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Fojar38
Sep 2, 2011


Sorry I meant to say I hope that the police use maximum force and kill or maim a bunch of innocent people, thus paving a way for a proletarian uprising and socialist utopia


also here's a stupid take
---------------------------->

Sydin posted:

I also thought it was implied that the dude was outright lying about there even being a contract, when Haru brings it up the company guy says he's never seen or heard about any such agreement.

Which makes total sense considering that a contract mandating someone to marry without their consent is like, insanely illegal and even if the contract "existed" it would be literally a useless unenforceable piece of paper.

It's weird that Makoto or even Joker himself didn't bring this up.

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Hunt11
Jul 24, 2013

Grimey Drawer

Sydin posted:

I also thought it was implied that the dude was outright lying about there even being a contract, when Haru brings it up the company guy says he's never seen or heard about any such agreement.

That was my understanding as well. It also helps that no matter how much a piece of poo poo her father was, there was no way he would ever agree to a contract like that.

AlternateNu
May 5, 2005

ドーナツダメ!

Fojar38 posted:

Which makes total sense considering that a contract mandating someone to marry without their consent is like, insanely illegal and even if the contract "existed" it would be literally a useless unenforceable piece of paper.

It's weird that Makoto or even Joker himself didn't bring this up.

Makoto, maybe. But what makes you think Joker would even think of that? Considering Japan isn't as far removed from arranged marriages as western audiences are, I'm not surprised they kind of took the douchebag's word for it.

SubG
Aug 19, 2004

It's a hard world for little things.

Sydin posted:

Yeah fair enough, the land itself would have plenty of value. Although I don't get the sense Sojiro is interested in selling. loving off to a cozy neighborhood to make the coffee and curry Futaba and Wakabe loved seems to be him living the dream, particularly after the conclusion of his Social Link.
Living your dream life while possessing enough wealth to comfortably place you in the top 1% globally is what most people would call `rich'.

Ytlaya
Nov 13, 2005

I'm in the third semester now, and Maruki is basically correct if he can fix the whole "cognitive dissonance making people confused when they notice glitches in the matrix" issue. These dumbass kids know nothing of the world*. There are presumably billions of people who are now being saved from traumatic/fatal situations due to this. To the game's credit, Maruki is actually acting in good faith and it provides a fairly convincing argument in his favor.

I'm also a little confused about the logistics of this whole situation. What happens if two people have mutually exclusive wishes? Initially I assumed it was a "everyone has their own ideal reality" situation, but then they explicitly mentioned that people like Wakaba or Haru's dad are actually officially alive in this world. Granted, random NPC dialogue seems to be indicating that issues are arising as a result of this, with a bunch of people saying things that amount to "I'm going to do (bad decision) because I'm so happy and who cares!" or reacting with confusion to their loved ones making out-of-character choices.


One other thing is that, after having replayed the original plotline, Ryuji is actually better than I remembered. He's a dumbass up until the end of the Okumura Palace, but after that he realizes he acknowledges his faults and is basically cool and good after that. He even gets his own animated cutscene where he saves everyone, and is also the first one in the third semester to decide to reject the new reality.

* though a couple of them are more justified - Yoshizawa's situation is considerably more hosed up than everyone else's (so it makes sense why she has so much more trouble rejecting the new reality), and I'm 99% sure Akechi is actually dead and was brought back to life and that there's going to be a sad redemption scene where he gives up his life as part of returning reality to normal.

Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 23:51 on May 25, 2020

Fojar38
Sep 2, 2011


Sorry I meant to say I hope that the police use maximum force and kill or maim a bunch of innocent people, thus paving a way for a proletarian uprising and socialist utopia


also here's a stupid take
---------------------------->

AlternateNu posted:

Makoto, maybe. But what makes you think Joker would even think of that? Considering Japan isn't as far removed from arranged marriages as western audiences are, I'm not surprised they kind of took the douchebag's word for it.

Joker is characterized as a genius

Ultiville
Jan 14, 2005

The law protects no one unless it binds everyone, binds no one unless it protects everyone.

Fojar38 posted:

Joker is characterized as a genius

I mean you can't figure that out from first principles and it's unlikely to have come up in school.

It might occur to him to look it up but that can be difficult even for a smart highschooler, and he knows her family has a bunch of lawyers, too. It's not like, an egregious thing to take her word for or whatever.

Orcs and Ostriches
Aug 26, 2010


The Great Twist

Ytlaya posted:

I'm in the third semester now, and Maruki is basically correct if he can fix the whole "cognitive dissonance making people confused when they notice glitches in the matrix" issue. These dumbass kids know nothing of the world*. There are presumably billions of people who are now being saved from traumatic/fatal situations due to this. To the game's credit, Maruki is actually acting in good faith and it provides a fairly convincing argument in his favor.

I'm also a little confused about the logistics of this whole situation. What happens if two people have mutually exclusive wishes? Initially I assumed it was a "everyone has their own ideal reality" situation, but then they explicitly mentioned that people like Wakaba or Haru's dad are actually officially alive in this world. Granted, random NPC dialogue seems to be indicating that issues are arising as a result of this, with a bunch of people saying things that amount to "I'm going to do (bad decision) because I'm so happy and who cares!" or reacting with confusion to their loved ones making out-of-character choices.



I think the logistics and issues with Maruki's plan show the faults in it. He shows he wants people to give up on dreams if they're too hard, because that can cause stress and disappointment. If people have mutually exclusive desires, he can erase them - totally change someone's personality, because it's the easy answer, and he's looking for easy answers.

On the other hand, everyone in the main party (and basically everyone Joker interacts with) has had their problems and traumas, and not trying to weigh one up against the other, they overcome and become better. It's a long, hard, road, and in the end they overcome, become stronger, and something I wish they would have brought up, have an unbreakable bond of friendship with eachother that would never have started if their problems just vanished.

Ytlaya
Nov 13, 2005

Orcs and Ostriches posted:

I think the logistics and issues with Maruki's plan show the faults in it. He shows he wants people to give up on dreams if they're too hard, because that can cause stress and disappointment. If people have mutually exclusive desires, he can erase them - totally change someone's personality, because it's the easy answer, and he's looking for easy answers.

On the other hand, everyone in the main party (and basically everyone Joker interacts with) has had their problems and traumas, and not trying to weigh one up against the other, they overcome and become better. It's a long, hard, road, and in the end they overcome, become stronger, and something I wish they would have brought up, have an unbreakable bond of friendship with eachother that would never have started if their problems just vanished.


Yeah, but Maruki is entirely correct that sometimes awful things happen that are 100% bad and can't really be "overcome" in any meaningful sense beyond "learning to cope as best you can." Beyond a certain point, trauma doesn't "build character" or improve people in any way.

It's also not clear how Maruki's altered reality deals with material issues. Are the hungry and homeless provided food/shelter by it? I think that you're just supposed to not think too hard about the fact that rewriting reality gives you a lot of options that don't necessarily involve brainwashing for improving peoples' lives.


By the way, what's up with the scene where during New Years you and Yoshizawa encounter Yoshizawa's dad, and he suddenly glitches out and changes what he's saying. Obviously that was the reality adjusting, but I couldn't figure out how what he said posed some kind of problem and why it was changed.

Clarste
Apr 15, 2013

Just how many mistakes have you suffered on the way here?

An uncountable number, to be sure.

Ytlaya posted:

By the way, what's up with the scene where during New Years you and Yoshizawa encounter Yoshizawa's dad, and he suddenly glitches out and changes what he's saying. Obviously that was the reality adjusting, but I couldn't figure out how what he said posed some kind of problem and why it was changed.

He was calling her Sumire, the glitch was that Sumire couldn't hear that name because of her issues. It was part of the world making her into Kasumi.

Hunt11
Jul 24, 2013

Grimey Drawer

Ytlaya posted:

Yeah, but Maruki is entirely correct that sometimes awful things happen that are 100% bad and can't really be "overcome" in any meaningful sense beyond "learning to cope as best you can." Beyond a certain point, trauma doesn't "build character" or improve people in any way.

It's also not clear how Maruki's altered reality deals with material issues. Are the hungry and homeless provided food/shelter by it? I think that you're just supposed to not think too hard about the fact that rewriting reality gives you a lot of options that don't necessarily involve brainwashing for improving peoples' lives.


By the way, what's up with the scene where during New Years you and Yoshizawa encounter Yoshizawa's dad, and he suddenly glitches out and changes what he's saying. Obviously that was the reality adjusting, but I couldn't figure out how what he said posed some kind of problem and why it was changed.

The biggest issue with what Maruki was trying to do is that it would be difficult for any human to do it and do it right and you can already see issues with his methods from day 1. He could have revived Kasumi but he didn't because to his mind what he did was the objectively right thing to do and even with tools that could have handled the situation better he was unwilling to use them.

I can answer the homeless one. He didn't do jackshit for them. You can run across a homeless person in the underground station and it is clear nothing has been done for him as he notes that everyone else is acting weird.

RazzleDazzleHour
Mar 31, 2016

Hunt11 posted:

I can answer the homeless one. He didn't do jackshit for them. You can run across a homeless person in the underground station and it is clear nothing has been done for him as he notes that everyone else is acting weird.

The really really funny part about this is that it pulls the Bruce Almighty thing where everyone is winning the lottery but there are still homeless people. He fixes everyone's problems in the simplest way possible - people who already have some money can easily get more, but it would be too difficult to invent a new physical house for people to live in so he just tries to change their brain to think "actually being homeless is cool and fine" except it doesn't even work because it's too difficult a sell for someone not to immediately see through the illusion.

Theoretically memory removal for significant trauma would kind of makes sense but then when you look at the rest of the world, a large number of his solutions to make people happier are making them not want anything and be totally okay with being in a poo poo situation, and the rest is removing the memory of or outright resurrecting dead people. It's not a world without problems, it's a world where your brain has been rewired to not care about or even perceive problems. Like, he bills his world as a total utopia but people still have to go to work. What the gently caress kind of perfect dream world still has people going to office jobs? This is basically the Law world in SMT where everyone has been brainwashed to have no free will but are happy because of it. Which, as we all know, is bad and dumb and is why Lucifer rules.

Terra-da-loo!
Apr 6, 2008

Sufficiently kickass.
I've never played a Persona game before but this is fun. I love how laid back the pacing is. Reminds me of rpgs I played as a kid.

RazzleDazzleHour
Mar 31, 2016

Terra-da-loo! posted:

I've never played a Persona game before but this is fun. I love how laid back the pacing is. Reminds me of rpgs I played as a kid.

If you're into some laid-backitude you will also probably like P4 but maybe not P3 because that game will be like tonal whiplash compared to 4/5

Stroth
Mar 31, 2007

All Problems Solved

RazzleDazzleHour posted:

If you're into some laid-backitude you will also probably like P4 but maybe not P3 because that game will be like tonal whiplash compared to 4/5

For people unfamiliar with the rest of the series, but enjoyed this one enough to consider trying them out: Persona 1 & 2 & 2andabit were ps1 urban fantasy RPGs with a touch of pokemon thrown in. Decent, but never really sold well. Don't worry about them.

Persona 3 was a soft reboot of the series that brought in the high school life simulator/dungeon crawler gameplay. There's the skeleton of a good game there but it's very flawed in a lot of ways (mostly in trying to stick to standard JRPG tropes a bit too hard instead of letting the story find its own voice). Persona 4 was where they polished out most of the issues and really found their groove. Persona 3 was a good game, don't get me wrong. But there's a reason Persona 4 is one of the standard contenders when people try to argue out the best PS2 RPGs.

Both received Royal style rereleases: Unfortunately both are only available on handhelds. Persona 3 Portable on the PSP and Persona 4 Golden on Vita. If you own the system already (or Playstation TV) and you enjoyed Persona 5 then they're definitely worth getting.

Oh and there's also Persona 3 FES, which is kinda a rerelease, but it doesn't have nearly as much as P3P.

Sydin
Oct 29, 2011

Another spring commute
Re: Maruki, he's not actually granting everybody their wishes. That's something he specifically did for the phantom thieves based on reading their minds in mementos + their counselling sessions because he's grateful to them (and Joker in particular) for giving him the final push over the threshold to complete his reasearch. For the vast majority of people he's just brainwashing them into liking his static, conflict-free reality, maybe granting them a minor favor or two to sweeten the pot, and that's it. It is confirmed in his palace when you reach the "psychological exam" portion: he tests people to see if they share his worldview or not, and if they don't he straps brainwashing devices on them until they do agree with him, even if it means completely overwriting their personality to the point they're not even the same person, as he does with Madarame, Okumura, and Joker's Social Studies teacher. There are also already cracks in his "perfect" reality before the Thieves break it up, including the homeless guy in Shibuya and the various Mementos requests you can do in January.

Maruki had good intentions but his new reality is essentially a giant brainwashing cult that doesn't even manage to fulfill it's intended function of creating a pain-free world since plenty of people on the margins slip through the cracks.

BIG FLUFFY DOG
Feb 16, 2011

On the internet, nobody knows you're a dog.


RazzleDazzleHour posted:

The really really funny part about this is that it pulls the Bruce Almighty thing where everyone is winning the lottery but there are still homeless people. He fixes everyone's problems in the simplest way possible - people who already have some money can easily get more, but it would be too difficult to invent a new physical house for people to live in so he just tries to change their brain to think "actually being homeless is cool and fine" except it doesn't even work because it's too difficult a sell for someone not to immediately see through the illusion.

Theoretically memory removal for significant trauma would kind of makes sense but then when you look at the rest of the world, a large number of his solutions to make people happier are making them not want anything and be totally okay with being in a poo poo situation, and the rest is removing the memory of or outright resurrecting dead people. It's not a world without problems, it's a world where your brain has been rewired to not care about or even perceive problems. Like, he bills his world as a total utopia but people still have to go to work. What the gently caress kind of perfect dream world still has people going to office jobs? This is basically the Law world in SMT where everyone has been brainwashed to have no free will but are happy because of it. Which, as we all know, is bad and dumb and is why Lucifer rules.


To back this up further the homeless dudes dialogue actually changes in the 3rd semester. For most of it he just goes "People are acting really weird lately. Whats going on?" but if you talk to him on the last day when Marukis strongest he goes "You look really stressed! Just accept things as they are! Giving up rules! :)

Dehry
Aug 21, 2009

Grimey Drawer
https://twitter.com/regularpanties/status/1265753438090080256

Here's how Valentines day with multiple girls would have been resolved in that ending. Deleted scene.

AlternateNu
May 5, 2005

ドーナツダメ!

Dehry posted:

https://twitter.com/regularpanties/status/1265753438090080256

Here's how Valentines day with multiple girls would have been resolved in that ending. Deleted scene.

I'm not surprised, but I'm glad they cut it.

Also, why datamine a Chinese copy of the game and post it on English social media w/o translation? >_>

Terra-da-loo!
Apr 6, 2008

Sufficiently kickass.
Heard something about the importance of feeding your plant. Where tf do I get nutrients to do that?

Hunt11
Jul 24, 2013

Grimey Drawer

Terra-da-loo! posted:

Heard something about the importance of feeding your plant. Where tf do I get nutrients to do that?

Check out the various stores and you should find nutrients eventually.

ChaosArgate
Oct 10, 2012

Why does everyone think I'm going to get in trouble?

AlternateNu posted:

I'm not surprised, but I'm glad they cut it.

Also, why datamine a Chinese copy of the game and post it on English social media w/o translation? >_>

I think with the current tools, only the Chinese version can be datamined.

Polderjoch
Jun 27, 2019

May the sacred flame guide me... Or something like that.

Dehry posted:

https://twitter.com/regularpanties/status/1265753438090080256

Here's how Valentines day with multiple girls would have been resolved in that ending. Deleted scene.

Good lord that's bad.

It does make sense with the whole bad end brainwashing thing, but literally brainwashing 11 people to be fine with living in a harem with you is uh. Really would've painted Maruki in a way worse light much more directly.

Sydin
Oct 29, 2011

Another spring commute

Dehry posted:

https://twitter.com/regularpanties/status/1265753438090080256

Here's how Valentines day with multiple girls would have been resolved in that ending. Deleted scene.

lmao that Maruki would just brainwash almost a dozen people into being fine with being part of the Joker harem for the sake of ~no conflict~. It actually kinda tracks with how he acts in-game: he flat out tells Joker he's willing to bend over backwards to have Joker accept his new reality and be happy within it, and if the price is giving him a harem then Maruki would probably do it.

Definitely glad that isn't in the final release though.

Gaius Marius
Oct 9, 2012

Terra-da-loo! posted:

Heard something about the importance of feeding your plant. Where tf do I get nutrients to do that?

The Low quality stuff is at the Don Quixote knock off in the shopping district, Higher quality stuff unlocks when you get access to Shinjuku. Feeding the plant gives kindness with no time loss. 1,2,or 3 points depending on the quality of fertilizer used. There's also some high quality fertilizer you can get before shinjuku unlocks by watching the shopping network. I believe you can water the plant every week.

Zwingley
Sep 20, 2011

"My dear Seth, you look absolutely dashing!"

Hair Elf
Pretty sure the best plant food you can get early is from the flower shop that you can work at in the mall

Gaius Marius
Oct 9, 2012

Oh yeah maybe I always forget there's shops down there

Terra-da-loo!
Apr 6, 2008

Sufficiently kickass.
Re: watching the shopping nerwork: where is the anetenna for the tv so I can do that? Also the DVDs, cause i got a player already.

Sorry to just ask instead of explore, myself, but I am either bad at time management or just at a part of the game where you don't get to explore much. Possibly the latter, because even though I've played for like fifteen hours, I think I'm still really early in. I've not even gotten to the second target yet, for example. Only recently even "officially" assembled the team or whatever.

Complete_Cynic
Jan 18, 2013



Terra-da-loo! posted:

Re: watching the shopping nerwork: where is the anetenna for the tv so I can do that? Also the DVDs, cause i got a player already.

Sorry to just ask instead of explore, myself, but I am either bad at time management or just at a part of the game where you don't get to explore much. Possibly the latter, because even though I've played for like fifteen hours, I think I'm still really early in. I've not even gotten to the second target yet, for example. Only recently even "officially" assembled the team or whatever.

You just use the wall-mounted TV downstairs for the shopping channel.

DVDs are from a rental shop on the main street opposite the book store / immediately on your right when you go there.

Terra-da-loo!
Apr 6, 2008

Sufficiently kickass.

Complete_Cynic posted:

You just use the wall-mounted TV downstairs for the shopping channel.

DVDs are from a rental shop on the main street opposite the book store / immediately on your right when you go there.

Ah, kay. Thanks.

How long is this game, btw? Like, roughly.

Orcs and Ostriches
Aug 26, 2010


The Great Twist
I cleared Royal at about 120 hours. I felt like I played fairly thoroughly and took my time, but I also left the game running while cooking or doing housework and all that, so my time might be a bit inflated.

TTBF
Sep 14, 2005



I'm nearing the final deadline and I'm at about 105 hours.

Sydin
Oct 29, 2011

Another spring commute

Orcs and Ostriches posted:

I cleared Royal at about 120 hours. I felt like I played fairly thoroughly and took my time, but I also left the game running while cooking or doing housework and all that, so my time might be a bit inflated.

Pretty much my experience to a tee. It's a ~100 hour game unless you're skipping all the text and cutscenes or deviating from the normal gameplay loop by throwing time slots away or doing heavy grinding.

Hunt11
Jul 24, 2013

Grimey Drawer

Sydin posted:

Pretty much my experience to a tee. It's a ~100 hour game unless you're skipping all the text and cutscenes or deviating from the normal gameplay loop by throwing time slots away or doing heavy grinding.

Exactly. I beat the game faster because I fast-forwarded through a lot of content I had already seen before in my previous times playing P5.

Detective No. 27
Jun 7, 2006

I'm in the Casino Palace. I forgot how the sequence of events goes. I usually try to rush the palaces in one game day. Since this one ends with Joker getting captured, was there an optimal day to finish it, or should I not worry about it?

Sydin
Oct 29, 2011

Another spring commute
Because of plot reasons you're forced to send the calling card on the last possible day, even if you sweep the palace much earlier. It's not possible to lose any days because you rush, so go nuts.

Hunt11 posted:

Exactly. I beat the game faster because I fast-forwarded through a lot of content I had already seen before in my previous times playing P5.

Yep, first playthrough took 120 because I didn't skip any dialogue (besides the endless "WILL THE CHANGE OF HEART WORK THIS, THE SIXTH TIME WE'VE DONE IT?!?!?!" texts) and I left the game on while I was a way a couple times. Currently right up to the final battle before finishing my NG+ and it's looking like I'm going to clock in at about 200 hours for both playthroughs combined, so about 80 hours with heavy dialogue skipping.

Dr. Fishopolis
Aug 31, 2004

ROBOT

Stroth posted:

For people unfamiliar with the rest of the series, but enjoyed this one enough to consider trying them out: Persona 1 & 2 & 2andabit were ps1 urban fantasy RPGs with a touch of pokemon thrown in. Decent, but never really sold well. Don't worry about them.

...


Oh and there's also Persona 3 FES, which is kinda a rerelease, but it doesn't have nearly as much as P3P.

Persona 2 duology is good as hell, has a lot of influence on 5 and is the direction I wish the series would go in after this.

Also, FES is the most "complete" version of P3 and the one you should probably play first. Don't feel like you have to play The Answer though unless you really love Tartarus for some reason. P3P is great for the FemC, but the presentation is extremely stripped down.

RazzleDazzleHour
Mar 31, 2016

P3P does have the Merciless difficulty which is kind of nice if you want that, but also P3P is the only version of the game where you can directly control your party which is the big thing people put in the game's favor. In P3/FES you actually can't control your party members at all, only give them vague suggestions, which can be incredibly frustrating at points.

Also as someone who loves P3/4/5 I would recommend a LongPlay of P2 because man I've tried to play those games a couple times but theyve just aged so badly. You could cheat your way through if you wanted too but doing a traditional playthrough is just such a slog

Sydin
Oct 29, 2011

Another spring commute
So if you're interested in gagging, here's the cut harem Valentine's Day ending with all the dialogue subbed to English: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6i4jnWu2jw

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HaB
Jan 5, 2001

What are the odds?

Sydin posted:

So if you're interested in gagging, here's the cut harem Valentine's Day ending with all the dialogue subbed to English: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6i4jnWu2jw

Yikes.

So glad they cut this.

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