Parallel Worlds: Let's Play Persona 2 and Persona 2!

After this scene, the party instantly appears in the parking lot, with Eikichi and the trailer full of Jokers. He still wants to save Sugimoto, even as the party tells him to get in the truck. Suddenly, a huge, ugly demon wanders in, with two guards.

Devil Sugimoto is weak to Fire but it's not worth fretting over if you don't have any good Fire fusions to use. Maya just uses Tidal Wave along with Otohime and Pixie to slaughter the two goons, then switches to Hydro Boost once it's just Sugimoto.

This battle is really easy, but sort of annoying since Sugimoto's Roar puts people into "Infuriated" status. This prevents them from making fusions, mostly. It would've been nice if Aizen Myouou had learned Maka Kaja because I could've killed him almost twice as fast, but he didn't. Oh well.

After the battle Michelle is pretty pissed off since he thinks the party killed him. But he seems to be alive, if not well, and they head off with him. Nate says he learned a lesson like this a long time ago, and admits that he's very greedy.

Before they leave, Ulala freaks out over the data, but Baofu shows them that he kept the hard drive. Then he tells everyone not to worry about Tatsuya either. They return to the Penthouse and...

Two of Nate's people were gunned down. Nate suspects Matsuoka, since he's still alive, but Baofu thinks it has something to do with "Sneak." They all agree to reconvene at his hideout in Narumi.


Baofu continues to scan the files, and finds that the plant is designed to collect lots and lots of "Kegare," a physical manifestation of hatred, fear...that sort of good stuff. He also notices plans for a two-legged assault robot containing human nerves (no, it doesn't make sense).


Baofu decides to ask Ellen what happened at Sumaru TV. Story time! She doesn't explain even close to all of this because you're supposed to play with Ellen if you really want to know. But I have, so here goes.

Ellen and the party head to Sumaru TV, if you chose her at Kuzunoha, and they meet Brad in the lobby. Ellen explains a bit of what's going on to him, and he gives them all of the information he can before heading off to his dressing room. Also at Sumaru TV that day are Lisa, Meepo, and Asacchi the Muses, Yukino, and Junko Kurosu. As Ellen begins investigating the studios, she and the party are sucked into a dark world. She deduces that they've been trapped in a "Kimon Tonkou" formation-a "reverse world" illusion created by Chizuru.

She's amused, but no one else is. To get out, they have to pass through eight numbered gates in order, which happen to be the doorways to the eight studios at the station. The order is marked by "Ba Gua" numbers, which are kind of like binary. ||| reads as 1, ||: as 2, and so on up to ::: for 8. It's not that simple either, since there's something wrong with the numbers. It's very easy to figure out (they're just backwards, so :|| which reads as 5 normally becomes 2, and vice versa) but if Maya is too dense she can also ask Brad which gate is next every time.

As they travel into the studios, they keep having increasingly improbable encounters with a very freaky stalker of Ellen's, who tries to kill her with a chainsaw (and also by having things fall on her head...). Then they encounter an illusion of The Guy From Persona 1, who Ellen loves, but he rejects her. All of these things are revealed to be an illusion created by Chizuru, and her shape-shifting familiar (who is usually a black cat). The party fights off the cat and escapes the reverse world, but when they enter Chizuru's studio they catch her leaving the set, too late to stop her. She summons another illusion of herself and four Shikigamis, one for each of EP's main elements (Earth, Wind, Water, Fire). After defeating them the party can finally leave, but they weren't successful in preventing the broadcast.

So then, as Ellen explains, Chizuru's new "rumor" (though she doesn't posit them as such, they work the same way) is that everyone is at risk of being taken over by their Kegare, and must visit new seminars all over Sumaru City to be purified before they become Jokers. Katsuya gets antsy about stopping the police again, but Baofu shoots him down.

They decide that their next target is one of the seminars, at Smile Mall, which is being led by a man named Ginji Sasaki...supposedly he too has been meeting with Chizuru.

Finally, if Maya talks to Baofu again in his hideout, he'll explain everything he's managed to deduce about the NWO's methods so far; since Kegare is like "sin," he says, then capturing murderers is the easiest because it's so powerful and obvious. But this just makes him wonder more why they're trying to collect it from normal people, too...

Next time: If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands!

Well, it could have been mistranslated. It'd make more sense if they were talking about a biological CPU that incorporates human brain tissue.

Considering they've already done that, it's not far fetched at all. Well, beyond the CPU part anyway. The robot thing is a bit eh.

Holy crap! Demon B-Type Wanzers! The one good thing that could possibly come out of Square-Enix acquiring Atlus.

Today's gossip is generally pretty dull. Katsuya is starting to feel deja vu, that something happened at Smile already, and Baofu says that Suou also had a dream that the police station was bombed. A guy at Kaori makes the connection between Chizuru and the rise of Joker incidents, and Miyabi says Eikichi left again without explaining why. Also, his dad saw him.



Meanwhile, all the IS kids have come to the shrine, but Jun only barely recognizes Eikichi and can only say that he's from the same school. Lisa thinks she might recognize Maya, but she really doesn't. Maya indicates she's a friend of Ellen, and Ginko mentions what happened at Sumaru TV. Also, her portraits looks much better in this game.



Shiraishi is developing a crazy new menu, featuring something very familiar...

(the "red bean dumplings" are from IS' weapon quest; the Shiraishi Lady makes Eikichi try them before she'll allow him to buy his ultimate guitar gun)

The only new rumor is from Nekomata, who says that Trish sells Ice Cream out of the fountain now. Ice Cream is like food, but you can buy it in dungeons and it, like the rest of her services, is overpriced. All right!

At Sumaru TV, Baofu meets Brad, and thinks that he's too much of a dumbass to be a Persona user. Maya also learns that Nate is a big baseball fan, as he's watching it on one of the screens.

Maya hits the Velvet room and makes a pair of Priestess Personas because she was going to eventually. They're actually pretty useless in this bit but they'll become great soon enough.

Sif is Thor's wife. She's a fairly powerful lightning Persona and we're going to be using a LOT of lightning, just for a bit of foreshadowing.

Tensen Nyan Nyan is based on a Taoist deity, but she's been given horrifying if hilarious catgirl tendencies. She herself is not especially useful, with terrible offense and kind of weak blocking properties, so she'll just be quickly leveled up once somebody is level 38 (since personas more than 10 levels below gain ranks faster) and then her true purpose will be revealed.

Smile itself is painfully simple, but I spent another hour here trying to get Aizen Myouou to learn Maka Kaja. He didn't. The monsters here start to have pretty varied resistances but since my goal is still to finish everything off with Crag Fang (Earth/Fire/Maha Magnus) the battles mostly feature Maya knocking off a bit of health with Maha Aques, Megido, or Zionga (depending on if the enemy resists water or not and how many I have to hurt), and then the fusion clearing them up.


The party needs to figure out how to get inside the hall, and Katsuya suggests looking for a vent somewhere. Maya suddenly remembers the time she set off a fire alarm here with a cigarette and the air vent in the Women's Restroom on 4F. The party heads over there.


Sasaki looks like a total fucking junkie in this game and he's giving a big speech to scare people into purifying their Kegare. All they have to do is come up to this machine and let it take it from them. One man does it, and announces that he feels bright and happy. Everyone cheers, "LET'S BE POSITIVE."



Back in the restroom, they wonder how to clean up the seminar hall without killing everyone so Maya suggests they light a fire. Ulala can't believe it, but Katsuya says it's a good idea. She takes that as a sign that he's hopelessly infatuated with her and doesn't care what she does, but Baofu points out there's a smoke alarm above them. Katsu and Baofu leave to corner Sasaki, while Maya lights a cigarette.

Inside, Ginji says he won't talk (I'd be willing to believe he's just an idiot who doesn't know what's going on at all) so Maya shoots open the large tanks of Joker, despite his warnings that something terrible would happen.


The Joker posesses him, and he laughs, as he gets his "I told you so!" moment.


Joker Ginji absorbs Earth. He summons four Tower "Shoggoth" demons at the beginning of the battle and he can use Samrecarm to revive them. The Shoggoths have about 550 HP BUT they usually just blow themselves up when they get turns. With Maka Kaja the party can use a big all-target fusion like Tidal Wave or Mega Blaze to kill them and hurt Sasaki at the same time, but since Nate was a dummy who never learned it, the battle works like this instead:

Everyone defends for a turn or two while most of the Shoggoths kill themselves. Then Maya, Katsuya, and Nate nail him with Hydro Boost and Ulala uses Zionga over and over while Odysseus heals with Soothing Breeze (Ginji's damage isn't high enough to kill them through this, until the end of the battle when he starts using Fire Breath as well). Even when he revives a Shoggoth it usually kills itself before the party can do anything to it, much less kill it, rendering it a moot point.

Ginji dies a horrible painful death and the party complains that they still haven't learned much. Nate calls Ellen, and tells him to contact Matsuoka. He'll find a reliable source to out the NWO to the entire world. Katsuya gets a call from Sneak at the same time.

Sneak doesn't answer, but he says he'll explain everything he can to Suou if he'll meet him at the concert hall in Aoba Park.

Everyone knows it's gotta be a trap, but he heads off on his own anyway, so Ulala threatens Baofu into coming with them to make sure he's alright.

Next time: What you gonna do, when they come for you?

Is Lisa trying to channel her inner Yang?

This next part is one of my favorite scenes in the game. Maya's crowning moment of badass<3

Most of the people in shops around the city have been brainwashed, and in nearly every one (except Kaori, pretty much) there's someone talking about being positive! and acting unnaturally happy. Often more than one. At the Police Station, the officers are wondering where the Captain and the Chief went.


Baofu's Persona radar never lies, apparently (unlike Ulala's "mantenna"...damn it, why did I not take a picture of that). Maya later catches him searching her apartment for taps, and wondering if he can prevent himself from getting too drunk by drinking more milk.



Nate also gets nostalgic at the Peace Diner, since they also had them in the first game. I really wish I had taken a few pictures of the one at the Black Market halfway through the game, but I didn't. Oh well.


Everyone heads over to Kasugayama High School in a definitively final attempt to make Nate worth something. After another half hour, he finally learned Maka Kaja. I've never had to grind so much for anything (that I wanted) in this game, but all Aizen Myouou wanted to get was Parameters Increased, which doesn't do me a whole lot of good, really. This means it's time to head for Aoba Park.


With Makakaja, this is pretty much how random battles go for the next several dungeons. In this dungeon, casting Tidal Wave is actually a bit better since it can kill the Kerepres demons in one hit, but hopefully Sif will learn Baptism by Thunder by the time it's really useful if I do this enough.


The "flowers can talk!" rumor allows Maya to speak with the large purple flower in the center of the park. He asks her a question about Wang Long affinities, which can be solved by talking to all the other flowers and asking the Wang Long girl in //, or by saving in front of it and guessing the answer until the right one is chosen. If Maya comes up with the right answer, she receives an Akashic Ring (Padparacha crafting material). If not, the flower poisons her and they all fall silent.

Aoba Park's chests contain some incenses and a Muscle Drink. It's a pretty good dungeon, treasure-wise, especially since it's not very long or large. At the end, Katsuya is shown sneaking into the concert all, surprised by who greets him.



Togashi explains that Sudou's organization doesn't trust him, and they sent the hitmen to Nate's penthouse without him even knowing. He explains the origins of the NWO, who found the mummified remains of "Gozen" in Honmaru Park 20 years ago. The park used to be the site of "Sumaru Castle," a stronghold held by a warlord named Kiyotada Sumaru.

Togashi then details their grand scheme: the collection of Kegare and the popularization of Wang Long are designed to destroy a sinful world and create an "innocent" one in its place. With the collected Joker power, they have not only created a large number of "pure" people to become the new humanity, but they plan to release the twelve Wang Long dragons from the Earth's ley lines and watch as they leave the world in ruin. Katsuya asks how they planned to survive all this, and the Chief drops perhaps his biggest bomb: they plan to float Sumaru City over the world with an ancient spaceship called "Ame no Torifune."

Oh, fuck.

Shimazu shows up and bemoans Togashi's betrayal. He then begins to explain what happened to Katsuya's father.


Togashi helped blackmail Suou and he was forced to take a disgraceful fall, but Togashi's guilt began to get the better of him, especially once Katsuya joined the force, obviously to prove his father's innocence. Togashi proudly tells Shimazu the NWO will soon be exposed, but the Captain just laughs. He claims that it's time for them to be revealed, since the final stages of their plan require that the world knows of their power and influence. If they were still hidden in the shadows they would not be able to complete their grand scheme.

Honestly, I think he's just spouting bullshit to throw everyone off, but anyway, he shoots Togashi and becomes cocky in his impending victory over Katsuya.


He seems to be surrounded, but he calls in a bunch of extra troopers on his side as well. In a horrible, horrible accent, he laughs and says, "This is how a game should be!"


The guards have Hypnotic Wave (all targets, low chance of sleep) and Aimed Shot (low chance of instant kill) which makes this battle extremely annoying. Pretty much the entire key to this battle is wiping them out before everyone dies. To this end, Nate casts Makakaja on Maya on the first turn and she attempts to use Tidal Wave with Baofu and Katsuya on them.

It doesn't work, but that's okay, because Maya can kill them all in a few turns anyway. (If I had been leveling up Tensen Nyan Nyan she'd be super useful here, since she would reflect Hypnotic Wave and have Mediarama to heal everyone). After that, Shimazu just gets washed out for the rest of the battle until he's defeated

Katsuya cuffs Shimazu as he dies, then walks over to talk to Togashi just a bit more. Sneak apologizes. Then, as he tries to reveal where Sudou's hideout is, he dies and can't finish the sentence. How surprising and original! Katsuya is fully prepared for Baofu to make fun of him for being an idiot, but Baofu declines to do so. He says the party should head back to his place again.

Next Time: It's Electric! (in Chinese)

She looks too girly now. I want my gawky tomboy!


On Tatsuzou's behalf, I take it. He didn't even mind that his son was a psychopathic serial arsonist?

Awww. We were specifically promised that Ms. Serizawa could use her sexiness next time, too!

Sudou believed that if his son were caught, his political career would be over. Tatsuzou didn't really have a problem with his son's actions, as long as nobody knew enough to hold it against him, since honestly, he's just as crazy.

Also, the "mantenna" line is from the beginning of the game at Kuzunoha. Ulala says she's getting good readings from Todoroki. And of course IT'S SO RELIABLE. She's great at picking men, you know, just ask Baofu. Todoroki is a good guy though. Not attractive, but other than that.

Alright I'm really trying to get through this within the next, oh, week or so, on the off-chance that once my semester starts I'll find myself completely unable to make myself finish this.


I didn't have home internet in 2000, but this is clearly the sort of important warning that belongs in a game with such a modern setting. The talk around town begins to shift towards the deaths of police officers and the NWO, but not everyone has heard about it yet.


Man, he really sells himself short sometimes. I'm sure he would've handled it perfectly on his own.


The Seedy CD is now open (actually, it's been for a while now, probably since the Science Lab but I forgot to keep checking), but since it has a Very Special Property (aside from being largely useless) Maya's party isn't actually ready for it. Ixquic stands out front and gives out the rumor that there's a 100 km/h hag inside the building. She wants to show the other kids how great she is, so she's asking someone else to do glorious deeds for her. Awesome.

This reminds me of the other rumor demons Maya's killed now, though. Returning the Dead Tsuchinoko to the guy in Narumi awards an Item Breeder, a very special item that makes a copy out of one usable item. She also got Tek Tek's name tag grinding in Kasugayama High School, which is worth a Soma from the guy out front. Excellent.

At Baofu's Lair, his monitoring of Sudou's phone leads to him picking up on what seems to be an important conversation. Yung Pao has held up his end of the plan, and is seeking his reward.

Baofu heads over to the factory on his own, in the hopes of breaking up the deal and killing two birds with one stone.

...right after he ragged on Katsuya for going off on his own. Yeah, this is going to end really well. Katsuya asks Nate to check for some information on Baofu before they leave.


When Maya walks out the door, the scene cuts to the conference room from the beginning of the game. Sudou, the white-haired man, finishes a conversation, then this man, General Sugawara, begins talking. He says that the X-1 is complete and ready for testing. One of the other NWO leaders says that the plan is progressing perfectly, with just one catch: the "Paradox." Not even Sudou knows why he's so important, but Tatsuzou reassures everyone that Gozen's ideas are beyond their comprehension, and surely he has a reason for this too.

At the factory, Baofu sits high in a warehouse watching the Mafia men waiting for Sudou. Suddenly, they start getting gunned down.

Several troops and a giant robot come out and kill all the redshirts, as Yung Pao escapes (in Chinese). Baofu hops off on his own, separating from the party again, and everyone but Ulala realizes that it was clearly a trap set by Sudou, who must have discovered Baofu's taps.

The factory is pretty quick if you're not mapping it. Crossing B1 requires traversing a conveyor belt section, except it can't be completed without reversing the direction of all the belts. That requires opening a locked door, the code for which is on B2. (Or, always the same)

Up on B1, the party can check out another big room. Baofu is already there, in a confrontation with Yung Pao.

Baofu refuses to let anyone steal his revenge, and when the other man jumps out to shoot him, he knocks him down with furious coin action. He picks up the gun, and Yung Pao asks how long it's been. Baofu's been waiting for this for five years, but as it seems he's ready to shoot, he's stopped by a voice.


Katsuya reveals that Kaoru was "traveling" in Hong Kong with Miki Asai, when they were in an "accident" that lead to their deaths. Except the accident was clearly a Mafia attack and only one of them died. Baofu turns the gun toward Katsuya and asks why he shouldn't kill Yung Pao.

If we kill everyone, who's going to testify against Sudou? (On the other hand, if we kill Sudou, that question clearly becomes moot.)

Baofu suddenly shoots the gun, which kills some dude off-screen. The NWO guys have caught up with us. Baofu snipes the weak guys so it's just a battle against the robot. (Then he puts the gun down and goes back to using his crappy old weapon)


It's weak against lightning so Nate uses Maka Kaja on Maya and she and Ulala just zap it over and over. Everyone else picks up the slack by healing. Lightning Blast hits for about 700 damage so the robot goes down about five turns.

This isn't the only one in the game though, so for the record when they come back, they have an arm cannon dealing 200 damage, a large explosive rocket which hits everyone for roughly 100, and "Muramasa Copy," which does about 100 damage and has a Persona-sealing effect like the Longinus copies from IS.


Yung Pao ends up dying anyway for some reason but he's kind enough to provide Baofu with his next destination. Nate says he has a boat at the harbor that they can use to intercept, so it's time to go out to sea.

Next Time: It's like 12000 BC all over again =( =(

Yung Pao! Yung Paaaaoooo!!!!!



(in Chinese)

This is the best part. The way the camera pans back up to Shimazu and Maya's already standing there, holding him at gunpoint... it makes me tingly. Especially when she amounts to White Mage Girlfriend in Innocent Sin.

I remember hating the Factory, but maybe I'm recalling The Other Side and spending a lot of time grinding up to summon Reflect: Magic Personas.

None of the dungeons in this game are that long really (aside from maybe The Last One and The Last One From IS); they just become long if you have to grind a little or try completing auxiliary objectives like accessing secret areas or mapping them (or, if you fall in a lot of pits). This is one of the only dungeons so far where I haven't had anything to do like that and I wrote down the door code when I was playing it this weekend, so it only took me about 20 minutes to play from the door at the beginning to the door at the end. Aoba Park the first time and Gold were shorter, and Smile would've been if I hadn't been trying to get Maka Kaja and failing.

I'm going to get basically the entire rest of the game's worth of EXP grinding done in this next dungeon though, which should make pretty much everything after the horrible smelly place pretty breezy. On the other hand, even though I can electrocute everything into oblivion, this is still taking too long.

Oh my goddddddd

Man it ain't like there aren't badass characters who are of the stocky persuasion.

(Please do Dr. Cid this year.)

Nah man, I know he has to have been getting at how completely heroic that is. I'm completely sincere when I say that's the greatest thing I've seen all week.

Oh, yeah, not that this really means anything but I'm sorry I've been so lazy. =x Between school starting, the dungeon after Nichirinmaru sucking, and other things taking up the time I would normally be playing EP I've barely done anything at all. There's a slight possibility of a miraculous update this weekend, but more likely I'll get around to it later this week or next weekend.

As a general rule, if you're a living human being you're too fat to be a Kaneko character.

But you forgot the helmet. FOR SHAME MR. NICH, FOR SHAME.

Realnerdtalk: I've seriously thought about PUMPIN THA IRON so I could cosplay as this fella, but the concave face is difficult. If only I could convince my galpal to dress up as Yakisni...

Also Spineshark we understand that it's taken so long for the next update, because the ruins is terrible and a horrible dungeon and Atlus should be ashamed of what they did

Katsuya muses in the Velvet Room about the implications of Baofu's backstory. It's also worth noting that PANTS meets him in person once in Innocent Sin. Look hard!


Lisa seems to be stricken by some deja vu when it comes to flying things being hidden under the city. In fact, most of the people Maya can talk to in Sumaru's shops have started to feel that things are a little familiar...Kankichi, on the other hand, assures everyone that even if the world is destroyed (by a Large Hadron Collider, for example) Gatten will still be open, like Milliway's!

Down at the harbor, Matsuoka has prepared Nate's boat despite having officially "quit." He explains that the NWO's ship looks like a cruise ship but the insides are more like a warship. He asks Maya to take care of Nate, and then they drive the boat off. As you can see, it is also going TO THE NO. 1!

Matsuoka talks to himself, impressed with Nate and his upbringing between Alfred and his friends, then he dials an unknown entity to have any traces of Nanjou's involvement erased.

Meanwhile, in the Nichirinmaru's submarine dock, Chizuru meets up with Guido. He asks why such a great man allows himself to be controlled, but he doesn't answer.

She's crazy in love with him. An FMV then shows some things blowing up on the boat, a submarine being lowered into the water with Kandori on board, and a small boat approaching the huge ship.

PANTS has been wreaking havoc on the boat already, so when Maya and the others arrive it's just a matter of locking down the end of the boat and getting ready to head inside.

Nichirinmaru means, er, something in Japanese, which I forgot and couldn't find again. It's not important. The music here is one of the coolest tracks in the game and the aesthetics on the upper floors are pretty sweet.

A large proportion of the battles here are against squads of Tenchu soldiers, who are pretty weak. Aside from Strength Python demons, nothing can stand up to a Maka Kaja'd Lightning Blast, so Maya spends a while just plastering things for no good reason. Along the way she meets the infamous Red Cape.

The Red Cape is a rumor demon and like all rumor demons it has threatening flavor text and is a total wimp in battle. Maya washes it out in just a couple of turns. It drops a Red Cape which she can give to a guy near the harbor for some item. We'll find out what it is later, since I don't remember myself.

After Nate watches the baseball game at Sumaru TV, he can do a contact combo with Baofu where they bitch about each others' teams.

It's great fun, even if it's not useful. Baofu and Katsuya also get one after the former's past is revealed, called "Investigation of Terror." It begins like Suou's usual Investigation contact, then Baofu steps in to "show him how it's done." The screen blacks out and there's a loud "CRACK." I laugh every time.

Heinir disapproves of human lust. Maya accidentally contracted him because he initiated a conversation and he's easily excited by anything so it was a good chance to get more Star Tarot and also Free, which are always in insufficient quantities.

On B2 of the ship is the Conference Room and the altar, but Gozen himself is nowhere to be seen.

Baofu says the ruins are about where Maya is standing (so, that red dot presumably) so there's no point in wasting time here. A pitfall leads to a small room on B3 with "Dul-Dauna's Oar," a material card. Not to build up the "surprise" too much, since it'll be revealed at the end of this update, but who could it for?

After going into the basement, and back up, Maya finds a door that leads out to a helipad. They arrive just in time to see an aircraft land, and Sudou slowly doddering toward it, while PANTS slaughters his guards. Sudou is impressed by the boy's drive, and wishes more people were like him. Then he offers him a position at his side when creating the new world, which will be free from original sin if all goes as planned. PANTS refuses of course, and claims Tatsuzou is being deceived, so Sudou heads off.

Unfortunately, he's also flanked by four of the X-1's. The kid offers to take one, leaving the other three for the party.


This battle is entirely laughable though. With Maka Kaja Lighting Blast now hits for over 900 damage, clearing all three robots out in just four turns. Backed up by Mediarama from Ulala wearing the now-leveled-up Tensen Nyan Nyan, there's absolutely no threat from these guys.


Yet another choice which makes 0 difference, as either way PANTS offers to save the world alone and leaves again. A quick jaunt below the waves and the party reaches the submarine dock, where PANTS has hopped into one of the robots.


Everyone gets into the sub and heads for the true destination. On arrival, Baofu notes that Tatsuya wrecked all of the NWO's subs so they wouldn't be able to escape.

In stark contrast to the previous dungeon, the Undersea Ruins feature horrible music and lots of dark blues that make it difficult to see anything at all. It's completely unpleasant.

Maya just heads down the staircases that are in front of her until arriving on B3, where she pokes around a bit. She finds this tempting area:

Unfortunately, this place sucks enough already so she isn't going to bother clearing the way. Nearby, however, is Trish's Fountain and a Velvet Room. It's time for a couple of new Personas, and with them I'm going to close off this update.

Maya is level 41 now, which means she has access to Personas up to level 46. How thoroughly convenient! This is roughly when -Dyne level skills become available, so let's round up a couple of those, shall we?

Sif can be mutated into the Cup Galahad.

Galahad is kinda cool but we still need Sif in this dungeon, so this won't happen yet. By request, Maya will make and probably even use him a tiny bit.

Dul-Dauna's Oar is for Il-Dana. He takes 138 Sun Tarot as well. Despite his Agidyne skills, he's basically a filler and even though he'll get used, his true purpose is a while off.


Hunab Ku is an Earth-based Persona whose other spells are not all that useful. I have one specific use in mind for him, but he too will ultimately serve in...a different form.

Il-Dana's creation quote is the usual stuff about beating people up for you, but Hunab Ku rather amusingly greets you with this:

(Please don't take four weeks for the next update.)

Hmm, you seem to have brought a problem to my attention that needs addressing.



Anyway next time should take less time, since I've gotten over the initial shock of the new semester, nearly finished the worst dungeon in the game and have almost finished the game that came out that I was really looking forward to.

Oh, I have even more Trish. Fuck yeah!

*crawls into the fetal position and slowly rocks back and forth*

On B2, Maya finds a large, open room, and shortly after walking into it, everyone's Persona-sense goes off.

It's a trap! Running toward the north end of the room causes her to fall into the large open space below where the Velvet Room and Trish's Fountain are. Yes, this dungeon is full of pitfalls, placed in completely random and annoying places (along with the one right here, which makes the dungeon about ten times longer).


Baofu and Ulala contract Barbatos by talking about drinks. The Free cards...we must have them! Hanged Man cards will be nice as well.


Taksaka has the "Photon Cannon" ability, which looks like this. It hurts a lot, but it's always amusing because it's redolent of the boss beams in G-Darius, since Taksaka is a fish-like demon.

Eventually after running up and down the stairs over and over, Maya falls in a hole on B1 that puts her on the correct side of the large room on B2. She walks through the empty doorway to see Tatsuya kicking ass as always.


There are 11 seals, each one holding a Wang Long Dragon, and this was the last one. Chizuru and Kandori's last task is to release a mass of Kegare along with the dragon. Nate gives a speech and then tells PANTS to take on Chizuru.


This battle is against one undead scientist and four robots. It's apparently considered one of the hardest battles in the game, which...huh. It isn't, really. Sure, the X-2's could Muramasa Copy the whole party at once but they don't hit outrageously hard and Guido barely even gets turns until they're defeated. After shocking them all to death, the real fun begins.

Kandori has the always-fun property "Strong:All" which is basically bullshit. It renders him immune to instant death, like all bosses, Light and Dark damage in general, and gives him 50% resistance to all other damage. Plus he has more health than any other enemy to this point.

He does spend most of the battle just using his gun, or this spell which cuts a character's current HP in half. It can't kill anyone so it's not very threatening, but even Maya's ridiculous Hydro boost only hits him for about 300 damage a round.

After the battle, Kandori admits his defeat and PANTS swears he's not going to let things be screwed up again. The ruins start to collapse, so Nate offers to save the villains, but they decline. After they leave, Guido apologizes for leading Chizuru to her death.


Aww, how touching. Not.

Ulala freaks out at the entrance, then everybody gets in the sub including PANTS, and an FMV shows the sub making a narrow escape from falling things.

At the harbor Katsuya asks his brother to tell him what's been going on.

Baofu had Nate research Katsuya's past to get back at him after what happened before. Then he also makes fun of Ulala for being stupid and starting everything in the first place. But PANTS has his own shocking revelation...


Katsuya thinks he's trying to disown himself and tells him no matter what, he'll always be his brother. Tatsuya says he'll tell everyone everything, but he tries to make them promise to stay out. HA! Don't count on it.

Around town, people are still freaking out about the impending doom, while Katsuya's continually concerned about his brother and PANTS complains about how we're wasting time. Mary's a little shocked and sad about Guido dying (again) and wishes she could've talked to him one more time, believing that he wasn't truly evil.

At the Iwato Shrine, Tatsuya tries to explain the fire, and Maya's bruise starts hurting as she has a flashback to the scene where Volcanus mutilated Sudou. PANTS says he's going to Mt. Iwato, where they all can see the truth. But...


That can't be good.

Next time: You Don't Know How it Feels!

There's not much around town. Tatsuya acts impatient, Katsuya is worried, and so on. At // Nate says that he doesn't think he's going to be with the party much longer.

I'm sure he won't mind then, if we do this.

Personas can be returned to Igor at any time, to free up space or (more usefully) receive items if they're at max rank. Since nobody will be able to summon Aizen Myouou after Nate leaves, it's a good time to kick him to the curb for a Maha Magnus card, since there are no more bosses to use him on. Also going into the recycle bin are Callisto, Helios, and Odysseus, who cough up Incenses for their trouble. Or incense cards. I forgot, damn.


Also, we get the CUP Galahad, now that we don't really need Vile Thunderbolt anymore. There's nothing else that's useful now, since we don't have any equipment or persona needs here.

Mt. Iwato works a lot like it did in IS. Tatsuya warns everyone that they may not like what they see, but of course everyone follows. At the first pool of mirrors everyone sees Nate remembering everyone splitting up at the end of High School, or something. They promise to all meet again after achieving their dreams. Despite being a required party member in Persona 1, Mark doesn't appear in this scene, which just highlights how amazingly he sucks. Alana doesn't either, which isn't surprising since she also doesn't have a portrait anywhere else in Persona 2, but Chris does appear in other places, just not this scene. Oh well.

Aside from just walking through it, Maya can find secret rooms blocked by wood planks. Through the small holes are small rooms containing treasure boxes. For no apparent reason there are material cards in these holes (unlike the Masks you're supposed to grab in IS, whose presence is explained quite handily).

By the end of the dungeon, Maya should have the Bronze Ring (for Baofu's Prometheus), the Silver Bow (for her own Artemis), the Ancient Sun (for Katsuya's Hyperion) and the Ortyx (for Ulala's Asteria). (The Rainbow Gleam is in a locker in Gold, and used to make Iris, who I decided wasn't really worth the effort at any particular time)

The scenes here outline the major plot arc of Innocent Sin, which I really shouldn't have to explain. First, Tatsuya explains their original meeting with Maya, then the story of Tatsuya Sudou The Other and how it tied into the Joker. He explains how they rescued Jun from Nyarlathotep's control, and finally what happened after they defeated him in his Hitler and Great Father forms. The only thing that's really worth noting is that in keeping with the theme of "Maya as silent protagonist" in EP, all of her lines have been transformed into things that can come out of Tatsuya's text boxes logically, with him responding to things she is shown not saying.


Yeah, so Maya's death basically sums up the problem. At least PANTS' Ridiculous Hero Complex is kind of logical! He continues to try and push everyone off though, explaining that if everyone remembers what happened then the world is super-fucked whether or not they defeat Tatsuzou.

But, you know, he just told everyone, so how could it really get worse? Realizing this, he begins to complain, but Maya has a chance to speak up.

After that heavy scene, there's really only one good choice here.

(I'll post the rest of the update late tonight or tomorrow.)

"Dummy...! look at you (all fuckin us up here on This Side n' shit)!"

Nooooooo

So, how goes Team éire?

Maya slaps PANTS, causing him to realize that he's been going about all of his business pretty stupidly. They all agree to go on together, and Nate, realizing the game's arbitrary rule about having only five people in the party, decides to excuse himself.

There's not a whole lot of interesting stuff around town. At Kaori Ulala will tell Maya she's jealous that Tatsuya cares so much about her, then she realizes something...

Yeah, laugh it off, you dumb broad! It's still your fault, you know!

In the Velvet Room, PANTS being level 55 allows summoning of Personas up to level 60...but none of them that are made available by this (from level 48 to 60) are actually worthwhile. However, there are a lot of nice Personas in the 61-70 range (including the Greeks) so as soon as he's gained a couple of levels there will be plenty of fun summoning.

At Cleir-de-Lune Maya buys armor upgrades for the first time in the entire game. (If you're wondering, there's about 21 hours on the clock at this point, which is longer than all of IS) She's got to save some cash, so she only buys body armor and helmet upgrades for everyone (except Tatsuya who comes with the sweetest new gear from Rosa Candida; the Cleir-de-Lune armor is almost as strong physically but also has Spell Defense, making it a lot better). No boots, though. Then she registers a TEC card and a Mediarama Card with the Time Count.

Registering cards at Time Castle causes you to lose them, but then allows you to buy back an unlimited number of them. Of course, all of the good ones cost exorbitant amounts, but it's worthwhile in some cases, especially on second loop, where you can buy the card that teaches Mediarahan (or Megidolaon) and keep all the ones you get for free.

Anyway she's only got the money to buy back one of each, but they'll go on Scathach once we can make her and we'll worry about more cards (since it'll also be good to put one on Prometheus) later. Also, the Time Count warns Maya that the world is going to be screwed. Screw you, man!

The way to Ame no Torifune is through the subway line, the entrance of which is in Narumi.

Maya decides to keep in charge. Ulala asks PANTS why he was the only one to remember the "Other Side." He doesn't say, but he answers Baofu's question about what everyone's like over there. He says that Katsuya's the same, Ulala got conned (since he missed that part this time), and that he knows nothing about Baofu save for his rumor webpage.

Tatsuya responds with his own question: What's it like being an adult? Baofu's answer begins to indicate that it's not all that different than being a teenager, but then he throws in this pessimistic and (in my opinion) darkly funny followup.


Maya hits the brakes because the track is ending. The rest of the tunnel is rumored to lead to the Torifune.

So it does.