day…
Is it just me, or are more people getting Apathy Syndrome lately?
I have a feeling something bad is going to happen. …Or, am I just being paranoid?
However, you can’t wield it very fast, so there is a high risk of the enemy launching a preemptive attack.
Therefore, when using a two-handed sword, you must stand a good distance away from your enemy, and pay close attention to the timing of your strike.
Should I just start going to club when I feel like it. Makoto?
Definitely.
Hey, I was just kidding. Even if I wanted to, Mitsuru would never let me.
…This is a perfect setup for me.
“Now, who wants to reach the top, hmmm?”
“Oh, me! Me! I wanna go to the top! I wanna go to the top!”
Well? Whaddya think?
sigh Ignore him. He’s just trying to do his impressions again.
Yeah, uh, I really don’t get this weird running gag all that much. Junpei trying to be a one-man manzai skit really is losing something in translation here, I swear.
It has great range, but its attack speed is slow.
If a Shadow gets in too close… I’m done for.
I need to fight from a distance…
The employee involved in creating the malicious code has already been terminated, but company officials have yet vto determine the true extent of the information leak.
Well, that’s rank 2 in about 16 days or so. Can we get to 3 in the next 12? P-Probably not… but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try!
Silence
Hm? Well, this is different.
Sure.
You wanna do something next Sunday?
Sure.
Sweet. I’ll see ya next Sunday, then. Don’t forget!
Kazushi seems excited…
Okay so, this would’ve happened on Monday right? Accepting this offer gives us like 5 points or so towards the next Chariot rank (enough to push over the threshold for rank 4!) but the offer would’ve been for Tuesday instead. We could reject that one but then we wouldn’t get this one because it’s kinda a dumb system.
Going to Tartarus locks that day’s call out and delays it until the next opportunity for it to come up. This is something we’re going to be using a couple times because otherwise scheduling is gonna be a pain in the ass to deal with.
More important right now, is that this DID happen and I didn’t have to savescum for it either (though I was totally planning on it).
En route to Edogawa, we can find Chihiro hanging out just outside our classroom now.
Um…
…C-Can I help you!?
I wanted to talk…
I-I-I don’t have anything to talk about!
…Oh, um… I’m sorry…
There is an awkward moment between you and Chihiro.
As is the case with a lot of things we’re doing today apparently, this is something that’ll pay off more in the future than now. Necessary evils…
Also we drink Edogawa’s weird bullshit again. I was completely expecting this to push us up to the fourth rank but no such luck. Go figure.
Well, uh, we have a fair few options now but we’ll stick with an old classic for now.
The Kendo Team is giving it everything they’ve got.
The workout is tough, but fun.
You don’t see Kazushi…
After finishing the training, you decide to go back to the dorm.
Wh-What’s up…? I was just gonna sneak into practice…
Did you ditch?
No way! I had a legitimate reason!
Kazushi seems pissed off.
She made the appointment without telling me, so… there was nothing I could do!
That sucks.
Doesn’t it? My mom, the rest of the team… Why does everyone have to be like that…
It gets annoying when everyone around you is so nosy, huh…?
Today, they took x-rays… I’ll know the results tomorrow. I don’t know why they couldn’t have told me today.
…Oh, hey! Don’t tell anyone about me going to the hospital, alright? I’m counting on you, Makoto!
…I-I’m always asking you to keep quiet… Sorry 'bout that.
Kazushi seems to be appreciative.
Your relationship is stronger now!
Wait a minute! Since you’re leaving, that means practice is over…
…Oh well. I guess I have to go home today… Later, Makoto.
Kazushi has left…
You decide to go back to the dorm.
Other than that, nothin’s been going on…
Man, talk about boring…
Let’s go to Tartarus for a little action.
Maybe I should come along… I’m dying of boredom, too.
…Akihiko, are you trying to make me angry?
Yeah, uh, definitely recommend NOT doing that!
How do you like living here?
It’s really… exciting.
That’s very true. I don’t think you’ll find a dormitory like this anywhere else in the world.
Officer Kurosawa must be selling them to us without realizing it.
Yeah, that’s a thing you can tell from the interface even! When your perusing in the store it tells you that there’s some added effect, but not what it is. If you parse it from Kurosawa’s perspective that makes sense but it does have a weird implication that it’s random even though it isn’t.
…But that doesn’t mean anyone will want to buy anything from you.
But, I guess there’s nothing you can do about that.
For even better luck, try skipping and frolicking around!
While I’m sure your curious, sorry, I don’t know if Makoto is a Taurus or not. His actual date of birth is not a known quantity, but that the year is 1992 is. He has to be 16 at the beginning of the second (of three) year of high school which limits it somewhat but that’s all.
For reference of everyone else of importance:
Yukari: October 19, 1992 (Libra)
Junpei: January 13, 1993 (Capricorn)
Akihiko: September 22, 1991 (Virgo)
Mitsuru: May 8, 1991 (Taurus)
So, uh, yeah, the horoscope happens a day before Mitsuru’s birthday at least. Fancy!
Silence
Actually, I’m kinda busy.
Oh, you are? Alright, I guess I’ll talk to you later, then.
Kenji hung up. He sounded disappointed…
Unlike with Kaz before, we can just tell Kenji to piss off and that’s the correct option. I know it seems weird since we don’t need to actually hang out with Kaz for anything this Sunday, but replacing it with Kenji instead is the worse option.
…And not just because he’s Kenji but that sure doesn’t help.
Regardless, we want to talk to Kenji now because at rank 3 he tells us about the Best Character*.
Well, I heard he knows more about food than anyone…
People are always asking him for recommendations on where to eat.
…Well, I major in noodles, so there’s nothing he can tell me about ramen that I don’t already know.
I mean, I heard he goes to Hagakure and orders rice-based dishes… What a loser!
Yeah, I’m sure that’s his worst trait all right.
Also wow Kenji you have no high ground to stand on, you creepoid weirdo.
I wonder who he is…
We could theoretically try and meet the Gourmet King right now and I was very tempted but there’s a time and a place for everything. The Gourmet King will get his time in the spotlight soon enough…
For now, let’s see how bad Kenji’s terrible plan will go. This should be funny.
Why?
Hey, don’t freak out, man!
I’m gonna go ask Ms. Kanou out right now!
Good luck.
Thanks, man! I’m gonna go get myself a girlfriend!
If I give him false hope, it’s going to make his crash that much sweeter…
Alright, dude, here I go!
Kenji ran off.
Hey, man, listen to this!
She said yes! Can you believe it!? She said YES!
No, in fact, I don’t believe it at all.
…O-oh. Uhh, so, you see, the thing about that is…
Kenji is in his own world.
Dude, I owe you! I owe you big time!
It seems that Kenji successfully asked out Ms. Kanou… i[/i]
Your relationship is stronger now!
Maybe, uh, here’s a thought: don’t consider assaulting your teacher, Kenji. Definitely don’t do it either!
Kenji is talking to himself and doesn’t seem like he’s ever going to stop.
Kenji ran off.
It’s getting dark. You decide to return to the dorm.
So, uh, real quick: the first time I played this game I got to this scene. I then proceeded to ignore Kenji for the rest of time, because jesus christ.
I can be fairly confident in presuming I’m not the only one.
Anyway, happy birthday Mitsuru! No one will comment on this in-game though!
You’re referring to the Shadows, I take it?
It’s been a month since the last attack, yet I’m certain that won’t be the last time they appear outside of Tartarus.
True… Lately, it seems like The Lost are everywhere. So, something must be going on…
During Rush, everyone on the team will attack the same enemy. It’s an easy way to finish a battle quickly.
But, be careful if you use it on a strong enemy, because you can’t heal during Rush. So don’t get us all killed, man.
It’s also the button that gets remapped in Persona 5 for the skills menu, so while I auto things a lot anyway I end up doing it more by accident as a result. Awkward, annoying but it hasn’t killed me yet so that’s a wash.
Anxiety is spreading near Port Island, where many of the victims are from. This is Kaede Kuroki, reporting from Tatsumi Memorial Hospital.
So there’s not much around at the dorm, and there’s a full moon tomorrow…
If that kid was right, then we have something happening tomorrow. Hopefully, it’ll be something we can manage if it even happens…
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So, May 9th. A Full Moon, huh? I’m sure nothing untoward will happen.
How’s it going? Have you been training in Tartarus?
Yeah, a lot.
Great, keep it up. It never hurts to train while you have the chance.
My wounds will heal in no time, and then I’ll be able to join you on the front line.
But, don’t just rely on me.
So, uh, something important here…
You wonder if something will happen.
You should probably head back to the dorm just to be on the safe side.
We don’t get any free time at all today. Last chance to save at all for the totally definitely nothing was, well, yesterday.
After that, we just skip right on over to the Dark Hour…
You’re still at it?
Yeah. You never know when the enemy might appear.
But, I thought you couldn’t scan outside of Tartarus?
To be honest, I lack the power…
Although, the power of Persona seems to be much broader than I thought.
There’s something special about his ability.
It hasn’t been that long since his awakening, either.
I have to admit, I was surprised too.
But in the end, it’s up to him whether or not he can reach his full potential.
Huh…?
Silence
What!? You actually found one!?
Wait, something’s not right. The reading is too big.
We’ve never encountered anything like–
You mean, it’s one of those!?
…It must be.
I’ll wake up the others.
One press of a button, a loud alarm and a fade to blue later…
Where is it!? I’ll rip it a new one!
We’ve detected a Shadow outside of Tartarus.
We don’t know for sure, but we think it’s another big one.
We have to defeat any of them we find, as quickly as possible.
That must be avoided at all costs.
In other words, we need to kick some ass, right? Well, count me in!
sigh Junpei…
Wha–!? Are you kidding!? I’m going!
You still need to recover. You’ll just be a hindrance.
Tch!
They’ll fare better than you, in your current state.
Have faith in them, Akihiko… They’re ready.
You’ll get your chance. But for now, wait for the Chairman.
…
Dammit…
Relax! I’ve got it covered!
I guess I’ve got no choice…
We’re counting on you…
Why me?
Who cares? They chose you, didn’t they? Same as always.
Heh, looks like you’re stuck playin’ leader again…
Sucks to be you.
If you’re providing backup out there, you’ll need time to get ready, right?
Wait for me in front of the station. I’ll be there as soon as I can.
Got it.
Alright, let’s go!
She’ll be here soon.
There’s a full moon tonight…
…Huh? What the!?
I just love the reactions (by which I mean Junpei’s) to Mitsuru turning up on the motorbike that they all know she has.
Listen carefully.
Tonight, I’ll be providing support from here. Everything else is the same.
To get there, you’ll have to walk on the tracks.
Are you serious!? Isn’t that dangerous…?
But, your bike…
It’s special.
That’s a bit of an understatement…
Now, if circumstances change, I’ll notify you immediately.
Let’s get started.
Okay.
L-Let’s do this!
End
You have to stop the Shadows before they harm the passengers. Hurry!
This is a small, controllable section that basically exists just to setup everyone’s equipment and check out the full moon. And also get a look at Tartarus from a distance, for good measure.
Yes, I can hear you clearly.
We just got here, but I don’t see anything out of the ordinary…
The readings are definately coming from that monorail.
Proceed with caution, and stay together.
Got it.
Heheh, my Persona’s just beggin’ to be used!
He’s been Transmogged, huh… Creepy.
So… guys like him don’t remember a thing, right?
It’s probably better that way.
Huh…? Wait a minute.
We’re not at a station, but the doors are wide–
!?
As if on cue, the doors begin to slam shut. Great work, tempting fate there.
Damn, it won’t open!
Ow, my fingers!
Will ya look at them! They’re all jacked up!
What’s wrong? What happened!?
It looks like we’re trapped inside…
Be ready for anything! Proceed with extreme caution!
R-Roger!
We get to move through the monorail’s train cars now though they’re lacking in much of anything. Including Shadows. Hmm, how odd…
I don’t see any Shadows…
Junpei even comments on it as we enter the 9th car…
Though this time around, nothing happens.
Well, not immediately anyway. Once we get about halfway through the 8th this happens.
gasp
There it is!
Oddly though, rather than attack us, the Shadow runs away. Hmm!
Junpei, being kind of an idiot, fails to see through the world’s most obvious ruse and tries to give chase.
Something’s not right… The enemy is acting strangely.
But, if we don’t go after it, we’re gonna lose it!
Makoto, you’re in charge over there. What do you think?
We should be careful.
I agree.
Who needs your advice!?
We can beat that thing no problem!
Hell, I’ll do it myself!
Watch out! Behind you!
Oh look, the obvious trap was in fact an obvious trap. What a shocker. I bet as we’re getting ambushed here, Junpei’s getting jumped by a bunch up ahead.
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
Alright, so, we have some new Shadows to deal with here. Makes sense, since this isn’t Tartarus and all.
They, uh, are cripplingly weak to fire though. Well, they ARE books…
They also signal the beginning of just getting real EXP values in general. I’m getting excited!
We have no choice.
You have to go after him, or you’ll be picked off, one by one.
Dammit, Stupei! What are you thinking!?
If I had to guess, he isn’t.
From what I can tell, he’s only a few cars ahead.
Gah! Get out of our way!!
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
Two Spurious Books like before, but with a Heat Balance added in for good measure. This one resists Fire (and Ice) so you can’t just use the same thing here, but…
It’s weak to Wind and Elec to compensate. It balances heat, after all! Not so great at the other things.
Well, after that we get a chance to heal if necessary (ha) and then run through another empty carriage.
He should know it’s too dangerous to go alone…
Don’t you think he’s acting weird? Did you say something to upset him, Makoto-kun?
Well, we can ask him once we’ve caught up to him!
No need, I can tell you right now what the problem is.
He’s obviously upset and mad that we were assigned group leader again, and he wasn’t considered. Unfortunately for him, it’s stunts like this that make him bad leadership material in the first place.
Shoot! He’s surrounded!? We’ve gotta help him!
Well, shit, he’s been hit with an All-Out Attack! He got too cocky…
…I’ve got it under control!
Take this, you freak of nature!
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
So, one book, one balance and… a Dancing Hand?! Well, that’s different.
It’s not quite the same as the ones we fought before, though. It has significantly less health and a reduced movepool.
It’s also capable of taking over double its max HP from a single Agi. Resistances are also, therefore, quite different from before, yes. It sure ain’t weak to Strike here.
Silence
…So, are you alright?
O-Of course I am…
I was doin’ just fine…
Excuse me!?
Well, he’s not wrong. That fight was 2/3rds weak to Fire and 1/3rd resistant sure, but Heat Balance kind of crumples because it’s trash fodder.
Be careful, you three!
I don’t detect any movement, but stay alert!
It seems the monorail is under the enemy’s control…
Whaddya mean, “it seems”!?
Uh… This doesn’t look good.
WHAT!?
Oh, God! What are we gonna do!?
Calm down and listen.
You’ll have to defeat it to stop the train!
So just do what you were going to do anyway, and everything will work out fine. Convenient!
Mass Destruction / Wiping All Out
Well, so long as the table is only laughing it’s fine. Being a table, it IS weak to Fire but uh Makoto missed like a dumbass.
So Yukari had to actually do something, and one-shot the table anyway.
Anyway, yeah, uh, you probably noticed the time limit. That never stops ticking down now that it’s started. If it hits zero, that’s kind of amazing honestly. You have to TRY to do that.
There ARE a couple normal Shadow fights hanging around in the second and third carriages, but…
They’re technically downgrades to the random fodder from Tartarus. Kind of a weird decision, but there is a chance that someone could maybe not one-shot the book, hand, table or balance so this is sort of maybe easier to deal with.
The Trance Twins being here is kinda a clever dickmove though, since they CAN steal your SP and all.
As we enter the second car, this happens. It… doesn’t affect anything though.
And of course, what we want is right up front in the first car…
The High Priestess b[/b]
That Which Comes From The Darkness
At the beginning of his journey, as the Fool met the Magician, he also met the Priestess. The Popess balances with the Magus to create all understanding. While the Magician is the conscious, the Priestess is the unconscious. She represents the potential and mystery that surrounds the unknown, in particular it generally refers to hidden knowledge. Remember the unlimited possibilities held within the self, and you can achieve anything…
…Is this the friggin’ boss?
We’re in the front car; it’s gotta be!
Hurry!
As a Shadow, the Priestess represents the Reversed side of the High Priestess tarot card. She was active by taking a direct role in proceedings, for example. A Priestess is generally knowledgable and wise…
She has an interesting design, huh? Long scrolls for “hair” covered in Sanskrit, an overly direct acknowledgement of the feminine aspect of the Priestess and she takes the B and J from the card directly. They stand for Boaz and Jachin and are two of the copper pillars from the Temple of Solomon, the first Holy Temple in Jerusalem.
Anyway, uh, the Priestess is kind of very simple honestly. She has 300 HP, 200SP and… 10 Strength, 10 Magic, 10 Endurance, 10 Agility and 10 Luck. Sure, okay.
Skillwise, she IS varied enough to put them to some degree of use. She always opens by summoning reinforcements, though.
In particular she summons two Muttering Tiaras. They ARE a bit different to normal and are also different to each other!
The one on our left has 8 in all stats and 100HP. It likes to cast Pulinpa, which I hope you remember from before.
If it’s not doing that, then it’s being a bit of a bother and casting Agi.
The other one has 7 in all stats and 70 HP. It casts Dia at that is it.
Resistance wise, these Muttering Tiaras are souped up somewhat being immune to Expel, Curse and Fire.
But they ARE Muttering Tiaras, so they are still quite weak to Ice.
Just, uh, keep the Ice single target and never aimed at the Priestess herself.
In an amazing mercy, the analysis screen here actually DOES tell you her elemental resistances. In particular, she repels Ice. Summoning Muttering Tiaras would be clever if you could realistically even have Mabufu at this point.
Anyway, her other skills include a Pulinpa of her own. Inconvenient, but not that big of a deal really.
Her basic attack is Pierce elemental for some reason. I don’t know. She’s slapping someone around with her scroll hair and that’s Pierce. Look, just go with it okay?
She can also cast Bufu, just so you can find out the quicker way to not cast Ice at her. The quickest way is to just do it, naturally.
But she’s not limited to just the single-target version. Mercifully, though, this means she can’t really hit anyone’s weakness except maybe Makoto’s.
She doesn’t need to, to do a number on folks. Especially Yukari, which you’d think wouldn’t be the case huh? She’s the mage! Why does she take more damage?
Simple: her Endurance sucks. All defense is based on Endurance, since it doesn’t affect HP here.
And lastly she can do Assault Dive. Remember it from the Rampage Drive before?
Yeah, about the same here. Her Strength IS ever-so-slightly higher though.
But, honestly, the Priestess is not a hard fight. Understandable, really. She CAN’T be a hard fight because you get railroaded into it without a chance to save or anything. It’s an odd mercy.
She gies some very nice EXP though, and a Diamond is great too. It’s not vendor trash! Gems are important. Gems are VERY important.
Silence
We’re going too fast! We have to put on the brakes or else…!
What are you waiting for!? There’s a train up ahead!
Seriously, c’mon, highschoolers. Operate this train! You should be able to do that effortlessly.
Dammit! I don’t know how to stop this thing!
In all seriousness, though, as everyone else is freaking out Makoto DOES just run through and… do something.
Silence
I-I think so…
Is everybody alright!?
Uh, y-yeah, we’re okay.
Ha, haa… My knees are shaking…
Dude… I’m like drenched in sweat…
sigh I’m so glad you’re safe…
I’m sorry I couldn’t do more on my end.
I trusted my instincts.
You saved me again.
…Thanks.
Silence
It seems the level of trust between you all has grown.
You learned a new tactic!
This is Mitsuru. We’ve successfully completed the operation.
The monorail didn’t sustain any noticeable damage.
Although the mysterious teleportation is, uh, not something we can do much about.
Thank you, Mitsuru.
Now, I don’t have to worry about tomorrow’s headlines.
The team did a great job.
They’re learning quickly.
But, what are the Shadows up to?
Taking over a monorail… This is getting out of hand.
I’ll be looking into the matter.
Hmmm… Let’s not jump to any conclusions.
For now, we should study their behavior for patterns or clues.
We cannot afford to always wait for them to make the first move.
Don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re doing fine.
More importantly…
Do you have anything to drink, Akihiko?
Huh…?
Why do you look so tired, Ikutsuki-san?
Wait… Don’t tell me that bicycle outside is yours!
Boy, am I gonna be sore tomorrow!
It seems as if the prediction came true.
You wonder what it means…
You are too exhausted to make any sense of it right now.
You decide to rest as soon as you get back to the dorm…
You know, after being murdered by Death, the full moon doesn’t seem so bad. It even gives you a nice new setting!
He said on the train.
It feels weird reading this after beating p5 how far we came. Also girls volleyball I now am scared of the coach
Is q and arena worth viewing lps for.
How does one LP Arena?
It does have a decent story with Labrys but it also has individual story modes that have minor variations with each other. Depends on how much you like that.
Q…probably is best experienced via LP. When a Persona game’s highlight is dungeons, something is off.
Arena looks too power of friendship for me especially compared to 5 which was friends are only that if they help you commit grand larceny. I suck at fighters so that’s why
Still this LP encouraged me to go download a rom for p3p and play it on my phone. Ah nostalgia