Lair of my thoughts

Good-old notebook

[persona-game-info]

Persona 5 Royal x Kayou Card Game Collab announced

[hoshihime98]

Did they ever posted a high quality version of the imagine in the second pic? The one with all the group together?

[persona-game-info]

Nah, I'm pretty sure you only get that one if you bought the card packs

[p5x-theories]

The menu for the Amo Crepe collaboration was revealed, so as usual, here's a translation of the items:

Kokatsu Academy: Whipped cream / Custard / Apple jam / Almond slices / Cinnamon / Raspberry / Chocolate roll

Gekkoukan High: Black cookie / Strawberries / Whipped cream / Chocolate sauce / Mint

Walk the Path of the Moon: Tartar sauce / Salsa / Grilled chicken / Lettuce / Mashed potatoes

Character Latte: Cafe au lait / Edible sheet

Phantom Thieves: Berry tea / Blueberries / Chocolate sauce / Raspberry sauce / Whipped cream

S.E.E.S: Blue soda / Melon syrup / Lemon slice (the melon syrup is in the green dropper, and can be added to the drink to "turn it into the Dark Hour")

[knightlittle]

Back in January, 2024, someone going by the name FrostWolf acquired several debug disks that contained the prototypes of Persona 5. There were five in total, dated as being from Jun 3, 2016; May 27, 2016; Mar 8, 2016; Feb 25, 2016; and Dec 4, 2015.

The December build has always been interesting to me, not necessarily because of its contents, but more so because of the community surrounding it. The interest in datamining was intense for the first few months, and then it died off quite completely. I’m not sure if many people are still actively datamining it, although to be fair I’m not very involved in the community.

Regardless, what I’m about to say should be taken with a massive grain of salt, because I’m saying it in large part because I hope it will reinvigorate the community if I’m correct about it having died down (but I also do believe this to be true).

I think I’ve found Akechi’s Palace.

…or at least something suspiciously Akechi-shaped.

I’ll start by just posting everything here, then give an explanation as to why I think it’s Akechi’s Palace and not anything else under the cut.

　　　　　　　　　　【Fields】

　　　　　　　　　【Objects】

【Textures】

First, let me give a brief overview of how Persona 5’s files are organized, to help explain what makes these assets suspicious. All of the locations in the game — “fields” — are referred to by a specific area code depending on what location they correspond to. For Palaces, the field codes look like this:

Kamoshida’s Palace: x51 and x52

Madarame’s Palace: x53

Kaneshiro’s Palace: x54

Futaba’s Palace: x55

Okumura’s Palace: x56

Sae’s Palace: x50 and x57

Shido’s Palace: x59

Sae has two codes for the version of the Palace in the opening (x50) and the full version (x57), and Kamoshida has two codes for… reasons. You might notice that the codes jump from x57 to x59; the unused environment file and enemy dialogue that refers to Akechi as the Ruler is labeled x58, suggesting his Palace was going to happen between Sae and Shido, or at least that it should be there in the files. However, there are no models or textures associated with code x58… but there are some files located suspiciously close to where it should be.

Please note that only the bolded parts of the asset name comprise the actual file name. Anything else is a descriptor I’ve added to give these parts more reference-able names.

　　　　　 　　 　　【Fields】

f059_050: Early Castle Throne Room

Out of everything here, this is probably the most suspicious, because it’s 1. part of a castle 1.1 with a chess motif and 2. it’s located right at the start of Shido’s Palace before any of the assets clearly associated with the Ark appear. My gut instinct is that this is some kind of Boss Arena — maybe the chess board would be the treasure? Maybe you would meet Akechi / Akechi’s Shadow sitting on the throne? It wouldn’t be the first time in the franchise where you fight the actual person in their dungeon (re: Persona 4) and it wouldn’t be the last (re: Persona 5 Royal) — but l don’t know of any good way to determine what exactly this is.

f059_051: Throne Room Hallway

Judging by the red colouration of the floor, this asset looks like it connects to the Throne Room. Like the Throne Room and all of the following field files, these ones appear earlier than any of the rooms actually used for Shido’s Palace.

f059_040: Elevator and Sewer Room

Originally, I thought this was a concept stage for the bow of Shido’s ship, but I don’t think that makes sense because the corridor along the side would be outside of the ship if that were the case. Furthermore, I think the white hallway connects to f059_042, judging by the shape and composition of the two fields, which would be even stranger for Shido’s Palace since that walkway would be way outside the boat. I think it also connects to f059_041 along the large flat orange section on the opposite side of the elevator.

Calling this the Elavator and Sewer Room because the tall golden pipe matches a lot of the early elevator objects, and, based on my understanding of what the colours correspond to, orange is for wood/brick, yellow is for metal, black is for water, and white is for generic surfaces; I think this field / Palace has a water feature.

f059_042: Sewer Room Extension

This is a really sparse field, but I think it must be a part of this Palace complex because it looks like it matches f059_040.

f059_041: Roundabout with Chess Paintings

Funnily enough, this asset was the loose thread that caused me to dig deep and find the rest of this stuff. I was originally just looking for unused textures in Shido’s Palace, and happened to stumble on chess.dds and Chess_King.dds, and while I was trying to figure out where or if they were used… lo’ and behold: some really suspicious stuff was lying around.

Some of the white pieces from f059_050 are missing… I’m honestly not too sure what that means, but it’s notable to me that these two fields have a recurring chess motif because this isn’t something you see in any other Palace’s iirc. This is one of the main reasons I don’t think this is an early version of Kamoshida’s Palace, combined with the suspicious placement and suspicious texture names.

As an exercise for the viewer: what might be the significance of all of the pieces except the King being stained red, along with the notable absence of the Queen?

050 and 051 might also be on a different floor than 040, 041, and 042, which could explain the naming conventions?

【Untextured & Simple Objects】

〔m159_040.gmd〕　　〔m159_035.gmd〕　　〔m040_003.gmd〕

The spears have an animation where they lower; the security camera’s main texture references a Field x40 which, along with the following door, is one of the only references to the nonexistent Field x40.

【Textures & “Catsle” Door】

〔m040_010.gmd〕　　

〔f040_door.dds〕　

　〔f040_misc_01.dds〕

This door is probably the most interesting thing here, at least to me, because it’s clearly in the early concept stage. The images on both textures are, according to a reverse image search, from assorted Japanese and Chinese reference image sites. Furthermore, the model has been mapped such that you can easily move parts around to see what it looks like with different parts. Natively, it just uses the white door and the dark decal, but by moving around the texture map and scaling certain parts, you could easily tweak the door until it uses the golden door or lion decal, for example.

Although this particular version of the door appears as one of the three line models that reference the mysterious Field x40, it appears twice in Okumura’s Palace and thrice in Shido’s Palace (in tex056_001_00_00, tex056_101_00_00, tex059_001_00_00, tex059_040_00_00, and tex059_042_00_00). Additionally, the texture and normal map for the Greek-style etchings on the top of the door are labeled as f040_catsle_04.dds and f040_catsle_04_NRM.dds. This door was likely designed for a castle-themed Palace; however, it never appears with Kamoshida’s assets, only by itself or with Okumura and Shido.

As an aside, I think there are some oddities with various naming conventions going on. I won’t go into too much detail here because I’m working on documenting everything on TCRF (which is… reaallllly a work-in-progress). In short: it looks like the opening Palace was going to be completely different, and for some reason there are assets that look like they should be in Futaba’s Palace that are labeled as Field x50 (which is doubly strange because even the casino parts use textures with the code x57 like the rest of Sae’s Palace; nothing in the final game uses x50 for textures). Since everything seems to be in a messed up order, and since I think only like 15% of the text, dialogue, and audio from the prototype has been translated, there could very well be more than this.

Please keep in mind: this might all be confirmation bias.

I went into the datamining project knowing that Akechi had an unused Palace, so it’s entirely possible that all of this is just unused parts of Shido’s Palace. However, I think the really suspicious thing that leads me to believe it might not be is that unused door, simply because it’s textures directly reference a field that doesn’t exist and indicates that the unused field was a late-game castle Palace. Still, there’s nothing that outright confirms where any of this came from, so again: bolder sized piece of salt.

As a closing note, I’d like to point out the irony that, of all the characters it could have been, it just had to be Akechi whose Palace would end up being such a pain in the ass to find.

It’s almost like the truth was shrouded in fog…

[knightlittle]

I’d like to take a second crack at explaining what I think may be going on here, mostly because I made an ass of myself in the Persona Modding Discord and I want to clear the waters.

The way fields in Persona 5 generally work is that they are a composite of other parts. A field is essentially a “package” of different models glued together to form one cohesive whole.

The problem is, the prototype isn’t very cohesive— there are a lot of completely random spare parts floating around that can never be accessed in game. For example, Okumura’s Palace has a lot of early assets floating around inside of it.

Which is notable because Okumura’s Palace is nowhere near this unfinished in the prototype. Also, hello Utah teapot!

There appear to be two different fields in the stuff from Shido’s Palace, as best as I can tell: the one associated with both f059_050 and f059_051, and the one associated with f059_040, f059_041, and f059_042. The naming conventions seem to indicate these two groups should form one cohesive whole.

These parts may very well just be early Shido. The _040 series in particularly looks a lot like the Ark, and the _050 series may just be an early version of the boss chamber.

However, there are three things I didn’t include in the above post that make me suspicious.

First: the Persona 5 artbook contains one piece of artwork that is definitely for Shido’s Palace (caption says Shido’s Palace Image).

Now, this is all we have for the early concept, and it’s entirely possible that there’s art we’ve simply never seen or that I don’t know about. However, given that this piece of artwork features Joker’s old design where he has a scarf and top hat, it likely predates most of the later 3D assets from Shido’s Palace.

There’s no castle motif, which means either they made a detour in Shido’s concept at some point — which would be interesting in its own right — or something else is going on. If anything would have caused them to start incorporating different motifs, it probably would have been Akechi, because he’s the one between the two of them with a “monarchy” or “castle” theme. However, personally I feel that it’s notable that the early version of Shido’s Palace in the prototype seems so distinct from what we know its earliest and latest forms are.

Second: there’s something really weird going on with naming conventions here. I was able to find a lot of parts from Futaba’s Palace…

…Except, the textures for these models use the code 050, instead of 055 like everything else. Which is notable, because nothing in the entire final game uses any textures with the 050 code; they all just share the 057 code with Sae, because… well, it’s Sae’s Palace. There are also random Mementos Objects, but they have the correct code for Mementos textures. What they’re doing in the opening Palace is anyone’s guess, though.

Granted, there’s a difference between models and field objects: field objects are much less likely to be misplaced. But, I do think there’s at least some merit to the idea that a lot of different parts in the game were moved around at some point. I haven’t finished going through everything yet, so currently the only other field asset I know to show up in strange locations is this placeholder safe room, which shows up identically in Okumura, Sae, and Shido’s Palace.

Maybe it’s cope, but if the developers were copy-pasting field assets like this one, I don’t think it’s improbable they could have done the same for the most unfinished Palace in the game, if for no other reason then to use as the basis for whatever revisions it seems they were making to Shido’s Palace.

Third: it’s impossible to say too much at all about the prototype, because only at most 45% of it has been documented. Right now, not including my own additions, only the overworld textures that are visibly different from final when you play the game, dialogue from Kamoshida’s Arc, some loose confidant dialogue, miscellaneous differences that are apparent by playing the prototype, and a few very notable objects and textures, have been documented.

I don’t believe Yukari’s stage or any of the other P4AU assets have been uploaded yet — which I’ll try and get around to — much less all of the differences in the main campaign.

So, who knows? The only thing left to do is go and find whatever the hell is left in there. Which… I will at least try to do as far as I’m able, however long it’s going to take. But it is going to take a really long time.

[p5x-theories]

Sorry for the wait- here's all the Super Spicy Takoyaki challenge matchups translated! Not sure why the official English account didn't also do this promotion, or at least some variation of it?

[afterthelambs]

Once again thinking of this comment about Akechi on a jcbackfire video. This should be required reading for understanding Akechi and P5R as a whole, i am so serious

"Circumstances are what dictate your choices" is the linchpin of his story and by extension the rest of the game's justice philosophy.

If you want to fix the world's problems, you need to address both. Punishing people for bad choices doesn't erase the circumstances that led to them making those choices in the first place— that's why Yaldobaoth is wrong. Warping circumstances to the extent that you take away people's agency to even make choices— that's why Maruki is wrong.

Those are the two main antagonists, and it's no coincidence that Akechi is central to both of their plans. Focusing on one concept while ignoring the other creates a neverending prison where nothing actually gets better. The middle ground —reconciling circumstances and choices as intertwined— is a necessary step to actually fixing things.

Everything comes back to this. Consider Mishima, who never managed to make the right choices until he was safe from Kamoshida's abuse. Or Sumire, who never managed to heal because Maruki took away her agency. Who would blame them for that?

Akechi literally carries this game's themes on his back. This is why he's the deuteragonist to Joker's protagonist. You don't have to like him, but if you don't understand him then you don't understand the game.

[the-ms-meep]

[afterthelambs]

Is the reason Akechi winks so much in official art because it's a reference to the Crow kanji missing the 'eye'? This trivia appeared in the game as a classroom question, so the devs themselves pointed it out. Funny if true

There's actually a lot of official art obscuring one of his eyes. Not just winking, but the way he's angled or holds objects up to cover it. Hard to unsee once you've noticed it. I feel like the reference to the Crow kanji has to be somewhat intentional

[amee-racle]

we have so much Damien with an axe art and other fan content, which is great, amazing even, but there is comparatively VERY LITTLE Celine with a shotgun content and I think this is something we should collectively be banding together to fix

[g3ck0o]

Being a Markiplier ego fan is so awkward because to get someone else into it, I'll rant endlessly about the writing and characters, how wonderfully they're portrayed and the themes that are so dear to me, and then I have to tell them "Btw the first one you need to watch is a parody of clue that includes characters such as: a closeted 1920's detective, a mustached man whose canonically been in jumanji, and a cook who represents every single chef that appears in any of the later series's. Yes it's very tragic and beautifully written. Also Mark's corpse got fingered"

[heavy-metal-papillon]

An accurate description of me getting my BFF into it a few years ago.

[thatonestorywriter]

I recently got back into Cult of The Lamb after getting the DLC, and I have to say... I thought of an AU of this.. because brainworms will never leave, thinking of a timeline where Yaldabaoth had come earlier, taking over the world, the world now half metaverse half reality, the would've been phantom thieves are converted into Bishops as Yaldabaoth saw their potentials and snipped it, converting them to obey only him

Ren and Akechi, an established relationship, being the bearers of the red crown with some sort of voice saying if rebellion won't kill him, then devotion will, and now they must cultivate their cult, convert the bishops to followers or kill them whichever comes first, make commandments, sacrifice followers, harvest devotion, all in the name of killing Yaldabaoth, maybe they turn into Gods at some point like how (spoiler) lamb turns into a god after defeating The One Who Waits

just something I got too thunk about DX

[heavy-metal-papillon]

You are the only person I've seen talking about a potential CotL AU. I thought I was the only one.

[darkcoriander]

How did it take me this long to realize the code from A Heist with Markiplier takes you to the bloopers because Dark is trying to show you that everything is an act?

I always thought it was somewhat underwhelming that Dark’s big monologue and subsequent quest only leads to a behind the scenes. But looking at it this way it’s genius.

Dark’s entire speech is about Actor and his “games.” I think it makes sense that his ultimate goal is to express to the viewer that everything is still an act, the show continues, and it’s important you remember that.

[g3ck0o]

As you might've been able to tell about my little rant about Markiplier's portrayal of humanity, I find the Actor VERY interesting. to. to say the least. He's just a truly, truly self-absorbed man. A very shitty self-absorbed man. And I love that about him!!

SPOILERS FOR: Who Killed Markiplier, DAMIEN, either of these's lore explanation streams, kind of WAIA and ADWM??

TW!! Mentions of suicide, manipulation, murder, depression, and. body snatching?? Loss of self, being trapped in an endless spiral of spite and loss?????

The Actor is by no means a good person. He thinks himself to be a hero, that people should be grateful to partake in "HIS story." That HE was the one that was wronged from the beginning. The thing I really like about that is it wasn't directly caused by anything. It was amplified by the House. I don't think the Actor would be here without it's influence, no, I also don't think he deserved all of what happened to him prior to his plans. The truth to it is, though, It was always a part of him, and it showed plainly to people like The Colonel. And I don't think he would've ever been able to change. After Celine "ran off" with William, and the aftermath of that, his only support was the Butler, who we have no proof was even that close with him In the first place, and whatever screaming matches arguments he may have had with the others about his issues likely weren't that helpful because- as long as he's being antagonized- he wouldn't truly understand what was wrong. Because in his mind, he's always in the right. He's a good guy, he had this lovely home for his friends, he funded the mayors election, he let William borrow money- because all he knows is the superiority that comes with his wealth. He has no idea that how he acts is wrong, insulting, or alienating. Because he's the good guy. These call-outs from the others after his supposed divorce likely had a large part on what was implied to be his original death, or his suicide, having his world flipped on him so suddenly. His death, from a stabbing if I remember correctly? Is where the House properly "got its hooks into him."

Despite his death, The Actor comes back. According to Mark in one of the charity streams, he began to experiment with this place in-between that he'd ended up in, and where the DA is while speaking to Celine and Damien.(The upside-down) I think about this. SOSOSOSOOO much. I don't have much to say about it in specific, but the Actor, repeatedly ending his life to test the upside-down and to find its limits is actually terrifying to me. Not in the situation, being stuck in that loop- but the fact that he's genuinely lost himself to the point of ending his life over and over, knowing that at one point the house may not bring him back again, and still continuing is. frankly horrifying. It would be different if he knew he'd come back each time, that he was trying to figure out the upside down itself- but no, he was testing it's limits. All of the deaths that Abe mentioned in Who Killed Markiplier. The stabbings, the drowning, the poison, the beating, the falling? Mark said that was the Actor's doing. Mutilating himself. He may not have been trying to make sure he'd stay dead, sure, he wasn't desperate for death or something like that. But I think that's honestly a less mortifying option. The idea he had anything left of his identity to kill. But he's just. finding it out. Risking it. The fact Abe found all of those wounds implied they stayed. That they were still visible. He was LITERALLY a WALKING CORPSE. A husk. And yet. He. Continued. That is beyond disturbing. He didn't care enough to stop. He never got help. No one ever found out. He just kept testing it's limits, seeing what would make him stay dead, and it never did. How numb does one have to be to go to such lengths for a reason they don't even know? I NEVER SEE IT TALKED ABOUT??????? Jesus Christ. This is one of the main reasons I don't think the Actor, prior to his "spiral" as Mark put it, would've come up with Who Killed Markiplier. I think at some point through these tests, the House managed to pull all of that spite and hatred and that old egotistical self out of The Actor. I think that the person he was before, in a metaphorical sense- was dead the moment he bled out for the first time. The moment he found himself dedicated to finding the upside-down's limits.

I know we always clown on him and everything but. He's genuinely so terrifying to me. No, he didn't lose everything like he said he did. He had his mansion, his money. But what he did lose? He lost his wife and friends because of his own toxicity. He lost his work because of his spiral, his own helplessness. And once he was alone in that House, he sure as hell lost what was left of the Mark that Damien and the other's knew. And now, he doesn't have any attachment. He lost all the care for anything but himself a long time ago. In the state he is right now, literally all that is left of him are the parts Markiplier based him on. Ego, selfishness, pride. All of the parts the House managed to salvage. I am convinced there is absolutely 0 way to "save" or redeem him now. There's no Mark left to save. It's just the Actor. An Actor. The shell of his outwardly self, still walking while the rest of him was left to rot in that manor. He makes me ILL OH MY GOD.

Him speaking with Damien in. Uhm. DAMIEN. Is something I LOVE. OUHHH I LOVE rewatching this it is SO GOOOOODDFKJAJGWHAWR. The Actor is so clearly in the wrong. It's so, so, PAINFULLY clear to the viewer and to Damien himself. He is so undeniably strung in the House's web it makes me feel sick, so utterly delusioned by it's pull. This is something that really gets to me, because it's the point where the Actor becomes the antagonist. The moment he becomes the actual villain. It's painful to watch, mostly knowing that people like Celine still aren't aware of the House. That Damien has to think this is the Actors whole doing, his entire plan. Which, it is. I'm not going to deny that these were his choices. But there were other factors that, it's likely he'll never know about. And at this point, this massive turning point, it doesn't actually matter. That's all the Actor will ever be anyway. Giving him that opportunity for pity would only further his beliefs. There's something tragic about that, and I will NEVER stop thinking about it. Don't even get me started on Darkiplier because HOOLY. (I've gotten myself started on dark now. sorry)

After DAMIEN, The Actor has successfully set the twins up to be the villain. (well. Damien specifically, but they're both there. so) And how he treats that is intriguing to me. According to Mark in the DAMIEN explanation stream, and as I said in the starting paragraph, he thinks people should be grateful to be in his story. In a way, I think Actor still sees them as friends? colleagues, maybe. He still thinks they have some kind of connection because- well, why else would he let him in on such an amazing opportunity?? You could argue that he was putting Damien in the antagonists role, that he was still forcing him into this, but is this not their friendship? The Actor in the superior role, offering these things, being so "kind" while putting him down? making others feel less? Because to him they are! Because he's the good guy! This is just The Actor reconnecting. This is him offering Damien something else in this new world after death that he cultivated for them. All while falling into those same toxic habits.

And the thing is, he somehow succeeded in having them ACTUALLY parallel in the way of appearances. He seems to be the hero, Dark seems to be the villain. But, because of their actions and what the viewer knows about them, 9 times out of 10, we all see it as the opposite due to their actions and reasonings. We KNOW the Actor. We know that it didn't go according to plan, that maybe the DA was never even supposed to be the viewer. That they weren't meant to HAVE context. Or, maybe we were and we were meant to have the same mindset as him. That despite all of their hardships, of course he was still the hero- his tragic backstory and all. Forcing Dark to appear manipulative, to be a liar, it adds onto the suspicion that maybe The Actor is the better of the two. What I REALLY find ironic about them is their body swapping. The Actor taking Damien's, the twins taking his. The Actor isn't Mark anymore. Not in mind, not in body. Only in that husk of a soul. Now Damien is what's left of Mark. Mark is the hero, Damien is the villain. Somehow, The Actor made that idea work, just not in the way he expected. Or wanted. And now, he's just some puppet on strings for something so much larger than him. So much more than him. He was doomed from the start. Doomed from the moment he began to live in that House from childhood, doomed from the moment Celine left him, doomed from the moment that knife pierced flesh. He was never going to make it out alive. He was never even going to make it out dead.

I COULD TALK ABOUT HIM FOR HOURS OUHHHHHH MY GODDDD I LOVE HIM SO MUCH PLEASE BRO

[chatlote]

Translation of the new Shuake Interaction in P5X

[chatlote]

Here's the sequel + the other thieves attempting the challenge!

[afterthelambs]

Joker looking down, Akechi looking up, both tipping their hats... yeah they're looking at each other

[persona-game-info]

New Persona 5 Big Band Concert Akechi artwork

[the-patron-saint-of-heelys]

Oxenfree I’m so sorry honey, I’m so sorry a bitch named Hazbin Hotel took radio demons from you and butchered them.

[the-patron-saint-of-heelys]