Persona 5: Every Main Character’s Age, Height, And Birthday
Persona 5: Every Main Character’s Age, Height, And Birthday
Protagonist (Persona 5) Megami Tensei Wiki Fandom
500+ Persona 5 ý tưởng anime, anime rùng rợn, quân bài joker
'Ren Amamiya' is the Official Persona 5 Protagonist Name ...
Persona 5 Royal: Joker x Kasumi Is Basically Canon - And ...
Did Joker bang Kawakami???!? - Persona 5 - GameFAQs
Yes, Persona 5's main character does have a canon name ...
Persona Memes - reddit
Persona 5 Joker – Custom Crossing
What is Jokers official cannon name? : Persona5 - reddit
persona 5 joker name reddit
persona 5 joker name reddit - win
[Video Games] "Too many swordsmen, are there?" The drama over Byleth joining the roster of Super Smash Bros Ultimate
What's Smash?
One of the premier fighting game franchises of all time, Super Smash Bros is a party series published by gaming giant Nintendo which sees characters from their various franchises (alongside several third-party characters) coming together for some family-friendly violence. Beginning with the original title in 1999 for the Nintendo 64, Smash has seen several outings in the years since, such as the iconic Melee for the Gamecube, Brawl for the Wii, the unoriginally named Smash 4 for the WiiU and 3DS, and the most recent title, Ultimate, which released on the Switch in 2018. Ultimate was seen as a huge celebration for the franchise, boasting that EVERYONE IS HERE- all seventy + fighters, ranging from staples of the original game to guest fighters and DLC, were in the launch roster. Helmed by Masahiro Sakurai,Smash is a household name and staple for parties worldwide, with Ultimate being one of the highest-selling fighting games in the world at over 12 million units sold.
What's Fire Emblem?
Fire Emblem is Nintendo's forray into strategy- a turn based fantasy seires that's one of the longer-running staples of the company with its roots in 1990 for the Famicom. Despite a lot of pushing from Nintendo, Fire Emblem failed to take off in the West for many years, with the future of the franchise being uncertain after several successive commercial flops in the 2000s. With the franchise risking cancellation if it failed to find a market, the team made a Hail-Mary pass of epic proportions thanks to Fire Emblem Awakening in 2013- a launch title for the 3DS that finally marked the series getting a foothold in the West. Since then, the series has released three big games: Fates, which wasn't very good due to pulling a Pokemon and cutting the game into three separate releases and having an awful story, Heroes, a free to play mobile game, and Three Houses, which saw the series move to the Nintendo Switch. In Three Houses, you play as Byleth, a mercenary hired to teach one of three classes in a military academy that are all led by House Lords- Edlegard, Dimitri and Claude. Three Houses combined Persona-style time management for social interactions with the tactical gameplay of the series, and was a critical success for the company, selling over 3 million units.
Smash and Fire Emblem's shared history
Fire Emblem and Smash have a tied history, due to Smash being part of the reason the series even began releasing in the West (Fire Emblem had such a small presense before this that a lot of people unironically thought Marth and Ike were original characters made just for the game). Two characters, Roy(Who's also our boi) and Marth, were playable in Melee, with their popularity leading to Nintendo beginning localisation efforts of the other games. Since then, Fire Emblem has gotten consistent additional represetation in each mainline title:
Brawl added Ike, protagonist of Path of Radiance and its sequel, Radiant Dawn. His massive two-handed sword and battle cry of "GREAT AETHER" made him stand out as a fun battler, with high damage potential but a weak mobility selection to balance him.
3DS/WiiU would bring back Marth, Ike and Roy, alongside newcomers Robin and Lucina from Awakening and, post-launch, Corrin from Fates as a DLC fighter. The Mii Fighter would also get an outfit themed on Awakening's co-protagonist Chrom as DLC.
Ultimate would launch with all prior Fire Emblem characters as part of the launch roster with a new addition- Chrom making the transition from Mii Fighter to Echo Fighter (the game's term for characters who are moveset clones, in this case for Roy while Lucina was officially made an Echo Fighter for Marth). Ultimate also saw a large collection of music from the series being available alongside three stages.
Perhaps one of the largest showings of how tied together the two series are, especially regarding FE getting off the ground in the West, can be seen in the announcement trailer for a re-release of Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light, the first game in the series as part of 30th anniversary celebrations. The trailer shows two young boys playing Melee and wondering where Roy and Marth are from, leading to them discovering Fire Emblem at large. It's at the launch of Ultimate, before the DLC released, that I'd like to dovetail and cover some of the tensions between Smash and Fire Emblem, alongside the post-launch support Ultimate got.
Smash fans vs Fire Emblem Fans: A Short History
Smash fans and Fire Emblem fans don't get along a lot of the time, it must be said (though Smash fans don't get along with anyone very well). Many Smash fans blame FE as the reason for Smash's roster being stereotyped as "Anime swordboys," due to Nintendo almost entirely drawing from the sword-fighting leads of the series instead of an axe or lance fighter. (Hector from Blazing Blade is often called an example of what a more atypical Smash rep would be due to wielding a large axe). While most of the fighters try and do different things mechanically (Robin is almost entirely a spellcaster for instance, while Corrin can turn into a dragon), that Chrom and Lucina were both moveset clones didn't help this perception. Many other Nintendo franchise fans aren't happy additionally at how Fire Emblem gets blatant preferential treatment by Nintendo. While it is justified as them wanting to show off the new FE games in each Smash title, that Fire Emblem is all but guaranteed to get new Smash rep every time a new game releases has embittered fans of older franchises that Nintendo hasn't given as much love lately (especially F-Zero, Metroid, Golden Sun and more). Sakurai being an open Fire Emblem fan hasn't helped the perception of an inherent bias for FE, though this is usually countered by the low representation for the Kirby and Kid Icarus franchises despite Sakurai's own roles in them. By Ultimate, a growing sentiment is that Fire Emblem is getting over-represented, as with the addition of Chrom it was now the third-most represented series in Smash after only Mario and Pokemon. Given FE's niche status in the West for most of this time, fans weren't very happy at this, partly for the aforementioned reason of wanting their own favorite franchises to get a new fighter (Metroid fans at least got a bone when Ridley joined the Ultimate roster and when Dark Samus became an Echo Fighter for Samus).
Ultimate's Fighter Pass 1: HOES MAD
Following Ultimate's launch, Nintendo released a season pass for five characters who would be added post-launch. Smash getting new fighters is notable not just because it means a new fighter and that franchise getting the prestige of saying it got into Smash, but because it means new music that can be used (unless you're Cloud) during matches. For the most part, the DLC fighters got really positive reactions due to the majority being unexpected third-party choices. Case in point, most players never saw it coming when during the Game Awards 2018, the first fighter would be revealed to be Jokerfrom Persona 5. He'd be followed in 2019 by three more reveals: Dragon Quest'sHero, representing the more iconic protagonists in the legendary JRPG franchise, Banjo and Kazooie from the cult Microsoft series, and Terry Bogardfrom the SNK franchise (shout out to Sakurai's history lesson that's pretending to be a showcase for Terry, which also involves Sakurai's story of how they got 50 tracks from the SNK games into Smash) Also Sans from Undertale got in.This unironically led to an increase in Mii Gunner mains. Terry and Hero would generate some salt in the West due to perceived antiquity and lack of pedegree/mainstream appeal (Hero being "another anime sword boy" didn't help), leading to a mocking response of HOES MAD from Hero's fans especially, though Terry's got in on the fun thanks to the pun involving Terry's home series, Fatal Fury. Thanks to the four characters seen thus far, the expectation was that Fighters Pass 1 would be made entirely of third party characters, and as January 2020 rolled around the expectations were high as to who would get in. Sora from Kingdom Hearts was a popular choice, alongside Geno from the Mario RPG series. Some dumbasses even wanted Tracer from Overwatch, partly thanks to Blizzard all but openly begging Nintendo for a Smash invite. The one with the most consistent support was Dante from the Devil May Cry series. And a few accidental coincidences boosted the idea of Dante getting in:
Dante's first three games had been ported to the Switch during Fighter Pass 1, with Devil May Cry 3 releasing in February 2020 soon after the final character was announced.
Brian Hanford, who played V in Devil May Cry 5,had a slip of the tongue where he talked about Dante in the context of Smash (“to be part of Marvel Vs Capcom, or Super Smash Bros., would be huge, which is what Dante is gonna be,”), leading many to believe Brian had leaked Dante as the fifth fighter.
Dante was experiencing a large-scale renaissance in popularity thanks to DMC 5 launching in early 2019, leading to him being on everyone's minds when it came to him joining the roster. Adding in his experience in fighting games already thanks to the Marvel vs Capcom games, it seemed set in stone that Dante would join the hallowed halls of Smash.
On the same day as the character reveal, Capcom had planned a DMC announcement (it turned out to be an announcement that the game would have a co-op mode for Dante and Vergil in Bloody Palace).
With expectations set high, everyone tuned in on January 16th 2020 to see the final Season 1 character... and it was Byleth, the player character of Three Houses. Another fucking Fire Emblem rep. The internet took it well,as you'd expect. Dante's fans just resorted to sad memes and jokes about one of Byleth's alt skins being "close enough" to let them pretend Byleth was Dante.
Byleth's announcement generates some of the most negative reactions to a Smash fighter yet seen, boasting the largest like-dislike ratios of Ultimate's DLC, and only matched for disliked announcements across the entire franchise by Corrin. A lot of people weren't happy at Byleth's inclusion, suffice to say, though like Terry and Hero the HOES MAD crowd came back for another go around. It didn't help how utterly predictable it was given it was a historical recreation of Corrin's inclusion in WiiU/3DS. While Byleth had been predicted, many expected the mechanical variance would be that Byleth would function similar to the Pokemon Trainer (who swaps between the Gen 1 Pokemon) in that Byleth would command Claude, Dimitri and Edlegard from the sidelines. Instead, Byleth had four weapons- three representing each of the House Leaders alongside their own custom whip-sword, the Sword of the Creator. That being said, at least Nintendo were somewhat self aware about it this time, given the reveal had supporting character Sothis mock Byleth for losing a fight by going "Too many swordsmen, were there?" as a way to reveal that Byleth's female variant would join the roster. While Byleth did offer some mechanical variety from the other FE reps, some were disappointed that Byleth specifically was representing Three Houses, due to Byleth's personality not being one of their selling points. Perhaps it would have been more preferable to have one of the House Leaders instead represent the game, but given how any one being selected would have been seen as favoritism of the Leaders (and the arguments about said Leaders being quite vicious), Byleth was the safest choice, if perhaps the most predictable. Fans of Xenoblade 2 were also unhappy at clear bias on Sakurai's part, given he'd previously said Rex, the MC, was from too new a game to qualify for a roster slot in Ultimate. In comparrison, Sakurai admitted in his presentation of Byleth that he pestered the developers to get early access copies of Three Houses to get to plan out Byleth's moveset, which only helped the idea of Fire Emblem operating on different rules from other series. Overall, Byleth was seen as a disappointing inclusion to wrap up the Fighters Pass, with the announcement honestly being more notable for the memes about the salt over the character themself. (My favorites were the onesabout Joker adding yet another teacher to his harem) After the shock reveals from relatively niche series such as Persona and SNK, Byleth was generally felt to be an overwhelmingly safe option to close on. While Sakurai did announce Fighters Pass 2 in the same event, promising six more DLC characters for Ultimate, a lot of fans from different franchises were still let down given how unpredictable the first wave had been.
Fighters Pass 2 and the Byleth aftermath
Byleth would launch a few weeks later and the reception was largely "Yeah they're fine," after an initial launch of "Yeah you're fuckin' overtuned and overpowered." They got some people who main them, others swore off them, much like any other DLC character in a fighting game, and the salt gradually diminished. In February of 2020, Sakurai would tacitly admit during a Famitsu article about Byleth's development that he was aware of the criticism about the addition, saying that he doesn't have as much power over roster choices as people like to believe (Byleth apparently snubbed a fighter he was much more enthusiastic about) but that he agreed that there were a few too many sword fighters and Fire Emblem representatives specifically in the game. Given Sakurai has said Smash will never have a roster as large as Ultimate again, it's likely some of Fire Emblem's representation will be cut down in future games as part of this culling.
That being said, I understand. First and foremost: there are too many Fire Emblem characters; and what’s more there are too many sword-users.
So far, three of the six planned characters for Fighter's Pass 2 have been released, with Min-Min from the Arms series coming first, Steve from Minecraft literally breaking Twitter (Steve's addition could be a post of its own with how much salt he generated) and the OG Anime Sword Boy, the One Winged Angel himself in Sephiroth being announced at the Game Awards 2020. We're still waiting for updates on when the fourth fighter will be revealed and who they may be, but regardless of who it is, there will always be a few mad hoes in the background. Also Geno finally got into Smash!... As a Mii skin which led to the character's fanbase collectively reaching for a noose. These hoes weren't even that mad, it was mostly just sad. Still. At least it's better than whatever the Walluigi mains are up to. Thanks for reading.
At a certain point in the game, you can buy a broken laptop at the thrift shop near Leblanc. You can fix it by buying repair parts in Akihabara to use at the workbench. Doing this grants access to a special shop
The TV in Leblanc might have a trivia show that gives knowledge
YOU SHOULD NOT READ BOOKS UNTIL JULY. Books only give stats after you finish them, and they’re usually way better ways to do this. The only time you should read books is on the subway and in class when you can. On July 3rd, the school library will have a book called “Speed Reader”, that allows Joker to read two part books in one sitting. After that, reading becomes worth it.
You can display gifts from confidants in your room by interacting with the shelf
When you unlock persona itemization in the velvet room, pressing R2 in the compendium will display what the persona will turn into if itemized
If connected to the network, pressing the touch pad will allow you to see the recommend activity/confidant to spend your time on
Ohya is the most useless confidant so don’t hang out with her unless she’s your final confidant that needs to be completed
Playing billiards at Penguin Sniper will increase your technical attack rank. Max technical rank will cause tech attacks to always down an enemy
Use a guide for the Justice confidant as some dialogue is necessary to access a future feature
Mishima and Yoshida are confidants that will rank up no matter what you say to them. So never accept Mishima’s late night hang out requests since he ranks up anyways
The fruit stand in the underground walkway will always give a random social stat point on Sunday’s
Hanging out with the Twins at night will reward you with the skill cards needed for their confidant. You can still do their confidant without skill cards but it won’t be as easy
Popheads 2020 Album of the Year #5: Grimes - Miss Anthropocene
Artist:Grimes Album:Miss Anthropocene (Deluxe | Revised | Revised Deluxe) Label:4AD Tracklist and Lyrics:Genius Release date: February 21, 2020 popheads [FRESH] thread: Here Listen:Apple Music (Deluxe) | Spotify (Deluxe V1) | YouTube Music (Deluxe V1) You know me as the girl who plays with fire, But this is the song I wrote you in the dark ... Madness, intellect, audacity? Grimes, the stage name of Claire Boucher, is an electronic musician and multimedia artist from Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. How ordinary and uncontroversial that makes her sound. As any Pophead surely knows by now, Grimes is far from either of those things. Much of the lore behind Grimes' early career seems well-known by now to her fans: she attend McGill University in Montréal, Québec (a very prestigious school) where she had an interest in neuroscience and worked on her Russian, a language she had first picked up in childhood (she is of French and Ukrainian heritage, and her name means "clear (f.) butcher" in French, a fact she finds hilarious). She chose her stage name after hearing of grime music on her MySpace (which is still around), and listed her music as "grime" despite never having heard grime music before (she ended up liking it, by the way). She also goes by c, the physical constant for the speed of light, because she finds her name hard to pronounce (she has a slight speech impediment, as well as a lisp for the sound /s/, though she doesn't care about the latter). Grimes learned to use recording software in university (Apple's GarageBand) and about music production from friends, and got involved with the music collective Lab Synthèse, which had a production space in a now-closed warehouse in Montréal and spawned the label Arbutus Records, which has since housed many Canadian indietronica acts. Grimes' first two albums were released on this label: Geidi Primes, a concept album about her favourite novel, the science fiction epic Dune; and Halfaxa, an ambient electronica album that has been described as gothic, both in 2010. Not expecting that anyone would hear her debut (it was first released as a run of 30 cassettes with hand-drawn covers by her), both albums were well-received by critics, to her surprise. All writing and almost all production was done on both by her alone. Grimes' early work was linked to the "witch house" microgenre, an underground scene of electronic music that was gothic in both sound and aesthetic, and was briefly popular around the early 2010s. (This can be seen on the tracklist of Halfaxa with that scene's trademark use of arcane symbols in their titles.) In 2011, she released the split EP Darkbloom with fellow Canadian electronic musician D'Eon, with the first five tracks being by her. Notably, this EP had her first song to have a music video, the self-directed "Vanessa". Her breakthrough, though, was yet to come. If you're looking for a dream girl, I'll never be your dream girl Visions (2012), Grimes' first LP with her new label 4AD, won her widespread acclaim and made her a cultural phenomenon in her home country of Canada. The album gave a more accessible and poppy spin on her early mix of dark, ambient and psychedelic music, and is a bewitching, trance-like album to listen through. Although the first single from it was "Genesis" with a music video featuring Brooke Candy, she won acclaim for her song "Oblivion", written about her own experience with sexual assault and trauma afterward. During this time, Grimes' image became linked with the Manic Pixie Dream Girl archetype, the concept of "kawaii" (a Japanese aesthetic which roughly translates as "cuteness") and her waiflike appearance; as well as her reputation as an outspoken feminist. Grimes has expressed dislike of being misinterpreted as a less serious musician during this time because of her turn towards a pop sound and aesthetic, as well as frustration at not being taken seriously as a woman music producer, still fairly uncommon in electronic music. Indeed the recording of Visions is a key part of Grimes lore: she made the album alone at her home in a matter of weeks, neither sleeping nor eating, and taking amphetamines to stay focused (she has alluded to possibly having ADHD before). [Author's note: Grimes has since disavowed the association of her music with drugs, saying that she has struggled with addiction in the past.] Her next album came in 2015: the widely acclaimed Art Angels, which saw a turn towards an even poppier sound and moved away from the ambient and psychedelic feel of Visions towards classic synthpop and electronica. Art Angels was recorded again at her home, now in Los Angeles, and showed a mix of strong pop hooks with more intelligible lyrics that touched on themes of personal doubts, lost friendships, and her place in the music industry. [Because this album is most likely her best-known on Popheads, I will not discuss it in much depth]. Infamously, she was quoted in 2019 as calling the album a "piece of crap", a narrative she has refuted since, saying her comments were taken out of context. Despite her success, neither Visions nor Art Angels had any singles that charted highly even in her home country, but she gained a loyal cult following online. To accompany the album, she also released The Acid Reign Chronicles, a series of music videos by her and her best friend HANA). How could one follow up an album that's been repeatedly called one's magnum opus? It would have to be something crazy, wouldn't it? Something that's provocative ... it gets the people going ... This is the sound of the end of the world Does anyone think global warming is a good thing? I love Grimes. I think she's a really interesting artist We come to it at last: Miss Anthropocene, stylized at release as Miss_Anthrop0cene, Grimes' fifth studio LP and my pick for album of the year.
It’s called Miss_Anthropocene. It’s a concept album about the anthropomorphic Goddess of climate Change: A psychedelic, space-dwelling demon/ beauty-Queen who relishes the end of the world. She’s composed of Ivory and Oil - Grimes via Instagram
?
The way I figure it is that climate change sucks and no one wants to read about it because the only time you hear about it is when you’re getting guilted. I wanted to make climate change fun. Miss Anthropocene has got a Voldemort kind of vibe. She’s naked all the time and she’s made out of ivory and oil. It’s going to be super tight. [...] If I’m stuck being a villain, I want to pursue villainy artistically. If there’s nothing left to lose, that’s actually a really fun idea to me. I think it has freed me artistically. The best part of the movie is the Joker. Everyone loves the villain. Everyone fucking loves Thanos. Let’s make some Thanos art. (Source)
If you haven't heard this album or know anything about it yet, you might be thinking: Wait,what? Miss Anthropocene is a concept album about the apocalypse. As Grimes said, she wants to make climate change fun. We're living in a new epoch, the Anthropocene, the age of humanity, so named because we now have the power as a species to alter our environment, or even destroy it. Some might find this disturbing. Grimes, however, finds it thrilling.
So my album’s about a modern demonology or a modern pantheon where every song is about a different way to suffer or a different way to die. If you think about it, god-making or god-designing just seems so fun. The idea of making the Goddess of Plastic seems so fun to me. - Grimes
As is common with Grimes: Is she serious? Is she trolling? Being edgy? When the news is full of natural disasters, species extinctions and dire warnings about a climate apocalypse, why would anyone want to make an album about how dying from climate change is awesome? Well, it should be said: Miss Anthropocene is not Grimes. She is a character, a personification of our times, and she is also (this is very key) a villain. This is, as Grimes has done before and shown a long-running interest in, a work of science fiction. It would be absurd not to talk briefly about how our last year was dominated by the life-altering effects of COVID-19 and how life in quarantine has felt like the apocalypse to many. It's been hard on us, our mental health, our finances. This isn't a "quarantine album", and the album was mostly finished before the virus appeared in the news. Grimes did not predict it, but she ended up making the perfect soundtrack to our dire 2020 anyway and how powerless we felt to do anything about it. "You're gonna get sick, you don't know when", she sings. The threat was always looming whenever we went out, and when we stayed in we had little to do often but doomscroll through news articles about wildfires, protests against police brutality worldwide, a draining election cycle in America, take your pick. Last year was frankly a shitshow no one saw coming - though maybe they should have. Things just aligned right with this album being full of darker lyrical themes, and darker in sound than the bright-sounding Art Angels. We had a taste of what the album would be like before it came out with the song "Pretty Dark" (video, a demo track released in 2019 that didn't make it onto the album. On this song, Grimes explores alternate characters, being a girl named "Dark", as a chance to escape from her Grimes persona. However, the concept of the album ended up being much more complex, with a whole pantheon of "new gods" that are fitting for our time, each song representing a different facet of the modern world. Here they are as listed on her website months before the album came out:
Goddess of climate crisis: Miss Anthropocene
Demon of addiction: "Delete Forever"
Goddess of ID and social media: War Nymph, her digital avatar
Demon of AI: "We Appreciate Power"
Goddess of gaming: "Violence"
Demon of political apathy: "My Name is Dark"
Goddess of simulation: "4ÆM"
Demon of ego death: "Before the Fever"
Goddess of digital lust: "IDORU"
Demon of sexual assault: "Darkseid"
Goddess of gender roles: "So Heavy I Fell Through the Earth"
Isn't this pretentious? Maybe. But it's optional: you don't need to know all of the album's lore to understand what Grimes is singing about on it. For those who wish to know the background and thought process behind the album in more detail, I highly recommend reading this interview with another uncontroversial Popheads fave, Lana Del Rey first, then delving into her Genius annotations. For now I'm going to give my own, somewhat subjective (!) takes on what each track is about. Annihilation sounds so dope!
In 2020, Grimes became a mother for the first time with partner Elon Musk, having a child named X Æ A-Xii (the Roman numeral for 12); a breakdown of how they came up with this unusual name can be found here. Grimes and Musk met in 2018 on Twitter, bonding over an obscure philosophical reference (a thought experiment about the dangers of AI called Roko's Basilisk) and made their first public appearance together at the Met Gala that year. Because Musk is (I would argue) an even more controversial figure than Grimes is, I won't be talking about him otherwise, nor do I believe it's relevant to the album. However, this song does touches on her feelings about pregnancy and motherhood, having to (in her words) sacrifice her body to another being. When Grimes announced her pregnancy in a rather cryptic Instagram post, there was some debate over whether she was pregnant herself at all (remember, she trolled the media in 2019 by claiming to have had an experimental eye surgery which makes zero biological sense). This was cleared up soon, however. On this song, Grimes reflects on being (as the saying goes) heavy with child, bringing new life into a world with an uncertain future. This entrancing song sets the tone for the rest of the album, as does its music video, which begins with a reference to the classic sci-fi film Blade Runner (a movie about rogue androids in Los Angeles that takes place in the far-off year of ... 2019, the year of the song's first release).
This song references the name of a powerful comic book supervillain, as well as Grimes' Playstation user ID, with online gaming being (her words) "where I go to kill people and stuff". The song features lyrics in Mandarin Chinese by Taiwanese rapper 潘PAN (Pan Wei-Ju), also known as Aristophanes, who had a feature on Art Angels' "Scream". A fan translation can be found here. Here Grimes develops upon her fascination with villains and death, while the lyrics by 潘PAN are hard to interpret literally, but paint a vivid picture of death and decay. The opening line feels quite fitting for a year where many of us sat at home all day being anxious (Unrest is in the soul / We don't move our bodies anymore ...) while the operatic backing vocals call to mind religion and medieval themes, another long-running interest of hers. However this is by far the most difficult song for me to connect with its "god" in concept, and I think its original concept was most likely just abandoned.
On this song, released only a couple of weeks before the album itself, Grimes surprised fans with a poignant acoustic ballad with influences from country music - not exactly the kind of genre she is known for doing. Taking the title from a prompt on her computer, Grimes wrote this song about the opioid crisis in North America, being saddened by the death of rapper Lil Peep, who had overdosed on fentanyl (a powerful opioid and dangerous street drug). As well, she touches on her own experiences with drug abuse (I did everything / More lines on a mirror than a sonnet) and being around drug culture in her youth, having lost many friends to drug addiction herself; she compares the experience of feeling euphoric on drugs to the myth of Icarus flying too close to the sun. Grimes describes this song as emotionally hard to perform for her, as is "Oblivion". In the video, she plays a queen overlooking a crumbling empire.
Grimes brings up again her fascination with the history of warfare and weaponry over a club banger, produced by the late i_o (Garrett Lockhart) who sadly died in November of unknown causes. Described as a love song sung between the planet Earth and humanity that portrays a dysfunctional relationship between the two; in describing the concept behind the music video, Grimes also talks about digital violence as a modern addition to the physical violence of the past, which is fitting given its "god" is video games. The video, filmed in the Vibiana cathedral in Los Angeles, features Grimes surrounded by women wielding swords and dance choreography inspired by Tiktok, with a cameo by HANA as the dead woman on the floor. Though Grimes didn't plan to put this song on the album, and the video was choreographed and filmed in a hurry, nevertheless she was pleased with the results. With its edgy and ironic concept (no, Grimes does not really love violence, nor does the Earth; she does collect swords though), as well as its excellent production, this is my own favourite song on the album.
Written for the long-delayed video game Cyberpunk 2077, in which Grimes plays an NPC named Lizzy Wizzy, this track has Grimes make use of her love of Bollywood films, sampling the soundtrack of the historical drama Bajirao Mastani. Grimes is well-known for her insomnia (see: the recording of Visions above), which is in turn known for its health effects (explaining the lyrics about getting sick). Here Grimes seems to portray being up all night in an ambivalent way. [Having stayed up all night many times, including to write this piece you are reading right now, I can confirm it only feels fun up to a point, after which it becomes exhausting.] To me this sounds like great music to play in a futuristic city at night - Grimes is a big fan of the cyberpunk genre herself, which tends to feature this setting, as shown by her previous references to Blade Runner and Akira (an influence upon the video of "Delete Forever").
Here Grimes gets into the theme of the album as being inspired by the "gods" - secular replacements for religion - that underlie the concept of the album, the most important being the goddess of climate change (Miss A herself) but including addiction ("Delete Forever"), insomnia ("4Æm"), and more.
I was like, “Well, who are the new gods?” Because we have all this new stuff. We have plastic and pollution and plastic surgery and social media. The new gods sound sick. They sound like … like the Sailor Scouts, like these sick demons. -Grimes
Here Grimes also alludes to her image as gothic, describing herself as wearing "black attire, black eyeliner", fittingly for a bleak-sounding, pessimistic song. Being the slowest track on the album, it may be hard to get into, but it wouldn't be the same without it.
Grimes described her thoughts behind the making of this song in this ... interesting tweet. (I voted for "fighting Balrog", but it seems closer to the latter.) Her "nu metal song about insomnia" ended up being not quite either but does show some of the influence of industrial music on the album; she again brings up drug use, sleeplessness and her alter ego of "Dark" from the single "Pretty Dark".
It’s just about pretty obvious, like, paradise in hell, making the decision to be good or bad. The specter of death always haunting you. It was serious. - Grimes
Grimes depicts herself as jaded and nihilistic (The boys are such a bore / The girls are such a bore / I never trust the government and pray to God for sure, yeah) in the lyrics and alludes to mental illness and self-destructive urges with the opening lines about wishing for annihilation ("When you don’t care if you live or die, when you’re so depressed that you’re like, 'Whatever, fuck it'"). She also hints at her long history of controversies and misconceptions in the media (I'm not shy but I refuse to speak/ Because I don't trust you to understand me). Grimes found the song very difficult to make, wanting it to sound "roaring" with its screaming vocals.
In one of her most melancholy-themed songs, here c. sings openly about suicide ideation, conceptualizing it as another demon of hers. She brings up various suicide methods and self-harm, and imagines herself in death as happy. Despite its morbid subject matter, this is a deceptively upbeat song musically. Although self-destruction and death are recurring themes on this theme, this is the one where she talks most about wanting to die herself.
First of all, that title is almost too on the nose for an album released in February 2020. Here Grimes sings about hedonism in the first verse and uses an old joke as a metaphor for death (There are many ways in / But there's only one way out), referring to birth and death. She explains the title thus:
Grimes explained how she wanted "Before the Fever" to invoke the "literal feelings" of dying — the uncertainty, desperation, and bizarre tranquility presumably felt when one knows it's the end. "Fevers are just kind of scary, but a fever is also sort of poetically imbued with the idea of passion and stuff, too," she told him. "It's like it's a weirdly loaded word — scary, but compelling and beautiful." What's more terrifying and more beautiful than committing yourself to another person when everything could very well implode in your face? One could even call it romantic. (Source)
Even though it was written before the COVID-19 outbreak became serious, nevertheless the theme of this song could easily be called love in the time of coronavirus for the way it combines metaphors of illness with romance (cf. the analysis of "Violence").
By far the happiest-sounding song on the album, this seven-minute epic is also the longest, and much needed after the dark themes that pervade much of it. Beginning with what sounds like birdsong, it's a fun, cute, lighthearted ditty that gives a bit of much-needed hope to the album (I wanna play a beautiful game / Even though we're gonna lose / But I adore you). Maybe we're all going to die and humanity will go extinct; maybe not. If that's going to happen, can't we have some fun anyway? As an aside, the title is a neat pun on the phrase "I adore you" but also seems to be referencing the novel Idoru ("idols") by famed cyberpunk author William Gibson, in turn about the Japanese concept of "idols", a unique kind of celebrity. There has been fan speculation over who, if anyone, the song may be about; Grimes alluded to its meaning on a livestream with HANA but did not say in the end. My own take is that it could just as well be about the Earth itself. These are all ten of the tracks on the standard edition of Miss Anthropocene; on the deluxe version(s) there are five bonus tracks, four of which are alternate mixes of other songs on the standard edition that differ mainly in length ("So Heavy I Fell Through the Earth", "Violence", "My Name is Dark" and "IDORU"). These seem to have been done to make the longer tracks more suitable for playlists, explaining the name "algorithm mix" for them. As well, there is one more: the original WAP.
First of all: what a fucking BANGER. "We Appreciate Power" is a bonus track that was released as a single in 2018. It was originally meant to feature vocals by Poppy, who had featured Grimes on her own 2018 album Am I a Girl? but after a feud between the two, she was replaced with HANA. Musically, it is influenced heavily by nu-metal, it blends crunchy distorted guitars and loud rock drums with an awesome electronic drop. Grimes' and HANA's vocals trade between verses and choruses and blend so well it is hard to tell which part is whose upon first listen. This song was due to have a larger-budget music video, but ended up getting a bare-bones video instead, which is still a very fun watch with its cyberpunk visuals. Lyrically, it was inspired by a North Korean girl group who make propaganda music for the state, as well as Grimes' fascination with the concept of an AI dictatorship. "We Appreciate Power" touches on common cyberpunk themes like mind uploading, transhumanism and simulated reality. The song portrays AI rule as something desirable yet frightening, punctuating the lyrics with unsettling shrieks and ending the song with Grimes chanting "Submit" repeatedly. Despite its tongue-in-cheek nature, the song's lyrics led to a minor controversy: for her speculation of AI replacing humans, musicians Zola Jesus and Devon Welsh called her a "silicon fascist" and they got into a spat on Twitter that seems to be resolved, with Grimes acknowledging Zola made some good points. As for the prospect of an AI takeover: it's frankly a terrifying thought, but at least we'd have jams like this. Now is the time to burn twice as bright and half as long. Sincerely, Miss Anthropocene This writeup is dedicated to all those cyberpunks who fight against injustice and corruption every day of their lives! (DJ mix) Thanks so much for letting me do this writeup, Popheads - and thank you if you made it to the end. I know there is a lot here, but Grimes is a longtime favourite artist of mine and I had a lot to say. I hope I've been reasonably balanced here and not come off as an apologist stan; I am well aware Grimes can be "messy" or a "problematic fave". However, I've tried to explain the best I can what this album is really about, give my thoughts, and explain why I think it's one of the albums of the year. As well, if I said anything factually wrong, please let me know; I tried my best to source everything and get things right.
Questions for the culture:
[Voice of Anthony Fantano] What did you think of the album? Did you love it? Did you hate it?
The album was infamously leaked months before its release. (I didn't listen to the leak.) Did you listen to it or not, and do you think it may have affected fan reception to the album?
A big problem with concept albums is that they often have an elaborate concept that doesn't come across well in the lyrics. What do you think of Grimes' concept for this album and did she succeed at it? Do you have different readings of the lyrics than what I wrote?
How would you say this album holds up against her others? Was the darker tonal shift a good thing? Would you have liked her to make a more upbeat or poppy album?
How would you rank it this among the year's albums? Were they better on average, worse, etc.?
Feel free to ask me any other questions, bring up other topics as you like and I will respond to everyone. (I just have one request though: please for the love of god do not bring up Grimes' partner or child; I think it's messy and like I said, not very relevant to the album anyway.) Any other topic, no matter how "spicy", is fair game though. Just be nice. Hope reading this was fun! We have more AOTY posts every day for the rest of the month, so be sure to check those out too. WE APPRECIATE POPHEADS - vayyiqra
If a member’s confidant is rank 10 during 3rd semester, you can visit them again for them to gain a new skill, an improved trait, and improved resistance
Now we shall begin
Mona:
Focuses on healing and wind attacks, with a few high critical physicals Trait: Increases amount of hp restored when Mona/allies use healing skills 3rd semester trait: Same as before but also reduces SP cost of healing skills Weak to: Electricity Resistant to: Wind 3rd semester skill: Medium physical damage to all foes with high critical Mona’s trait is pretty good early game, but soon both Mona and other members learn healing skills that heal all HP, making Mona’s trait useless, even the 3rd semester one. Pros
Best healer
High critical skills
Weakness isn’t a very common skill type
Cons
Low defense
Trait is only useful early game
Weak attacks
What to improve Should focus on improving their defense by using the Jazz club to raise their defense stat and maybe get Marakukaja. Use accessories that increase defense or magic Overall Mona isn’t bad, but they are outclassed by pretty much everyone. You should probably only use them for boss battles if you’re struggling, but you can get plenty of items to revive, cure, and heal allies. Mona is also an automatic confidant so they might not have as much confidant skills as others
Skull
Focuses on physical attacks with electrical skills Trait: Chance to increase Skull’s/allies physical attacks by 40% 3rd semester trait: Same except 80% Weak to: Wind Resistant to: Electricity 3rd semester skill: All allies next physical attack will do more than double damage Pros
Strong physical attacks
Great defense
Cons
Low magic stat
Low agility
What to improve You don’t really need to improve Skull, because they should be used as a physical attacker which they’re already great at. If you are going to improve something, give them better magic or agility with the Jazz Club. Overall Skull is one of the most powerful allies in the game, and their trait goes great with other allies that use physical attacks. They also get Charge, which doubles their next physical attack. Definitely a solid member to keep in your party.
Panther
Focuses on high damage fire magic Trait: May decrease SP cost for Panthers/allies magic skills 3rd semester trait: Same except with higher chance Weak to: Ice Resistant to: Fire 3rd semester skill: All allies next magic attack will do more than double damage Pros
Best magic damage
Unlocks a severe magic skill
Has healing and ailment capabilities
Cons
Worst physical attacks
So-so defense
What to improve Panther is basically the magic version of Skull, so you don’t really need to improve magic. If you are going to improve a stat, it would be defense Overall Panther is another great member, being great for bosses. However SP might be used quickly with them.
Fox
Focuses on strong physical attacks and ice magic Trait: Chance for Fox/allies to avoid physical attacks Third semester trait: Same except with higher chance Weak to: Fire Resistant to: Ice Third semester skill: All stats increased for all allies for three turns Pros
Great physical attacks
Good agility
Cons
Doesn’t naturally get charge unlike Skull
So-so magic
What to improve You should definitely get Charge from the Jazz Club for them, so they can keep up with Skull. Other than that, maybe defense and luck. Overall A solid choice. They’re slightly better at magic than Skull. But it’s best to use them in the same party as Skull, because of Skull’s trait. Unlike Skull though, Fox gets physical attacks that power up after a baton pass. If you give Fox the skill Charge, they’re worth using
Queen
All-rounder with Nuke skills to deal technical damage Trait: Increases allies chance of inflicting burn/shock/freeze by 25% 3rd semester trait: Same except 50% Weak to: Psy Resistant to: Nuke Third semester skill: All stats lowered on all enemies for three turns Pros
Good at everything
Great healing
Technical damage capabilities
Weakness isn’t a common skill type
Trait increases power of the most powerful teammates (Skull, Panther, Fox)
Gets a severe skill
Cons
Not a lot of enemies are weak to Nuke
Trait is only used for certain teammates
What to improve If you play billiards at Penguin Sniper, you increase the whole party’s technical rank. Getting max rank will cause every technical attack to down an enemy. Nuke skills do technical damage to enemies that are shocked, frozen, or burning. If you’re going to give Queen Jazz Club skills, they would go great with the stat increase/decrease skills. Concentrate is also a solid skill to give Queen. Overall Queen is arguably the best party member. I doubt they will ever leave your party, especially since they go well with other powerful teammates.
Noir
Uses Psy and Gun attacks to do technical damage Trait: Decreases party’s chance of being inflicted by ailments 3rd semester trait: Same but with higher chance Weak to: Nuke Resistant to: Psy Third semester skill: All allies reflect next magic and physical attack Pros
Weakness isn’t a common skill type
Technical damage capabilities
High critical attacks
Cons
Isn’t the best at Magic and physical/gun
Can’t unlock confidant abilities until late game
Tetrakarn and Makarakarn aren’t going to be used much
What to improve Just like Queen, increasing your technical rank will greatly boost them. If you do that, Noir can down all enemies inflicted with an ailment with Psy skills. If you get chaine’s hook by doing the Faith confidant, ambushing enemies from a distance causes them to immediately be inflicted with an ailment. If you do all that, Noir will be one of the best members for non-boss battles. However, if you don’t do all that, they aren’t worth using. Overall Noir’s power relies on what you did, if you did all the things mentioned above, they’re great. If you didn’t, they’re so-so. I suggest boosting the Psy skills, not the gun.
Crow
Uses bless and curse insta-kills Trait: Chance of decreasing support skill’s SP cost Weak to: Curse Resistant to: Bless Pros
Uses both Bless and Curse skills
Has insta-kill skills
Has Almighty skills (almighty skills are powerful attacks that ememies can’t protect themselves from)
Can revive teammates
Has a good physical skill
Gets Debilitate
Most confidant skills are already unlocked when they join your party
Has a severe skill
Cons
Doesn’t get any skill boosts automatically, so they’re not the best for bosses
Luck stat isn’t very high
What to improve Crow gets high powered attacks, but no boosts for them, so use an accessory that either boosts Bless or Curse. Overall Crow is a great member for non-boss battles, as they can end the battle instantly. Definitely use them when you can.
REDACTED
Focuses on high powered attacks to ravish enemies Trait: Chance to decrease support skill costs 3rd semester trait: Same but can also decrease Almighty skill cost Weak to: Bless Resistant to: Curse 3rd semester skill: Colossal Almighty damage to one foe, extra damage if foe is downed Pros
Almighty attacks
Lower chance of being inflicted with Ailments
Starts battle with an attack boost for three turns
High stats
Has debilitate
Has severe skills
Cons
Doesn’t have skill boosts
Only has one skill to target weaknesses
Weak to a common skill type
What to improve You might want to give an accessory that nulls bless skills or gives a skill to target more weaknesses. Since they join you around the time Spell Master is available at the Jazz Club, they are a solid choice to give that skill Overall With no skill boosts, it’s best to use them after a baton pass. You don’t get their 3rd semester trait/skill until the final day, and even then you have to use the correct dialogue choices to get it. But besides that, great party member
Violet
Uses bless magic and powerful high critical physical skills Trait: Allies may not be downed when hit with their weakness 3rd semester trait: Same but with higher chance Weak to: Curse Resistant to: Bless 3rd semester skill: Severe physical damage to one foe two times Pros
Great physical attacks
High luck stat
Can heal
Great agility
Cons
Lowest defense in the game
So-so magic
Weak to common skill type
Can’t learn Charge, even from Jazz Club
What to improve You might want to give them higher defense and Arm’s master from the Jazz Club. You can give them charge from a will seed accessory. Overall Violet would be best used with Skull do to Skull’s trait. Having Skull, Fox, and Violet in the same party could make you unstoppable. With high critical attacks, Violet can easily down an enemy. Only bad part is their low defense
Extra Tips
Most members learn a skill that gets rid of a enemies resistance to their skill type. (Like Panther can get Fire break, which gets rid of enemies resistance to fire)
It is not recommend to keep these skills, most bosses don’t have resistances and they’re ways to kill enemies with resistances. Queen and Noir can ignore resistances with technical attacks, Skull and Fox aren’t meant to be used as magic attackers, and Mona doesn’t do enough damage anyways. Only member that could use it is Panther, because Fire is the only thing they’re good at. If you want these skills, just have Joker get a persona that focuses on them.
If you need room for an extra skill, I personally like to get rid of the magic attacks that only target one enemy. Skull, Fox, and Violet aren’t meant to be magic users, Morgana isn’t a powerful attacker, and Noir needs the room most. The only person I don’t use this for is Queen, because they have a severe to one foe skill. Crow and REDACTED are also an exception
Use the party members that have the highest confidant rank
Panther has more confidant skills that effect battles if you need another excuse to use Panther
Gun attacks count as physical, so things like Skulls trait and Charge can boost it
If you need healing, instead of just doing Auto-recover, you can go to your menu, press skills, and use a healing skill from someone not in your party. This way you don’t use the SP from your party
Team Builds
Physical attacks: Skull, Fox, Violet (Fox and/or Violet can be replaced with Noir and REDACTED) Magic Attacks: Panther, Noir, Queen (One of them can be replaced with Crow or REDACTED) Boss Battles: Panther, Skull, Queen (Queen can be replaced by Mona if you’re struggling) Downing Enemies: Noir, Queen, Mona (Can replace Mona with Violet or Crow) Critical Attacks: Violet, Mona, Noir Quick Fights: Crow, Panther, Skull Full Support: Queen, Noir, Crow (Can also use REDACTED, Skull, Fox)
So, I believe u/Rexthedinosaur2002 made a post about the Fool's Journey before. He believed John was in The Tower (Tarot card 16 of 21) as of now. I'm gonna see if I agree by going through the story thus far: BEGINNINGS & CONSCIOUSNESS:"He is a fool because only a simple soul has the innocent faith to undertake such a journey with all its hazards and pain"(The Fool, 0). "The Magician....represents the active, masculine power of creative impulse. He is also our conscious awareness"(The Magician, 1).
John is born, innocent and untainted.
John becomes conscious/active.
UNCONSCIOUS AWARNESS & POTENTIAL:"The High Priestess is our unrealized potential waiting for an active principle to bring it to expression"(The High Priestess, 2).
John has a lot of dormant potential as a result of his ancestry.
NATURE & SENSATION: John's parents influence him as he learns about the world (The Empress, 3) ORDER & DISCIPLINE: John also learns about the Rules (The Emperor, 4). It's possible that John's mother represents the Emperor and John's father represents the Empress, instead of vice-versa. I don't think we know enough yet to say though. EDUCATION & GROUP IDENTIFICATION:"Eventually, the Fool ventures out of his home into the wider world. He is exposed to the beliefs and traditions of his culture and begins his formal education"(The Hierophant, 5).
John goes to school, where he is bullied and learns about the hierarchy. He hates it, but he does meet Adrion along the way and finds his niche.
RELATIONSHIP & VALUES:"[The Fool] yearns for relationship. The Fool also needs to decide upon his own beliefs"(The Lovers, 6).
John meets Claire, who befriends him and Adrion. This seems clear to me since it's revealed that John liked Claire. Claire helps John discover his ability, and John is overjoyed that he actually has one, placing value on power.
VICTORY & SELF-ASSERTION:"For the moment, the Fool's assertive success is all he might wish, and he feels a certain self-satisfaction(The Chariot, 7).
John begins training and becomes stronger due to his discipline and willpower. He starts to win fights.
STRENGTH & COMPASSION:"Over time, life presents the Fool with new challenges, some that cause suffering and disillusionment"(Strength, 8).
Here's where things start to go off the rails a bit. John becomes the strongest/ becomes king even after suffering setbacks like losing to Zirian. However, instead of rising above frustration and anger while learning tolerance, John gives in to excessive revenge and his fixation on power. This is still accounted for though: "At times, intense passions surface, just when the Fool thought he had everything, including himself, under control."
INTROSPECTION/GUIDANCE/SOLITUDE:"The sensual world holds less attraction for him, and he seeks moments of solitude away from the frantic activity of society. In time he may seek a teacher or guide who can give him advice and direction"(The Hermit, 9).
John is apprehended by the authorities and comes back unable to live with himself. The guide can either be seen as his father or unOrdinary itself. This part also signifies the destruction of John's friendships.
TURNING POINT & PERSONAL VISION: "When the Fool glimpses the beauty and order of the world, if only briefly, he finds some of the answers he is seeking"(Wheel of Fortune, 10).
John reads unOrdinary and rather than thinking he can be like the hero in the book, he takes it as assurance that there are other people like that in the world to make it a better place since he doesn't trust himself to do it. "Having been solitary, he feels ready for movement and action again." He starts hanging out with his dad, exercising, and trying to get into Wellston...he succeeds and turns everything around.
RESPONSIBILITY & DECISION:"He looks back over his life to trace the cause and effect relationships that have brought him to this point. He takes responsibility for his past actions so he can make amends and ensure a more honest course for the future"(Justice, 11).
John becomes like his dad and decides to not use his power at all in order to not hurt other people. He protects some people from getting bullied and tries to live his best life. It is in this step that attends Wellston and meets Seraphina. However, John is now at a crossroads: "Will he remain true to his insights, or will he slip back into an easier, more unaware existence that closes off further growth?" By using a persona instead of bettering his true self, however, he actually closes himself off from further growth.
LETTING GO & REVERSAL:"Sooner or later, he encounters his personal cross - an experience that seems too difficult to endure. This overwhelming challenge humbles him until he has no choice but to give up and let go"(The Hanged Man, 12).
I think this would be John's month without Seraphina and Arlo's betrayal. This leads into Sera's ability loss and John's struggle with how he should help her. Eventually, John lets go of some of his inhibitions: "At first, the Fool feels defeated and lost. He believes he has sacrificed everything, but from the depths he learns an amazing truth. He finds that when he relinquishes his struggle for control, everything begins to work as it should. By becoming open and vulnerable, the Fool discovers the miraculous support of his Inner Self." The difference here is that his inner self is quite vengeful instead of reaching a peace and tranquility. He lets everything go out of control actually, not really releasing control.
ENDING & ELIMINATION: "The Fool now begins to eliminate old habits and tired approaches"(Death, 13).
This process starts during Episode 107, when John becomes so frustrated with himself for not acting when Sera got beat up by Zeke that he punches the wall and becomes Tuesd-I mean Joker. John starts to lash out at the people that hurt Sera and himself. His black speech bubbles become even more frequent, and his William-esque personality begins to die. He even has this internal monologue where he concludes that "power is the only thing that matters" and stops thinking that people will ever listen to reason. This process seems to end around Episode 131/132, when John comforts Sera after her kidnapping and then he declares war against the hierarchy. This is also when his white speech bubbles stop completely.
TEMPERANCE & COMBINATION:"Now, he realizes the balancing stability of temperance (14). He discovers true poise and equilibrium"(Temperance, 14).
Another way that John's Fool's Journey is like a more dark/twisted version: he becomes more confident and cunning now that he's set his mind on destroying the hierarchy. He's still angry, but it seems like he's completely in control. No one can stop him.
HOPELESSNESS:"The Fool has his health, peace of mind and a graceful composure. What more could he need?...The Devil is not an evil, sinister figure residing outside of us. He is the knot of ignorance and hopelessness lodged within each of us at some level"(The Devil, 15).
While John is the furthest from peace of mind and graceful composure, he does fall away into hopelessness when Sera confronts him about being Joker. He feels like Sera has gone behind his back and talked to people John hates and now thinks he is a monster, regardless of whether or not she actually does think so. Thinking she betrayed him, he loses himself and succumbs to anger and power fixation once again...losing trust for everyone so he can only rely on himself. And then, his hopelessness becomes complete when Zeke attacks him due to his secret being out. He literally says "it's hopeless" and just admits that he's a monster...or perhaps a devil.
DOWNFALL/SUDDEN CHANGE/RELEASE:"How can the Fool free himself from the Devil?...The Tower is the ego fortress each of us has built around his beautiful inner core. Gray, cold and rock-hard, this fortress seems to protect but is really a prison"(The Tower, 16).
John constructed his tower after Arlo put doubt in his mind about Cecile and when Safe House was founded. In response to those events, John keeps everyone at a distance and threatens all who cross him with pain, falling further into anger. This is where we are now in the story, so I agree that John is currently in The Tower. So what happens next?
"On Card 16 we see an enlightening bolt striking this building. It has ejected the occupants who seem to be tumbling to their deaths. The crown indicates they were once proud rulers; now they are humbled by a force stronger than they. The Fool may need such a severe shakeup if he is to free himself, but the resulting revelation makes the painful experience worthwhile. The dark despair is blasted away in an instant, and the light of truth is free to shine down." So, if we're going by the Fool's Journey, John might lose his status as king, whether he gives it up or it is taken from him. In addition, whatever happens will break him out of his shell and allow him to trust/be hopeful again.
Also, the change will be sudden. This may come in the form of someone taking the amplifier and beating John, which likely won't change his worldview, or someone will have to talk to John and convince him to change. Maybe John's mom or dad will come back to try and help him. Maybe John will be taken down by Vaughn and potentially expelled, but that will not change John's worldview and will come off as repetitive. Or perhaps John will be betrayed by Zeke and Cecile, although that's not quite sudden and also not help him at all. There's also the association of lightning in the card to go over, since that's Remi's ability. I don't think she could beat him in a fight, but Remi might have a hand in breaking through John's shell. Or maybe the revelation that Remi's brother was a superhero could do something. I'm not sure.
I think though that Sera will have to be one of the people that convinces him. Her getting her ability back would certainly be sudden and unexpected, and if Sera wins a fight against John, he will have no choice but to listen to her. While this will reinforce John's opinion that power matters, Sera still might be able to convince him that it's not the only thing that matters. Again, I don't know, but I do think that the next card supports this theory if John's story does indeed follow the Fool's Journey.
HOPE/SERENITY/GENEROSITY:"The Fool is blessed with a trust that completely replaces the negative energies of the Devil. His faith in himself and the future is restored. He is filled with joy and his one wish is to share it generously with the rest of the world"(The Star, 17).
The picture on the card is that of a woman. I believe that Seraphina is the Star, as she is in the unique position to be able to defeat John in battle and to get through to him as well. In addition, her name means "fiery/burning ones." In this stage, John will finally be able to trust himself and others.
FEAILLUSION/BEWILDERMENT:"What effect could spoil this perfect calm? Is there another challenge for the Fool? In fact, it is his bliss that makes him vulnerable to the illusions of the Moon"(The Moon, 18).
I think in this stage, John wants to make a positive change in the world, but he still doubts himself too much and is scared of himself. Either that, or he believes that he can live how he used to as his cripple persona. For example, let's say for the sake of argument that he refused to use his powers once again and just hung out in Safe House. This doesn't really help since he's already attacked Safe House before and don't trust him, even if Sera were to be friends with him again. What he really needs is to merge a good nature with the power to change things for the better.
ENLIGHTENMENT/GREATNESS/ASSURANCE:"No challenge is too daunting. The Fool feels a radiant vitality. He becomes involved in grand undertakings as he draws to himself everything he needs. He is able to realize his greatness"(The Sun, 19).
I think this would symbolize John finally understanding that he truly can be like the main character of unOrdinary instead of thinking he cannot. If he puts the effort into changing himself and making amends for what he has done, it will serve as proof that he actually can do it.
REBIRTH/INNER CALLING/ABSOLUTION: "The Fool feels absolved. He forgives himself and others, knowing that his real self is pure and good. He may regret past mistakes, but he knows they were due to his ignorance of his true nature. He feels cleansed and refreshed, ready to start anew"(Judgement, 20).
This would be John truly accepting himself and making the changes necessary to live as he should. John recognizes that he has changed himself and he can finally do perform good works in the wider world. "He discovers his true vocation - his reason for entering this life. Doubts and hesitations vanish, and he is ready to follow his dream."
INTEGRATION/INVOLVEMENT/FULFILLMENT:"In line with his personal calling, he becomes actively involved in the world. He renders service by sharing his unique gifts and talents and finds that he prospers at whatever he attempts"(The World/ZA WARUDO, 21).
This is John actually making changes in the world and reforming the hierarchy, perhaps. This would probably be during the endgame of the story. This could encompass fights with EMBER, Spectre, and/or the Authorities. After that's over and a new order is achieved, the story will likely end. We might get a redemption by death, John having to give up his ability, John becoming a member of the new authorities, John just going home to be a family man, or even John becoming an ability trainer, helping people develop their abilities as well as their minds in order to prevent people from going through what he did. Not sure, I'm just some guy on Reddit.
Edit: Wow, I didn't think this would get gold. First one I've ever gotten. Thank you very much u/DemiNeveWinter!
When I played Persona 4 Golden earlier this year, I fell in love with some aspects (the characters, the atmosphere, the music), and tolerated others at best. With the advent of Persona 5 Royal, and my cousin letting me borrow his PS4, I found myself swept up in the hype of a game that blew my expectations away and then some. It truly felt like someone at Atlus had been looking over my shoulder while I played the previous game and took detailed notes about what to improve in the sequel. I can honestly say that it’s an upgrade across the board in just about every way that matters to me, and I can wholeheartedly, without any caveats, recommend it to anyone with an interest in this series. If you like anime, if you want to get into JRPGs and don’t know where to start, or maybe you’re like me and you just thought the memes and fanart were cute, you owe it to yourself to give this game a shot. It’s enough for me to want to go back and retroactively make this my game of the year for 2017, which was a pretty stacked roster in itself. Everything seemed to come together, the right team at the right time with the right idea, to catapult what was a pretty niche franchise into AAA stardom to rub shoulders with the Zeldas and Marios as among the best in its class. Even now, with the release of Royal, it’s easily my GOTY now, due in some part to the anemic list of releases, but that’s another topic altogether. I’ll try to keep this review/essay focused on the game itself rather than just comparing it to 4, but given that it was my primary entry point to the series, I will make frequent references to that game, so SPOILERS for both ensue. What I found most immediately charming about Inaba was its sense of time and place. The shuttered businesses, the barren main street, the anxious town with the specter of death over it while a group of carefree teens made plans to go to the mall on their clamshell flip phones captured a dichotomy that I hadn’t felt explored in other games. Whether the developers intended to or not, they created a late 00s period piece that resonated with me quite strongly as someone who was roughly the same age as the protagonist in that time. I would imagine sentiment would follow for those younger than I, as 5 is much more proactive and hyperactive in its presentation. The game is a feast for the eyes, proving beyond the shadow of a doubt that a cohesive style and aesthetic will far outlast the shiniest graphics, as it makes the most of its visuals to draw the player in. The UI itself is a masterclass in action, there are entire games with budgets and teams that dwarf Persona 5 that don’t have as much personality as the pause menu in this one, the way the icons jiggle and pop practically begging you to click on them next. The other pillar holding up its remarkable sense of style is the music, and between 4 and 5 I’m genuinely torn as to which I like better. 5 definitely has the edge when it comes to production value, but the jazzy, upbeat soundtrack is also more content to sit in the background and provide an accompaniment to the city living, in contrast to 4’s loud, gaudy pop earworms, each one an anime opening in the making. While it takes center stage during key moments, most of the time, the soundtrack is this constantly undulating rhythm in the back of the player’s mind, rising and falling with the action, keeping the pulse going like the click clack of wheels upon the train tracks. Undoubtedly, my favorite song is Beneath the Mask, a melancholy tune that sounds like a rainy night and a dying cigarette in an ashtray, the perfect soundtrack to a place of sanctuary after a long day. The nebulous subject of its lyrics leaves it open to many different interpretations: a well-deserved rest after great triumph, or crushing loss and setback; a private moment shared between two lovers, or a reflection on the emptiness of the room itself, alone with one’s thoughts. It’s hard to compare soundtracks in a year with Nier Automata on the roster, but 5 absolutely passes the “would I listen to this outside of the game willingly” test. Just as Heartbreak, Heartbreak became synonymous with me doing laundry and other chores over the summer, I came to associate Beneath the Mask with my commute in the fall, under cover of darkness. I think it’s special when you can tie a game to a certain moment in your life, and this one certainly did it for me. Overall, it was the slower paced, more moody tracks like this and Sunset Bridge that stuck with me, proving that music does not have to be a spectacular front and center banger to play an essential role in the drama, though the game has its fair share of those (Life Will Change, Last Surprise, and Rivers in the Desert being standouts). The change in setting is not limited to the audiovisual aspects, however, as the game itself feels faster and more anxious, almost oppressively so, as moving to the city from the middle of nowhere would feel. Gone is the lackadaisical, laid back intro of the prior game. Here, you are thrust into the driver’s seat immediately, before the game splashes water in your face and asks you where you were on the night of the 12th between the hours of such and such. I thought the opening hours of the game were a fantastic way of setting the stage, as we’re wowed by the prospect of Ocean’s Eleven but anime and then brought back down to Earth via the interrogation as a framing device for the story. I like it because it splits the story into neat chunks, each Palace its own arc. Coming out of Persona 4, my two biggest questions were A: If adults like Adachi are aware of and can manipulate the Shadow World, why have there been no formal attempts to study it? And B: What if the Investigation Team didn’t stop after uncovering the killer? I was delighted to discover that not only does 5 address these topics, but the latter defines the conceit of the whole game, placing the Thieves’ idealism for a better world against bigger and bigger targets, a fitting escalation for a big name sequel. The former question is a major subplot in the story, though the answers I came up with in my head were grander than what ended up being presented. I appreciated how this turn of events resulted in the gang being more proactive, i.e. seeking out targets to punish them for their misdeeds, rather than purely reactive like the kids in 4, who had to wait for each kidnapping to happen in turn before acting. Persona 5 is a much harsher world in comparison, one that demands that its protagonist hit the ground running and get going fast. You’ve been sent to juvie on trumped up charges, nobody wants you around, you’re shoved into an old, dusty attic as a ward of the state, and everyone is looking for an excuse to get you expelled or worse. Even walking down the hallway invites comments from onlookers and rubberneckers who aren’t sure yet if they want to look down on or admire you. All this set dressing contributes to a city that feels just alive enough to allow your imagination to color in the margins and give a much better impression of a cramped metropolis with a beating heart than a big open world would. It’s natural, then, that the protagonist would come to identify with others who fell through the cracks like he did, others who people judged by the masks they wore other than their true character. With Yu it seemed like he immediately formed lifelong bonds with the first three kids he met on the way to class. Ryuji’s and Ann’s friendships feel like they develop more naturally, first as a result of being backed into a corner together with nowhere to go, and gradually getting to know each other as people. It’s as if Atlus took a good look at the broad archetypes they established with Yosuke, Yukiko, Rise, etc and realized them into more fully fledged characters. I loved hanging out with all of the Thieves, getting to know their inner lives and it pained me that I couldn’t max them all in the allotted time. It’s impressive that they managed to build up such a strong portfolio of confidants with their own storylines and character moments without stepping on each other or retreading old ground. I even liked hanging out with Mishima, probably because he’s the one closest in spirit to what fans of this game are actually like, as opposed to Joker’s more aspirational mystique. For the longest time, I thought that the first Palace was the game’s high point. At no other point in the base game did I feel like the player motivations and the character’s motivations were so intertwined on a base level. Kamoshida is such an excellent starting point because right away, you hate him on multiple different fronts: for antagonizing you (and by extension, the player), for being an abusive monster to your friends and classmates, and because of the corrupt authority he represents and the power structures that enable him, nurturing the seed of rebellion planted within Joker and his friends. It’s not a coincidence that all of the Thieves are latchkey kids with absent/aloof parents. That neglect, intentional or otherwise, fostered a lingering sense of ennui and discontent that lets them get wrapped up in the Thieves’ romantic struggle against societal norms. It’s an adventure, and you want to get carried away in it just as much as they do, that investment feeling all the more bittersweet when it comes crashing down around them. It does a brilliant job of selling the illusion of putting the player in the driver’s seat and letting them dictate the pacing of the plot, all by changing a few of the circumstances around how the Palaces are tackled, and though you are given an abundance of activities to dedicate your time towards, I never felt confused about what I should do, because they were all equally viable methods of advancing the player’s goals. Since I brought up the Palaces, I should mention perhaps the single biggest improvement over the previous entry, and that is the way this game handles the dungeon crawling aspect of the game. For starters, Palaces/Dungeons are actual discrete spaces now with proper level design (!) that draws upon the chosen theme in a meaningful way to make them all distinct from one another. It’s a huge step up from ten floors of the same randomly generated slog with different wallpaper every single time. Traversal is overhauled, and the quarter-assed stealth mechanics from 4 are realized into the ambush system here that makes entering combat feel like a tactical decision on your part rather than having Yu swing his bat in the vague direction of an enemy. Joker and the Thieves move at a brisk, animated pace, zipping around between hiding spots and looking for an angle of attack rather than blundering through a bunch of copy pasted hallways. Other big, big pluses include: not having to fight every single enemy to squeeze out the xp needed to fight the boss, not having to fight trash mobs at all with Ryuji’s level 7 perk, having more items and perks to mitigate the war of attrition on your SP early on, there being an actual reason to go out of your way to explore in the form of Will Seeds. The list goes on. And if you do want that down home grind, there’s always Mementos, which I actually enjoyed my time in, largely because of the aforementioned reasons. Side quests in 4 always amounted to talk to this random guy who asks for a vendor trash item you probably got rid of when mashing sell all at the ironworks shop. Now they manifest as minibosses in Mementos, which ties into the whole vigilante justice hero of the people angle that the Thieves thrive on. Again, taking something that kinda worked before and improving it by marrying the themes and the gameplay. Also, everyone gets guns, which would be great on its own, but is amplified by the fact that they actually do work. Not all of the Palaces are bangers, I think the 2nd and 3rd suffer the most from lackluster villains but they do their job as a sort of training arc showing how the Thieves escalate in terms of targets and notoriety as well as expanding their own roster. Futaba’s Palace is a highlight and one of the better story dungeons, and I appreciate how it broadened the scope of the setting by showing that people had indeed attempted to research the Metaverse in an academic fashion, but were struck down by some shadowy force. This is where my brain took over and started imagining much wider implications that the game ultimately didn’t explore, like the government having access to a black ops unit of Persona users who could change hearts and inflict mental shutdowns at will, but I’ll come back to that later. Suffice it to say that Sae’s Palace is another excellent addition with a dope theme, but what follows immediately after doesn’t so much bring the story to a halt as much as it gets t-boned by a mile long train of awkward, clunky exposition. You ever play an action game, and right in the middle of it, the game stops and shows you a cutscene of your character doing all these badass choreographed moves for minutes on end, that you would never be able to do in the game itself, that’s just this long, laborious display that leaves you thinking “wow, that looks cool, I wish I was playing that instead of just watching”? This is the narrative equivalent of that. All along, we’ve stuck by Joker’s side. Very occasionally, the game will shift perspective to a fly on the wall of the villains so they can twirl their mustaches for a few but by and large, the player and protagonist are one in the same from beginning to end. They even go through the trouble of giving him amnesia at the start so that your Joker can retell the story as he remembers it. This is important because it establishes that the player knows what the protagonist knows, and vice versa. This whole segment throws that all out the window and reveals that Joker and the rest of the Thieves colluded in a secret gambit to expose Akechi that the player had no knowledge of and could not contribute to even if they wanted it. It’s like the devs rip the controller out of your hands and tell you to keep all limbs inside the car because you’re on their ride now and you’re going to experience it exactly as we intended even if it completely divorces the player from the shared experience of the protagonist by shoehorning all this shit that supposedly happened offscreen into what is supposed to be the emotional climax of the story. It feels like an overcorrection of the equivalent moment in 4, except in that one you had to choose the exact string of responses the devs wanted lest you be booted to the credits. Here, it’s just flashback after flashback crowbarred into the story, sometimes in succession to such a degree that I began to feel like it was losing the all important emotional investment built up. Narratively, it’s supposed to be a moment of triumph as everyone congratulates Joker on pulling off his masterstroke idea of faking his death flawlessly but in practice it feels like that meme of Michael from the Office shaking hands with his old boss, the player taking credit for something they had no part in, but would have liked to be in on. It’s not a dealbreaker, but it is annoying considering how closely intertwined the journey of player and protagonist had been up to that point Another nitpick before we move on from here, I really thought that Joker’s constant flashbacks to the inciting event where he punched Shido but was unable to remember him were building to something. I legitimately thought that Shido had masterminded this scheme where he got Joker enrolled into Shujin and purposefully nudged him towards radicalization and forming the Thieves so that he could have a crew of fall guys to take down in his ascent to the top. I expected that Joker’s amnesia was a by-product of this mind tampering, but apparently he’s just an idiot who has this chip on his shoulder when it comes to authority but for some reason is unable to put a name to the face of the man who first put him behind bars. I also thought it was a bit cheesy that Shido had ties to literally every major villain they had faced up to that point. By the end I was half expecting him to reveal that he was the one driving the car that ran over Kawakami’s favorite student back in the day. Some real Reverse Flash “IT WAS ME BARRY” shit going on there, but I digress. Shido’s a good villain, and a fitting end to the escalation that the Thieves had going. I also loved the development that even though Shido had a change of heart, the movement behind him was still going, because the systems of power that allowed him to get where he was and exercise his will ran deeper than any of the Thieves knew, and it would take more than changing one heart to turn things around this time. What follows is pretty iffy for me. I’m a firm believer that all the supernatural Metaverse stuff should take a backseat to or be a vehicle for the interpersonal drama between the characters we’ve come to know. It’s flavor text and set dressing, important to the story and atmosphere, but not its focus. When you try to put backstory and worldbuilding into the foreground, especially in the drama first storytelling that Persona is going for, you end up with Yaldaboath, a boring ass cup in the basement of Mementos who speaks in riddles and soaks up damage like a sponge. Nothing about this fight feels as climactic as the last because the player had no idea they existed until about 15-20 minutes ago. I liked the reveal with Igor and the conversations with the crew in the Velvet Room, but beyond that a confrontation with a shiny god of Some Abstract Proper Noun just feels really lame without any requisite emotional context. Capping him in the face with a three story Glock was pretty cool though, so props for that. And, it sets the stage for the Royal content, the single best arc in the game. I’d heard the third semester in this game hyped up before I got into the series, and it deserves every bit of praise. Again, it’s like someone at Atlus predicted my comments on the previous final boss and tailor made an arc full of closure and emotional resonance because the characters coming into conflict with each other are people with complex relationships and not just jumbles of polygons with a health bar and an ominous monologue. I love the It’s a Wonderful Life AU aspect of the dream world, making it genuinely difficult to try and turn people like Ann away from this place where they could forget their awful traumas and just be regular teens. I loved seeing Kasumi go from a pretty bland and boring confidant to literally rediscovering herself and becoming a wholly realized person for it. Akechi’s presence in this arc is my favorite in the game and his snide comments and deliciously over the top ferocity in combat shot him up the charts of best characters now that he was able to comfortably go mask off. It’s fantastic hearing him address the Thieves with previously barely concealed and now open contempt, but he reserves the worst barbs for Maruki, who’s so kind and affable that it almost makes you forget how crazy his plan is. Instead of lecturing you to death or getting too heady, he appeals to the same ideals that Joker did in forming the Thieves, creating an interesting foil with motivations that are arguably more noble than the main characters, but that alone cannot justify what he’s done. It’s a tricky situation to unpack, but I think it’s easily the best written part of the game, and left me feeling whole and satisfied by the end. As exhaustive as this may seem, there are still things left I haven’t even touched on, like that one honestly fucked up scene where Joker leave Ryuji to be assaulted for no reason, or how much better Akechi is than Adachi even though they fill the same role of cop who's actually a secret incel, or the hundreds of smaller quality of life improvements that make the game less of a chore and more of an addictive rush as you get swept up in this other world. My total playtime clocked in at just under 130 hours, an absolutely massive jump from the 75 or so I’d spent with 4, after foolishly assuming I’d knock the sequel out in about a month or so. When I finished the game, I was exhausted, I was ready for it to be over, and wanted to move onto something else, but I was also wistful. I carried within myself the knowledge that I would never play it for the first time again, and consciously or unconsciously I would spend the next few weeks looking for something to fill the Phantom Thief shaped hole in my chest. I had so thoroughly been engrossed in this world and its characters that I don’t quite feel ready to say goodbye, even if the prospect of NG+ still seems daunting. As in some of the best games, like Nier Automata or Red Dead Redemption 2, this first full playthrough feels so complete to me, that it almost seems wrong to go back and disturb the world as I left it, because I played my part, and it’s at peace now. I had assumed that I would hate an ending where, after everything, Joker moves away. Why, after so much investment and time spent building friendships that would last a lifetime, would he simply go back to nothing? I wasn’t prepared for how natural it would feel. How everyone expressed their desire to grow as people, first beyond the labels others ascribed to them, and then the label of Thief they applied to themselves, to become men and women who could affect society in their own way, wholly distinct from any god given supernatural power. It felt surprisingly mature for the series to advocate for a break from escapism, and instilled within me a desire to move on as well. I have no idea what Persona 6 will look like, but it’s going to be hard to replicate the leap in quality, as they’ve outdone themselves to create what’s become one of my favorite games.
Persona 5 carried on the torch of an incredible series with a massive fanbase that is well received and renowned on a global scale, and the successor to Persona 4 is unsurprisingly massive; there's a lot to know. Sometimes, though, it's not about being able to list every persona in the compendium. Sometimes it's about the trivia knowledge that you never know you need until you need it. For ... 27-01-2019 - Khám phá bảng của Tak_Koji"Persona 5" trên Pinterest. Xem thêm ý tưởng về anime, anime rùng rợn, quân bài joker. Persona 5; Did Joker bang Kawakami???!? Topic Archived; Page 1 of 2; Last ; More topics from this board... Kawakami Appreciation Topic Rank 12: Christmas Special: SaizotheSixth: 500: 11/23 9:21PM: Kawakami Appreciation Topic 13: Stealing Hearts Edition: SaizotheSixth: 71: 2/7 4:40PM: Your opinion on the persona above : ANW: 8: 2/8 1:45AM: could you tell reason why persona 5 (anime) is most ... The protagonist of Persona 5 is a transfer student at Shujin Academy. At the beginning of the game, he has little to no power or influence in the world and is restrained by the rules of the system he was born into. However, beneath his quiet demeanor is a strong-willed Wild Card leading the Phantom Thieves and capable of exploiting the Metaverse to affect reality. To his teammates, his code ... The Persona 5 Protagonist's Canon Name, Revealed. He does have one, however. In fact, he has two. Let us explain: The bespectacled hero of Persona 5 has a name in the official manga: Akira Kurusu ... One fan on Reddit, who has analyzed each of Violet's three personas, has pointed out how each of her personas correlates with Sumire's journey throughout Persona 5 Royal - but has also made an interesting connection between her relationship with Joker that essentially confirms that the romantic undertones that fans have picked up on are, in fact, canon. That’s just how the sound appeals to Westerners, in Persona 5, there was a class study question regarding how humans cognitively associate certain letters and how certain words sound with levels of intensity. It’s the same case here. One of the reasons why Ren was chosen was due to the symbolism of the meaning behind the kanji of the full name. I put Canned Heat by Jamiroquai over Joker dancing. Persona 5. youtu.be/LnWO2x... 5. 0 comments. share. save. About Community. Memes and shitposts focusing on the Persona game series. 1.8k. Members . 7. Online. Created May 12, 2017. r/PersonaMemes topics. Internet Culture and Memes; Filter by flair. Persona 3; Series; Persona 4; Persona 5; r/PersonaMemes Rules. 1. Must be related to the ... Persona 5 Joker. Peach Lasagnito April 3, 2020 11:25 am Categories: New Horizons - Coat. Joker’s phantom thief outfit +2. Tagged with: cosplay, Joker, Persona, Persona5. Share: Share on facebook. Share on twitter. Share on reddit. Share on tumblr. Share on pocket. Share on email. Share: Share on facebook. Share on twitter. Share on reddit. Share on tumblr. Share on pocket. Share on email ... The official name for the Persona 5 protagonist, who is also known by his code name “Joker,” is Akira Kurusu in the official manga adaptation. In this TV anime adaptation of Persona 5, the actors for the main cast from the original game will make a return.