|
Justice posted:Devil Survivor 2 just came out in Japan, so it's going to be a while before (if ever) it comes out in the west. It is coming out, just with a nebulous "2012" release date. And am I the only one who personally hopes they try and get the female characters in DS2 "under control", as it were, for the international release? I mean I know Japan has always struggled a little bit with balanced depictions of women (and oddly, previous SMT games have often been very good about this), but the art for the girls and the focus on their chests (and their absurd size therein) really borders on the creepily fetishistic to the point of being distracting. That was probably the  iest thing I've posted in the past six months but goddammit that's been bugging me ever since they revealed more than a single female character for that game.
|
#
¿
Aug 2, 2011 12:05
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 5, 2024 15:48 |
|
|
The absolute worst part is having crackpot theories about the identities of certain characters who haven't yet been named and you know absolutely nobody is going to give a poo poo about your lonely nerd theories about fake anime teenagers but you desperately want to post them anyway
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2016 18:17
|
|
|
Luna Was Here posted:also are the collector's editions up yet i want in on this game even if it means not knowing what the gently caress is going on Don't believe they are, no. And getting one before the JP fans snatch them up will be difficult. You are probably better off waiting for the NA CE announced (possibly) at E3.
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2016 19:01
|
|
|
Bringing it back a bit:MotU posted:this is a Judge Free Zone, friend ImpAtom posted:I would unironically like to hear your theory. All right, you people asked for it. Took a while because good lord this post is huge and I had stuff to do yesterday. So to start off, let's say it upfront: you know this girl, right?  Biker Punchy Girl? Who seems to be code-named Queen? I have a suspicion she might just be Nanako Dojima. She might go by purely the codename at first, but that's Nanako. "What the hell? Why would you even come up with such a theory in the first place?" So I've been suspecting they might try something like this for a long while now. Nanako was pretty much the breakout character among the Persona 4 cast, on both sides of the Pacific, even moreso than heavyweights like Naoto or Kanji. While she was obviously written to be endearing and sympathetic, the Atlus crew has made comments over the years that they did not expect her to go over quite as strongly as she did, especially internationally. Heck, to get all wrestle-talk about it for a second, Nanako is probably the most "over" character period among the combined P3-P4 era cast, and there's been pains made to make sure she participates in the various spinoffs and crossovers. So with all that, I've been suspecting for a while now that they'd make Nanako a playable character in Persona 5. If Persona 5 development took a while, as I thought it would - though not quite to this extent - then the series conceit of "the game takes place a few years later than the actual release date of the title" would make such a thing look feasible, as Nanako would be old enough to be a proper Persona party member, and it's something the older fans would go ga-ga over. It would also hardly be the first time a character from a previous title made a major appearance in a later one. Hell, in Persona 2, two of the playable adults were party members in the previous game, and a ton of the other folks made cameos! And even goddamn Tamaki from SMT If shows up in a big way! This was even something of a complaint about P3 and how completely it made a break from the previous titles, and P4 similarly didn't have many links to P3 (although the spinoffs would change this). While it seems like P5 wants to be a similar switch-up and step forward for the series (something else I'm not surprised about), including a previously-unplayable, beloved character as a major playable character would be a good middle ground between abandoning the previous titles entirely and maintaining some link to them. Granted, what we've seen of Queen seems like a bit more of a departure from the established character of Nanako than we'd expect, but we'll get to that. "Okay, nerd, so what proof do you have of this at all?" Right now, since we mostly just have video to work with, it's largely "physical" attributes. - First of all, even accounting for "anime people all look the same" syndrome and the drift/evolution in art style between P4 and P5, Queen looks pretty much exactly how I'd expect a 16-17-year-old Nanako to look.    The facial structure's about right, the hair seems maybe a little darker but that actually happens to people as they get older (plus most of the scenes with Queen in them have been kind of oddly, darkly lit, even that one with the screens behind her) and in general it's how I'd expect Nanako+~10 to look. The hair's a bit shorter than what we see of Nanako with her hair down, but we can still chalk that up to a decade of drift and if I was going to design a fighty teenager Nanako, facewise at least this is how I'd do it. - That mask. That mask. All of the other characters have fairly original masks or ones that tie in to their personas, but aren't really super recognizable in terms of "Persona references" and mostly just focus on the thief-y atmosphere (or go full cyberpunk in Futaba's case). Queen's mask...   Queen's mask, especially the profile of it, is something we've seen before.   It's not an exact copy, of course - the eye-holes are a bit wider and more rectangular, and it's riveted vertically rather than built in a lamellar horizontal style. But it definitely cuts the same profile and impression, especially in the form of a domino-style mask as opposed to a full-face one. Certainly not a ~smoking bullet~, but given the game's tight art design, that'd be an odd similarity to just drop casually onto a member of the cast... - Queen's fighting style.   This one probably could use some animated gifs, but lol I've been on the internet for two decades and am still bad at those. The idea, though, is this: if Nanako Dojima, after her experience in the TV Abduction Case, told her friends and family she wanted to learn to protect herself, there's really two candidates for doing that (since, despite that awesome piece of fanart, Ryotaro would probably not be keen on teaching her to use a gun at any age).   And when you really get down to it, she fights like both of them.  You really need to see it in motion (including in the Staff Interview with Hashino), but Queen's fighting style involves a ton of kicking. Pretty much all of her "combos" involve very Chie-like kicks in some form. But she also punches. And while Narukami didn't punch, what Queen does is these really stiff, powerful punches which finish combos and that are rather like the power swings Narukami did with his hanzo steel. It feels very much like a Nanako who learned from both of them and made it her own. It's very easy to see where Queen's fighting style could have come from if she is Nanako. - Her probable place in the story. So this is the one bit that's not based directly on what we've seen and is a bit more speculative, but it still stands out on thinking about it. Starting with Persona 2, the composition of the party tended to follow a relatively basic structure that each game shared and built on: a core team and then some peripheral characters, but one of the peripheral characters, nearly always female, is in fact absolutely crucial to the overarching plot and is a crux in driving it forward. (Persona 1 didn't have this as much because it barely had a plot. Maki sssssorta fits the following mold, but...) P2 Innocent Sin had Tatsuya, Lisa and Eikichi, and then Maya was introduced fairly early on but was far, FAR more important to the plot than was initially obvious. (Eternal Punishment works, of course, because it flips this entire arrangement, with Maya getting a "core crew" of sorts and Tatsuya being the odd outsider core to the plot.) Persona 3 had Protag, Yukari and Junpei, and then Mitsuru, who was a bit distant at first but ultimately proved to be the main driver of the wider plot in the party. Persona 4 had a slightly bigger "main crew" with Narukami/Yosuke/Chie/Yukiko, and then later picks up... Naoto. Part of the reason for Naoto's whole "disguised gender identity" thing was to make it less obvious from the outset that she'd be fulfilling the "girl driving the plot forward" role, but once she joins, she's definitely the main driver of the plot.  And so Persona 5 has a central crew of Phantom, Ann and Ryuji. And who else features heavily in the new trailer and seems to have a lot of plot presence?  Yyyyyyyup. And here's the trick: the "girl who drives forward the plot" often has some kind of link to the wider series and franchise. Maya was literally friends with a member of the Persona 1 cast and brought said character along, Mitsuru's company was plugged into the Nanjo Group and was trying to replicate some of the weirdness encountered in P1/P2 for their own ends (though it's a bit easy to miss this); only Naoto sort of breaks this mold, but there's still some questions surrounding her extended family her nature as a detective, which is something of A Thing in wider SMT. (Yes, the direct Kuzunoha reference is an invention of the EN version, but paying even a bit of attention during her Social Link raises some questions about the nature of her grandpa.) It would therefore be in keeping with the general narrative structure of the games if Queen has some kind of link to previous games. Queen literally being Nanako would be the most blatant link since Yukino being Maya's literal bestie, but by the same token it would hardly be unprecedented. Queen probably will have some kind of plot link to the wider game and to past Personas, and her being Nanako would open up several avenues on that front. "Come on, dork, there's problems with this and you know it." Okay, so yes, this theory does have its share of holes. - The eyes.  So this is the biggest one, right here, for sure. While the rest of her facial and body structure etc. is what I would expect out of a late-teens Nanako, even in terms of eye shape, generally speaking the color of Queen's eyes is significantly different.  In the original game, her eyes basically match her hair color, and are light-ish brown. Queen's eyes... almost seem to vary depending on the lighting. The idea seems to be that they're a very bright brown that looks red depending on the light. Now, I included a picture of Nanako from P4D earlier because her design has actually been getting some revision as time's gone on, specifically her hair getting darker (which is another plus point in the theory's favor), but nothing nearly as dramatic as this difference in eyes. If there's anywhere the theory gets torpedo'd, it's here. It's still very possible that they're just revising her design for impact (as the reddish eyes stand out the best with that deep metal mask and dark bodysuit of Queen's) and certainly there's some style differences in P5 even compared to P4D (which is the closest to P5 in terms of development and style) and definitely P4 vanilla, but this big shift in eyes still feels like something of a stretch. There's still ways it could be swung even in-game, though, and as far as eyes go, her introduction in the trailer is... curious in general. We actually see her with shadow eyes first, but exactly what those even mean in this game is still a little unclear. - A most furious Nanako? The other weird point here would be the contrast in attitudes.  In P4, Nanako is a shy little girl who ultimately learns that her Daddy still loves her, and her new Big Bro loves her lots too, as does his friends, and it's okay for her to be happy.   In P5's most recent trailer, Queen is being presented as a perpetually-angry biker who takes poo poo from no-one and is more than happy to beat the piss out of them. Needless to say, if you're trying to bring the hype for a returning character, this is a somewhat unusually wide personality shift for their return.  Moreover, while Queen's fighting style does take a number of elements from Chie and even some from Narukami, she's... well, no other word for it: brutal. Even without the extra interface splatter, and even taking into account that ALL of Team Thief fight a bit harder than previous Persona heroes, Queen's manner of fighting is just absolutely bone-crunching. All of her punching finishers are delivered with that stiff-as-gently caress impact I mentioned earlier, beyond even what Narukami does, and the general impression of her animations is that she is very deliberately trying to beat the hell out of her target and keep them down, with no mercy or quarter. The overall impression of her fighting style is just one of pure power. Even for those of us who entertained the idea of a playable Nanako previously, I don't think this is quite how any of us envisioned her fighting in a theoretical playable appearance. Now, given that it will have been about ten years between P4 and P5 if the theory is right, there's plenty of time for Nanako to have moved in this direction, and admittedly the trailer & interview are just a tiny sliver of Queen's overall appearance in the game. But it does still feel like an odd direction to take Nanako in, especially for a character who's already as "over" as Nanako is. And also, Nanako could certainly reach a point like this in her life, but there's a question as to whether Hashino & the P-Studio writing crew would really want to Go There in general. P5 is definitely going to be a darker game than its predecessors (especially P4) and tackle somewhat heavier issues, but taking the Dojimas in what would presumably be This Direction would probably feel a little odd to all involved and they might not want to do it. On the other hand, it sure isn't like we've had some weird-as-hell swerves from returning characters before. Hi, Maki in P2. Hi, Yukino in P2 for that matter. Oh hello there, virtually every goddamn P3 character in P4A/U. Yeah, I see you over there, Chihiro, even if you were mostly played for comedy. And, while Going There would be a little awkward, it could still provide some pretty great character moments not just for Queen-Nanako, but also for the rest of the cast (including our protag) as they help her out. So it isn't impossible, and certainly the P-Studio crew loves wrecking people's expectations (which, on some level, makes this theory stronger), but it would be a fairly dramatic shift for the character, at least on the face of it. - The time? So I've had this pointed out to me: this idea would need to line up with the year the game takes place. And as it turns out, we've seen the calendar.  So P5 takes place in a year in which May 16th falls on a Monday. Okay. Well, uh. That would be this year, 2016. Welp. If that's true then the theory is just shot down; Nanako would be twelve in 2016, and Queen is clearly much older than that. It'd be a bit odd, too, because Persona games usually take place a little later than their release dates (although P1 & P2 had no definite year or calendar system period). Except... take another look at that.  They're actually pointedly obscuring what year it is again! What could this mean? Well, it could mean a lot of things. Among others, they perhaps just want certain days to fall on certain dates, but don't want to lock themselves into a specific year. Maybe they just want the games to take place in an ambiguous "current" timeframe again. And this would mean that it easily could be ten-years-plus since Persona 4, and they just want to treat it that way while using a specific monthly calendar. So this one could go both ways. It might be too soon for Nanako, but P-Studio could also be getting themselves out from under having to follow the real world calendar beat for beat. SO GODDAMN THAT IS A LOT OF WORDS. TLDR: There's a number of hints that Queen could be Nanako Dojima from P4, but naturally there's some questions about the idea too. The whole thing is probably deliberately ambiguous and we're meant to be guessing about her for the time being. The proof going forward will be whether or not they're cagey with Queen's name in future media previews. If they decline from giving her proper name, it'll be time to get really suspicious. Personally I think it would be a neat idea and would open up some interesting narrative avenues, and it'd be cool to see a character come back like that. I can see how people would think otherwise though! Anyway that is my dumb theory about an anime videogame teenager with lots of pictures, I hope you fellow posters at Somethingawful dot com enjoyed it! (I'm looking forward to Queen either way because she seems like she is absolutely my jam)
|
|
#
¿
May 6, 2016 18:37
|
|
|
Hey man, you people said it was a Judge Free Zone, so I went for it.ImpAtom posted:I would not be tremendously surprised if one of the characters is a P3/4 character and Nanako is pretty much the only likely choice. That said it's kinda hard to say without knowing more info. If they actually try to obscure the character's name then it could be pretty plausible but it's a bit hard to judge the character design since a lot of Persona designs can be kinda overlappy. Yeah, I mean, it's all pure speculation and it's a crazy as hell theory, but there's just bits that line up a little too well for me to not have Big Thoughts about it all. It probably won't happen but part of the fun of hype is speculating. (And yeah one way or another I still expect some kind of character link to P3 and P4, they noticed how unpopular the split from P1/2 was in P3 and they've invested a lot into getting people attached to PS2-era Persona now.) Super No Vacancy posted:i think the part about the mask is interesting I mean #FE does exist (It was really the mask that sold me, too - at first I was like "huh, they're slightly similar" but then I saw the close-up of her mask and was like "now wait one loving second") projecthalaxy posted:they are cutting out the middleman, and Queen is just a big bag of Plumes of Dusk that grew arms and legs and is now seeking her own truth Tired Moritz posted:um your theory has one flaw and it's that in the persona 4 epilogue, Nanako has long hair? and everyone knows that once you go long, you can never go back. My precious theories are undone
|
|
#
¿
May 6, 2016 19:23
|
|
|
Problematic Pigeon posted:
This thread is making my anime dreams come true But really, I fully acknowledge that it's a crack theory and I'll inevitably be disappointed when it isn't true, but dammit, hype is all about this sort of thing Ratoslov posted:If there's a Protagonist that could rock the Devil Arcana, it's P5tagonist. Honestly, Arsene would be a perfect Devil, but it'll almost certainly be Fool. I doubt they'll change the MC's wild-card-ness, and they don't seem to be changing the idea of the others having static/plot-based Personae.
|
|
#
¿
May 7, 2016 04:11
|
|
|
Junpei Hyde posted:Clearly an alias That must be it, yes, that has to be it has to be rip my anime dreams  (naw it's fine, it was always a crazy theory and there were plenty of reasons for them to not do it, there were just some elements that felt like they lined up a little too well hell playing through P4G for real due to this hype I noticed one or two more things that made me go "wait what the gently caress") Anyway Makoto seems cool and like The Best One, and I can't wait to see what role she has in the plot as I get the impression it will be substantial. Even if she isn't Literally Nanako, I stand by my theory that she's going to be a plot driver in the vein of Maya/Mitsuru/Naoto, as that's flat out a motif of the games at this point. I still feel like there's going to be some kind of link to the other games, though, and at this point I'd bet it'll be during the police scene. I wouldn't be surprised to see Actual Mitsuru come in during Joker's interrogation or something similar. They set up way too many "Persona user with law enforcement links" in P4/P4A to not play that card against a literal pack of thieves. Baal posted:I cannot wait to see Makoto and Haru's portraits in this Makoto's is going to be pure elemental fury and I cannot wait for it
|
|
#
¿
May 10, 2016 21:27
|
|
|
Kay Kessler posted:I've got a feeling Makoto's anger will involve her "hilariously" beating up the male party members for ridiculously trivial reasons. I actually don't think it will, for reasons I pointed out in my big dumb "Queen is Nanako" theory post: so far it appears that the game is going to be selling Makoto's violent tendencies very straight. Everything in the trailer involved legitimate anger and actual bone-crunching violence - her attack animations might be the most legitimately brutal we've ever seen out of a Persona protagonist (allowing for the fact that Persona 2's limited technology put certain restrictions on that cast). I actually suspect she's going to be played as a general straight-man to the antics of Ryuji, Anne and Sakura (and to a lesser degree, even Yusuke and Haru) and there might be the general threat of her getting angry at everyone (with commentary about how she'd actually probably beat them silly). And what Polygon said in general - her anger isn't really directed toward her teammates usually (but I'd bet her social link or equivalent will deal in part with helping her with her suppressed anger issues). The trailers and whatnot do make me think that, despite being recognizably "modern Persona", the game will strike a somewhat more serious tone than previous installments and tomfoolery like that would be out of sync. And P5 doesn't seem to have the staff disjointing problems that SMT4 had, so...
|
|
#
¿
May 11, 2016 05:50
|
|
|
Luna Was Here posted:also it makes me really excited to see that all of the UI is in english already which makes me curious as to how long it will take for it to come out to the West. Persona 3 came out in the US about a month after the JP release but there was about a 5 month gap between P4 JP>NA and their most recent releases have about 3-5 months between JP and NA release dates. I'm hoping that the reason we waited so long for a release date was so they could make more headway on getting closer worldwide releases but hope is all i got In a big RPG like P5, interface work isn't usually the biggest hold-up; rather, it's TL/editing, inserted, and then debugging that massive script. Even with good tools, the sheer volume of text can take a while. (I don't doubt the interface being EN/JP from the outset is deliberate, though.) It's really hard to say when the game will come out in the US; Atlus is currently committed to 2016, but I do wonder if a company of Atlus USA's size will be able to manage a day-and-date simultaneous release - which isn't to throw shade at them, mind! It's just really goddamn hard to TL a game in-progress, and the main reason Square's been able to pull it off recently is that they have the TL team and the writing staff in the same *building*. (And even then, they often have to bust rear end.) I wouldn't be surprised at all if it's a December release for us. Whatever it takes for the localization to be good! My god
|
|
#
¿
May 11, 2016 16:44
|
|
|
 When she isn't about to remove your goddamn organs, Makoto knows how to be classy as hell Also this is interesting, it looks like the characters will have a number of outfits in-game beyond just summer/winter casual clothes, school outfits, and thief gear. Also:  An interesting detail - the deWinter Persona has no face or head. I suspect Haru's internal struggle is going to be a little more about identity and being noticed for who she is. Endorph posted:Protag: 16 They're built a lot more like the P3 crew - two upperclassmen (Mitsuru/Akihiko and Makoto/Haru), the main crew is second-years, and then there's a slightly younger navigator. They just look older than P3 and P4 crews due to the art, though, yeah. In some ways Makoto gives off the air I think they wanted Mitsuru to have but never pulled off exactly. SpaceDrake fucked around with this message at 17:15 on May 11, 2016 |
|
#
¿
May 11, 2016 17:13
|
|
|
Golden Goat posted:I'm tempted to get a US 2DS and SMTIV:Apocalypse just to play it. I would hold off and wait for more reviews/impressions. Vanilla SMT4 ended up being a rather troubled game, both from a plot standpoint and, from my experience, a mechanical one. You should probably still get a 3DS of some sort because its library is loving amazing (you want to talk Atlus-made 4th games, you should play Etrian Odyssey 4), but I definitely wouldn't buy it just for SMT4/4 Apocalypse.
|
|
#
¿
May 11, 2016 17:37
|
|
|
Golden Goat posted:I really, really liked SMTIV though. Oh wait I see, you're in Europe. Well, if you liked SMT4, then go for it, I guess! I would bet it's coming to Europe, though.
|
|
#
¿
May 11, 2016 18:00
|
|
|
Luna Was Here posted:drat, that's really cool of them. I wonder how much that's making Atlus USA sweat for the localization of P5, even if I doubt that it will happen again after happening here. I can say with some confidence that they're sweating every single detail of P5 as it stands. It's the most important game in the company's near-20-year-history and everyone working on it likes Persona. The pressure is pretty much crush depth over there, but I got confidence those dudes will knock it out of the park.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 20, 2016 08:33
|
|
|
ntan1 posted:Are ya'll playing on hard difficulty? ImpAtom posted:I'm playing normal but even on normal the damage numbers are pretty high. It's a lot more in vein of SMTIV where you need to get the ambushes on enemies to avoid wasting a ton of resources on healing or getting one shot. God dammit, I was just about to come in here and ask about this. I was never a big fan of SMT4's big swingy numbers and lack of a defense stat, partially because the controls on the map weren't the best and your team being able to vomit infinite numbers made everything feel trivial, whereas if the enemy did stuff you just exploded, rip. If the out-of-control numbers are still a thing, I think I'll end up giving 4A a miss. I just didn't have a lot of fun with the original by the end. And it's a shame because it seems like a lot of other stuff got addressed.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 22, 2016 01:59
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 5, 2024 15:48 |
|
|
The GIG posted:They're talking about Persona 5 well rip me then In that case, yeah, has the crazy damage scaling and "everyone explodes on contact" problem from SMT4 been addressed much in 4A? I can't seem to find much discussion of that point, and it's more or less the deal-maker for me picking it up. (And for P5, I think it'd work better because yeah, the game really emphasizes stealth and ambushing. I'm going to be curious to see how it feels compared to, say, SMT4, where the big damage kind of put me off after a while.)
|
|
#
¿
Sep 22, 2016 02:14
|
|