Part 112: 9/23: Frank Castle’s Long-Lost Daughter

Part 108: 9/23: Frank Castle’s Long-Lost Daughter

Music: Tokyo Emergency



Let’s head into the Palace! Spoiler alert: This is by far the worst one in the entire game! Just like the rest of this arc, it’s interminably fucking long! Hooray!



Music: Sweatshop








*sigh* Might as well put him back in the squad, right?

All right, let’s go!

I didn’t forget the shit you pulled, cat. Just know that.




All of the other Palaces have seemed out of this world, but this one’s really in space…



Well, time to go back down the elevator.



Hm?



Your Persona is too weak to fight safely at the moment. Just leave that side of things to us for now.
O-Oh, OK…

A slightly different version of this same conversation can be had by talking to Haru directly before going over to the elevator, but it’s near-identical. In fact, I suspect it’s exactly the same in the original script and might have just been translated slightly differently in both cases.





This time, there are actual Shadows populating the Palace, so we have to be more careful.



This is Arahabaki. It’s weak to both Psy and Nuke but, infuriatingly, repels Physical and Gun. I think it also uses Despair and Makarakarn to repel magic attacks, but we have Makoto so we don’t see a lot of its turns.



Not much here but Okumura’s portrait, which I just love for some reason.



Eventually, we come across a different enemy variant, but there’s not much different about this one except its shape. No, the interesting thing happens when we successfully ambush it...

Music: Last Surprise



These eyeliner starfish are Decarabia.




They’re about to eat hot lead.



BANGBANGBANG



BANGBANGBANGBANGBANG



BANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANG



We dealt more than 12 damage total, we were just only dealing 12 damage every hit. Still, Bullet Hail is just kinda weak. That, or our guns suck. It’s probably a bit of both. e: Apparently, it's just a flat percentage, which is really lame and not at all how I thought that worked! I actually meant to go buy new guns and upgrade them before this Palace visit, but I… uh… forgot, and I really didn’t want to rerecord, especially after nabbing a few Personas. Because I’m an idiot, I ended up rerecording anyway, but that’s neither here nor there.

Also, I didn’t want to waste the money.

Anyway, here that animation is in handy .gif form:





Now, these devious Decarabia repel Fire and do not appear, at first glance, to be weak to anything our current party can throw at it. That is, until they give themselves away by using Tetrakarn to repel the next Physical attack made against them. So, we decide to test that.

Also, don’t worry, this enemy can’t use Despair, just Megidola, Tetrakarn, and Agidyne (Heavy tier Fire). Morgana only got hit with it because Tetrakarn bounced his own attack back towards him.



Sure enough, this poor enemy is weak against Physical. We probably won't get much use out of it for that reason.



Also here’s some Slime palette swaps Black Ooze, which from this wiki I found appear to use Stagnant Air and Famine’s Scream to inflict Hunger (an enemy use-only status effect that turns party damage way down), as well as summon more of itself. I didn’t see any of these moves, because it’s weak to a lot of shit—Electricity, Psy, and Bless, even if it resists Physical and Gun.

Music: Sweatshop



We eventually return to the room from earlier.



Looks like a hamburger bun to me. I mean, we’re dealing with Big Bang Burger here.
I’m sure it’ll become clearer as we proceed. Come on, let’s go.



Whatever, let’s head to the door.



Leave it to me.






Was that an act Mona put you up to? Y’know… the beauty thingy?




(pause)

Uh… Is that a joke?
You moron!

I know it’s probably not actually intentional because this game is kind of scatterbrained in certain aspects of its writing but I like that Ann is the one who calls Ryuji out here, considering her explanation of her own inspiration to become a Phantom Thief in her Confidant being Just Fujiko Mine.

Ever since I was young, people around me have never seen me for who I really am. They would be kind to me just to please my father, and would get money and presents in exchange. Adults, teachers, even friends… It seemed like everyone smiled at me for their own personal gain.
That’s why you kept the details of your family a secret at school…




I wanted to be just like that! Even though I knew it was a fantasy… I still looked up to them.
Everyone goes wild over heroes at some point. It’s fine havin’ someone like that on our side, right, Joker?





Music: Blood of Villain




Same, what the shit!? Motherfucking Mysterio just showed up!

This is insane on so many levels…!

YEP




Ah, dammit, this asshat?

Him…!? Did he come into the Palace too!?



Remember what I explained to you earlier?
You mean about the cognition thing…?



OH MY GOD, THIS DUDE OWNS

It should also go without saying that they now have Christopher Corey Smith under an absurd spaceman voice filter, and it’s great.




Are those… the rumored Phantom Thieves? ...I see! *chuckle*



“Overcome failure at any cost, even if it means betraying others”… You truly embody the Okumura motto!

That’s a real specific motto.



Why do you only ever think about gains and losses!? That’s why the company has a bad reputation… All because you treat people like they’re tools!

You’re living in the past, it’s a new generation, old man!




The cold reality of kicking people down is a part of business! Virtue and sentiment are for losers. *chuckle* Okumura Foods shall be the foundation of my victory!
His company is just a stepping stone…



Unless you make some compromises, I can’t introduce her to my father.
She needn’t be your lawful wife anymore… Take her as your lover, or whatever it is you desire.
Very well… I accept.
Lover…? I was raised under this company’s wealth… I even accepted a political marriage for you.



Father! You want me to be that man’s plaything just to satisfy your own ambitions?
Hmph, why fret? You should be overjoyed that you’re fulfilling your role as an Okumura daughter. This is the only value you’ve had from the very beginning.
So… even his own daughter’s life is a commodity to him.

Oh hey, Yusuke’s here, everyone. I kinda forgot he was here because he hasn’t said anything for the entire upda—holy shit, I already made this joke!



Haru’s Awakening (Definitely watch this)





Oh dear.

Music: Awakening




Ohhhhhhh dear.



Ah, gross!














Spotlight purely for dramatic effect.



Freedom for you must stem from betrayal. If you still yearn for it now… then you must not err. Now, tell me… Who shall you betray?









Music: Will Power



um.



UM.



HOLY SHIT



RIGHT!?












Heh. I know it’s corny, but I appreciate the line all the same.

Haru’s Fiance




Haru! Be a good girl! Come be my toy!

It’s getting kind of uncomfortable how every other Palace seems to involve the threat of sexual abuse in some fashion, but maybe that’s just me.



For the sake of changing my father’s heart, I cannot lose!
So this is Haru’s true power…!



All right, let’s do this! Time to pummel that scummy jerk!



So here’s Haru’s starting skillset, with the exception of one of her support skills, Fast Heal. Fast Heal lets her recover from ailments in half the time, which is theoretically kind of useful but in practice you’re still hopefully wiping that shit off ASAP. In dire situations, though, it lets her recover faster so she can use Amrita Drop, which cures every ailment for a single party member. Psy Break is a Break skill, and is thus garbage. Psio and Mapsio are Medium Psy, of course, but Triple Down is the interesting thing here, dealing Light Gun three times to all foes.

You may be wondering why we haven’t seen much in the way of Gun skills. At this point, we’ve even seen more of Bless and Curse attacks than Gun. Well, for some weird reason there are only four Gun skills in the entire game, and two of them are reserved for the absolute endgame. What that means is that not only does Haru fill a valuable niche with her Gun affinity, she’s probably going to be keeping Triple Down for the entire rest of the game. Because damn, is it a good skill.

Not that you’d know it from this fight, though. The smaller robots are weak to Wind, but resist damn near everything else, including Gun. They’ve also got an annoying habit we’ll go into later. Anyway, Haru’s affinities are Psy and Gun (though she doesn’t resist Gun like she does Psy), as well as weakness to Nuke, you know, the predictable shit. The rather paltry number of Gun skills in the game may lead some to the conclusion that it’s a waste of skill slots, and that they should focus on her Psy output. This is a fucking trap. Her Strength and Magic aren’t terribly far apart, but the skills she does get push the balance waaaaaaaay over towards Gun, to the point where I’ll probably end up disposing of most of her Psy skills.

Anyway, in terms of melee weaponry, Haru uses axes, and her gun is...




...a grenade launcher!? Where did she get a fucking grenade launcher!?

I haven’t really been going into the differences between the various characters’ gun selections, so I’ll start now. I can’t find any good documentation on any of this, so a lot of it’s just guesses! Uh-oh!

• Maaku’s pistol is all-around fine, decent ammo capacity and damage. 2 clips of 8 shots.
  
• Ryuji’s shotgun is high damage, but low-ammo. I assume the accuracy suffers as well. 2 clips of 4 shots.
  
• Ann’s SMG is low damage, high-ammo, with the caveat that she cannot choose her target, which is picked at random from the available enemies every time she fires. 3 clips of 12 shots.
  
• Morgana’s slingshot is a fucking slingshot. Medium damage, low ammo. 3 clips of 5 shots.
  
• Yusuke’s goddamn AR-15 is moderate damage, high-ammo. 2 clips of 12 shots (!!!).
  
• Makoto’s revolver is high-damage, low-ammo. 2 clips of 6 shots, duh.
  
• Haru’s motherfucking grenade launcher is actually just okay in the damage department, but hits every enemy on the field. 6 clips of 1 shot.
  

Characters cannot use more bullets than are in their clip in a single action, and they reload every action.



One thing these robots can use is Recarmdra, a nasty little skill.




Using it will fully restore the HP of the other enemies...



...while setting the user’s HP to 1. This is an enemy-only skill, naturally. The robots can also use Haru’s own Triple Down, which can turn into a massive problem. We want to take them out quick.




Thankfully, the party member the game automatically subbed out for Haru was Ryuji and not Morgana, so they go down quick due to their Wind weakness.



Haru’s cut-in is uncharacteristically cold, yikes.




Haru’s Psy skills, in addition to being trippy as fuck, hit FianceBot’s weakness rather well.







Oh my god it attacks by bowing this is so good and stupid



One more Psio and we get another AoA.




Adieu, shithead.



Milady is based on Milady de Winter, from the novel The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas. The character is a spy for Cardinal Richelieu and one of the primary antagonists of the story, serving mainly to oppose d’Artagnan. I had kind of assumed she was more of a heroic character based on the nothing I knew about her role in the story, but no. She’s a murderer who commits countless grievous crimes and then gets executed. Ouch.

I’ve already gone into Haru’s skillset in some detail, so I’ll spare you from too much more, but just know she’s one of the best damage-dealers in the game. As for Haru herself, she's voiced by Xanthe Huynh, which is unironically, without a hint of mockery, an amazing goddamn name. However... nope, I don't actually think I've ever heard her in anything. Well, that's not entirely true: she had bit parts in both SAO and One Punch Man, but I could not have told you that without checking and she's probably one of the least known names in the cast. Her voice, while by no means bad, took a little bit of growing on even me when I first heard it, but at this point I'd probably rate her pretty highly in terms of performance among a cast that's generally pretty solid all things considered.