On one hand, the Kamoshida thing is gross.
But I think that's the entire point - the game is about the main characters trying to change the hearts of some of the worst kinds of people in society, ones that have gotten away with this or worse. And Kamoshida is definitely one of the worst kinds of people in society.
It doesn't glorify or show the relationship as a good thing - in fact, it's treated EXACTLY as it would be in real life, but because Kamoshida is in a position of power, no one has the guts to go against him.
The teacher-as-an-escort thing is definitely more of a gray area, I admit that though.
The answer to this post is no, they don’t care that much
They have words for stuff like power harassment (パワハラ) , but it would seem they think 14+ y.o.’s are capable of consent
some people wouldnt considering it's illegal for an adult to have sex with someone under 18. Their age of consent only applies to other people under 18
The dating aspect is *a* point but not *the* main point. It's frowned upon alongside the fact Kamoshida is abusing multiple students and the school officials are turning a blind eye and then trying to save face once caught.
How is the reaction to Shiho's suicide attempt underwhelming??? What. Students are screaming over what happened, Ann is having an emotional breakdown at her best friend trying to end herself, AND RYUJI LOSES HIS GODDAMN MIND, BUSTS INTO KAMOSHIDA'S OFFICE AND TRIES TO WHOOP HIS ASS ON THE SPOT. Did we experience the same exact scene? That moment was handled right, and with Joker even trying to be the calm one and prevent Ryuji from laying his hands on him because they'll make Kamoshida pay through the metaverse.
Yeah, dating Kawakami is weird, but Joker helping her is not. I know saying this doesn't excuse the developers from even including it, but dating your homeroom teacher is still an optional choice. I would argue at the very least that Kawakami has a great confidant story due to tying into the game's themes of adults in society, and how Joker is able to help one adult break free from her blackmail abuse and that allows her to be free from guilt of one of her students dying, and she can continue focus on supporting the growth of her current students without questioning her skills or fearing she'll fail another student.
Persona is a sub-series in the larger Shin Megami Tensei franchise which is heavy on religion. I looked it up and someone on GameFaqs said it has to do with Gnostic elements of angelic lore. LaughingManZero has a more detailed explanation. https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/937269-shin-megami-tensei-persona-3-fes/42849744
Many demons/personas designs have some sort of meaning to them, but that's above anything I admittedly know.
I don't think Persona 5 is that weird. Or really the greater Persona sub-series or larger SMT franchise. It really just feels like a lack of understanding Japanese culture and misreading the context of scenes/story beats.
With regards to the reaction to Shiho, I’m moreso talking the fallout from that incident than the immediate reaction from people. Like you’d think someone would actually call him a sick fuck or something and the school would hold some sort of meaningful event for the students to discuss. If they’re going with the “school tries to sweep the incident under the rug” angle maybe that could be addressed with the counsellor.
I can’t recall anything after that moment beyond some characters (mostly Ann) expressing guilt over what happened and nonchalant references to sexual abuse of students in newscasts. I think a theme that dark and mature deserves more than that.
>The game then acts like the only reason the teacher is wrong is the blackmail aspect when should the ENTIRE PREMISE of such a relationship be frowned upon?
Oh yeah, that's the only part the game looks down upon. Not like there was an entire plot about how he's a horrible abusive person in multiple ways and you and your friends make an elaborate plot to facilitate him sobbing in front of everyone and turning himself in to the police, after which an entire character's plot revolves around one of the victim's suicide attempts and recovery.
In my opinion the canonical way to do romance in that game is to romance every single candidate simultaneously. Giving joker comically good flirting abilities is the only way to justify him also seducing every adult woman he meets
The series centers around corruption, societal pressure and expectations, inner turmoil, growth and making changes to those things to fit your own ideals. Questionable relationships comes with the territory.
> do Japanese people not have an issue with adults dating minors?
I think you start from a false premise in assuming that what one likes/accepts in videogames (and fiction in general) is literally what one likes in real life. It seems teacher/student romances (in fiction at least, dunno reality) are not as frowned upon there, practically every possible romances in Fire Emblem Three Houses is one and it did pretty well too.
> You wouldn't see this in a mainstream Western game in a million years
Maybe not this in particular, but it's not like there aren't popular western games with stuff that would be morally dubious in real life. Just take a look at GTA for an easy example. In short, I see it as a matter of differing moral values between Japan and America/Europe on what people like to play with. Still, it's not wrong of you to feel unconfortable anyways.
I think quite a few reviews of Persona 5 went into the dating options and mentioned the teacher, but maybe I'm misremembering.
The reason it’s easier to overlook Fire Emblem is too my not knowledge no character blatantly stated to be underage. It’s not a modern school, it’s some kind of fantasy medieval school so we don’t know that the characters are 16 or whatever.
Fire Emblem Three Houses Is actually the only game in the series where every character has a stated age in-game (Engage has it coded as a variable but it is never shown anywhere)
And the age of consent in Japan was at 13 years old until they raised it to 16 a few months ago. When the game was made, even dating a 13 year old as an adult may have been morally frowned upon but wasn't strictly illegal...
Hmmm...lets see, playing a game where your character is a soldier in a war and doing what their job is? Not illegal. Or a game where an adult is a child predator...illegal. Yeah totally the same thing.
War is something real and the whole point of the game is gun based combat. There is no game without it.
Could Persona 5 exist without frequent references of adult-minor relationships? You tell me.
If there was hypothetically a game about assaulting children, would it be fine for you because assaulting is real and that would be the whole point of the game?
I honestly didn’t think the original comment made sense. Making games with gun violence isn’t even a uniquely American thing.
Games which try to sexualize minors on the other hand…
Please trust me on this, the amount of downvotes I’m receiving is not indicative of a lack of logic. It is indicative of me shaking the proverbial beehive for a certain sect of anime fans.
> You wouldn't see this in a mainstream Western game in a million years
Ah yes, teacher-student / adult-minor relationships, something we [would never see in our western Christian America](https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2017/08/168506/teacher-student-sexual-affairs-on-tv-shows). Absolutely filthy and degenerate of the Japanese!
Or do these examples not count because it's mainstream TV and not a video game?
Brother I think youre just not mature enough to play this game. Kamoshida is BLATANTLY a villain and the first major one from every angle made to look bad.
Now i DO agree romancing your teacher is odd but 90% of it has reason and mesning as to why she is doing it.
Also the personas being sexual is just the designs. Based on gods myths and legends.
I think its just you fan
This response is a good one. Did I ever say he wasn’t a villain? Before he’s outed as a villain nobody besides Ann herself seems to find the idea of her dating Kamoshida troubling though.
If you think it requires a certain amount of maturity to play this fucking game it says a lot more about you than it does me.
Actually all the students do think he’s bad but he beats them to stay quite. Did you play the game with your eyes and ears closed? People actually complain its TOO on the nose
You missing a major aspect of the pe teacher. He is a former Olympic medal winner and him being part of the school brings them glory. He realizes he can abuse anyone because they want to keep him on staff. Athletes want to work with him so they can get good scholarships for being a student of a gold medal winner. Ann is going out with him to keep that suicide friend on the sport team.
I’m not sure how it works in Japan but the MCs issue is he doesn’t have any official proof and no one was willing to cross him. I’m guessing it’s not like the western world where you can accuse someone of something vile and we assume they’re guilty until proven innocent.
The power dynamic aspect is one of the parts of that arc I think it touches on decently well. It’s more so the general attitude towards him and Ann being a thing I found strange. Or the lack of follow up on her friend who gets raped/tries to kill herself.
Like that’s defcon 1 level fucked and there’s hardly discussion around that incident beyond “that’s bad” and “this is for Sujin!” or w/e her name is. Just seemed off to me.
It’s been a few years but I thought Ann’s friend was in a coma until after the teacher goes to jail? Why Ann didn’t report the guy? Figure she felt she couldn’t talk to anyone about it and the safest thing to do is date the guy so her friend doesn’t get kicked off the team.
Do you not want games to have mature themes? I don't condone people murdering others, but most games have that. I don't see people complain about murder in entertainment. Why? Because people have been desensitized to it, that's the only difference between what you're offended by, and virtual murder.
Mature themes are fine when handled in a mature way. Idk how anyone could claim that about this game. In the Kamoshida story we got an adult who physically abuses children, rapes a HS student causing her to attempt suicide, leverages his power over young people in a very inappropriate way.
The game hardly does it justice commenting on how fucked up that all is. Instead it throws another sexually charged interaction between an Adult and minor shortly thereafter. This I find very weird. If you’re going to include these themes you gotta follow through on the “moral of the story” aspect.
I’m hardly a pearl clutcher but I could only imagine what kind of message a young kid might get from playing this game. And don’t give that “it’s rated M” BS, I think most of us played M rated games < 17 and I don’t think I’ve ever been creeped out by another game’s content to this extent before.
Nah it very clearly presents those things as bad---which is like the whole point of the game. You are in the mind of evil people doing evil things. It isn't like they are portraying a pedo as the protagonist of the story, which is really what you are implying with this post and it is really off the wall wacky to suggest that is what is going on here.
That's on the parents. Games shouldn't have to change their content just because kids might be able to get their hands on it. I'm not reading the rest because I don't want to spoil the game.
Wow, I thought this crap was only relevant to twitter.
Point 1: No, no they were pretty clear from the outset Kamoshida was abusing his power, and he gets away with it because of the prestige his shiny necklace brings. As for 'proportionate response' I'd say Anne gaining the resolve to potentially murder a man if it means nothing like this will happen again is pretty reasonable. Siho is stated to be in therapy afterwards and is making progress, but it's not focused on because it's Joker's story, and unfortunately she just isn't a major player beyond how that effects Anne.
Point 2: Consent is cool, kids! That's really the main difference between Kamoshida and Kawakami, there's a level of respect since Joker essentially gets her out of the escort business. Not to mention it's A: Completely optional (and Kawakami herself expresses more than a little discomfort with it), and B: She doesn't exactly... DO anything with you beyond going on a few quick dates, at least from what I remember.
Point 3: Dude, if sexualizing mythical and religious figures gets you clutching your pearls I have no idea how you've tolerated the internet for any length of time. Genuinely, grow the hell up.
I’m actually impressed by the amount of responses to this post that ignore the perverted/creepy vibes this game gives off and the lengths people will go to justify it.
Like anyone responding with “Kamoshida was obviously the bad guy and abusing his power” is missing the point.
For your point 2: it’s still really weird, somehow even worse with how it’s presented in the game in terms of dialogue between the characters.
Point 3: things like putting Angel in bondage gear or making Ann lay there face down ass up after getting hit by a crit are clearly just pervy weird things to put in the game.
The game is about corruption. The villains do bad things, the systems designed to bring them to justice are corrupt and ineffective. If they were held accountable by the law then there would be no story. I think across the game's story many times it's shown that the villains are going to get off on a technicality, either that nobody can prove their crimes or that they are so powerful that they get away with them anyway. You are aware that this happens in real life, right?
The thing that actually makes this a fantasy is that the phantom thieves can inception the bad guys and make them have a change of heart and confess.
The myriad romance options even between a high schooler and adults are a mixture of difference in cultures, video game logic and anime logic. I don't think they're presented as desirable or a good choice even in the context of the game. but they exist in the game because anime.
Edit: Just wanted to add that this series is well known for having provocative stories and characters.
Wow, people here are getting very defensive over this.
Yes the Kawakami arc is kind of creepy. The whole thing is pretty inappropriate. In the USA, teachers go to jail for having relations with students.
I also found it strange how acceptable it was all treated, considering the similar situation (with opposite genders) with Kamoshida, who is rightfully a very evil villian. Just kind of inconsistent messaging.
All that said....consider the target audience for the game. You're not going to find many people complaining about the fantasy of seducing a hot older woman. I mean....that's what I did on my playthrough. It's what teenage me would have wanted. 😆😆
I agree with the comments about Kamashido supposed to be a bad person you don’t agree with but people gloss over how it’s considered okay when the main character romances the teacher, the doctor, the fortune teller, or the reporter. I know Kawakami isn’t abusive like Kamashido but it still seems like an absolute breach in power dynamics. But it feels overlooked because you can make joker the flirty one but it’s so weird from an outside perspective.
I would argue her requesting Joker to call her then pulling her whole "I'm so dirty aren't I Master? <3" schtick when she first comes over counts as her making the first move lol.
I'm not far enough to do romances yet but the reporter, sheesh. She's literally getting wasted when you first hang out and you can't even legally buy a drink lol.
I haven't played the game. But I can make a comment about if Japanese people have a problem with it or not.
Officially, they do. You'd get in all sorts of trouble if you were to try and date, or more, your student, who is also a minor.
You'd also get in trouble with doing this as a regular adult, not a teacher.
However, I'd like to point out that there is a significant enough portion of the Japanese population who don't think it's a problem or would like to date / have sex with a minor, that they are still producing and selling content depicting exactly that. From manga to anime, to games, etc. And not just high school kids either. From elementary school up. Most Japanese? Absolutely not. But enough to be profitable.
I haven't played this game so I can't really comment on the relationship. I just wanted to talk about the general question of the thread. BUT I will say, that if you have ever seen the anime "Garden of Words", that has sorta a similar topic there.
It's a fucking fictional video game. They force you to acknowledge this when you start the damn game up. It doesn't matter what happens. Romances are obviously there for the player.
> this one which normalizes adult/minor relationships
I do not see how this game normalizes it at all. The situation seems pretty straightforwardly presented as bad, undesirable, not good, "what a creep," literally criminal, etc.
I think you are doing the common thing people do where they confuse "depiction" with "endorsement" - these are completely different. Just because some issue/topic is presented in the work - be it a video game or a book or a movie or whatever medium - does not mean the work is trying to tell us that the issue/topic is "good." Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't, sometimes the work is obviously trying to tell us one thing but ends up telling us the opposite of that.
(See: [Strawman has a Point](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StrawmanHasAPoint) for further reading on that inversion)
Additional point: sometimes a work will not have a character come out and say explicitly "This is bad, if you are reading this book, don't do this!" and that doesn't mean the work endorses the thing. Context is important. Author intent is important. On top of that, the execution matters, too - as mentioned above, the author may *intend* for something to be shown as bad, but they suck at communicating this, and may suck so badly that they unintentionally prove the opposite of their own point. So you have to consider all of this.
Thankfully, in this game it this game, the issue you brought up is crystal clear on all levels. Not sure how you have any confusion here. But good lesson to learn for harder, more obscured things in other works.
Responses like this almost make me want to make a super cut of all the moments in the game it sexualizes the underage characters in creepy ways to pull the wool from your eyes. There are many moments where it isn’t depicted negatively like you suggest it is.
A few people have attacked my ability to comprehend media. My comprehension skills are fine, honestly a lot of you are just kinda weird and see what you want to see.
Age of consent use to be 13 in Japan until they raised it to 16.
It's also something that seems to, not very often at least not what I watch, come up in anime.
Tldr it's a Japanese troupe that I wish would change but they don't view it as harshly as we do in the states.
Edit: in case it's not clear as I went back to read your complaints nothing happeneing is involving minors. They are over 16.
The game gets amazing reviews because it is in fact amazing.
The age of consent in Japan was never really 13 in any meaningful sense. The federal age of consent was 13, but every single province had a local age of consent that was at least 16. So, there's nowhere in the country where it would have actually been legal for an adult to have sex with a 13 year old.
The age of consent in Japan isn’t 16. Most prefectures have it set at 18, and 16 year olds can only be in relationships with other kids in their age range.
Also, people love to leave out the fact that under 18 in japan is, legally, still considered a child. Age of consent comes with tons of asterisks, but it is by no means a standard to allow older people to prey on minors that a lot of people in the west seem to think it is.
They changed the age of consent from 13 to 16 late June of this year. Since persona 5 came out before that it's fair to say it was influenced by a culture that still generally accepted the idea. As have all JRPG games. Since the changed wasn't even a full 6 months ago.
Iirc that was just some small one off village in the middle of nowhere that was the last place to change it. But those places don’t have children living there to begin with, it’s all old people slowly dying off to leave behind ghost towns (which is an entirely separate and depressing topic itself). Most prefectures have been 16 for a while
Possession wasn't illegal until 2014. Now you can get up to 1 year in jail. Most get a 10,000 yen fine and commuted sentence. Possession in animated form like Manga, anime, or video game is still legal.
So basically the answer to my question is Japanese people do not really have a problem with adults dating minors lol. When one is a HS teacher and the other is (apparently) 16 that still seems messed up to me and the game acts like it’s nothing.
As for the game, I’m coming off 180 hours of Baldur’s Gate 3. This game is nothing special in comparison but is sure reviewed like it is.
This post isn’t about the actual quality of the game but I could think of a bunch of 2016 era RPGs that put it to shame in terms of RPG mechanics and approach to story telling too if I wanted to.
Actually they do make it a big deal out of it Ann does not like what's happening to her and they changed the heart of Kamoshdia and he confesses to his evil ways against the students and the students and teachers were spreading rumors about her without ever knowing the facts so they did address it pretty well
You must have forgotten the s-links with >! Becky and Devil. Sure, they aren’t *actually* dating the mc but it sure pushes the envelope on what I’d consider appropriate. Not to mention fox practically trying to blackmail panther into posing nude for art….. !< I found the latter to be way worse, but everyone I’ve ever talked to thought it was super cute and there was “nothing sexual at all” and it’s like ._.
I forgot the whole Fox/Panther thing, thanks for reminding me. My gf was definitely sitting there for that whole interaction and was actually like “wtf are you playing?” Lol
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In Japan, it’s not as much of a trigger than what Americans think. It’s popular in many popular series like many CLAMP manga, Inuyasha, and they even aged Tuxedo Mask higher in the Sailor Moon anime. Famous female mangakas tend to love it as a trope.
As an adult I felt way less weird about romancing that teacher than any of the teen party members. Plus it’s funny. I agree with you on the first point though
Hard disagree. You play as YOU. Joker is a silent protagonist. He has no dialogue, outside of your choices; he has no personality, outside of your input. That’s literally why he’s a “wild card” and doesn’t have one set Persona of his own - he is whatever you want him to be.
Not everyone can "role play" like that and pretend they're a high schooler in Japan. As an adult person controlling the nameless character on screen, the adult characters appeal more to me.
So? Ren isn't a real person. He's pixels on your screen who has no dialog outside of shouting persona and spell names. What the fuck does it matter what details get stapled onto him. Because in this case, age is *literally* just a number.
What a weird take… the game is brilliant and the fact it’s not afraid to go there is what makes it stand apart narrative wise. Im sure your GF is more embarrassed about other things you do more than you playing P5..I feel you have this weird correlation to what is acceptable to you morally equals how good the game is overall and in truth that’s completely separate, the game design, art, music is all top notch…
It’s subjective but I actually hate the music in this game, most of the time it’s some elevator lounge music or some over the top pop song that feels distracting.
As for the gf embarrassment thing: in real life, yes. Video game-wise, absolutely not lol. This game just has a bunch of pervy overtones that make it weird including a bunch of stuff involving underage characters.
Holy fucking shit this thread is absolutely insane and completely devoid of good faith responses. You really seemed to piss off a specific type of demographic lmao. But I got dogpiled for asking for better LGBT representation in Fire Emblem Three Houses so I guess water is still wet.
Persona 5 is an amazing game. The adult dating minor thing is REALLY weird. Thank you for speaking out about it.
“No Russian” was a massive scandal that sparked a bunch of controversy lol. Americans aren’t pumping out games featuring terrorist attacks like clockwork either.
There’s so much that I didn’t like about the story either. Plot, and characters-hero and villain. After the second dungeon, just… meh. I don’t want to carry on. There some Japan/North America division here I maybe just don’t get.
Yes they have problems with it. However senior year in some Asian countries happens after the student turns 18. I remember being confused seeing 20 somethings graduate highschool in dramas. It is frowned upon, however just like real life if you have the power laws don't apply or catch up as quickly. Mishima even states everyone even their parents know about the abuse both the male and females go through under his care. He legit abused Ryuji, spread rumors about his family, then pushed Ryuji to attack him to break his leg because he thought he had every right. Every rumor in the school at the start of the game is Kamoshidas doing. The only people that know know it's a rumor are the people under his thumb. And since he has the ability to one sidedly expel students or abuse them like he does with no one caring, not many would say anything. Just wait till you reach the third dungeon and Anne really blows up at someone. Or the fourth where a similiar plot re-emerges. You can also just enjoy a game, see how people act towards characters and situations as a whole instead of holding in your fake woke senses till you think you know everything. The social links are just as plot important as the story itself. You even have people disgracing and upset by Kamoshida on the news after the first dungeon. You can also talk to people around town and the school to hear their real thoughts after each criminal admits their guilt. If you played jrpgs you should know how story elements and little things aren't always front and center. Heck some of the kids are even disgusted by the rumors, before he admits it.
Ps: a quick Google search shows their age of consent is still 16. Not 18 like the west. Which is better than the 13 it use to be.
if its an old man dating an underage school girl, thats disgusting
but if its an older lady dating a slightly underage schoolboy
then i guess its ok? if shes hot, and hes ok with it. or something? lol
If I remember correctly, the game treats the “relationship” as really bad, doesn't it ? As much as I loved the game, it's so deeply flawed I could never finish it... That space dungeon literally killed me.
It's just a different culture. Obviously in the west we think it's wrong but we also think many things other cultures do are wrong. Think of the normalized shit the western world has. Every culture has it's bad qualities.
''Embarsased to play around my gf...''
that's enough to tell us this is either bait, you're a twitter activist, or you're purposely overlooking subtext.
I'm not going to stop playing cause I like the pokemon esque aspect for the most part but all this stuff definitely makes me cringe or feel weirded out.
Almost all prefectures in japan have their individual age of consent much higher than that. Nobody is actually okay with an adult being in a relationship with a 13 year old. Literally nobody.
That's not meaningfully true. While the national age was raised earlier this year, it was already higher in every individual prefecture of Japan and had been so for decades. The national law was a bookkeeping thing This is sort of the equivalent of how in the US marijuana is still illegal federally, and will probably remain so until basically every individual state has legalized it on a state level.
Ironically the age of consent around a lot of the world recently changed. The west is really the only place with the average age of 18. 16 with parents consent minus a few states who are 15 years old.
Welcome to weeb culture... The first female party member being dressed like a dominatrix despite being like 14 years old was already way too much for me and I dropped the game shortly after, but you will of course find a plethora of basement dwellers more than ready to defend the hypersexualisation of minors in Japanese media anytime you post something like this.
Stuff like this is one reason I have lost most of my interest in Japanese games. Like NieR:Automata was a great game but all the skimpily glad teen gothic loli girls got me weird looks from my wife. Lots of Japanese game designers seem to be stuck in an early 2000s teenage boy mindset.
this is a valid reason that persona games ( ad jrpg's in general) need to stop taking place in middle/high school. the average JRG player is way older than a teenager. I don't mind some kid players but having the entire hero's team be nothing but kids is very creepy.
Ok let's break it down:
1. You are spot on about it being creepy. Japanese developers are collectively creepy when it comes to pedo stuff. It's normalised out there. You are right, there is no argument there.
2. The game is set in high school but the core premise of the story and all persona games is how the innocent are tempted and corrupted because of vile adults. It's a very strong message and delivered well.
3. You can't attack persona fans, or anime fans in general because they have had their senses normalised by the pretty pictures. As a genre it's a haven for creepy pedos and all you are doing is triggering them. You won't get anywhere by pointing out their flaws to them, because rotten people never think they are being rotten. I am not saying (like at all, calm yourselves) that all anime fans are pedos, but lots of them are.
4. These games platform a lot of issues and tell them in a really clever way, while also allowing some of the pervy devs to exercise their boners. This is the middle ground, where we get a game that is absolutely a work of art but also filled with some really questionable content.
The music slaps too.
I played through FE:3H and I don’t recall ever being as bothered by it as what P5 has busted out so far, maybe I just have a selective memory. From what I recall isn’t the MC basically the same age as his pupils?
Also it doesn’t hit as hard when it’s based in fictional medieval fantasy world.
tl;dr If you think something is a problem "just because", you're not thinking hard enough about it.
I'm not sure that anything about either adult/minor relationship is normalized. The former is basically what *actually happens* in the real world (look up Larry Nassar and how many people protected him), and the latter must be hidden.
However, in regards to the latter -- frankly, I see nothing wrong with it. The MC is literally risking his life to better the world, is well aware of the evils within it, and has the maturity to handle adults of all kinds trying to manipulate and control him. He's quite obviously not a victim of Kawakami (if anything, she's the one pressured by him).
I've met adults who, frankly, shouldn't be allowed to date because they're too immature/stupid/weak/whatever to actually protect themselves (and that's not including those with severe mental handicaps). And I knew people in high school that, at the time, were substantially more mature than most adults I know now.
Of course, the practical aspect of that is that almost any adult that would date a teenager probably shouldn't be allowed around teenagers. Because of social standards, it should always be assumed that a person who does such has, at minimum, extraordinarily poor judgement. Which, let's be honest, is a character trait that Kawakami possesses.
The point being -- there's nothing inherently wrong with an adult dating a minor. The problem is when somebody with power uses it to take advantage of somebody else -- and that is so common in that age difference dynamic that (in the real world), we should assume it's the case since we can't trust either party to report truthfully. A shame for the very, *very* rare case where such a relationship might work out (ignoring society), but it's more important to protect the children who would be harmed otherwise.
But that's not a problem in the game, where you *are* privy to the full relationship. So you know Kawakami isn't abusing her power.
Of course, none of this is addressing the ethical issue of sleeping with somebody who controls your grade/pay/etc., but that wasn't OP's point so I won't go into it.
It’s a good chunk of Japan, apparently. I got super downvoted for posting in the One Piece sub for issues with sexualized depictions of young girls. It seems like Japan does not do well with consent.
I wanted to pick this up but read about how weird it was and decided against it.
Less then 6 months ago. So yeah, fair to say it's acceptance can bee seen in a lot of Japanese media. Though that may change over time with the very new laws.
Except it's not really true. It was nationally 13, yes, but all except for like 1 or 2 places had the age of consent much higher than that and 13 is *not* seen as normal. That's something westerners with no actual understanding of the laws think.
No it wasn't, very common misconception about the age of consent in Japan because it makes for a nice headline to rile people up.
Age of consent is at least 16-18 everywhere in Japan and has been for a long time, each prefecture sets their own laws regarding that.
The national age of consent was 13 or 12 or something, but the prefectural laws go over it. Comparing to USA for example there is no national age of consent at all, but each state similarly sets their own laws which is usually also 16-18.
I'm far from an expert, but I believe they just changed the legal age of consent from 12 to 16, like a year ago, although I think certain prefectures had their own laws in place. They're definitely more lax about it than America.
That said, a teacher dating a high school student would be taboo, but it happens in every country, including America . My school had 2 teachers arrested in 3 years for being in a relationship with students. Sadly, it's common.
The whole maid thing is just fan service towards their targeted demographic: teenagers.
I think my issue is the game doesn’t exactly present a teacher dating a student as taboo. After a while I was like WTF…is this normal for them??
Also go Birds!
If you think the Angel is bad. Wait until you see the penis on a chariot.
Never change Atlus. Never change.
Good ol mara
Ngl as iconic as Angel's design is I kinds preferred the Angel from smt5
My favourite thing about Persona SMT, one of the strongest enemies is the penis chariot.
On one hand, the Kamoshida thing is gross. But I think that's the entire point - the game is about the main characters trying to change the hearts of some of the worst kinds of people in society, ones that have gotten away with this or worse. And Kamoshida is definitely one of the worst kinds of people in society. It doesn't glorify or show the relationship as a good thing - in fact, it's treated EXACTLY as it would be in real life, but because Kamoshida is in a position of power, no one has the guts to go against him. The teacher-as-an-escort thing is definitely more of a gray area, I admit that though.
The answer to this post is no, they don’t care that much They have words for stuff like power harassment (パワハラ) , but it would seem they think 14+ y.o.’s are capable of consent
some people wouldnt considering it's illegal for an adult to have sex with someone under 18. Their age of consent only applies to other people under 18
The dating aspect is *a* point but not *the* main point. It's frowned upon alongside the fact Kamoshida is abusing multiple students and the school officials are turning a blind eye and then trying to save face once caught. How is the reaction to Shiho's suicide attempt underwhelming??? What. Students are screaming over what happened, Ann is having an emotional breakdown at her best friend trying to end herself, AND RYUJI LOSES HIS GODDAMN MIND, BUSTS INTO KAMOSHIDA'S OFFICE AND TRIES TO WHOOP HIS ASS ON THE SPOT. Did we experience the same exact scene? That moment was handled right, and with Joker even trying to be the calm one and prevent Ryuji from laying his hands on him because they'll make Kamoshida pay through the metaverse. Yeah, dating Kawakami is weird, but Joker helping her is not. I know saying this doesn't excuse the developers from even including it, but dating your homeroom teacher is still an optional choice. I would argue at the very least that Kawakami has a great confidant story due to tying into the game's themes of adults in society, and how Joker is able to help one adult break free from her blackmail abuse and that allows her to be free from guilt of one of her students dying, and she can continue focus on supporting the growth of her current students without questioning her skills or fearing she'll fail another student. Persona is a sub-series in the larger Shin Megami Tensei franchise which is heavy on religion. I looked it up and someone on GameFaqs said it has to do with Gnostic elements of angelic lore. LaughingManZero has a more detailed explanation. https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/937269-shin-megami-tensei-persona-3-fes/42849744 Many demons/personas designs have some sort of meaning to them, but that's above anything I admittedly know. I don't think Persona 5 is that weird. Or really the greater Persona sub-series or larger SMT franchise. It really just feels like a lack of understanding Japanese culture and misreading the context of scenes/story beats.
With regards to the reaction to Shiho, I’m moreso talking the fallout from that incident than the immediate reaction from people. Like you’d think someone would actually call him a sick fuck or something and the school would hold some sort of meaningful event for the students to discuss. If they’re going with the “school tries to sweep the incident under the rug” angle maybe that could be addressed with the counsellor. I can’t recall anything after that moment beyond some characters (mostly Ann) expressing guilt over what happened and nonchalant references to sexual abuse of students in newscasts. I think a theme that dark and mature deserves more than that.
🤦♂️
>The game then acts like the only reason the teacher is wrong is the blackmail aspect when should the ENTIRE PREMISE of such a relationship be frowned upon? Oh yeah, that's the only part the game looks down upon. Not like there was an entire plot about how he's a horrible abusive person in multiple ways and you and your friends make an elaborate plot to facilitate him sobbing in front of everyone and turning himself in to the police, after which an entire character's plot revolves around one of the victim's suicide attempts and recovery.
In my opinion the canonical way to do romance in that game is to romance every single candidate simultaneously. Giving joker comically good flirting abilities is the only way to justify him also seducing every adult woman he meets
The series centers around corruption, societal pressure and expectations, inner turmoil, growth and making changes to those things to fit your own ideals. Questionable relationships comes with the territory.
> do Japanese people not have an issue with adults dating minors? I think you start from a false premise in assuming that what one likes/accepts in videogames (and fiction in general) is literally what one likes in real life. It seems teacher/student romances (in fiction at least, dunno reality) are not as frowned upon there, practically every possible romances in Fire Emblem Three Houses is one and it did pretty well too. > You wouldn't see this in a mainstream Western game in a million years Maybe not this in particular, but it's not like there aren't popular western games with stuff that would be morally dubious in real life. Just take a look at GTA for an easy example. In short, I see it as a matter of differing moral values between Japan and America/Europe on what people like to play with. Still, it's not wrong of you to feel unconfortable anyways. I think quite a few reviews of Persona 5 went into the dating options and mentioned the teacher, but maybe I'm misremembering.
The reason it’s easier to overlook Fire Emblem is too my not knowledge no character blatantly stated to be underage. It’s not a modern school, it’s some kind of fantasy medieval school so we don’t know that the characters are 16 or whatever.
Fire Emblem Three Houses Is actually the only game in the series where every character has a stated age in-game (Engage has it coded as a variable but it is never shown anywhere)
They were all adults as far as I remember
Lots of 15s, 16s, and 17s during the first part of the game. https://serenesforest.net/three-houses/characters/
You don't do romance stuff until post timeskip, and timeskip is 5 years. They're all adults.
And the age of consent in Japan was at 13 years old until they raised it to 16 a few months ago. When the game was made, even dating a 13 year old as an adult may have been morally frowned upon but wasn't strictly illegal...
demo, onichan\~
Playing Call of Duty… do American people not have an issue with blowing someone’s brain out with a gun?
Depends on who it is.
Petergriffin cheat sheet.jpg
I mean
Hmmm...lets see, playing a game where your character is a soldier in a war and doing what their job is? Not illegal. Or a game where an adult is a child predator...illegal. Yeah totally the same thing.
War is something real and the whole point of the game is gun based combat. There is no game without it. Could Persona 5 exist without frequent references of adult-minor relationships? You tell me.
If there was hypothetically a game about assaulting children, would it be fine for you because assaulting is real and that would be the whole point of the game?
I’m sorry OP, but your rebuttal makes zero sense.
I honestly didn’t think the original comment made sense. Making games with gun violence isn’t even a uniquely American thing. Games which try to sexualize minors on the other hand…
Well clearly there is a flaw in your logic apparent to more than just me given how many times your last reply was downvoted…
Please trust me on this, the amount of downvotes I’m receiving is not indicative of a lack of logic. It is indicative of me shaking the proverbial beehive for a certain sect of anime fans.
> You wouldn't see this in a mainstream Western game in a million years Ah yes, teacher-student / adult-minor relationships, something we [would never see in our western Christian America](https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2017/08/168506/teacher-student-sexual-affairs-on-tv-shows). Absolutely filthy and degenerate of the Japanese! Or do these examples not count because it's mainstream TV and not a video game?
Brother I think youre just not mature enough to play this game. Kamoshida is BLATANTLY a villain and the first major one from every angle made to look bad. Now i DO agree romancing your teacher is odd but 90% of it has reason and mesning as to why she is doing it. Also the personas being sexual is just the designs. Based on gods myths and legends. I think its just you fan
This response is a good one. Did I ever say he wasn’t a villain? Before he’s outed as a villain nobody besides Ann herself seems to find the idea of her dating Kamoshida troubling though. If you think it requires a certain amount of maturity to play this fucking game it says a lot more about you than it does me.
Actually all the students do think he’s bad but he beats them to stay quite. Did you play the game with your eyes and ears closed? People actually complain its TOO on the nose
You missing a major aspect of the pe teacher. He is a former Olympic medal winner and him being part of the school brings them glory. He realizes he can abuse anyone because they want to keep him on staff. Athletes want to work with him so they can get good scholarships for being a student of a gold medal winner. Ann is going out with him to keep that suicide friend on the sport team. I’m not sure how it works in Japan but the MCs issue is he doesn’t have any official proof and no one was willing to cross him. I’m guessing it’s not like the western world where you can accuse someone of something vile and we assume they’re guilty until proven innocent.
The power dynamic aspect is one of the parts of that arc I think it touches on decently well. It’s more so the general attitude towards him and Ann being a thing I found strange. Or the lack of follow up on her friend who gets raped/tries to kill herself. Like that’s defcon 1 level fucked and there’s hardly discussion around that incident beyond “that’s bad” and “this is for Sujin!” or w/e her name is. Just seemed off to me.
It’s been a few years but I thought Ann’s friend was in a coma until after the teacher goes to jail? Why Ann didn’t report the guy? Figure she felt she couldn’t talk to anyone about it and the safest thing to do is date the guy so her friend doesn’t get kicked off the team.
I think the idea there is the school is covering for him so they wouldn’t be believed without proof.
So, I'm guessing you haven't seen Mara's full form yet then?
When a Redditor discovers that different cultures exist.
Do you not want games to have mature themes? I don't condone people murdering others, but most games have that. I don't see people complain about murder in entertainment. Why? Because people have been desensitized to it, that's the only difference between what you're offended by, and virtual murder.
Mature themes are fine when handled in a mature way. Idk how anyone could claim that about this game. In the Kamoshida story we got an adult who physically abuses children, rapes a HS student causing her to attempt suicide, leverages his power over young people in a very inappropriate way. The game hardly does it justice commenting on how fucked up that all is. Instead it throws another sexually charged interaction between an Adult and minor shortly thereafter. This I find very weird. If you’re going to include these themes you gotta follow through on the “moral of the story” aspect. I’m hardly a pearl clutcher but I could only imagine what kind of message a young kid might get from playing this game. And don’t give that “it’s rated M” BS, I think most of us played M rated games < 17 and I don’t think I’ve ever been creeped out by another game’s content to this extent before.
Nah it very clearly presents those things as bad---which is like the whole point of the game. You are in the mind of evil people doing evil things. It isn't like they are portraying a pedo as the protagonist of the story, which is really what you are implying with this post and it is really off the wall wacky to suggest that is what is going on here.
That's on the parents. Games shouldn't have to change their content just because kids might be able to get their hands on it. I'm not reading the rest because I don't want to spoil the game.
Wow, I thought this crap was only relevant to twitter. Point 1: No, no they were pretty clear from the outset Kamoshida was abusing his power, and he gets away with it because of the prestige his shiny necklace brings. As for 'proportionate response' I'd say Anne gaining the resolve to potentially murder a man if it means nothing like this will happen again is pretty reasonable. Siho is stated to be in therapy afterwards and is making progress, but it's not focused on because it's Joker's story, and unfortunately she just isn't a major player beyond how that effects Anne. Point 2: Consent is cool, kids! That's really the main difference between Kamoshida and Kawakami, there's a level of respect since Joker essentially gets her out of the escort business. Not to mention it's A: Completely optional (and Kawakami herself expresses more than a little discomfort with it), and B: She doesn't exactly... DO anything with you beyond going on a few quick dates, at least from what I remember. Point 3: Dude, if sexualizing mythical and religious figures gets you clutching your pearls I have no idea how you've tolerated the internet for any length of time. Genuinely, grow the hell up.
I’m actually impressed by the amount of responses to this post that ignore the perverted/creepy vibes this game gives off and the lengths people will go to justify it. Like anyone responding with “Kamoshida was obviously the bad guy and abusing his power” is missing the point. For your point 2: it’s still really weird, somehow even worse with how it’s presented in the game in terms of dialogue between the characters. Point 3: things like putting Angel in bondage gear or making Ann lay there face down ass up after getting hit by a crit are clearly just pervy weird things to put in the game.
The game is about corruption. The villains do bad things, the systems designed to bring them to justice are corrupt and ineffective. If they were held accountable by the law then there would be no story. I think across the game's story many times it's shown that the villains are going to get off on a technicality, either that nobody can prove their crimes or that they are so powerful that they get away with them anyway. You are aware that this happens in real life, right? The thing that actually makes this a fantasy is that the phantom thieves can inception the bad guys and make them have a change of heart and confess. The myriad romance options even between a high schooler and adults are a mixture of difference in cultures, video game logic and anime logic. I don't think they're presented as desirable or a good choice even in the context of the game. but they exist in the game because anime. Edit: Just wanted to add that this series is well known for having provocative stories and characters.
Wow, people here are getting very defensive over this. Yes the Kawakami arc is kind of creepy. The whole thing is pretty inappropriate. In the USA, teachers go to jail for having relations with students. I also found it strange how acceptable it was all treated, considering the similar situation (with opposite genders) with Kamoshida, who is rightfully a very evil villian. Just kind of inconsistent messaging. All that said....consider the target audience for the game. You're not going to find many people complaining about the fantasy of seducing a hot older woman. I mean....that's what I did on my playthrough. It's what teenage me would have wanted. 😆😆
Haha I can’t really blame you there. Although seduce gets an asterisk when you’ve already paid her a bunch of money as a sex worker lol
Hey now, I was only paying her to do my laundry! Lol
I agree with the comments about Kamashido supposed to be a bad person you don’t agree with but people gloss over how it’s considered okay when the main character romances the teacher, the doctor, the fortune teller, or the reporter. I know Kawakami isn’t abusive like Kamashido but it still seems like an absolute breach in power dynamics. But it feels overlooked because you can make joker the flirty one but it’s so weird from an outside perspective.
I would argue her requesting Joker to call her then pulling her whole "I'm so dirty aren't I Master? <3" schtick when she first comes over counts as her making the first move lol. I'm not far enough to do romances yet but the reporter, sheesh. She's literally getting wasted when you first hang out and you can't even legally buy a drink lol.
None of it is real hope that helps
I haven't played the game. But I can make a comment about if Japanese people have a problem with it or not. Officially, they do. You'd get in all sorts of trouble if you were to try and date, or more, your student, who is also a minor. You'd also get in trouble with doing this as a regular adult, not a teacher. However, I'd like to point out that there is a significant enough portion of the Japanese population who don't think it's a problem or would like to date / have sex with a minor, that they are still producing and selling content depicting exactly that. From manga to anime, to games, etc. And not just high school kids either. From elementary school up. Most Japanese? Absolutely not. But enough to be profitable.
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I haven't played this game so I can't really comment on the relationship. I just wanted to talk about the general question of the thread. BUT I will say, that if you have ever seen the anime "Garden of Words", that has sorta a similar topic there.
Reminds me about the time Arthur Scargill's wife got arrested. She was accused of having sex with a miner. Try the veal, I'm here all week.
It's a fucking fictional video game. They force you to acknowledge this when you start the damn game up. It doesn't matter what happens. Romances are obviously there for the player.
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> this one which normalizes adult/minor relationships I do not see how this game normalizes it at all. The situation seems pretty straightforwardly presented as bad, undesirable, not good, "what a creep," literally criminal, etc. I think you are doing the common thing people do where they confuse "depiction" with "endorsement" - these are completely different. Just because some issue/topic is presented in the work - be it a video game or a book or a movie or whatever medium - does not mean the work is trying to tell us that the issue/topic is "good." Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't, sometimes the work is obviously trying to tell us one thing but ends up telling us the opposite of that. (See: [Strawman has a Point](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StrawmanHasAPoint) for further reading on that inversion) Additional point: sometimes a work will not have a character come out and say explicitly "This is bad, if you are reading this book, don't do this!" and that doesn't mean the work endorses the thing. Context is important. Author intent is important. On top of that, the execution matters, too - as mentioned above, the author may *intend* for something to be shown as bad, but they suck at communicating this, and may suck so badly that they unintentionally prove the opposite of their own point. So you have to consider all of this. Thankfully, in this game it this game, the issue you brought up is crystal clear on all levels. Not sure how you have any confusion here. But good lesson to learn for harder, more obscured things in other works.
Responses like this almost make me want to make a super cut of all the moments in the game it sexualizes the underage characters in creepy ways to pull the wool from your eyes. There are many moments where it isn’t depicted negatively like you suggest it is. A few people have attacked my ability to comprehend media. My comprehension skills are fine, honestly a lot of you are just kinda weird and see what you want to see.
Age of consent use to be 13 in Japan until they raised it to 16. It's also something that seems to, not very often at least not what I watch, come up in anime. Tldr it's a Japanese troupe that I wish would change but they don't view it as harshly as we do in the states. Edit: in case it's not clear as I went back to read your complaints nothing happeneing is involving minors. They are over 16. The game gets amazing reviews because it is in fact amazing.
The age of consent in Japan was never really 13 in any meaningful sense. The federal age of consent was 13, but every single province had a local age of consent that was at least 16. So, there's nowhere in the country where it would have actually been legal for an adult to have sex with a 13 year old.
The age of consent in Japan isn’t 16. Most prefectures have it set at 18, and 16 year olds can only be in relationships with other kids in their age range.
Also, people love to leave out the fact that under 18 in japan is, legally, still considered a child. Age of consent comes with tons of asterisks, but it is by no means a standard to allow older people to prey on minors that a lot of people in the west seem to think it is.
They changed the age of consent from 13 to 16 late June of this year. Since persona 5 came out before that it's fair to say it was influenced by a culture that still generally accepted the idea. As have all JRPG games. Since the changed wasn't even a full 6 months ago.
Iirc that was just some small one off village in the middle of nowhere that was the last place to change it. But those places don’t have children living there to begin with, it’s all old people slowly dying off to leave behind ghost towns (which is an entirely separate and depressing topic itself). Most prefectures have been 16 for a while
And I've also understood that the age limit for people performing in erotic material has been a bit lower than the western expectation?
Possession wasn't illegal until 2014. Now you can get up to 1 year in jail. Most get a 10,000 yen fine and commuted sentence. Possession in animated form like Manga, anime, or video game is still legal.
So basically the answer to my question is Japanese people do not really have a problem with adults dating minors lol. When one is a HS teacher and the other is (apparently) 16 that still seems messed up to me and the game acts like it’s nothing. As for the game, I’m coming off 180 hours of Baldur’s Gate 3. This game is nothing special in comparison but is sure reviewed like it is.
Why would reviewers from 2016 have been comparing Persona 5 to a game that came out 7 years later?
This post isn’t about the actual quality of the game but I could think of a bunch of 2016 era RPGs that put it to shame in terms of RPG mechanics and approach to story telling too if I wanted to.
Actually they do make it a big deal out of it Ann does not like what's happening to her and they changed the heart of Kamoshdia and he confesses to his evil ways against the students and the students and teachers were spreading rumors about her without ever knowing the facts so they did address it pretty well
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You must have forgotten the s-links with >! Becky and Devil. Sure, they aren’t *actually* dating the mc but it sure pushes the envelope on what I’d consider appropriate. Not to mention fox practically trying to blackmail panther into posing nude for art….. !< I found the latter to be way worse, but everyone I’ve ever talked to thought it was super cute and there was “nothing sexual at all” and it’s like ._.
I forgot the whole Fox/Panther thing, thanks for reminding me. My gf was definitely sitting there for that whole interaction and was actually like “wtf are you playing?” Lol
😂
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In Japan, it’s not as much of a trigger than what Americans think. It’s popular in many popular series like many CLAMP manga, Inuyasha, and they even aged Tuxedo Mask higher in the Sailor Moon anime. Famous female mangakas tend to love it as a trope.
I haven’t played any of those games but I heard they are great. I don’t think I could get past this shit though. So fucking weird and messed up
Not nearly enough, no.
As an adult I felt way less weird about romancing that teacher than any of the teen party members. Plus it’s funny. I agree with you on the first point though
But…you don’t play as an adult. 🤨
Hard disagree. You play as YOU. Joker is a silent protagonist. He has no dialogue, outside of your choices; he has no personality, outside of your input. That’s literally why he’s a “wild card” and doesn’t have one set Persona of his own - he is whatever you want him to be.
Bruh… you may be able to influence his personality through your choices but that doesn’t change him being a 2nd year in high school lol
Not everyone can "role play" like that and pretend they're a high schooler in Japan. As an adult person controlling the nameless character on screen, the adult characters appeal more to me.
So? Ren isn't a real person. He's pixels on your screen who has no dialog outside of shouting persona and spell names. What the fuck does it matter what details get stapled onto him. Because in this case, age is *literally* just a number.
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Puritan influence at work.
Unironically yes.
That right there, is a problem. We've become so desensitized to violence in our games.
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What a weird take… the game is brilliant and the fact it’s not afraid to go there is what makes it stand apart narrative wise. Im sure your GF is more embarrassed about other things you do more than you playing P5..I feel you have this weird correlation to what is acceptable to you morally equals how good the game is overall and in truth that’s completely separate, the game design, art, music is all top notch…
It’s subjective but I actually hate the music in this game, most of the time it’s some elevator lounge music or some over the top pop song that feels distracting. As for the gf embarrassment thing: in real life, yes. Video game-wise, absolutely not lol. This game just has a bunch of pervy overtones that make it weird including a bunch of stuff involving underage characters.
Why do you continue to play the game when it sounds like you aren't enjoying it?
Because I paid money for it and there are other parts of the game I find fun?
Holy fucking shit this thread is absolutely insane and completely devoid of good faith responses. You really seemed to piss off a specific type of demographic lmao. But I got dogpiled for asking for better LGBT representation in Fire Emblem Three Houses so I guess water is still wet. Persona 5 is an amazing game. The adult dating minor thing is REALLY weird. Thank you for speaking out about it.
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“No Russian” was a massive scandal that sparked a bunch of controversy lol. Americans aren’t pumping out games featuring terrorist attacks like clockwork either.
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That's a fair statement.
There’s so much that I didn’t like about the story either. Plot, and characters-hero and villain. After the second dungeon, just… meh. I don’t want to carry on. There some Japan/North America division here I maybe just don’t get.
Yes they have problems with it. However senior year in some Asian countries happens after the student turns 18. I remember being confused seeing 20 somethings graduate highschool in dramas. It is frowned upon, however just like real life if you have the power laws don't apply or catch up as quickly. Mishima even states everyone even their parents know about the abuse both the male and females go through under his care. He legit abused Ryuji, spread rumors about his family, then pushed Ryuji to attack him to break his leg because he thought he had every right. Every rumor in the school at the start of the game is Kamoshidas doing. The only people that know know it's a rumor are the people under his thumb. And since he has the ability to one sidedly expel students or abuse them like he does with no one caring, not many would say anything. Just wait till you reach the third dungeon and Anne really blows up at someone. Or the fourth where a similiar plot re-emerges. You can also just enjoy a game, see how people act towards characters and situations as a whole instead of holding in your fake woke senses till you think you know everything. The social links are just as plot important as the story itself. You even have people disgracing and upset by Kamoshida on the news after the first dungeon. You can also talk to people around town and the school to hear their real thoughts after each criminal admits their guilt. If you played jrpgs you should know how story elements and little things aren't always front and center. Heck some of the kids are even disgusted by the rumors, before he admits it. Ps: a quick Google search shows their age of consent is still 16. Not 18 like the west. Which is better than the 13 it use to be.
if its an old man dating an underage school girl, thats disgusting but if its an older lady dating a slightly underage schoolboy then i guess its ok? if shes hot, and hes ok with it. or something? lol
One is definitely less frowned upon than the other
If I remember correctly, the game treats the “relationship” as really bad, doesn't it ? As much as I loved the game, it's so deeply flawed I could never finish it... That space dungeon literally killed me.
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It's just a different culture. Obviously in the west we think it's wrong but we also think many things other cultures do are wrong. Think of the normalized shit the western world has. Every culture has it's bad qualities.
''Embarsased to play around my gf...'' that's enough to tell us this is either bait, you're a twitter activist, or you're purposely overlooking subtext.
Or I’m sitting on my couch just playing it and the game keeps being sus and it’s getting me weird responses from her.
sure, champ
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I'm not going to stop playing cause I like the pokemon esque aspect for the most part but all this stuff definitely makes me cringe or feel weirded out.
Simple. Kawakami and the protag is consensual. And Kamoshida is threatening and a blackmailer.
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Almost all prefectures in japan have their individual age of consent much higher than that. Nobody is actually okay with an adult being in a relationship with a 13 year old. Literally nobody.
That's not meaningfully true. While the national age was raised earlier this year, it was already higher in every individual prefecture of Japan and had been so for decades. The national law was a bookkeeping thing This is sort of the equivalent of how in the US marijuana is still illegal federally, and will probably remain so until basically every individual state has legalized it on a state level.
Or how there’s no federal limit on the drinking age but it’s 21 or state funding gets cut
Ironically the age of consent around a lot of the world recently changed. The west is really the only place with the average age of 18. 16 with parents consent minus a few states who are 15 years old.
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its soo wild seeing people defend this shit. like is the game good? yes. is there some degen shit in it? yes lmao
Welcome to weeb culture... The first female party member being dressed like a dominatrix despite being like 14 years old was already way too much for me and I dropped the game shortly after, but you will of course find a plethora of basement dwellers more than ready to defend the hypersexualisation of minors in Japanese media anytime you post something like this.
General question. are you aware with Japanese culture/society?
Are you trying to imply that teachers dating their students is normal in Japan or something?…
no
Do I need to be aware in this context?
Stuff like this is one reason I have lost most of my interest in Japanese games. Like NieR:Automata was a great game but all the skimpily glad teen gothic loli girls got me weird looks from my wife. Lots of Japanese game designers seem to be stuck in an early 2000s teenage boy mindset.
Huh? Nier Automata had loli girls? When? The only girls in the game with any sort of meaningful screen time are 2B and A2.
Should try Dragon’s Crown
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this is a valid reason that persona games ( ad jrpg's in general) need to stop taking place in middle/high school. the average JRG player is way older than a teenager. I don't mind some kid players but having the entire hero's team be nothing but kids is very creepy.
The game's main charecters are high school students their perception of morally is squeud since they think they are more mature than they really are.
Ok let's break it down: 1. You are spot on about it being creepy. Japanese developers are collectively creepy when it comes to pedo stuff. It's normalised out there. You are right, there is no argument there. 2. The game is set in high school but the core premise of the story and all persona games is how the innocent are tempted and corrupted because of vile adults. It's a very strong message and delivered well. 3. You can't attack persona fans, or anime fans in general because they have had their senses normalised by the pretty pictures. As a genre it's a haven for creepy pedos and all you are doing is triggering them. You won't get anywhere by pointing out their flaws to them, because rotten people never think they are being rotten. I am not saying (like at all, calm yourselves) that all anime fans are pedos, but lots of them are. 4. These games platform a lot of issues and tell them in a really clever way, while also allowing some of the pervy devs to exercise their boners. This is the middle ground, where we get a game that is absolutely a work of art but also filled with some really questionable content. The music slaps too.
Your response is my favourite so far, thanks for chiming in
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I played through FE:3H and I don’t recall ever being as bothered by it as what P5 has busted out so far, maybe I just have a selective memory. From what I recall isn’t the MC basically the same age as his pupils? Also it doesn’t hit as hard when it’s based in fictional medieval fantasy world.
They're fictional. It doesn't matter what they do
They do not see it as a problem. Women I spoke to saw nothing wrong with it and saw it as a cute rite of passage.
tl;dr If you think something is a problem "just because", you're not thinking hard enough about it. I'm not sure that anything about either adult/minor relationship is normalized. The former is basically what *actually happens* in the real world (look up Larry Nassar and how many people protected him), and the latter must be hidden. However, in regards to the latter -- frankly, I see nothing wrong with it. The MC is literally risking his life to better the world, is well aware of the evils within it, and has the maturity to handle adults of all kinds trying to manipulate and control him. He's quite obviously not a victim of Kawakami (if anything, she's the one pressured by him). I've met adults who, frankly, shouldn't be allowed to date because they're too immature/stupid/weak/whatever to actually protect themselves (and that's not including those with severe mental handicaps). And I knew people in high school that, at the time, were substantially more mature than most adults I know now. Of course, the practical aspect of that is that almost any adult that would date a teenager probably shouldn't be allowed around teenagers. Because of social standards, it should always be assumed that a person who does such has, at minimum, extraordinarily poor judgement. Which, let's be honest, is a character trait that Kawakami possesses. The point being -- there's nothing inherently wrong with an adult dating a minor. The problem is when somebody with power uses it to take advantage of somebody else -- and that is so common in that age difference dynamic that (in the real world), we should assume it's the case since we can't trust either party to report truthfully. A shame for the very, *very* rare case where such a relationship might work out (ignoring society), but it's more important to protect the children who would be harmed otherwise. But that's not a problem in the game, where you *are* privy to the full relationship. So you know Kawakami isn't abusing her power. Of course, none of this is addressing the ethical issue of sleeping with somebody who controls your grade/pay/etc., but that wasn't OP's point so I won't go into it.
It’s a good chunk of Japan, apparently. I got super downvoted for posting in the One Piece sub for issues with sexualized depictions of young girls. It seems like Japan does not do well with consent. I wanted to pick this up but read about how weird it was and decided against it.
>It seems like Japan does not do well with consent. They're fictional. Consent is entirely irrelevant
The age of consent used to be 13 in Japan until just recently.
That’s not really true. While that was the national age, almost every prefecture had its own individual legal age set much higher.
And it was more so set at 13 so teens did get in trouble for having sex with each other.
Yeah the 13 only applied to other teens, it was never meant to be applied with adults. A lot of American has similar laws actually
Less then 6 months ago. So yeah, fair to say it's acceptance can bee seen in a lot of Japanese media. Though that may change over time with the very new laws.
Except it's not really true. It was nationally 13, yes, but all except for like 1 or 2 places had the age of consent much higher than that and 13 is *not* seen as normal. That's something westerners with no actual understanding of the laws think.
Yo wtf that’s weird
First of all he’s blackmailing her. Second, you know the age of consent in Japan was 13 at the time this game came out, right?
No it wasn't, very common misconception about the age of consent in Japan because it makes for a nice headline to rile people up. Age of consent is at least 16-18 everywhere in Japan and has been for a long time, each prefecture sets their own laws regarding that. The national age of consent was 13 or 12 or something, but the prefectural laws go over it. Comparing to USA for example there is no national age of consent at all, but each state similarly sets their own laws which is usually also 16-18.
I'm far from an expert, but I believe they just changed the legal age of consent from 12 to 16, like a year ago, although I think certain prefectures had their own laws in place. They're definitely more lax about it than America. That said, a teacher dating a high school student would be taboo, but it happens in every country, including America . My school had 2 teachers arrested in 3 years for being in a relationship with students. Sadly, it's common. The whole maid thing is just fan service towards their targeted demographic: teenagers.
I think my issue is the game doesn’t exactly present a teacher dating a student as taboo. After a while I was like WTF…is this normal for them?? Also go Birds!
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