Hey Axe, Waypoint published a piece on Western perceptions of Japan fairly recently! It’s by Emma Kidwell and highlights how homogeneity within Japanese society is an actual issue.
Japan is its own culture, true, but just like in Canada and the US there are various social movements, countercultures and ingrained prejudices. One could argue that it isn’t the place of Western critics to bring up these issues, but these issues are already being brought up by people in Japan.
Yeah that article certainly open my eyes to Japan’s situation and made me realize the uptick in queer characters in my anime as of late to some degree. There also a lot more dark skin characters and not just from within japan but around the world in Japanese games and show so in some aspect they are moving to be diverse.
Japan actually became the first country in the world to elect a transman to public office this year!
Did I say to let them off the hook? I believe I specifically said not to. I simply said that ignorance of the issue is conceivably not feigned in Japan, whereas anyone who uses that same excuse in the West should rightly be castigated for lying through their teeth. Gaming culture in America has progressed leaps and bounds toward inclusivity and representation and that’s a great thing, but that same wave has not reached the shores of Japan. I’m not being edgy or controversial when I say that Japan is not at the forefront of visible LBGT activism (consider: NYC’s Pride March had 8x the attendance of Tokyo Pride this year, even though Tokyo has 2x NYC’s population), even though Japan has arguably the longest history in the world with respect to tacit acceptance of same-sex relationships. (cc: @Larena) I never said there’s no queer movement in Japan. But it’s not as mainstream as it is in America and therefore doesn’t filter into as many aspects of society as it does in (liberal, coastal) America.
@Link Yes I read that when it came out and it kind of supports my point? Japan isn’t a model society; it has tons of social issues that don’t get covered in regular Western news or media. Everyone should read more Japan Times; I’ve been following their coverage of Abe’s attempts to twist Article 9 for his own nationalist purposes (yes, Japan has a nativist/populist movement!). It’s a complicated place, just like everywhere else. Nowhere did I say Japan is immune from criticism. In this particular case, it may be obvious to us as liberal-leaning Western thinkers that P5 has inclusivity problems. It is not obvious to Japanese devs and it is not reasonable to treat the content of P5 as a reactionary response to a conversation occurring in the West that they missed the first part of.
Just want to say this article was written by a friend of mine and ahhhhhhh I’m so excited to see her published on Waypoint.
P5 has a real attitude problem and it has been difficult to come to terms with. To me it feels performative in a lot of ways. It doesn’t go deep enough and doesn’t dedicate itself to its message in a way that feels really impactful. At the core of that issue is the way it treats other characters who are on the fringe and can be considered as outsiders. As pointed out in the piece, the portrayal of the gay characters in this game is absolutely dreadful. The way it treats Ann throughout is completely at odds with the legit good dialogue Sae has about how badly women are treated in their society. These kind of weird and out-of-sync things are too prevalent in the game and dilute the message.
All this sucks because there’s a ton I love about the game too. P5 has my favorite core cast in the series and the combat is best-in-genre good. The story goes interesting places and there were stretches I felt genuine terror and concern for the cast’s well-being. The Confidants/slinks are probably the best they’ve ever been. I also think that the game’s broader message is at its core a very good one. It stumbles with the smaller details enough that it dilutes the bigger message though. You can’t tell me how bad sexism is in society and then engage in it with the most basic “hehe her BOOBS” scenes imaginable.
Extra credit made a good point on how sexuality can work in a game but shows how Persona 5 does it the wrong
Right, I can’t expect devs in Japan to keep up with conversations folks half a world away are having online, but my pie in the sky hope is that they are keeping up with the conversations that are happening in their own country. If the treatment of LGBT characters and issues in Persona 5 is reactionary, it’s reacting to stuff that is already present in Japan.
I do also want to hold the localization team to some level of responsibility, though don’t know how much control the English localizers had over the portrayal of individual characters.
Quick note I’ve been typing this out for awhile and this post isn’t meant as a response to anyone else’s post and are just my thoughts on the game.
Persona 5 in retrospect feels like some kind of weird marketing for something that is actually as smart as it pretends to be and the further away from it I get the more I feel like I spent 120 hours playing that Pepsi commercial where all the worlds issues are solved by giving a cop a can of soda. The combat is still pretty good but it wasn’t much better then the other games, and while I can understand how someone else would enjoy the characters more then I did (and I did like a few) I found most of the Slinks rote and I’m increasingly finding the Persona style of just telling people what they want to hear so the social link goes up off putting.
There was a time these games were novel enough that I could look past the flaws but that was long ago and I need more then someone selling me the power fantasy of being a teenager again to put up with the games ultimately shallow attempts at being topical when games like Night In The Woods do it much better.
Atlus USA and the main branch are getting closer every year and with the fact that they loosen the video uploads of the game means they are listening to some degree. Again best we can do is get our voices heard since they can do it.
To @VulpesAbsurda Keep in mind the game was in development for over 5 or 6 years and so whatever design they had could be easily change and when they said in a interview they the main character was going to be male and heterosexual was mostly likely cause that what they had plan at the beginning. With planning under way for Persona 6 they have a chance to design the game with queer characters in mind we just need let them know now.
Persona 5 is my favourite game so far this year and it will likely be my GotY.
It is in-fucking-excusable how this game tackles sexuality, even if its an improvement over 4.
Indeed and why it good we’re talking about it here. It’ll be wrong to ignore it.
Yeah, just wanted to quickly say my two cents cause I don’t have time to go through the entire thread atm.
Will come back later after reading everyone’s thoughts with something that is beyond the bare minimum.
NitW is a great example of a game dealing with similar themes in a much more nuanced way. I’m glad we have what is essentially a AAA game in P5 attempting to tackle those same themes with a much larger scope though. It’s a blockbuster and with that designation comes certain concessions which is unfortunate! It isn’t nearly as focused. That said, they need to be better and hopefully P6 will be.
I guess where I differ is that I don’t value attempts that fail this drastically. I also don’t really think it being a blockbuster matters much. In theory I guess it does but in practice I wonder if a game this niche that mangles so many of it’s themes so much is actually a net positive.
And obviously others feel differently and that’s fine. But as a former fan I’m kinda done with this series.
yeah i’m with you on the last point. i remember having every single thought that’s been expressed in this thread over P4 and (though i haven’t played P5 myself yet) its incredibly disheartening to see them learn nothing from their mistakes. barring some sort of dramatic reboot i can’t picture myself getting invested in the series again
That’s fair. Three attempts is a lot and they still haven’t completely stuck the landing. Funny enough the one that really nailed it was a re-release of P3 on the PSP in the form of the female main character route they added. It removed the horrible transphobic content from the beach scene entirely and has some of the best new slinks in the franchise. It was also not headed up by Hashino unlike the core series which was all him.
Part of the reason I’m still hopeful for P6 is because a new team will be taking the reigns. Hashino is off doing his fantasy game and that potentially means an exciting change of direction for P6. I know it’s more likely they’ll make Another Persona rather than do anything drastic but I’ll still hold out hope that the new team can make large strides forward where the old team didn’t.
They did say they always step up from the previous persona game so there is a chance. Plus Hashino and his team may find something new with doing fantasy with social ideas so in a way it a whole new world to try for Atlus.
This article reminded me that Yosuke was at one point canonically bisexual so it inspired me to write about that. https://medium.com/@peacoatseason/persona-4s-closeted-bisexual-sidekick-70365baa234c
No, though i also think we should be careful that our criticism doesn’t come of as racist or xenophobic. You know?
I’m pretty sure they have no say beyond translating and marketing the game. I don’t think they are involved in the game’s development if that’s what you mean.
