Shin Megami Tensei: Persona is a video game franchise developed by the company Atlus, and is a spin-off to another Atlus game franchise, Shin Megami Tensei, which in turn is a section of an even larger game franchise called Megami Tensei, or Megaten for short. Persona (a shortened down name for the Shin Megami Tensei: Persona series), is set in modern-day Japan, and hosts a large cast of characters, creatures, and tons of symbolism relating to Tarot Cards, Greek Mythology, Japanese Folklore, and Classical Literature. What makes these games so beloved around the world are its Design, Characters, Music, and Symbolism.
The Arcana is the means by which all is revealed…
Before we can get into Persona 5 Royal, by the way spoilers for Persona 5 Royal, there are some things that should be covered beforehand that are featured in every Shin Megami Tensei: Persona game. Notably, The Concept of Personas & Shadows, The Arcana Tarot Cards, and The Velvet Room. The idea of Personas and Shadows didn’t originate from the Persona series. It actually comes from a Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist, Carl Jung.
Jung believed that when people saw each other they would use different versions of themselves, instead of the real self. Those other versions are what he called Personas, and Shadows come from peoples’ Ego. These beliefs and ideas shaped what Persona is all about, at least with Personas and Shadows within the games. Carl Jung also taught about Anima and Animus, different Male and Female parts of a person, and that to be a perfectly balanced person you must have a balance of Anima and Animus. Anima and Animus also play a part in another thing that influenced Persona, The Arcana Tarot Cards.
The Arcana Tarot Cards, which will be referred to as The Arcana from now on, are a deck of Tarot Cards, the most commonly used deck of Tarot Cards to be specific. There are both Minor and Major arcana, with the one Persona mainly uses being the Major Arcana (The Fool, The Magician, The High Priestess, The Empress, The Emperor, The Hierophant, The Lovers, The Chariot, The Strength, The Hermit, The Wheel of Fortune, The Justice, The Hanged Man, The Death, The Temperance, The Devil, The Tower, The Star, The Moon, The Sun, The Judgement, and The World.) The Major Arcana are used to categorize both characters and Personas within the games, such as the main characters representing The Fool, with their first Personas also being represented with The Fool card, or someone like Junpei from Persona 3 being represented with The Magician, or Kanji from Persona 4 being represented with The Emperor.
All these different Arcana represent various things, but the main ones that Persona focuses on are The Fool and The World. As stated before, the main character of Persona 5 is represented with The Fool, due to the Tarot Cards representing a journey. The Fool’s Journey, to be precise, is a representation of life itself, showing someone who has just started out life going through the world, meeting tons of different people, and eventually having traits from all of the people they met and learned from, making them sort of worldly. The World tarot card represents this “final form” of the person at the end of the journey. The Persona games use The Fool’s Journey as a catalyst for what the games’ story will go through, with the various characters the main character meets being different cards at various different points, making each game feel just different enough but still familiar for fans. The tarot cards you would always see include The Fool, The Chariot, The Emperor and Empress, The Magician, The Lovers, and The High Priestess, with some games featuring The Hermit or The Star in the main cast, while others have those cards be for villains or social links.
Another key part of the Persona Franchise is The Velvet Room, a mystic place between The Living World and elsewhere. Within The Velvet Room there are, most of the time, one Velvet Room Attendant, and Igor, the Velvet Room Proprietor. The main characters will have their first visit to The Velvet Room in a dream, and use The Velvet Room to create new Personas through Fusion, acquire Personas using yen, and many other things that vary from game to game. And now that those three pieces of the greater Persona franchise have been covered, we can move on to what’s so great about Persona 5 Royal.
The Design of Persona 5 Royal
The Design within the context of games can include various things, but what we will focus on today is the Game Design of P5Royal (a shortening of Persona 5 Royal), which follows a sort of cycle, with School-Life simulator as the first half, and Dungeon-Crawling jRPG as the second half.
In P5Royal, one half of the game is spent doing school activities, building social links, shopping for items, and doing other preparations for the other half of the game. In the original Persona 5, you’d spend more time doing school activities, like exams and homework, but P5Royal skips all of that most of the time, with some questions happening from time to time. Then, after school, you have the choice to enter Mementos or stay in the regular world. In the regular world, you can go into various buildings where you can buy items, like weapons to fight shadows or medicine to heal you. You can also build your social links.
Social Links are a core component to Persona games. They allow you to learn more about characters within the story, as well as give you perks and boosts to The Phantom Thieves and your Personas. Each Social Link is tied to an Arcana, and whatever Arcana that Social Link is connected to, the Persona related to that Arcana gets a boost of sorts. And, of course, there’s character backstories and fun events you can have with various characters, including some of The Phantom Thieves. A favorite of mine is Akechi, since at one point he just tells the main character, and technically you, that he hates you. He is a detective, and you do play the role of a criminal, so it checks out.
Once you’ve prepared enough items and tools, the Phantom Thieves of Hearts will venture into Mementos, a randomly generated Metaverse where shadows roam and people’s desires take control. The main “dungeons” of P5Royal are called Palaces, and within each palace is a person with corrupted desires, and their respective Treasures. The Phantom Thieves raid these Palaces and steal the corrupted desires of the inhabitants, called Treasures. These Palaces are reminiscent of their real-world counterparts, such as the first palace, Kamoshida’s Palace, which is a castle. In the real world, it’s Shujin Academy (the school that the main character goes to with all of the other Phantom Thieves), but in Mementos, it’s a giant castle with guards and paintings of Kamoshida all around the halls and corridors.
Within Palaces, the owner’s Shadow will rule overall, and they can create cognitive versions of people to inhabit the Palaces alongside them, along with Shadows being brought in by the allure of the Palaces. Of course, the Phantom Thieves raid the Palace, steal the Treasure, and defeat the Shadows within the palace, and once the Treasure is taken, the Palace crumbles down into dust. All of the palaces represent the seven deadly sins, which could have some connection to Dante’s Inferno, since throughout P5Royal you descend down into Mementos, and the palaces within Mementos follow a similar pattern to the sins in The Divine Comedy, but it isn’t exactly the same.
While in Mementos, you can encounter Shadows and fight them. While in a battle, you can choose between a melee attack, using a gun, activating your Persona, using an item, analyzing the Shadow, passing your turn over to another Phantom Thief, or skipping your turn entirely. Once the Shadow reaches low enough hp, you can either spare them to get money or have them become a Persona, or activate an all-out attack, which is a cinematic attack with all your current party members going all-out in a cloud of smoke, leading to a finishing screen with whatever character had a turn last before the all-out attack was triggered.
The Characters of Persona 5 Royal
Within Persona 5 Royal, there lives a large cast of characters, from over-the-top corrupt adults to stereotypical high school students. However, the main focus within Persona 5 Royal sits upon The Phantom Thieves of Hearts, the playable characters in Persona 5 Royal.
There are 10 Phantom Thieves in total, those being Ren Amamiya (Codename: Joker), Morgana (Codename: Mona), Ryuji Sakamoto (Codename: Skull), Ann Takamaki (Codename: Panther), Yusuke Kitagawa (Codename: Fox), Makoto Nijima (Codename: Queen), Futaba Sakura (Codename: Oracle), Haru Okumura (Codename: Noir), Goro Akechi (Codename: Crow), and Kasumi Yoshizawa (Codename: Violet). All of them have their own job within the Phantom Thieves, as well as outfits in Mementos.
The jobs that each of the Phantom Thieves have aren’t completely straightforward, but it isn’t impossible to figure out. Joker is the lead man, our gentleman thief, he makes lockpicks and hacks into computers. He’s the Ethan Hunt, or Jason Bourne of the group. Mona is the mastermind, the one planning out the heists. He has all the information about Mementos at the start of the game after all. Skull is the muscle, the guy who punches first and asks questions later. Panther is the master of disguise, and the distraction, dressing herself up to get information from anyone tricked by her acting.
Fox is the forger, able to perfectly copy any signatures they may need. Queen is the getaway driver, as well as secondary muscle if Skull is preoccupied. Noir functions as the insider, the mole. Since she owns her dad’s very famous company, she can get information fairly easy and can provide the Phantom Thieves with funding. Crow and Violet don’t serve any specific job within the Phantom Thieves, Crow is a detective who eventually turns on the Phantom Thieves, only to then join back up with them, and I don’t know enough about Violet.
On the topic of Crow, his Mementos outfit is odd compared to the other Phantom Thieves. Most of them have very dark color schemes, with some having a bright color to add a little pop to the costume. Their gloves also represent what element they use. Crow’s outfit, however, is quite the opposite. He wears a white and flashy costume with bright reds and yellows, wielding a lightsaber and laser gun as his weapons instead of the standard real guns and daggers, pipes, and other assorted knick-knacks. Crow is a detective in the regular world, so it makes sense that he’d be different from the other thieves, but it’s almost like he’s trying to be a big sign that says, “HERE’S THE PHANTOM THIEVES, COME GET US ARRESTED!!!”, which isn’t out of character for him.
The Music of Persona 5 Royal
The Music in Persona is some of the most highly praised part of the franchise. From the jazz, hip-hop, and rock fusion of Persona 3’s “Burn my Dread”, “Mass Destruction”, and “Battle for Everyone’s Soul”, to the Rap-Rock and J-Pop styles of Persona 4’s “I’ll Face Myself”, “Specialist”, and “Reach out Towards Truth”, once Persona 5 was announced, everyone wondered what genre it would be inspired by. And, once it came out, everyone was amazed. From upbeat and adrenaline pumping songs like “Wake Up, Get Up and Get Out There”, “Last Surprise”, “Life Will Change”, and “Rivers in the Desert”, to atmospheric and chill tracks like “Beneath the Mask”, “Alleycat”, and “Memories of a Summer Day”, it had clear inspiration from the subgenre Acid Jazz, and still featured some Rap-Rock elements, but the main feature was Acid Jazz. With Persona 5 Royal, it followed through with the Acid Jazz influence, with some notable songs being “I Believe” and “No More What Ifs.”
One of the greatest songs to come out of Persona 5 was “Rivers in the Desert”. The song begins with a strong impact, with drums setting up an intense beat and guitars that sound like revving engines. The lyrics within the song give the impression that the Phantom Thieves are at a very low point, it’s a struggle that they find themselves in when this song plays. “Rivers in the Desert” plays in the one of the endgame boss fights, which is the Phantom Thieves final push to keep Joker from going back to prison and stop a corrupt government official from taking full control of Japan.
The soundtrack of Persona 5 features various harmonies, which come in at specific moments, kind of inviting people to “sing along”, like it’s telling you “Hey, here comes a cool part!”, and this song is a master class in this idea. The lyrics, “A River in the Dry Land” start without harmonizing in the vocals, but on “Dry Land” the harmonies kick in, giving it more of an oomph, a little punch to those words. The melody of the vocals in “Rivers in the Desert” also kind of sound like “Smooth Criminal” by Micheal Jackson, which is fitting. Also, the name of the song, “Rivers in the Desert.” Rivers aren’t usually found within deserts, so what does this mean?
Well, it could symbolize the fact that the Phantom Thieves are doing the impossible, going against powerful people and eventually Gods, so they can keep their agency and protect their lives. It’s the ultimate obstacle, pure control over all of the world, and a gang of misfit criminals with regular old guns, knives, metal pipes, and other tools are staring that obstacle in its figurative, and probably ugly, face and saying, “We will overcome this, and we will defeat you.”
It can also represent creating hope within the direst of situations. If you were stranded in a desert, and a river suddenly appears, you would believe it is a miracle. But it isn’t a miracle in this scenario. It’s people who’ve gone through physical abuse, mental torture, criminal sentences, threats to be sold off or taken into a life of crime against their will, and they are the ones carving out a path for that river to flow, and turn a desert full of death and demise into a forest, granting new lives for those who are willing to take it, and not waiting for it to be given to them. The song is also incredible, here’s a YouTube link for it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvuHvXsZPrk However, that’s just Persona 5, and we’re here to talk about Persona 5 Royal.
I Believe, Persona 5 Royal’s Greatest Song
In Persona 5, the song “Life Will Change” plays when you are going to fight the boss of each Palace, hyping you up for the final confrontation against, as Ryuji puts it, “S***ty Adults.” In Persona 5 Royal, when you are going up the staircase leading to the final boss, the song “I Believe” starts to play. “I Believe” is basically “Life Will Change” 2, with “I Believe” having a leitmotif from “Life Will Change” in the instrumental, and lyrics that call back to “Life Will Change.”
“I Believe” begins pretty similar to “Rivers in the Desert”, with the same bass, and the other strings sound similar to “Last Surprise”, and once that impact ends, it goes into the main “Life Will Change” leitmotif, using the same instruments to hype people up, with the cords of the vocals being very similar to “Life Will Change’s” vocals. And, later on, the lyrics directly call back to “Life Will Change.”
In “Life Will Change”, the lyrics are talking about the Phantom Thieves, acting as taunts to the palace bosses, calling the bosses old, frail, crippled, degrading them while they try to take their Treasures. Some specific lyrics are also confirmation that the Phantom Thieves are real and are here to take the palace bosses down. “It’s not a game. I’m not a robot, A.I. challenging you.” “I’m not a phantom, I’m in your face and I’m here to see it through.” These lyrics are referenced in “I Believe”, with the first lyrics after the chorus being “I thought that I told you I’m not a robot, no. I thought I told you I’m not a phantom, I’m in your face.” After all that the Phantom Thieves have gone through, there’s still one person that doesn’t believe they are real and thinks they can’t do anything to stop him. But the Phantom Thieves have played those games and danced those dances. They know exactly what to do and say to this final obstacle.
While “I Believe” is quite cheesy, with it’s lyrics about being afraid but being together and not feeling fear, it can also be interpreted as a sort of love letter to Persona 5. As said earlier, it has similarities to “Rivers in the Desert”, “Last Surprise”, and “Life Will Change”, three of the most recognizable songs from Persona 5. Persona 5 came out on September 15th, 2016, and P5Royal came out 3 years later, on October 31st, 2019. The composers, lyric writers, and vocalists had 3 whole years to convey their love for this game, and they delivered. “I Believe” is the perfect ending song for Persona 5 Royal, and it only plays while walking up a staircase. The complete opposite of descending down into the infinitely randomly generated Mementos, now the Phantom Thieves rise up into the skies on a clear glass staircase, to one day land among the stars in their own way.
The Symbolism and Themes of Persona 5 Royal
Desires are a core part of Persona 5 Royal, it’s the entire reason there are Palace Bosses after all, since those people had corrupt desires that needed to be taken away from them to keep people safe. Desire isn’t the only driving force of Persona 5 Royal. There are deep themes of Anti-Corruption and Anti-Escapism, as well as the abundance of symbolism found within the Personas that each of the Phantom Thieves use within P5Royal. And, of course, the Jungian Psychology and Tarot Card Symbolism that influenced all of this.
The theme of Anti-Corruption is the main thing that people will notice when playing P5Royal. Through the whole game you fight against adults who’ve corrupted and taken over the systems they find themselves in, and the Phantom Thieves fight and win against them to un-corrupt the systems for the betterment of society. The Phantom Thieves aren’t just criminals and misfit thieves, they are freedom fighters, defending the public from the control of very over-the-top antagonists. The Wings of Rebellion is a common thing mentioned throughout all of Persona 5 as well as Persona 5 Royal, representing a sort of force within the Phantom Thieves that compels them to fight for what they know is right, using any means necessary. This is especially shown with their Personas.
A great example of this is Ryuji Sakamoto’s Persona, Captain Kidd. Captain Kidd is a real-life pirate that had various tales written about him and could be considered a legend in the world of piracy, even being referenced in media featuring pirates, such as the popular anime One Piece. Captain Kidd started out as a Scottish privateer, working under the government. Once an accident occurred, he was considered a pirate, as well as his crew, and was eventually executed for Piracy, but he still did the same work he did under the government, just with less “restrictions.” He fought for what was right, using any means necessary, Waving a flag for a country that no longer accepted him.
Ryuji’s story is oddly similar. He started out in Shujin Academy as a relatively normal student. He had average grades and was in the track team. However, an accident occurred with a coach, Kamoshida. This left Ryuji with a bad limp and a reputation for being violent. But those accusations were false, and he still did good at school, trying his best to prove his innocence and take Kamoshida down. Eventually, he would succeed, with the help of his fellow Phantom Thieves, and take Kamoshida down, as well as get his reputation fixed and accusations disproven. His Persona reflects the exact tale he went through, and he proudly uses the codename Skull to represent his Mask, his Persona, Captain William Kidd.
For the rest of this article, we will be venturing into Spoiler Territory, so if you don’t want to be spoiled on important things within this amazing game, stop reading NOW. Otherwise, keep reading. Either way, I hope you’ve enjoyed this article as much as I have when writing it.
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[SPOILERALERT]—Yaldabaoth, Satanael, Maruki, and Anti Escapism—[SPOILERALERT]
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Yaldabaoth is the final boss of Persona 5 and is the God of Control. He is a corrupt god, using his power to punish humans, as well as creating all of Mementos and technically being Mementos. So, the Phantom Thieves must stop him to save all of humanity from subjugation within a fate worse than death. So, what does Ren Amamiya, what does Joker, the Wildcard leader of the Phantom Thieves, do? He summons his Ultimate Persona.
Ultimate Personas are the, well, ultimate Persona for whoever awakens it. In Persona 3, Makoto Yuki (The Main Character) goes from Orpheus to Thanatos, and finally awakens Messiah, a Persona of the Universe Arcana, as his Ultimate Persona, representing the ultimate sacrifice he makes in the end to protect the world. In Persona 4, Yu Narukami (The Main Character of Persona 4) starts out with Izanagi, and eventually awakens Izanagi-no-Okami, of the World Arcana, as his Ultimate Persona, to uncover the Myriad of Truths within his small town. So, what does Joker of the Phantom Thieves get? Satanael, the Demon Lord.
The one thing that could counter an evil god would be a demon lord, wouldn’t it? Satanael is the Ultimate Persona of Joker, awakened from within Arsene, whose name is taken from Arsene Lupin III, a famous thief who stole from the rich and other criminals to give back to his community, much like what Joker and the other Phantom Thieves do. And, somehow, Arsene becomes Satanael, the Bringer of Light and Prince of Darkness. And, what I find interesting is that Satanael, unlike the other main character’s Ultimate Personas, is still of the Fool Arcana. Orpheus is a Fool, then becomes Thanatos, Death, and eventually Messiah, of the Universe. Izanagi starts as a Fool and eventually reforms with Mesaku Izanagi of the Jester to become Izanagi-no-Okami, of the World arcana. So, Arsene becomes Satanael, but stays a Fool. Because Joker isn’t done with his Fool’s Journey yet. He has a whole Third Trimester to go through in school, after all.
The Third Trimester features various new and old characters, but the main focus in this article will be Joker and Maruki, The Fool and The Councilor. Maruki starts out as the simple school counselor, hearing everyone’s problems and trauma, and helps them out the best he can. But, once he awakens his Persona, he begins to think, “What if I can permanently help these people?” Maruki begins to manipulate the remnants of Mementos, influencing the people’s collective cognition to grant them their deepest desires, giving them happiness beyond what should be possible. He even brings people back from the dead with this. But, it isn’t real. It’s all a mirage, put up to let people escape and be happy again. And that isn’t healthy, Maruki of all people should know that it isn’t healthy. And, using Mementos to create this false reality could lead to stagnation of the entire human race, and a permanent fusion of Mementos and the Metaverse as a whole with the real world, meaning all of the Palaces and randomly generated wastelands would combine with our known reality, which would obviously cause problems, but Maruki didn’t know this. The Phantom Thieves, however, do. So, they go on one last heist, to save the world one last time, but this time it’s against Maruki, the Adjudicator of Happiness.
The theme of Anti-Escapism practically oozes out of the Third Trimester, even having two characters embody Anti-Escapism, with both taking on new personalities because they felt that they “weren’t enough” as who they were before. Maruki believes that the world would be better off it everyone was given what they desire, but Joker knows the truth. If you don’t have what you desire, then you must take what you desire. The Phantom Thieves crawl up from the depths of Mementos into the highest of skyscapers, going even further beyond, reaching a place among the stars, and fight Maruki, take his Treasure, and start to leave. But Maruki doesn’t think so, and he takes his Treasure back, reawakens his Persona, Adam Kadmon, and fight the Phantom Thieves one last time.
Once that fight ends, Maruki is left defenseless. The other Phantom Thieves get away, but Joker goes back, to try and reason with Maruki. Maruki refuses to listen, and they start fighting without their Personas. Maruki is knocked down, and almost falls to his death, but Joker catches him at the last minute. And before we see what happens, a blinding light flashes on them, and the credits roll.
Many people will jokingly say that “Persona 5 is like if High School was actually fun.” And, technically, Persona 5 Royal is the same. People will use video games to escape from their reality, and see a different world, where they don’t have to deal with Family Drama, Bullying, Self-Hate, and tons of other issues. But, that isn’t what you should do. You shouldn’t have your happy ending given to you by some code and pixels on a screen. You should wake up, get up, and get out into the world and do something great. I believe in you. Your life will change, whether it’s an immediate thing or some sort of last surprise, that doesn’t matter. All I know is that there are better times ahead, you just have to find them and take the chance. But make sure to take your time.