Persona 5 - Shido’s Ship

The Thieves go to the Diet Building to see if they can figure out how to get into Shido’s palace. After trying a few different words, the metaverse is triggered when someone mentions ship. Of course, Shido would think of himself as a captain who will right the ship of Japan. He has been charting the course for years and now he is at the helm. His ship is full of people who have bought the ticket to be on board by helping Shido achieve his ambitions. Only the most influential people get to enjoy the party, and none of the thieves have the invitation.

In the central hall, we see people milling about but they pay no attention to our friends. You need to be a somebody to even get a look from these people. That is not a problem though. Less the people notice us, better it is. There is not much to do here but the restaurant is off-limits. Only those with the membership card can go in there. Considering these are the Phantom Thieves, it should not be too hard to get one. Somebody has lost one, so we don’t even need to steal it, just claim it from whoever found it. Joker traces his footsteps until he ends up back at the bar. After a few questions, the bartender just hands the membership card over. We are so fortunate all the corrupt people are also inept. If they weren’t, I don’t know what we would do. I do wish there was more than one way to solve this problem. Maybe allow us to fake one, or find an alternate way in. This has not been that kind of a game though, so no reason to start so close to the end.

With the invitation, Joker and friends can go to the dining hall. The plan here is to get letters from some of the influential people and use them to get access to Shido. Just like any corrupt enterprise, access to the top is gated by middlemen. Once they can vouch for Joker, he can finally meet the boss. Inside the dining hall, two people have to take the seat. Makoto being the smartest one has to be one. Ryuji is excited about trying the food here so he can be the second one here. Everyone else will hang out close by just in case there is any trouble. Ryuji’s excitement fizzles out once he is told the food is not going to be real. It is more of the Matrix situation though. Who cares that it is not real if the brain is tricked into enjoying it? Interesting question to ponder about perception and reality, sadly the game does not dwell on it for too long. An arrogant old man nearby starts complaining about sitting next to the common youth. Persona 5 gets the disdain politicians have for the people they serve absolutely right. Mr. Ooe is the complaining politician in this instance. His literal job is to listen to the people who elect him and represent them. Instead, he is upset about just being near them. His attitude is so relevant to the current political climate, it is painful. With that in mind, it is all the more satisfying to completely wipe the floor with his shadow. I did not hold back with anything. Just crushed him and forced a letter of introduction out of him. Even though all of these are people in the real world, the versions here are only Shido’s cognitive perceptions of these people. Killing them here will not really have any negative impact on the real world counterparts. I did not understand this on my first play, and it did bother me a little because I kept thinking these people were going to start dying in the real world. Game does a good job of making the player invested in the morality of the characters’ actions. This makes all the actions even more impactful. We will see a few more examples of these before the end.

Still not a fan of the puzzles in the ship. Turning into rats and becoming powerless does force a different style of gameplay by making the player resort to stealth. Constantly turning the statues switches on and off gets old quickly. Penalty of being seen by the shadows is quite steep. If Joker is caught a few times in the rat state, you might as well start from a save point. It is even more annoying now that my whole party is as strong as it can be, but I am restricted from using it for a significant chunk of the palace.

I am so glad when I’m done being a rat and can finally go beat a lecherous man into giving me a letter of introduction. Ryuji’s giddiness at having the girls in bikinis comes off a little gross, but it the real cherry on the pervert cake is the Japanese royal family member who is lounging around here. At first, he refuses to even talk to our friends because they are commoners. Only when Ann pretends to be a part of British royal family, he engages with them. And then right away he becomes rapey. Another garbage person who I enjoyed beating down. The parallel drawn here between the royalty and the politicians is hard to miss. The arrogance each one has when faced with interacting with the common people is very similar. Royalty is used to be the ruling class in Japan, until as recently as the second world war. Politicians have replaced them since then. Even after having lost the privilege of being the stewards of the country, these people have not learned their lesson. Their perception of their own superiority has not diminished one iota even as their real power has decreased substantially. This man still thinks of himself as somebody who was divinely gifted with better genes and a title. The hard truth is that he was gifted with being born into enormous wealth which papered over his shortcomings and allowed him to live in luxury while other smarter, but less fortunate people suffer through poverty. I do not know how relevant that is to Japan right now, but the parallels to a certain leader in the United States are just uncanny. Even down to the tendencies of being a sex pest.

The politicians replaced the royalty as the leaders of the nation almost every where in the modern times so the people could have more control of the governance. But they behave like the new royalty now. They conduct business with the same disregard for their constituents the “divinely” selected leaders used to. They also maintain the distance between themselves and the people who they represent, so they never have to answer for their actions. I do not want to keep on harping about the politics and the current state of affairs but the theme of this palace compels me to do so. With the current level of poverty and death Americans are going through the symbolism here hits awfully close to home. Over three hundred thousand people have died in the last year with millions incapacitated by the pandemic. The disease has ravaged the economy, and the normal way of life for virtually everyone. Those who have not lost lives or loved ones have lost jobs or homes. The richest country in the world has the longest lines for food banks. And the democratically elected leaders do nothing. Those who passed legislation to give trillions in tax cuts to the ultra-rich, balk at the suggestion of giving a few hundred dollars to the people who are at the brink of financial ruin due to no fault of their own. Millions are spent on charades the culminate in elections, yet the public is not even given peanuts to get by on. The disdain for people like us is palpable. Those who sit in the halls of power squabble and peddle bullshit conspiracy theories to massage their own egos, while the majority of this country is forced to figure out how to keep a roof over their heads. It is deeply saddening to see the people around me suffer, but it is absolutely maddening to see the those in positions of power sit idly by instead of helping. This palace made me long for a metaverse where we could change the hearts of our leaders, so they were no longer hard as stones.

05-22-2020