PERSONA 5 ROYAL RANKINGS - PALACES
I just beat Shido's Palace the other day and I've thought a lot about the Palaces throughout the game thus far (assuming there are no more, don't spoil anything pleeeeease). There are some I like more than others, and some elements of certain Palaces I like more over others, so I thought it'd be fun to lay it all out. TIME TO RANK THE PALACE STUFF!!!
General Palace Rankings:
7. Kaneshiro
Kaneshiro's Palace overall was definitely my least favorite out of all of them. It's the one whose arc and surrounding story/context I was the least emotionally invested in, the look of it I wasn't crazy about, and overall, even though it was generally enjoyable (because the GAME is enjoyable), it very much felt like a 'stepping stone' Palace or arc for me, one that I was happy to leave behind. I love Makoto though, so I love that we got her out of this arc.
I did like the ending portion of the Palace when we had to match up the dial-lock things to make a long hallway, and the whole math puzzle gimmick where you had to crack the code and put the right pin in that got increasingly more challenging was actually pretty rewarding for me. I'm a chronic look-up-things kind of person when it comes to video games because I'm not super adept at puzzles, and I'm not proud of it, however, I didn't have to look anything up and I was able to figure everything out by myself, which for me personally made me feel accomplished and productive.
6. Madarame
This Palace had a super cool look to it with the paintings and everything, and the added element of at times having to enter and travel along paintings to proceed in the Palace was really cool. I'm not super crazy about this Palace, although I do LOVE Yusuke so so much, for many reasons.
This Palace wasn't overly difficult for me, in fact the Madarame boss fight was actually a breeze. Probably partly due to the ridiculously broken DLC Personas I had gotten soon beforehand that made his boss fight with the multiple enemies/copies so easy that I didn't believe it when I'd beaten him; I was convinced that there had to be another phase because it had been so easy just beating them up with Raoul's level 76 hit-all-foes curse attack 😅 However, the Shadows throughout Madarame's Palace were actually REALLY difficult. This guy in particular:
Yeah, this motherfucker. I died to these specific Shadows in this Palace more than I'd died to anything in the game up to this point. Made me rage quit at least twice 😅
5. Shido
Putting aside the emotional context of the Palace, Shido's Palace is in the middle of my ranking for multiple reasons. I love the look of it, and certain gimmicks in the Palace were fun (the being turned into mice bit was particularly funny/unique).
Aside from that though, the layout of the Palace at least for me often got really confusing and I lost count of how many times I wandered around or restarted ares because I kept getting lost. Especially with the mouse sections, despite the fun and quirky element of, well, being a mouse, having to find the tiny hole to crawl through when all the other doors were locked was pretty annoying. To add to that, the whole Palace is pretty much a song and dance of finding five specific people to get introduction letters from felt kinda monotonous, especially when roadblocks and obstacles would present themselves that we'd have to skirt around. I don't know, it just felt kind of annoying after a certain point.
However, the two huge emotional set pieces, the Akechi showdown and the escape + Ryuji's sacrifice, were so massive that it makes Shido's Palace higher up on the ranking for me. The emotional weight of this Palace is why it's higher than any of the others ones, because this Palace really does feel like THE Palace. Everything the Phantom Thieves have been building to has led to this Palace and fighting Shido, especially Ren's story himself.
4. Okumura
The look of this Palace is really cool with it being in space, and especially all of the tech, futuristic stuff was really cool. The story behind the Palace and Okumura was interesting enough, then add to that Haru and our investment in HER story, as well as the added emotion regarding Morgana's temporary absence and his small arc before ultimately teaming back up with everyone to infiltrate the Palace all together. All of that makes it a generally fun and engaging Palace.
Except.
THIS.
MOTHER.
FUCKING.
BOSS FIGHT.
Lemmie tell you I have never spent so many total hours on a boss fight. I've think it was around 8 hours over the course of like four days. Also, I've 'rage quit' in video games before, but I put that in quotations because the pure rage this boss battle triggered in me is something no video game has ever done before.
I get emotional easily when it comes to sad/wholesome movies and TV and occasionally video games, sure, but I've never cried from RAGE before. On multiple occasions, I had to toss my controller away after yet another death, hunch over, and do deep breathing while shaking because I was trying to stop myself from bursting into tears. That's how unstable this boss battle made me.
So. Fuck this boss battle. Oh my god.
This was the first time I had to look something up in the game thus far, because I could not for the life of me figure out how to even get close to fighting Okumura himself. And it still didn't work for a while. I followed an article TO A T so many times and I still couldn't get close. I even took a break for a day or two and was legit grieving for a minute there because I was suddenly terrified that this at the time 'unbeatable' boss fight was ultimately gonna force me to stop playing the game that I'd been living and breathing 24/7 for two months straight.
I ultimately ended up changing the difficulty to Merciless and beat him I think my first try on that difficulty. But holy shit. I was so happy to have beaten him that I almost cried from relief.
Anyway 💅
MOVING ON ☺️
3. Kamoshida
Maybe this is a hot take but I think objectively Kamoshida's Palace is probably the best one out of all of them. Putting aside my own preferences and opinions, I think this one is the best Palace in all the ways. It's difficult for a tutorial Palace, but not TOO difficult, the puzzle elements are not crazy enough that they leave players scratching their heads, the progression is relatively linear, and in my opinion, the 'tutorial' parts of this Palace, like the frequent tutorial cut-ins and Morgana's explaining doesn't get in the way too much and they feel natural rather than annoying, which I know some tutorial segments in video games can be.
Mostly the reason why this Palace is so high is because of the emotions whiplash of the first arc of the game. I didn't know that much about Persona 5 when I got Royal, it was purely a recommendation from a friend, and I only knew bits and pieces from Smash, occasionally hearing about it other places too. But I had hear little things about Persona here and there, I had kind of casually carried interest in getting into the franchise, but never went too deep other than looking up a little about the franchise.
But in light of that, I didn't know just how dark the game would be. I personally respect when stories and fiction don't shy away from hard or difficult topics, and up until that point, I mainly had only placed Nintendo games. I grew up with only Nintendo consoles, and the only non-Nintendo games I'd played were through the Switch or other consoles.
I was very used to the more innocent, fun charm of Nintendo, at least as a kid, and in my late teenage to early adult years, I didn't game as much except for brief hyperfixated spurts in Animal Crossing and Skyrim. So uh. Needless to say, I was VERY caught off guard by how INTENSE and DARK Persona 5 Royal was. It SAYS things, it SHOWS things without censorship, and I was so shocked by the boldness of the Kamoshida arc that it both gave me loads of respect for the game I was playing, made me immediately love it more than any game I'd played in a long time, and got me incredibly emotionally invested. The scene where Shiho attempted suicide shook me so much that I was shaking and had to take a break afterward because I was so stunned that they went there. As a result, I was filled with a burning passion to kick Kamoshida's ass and therefore that enhanced the experience of this first Palace.
2. Sae
Sae being a heart that we change in the game was such an unexpected turn for me in the game, and when we got that little foreshadowing in the interrogation room, I was locked in for the next arc.
Most of the placement for this Palace is the aesthetic of it, the soundtrack, and the emotions behind it. First of all, Sae being Makoto's sister put that personal element in it, and also the addition of having the little 'future' hints in the interrogation room make it known that she has a role in the future of the game, which is influenced by whether or not we're successful in her Palace. So the story implications and stakes of the success of this Palace were huge. I also knew something BIG story-wise happened on November 20th in-game, but I wasn't quite sure what it was, so that felt especially big to have that date looming over me, especially since I completed the Palace on 11/18, the latest I could've possibly waiting because I was trying to max out my social stats.
Aaaaand:
1. Futaba
Everything about this Palace is beautiful and tragic in such a way that makes it rise above the others. Oh my God Futaba I love you so much
First of all, the feel of this Palace is SO cool. We got two (maybe more?) fully animated cutscenes around this Palace, the desert/tomb/pharaoh aesthetic made it the most visually interesting for me, Futaba's STORY is so heartbreaking and it made me so invested, her connection to Sojiro added another personal element, the music SLAPS, the puzzles/mystery of this Palace enhanced the experience for me, and I also LOVE that in order to proceed into the main space of the Palace, we had to do a little side quest to a desert/wide west-type town IN her cognitive desert. Everything about this Palace is perfection.
Now, onto more Palace specifics, this time ranking the soundtrack, the look/aesthetic and the emotional context, in that order. I talked about some of these things in my general rankings, but I'm gonna more in depth in these next rankings ✨
Next:
Palace Theme Rankings:
7. Okumura
This theme definitely FITS this Palace. It's super techy, with rock elements, sounds almost robotic and mechanical, which, again is super fitting. But overall, this is the Palace theme I'd probably be the least likely to listen to if I wanted to casually enjoy one of the Palace themes during a car ride or a walk or something.
6. Madarame
Nothing really to say about this theme, there's nothing I don't like about it, but I think it's a combination of my neutral feelings towards the Madarame arc and just liking all the other themes more.
5: Kamoshida
I think this one definitely would've been lower a few weeks ago because of its almost 'lofi', jazzy, casual, everyday feel compared to the horrific emotional experience of the Kamoshida arc, so that dissonance is frankly pretty uncomfortable.
But then I realized that maybe the reason why it's so 'chill' is because that's how Kamoshida views the horrible acts he's been committing. The abuse that he's been dealing out doesn't bother him, it's all in a day's work, it's casual activity for him, so therefore the soundtrack sounds casual. That's how I like to view the theme.
4. Kaneshiro
This one was my favorite for quite a while, the main instrument it uses is so fucking cool and the main melody sticks in your head for a GOOD long time. I'd jam to this one any day.
3. Shido
This one honestly was gonna go one spot lower than Kaneshiro's theme, but Shido's arc carries more emotional weight than Kaneshiro's, so ultimately that element brought it over into spot three.
This one I feel captures the hardcore majesty of the giant ship, and it's honestly been in my head for like a week. Also, the emotional emptiness of witnessing Akechi's death and that whole intense cutscene, then fading back into the gameplay and hearing this was brutal. This banger of a song held so much more weight and emotion after that.
2. Sae
I honestly thought this would be number one, but after thinking about it, Whims of Fate gets number 2.
So, I'd heard a few Persona 5 songs floating around on the internet years before I ever played this game, and this song was one of them. I also remember, before getting to Sae's Palace, I had a friend who was a Persona fan tell me that Sae's Palace theme was his favorite. To which I was a bit hesitant, because I REALLY liked some of the other Palace themes and wasn't super sure about the possibility of my other favorites getting dethroned.
But when I entered Sae's Palace for the first time and this song started playing, I deadass lowered my controller down and said to myself, "Whims of Fate is the PALACE THEME?????"
Absolute banger. Stunning. Jazzy, the melody and lyrics are sparkling with life, and easily the most 'eye-catching' Palace theme. Objectively one of the best songs in the soundtrack.
But, the emotion wins with number one:
1. Futaba
This one is not as exciting as Whims of Fate of course, and for a while Whims of Fate was my favorite Palace Theme. But as I was thinking about this ranking, I was deciding what the rankings were by which theme I would rather listen to if I was given a choice. This one was ultimately the number one choice, and that's all thanks to how connected I feel to Futaba's story and her arc.
Now, onto...
Palace Look/Aesthetic Rankings:
7. Madarame
I liked all the paintings of the students and I, again, loved having to interact with the paintings and the art in order to progress in the Palace, but I think this one being lowest on the list has to do with the fact that I was so fired up from the Kamoshida arc that I expected the Madarame arc to blow me out of the water too, and it was a bit underwhelming compared to the starting arc of the game.
I did love the golden staircase rooms though, and having to find the fake Sakuri paintings.
6. Kaneshiro
Really the only thing that bumps this one above the Madarame Palace is all the money lying around and the vault at the end. The rooms where money was actively falling like rain or confetti also made the mood really hit in a way that the arc as a whole didn't.
5. Kamoshida
Just with the look itself, it's lower because it's uncomfortable and horrifying, but it's SUPPOSED to be. Kamoshida's castle is literally a sex dungeon, and I also LOVE (in a way) that they held off on having all the creepy mannequins and busts until you progressed to like the the second or third floor. I remember when I got to the floor where the mannequins where, I entered into the first hallway on that floor and saw naked woman busts down the walls of the hallway like trophies, and I vividly remember just stopping and staring in shock for a bit as I realized that this Palace was a sex/abuse dungeon.
Creepy and horrifying, but MAN did they nail the uncomfy vibe.
4. Shido
They definitely captured the majesty of a giant cruise ship with this one. The carpeted hallways, the royalty milling about, the HUGE game room, fancy restaurants, and pool deck, this and the music really helped it FEEL like a beautiful cruise ship. I've been on multiple cruises with my family over the years, and Shido's ship felt huge and magical like that. I also especially loved having to scale the SIDE of the ship too.
3. Okumura
Despite my gripes about the Okumura Palace and the boss fight, the atmosphere is STUNNING. I love sci-fi stuff, I had a huge space phase as a kid, and the little touches of seeing planets or nebulas or stars out the windows was really cool. I also love how in the latter half of the Palace, you have to actually use vacuum pathways to fly THROUGH space.
2. Sae
I LOVE the look of Sae's Palace. They really nailed the casino feel, with the constant game rooms, the wild colors, and the music. It's also a very stark contrast to the back staff hallways, which are all lifeless and grey.
The nailed the casino feel a little TOO well because the main areas of this Palace actually got pretty overstimulating after a while 😅
1. Futaba
Okay, yes, if you can't tell, I very much like Futaba's Palace. I remember sometimes just standing in one spot in different rooms and move the camera so I could admire all the details. I wanted to explore every damn inch of that place, it was so damn ENCHANTING. Having to construct the murals was a nice touch, and then also having to transfer gems from one statue to the other was another fun challenge.
Not to mention of course the huge ass desert and then having to travel to that far off city as part of the Palace. That honestly made it so much more enjoyable, feeling like the Palace environment was expansive enough that we could travel to other locations IN her cognition.
All right, and lastly...
Ranking the Palaces based off of Emotional Investment:
7. Kaneshiro
As I've said before, this was the most 'boring' arc for me. It felt very much like a means to an end and I was glad to be past it when I beat him.
6. Madarame
Similar to Kaneshiro, this felt like one of the weaker arcs that I wasn't as invested in.
In recent months, I have come to realize in my own life that I had an abusive music teacher when I was a child and have recently taken the step of calling them by their first name rather than 'Ms ____.' So, this has made me feel a bit closer towards this arc, but honestly it's less this arc and more feeling closer to Yusuke.
So thus, Madarame is still lower on the list.
5. Okumura
Okumura kind of felt like Kaneshiro in the sense that he's just a corrupt businessman who went over the rails, but the emotional investment part of his arc comes from Haru. I was unsure of Haru when I first met her in the game, as I think we're supposed to be, but learning of her predicament and especially meeting her abusive fuckass fiancé made me feel more determined to beat him.
Also, his Palace in general was really sad as I went through it– seeing the employees being worked to death, the little bits of dialogue we'd get from them, the 30 second lunch break then back on full grind, the worker arms collapsing after just a slight uptick, and most of all, getting to the final area with the elevator and seeing the broken, overused robots– employees– on a conveyer belt and being dropped in a furnace to keep fueling the factory.
I remember being on FaceTime with a friend and when I saw that last part I immediately stopped and picked up my phone to show him. This was one of the times in the game where I thought to myself, damn they really went there.
4. Shido
Shido being the 'big bad' of it all and realizing how he was connected to pretty much all of the previous bosses was the most intense part for me. That, and finding out how he's connected to Ren specifically made him feel really dangerous and powerful and made me all the more hungry to see him grovel for forgiveness. The game did a really good job of making him feel really formidable. With all of the strings he's been pulling, all the events, the mental shutdowns and psychotic breakdowns he's been indirectly and directly causing behind the scenes of the whole game so far, the game did a phenomenal job of making him truly feel like the final boss and the most dangerous person the Phantom Thieves had fought so far.
3. Sae
I'm not overly crazy about Sae as a character aside from relatively base level enjoyment of her, but Sae's PALACE held SO much emotional weight and I'd say this Palace held a sense of urgency like no other one has done so far. Her being Makoto's sister helped me want to help Makoto through making Sae have a change of heart, and knowing how much depended on the Phantom Thieves' success charged this Palace and this whole arc up with engagement and involvement. Probably my favorite overall ARC of the game.
2. Kamoshida
This motherfucker can die. Holy shit he can go to HELL.
This arc made me so emotionally invested in all the ways, his story with Ryuji, the Shiho's attempt, Ann being toxically wrapped up in him, and his iron grip on the school and its students (shoutout to Mishima!!) was so damn frustrating and I was SO ready to send him to hell.
I remember when Morgana was talking about how causing a change of heart in him could potentially kill him, Ren and Ryuji were unsure about it, and so was I, so ultimately I was like 'well, let's see if there are other options,' same as how the characters were. But when Shiho attempted suicide, my rage and hatred for him shot through the room, and then all of a sudden just like the characters, I didn't care what happened to him I was so pissed and disgusted by him.
The game perfectly shaped my emotions through the story, they had me wrapped around their finger in a way that felt satisfying because the story was making me feel the way I think it was supposed to make me feel.
1. Futaba
YES I LIKE FUTABA OKAY
Her story hit me so hard, and stuck with me. First of all, her story and the tragedy of her mother's death was woven through the narrative and became a crucial thing in the future of the story. The significance of her mother's death was still relevant long after Futaba's Palace.
The mystery of her being a shut-in, the fight to get into her room, the tragic reality of Futaba's mental health put painfully on display in her Palace, everything was perfect and tragic and perfect. Even the Shadows being summoned in her Palace came with her screaming in the background. Every time a Shadow appeared and I heard her poor scream, I wanted to cry and hug Futaba until all her pain went away.
This is when the game really started to pick up again for me in terms of emotion. Kamoshida's arc was super intense for me, then the next two, Madarame's and Kaneshiro's, felt weaken and I wasn't as invested, then Futaba's arc came around and slapped me dead in the face. I thought I'd gotten used to the genius of the game and how the Metaverse stuff worked, but then Futaba came along.
The mystery of Alibaba being Futaba and Futaba hating herself so much that she requests her own heart to be changed?? That pierced me right through the heart. I struggle with severe mental health issues and have diagnosed anxiety, treatment resistant depression, and c-ptsd from multiple things. I've suffered from suicidality and chronic guilt (possibly from that abusive music teacher), and depressive episodes and addiction as a result of that guilt. So, naturally, Futaba's story and her wanting her own heart changed and her Shadow self in her Palace constantly chanting that she needs to die and will die really hit the mark with me.
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ANYWAYS, that is it for my rankings! Hi-chews and my dogs got me through this tumblr post lol I didn't think it would take three hours 🤣
More Persona breakdowns to come!
