Current Events > so i am about 80 hours into persona 5 royal. some spoiler rant about the story

(+) Yeah! (+)

Again, spoiler but only up to shido's palace.

I feel pretty ambivalent about the whole "stealing hearts" thing. At its core, the game tries to highlight various societal problems in japan, from kamoshida to shidou which most likely has real life parralel. The teenagers "rebels" against these people, but i guess stealing hearts is just too convenient power fantasy to convey author's intent on how to tackle these problems, and it became kinda toothless in that way because you just steal hearts, and conveniently these people realize their mistakes and confess everything? I am not saying the author can amd must offer a solution to this multi-generational and multi faceted issues, but stealing hearts feels very reductive toward real people who cried and bled trying to solve these issues.

On the philosophical side, it seem to assume and deep down these culprits seem to know what they are doing is wrong, thus when the treasure is taken, they judged themselves by this seemingly objective measure of morality of what is "right and wrong" then fix their behavior from that basis. (This can be explained, that the phantom thieves targets corrected themselves to the what the general masses think is right. So if the public think plagiarism isnt wrong, madarame's change of heart wouldn't happen)

I am not a moral relativist, but there is also no absolute and some people who do these kind of crimes genuinely doesnt think what they did is wrong. Unless the whole judgement against the majority of society perception about morality is right, the change of hearts wouldnt happen to people with actual and severe sociopathic/psychopathic behavior.

Maybe i am just overthinking a simple premise about fixing society with basically magic.

You realize that it's not meant to be realistic?

I saw a video about cut Kamoshida and Madarame memories which delves into their backstories a bit. Based on that, those two at least do seem aware that what they're doing is wrong. It does get a bit iffy after though since the next palace belongs to a gangster.

Were persona games ever meant to present solutions to solve societal problems? I always interpreted the games more as facing yourself and overcoming your own issues, in relation to society around you. While it is a power fantasy, it is cool nonetheless IMO.

Rika_Furude posted...

Were persona games ever meant to present solutions to solve societal problems? I always interpreted the games more as facing yourself and overcoming your own issues, in relation to society around you. While it is a power fantasy, it is cool nonetheless IMO.

No its not but the method and results feel too simple nonetheless.

But as a game i think it is really great, and the further refinement to the formula and addition of palaces instead of random generated dungeon is amazing.

BloodMoon7 posted...

You realize that it's not meant to be realistic?

I saw a video about cut Kamoshida and Madarame memories which delves into their backstories a bit. Based on that, those two at least do seem aware that what they're doing is wrong. It does get a bit iffy after though since the next palace belongs to a gangster.

Yeah, it could be just the author is basically saying " come on! Our society is fucked, wake up and rebel against it" and i am reading too much into the symbolism of stealing hearts.

Otherwise My only real "complaint" about the story in general is how the party member persona evolution ties to the confidant rank. It feels less satisfying because it isnt integrated with the main story. Compare it to persona 3 spoiler junpei's character development with chidori's and ultimately his persona evolution

At the end of the day, that's not what the game is about. Not only would the pacing answer storytelling suffer immensely if the writers were to shove in manifestos on systemically solving issues like rape/abuse, organized crime, big business/political corruption, hikikomori-ism, criminal justice reform, parental abandonment, and the dozen other issues the game tackles, those individual issues aren't ultimately the point.

Throughout the game, it's shown time and time and again that these bad actors in palaces are symptoms, not the disease itself. Every time the thieves steal a heart, they fix a terrible person, but the world doesn't actually get better. Kamoshida, Madarame, a TON of people knew the whole time what was going on, but looked the other way. The police were powerless to move against Kaneshiro. Everybody helplessly ran around in circles over Medjed. Futaba was gaslit into severe depression, and damn near the whole world gave up on her for it. Everything about the protagonist's brushes with the police are indicative of a culture that doesn't care who you are or what you did, just whether you stay in line, or get smacked down if you don't.

The thru line is that these big bad actors are just symptoms of an apathetic world. People see and know that all of these shitty th8ngs are happening around them, and they just 0lug their eyes and ears and act like if they just go about their daily lives, none of it matters. Its why the Okumura arc, while bloated near the beginning, is so important. Its the evidence that just taking out bad guys and being popular super heroes doesnt actually fix anything; regular people still dont care, and just enjoy the "fireworks." The phantom thieves, fully realized, aren't about solving all the world's problems, its about making you want to try.

apolloooo posted...

Again, spoiler but only up to shido's palace.

How did you get that far and miss the point that bad?

SAlYAN posted...

At the end of the day, that's not what the game is about. Not only would the pacing answer storytelling suffer immensely if the writers were to shove in manifestos on systemically solving issues like rape/abuse, organized crime, big business/political corruption, hikikomori-ism, criminal justice reform, parental abandonment, and the dozen other issues the game tackles, those individual issues aren't ultimately the point.

Throughout the game, it's shown time and time and again that these bad actors in palaces are symptoms, not the disease itself. Every time the thieves steal a heart, they fix a terrible person, but the world doesn't actually get better. Kamoshida, Madarame, a TON of people knew the whole time what was going on, but looked the other way. The police were powerless to move against Kaneshiro. Everybody helplessly ran around in circles over Medjed. Futaba was gaslit into severe depression, and damn near the whole world gave up on her for it. Everything about the protagonist's brushes with the police are indicative of a culture that doesn't care who you are or what you did, just whether you stay in line, or get smacked down if you don't.

The thru line is that these big bad actors are just symptoms of an apathetic world. People see and know that all of these shitty th8ngs are happening around them, and they just 0lug their eyes and ears and act like if they just go about their daily lives, none of it matters. Its why the Okumura arc, while bloated near the beginning, is so important. Its the evidence that just taking out bad guys and being popular super heroes doesnt actually fix anything; regular people still dont care, and just enjoy the "fireworks." The phantom thieves, fully realized, aren't about solving all the world's problems, its about making you want to try.

Very good analysis of the themes thank you. Yeah in the end, i agree. I am thinking too much about the change of heart too and how too much a convenient power fantasy for the problems they are trying to tackle.

dave_is_slick posted...

How did you get that far and miss the point that bad?

I dont say i am not enjoying the game. Easily the best gameplay for the modern SMT games ( i played persona 3,4, SMT 4 and apocalypse, devil survivor 1 and 2 and strange journey)

And the story is still pretty good with good overall themes and world building. This topic is me basically overthinking "stealing hearts" aspect of the whole game.

apolloooo posted...

Very good analysis of the themes thank you. Yeah in the end, i agree. I am thinking too much about the change of heart too and how too much a convenient power fantasy for the problems they are trying to tackle.

As you get closer to the end of the game, that actual core themes and messages will get a lot more apparent. As is usually the case with persona.

You've clearly played 3, I see. By the end of the game, we didn't need stories about how Strega should have gotten proper therapy, Ken getting adopted into a proper family, the corporate restructuring of the Kirijo Group, spaying and neutering your dogs, or Ethics in AI/Robotics. That's not what the game was about. Valid discussions to have, sure, but not strictly relevant to the cote story being told.

BloodMoon7 posted...

It does get a bit iffy after though since the next palace belongs to a gangster.

the gangster one doesn't really matter cause it's supposed to show that some of them are just naturally horrid, that guy wasn't really remorseful after losing.