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Super Smash Bros. is Nintendo’s premier fighting game franchise. The series released its fifth entry, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, in 2018. The brainchild of Masahiro Sakurai (the man behind Kirby and Kid Icarus: Uprising), it is beloved by many for its fun and easy-to-grasp gameplay, and more notably, its massive crossover status. The Smash series has always been about characters from all different franchises and companies duking it out. With a whopping 81 planned characters (plus seven clone characters, referred to as “Echo Fighters”), every player is bound to find at least one they like.
However, no series is without controversy, and people often find themselves lamenting the characters that DON’T get in, and sometimes even those that do.
I realize that there's a post talking a lot more in-depth about one of these characters, so if you'd like to read that as well here's a link.
A Brief History Lesson
Super Smash Bros. debuted for the Nintendo 64 in 1999, with this classic commercial depicting mascot versions of popular Nintendo characters duking it out to The Turtles’ “Happy Together”. The game was a smash (heh) hit, and featured twelve playable characters (Mario, Donkey Kong, Link, Samus, Yoshi, Kirby, Fox McCloud, Pikachu, Luigi, Ness, Captain Falcon, and Jigglypuff). It supported up to four players, and had a variety of items that could be used in battle. More characters were added throughout the sequels, including third party characters such as Sonic the Hedgehog and Mega Man. In the third game, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, a new item was added to the game: “Assist Trophies”, summonable NPCs that could assist the player who summoned them in battle. Each Assist Trophy did something different, and many characters who otherwise wouldn’t have a shot at being playable got to appear this way. One such character was Waluigi from the Super Mario Bros. series, who would run around the stage and stomp on opponents while hitting them with his tennis racket, making them briefly immobile.
When the fourth game for the Wii U and 3DS came around, several cuts and changes were made so the game could run on the comparatively weaker 3DS hardware. The game also featured no story mode. However, there were three big hope spots for fans. The first was Mii Fighters, which allowed players to create their own custom fighter (either a Brawler, Gunner, or Swordfighter), with a variety of costumes based on various characters. The second was the inclusion of DLC, which allowed new characters to join after release (for a price, of course). The third was the biggest of all: the Fighter Ballot. This was a chance for fans to vote on which character they’d like to see join Super Smash Bros. for 3DS and WiiU.
The Fighter Ballot
The Fighter Ballot was extremely popular, with thousands of people voting for their favorites. Aside from “meme” picks like Goku or Shrek, some of the most popular choices, at least according to message boards and polls from the time, included Ridley from Metroid, Waluigi and Princess Daisy from Super Mario Bros. (this despite Waluigi still being an Assist Trophy), Sora from Kingdom Hearts, the Inklings from Splatoon, Shantae, Wolf O'Donnell from Star Fox (a character who had been cut during the transition between games) Banjo-Kazooie, Geno from Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, and quite possibly the loudest fanbase, King K. Rool from Donkey Kong Country. The ballot came to a close in October 2015, revealing the winner to be…
…Bayonetta.
While Bayo certainly did have her fans and supporters, many people were…underwhelmed, to say the least. Bayonetta was allegedly the most popular character in Europe, and in the Top 5 in America, though some folks found this hard to believe. Things weren’t helped by the unpopular reveal of Corrin from Fire Emblem Fates as a DLC character before the ballot closed, with many people stating that there were too many Fire Emblem characters (at the time, the game had six different characters from the series). Eventually, the game was datamined, and it was revealed that Bayonetta’s data existed in the game just two weeks after the ballot opened up. Mii Fighter costumes of some of the more popular picks were released as consolation prizes, but it still stung. Sakurai stated that the ballot was meant to pick fighters for a future installment, and not for Smash 4, but this is a bit hard to believe given that the website outright said the character would be for Smash 4. However, there was still hope for these characters in the future.
Everyone is Here…?
The fifth game in the series, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, was quite possibly the most hyped-up game of the decade. It promised to be the ultimate (heh) dream match, with every single fighter from past games returning. It also introduced several highly requested newcomers, including Ridley (complete with a shoutout to his supporters), Daisy (I cried tears of joy at her reveal), the Inklings, Simon Belmont (and his descendant Richter) from Castlevania, Isabelle from Animal Crossing, and of course, King K. Rool, all of whom generated a lot of hype. This only expanded when the DLC was revealed, with several unexpected characters from a variety of different companies. However, one character was notably missing: Waluigi.
The Purple-Clad Plumber
For anyone who doesn't know, Waluigi is a character who originates in the game Mario Tennis. He was originally created solely so Wario could have a doubles partner, and quickly became a mainstay of the spin-offs. At first, he was seen as an unnecessary character who only existed as filler, but his role in Matthew Taranto's webcomic Brawl in the Family saw him gain popularity. The comic mostly focused on video game-based gags while occasionally having longer story arcs. Waluigi would show up to take over the comic every once in a while, with his catchphrase "TOO BAD. WALUIGI TIME." often appearing. People loved the comic's take on Waluigi as a zany, over-the-top, and somewhat tragic character. It wasn't long before this version of Waluigi became a meme, with the regular version following.
It’s a Cold and It’s a Broken Waluigi
Generally, Assist Trophies are considered to be a “deconfirmation” for a character. While nothing in the game outright states that a character can’t be playable if they also appear as an Assist Trophy, nothing denies it either. There is technically a chance, as the game does have certain conditions that disable assist trophies on certain stages (for example, the Moon from Majora’s Mask can’t appear on the stage Great Bay, as it appears as a background element). Stage elements can also be affected by which characters are playing in a match. For example, King Dedede won’t appear in the background of Dream Land if he’s also in the match, Toon Link will be replaced by Alfonzo (“Leave it to me!”) on the Spirit Train if another Link is playing, and Fox, Falco, and Wolf have specific dialogue changes referring to one another. However, this has never been confirmed, and Assist Trophies have always been unplayable. Which brings us to Waluigi.
In early June, Waluigi was confirmed to be an Assist Trophy, and therefore unplayable, for the third game in a row. As if to add insult to injury, the video also revealed that Assist Trophies can now be knocked out, and used Waluigi to demonstrate this. People were, to put it lightly, fucking pissed. Memes were made about the situation, songs were written, petitions were signed to get Waluigi included, Matthew Taranto of Brawl in the Family got in on it, years after the comic had ended, and a few (emphasis on a FEW) fans even started harassing Sakurai in an attempt to get the purple plumber in the roster. A small group of Waluigi cosplayers staged a protest at a Smash event, and while they had good intentions, they did make some staff and guests uneasy. Some theorized that the Assist Trophy thing was a red herring, and that Waluigi would be revealed as playable after all. People were literally analyzing the colors of some chairs in the background of a video. It was crazy. Things only got worse for poor Waluigi when the first DLC character was revealed…
…a Piranha Plant. Just a single Piranha plant.
Generic, nameless Piranha Plants have never been playable in any official Nintendo game before this, so its inclusion was a surprise. A few people thought it was a jab at Waluigi supporters (which, let’s be real, it obviously wasn’t). Once the shock wore off, however, the Plant was welcomed into the Smash family with open arms. The fact that it was free for a limited amount of time certainly helped. The next DLC character (and the first in the “Fighters Pass”, a series of five DLC challengers), Joker from Persona 5, was also beloved by the fanbase, with his trailer showing him literally hijacking the 2018 Game Awards. Then E3 2019 came, and fans were speculating on who the next fighter would be, with Erdrick from Dragon Quest, Banjo and Kazooie, and Steve from Minecraft being popular guesses. The latter two, in particular, sparked quite the rivalry.
Bears, Birds, and Blocks
While Banjo-Kazooie was originally considered a Nintendo property (it even had its own commercial from the same people who made the “Happy Together” Smash commercial), with Banjo’s debut (sans Kazooie) being in Diddy Kong Racing, they were developed by the company Rare, which was later bought out by Microsoft. Microsoft and Nintendo are historically rivals, so the bear and bird joining Smash was seen as an impossibility for many years. However, many had hope, given that Microsoft and Nintendo had been on much friendlier terms in recent years. But there were some strikes against them. For one thing, Banjo and Kazooie weren’t exactly…relevant. Their last game, Nuts and Bolts, was in 2008, and was seen by most fans as a disgrace to the franchise due to its change in gameplay and aesthetic. JonTron’s memetic version of “I Will Always Love You” comes as a reaction to this game, in fact. If a Microsoft character WAS added, it would likely be someone more popular. Say…a character from one of the highest-selling games of all time? That’s right, Minecraft.
For weeks, a rivalry brewed between Banjo-Kazooie fans and Steve fans, and a trend called “Steveposting” began to spread. Starting on 4chan, people would post pictures of a grotesque 3D model of Steve harassing other characters, often accompanied by a copypasta starting with “GOOD MOOOOOOOORNING /v/! Just wanted to remind you that we’re another day closer to Steve (yes, THE Steve from Minecraft) getting confirmed in Smash Ultimate! Make sure to save your tears for the upcoming Fighter Pass when Steve walks into the spotlight!” The most popular character for Steve to harass was Banjo. People would often argue that Steve had more relevance, and post images of Steve harassing, harming, or killing Banjo and Kazooie. One infamous video featured Banjo walking through a blocky landscape, remarking to Kazooie that they must have ended up in Minecraft instead of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. “Grotesque Steve” reveals himself, shows off Kazooie’s mangled corpse, and approaches Banjo with a sinister look on his face…the rest of the video is disgustingly NSFW, hence why I won’t be linking it or even describing it. If you know, you know. Overall, the rivalry was pretty bitter, and even genuine supporters for Steve grew tired of the “Steveposting”.
Finally, E3 2019 rolled around, and fans were excited for new content from Nintendo. One of the first reveals of the day was the second new DLC character for Smash…that being the heroes from Dragon Quest. Most people thought that Erdrick from Dragon Quest III would be the representative, and while he does appear, he’s not the only one (the heroes from XI, IV, and VIII also show up as alt costumes). Japanese fans were thrilled, American fans weren’t as enthusiastic, and it looked like there would be no more Smash news for the day. That is, until the just before the very end of the presentation. A trailer began, similarly to King K. Rool’s, only to then cut to the King hanging out with Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong. Suddenly, a golden piece bounces across the screen. Wait, is that…a Jiggy? No, it couldn’t be… DK and friends look out the window, to see a familiar silhouette, only for it to be revealed to be the Duck Hunt Dog in disguise. But then everything changes when the new character descends from above and knocks the Dog out of the way. That’s right folks, against all odds, Banjo and Kazooie are in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate!
As for Steve, he and his fellow Minecraft friends were eventually added in October 2020 (in his familiar blocky form, thankfully), which put the rivalry to rest for good. Finally, the Steveposting days were over. These new fighters were well-received, but the same can’t be said for the fifth DLC character.
Too Many Swordsmen, Are There?
Generally, if a new game is released after Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, a free update will add content from said game, usually in the form of “spirits”, power-ups you can equip to your fighter of choice to give them a stat boost of some sort. In-universe, they’re explained as characters who have lost their physical form due to events in the game’s story mode. For example, equipping the Hammer Bro spirit will enhance your jumps. One game did not receive free update spirits, however.
Fire Emblem: Three Houses is definitely one of the best games of 2019, in my opinion. With four distinct routes, a ton of morally grey characters, and an absolutely bitchin’ theme song, it’s definitely worth a try. While it’s not without its problems, the game is still pretty solid. The reason I bring this up is because Fire Emblem: Three Houses got nary a mention in Smash, despite being a new installment of one of Nintendo’s most heavily-advertised franchises. This led people to speculate that they were saving a Three Houses reveal for later. And as it turns out, they were!
Now, the fourth DLC character, Terry Bogard from Fatal Fury, was not met with the brightest reception from fans. At the very least, he came with a lot of amazing music (a whopping fifty songs from various SNK games). My personal favorite out of these is the theme song from Psycho Soldier. That sax solo though! While some people were obviously mad (or should I say…fatally furious?) about Terry’s inclusion in the game, most of the memes came from fellow SNK character Mai Shiranui’s exclusion from any form of cameo (to preserve the game’s ESRB rating). Anyway, people were really expecting something big for DLC fighter #5.
The fifth DLC character was revealed in January of 2020. Many predictions included Sora from Kingdom Hearts and Dante from Devil May Cry. The trailer dropped, only to reveal that the final character for the Fighters Pass was Byleth, the player character in Three Houses. The trailer had a jab at the common complaint that the roster has too many swordsmen…to which Byleth responds by becoming a swordswoman, as well as using other weapons from their home game. And yet still, people were once again, to put it lightly, fucking pissed. Read the comments on this to get an idea of it. After all, this now marked the eighth Fire Emblem character in the game.
Naturally, some people made memes about the situation. Others jokingly pointed out that one of Byleth’s alternate costumes gave them a red outfit and white hair, just like Dante (though the costume was meant to resemble Three Houses character Edelgard). Voice actress Allegra Clark, who voices a few characters in Three Houses, had this to say about the news. Even to this day, some people are still upset over Byleth’s inclusion.
The Heart of a Marionette
Geno is a character from the cult classic Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. The game is certainly an oddball in the Mario franchise, but it’s beloved to this day by many. Geno appears as a living marionette with a gun arm, and he’s been a popular request for Smash Bros for a while now. He appeared in the famous (and very fake) “Grinch leak”, which incidentally also featured Banjo and Kazooie. YouTube animator TerminalMontage is one of Geno’s most vocal supporters, and even Sakurai has stated that he’s a fan of the character. So, what’s stopping the little puppet from getting in? Licensing. Geno is technically partially owned by Square Enix, so getting him in the game has always been tricky. He appeared as a Mii Fighter costume in Smash 4, but fans had hope that he would appear for real in Ultimate.
Now, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate introduced some very interesting Mii Fighter costumes. Costumes usually come in two parts: headwear and outfits. Headwear can include hats, wigs, helmets, and even masks. That last one is the important one here. Certain Mii Fighter costumes came with a full-head mask of a character rather than just a hat. These costumes, which some fans refer to as “deluxe” costumes, also came with a song, making them feel like a sort of bonus DLC character. The most popular of these is Sans from Undertale, though Cuphead also has one, as do Vault Boy from Fallout and Bomberman (though the latter two don’t come with music tracks).
So, December 2020 rolls around, and with it come the Game Awards. The new Smash trailer shows several of our heroes facing off against the game’s main villain, Galeem…only for it to be sliced in half and killed. Suddenly, “One-Winged Angel” starts to play, and hoooooOOOOOLY SHIT SEPHIROTH FROM FINAL FANTASY VII IS IN. People were, to put it lightly, fucking STOKED!!!!!! There were a few whiny “too many swordsmen” people, but they were drowned out for the most part…
...then came the costume reveals.
Each new fighter generally comes with five new Mii Fighter costumes, whether they be outfits, headwear, or a set of both. Sometimes they’re related to the character, sometimes they aren’t. The first four were pretty basic, with outfits based on Aerith, Barrett, and Tifa, Cloud’s companions from Final Fantasy VII, as well as a hat themed after a Chocobo. The fifth costume, on the other hand, led to a lot of disappointment.
I think we can all guess who it was. Geno fans were upset, and definitely made themselves heard. To make matters worse, Geno’s headwear was just a hat, when a mask would have worked well. Him being a “deluxe” Mii costume could have been a nice compromise to get him in. The aforementioned TerminalMontage made a short video on the topic, showing his disappointment with the results. Quite a few people made fun of Geno’s supporters for ever thinking he’d be playable, while others celebrated the fact that Sora or Lloyd could still have a chance. And all of this came mere months after the revelation that the widely-rumored Geno plush was in fact a myth.
In Conclusion
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate still has three DLC slots left, and everyone is wondering just who the final three will be. Personally, while I’m sure I’ll be content with whoever we get, there’s sure to be some fighting no matter what, and the only way to settle it…is in Smash.

I've thought long and hard about that question ever since. How should I live my life...? ...And after this round concluded, I finally found my answer. I want to save characters as a ranker. Simon Keyes... He, too, was a victim. He lost his placement in a past cut, and with it, the ability to secure a top 10 position.

A spirit channeling in the rankdown is something truly special. Most every cut has a sense of finality to it, while also remaining as the sole piece written in regards to that character. It’s both the beginning and the end of the conversation, all in one. A use of Extraterritorial Rights can add to this conversation, but it merely pushes back the inevitable moment when a character must be stricken down, unable to progress any farther. The finality of a cut is an all-encompassing rule that forces us to be as thorough as we feel necessary for the character. There is no further conversation to be had, once the cut is up, it’s up.
Of course, the spirit channeling is the one exception to this. With this ability, we’re allowed to further the conversation, and build off of what’s been said, adding to the view of this character with our own perspective. Most importantly today, however, is the ability to follow-up an in-depth dive that’s already taken place. Unlike every piece I’ve written before, the important perspective I have to consider today isn’t my own, but that of the person that cut the character I’ll be discussing. u/CharlieDayJepsen is the man of the hour, and over the past few days I have meticulously combed over the entirety of his cut to find every problem taken up with Simon Keyes, no matter how small, and will be attempting to disprove every single one that I find issue with.
Because of the nature of this write-up as a response, it will probably read a little differently from the rest of my works in this rankdown. Today, I’m not going to be taking every aspect of the character into mind and going over exactly what I feel is important and core to their existence. No, that can be done by whoever does end up laying down this king for good. Rather, I plan to structure this cut around how strongly I feel about the points made in Simon’s cut, as even though I have plenty to disprove here today, not all of it is merely factual or can be easily explained. There’s some fundamental problems that the cut claims to exist, and this is where the majority of my time here will be spent. Most of these seem to revolve around the confrontation at the end of The Grand Turnabout, so I think that would be a prudent place to begin. Now then, let’s lead in with the musings of yet another fallen champion claimed by the past round.

A Mask Worn to Survive

Ha...! Don't you know anything? No matter the man, we all wear masks... Either on our faces or even our hearts.

-Godot, Legendary Prosecutor
The confrontation with Simon Keyes is easily one of the high points of the Ace Attorney series in my eyes. It’s the culmination of the entire game up to that point, and the introduction and exploration of its true main antagonist. More than those, though, it somehow manages to support these story elements with a character who is both incredibly interesting by their own merit alone, while managing to be one of the fiercest opponents in the entire series. This confrontation is what a good two sections of the cut is focused on, so let’s see exactly what problems were had with Simon there, and see if these hold true under scrutiny. Since there’s a lot to unpack, let’s begin with Simon as a character, rather than Simon as an opponent.

Nope, that’s too challenging. Instead, we get treated to Simon Keyes, cackling villain, stripped of all the nuance that we’ve just spent the last 2 hours uncovering in his past.

​

Why, then, could the team not think of anything more to do with his final confrontation than turn him into a case 1-tier villain in terms of subtlety?

​

No, he just lets his hair down and does a bunch of insane “evil guy” laughs to let you know that he’s really super evil and you’ve gotta beat him, guys!

Throughout the last stretch of Simon’s cut, this is the prevailing complaint that’s had with him, persisting through two whole sections. And, under a first glance, sure, I could definitely see this being a reasonable complaint. Simon’s backstory is certainly quite tragic, and his morality is definitely deep into the grey, so one would probably expect him to be a nuanced figure with complexities to his actions when he’s on screen, rather than a cackling super villain. Well, I’d argue that’s exactly what we get. Let’s break down exactly how Simon acts throughout this whole confrontation.
Simon begins quite confident, at least enough to remain within his scared wimp persona, trying to worm his way out of having to confront Edgeworth directly. However, Simon isn’t an idiot, and one of his strongest abilities as a debater is reading his opponents and their moods, as we’ll go over in the next section. Because of this, he realizes quite quickly that Edgeworth must have at least enough to pin this whole thing on Simon if he doesn’t fight back, so he decides to take a different approach, he takes on the persona of a villain. He becomes a cackling madman who’s so obviously evil it hurts, but despite this, he begins arguing like there’s no tomorrow, and almost clears himself of all suspicion. So, what’s exactly going on here, and how is it not just Simon revealing his true self?
Something important to consider here is how his personality progresses throughout the argument, whenever Edgeworth begins to gain ground over Simon, he loses that maniacal energy, and becomes much more cold and calculating. Sometimes, when taken especially off guard he even becomes emotionally vulnerable, like when he finds out about his and Knightley’s true genetic past. One needs to look no further than this genetic past to realize what’s happening here. When confronted, Dane Gustavia keeps his cool head and honorable persona, only becoming a cackling monster of a human being once you push through his arguments and unveil his true self. Simon is the exact opposite of his father, his villain act is just that, an act. It’s a style of argument he puts on to get in Edgeworth’s head and easily manipulate the conversation to his whims, and it works pretty perfectly.
Constantly, Simon is able to use his antagonism to push buttons or change the talking points, and it’s only when he reverts back to his true, vulnerable persona that Edgeworth begins pushing through to the truth. By the time you win over Gustavia, he’s overcome with rage over his loss, showing you that there really is nothing more to him. Simon, on the other hand, drops his persona completely, becoming a scared kid again, and a complete coward afraid of his own animals. After this, he remains weak and broken, unable to function without a mask to put over his heart, and that’s exactly what both his personas are, just masks, or rather shields that he uses to protect himself. In order to survive for as long as he had, he had to lock away how truly weak he is, and force himself to become what he viewed as true strength.

Simon:Gyahahahahahaha! Is that so? Are you sure he's not just trying to emulate his own father, the one he admires SO much!?
Kay:Absolutely not! That's not true at all!
Ray:Now, now, Kay. The person he's talking about now isn't Miles, but rather, Simon himself.

This exchange is very interesting when taking what we’ve discussed about Simon’s personality into account. Subconsciously, it almost feels like whenever he’s confronted, he simply retreats into the safety of the father that he’s grown to hate so much. Basically, what I’m trying to say is that he’s much more than just another one-dimensional villain we’re tasked with taking down. This truth of his personality also ties into another complaint presented within the original cut, of Simon’s integrity as a character being compromised by an offhand remark that he leaves Knightley with, shown here:

......If only you hadn't stopped me 18 years ago... ...it wouldn't have had... to come to this.

The cut complains that this is just a campy, over-the-top villain moment for Simon that doesn’t make sense for such a cold and calculating character. Which, just ignoring the irony of that claim, I’d say is completely untrue, and not at all what this scene shows us. There is no tactical reason for Simon to say this, and no one to gloat to either. The only reason he would say this is if he genuinely meant it, and I think that’s exactly what’s going on here: proof that Simon is more human than he likes to pretend. I think this is him showing genuine regret over things having come this far, but I don’t think this devalues him as an evil character either, as he merely regrets Horace’s actions, and not his own in the moment. He still views this as the just thing to do, even though he expresses sadness that he has to. Taking this in mind, I really think that this is an absolutely great moment for him, showing many aspects of his character at once.
Before we move onto the confrontation itself, there’s a final complaint about Simon as a character here that I feel I need to address, having said my peace on his personality. And that’s that his persona of a cackling villain creates tonal dissonance, by making it feel that the game is just attempting to force Simon in a villain for the player to take down in order to instill a sense of fun where there shouldn’t be. Obviously, I don’t agree with this, nor do I think the game is making anything lighthearted where it shouldn’t be. I think Simon is always treated with the right amount of tragedy throughout this encounter, and especially once his true personality starts to show as his villain mask breaks.
In regards to the game seemingly trying to force us to have fun in taking down this tragic figure, I think it needs to be recognized that Simon is still a genuinely evil person. He treats others as animals to be used, and has harmed many people in his attempts for vengeance, including kidnapping someone close to us, and getting two innocents murdered. Simon is a menace who needs to be stopped, and by not making Edgeworth question whether it’s morally right to take him down, and by not making the scenes overly melancholic, it feels like the game recognizes that he is indeed too far gone to be recognized as anything other than a true criminal. A criminal with potentially justified motives, but one that went too far in his pursuit of them nonetheless, and this allows the game to have some fun with the confrontation and give us that sweet Ace Attorney satisfaction, without feeling tonally dissonant, as long as it doesn’t ruin Simon as a character in order to do this, which I feel I’ve made clear that I don’t believe it does. Now then, let’s talk about that confrontation itself.

An Argument of True Intellectuals

“The world is full of crazy people with different opinions than mine” -The Joker

By the way, I ran out of relevant, smart-looking quotes almost immediately, so enjoy some samplings from my good friend, The Joker, who’s well known as the biggest inspiration of Raymond Shields. For this confrontation, I’d like to do something wild and lead with my own opinion on it first, and then follow that up by looking over the problems Charlie presents on it, since I feel like that would make it easier to understand why I think they’re all fairly trivial points. So, what makes this confrontation feel special?
Simon. He’s the entire reason behind how amazing this argument is, as he’s one of the fiercest opponents in the entire series, and rivals Manfred von Karma himself as one of the most controlling and manipulative debaters that the series has ever known. Let’s look at exactly what I mean by this, because since I didn’t really see it brought up in the cut, this aspect of him might be easy to miss, since he’s much more subtle about his methods than the hilariously over-the-top von Karma. As I stated before, Simon is an expert at reading his opponents, I mean he’d kind of have to be in order to orchestrate the events of the case in the way he does, knowing exactly what buttons to push in order to get a murderous rise out of his targets. This ability manifests in numerous ways within this final confrontation.
First of all, there’s his subtle concealment of information, in a way possibly more skillful than any other culprit in the entire series. A perfect example of this would be the very first testimony of the segment, where Edgeworth is trying to latch onto something to tie Simon to the crime, and as soon as he notices the way Edgeworth reacts to his statement about the truck, even with how subtle Edgeworth is, he immediately changes the topic. Simon pretty much works on hunches, and it’s why he was able to get so far in his plan, because he was able to read people and act accordingly, and his argument style reflects this magnificently. He’s constantly changing the subject and acts dismissive or even insulting at times in order to just get a rise out of Edgeworth and co. And the best part? This strategy completely works.
He manages to effortlessly shut down pretty much any of your companions who butt into the conversation, with the exception of Raymond Shields, due to his extensive Joker cosplay practice. He even manages to get a rise out of Edgeworth, stating that he never even cared about Simon in the first place, and was just using him as a fantasy to live out the life of his deceased father. Another critical aspect to making this confrontation feel like a true battle of intellectuals is his ability to completely adapt to Edgeworth’s argument. Make no mistake, Simon is not infallible in an argument, he gets visibly shocked and flustered at multiple points, but he’s always able to quickly recover with a new argument, molded around anything Edgeworth has just proven. This makes for a constantly changing landscape for the confrontation that always feels like it’s heading in one direction, unlike Alba’s confrontation which jumps around at every 5 minutes, with him just asking you to prove some random thing.
The tool in Simon’s swiss army knife of skills in this confrontation is his knowledge of what will incriminate him of a crime, and what he can freely state without fear. Before the second testimony, he’s already admitted to the role of mastermind, and pretty much explained his entire plot to you, but carefully leaves out the parts that he knows both would incriminate him, and that you have no evidence to prove. As he states, he just sent some letters with some secrets is all, and that’s not a crime. It makes for an interesting confrontation, because despite being some orphaned circus clown who’s been completely surrounded, it really does feel like he hold complete power here, because of the way he shapes the conversation and knows how to dodge and weave the law. He even knows when Edgeworth tries to ask leading questions or makes assumptions that any normal culprit just wouldn’t notice or know how to shut down.
All of these skills of his make his takedown incredibly satisfying, and seeing him finally begin to not recover from your blows in those last 10-15ish minutes of the confrontation is immensely satisfying. But of course, he even has some curveballs thrown in at the last second like a fake breakdown and an accusal of John for the murder, because he’s kind of awesome. But anyway, enough about why the confrontation is good, let’s talk about why it isn’t bad. Charlie’s complaints can be boiled down to about three points so let’s tackle them one at a time.

Compared to Alba’s frankly overstuffed confrontation, complete with mid-testimony save point, Simon’s one-and-done segment feels almost anti-climactic.

One of his biggest points against this argument is how short the whole thing feels once the space between the first and second testimony, where we learn of his past from his perspective, is removed. First of all, this section still contains some gameplay, and plenty of good ol’ back and forth, so it’s not like everything completely comes to a halt in order to present his life story, but for the sake of argument, let’s say that it doesn’t count as part of the argument. So, what are we left with? Well, using my own timed replay of this case, along with some recordings of it on youtube, I’d say there’s still over an hour left of this case to experience, which feels about average length for a final confrontation in Ace Attorney to me, personally. And considering how tightly packed this confrontation is, what with Simon’s argument tactics, that’s an impressive feat.
The cut makes this section out to be much shorter than it really is, stating that there’s a combined total of 20 minutes filling the space between the last three testimonies, and while this is true, it’s kind of misleading. This fails to account for the time spent within the testimonies, along with the about 20 minutes of time after the fourth testimony, which has plenty of arguing within it, rather than an extended automatic takedown that you might expect. This all adds up to about an hour, and add in the first testimony and the follow-up sections regarding Simon’s role as a mastermind, and that’s around an hour and 40 minutes for the confrontation, I really don’t see how this could be described as “lacking” when it adds up to about the same amount of time as Alba, but is significantly more interesting.

The game just tells us he’s this manipulative bastard. There’s this little moment in the circus tent where he tries to guilt-trip Kay and she starts doubting herself. This lasts about 5 seconds before Edgeworth objects and calls him out for it. Whoops, there goes his manipulative skills.

I’ve already gone over why this is pretty much undeniably wrong, so I’ll be brief here. We see Simon consistently read the room and outplay his opponents in conversation. He’s able to get a rise out of just about anyone, including Edgeworth, and uses manipulation of the conversation flow to get people thinking about what’s most beneficial for him. I’m not exactly sure how you can miss any of this, so I’ll be moving on.

You know what would’ve been a much better final confrontation?...

This whole section where Charlie proceeds to outline a cooler way for the confrontation to go isn’t exactly what I’d call criticism, but it’s here so I might as well respond to it. This is supposed to be Edgeworth’s final test, where it’s up to him to prove his conviction to save people, and finally come back into his role as a prosecutor. This is not the moment to have him lose his conviction and start doubting himself, the time for that has long passed, and now what’s most important for his character is pushing this new resolve to its absolute limit with a debate of intellectuals. Logic Chess is mainly meant for pulling out information in order to get to testimony, which isn’t really something that needs to be done here, nor would it fit Simon’s character for this to be an effective tactic against him. This is, of course, as long as Edgeworth actually would get to finish the Logic Chess in this scenario, since it stops describing this once he loses conviction, so it may just all tie back to that, which I’ve already gone over why it wouldn’t really fit I2’s narrative.
So yeah, I find this confrontation to be one of the most fun debates in the entire series, due to Simon’s skill as an opponent here, and I think all of the complaints levied against it are pretty trivial or just untrue. Before I continue, I’d like to share some discoveries I made while replaying this confrontation for the sake of this write-up that I just don’t see talked about enough. During the debate, we learn some interesting facts of Simon, including, but not limited to, his love of vore, his ability to do an impeccable Godot impression, and worst of all, the reveal that he’s a Danganronpa fan, a V3 fan even! Truly, a despicable final villain. Okay that’s enough of that, I was stalling so I didn’t have to talk about The Plan, but I might as well just tackle this head on.

Why The Plan is Cool, Actually

The Joker is a complex character. He has many names, but his most common is "The Mad Dog of Shimano". He is also known as "The Mad Dog of Shimano" or "The Mad Dog of Shimano Killer"

There’s plenty of complaints to be found against Simon’s mastermind scheme within this cut, so I’ve elected to separate these into two categories: Complaints that are wrong, and complaints that are subjectively bad. Let’s start with the latter. Basically, these complaints boil down to Simon’s plan itself having plenty of holes, that end up devaluing it as a mastermind scheme, and making him feel incompetent. Here’s some examples of this argument taken straight from the cut:

Often, when I see a player who has recently finished Investigations 2 discuss the game, they give a compliment that is doled out a lot: “the mastermind’s plan was genius.” Reading the entirety of his scheme in the context of the story, I’m utterly stumped. What on earth was so masterful?

​

Simon is subsequently arrested, which he hadn’t anticipated. Lucky for him, Edgeworth is on the scene to save the day. Very lucky, in fact, because Simon’s mastermind plan would have fallen at the second hurdle had Miles not been around. It annoys me that Simon’s plan at this point only works because Edgeworth is on the scene.

​

This “secret murder” that happens during the events of Forgotten pushes the credibility of Simon’s plan to the limit. The sheer number of characters who were in the area - “Huang”, Courtney, Kay, Crane, Lotta, Blaise - are all mere seconds away from coming across each other and it all feels too silly to me.

I agree with pretty much all of these assessments of his plan, there were definitely some holes to be found within it. To add onto these, his kidnapping of John was poorly planned out and nearly resulted in one of his enemies getting away freely, and he failed to properly account for any incoming letters which he should have been watchful for. Of course, where I differ from Charlie is that I don’t see this as an issue at all. Simon is a human, not some kind of robot capable of predicting the course of the universe, so it’s only natural that he’d make some mistakes when masterminding a scheme this complex. For mine, he had no way to predict what moves Blaise would make to manipulate the system, nor any control over the postage system.
As for Charlie’s complaints, I’m not exactly sure how someone would be able to predict the events that take place in The Imprisoned Turnabout, as it’s one of the most complicated and intricately woven cases in the series. The actions taken by the culprit and other individual parties during that case were a complete wild factor that no one would be able to account for, so it make sense that Simon wouldn’t have a contingency plan for it. As for the I2-4 complaint, I don’t see how it being close to failure due to a high person count in the vicinity is exactly a flaw, due to that both being unpredictable in the case of Lotta, Courtney, and the body double, but also being the exact thing that causes his arrest, being his one biggest miscalculation in the game. Without these two, he would pretty much be an infallible god, which is neither interesting, nor realistic for a character. I just don’t see why him making mistakes is at all a complaint.
As for what’s so masterful about the plan, it’s not his ability to completely plan it all out down to every detail, instead it’s about what I’ve already gone over. Simon’s genius comes from his abilities to read people, and adapt to circumstances with extreme speed. For the former, he’s able to know the exact scenarios to set up in order to push people to their limit, which proves to be quite useful in his schemes. For the latter, he’s able to make constant improvisations on the spot, such as framing John or using Edgeworth to take down Blaise, both of which further his plan than he could’ve just using what he knew when brewing up his scheme. Simon is a genius manipulator and an incredible improvisationist, he is not a master planner, nor does the game really make him out to be one. After all, he’s just a clown y’know?

You Can Skip This Section

The movie opens with the Joker walking down the streets of Gotham City with a bag of chips in one hand.
Joker: [chuckles] I think I'm going to have a heart attack.

This entire next section is just me correcting misinformation about the plan from the cut, so if you don’t care about I2’s stupid mastermind scheme, then feel free to just skip to the next section where I start talking about Simon Keyes again. Okay, so I’ve collected about six different excerpts of the cut that I feel are worth addressing regarding the big connected I2 scheme, so let’s go through them one at a time.

The problem is that de Killer’s first failed attempt only exists because the writers needed Simon to later get Knightley involved in his plot. It’s another case of the story overstretching itself, when a much simpler solution (have Simon plan to implicate Knightley from the get-go) is sitting right there.

I find this to be an odd complaint since it’s pretty clear that the assassination attempt failed the first go around for a multitude of narrative reasons. First off, there needed to be a reason for Shelly to be Simon’s enemy throughout the game, and that wouldn’t make much sense if he hadn’t gone after the president once already prior to Turnabout Target. There’s also the element of the case specific story to keep in mind, as there’s really no logical reason for the bodyguard setup of I2-1 if it wasn’t for the method that Shelly used to infiltrate the president’s ranks and attempt an assassination attempt on him. I’m not even sure if this is really a major complaint, but he spends a good amount of time on it so I’m assuming he at least finds it contrived enough to be detrimental to Simon’s plan’s integrity, but I just don’t see it, since it makes a lot more sense to just hire an assassin to assassinate someone than to just immediately go with the complicated over-the-top scheme, plus it has multiple reasons to exist outside of that.

There is no feasible reason for why he should even know that Dogen has been threatening Roland, let alone that she is specifically paranoid he will send somebody to kill her.

I’ve already gone over a few of these complaints in my comment on the cut itself, but I’ll repeat the information here. Simon was playing correspondence chess with Dogen at the time, so there’s absolutely no reason that Dogen couldn’t have included some information about the way he was running the prison. In addition to this, there’s no reason to believe Dogen couldn’t have gotten this information to Simon some other way, either through just forcing Roland to send a letter, or just informing Simon of his plan to manipulate the warden before Dogen turned himself in. Basically, this one just doesn’t hold water under scrutiny.

His choice to warn Blaise of Crane’s intent to murder him is quite baffling to me. If he doesn’t warn Blaise, she murders Blaise and is subsequently arrested for the murder.

There were plenty of ways for Blaise to get around this if he wasn’t ready for it, I mean the guy is pretty strong (dude has a six pack) so he could probably easily overpower her. Without the letter Simon sent to him, informing him that Jill knows full well of his secrets and crimes, he might’ve handled this situation nonlethally, and just gotten Jill arrested for attempted assault. The only way to ensure that someone murdered and was arrested here was to let Blaise in on Jill’s secrets.

If he had a “don’t get innocent people killed” mentality which led to Jill being the culprit of Forgotten, I would have been much more invested in taking him down for conspiring to lead an innocent woman to murder in her pursuit of justice.

This complaint just confuses me, so I don’t really know how to approach it. I’ve just gone over why it makes sense for him to get Blaise to be the killer in the case, but I don’t see how anything fundamentally changes about him even if he hadn’t. Either way he still destroys the life of an innocent person, I’m not sure why the way that he does that changes how investing it is to take him down. Plus, having Jill as the culprit of I2-4 wouldn’t fit in with the escalation and subversion present within the culprits of Investigations 2.

“Huang” recognises the adult Simon Keyes for some reason (?) and opens fire on the balloon (??).

It’s never once stated that Huang recognized Simon, merely that he didn’t want a witness to his meeting with the person that he planned to kill. This is also why he opens fire on him, the dude was in a hot air balloon, it would be pretty difficult to track him down if he let him get away after witnessing that.

After learning about this, Simon chooses not to contact Courtney with proof that he has John to ensure a guilty verdict, because Simon is a mastermind, you guys!

Simon had no way of contacting Justine short of just busting into court and admitting that he kidnapped John, and that would be pretty problematic for his plans. Justine had just handed over her phone to Edgeworth, and Simon knew this since he left a bug on Kay. He actually does what could probably be considered the next best thing to contacting Justine, by contacting the person with her phone and letting them know that there was a kidnapping mix-up, so that Edgeworth can deal with it and inform Justine himself, which he doesn’t really end up doing but whatever at least Simon tried.
Speaking of the bug, I forgot to mention how cool it is that Simon turned off the bug during that call, and it creates a really good dashing of the player’s hope after they bring back Nicole’s recording to implicate him during the confrontation. This also creates the gunshot discovery which is another cool moment. This doesn’t fit in this section but I refuse to go back to the previous one and figure out where to add it in, plus I’m done correcting Charlie on the plan, so let’s move into the next section before I lose any more brain cells thinking about the events of I2.

A Quick Breather

“Whatever” -Joker, just before he dies.

Before I tire myself out with the last two big complaints I took issue with in the cut, let’s take a breather and go over complaints that I either can’t really disagree with, or that are completely subjective so I can’t really tackle her.

Of course, he gets his own character theme at the end, “The Man Who Masterminds the Game”, which I’m decidedly not a huge fan of (it sounds like a dull interpretation of Layton villain Don Paolo)

Charlie clearly suffers from insanity and should be immediately removed from the rankdown. In all seriousness this is obviously a subjective point, but I just fried my brain pointing out misconceptions about I2’s plot, so give me a moment to talk about one of my favorite themes in the series real quick. The comparison to Don Paolo’s theme is certainly not a far stretch, but despite their similar instrumentation, I find they give off completely different vibes. I’m not a music expert so please excuse my very basic descriptions of the music, but Don Paolo’s theme just gives off incredibly chaotic energy, constantly pushing forward and never slowing down, which really fits with his just absolutely manic characterization. Simon’s theme on the other hand is filled with just “Oh shit” energy, being much more calculated and deliberate, and feeling incredibly sinister the entire time. It really gives off the vibes of “this dude is TROUBLE” and makes it double too. Okay whatever next point.

I’m a little unsure of why a monkey theme is even his thing, but the game has chosen to roll with it and I’ll give them points for sticking to their guns.

This one isn’t even a criticism. I’m not sure why I included it in my revive outline. I think I just wanted an excuse to talk about monkeys somewhere. Anyway, that’s done with so let’s move on.

His final breakdown where all the animals break loose and kick his ass is over-the-top stupid. It would be a funny breakdown if he wasn’t supposed to be portrayed as this serious evil mastermind. But he is, so the silly breakdown just comes off as a lack of restraint.

I admit, this breakdown probably could’ve been a bit less over-the-top in nature, but I personally don’t find it too egregious, plus the visual of a gorilla punching him in the head and somehow not just decapitating him is hilarious to me. Plus, even if it is a bit over the top, it’s a fitting visual of him losing control over the situation and the “animals” that he made dance in his little performance, plus a cool tie-in to his nature of using others rather than forming actual bonds. It is a bit silly though, this is like the one point I concede in the entire write-up, please savor this unique moment.

The Brilliance of a Selective Memory

"What's so funny Joker?"
"You see, my brother was involved in the stock market crash of 1929-30."

Entering into the penultimate section of this revive, we have a complaint that I wasn’t exactly sure how I was going to handle, and before I replayed the last segment of The Grand Turnabout in preparation for writing this revive, I thought I might have to concede this point to Charlie. Thankfully, I’ve been reminded of a nugget of information that invalidates this whole complaint and just ends up making Simon a more interesting character to boot. So, let’s get into the complaint itself.

A last-minute revelation that an eight-year-old Simon somehow managed to “mistake” Dover for his father has the unmistakable scent of writer’s block.

​

Simon has to think his father’s dead, or else we have to incorporate case 3 into his revenge plot. Hmm, that’s a lot of work. Slap him with a selective amnesia sticker and call it a day.

I have to admit, this is one aspect of Simon’s backstory that always confused me thinking back on the game, as it is pretty ridiculous to imagine that he’d just magically end up switching the two fathers in his mind due to a selective memory loss. And it’s true that the writers pretty much had to think of a way to end up with Simon having the two switched in order to make the plot function, giving him a reason to hate Horace, and no reason to get involved in the takedown of Gustavia. But thankfully for me, this selective memory of his where he just magically forgets what’s convenient for the game isn’t what happened at all. In fact, if you think back, Simon pretty much had to have forgotten the entirety of his past in order for the game’s plot to function.
It’s reasonable to assume that Gustavia may have had relatives that Simon could have tried to live with in Dane’s absence, but it’s never stated that he attempts to contact any of them. This is very telling that he pretty much completely forgot anything from before the moments of Horace’s attack, and the casual way he shrugs off not remembering Isaac Dover being a european sculptor is nearly confirmation that his childhood is just a complete blank. So of course, this begs the question of how the young simon managed to remember Dover as his father, as the cut states he does. Well, he doesn’t. Let’s take a look at exactly what’s said:

Isaac Dover is my father's name. 18 years ago, my memories were muddled from the shock of my near-death experience... So it wasn't until later that I learned the truth. On that day, my father was murdered.

It wasn’t until later that he learned of Isaac Dover, meaning that his father was also a complete blank in his memory, not just a selective part that he conveniently mixed up. Knowing the date of the day he lost his memories, and the general things he remembers saying when attacked by Knightley, it’s not unreasonable to assume that Simon could have done some digging and looked for matching incidents. Of course, this begs the question of why Simon immediately assumed that Dover was his father when there were other contestants. Well, this is why I believe that this mix-up greatly benefits Simon as a character. Let’s once again look at what he has to say about the revelation that he had it backwards:

All I knew was that Knightley's father was trying to set up my own father. That's why I immediately knew that the one who died that day was my dad.

Simon viewed himself as the complete victim of the situation, due to the way that he views the world as both against, and revolving around him. Because of this absolute sureness that his father was the victim in this scenario, he had no doubt in his mind that it had to be Dover. This is a brilliant way to work the mix-up naturally into the story, by using Simon’s faults as a person to force him into a situation where he would assume the truth without any room for alternative, and even if he did question it, without knowledge of who the killer was, there was no other real alternative. It’s possible seeing Gustavia could have jogged his memory the same way Dogen did, but we don’t know if it would’ve, since he literally had no idea who Gustavia was, he only knew of the victim. Knowing this, the whole thing fits pretty naturally into Simon’s backstory, and is much more than the lazy selected amnesia that it appears to be, and as Charlie admits himself:

The fact that half his motivation for revenge is misguided is a lovely bit of dramatic irony in the final confrontation.

Now then, we have one last pitstop to make before this ride comes to an end.
Continued in comments...

In September 2017, I was browsing Reddit and came across a side-by-side photo comparison of Kim Jong-un. In the left photo, the leader was shown to be normal size, and in the right photo, he’d been photoshopped to look noticeably more thin, making him seem bizarrely agile and stringy. “Skinny Kim Jong-un would make the situation with North Korea more intimidating,” the post read. It held the number one spot on the front page for a few hours and garnered 156,000 upvotes, a massive total for a single post.
I’d been aiming to go viral on Reddit for a while, and I saw my opportunity when someone commented, “Gotta say, skinny Un would make a decent Bond villain.”
“Slim Jong Un,” I quickly replied.
My comment earned 34,700 upvotes in the hours that followed.
The scales shifted for me then. A horrible pun that took all of five seconds to conjure had led tens of thousands of people to give me an upvote, a measure of validation and approval.
I had been lurking on Reddit for a few months and had recently begun to comment. Little did I know that this initial taste of virality would be the beginning of a years-long ascent to the top of Reddit's karma leaderboards.
​
I began my Reddit career on some of the site's true crime communities. I’d been watching groups of Reddit users in subreddits like UnresolvedMysteries volley around theories about unsolved crimes. It was sort of thrilling to think of the community as being on the verge of cracking a cold case. I wanted to be an internet sleuth.
I posted comments with my own interpretations of missing persons cases and perplexing murders. On the rare occasion one of my comments sparked a new conversation about a case, I felt proud, as though I’d performed real detective work.
This was during a period in my early 20s, shortly after college, when I was unexpectedly living at home, friendless and jobless. To stave off my boredom, I spent hour after hour on my computer. Reddit seemed like a place of spontaneity and excitement, and in my growing loneliness, the idea of a large community—and its thousands of subcommunities—appealed to me.
One day, a man directly involved in one of these cold cases responded to a comment I’d made. The man kindly corrected my uninformed speculation about a mother and daughter who had seemingly vanished, confirming for everyone in the comment section that the two remain missing to this day.
I read the comment and stopped, astonished. In all the time I’d spent on true crime subreddits, I’d never been directly confronted by someone involved in a case. I’d never considered that something like this was possible, that my online comments would have some sort of real-life consequences, no matter how small.

As much as Reddit had helped me to fill empty time, it exposed a more significant emptiness within me

As powerful as my interaction with the man from the cold case was, my mind kept returning to the fact that it was only a single comment on a single post in a single subreddit on a single day. I tried to calculate how many millions of discussions were taking place at the moment I made my comment, and the enormity of the sum made me feel like nothing but a blip on the radar, a shadow of a point.
Reddit, I realized, is vaster than I could imagine. It seemed sort of like magic.
In its sprawl, Reddit shapeshifts. Minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day. While no two posts are ever quite the same, synchronicities and inside jokes emerge. On Reddit, people around the world play touch-and-go with news stories, politics, memes, and their hobbies, participating in an exchange of mood and culture. It's a community that entertains itself and makes a concerted effort not to be captured by the views, angles, and attitudes of more mainstream social media.
​
As I explored Reddit's vastness, I decided I wanted to stay away from discussion-based subreddits and subreddits focused on news and politics altogether. After learning about the rise of incels in Reddit forums, the exchange of "jailbait," and the incident in 2013 when Redditors misidentified the Boston Marathon bombing suspects and terrorized an innocent man’s family, I decided I would stick to subreddits focused on pictures, gifs, and memes.
I recalled users I’d seen here and there who had a gimmick, like the particularly talented poem_for_your_sprog, whose every comment is an original, themed poem in reply to a post. These types of users—and there are only a famous few—exist simply for their novelty and operate independently of Reddit’s self-righteous diatribes.
It became clear to me that my next Reddit incarnation would have a simpler purpose: to do as the jokers do. My username is dickfromaccounting; I was halfway there already.
I could post cheap puns and wisecracks in the hope of scoring fake internet points, known as karma, earned by sharing a post or making a comment that gets upvoted. It’s a way to gain a hollow kind of influence, and having a lot of karma is proof that you can repeatedly capture the attention of scores of people on a site as huge as Reddit. Amassing karma is a game of hard-fought strategy, and I wanted to win.
I started making and maintaining extensive notes in my phone, compiling bits and pieces of jokes or dialogue I’d hear while watching a video on YouTube or a show on TV.
For a while, I searched for posts through the “New” filter on popular communities that I was subscribed to, so that I could pinpoint a post that I thought would have a good chance of going viral (and would thus get more visibility and traffic for upvotes), and I could be one of the first users to leave a comment, which is another way to increase visibility. After a while, I learned to place my comments well enough to time a post’s ascent to the front page of Reddit, where only a select number of posts appear to millions of users. There, the posts would get several thousand upvotes each, translating into a few thousand karma and upping my score. I knew really successful comment-oriented users boasted karma counts in the millions, and that was a tally I was absolutely determined to match.
Just a few weeks after I began this new strategy, I made the Kim Jong Un post, and suddenly, virality didn't seem so distant a dream.
But I hesitated. Going viral had been a matter of perfect timing—how was I to possibly set myself up like this again? It occurred to me that making posts, as opposed to comments, would give my karma lure more precision: I could choose when and where the hook landed.
I became a student of the site’s complicated info-sharing dynamics. Every subreddit has a different persona with its own habits, preferences, and faults. I wanted to study them all, to learn what each one wanted and how it would respond to this type of gif or that kind of image. It felt like a sociological endeavor to study the subreddit personalities and characteristics, like I was collecting data points and observations on human behavior and identity online for no purpose other than my own digital self-gain.
I shut myself up in my room. The further I removed myself from the people I knew in the real world, the further I descended into the minds of people I’ve never interacted with and would never meet again.
One day, I was perusing the all-time most upvoted posts of askreddit, a community where people pose questions like “What movie is so ridiculously stupid, but you love it anyway?” and “Which conspiracy theory is so believable that it might be true?”
I noticed that there was a pattern in the phrasing of some of them, that they used the same leading approach. “How would you feel,” one of the posts asks, “about a law requiring parents that receive child support to supply the court with proof of how the child support money is being spent?” What caught me about this question is that of all the questions and ways a question that can be asked, asking someone how they feel about something is plausibly the most basic way to start a broad conversation.

There was no turning back. I was, and still am, a "karma whore."

A discussion I’d had with my Mom earlier that day came to mind. We talked about how alarming it was that a person like my grandmother, who can barely see or hear and has a lead foot, can continue to drive. “How would you feel,” I asked in my post, mimicking what I'd learned about the format, “about a law that requires people over the age of 70 to pass a specialized driving test in order to continue driving?” Within a day, the post became the most upvoted question in the history of the subreddit, raking in over 120,000 upvotes. It held the record for several months, until the real Bill Gates himself (by his username thisisbillgates) broke it with a leading question of his own.
With this record-breaking post, I’d reached the end of one plane on Reddit and found the beginning of another—the mega-viral, hundreds of comments per second, karma-ka-chinging, all-time great inspiring, fame-teasing front of the “front page of the Internet.”
There was no turning back. I was, and still am, a "karma whore."
The act of seeking karma is a sensitive issue on the site. Some users post original content, or stuff that they only make themselves. These users, Redditors will tell you, are respectable because their pursuit of karma is funded by their own work and energy. But the site’s system is volatile, and not all original content is well-received. Karma whores know this in their core. Karma whores learn to be clinical and bot-like. Karma whores make nothing themselves and often pull their content from users on other sites without crediting. This recklessness, Redditors will tell you, reveals the true emptiness dwelling inside these people.
For several months, my daily routine was monastic: as soon as I rolled out of bed, I’d open Imgur, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook and scour for something I could post, continuing the search through the morning, afternoon, and evening until I’d rounded up at least three or four viral posts and satisfied my own made-up quota.
This was a process of trial and error. I studied the rates at which my viral posts were upvoted minute by minute, hour by hour. I posted at different times of the day to determine when users were most active. For every viral post I made, I deleted a dozen others that failed to stick. If another post was competing with mine to trend within the subreddit, I’d downvote it, and others, in an attempt to trigger the algorithm that would give mine a boost. I reached a point where, within 15 minutes of sharing it, I could tell whether or not a post would make it to the front page.
The subreddits with the most subscribers would give me the best chances of going viral, since they have the highest number of active users, meaning the highest upvote potential. Based on the type of content I’d collect on other sites—usually cute animal gifs, interesting images, and memes—I’d target popular, media-based (as opposed to text-based) subreddits for very general interest groups: aww for all things cute, pics for all photos, and gaming for everything about video games. Although I could predict whether or not a post would go viral, there was no real way for me to know exactly how viral it would go. The degree to which the content went viral on other sites (measured by the number of likes or upvotes) would be some indication, but it wasn’t always a clear sign. Of the 17 Reddit posts I’ve made that have topped a hundred thousand upvotes, for example, maybe half of them were proportionally viral on the other sites. What made the other half go viral on Reddit was simply a mixture of mood and momentum.
Since learning how to master the process of matching content with its best-fitting subreddit, I have gained more than 8 million karma. Of the 250 million or so users on the site, my account is ranked 13th, and I plan to crack the top 10 very soon. According to one statistical model shared in a data subreddit earlier in 2018, my posts that year reached the front page more times than any other user on the site. "The top poster, dickfromaccounting, represents about 1% of all posts that reached the front page," that analysis said.
I had conquered the front page of the front page of the internet and won an anonymous fame. All problems solved, all ailments allayed, all goals achieved. Right?

I retreated to my room, where the silence of everything but my own clicking and typing and wandering mind filled the air around me. I worked in what felt like a four-walled enclosure, a laboratory and not a bedroom.

I must admit that critics of karma whores do hit a nerve. What I do is a form of thievery. I can’t deny stealing content, nor can I pretend that attention isn’t my primary motivation for doing so. The thousands of posts I’ve made throw a spotlight on my little portion of the internet, where a tiny share of the day’s digital dialogue focuses on something I place in front of people. Without my intervention, they might not have enjoyed this interesting, funny, moving, surprising bit of media. This attention, even if only on a single post for an hour or so, makes me feel powerful, like I can exercise a certain control over what occupies people’s minds.
And yet, all along, a feeling of voicelessness and meaninglessness crept beside me. I was in pursuit of a daily adrenaline shot, this singular form of power that came from watching a post rocket to the top of Reddit’s popularity ladder. Nothing else mattered. Nothing beyond my fake internet points.
Gradually, I started eating less. I saw people less. My parents and I talked less, and I retreated to my room, where the silence of everything but my own clicking and typing and wandering mind filled the air around me. I worked in what felt like a four-walled enclosure, a laboratory and not a bedroom. When my back would ache or my neck would get tight, I’d pull myself away from my computer long enough to observe the thinness of my wrists.
As much as Reddit had helped me to fill empty time, it exposed a more significant emptiness within me. Attention on Reddit, after all, is like quicksand. Every post I shared made me feel closer to getting out, but the effort that it took to make those posts plunged me deeper into the pit.
Moderation, I thought, could be my rescue. I could resort to the thing that had initially drawn me to Reddit: a sense of community. I could become one of the users who oversees posting and commenting activity on a subreddit. I could be one of the gatekeepers, the socially responsible leader who removes the rampant hate speech and sexism and bigotry, bans repeated rule-breakers, and guides the community to more civil interaction. I might not be able to purge the site of all of its evils, but at least my time on Reddit wouldn’t be spent in total self-service.
I joined the moderation team of iama, a subreddit where famous celebrities, scientists, politicians, and other notable figures and groups host “ask me anything” sessions, one of the largest communities on the site. I joined the teams at BikiniBottomTwitter, the place for SpongeBob memes, and oldpeoplefacebook. I joined WhitePeopleTwitter, a subreddit that consists mostly of jokes and observations poking fun at white people but, in the comments, sometimes devolves into a racist spam machine and requires very active moderation.
Moderating these communities and doing my part to keep them clean and amicable does give my fascination with Reddit a bit more meaning. I know that maybe I could play some role in helping someone—a person like me passing time on their computer—feel as though the world is not always out to get them.
But emptying the site of all hatred and apathy is impossible. Every time I open the moderation tab, no matter how many times a day, new posts and comments have been reported for one reason or another. The cycle never stops, and how could it? Users wield their anonymity like a regenerative get-out-of-jail-free card, continually renewing the choice to be selfish and inconsiderate without facing any immediate consequences.
Moderators are supposed to perform the grunt work for the company, handling the day-to-day site maintenance and operation without compensation. It’s thankless work, even though moderators are the users plugging and replugging the same hole in a ship that’s perpetually taking on water. And as the Reddit public has informed me many times, I’m not only attention-hungry as a karma whore, I'm also power-hungry like all moderators. There seems to be no way to redeem myself.
By now, I know that my thinking is tinged with this strange, digital stardom. I’ve seen my posts, the work of my amused fingers, hold the attention of a sliver of the world. I’ve owned and managed places on the internet where people from all walks of life come together to talk. I’ve exceeded every goal and exacted every plan that I established for myself when I committed to wasting time on Reddit.
And now that my fame has brought me here, I find, more and more, that I’m in oddly familiar territory: As the days slog on, I can see that most of the rocks are turned over. There are very few corners left for me to check. The effort that began as a trek away from time spent by myself has, in its own time, returned me to my point of origin. I am certainly more viral-savvy for having made this online journey. I probably know people and their media consumption habits better than most. But even here, at the top of Reddit, with all the attention I’ve ever wanted, I am no less alone.

I can't believe League will soon be featuring Dante from the Devil May Cry Series as the new champion. If you have looked at the latest Champion Roadmap, you will understand. If not, allow me to explain. It shows hints of the new deer jungler. Then it shows what I imagine to be another Darkin. Last but most certainly not least, it teases at a new marksman.
This new marksman was shown along with a gif of increasing letter grades. It asked if we enjoy stringing together abilities to create stylish new combos, and if we are excited by diving into the fray in a whirlwind of blades and bullets. And last but not least, it referred to them as dressed to slay.
Dante is on the list to be added to League. With the addition of licensed characters such as this, the possibilities are endless. Your next league game could feature the top lane classic of Mordekaiser vs Cloud Strife. Or how about the jungle matchup of Wukong vs Funky Kong. And in the mid lane of course Talon got counterpicked by a Joker from Persona 5. And as we all know Dante in the bot lane with the off-meta support everyone hates of Minecraft Steve vs Lucian and Thresh. With that ladies and gentlemen, I rest my case.

Persona is one of my absolute favorite series ever, and I have a lot of sentimental attachment to it. So, the Joker reveal was so extraordinarily perfect to me that I can't help but get the dumbest smile whenever I think about it - I don't think anything in or about a game can top this for me. Predictably, Joker was by far my #1 character choice. I feel like it elevated Ultimate from one of the best games ever made, to one of the best games that will ever be made. So I wanted to make a post about it now that I can think properly again.
Hopefully this post will explain why Joker's inclusion is so cool, why Persona is so great, and provide some background on Persona. There was a fantastic thread by Paulie25 posted a while ago as a crash course on the topic, as well!
I can't help but make this thread super long, I hope it's interesting!
(Also, Reddit Enhancement Suite will allow you to view links in the post itself.)
So, let us start the game.
Shin Megami Tensei
When talking about Persona, especially in a Nintendo context, I think it's right to also mention it's sort of "parent" series, Shin Megami Tensei, or SMT. See, Persona is a spin-off of SMT, but it became more popular than it's parent series over time. Don't let that fool you though, because SMT is also a fantastic series and even with Persona existing, there's nothing quite like it.
Keep in mind this section is about things that are mostly specific to SMT, so what you read here isn't necessarily reflective of Persona. We'll get to that soon.
SMT games are RPGs by Atlus (whose parent company is now Sega), and usually focus on a single individual or a small group as they sift through an apocalypse that has reduced the Earth to rubble. The world has been claimed by conflicting forces of Law and Chaos, which are comprised of beings from religion and myth, ranging from Angels to Onis, Horus to Cu Cuchulain, Satan (yes, that Satan), to Metatron to Vishnu. There's a ton of different demons (they are generally referred to collectively as demons regardless of affiliation) to battle, fuse together, and... talk to? Yes, a massive part of the SMT experience is talking with demons - about what humanity is worth, about the apocalypse, and about whether you'll join them to fight for a world ruled by law or a world that has no order. Or they'll even do trivial things like hassle you for money, they'll be really peculiar, or just generally rude - especially series mascot, Jack Frost. Either way though, you'll be trying to get these demons to join you. You can usually do this by fighting them, persuading them, or sometimes blackmail, the works.
SMT is a really great series and definitely worth a look - either alongside or seperate from Persona. They are different enough so that if you don't like one, you may like the other - though there's definitely a lot of overlap, so I recommend checking out both! Persona is generally more approachable, though.
As for why SMT is especially important in a Nintendo context - SMT is actually often available on Nintendo consoles, and usually exclusive. Though, what's probably the best in the series, SMT 3: Nocturne, is a PS2 exclusive, so unfortunately it's not on regular Nintendo consoles. Though, it's not especially difficult to get a hold off if you have something that can play PS2 games. This is the most recommended one.
And:

1. SMT 4 and 4 Apocalypse are available for 3DS. They are the most recent games currently. They are the most approachable in the main series, as well. I'd recommend 4 first, as it's closer to the series standard than Apocalypse.
   
2. SMT Strange Journey is on the DS. It's highly advised to play the original DS version, Strange Journey Redux is generally considered weaker than the original. Strange Journey is really tough, but often considered one of the best in the series.
   
3. SMT 5 is coming... eventually, as a Switch exclusive. It's kind of unclear how far along in development it is, but it should hopefully be out in the next couple years. Maybe we'll get to see Unreal Engine work it's magic on Jack Frost sometime soon-ish.
   
4. There's also other SMT spin off titles like the SRPG Devil Survivor available for 3DS. They might be worth a shot if you're interested! They're a bit more similar in tone to games like The World Ends With You. Definitely different from the mainline series, but still strong.
   

Also, chances are you've seen the little "Featuring Dante from the Devil May Cry series" emblem. Well, that's from Nocturne. Yes, Dante from the Devil May Cry series is featured in that game.
Background on Persona
Persona, as previously stated, is a spin-off of SMT that has become a popular series in it's own right - it's actually become considerably more popular than SMT itself. These games are RPGs, like their predecessors, and share some cues with SMT in some aspects - the main link is that the demons from SMT are featured in Persona's combat system, and are seen as Personas, manifestations of someone's soul that can be used to fight, or in some cases, provide support in other ways. Personas are essentially Stands, and more or less act the same way. Meaning, they appear on command to fight on your behalf, and don't normally speak except in select cases, since they're essentially extensions of the characters they belong to. However, while your party members only have one Persona at a time, you hold the Wild Card, which allows you to fuse the Personas you acquire into stronger ones, all the way from the lowly Pixie to the mighty Thor and beyond. Each Persona has it's own strengths and weaknesses, and they can inherit abilities from the Personas that they are fused from. It's very rewarding to put together a Persona you're especially fond of, since they're pretty customizeable. In Persona 5, the SMT demons are also seen as Shadows, the hostile denizens of the "counterpart world" that you explore. But more on that later.
SMT and Persona are also very different in a lot of ways, however, and this is mostly due to one key difference - SMT is about talking to demons, but Persona is about talking to people. This informs the biggest differences between the two series. The setting has been changed from a post apocalyptic world (usually Tokyo) to modern and (usually) urban Japan, and the questions about law and chaos prompted by self-righteous demons are now melancholic, tender, and often relatable musings by (usually) ordinary people about how to deal with life treating you unfairly. This is where a lot of the appeal of the series is.
But before I continue, I want to mention that Persona 1 & 2 (& Persona 2-2 (Persona 2 is comprised on the first game, Innocent Sin, and the second game, Eternal Punishment)) are very different from the "modern" Persona games, 3, 4, & 5. This is because Persona was much closer to older SMT titles when it was first conceived, and were made around 1996-2000. The series was dormant for about 6 years, until Persona 3 was developed under Katsura Hashino (who is currently working on Switch game "Project Re: Fantasy") and founded many of the elements that comprise modern Persona - like the calendar system and the ever iconic Social Links.
Because of their age and changing conventions, Persona 1 & 2 are mostly recommended after trying out 3, 4, and/or 5 (they still have great things going for them, but are less approachable). Now I'm going to focus on 3, 4, and 5, so some of the things mentioned from now on may not apply to 1 & 2.
The first two paragraphs in this section mention some pretty different sounding things, and that's because of a key aspect of Persona - it has two hemispheres that play off of each other. How intertwined those parts are depends on which game, but principally Persona is made of a dungeon crawling RPG half, and a social sim half - hanging out with your classmates, messing around in the arcade, helping people, fishing, going to the movies; you play through almost every day of the game's calendar year and really get acquainted with your surroundings. It's highly recommended to play these games at your own pace, because they really shine when you can immerse yourself in them. I'd avoid trying to speed through, because they are long. Like, 60+ hours is expected for your first playthrough. But every hour has something really great, and the culmination of it all results in something even greater than the sum of it's already wonderful parts.
You begin the game in a normal Japanese town/city, but eventually gain access to an alternate version of an area, or another world. A series constant is that early in the game, the mysterious Igor and his various assistants will instruct you on the rules of this land in the ethereal Velvet Room (which looks different in each game), while it's signature, enchanting theme plays. He emphasizes something in particular - that the bonds you make in the real world will give you strength in the other world. This isn't just a narrative deal - the bonds you create, called Social Links, or Confidants - each of which correspond to one of the major arcana of the tarot deck of cards, are leveled up by improving your relationship with others by spending time with them. Strengthening those relationships will make your Personas stronger when you fuse them, and sometimes even grant direct battle enhancements. Seeing these two halves compliment each other gives Persona it's unique identity, and it's difficult to find anything quite like it.
Currently, Persona games are mostly only available for Sony consoles, but I can see that changing in the future, especially now with Joker's inclusion. Either way, I can't recommend the games enough. The spin-offs Persona Q and Persona Q2 are available for 3DS, but to really get the most out of those games you'll want to play the main series games first.
So, why is Persona cool?
Firstly, the premise is great, playing almost every day of a calendar year and interacting with the people of the city from different walks of life makes for a fun, and often thought provoking and tender experience. The game lets you play the way you want - you are encouraged to go at your own pace and see what you want to see. The series was designed around picking and choosing what you want to do, more or less like real life, so it's up to you to pursue the Social Links you want, and for you to prioritize what matters most to you - do you care more about being smart, charming, or confident? Which do you want to work on first? Do you care about being charming enough to gain approval and get closer to a few people, or do you care more about your friends who don't require that? Who are you more invested in, the old couple who are afraid the memory of their late son will fade away, or the odd monk who gives you life advice in the club at the mall? Or maybe you were more interested in the shady businessman who tries to get you involved in his schemes? Which of your party members do you want to focus on the most? Are you focused on supporting your friend who's been ostracized but helped you get through the first few weeks at school, or are you focused above all else on helping one of your friends get past life as a shut-in? Would you rather work on your realtionship with the back-alley doctor or the former yakuza store owner? There's always a rush when your favorite character is available to talk to, since they have their own schedules that they adhere to, so it feels especially satisfying to catch them on a good day.
You can manage to do a lot of this stuff in one playthrough if you manage your time well, but the overall design of having to choose what you are more focused on helps the game shine, and really makes the gameplay systems come together. It's impressive, the social sim aspects are just as strong as, sometimes maybe even more so, than the RPG part of the game, which is no slouch either. The battles are snappy and satisfying, fusing Personas to get stronger is very fun and rewarding, and there is an immense satisfaction when your fusion nets you a strong Persona that corresponds to a Social Link you've been working on. The bosses are often tough and interesting as well.
The games also not only have a unique identity within the landscape of games as a whole, they also have unique identities from each other, and you can see this through a lot of aspects, but especially in the art and music. Each game has a key color, Persona 3's cool blue, Persona 4's bright yellow and Persona 5's striking crimson, each of which inform the feel of each game. We'll talk about Persona 5 a lot in it's own section, so I think now is a good time to go over 3 and 4, which also both cannot be recommended enough if they at all interest you, just like with 5.
Persona 3's key color of cool blue reflects the melancholic nature of most of the game. P3 is focused on a pretty heavy topic - death. But more principally it's about moving on, and realizing that life is worth living even when it may not seem like it. It's also about making the most of the time you have, and forging bonds with others so that they'll have memories of you. When I said Persona was about picking and choosing what's most important to you, that's in full force in Persona 3. You can do everything with proper setup and knowledge, but the developers didn't go out of their way to make that happen, because they were more interested in the idea of players prioritizing things just like in real life - and I think that's brilliant, because it creates an incredible thematic resonance with the rest of the game, because it's all about appreciating the time that you have and spending it wisely.
In Persona 3, you are a new student to Tatsumi Port Island's Gekkoukan High School. Upon arrival though, you stay conscious during the Dark Hour - an enigmatic time that appears at midnight that leaves everyone save for a select few people unconscious. During this time, you awaken to your Persona, and are recruited into what will become your party, S.E.E.S., who climb the mysterious tower of Tartarus to eliminate the strange beasts known as Shadows and end the Dark Hour. The game is themed around the Fool's Journey of the tarot, and you as the Fool Arcana face powerful Shadows of each Arcana until you are forced to fight the Death Arcana. It takes a few creative liberties with the tarot, but uses them effectively to create a compelling story.
What's really interesting is that your party often have internal quarrels, and all feel like people vying for their own goals and interpretations of how things are and how they should be. It adds an interesting layer of depth to the internal dynamic of the group, but makes it all the more satisfying once everyone is on the same page. The game does a great job at making it's characters feel like their own people, beyond it's Social Links, party members typically have two major arcs that flesh them out and make them grow, and they have their own schedules and circumstances that they abide by.
P3's visual design is also really incredible, the way it combines interesting, otherworldly designs with with modern architecture in Tartarus creates a sense of familiarity, despite it's distance from the normal. Even with it's age, you can make out some really nice, cool environments across Tasumi Port Island. While the game's shown it's age, there's a certain charm in some of the solutions it found to accommodating the time and circumstances it was made in, with some interesting art choices - there's a large focus on flat colors with minimal shading. This is also present in the animated cutscenes, which results in a really memorable and unique style that gets developed to create really cool things like this piece for the Persona 3 movie.
P3's strong points are also amplified by it's great soundtrack, the sincerity it puts behind tracks like Iwatodai Dorm and the similarly cheesy, yet endlessly hype Mass Destruction make them impossible not to love. Whether you're currently listening to When The Moon's Reaching Out Stars and the complicated feelings behind it, or the eerie yet invigorating Master of Shadow, there's nearly always a song playing that's helping to tie the experience together.
Persona 3's real standard version is Persona 3 FES for the PS2. Another version of the game, Persona 3 Portable for the PSP, added the option to play as a female protagonist with new Social Links and enhanced/updated several battle mechanics. Unfortunately, it doesn't have the free roam featured in the original, you now use a cursor to explore the overworld. It's hard to make a definitive recommendation on which version since each has it's strengths and weaknesses, but if you really value the free roam and better graphics I would go for Persona 3 FES. The female protagonists route in Portable is absolutely wonderful though, I think her version is considerably better than the already great male protagonist route.
Persona 4's key color of bright yellow reflects the comfy small town atmosphere of Inaba. What is interesting though, is that it's indicative of the games themes of evasion from the truth. Behind that peppy yellow and the sleepy atmosphere of Inaba is the fact that there's a serial killer in the town who's methods are unfathomable to the police department. Only those with Stands Personas are going to be able to find out what's going on here. If that sounds familiar, that's because the premise is extraordinarily similar to that of JoJo's Bizzare Adventure Part 4: Diamond is Unbreakable. But for that reason, some of the same things that made Diamond is Unbreakable a strong manga make Persona 4 a strong game.
P4 focuses on the tension between the case and the relief of trying to live life peacefully and fun in Inaba, where you'll be staying with your uncle Dojima, a detective for the local police force. Soon after transferring to Yasogami High School, you and some classmates will investigate a local rumor that you can travel to alternate world through a television. Low and behold, the rumor wasn't unfounded, and you'll find yourself in the backside of the TV, home, among other things, to it's great signature theme. After an enigmatic resident of the world explains how it works, you'll begin to use the world to stop the murderer. This is where the Investigation Team is born. P4 is also heavily about escapism, and what's perhaps the main crux of the game is helping the people who'll become your party members confront Shadow versions of themselves, borne from their repressed malcontent with who they are. For them to awaken their Personas, they'll need to come to terms with themselves. They'll end up being the ones who reach out to the truth when no one else can. The Investigation Team frequently meets up for general activities and gets along well, making for a comfortable atmosphere despite the creeping tension of living in Inaba. It makes for an interesting experience, even within the Persona series.
The art is very pop, and does a lot to emphasize it's more upbeat exterior compared to the other games. This extends to it's battle screens and UI elements. It's further supported by some incredible tracks like Heartbeat, Heartbreak, and Signs of Love, which really build up your time in Inaba as something special. Because of this, along with it's character dynamics and welcoming atmosphere, it's also a good way to get into the series since it's tone leaves it very approachable, and eases you into the eccentric and odd elements that give Persona it's unique flavor.
Persona 4 is available for the PS2, and the updated rerelease, Persona 4: Golden, is available for PS Vita.
Persona 5 / Why is Persona 5 cool?
Now to actually talk about Persona 5, the main course here. And it's incredible.
Persona 5 is the most recent main series Persona game, released in September 2016 in Japan and April 2017 in the West, after numerous delays from it's supposed Winter 2014 release date. Despite Persona 3's 2006 release and Persona 4's 2008 release being very close together, it took 8 years after 4 for 5 to be released - mostly due to the transition to HD development. Taking their time proved to be well worth it though, because we ended up with one of the best, most passionately adored, and memorable games of 2017 - and probably of the console generation - likely beyond that, too, even. Even Sakurai himself is a massive fan of the game!
P5 has done a lot to update the series' visual presentation to the modern era, and you can really see the fruits of the labor of developing Catherine (PS3, 360, PS4, Vita) here, because the experience in creating HD models acquired from making Catherine couldn't be more clear - the models in Persona 5 are gorgeous.
In fact, the whole game is gorgeous. That Joker announcement trailer wasn't just for show - it's inspired by the Persona 5 intro. Everything, from the title screen, to the shop menus, to your equipment menus; from every component of the battle menu, elements of it's battle mechanics, and beyond - all of it is absolutely dripping with style. And not just any style, it's style reflecting the picaresque stories that inspired it, as well as it's key color - a striking crimson.
The use of strong crimson works well to establish that you will make yourself be seen. It's a color of confidence. We'll get to that soon. In Persona 5, you play as a transfer student that you choose the name of. This is Joker. Joker, though is a code name, which will make sense in a short while. His canon name is either Akira Kurusu or Ren Amamiya, depending on the adaption. You, Joker, were expelled from your original school due to trying to help a woman deal with a belligerent man who turns out to be a powerful politician. He gets you in a lot of legal trouble, and this leads to you having to move to Yongen-Jaya, near Tokyo, where you'll be attending Shujin Academy, and live in the (surprisingly comfy) attic of the LeBlanc cafe, owned by your new guardian, Sojiro.
You'll notice your phone has a mysterious application that cannot be deleted, and at night you appear in the Velvet Room. This series of events will allow you to access the Metaverse, an alternate version of the world where people will especially strong distorted thoughts and feelings alter the very landscape. In the Metaverse, the world is dictated by what people think and feel. For example, if someone happened to think a model gun was a real gun, in the Metaverse, the model gun would work exactly like a real gun would. The places resulting from that are referred to as Palaces, and are inhabited by Shadows, as well as a Shadow version of the one who's thoughts and feelings created the Palace. You'll end up here alongside a couple of classmates, and you'll find that a truly vile and manipulative teacher has transformed the Metaverse version of Shujin into a castle. An odd and enigmatic character will explain how the Metaverse and it's Palaces operate. They'll focus on something in particular - stealing hearts. By sending a calling card to provoke the owner of the Palace, a precious item will appear within the Palace's confines. By stealing that item, you can force someone to admit their crimes. Naturally, you'll be using this technique to take down the revolting teacher, while the school administration tries desperately to cover up the issue to save face. This operation is the birth of the Phantom Thieves, your party who seeks to use the ability to steal hearts to bring hope to downtrodden people, just like creating rivers in the desert.
That's where the use of crimson and picaresque inspiration comes into play, and what the central theming of Persona 5 revolves around. Persona 5 is about making sure your voice is heard. When the powerful are free to control people however they want, and apathy begins to set in as no one feels like they can do anything, the only choice you have is the wake up, get up, and get out there, because that's the only way life will change. So, you do just that. With your newfound power, you help out various people who have resigned themselves to live underneath someone else's heel, and give them the reminder that they need that it's worth trying to control your own life and push for change. There's a lot more to unpack in this department, but some of it dives into spoiler territory, so please trust me when I say it's remarkably well thought out, interesting, and powerful.
Each of your party members Personas are based of off famous rogues of history and myth, with your own original one being Arsene, based on Arsene Lupin. Almost every aspect of the games plays up your nature as the Phantom Thieves - the story dungeons of the previous games are now elaborately designed areas where heists occur, from castles to tombs to museums. The Social Links are now Confidants, and the bonuses they provide are not only to your Personas, but also directly help your abilities in the Metaverse, as they come to support your intentions as the Phantom Thieves. There's now a stealth system, and the advantageous stage on an enemy Shadow is now an ambush.
There's been several gameplay improvements as well - dungeon exploration is perfected, with the Palaces each having their own unique layouts and themes, as well as sporting some great art direction. You're fully free to run and explore the Palace with snappy terrain traversal, as well. In battle, the game is streamlined immensely by one simple change - the new battle UI. What's changed is that instead of scrolling through menus like a traditional JRPG, every button corresponds to an action. There are menus you can enter from there, but this one simple change really improves the game feel from great to sublime.
P5 also brings back demon negotiation from SMT and Persona 1 & 2. As stated far back in this post, the demons you acquire as Personas appear as Shadows in the Metaverse. Now, not only can you fuse Personas in the Velvet Room, but you can also persuade Shadows by targeting their weakness and holding them at gunpoint, known as a hold up. From there, you can pressure them into joining you, or giving you money/items. The Shadows are pretty weird though, so prepare to think outside the box when it comes to your conversations with them.
I've dotted some songs around in this section, but I do want to point out that the music, lovingly crafted by Shoji Meguro (composer of most of Atlus' largest games, including SMT 3 and Persona 3-5), is superb. It has some of the smoothest, some of the most invigorating, and honestly some of the best general music I've ever heard - the music in Persona 5 is a narration of the game to a degree that few other games compare to.
Naturally, like the previous games, Persona 5 blends it's art, themes, gameplay, and music extraordinarily well, but 5 might just be on a level above even them. Every element on it's own is incredible and well thought out - from it's art, it's themes of rebellion and change, it's wonderful gameplay systems, to it's legendary music. The cohesion and synthesis is at an unbelievable level. Here's just a few examples of how it's elements play off of each other:

1. The art supports the gameplay by making the battles incredibly satisfying with wonderful animations. Targeting enemy weaknesses conveys a large weight. I linked a regular attack that didn't exploit a weakness as a frame of reference, critical hits and high-level skills get even better.
   
2. The menus and UI take inspiration from comic books as well as grafitti, evoking underdog heroes and a rebellious nature, so the themes of the game are always present in some capacity - even when simply equipping a new weapon.
   
3. The music sells the themes through it's lyrics and subject matter, creating some truly incredible moments. Especially in the later half of the game, the music will take you on it's own journey with how much it can command the mood of a scene, especially during heists and boss battles.
   
4. The Palace exploration gameplay supports the themes, because you are not only like thieves in a narrative sense, you also explore Palaces like a thief, ambushing enemies with maneuvers they never saw coming.
   
5. Often many elements will be supporting each other at one time. Once a calling card is sent, the tension rises to a fever pitch - you are executing your plans to topple corrupt individuals, the music is playing your signature theme as the Palace owner is getting increasingly desperate to stop you, the art is selling each of the Thieves' unwavering determination, and the whole Palace is on absolute maximum security, which is even reflected by the game's stealth mechanics setting the Palace to it's maximum alert level. These moments and many more are truly brilliant.
   

Not to discard core Persona elements, P5's Confidants are just as interesting and engaging as the Social Links of it's predecessors. There's a ton of characters to interact with, and the stories deal with topics ranging from parental issues to deep self-loathing to dealing with ostracization, with stories that can be about caring for loved ones with severe depression, or how to become a stronger person to support friends who have suffered. That's a very small sample, there's many more stories with their own topics, as well. There's a lot of really tender and important moments in these Social Links, and, just like in real life, there's also calming and fun moments of levity too. There's guaranteed to be multiple characters you'll be interested in, especially if you go out of your way to give them a chance and listen to their stories.
Persona 5 brings the series to the modern era in a spectacular fashion, and I think it's a game people really should enter with an open mind, because it might just become one of your favorite games ever.
Persona 5 is currently available for PS3 and PS4, but I highly doubt Atlus will keep it exclusive to those platforms now that there's a few million people with a Switch who are interested. Every prior Persona game has been remade, and Persona 3 actually had an updated rerelease fairly soon after the original. We'll likely see Persona 5 appear on Switch in the coming year or so, and maybe it'll even be updated!
Who is Joker and what's he like? Why is he cool?
So, Joker is the main character of Persona 5. He's your player character and the leader of the Phantom Thieves. In the real world, he normally tries to avoid drawing attention to himself, though when confronted he can get pretty sassy. He often has dialogue choices for messing with people. In the Metaverse he's in his element, and is very cocky. You can tell he enjoys every second of being a thief. He's got a great design and he's just generally really fucking cool. He also sounds amazing, given that he shares his voice actor with the Smash Bros. announcer, Xander Mobus. You can listen to all his voice lines right here, in all their glory. They're also very entertaining to listen to in a row like that.
In terms of moveset, Joker's has three weapons - a dagger, a gun, and most importantly by far, access to well over 100 Personas, all of which have their own unique forms and abilities. His Persona abilities are absolutely gargantuan, and this is very certainly going to be his main method of combat, no matter what game he's in. Even his main Persona, Arsene, will provide a wide array of abilities, with an emphasis on dark magic. Expect Joker to be fairly fast and have a wide array of tools at his disposal.
Significance of Joker in Smash
It's abundantly clear by now that I love Persona, and not only is Joker's inclusion beyond wonderful for bringing a very nice character from an incredible game to Smash, it's also going to bring so much more attention to this series, and I couldn't be more glad for it.
The reality that there's gonna be so many new faces experiencing this series is so heartwarming to me, because I look back at my time with Persona 5 back on it's initial release as some of the best time I've ever spent with a video game. I hope many more will get to feel the same.
Just to think, there's probably well over a million, probably well over a few million people eagerly awaiting the first DLC character of the fighter pass, and Nintendo and Atlus took this opportunity to introduce so many people to this absolutely lovely series. Persona used to be pretty niche before Persona 5, despite the series' constant praise along with it's fairly wide and intensely passionate adoration, so I'm glad it's finally and indisputably made a name for itself, and gets to be included in the ever growing family of Smash Brothers, among the greatest names gaming has ever seen.
To me, I think it's earned it. Lookin' cool, Joker.

Preface

With Joker ready to seize the ultimate treasure that is a spot on the roster today, I thought it'd be right to talk about what exactly Persona is, and why the hype is absolutely incredible right now.
Persona has actually seen tremendously passionate adoration and considerable critical success for quite a while now - you may have heard about it in passing years ago - but it had stood as a cult classic, since the mainline games hadn't had a major console installment since 2008.
That is, until the release of Persona 5; much like the Phantom Thieves themselves, the series has erupted onto the main stage, taking the hearts of countless people in a way that many never saw coming.
Amidst all the hype, you may be wondering what lies beneath the mask.
Persona's one of my absolute favorite series, and it has a very special place in my heart. So, Joker's inclusion in Smash is so absolutely legendary that I still don't think I have the words to describe how much it means to me.
What I do hope I have words for though, is why Persona is so wonderful, beloved, and worth your time. Hopefully these words are also better than last time; this post is actually an echo fighter, noted by the little epsilon symbol!
I recommend Reddit Enhancement Suite, since it lets you expand images here in the OP while reading, plus it comes with a bunch of really nice features!
It's worth mentioning that Persona isn't really for everyone in the same way something like Mario or Zelda are; but if you go into it with an open mind, it can offer oceans of fun, along with just as vast amounts of thoughtful experiences; and maybe even some of the fondest and most important time you've had with games.
And maybe, if you really resonate with it, after playing, life will change.
So, let us start the game.
But first...

Shin Megami Tensei

Before talking about Persona itself, I think it's right, especially in a Nintendo context, to talk about the series it's derived from, Shin Megami Tensei - also known as SMT or Megaten.
See, Persona is actually a spinoff series of SMT. While it's not necessary to be familiar with SMT in order to understand or enjoy Persona, as they do not share continuities; SMT is strong in it's own right, and it also helps provide insight to the developer, Atlus (who are now owned by Sega).
SMT is a JRPG series spanning back to 1987 - but despite how evocative that may seem of many classic RPG franchises - SMT's identity and mannerisms are a world apart. While many of its contemporaries adopted traditional fantasy settings, which they'd later develop in different ways, SMT had, from it's inception, been vastly different from its peers.
SMT's world is Earth - in the throes of a devastating apocalypse, one that's left it as little else but rubble; along with a peculiar effect - the world is now teeming head to toe with otherworldly beings. The planet's become the subject of a territorial dispute between rival forces of Law and Chaos, the ranks of which are comprised of a whole pantheon of figures.
...Actually, make that multiple pantheons, because I mean that as literally as possible - the beings you meet in SMT (referred to as demons, regardless of affiliation) are all from real world religion, mythology, and folklore; and are used to present conflicting ideologies developed over the course of history.
You form pacts with these demons and fight alongside them; which isn't all that different from Pokemon, at its core. But, while Pokemon and their mechanics are fairly straightforward (at least on the surface), SMT's demons... are a bit different.
Not just because you fuse them, either: in SMT, demons are not pets or mere obstacles: the demons are the people you talk to. They are the residents of the world - the NPCs, the enemies, and the allies, so your experiences with them are much more broad than with the same kind of entities in other games. Maybe they'll try and shake you down for cash, maybe you'll enter a weird conversation, maybe you'll try and recruit them, or maybe they'll just kill you.
Some enemies will admit your strength, or fall for your words and join you, but others may not be so obedient. The opposing forces of Law and Chaos are also comprised of those who seek to make you follow their ideology. These conflicts will be especially uncompromising, but if you can continue to best your opponents, you'll be able to learn more of the philosophies of each faction, and make your decision on what should become of the remnants of the Earth.
As for why it's good to mention SMT in a Nintendo context; it's because the series actually appears pretty frequently on Nintendo consoles, and is often exclusive, too. Although, what's probably the strongest and most recommended game in the series, SMT III: Nocturne, is a PS2 exclusive, but isn't that difficult to get a hold of it you have something that can play PS2 games.
Modern SMT games on Nintendo consoles:

• SMT IV, and SMT IV: Apocalypse are both available on 3DS. They are the most recent mainline entries, and are solid titles.
  
• SMT Strange Journey is available for the DS. It's really tough, but it's also one of the best in the series. There's a 3DS version, Strange Journey Redux, but it's highly advised to play the original instead, because it's far favored over Redux.
  
• SMT V is an upcoming Switch exclusive. It's unclear how far along in development it is, but it was actually unveiled back around when the Switch itself was. Maybe we'll get to see Unreal Engine work it's magic on Jack Frost sometime soon-ish.
  

And, if you've ever wondered where that "Featuring Dante from the Devil May Cry Series" emblem comes from, well, that's from Nocturne. Yes, Dante is featured in that game.
...I can't end this section without some more of series (and Atlus) mascot Jack Frost, so here hee is, ho!

What exactly is Persona?

Experimenting with SMT, Atlus would release SMT If..., which would receive a spiritual successor, Revelations: Persona for the PS1. This started to establish some primary differences between the two series: SMT would be focused on navigating the apocalypse and the will of its residents, but Persona would instead opt for a focus on the people who would have to navigate the mire of the mind, in their own bouts of survival.
It enjoyed modest popularity, and was followed by Persona 2: Innocent Sin and Persona 2: Eternal Punishment, both for PS1 (and would see PSP remakes).
The first set of Persona games have some great things going for them, but because they are a touch archaic, and so different from their successors, the rest of this post is going to focus on Persona 3, 4, & 5.
After acclimating to the PS2 environment, Atlus took the opportunity to revitalize Persona under an all new creative vision, for Persona 3.
Katsura Hashino, director of SMT III, assumed the same role for the new title, bringing new mechanics, ideas, and customs to the series; while the art was headed by Shigenori Soejima, who made an incredible effort to modernize the series and provide it with a tremendously unique identity and style. Additionally, long time Atlus composer Shoji Meguro expressed great satisfaction with the project, as it allowed him to compose music that he'd always wanted to. Each of these creative directors have worked on Persona 3, 4, & 5, keeping the design philosophy consistent, yet dynamic.
Persona games, like father, like son, are JRPGs. But despite sharing the same genre as SMT; what I think is more interesting and important, is how the two series contrast with each other.
While SMT's world is strange and largely solemn - characterized by its desolate landscape and strange, otherworldly residents; Persona's setting is far more intimate, taking place in modern day Japan. And because of that, Persona is very different from SMT - by changing the setting, while also having a similar core design philosophy, you end up with something entirely new:
The odd interactions with demons are now conversations and activities with friends;
The pacts with demons are now friendships you forge with peers who've awakened to the ability to summon a Persona, changing their world drastically;
And the coldly delivered questions posed by self-righteous demons are now melancholic, tender, and often relatable musings by regular people about the harsh realities and unfortunate feelings they face.
That's the basis for the most important difference between SMT and Persona, and the one that arguably informs all the rest: Shin Megami Tensei is about philosophy and talking to demons, while Persona is about psychology, and talking to people. This difference effects just about every aspect of the game, and provides Persona with a whole new set of strengths, as well as a tremendously unique identity.
A key to that identity is that among Persona's many themes, the most recognizable, central, and universal is its heavy inspiration from Jungian psychology. Many of Carl Jung's ideas are adapted into elements of the game, like the collective unconscious, archetypes, and most prominently, the persona and shadow; which are all featured as important ideas and mechanics. While you don't need to be familiar with those ideas to enjoy Persona, and the game doesn't make background information necessary, nor does it try to explain the concepts beyond what is needed, seeing the elements at play is still very interesting.
Central to those themes, is the Velvet Room and its surrounding subjects. This room exists between dreams and reality, mind and matter; explained by its residents and expressed by its endlessly memorable theme.
The Velvet Room is connected to the collective unconscious, humanity's shared ideas and visions, and the residents of the enigmatic room - a mysterious man named Igor, along with his various assistants - will assist you on your journey: detailing important points about the journey you will embark on, explaining the importance of the relationships you forge (which is very important and we'll come back to that soon), and allowing you to fuse and recall Personas, summoning them from the sea of the soul.
Personas are manifestations of a person's soul, and are capable of fighting, or in some cases, providing external support. They're understood to operate more or less like another limb; and if you're familiar with Stands, from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure (Part 3 onwards), Personas are very similar. Personas are not usually able to be summoned in the real world, however. This means that you and your teammates are actually more or less normal people, and act as such on any given day; but can explore an alternate world and call upon your Personas there, to accomplish a goal that'll effect the real world.
The demons that you face in SMT are now the Personas you fuse and equip. Where in SMT, they were residents of the game's world, in Persona, they are representations of icons that humanity has created - cultivated from, and passed into, the collective unconscious. They each correspond to one of the Major Arcana of the Tarot deck of cards, representing the archetype of person that they are similar to, who they resonate with, and what ideas and values they express. This concept is very important, and we'll return to it soon.
So, a few major elements have come up, and they sound pretty different; there's a heavy focus on interacting with people in your local area, and you explore a "counterpart world," summoning Personas to fight. That's because Persona is comprised of two hemispheres, a dungeon crawling RPG half, and a social sim half, which support and play off of each other.
The RPG half consists of the supernatural elements of the games. Exploring labyrinthine towers, twisted worlds behind the TV, locations born from warped thoughts, and more; while summoning Personas to fight against the hostile beings known as Shadows, who come in countless different forms.
Shadows are your opponents in these strange places, and are sort of counterparts to Personas. Weak shadows aren't quite tied right to one person, but stronger ones take the form of conglomerations of identities (told through their Arcana), or are born from the unconscious or repressed thoughts and feelings of a specific person.
By defeating these Shadows and exploring the environment, you'll be able to effect the real world in various ways, which change from game to game. Managing to accomplish this while juggling your real world responsibilities is a critical pillar of Persona's design. Which brings us to...
The Social Sim half. Since you can only summon Personas when exploring the "counterpart world," you're a normal person when you aren't over there. So, you're encouraged to live as you like in the meantime - hanging out with your friends, talking to passersby, messing around at the arcade, going to the movies, reading books, fishing, doing part-time work, visiting nearby landmarks, and tons more.
You play through almost every day of the calendar across the game's many months, and become well acquainted with your surroundings in the process. It creates a very intimate setting, and the experience feels special, as you have fun, accomplish goals, explore opportunities, and share important conversations with the people around you.
These games shine when you take your time: it's best to savor the experience and immerse yourself, so I'd very strongly advise against rushing - these games are long. Like, I'm talking 60+ hours as a lower estimate. But each hour has something pleasant, interesting, or thoughtful, and the culmination of it all results in something that's even greater than the sum of its already wonderful parts.
Talking to the people around you is the main attraction here, and the old pals from the Velvet Room are here to help establish that: Igor explains the power of Social Links or Confidants, the bonds you form with others. Each of them, not coincidentally, also correspond to the Major Arcana of the Tarot - The people you meet present you with a bond, based on their identity and how they relate themselves to you.
Strengthening these relationships is especially important to Persona, and learning about the different characters is both fulfilling on it's own, and it supports the themes of the game, as many character's arcs have a message that resonates with the key ideas expressed by each title.
These bonds you forge aren't just for the social sim segment either - improving your relationships with Social Links/Confidants will grant you more experience when fusing Personas of a corresponding Arcana. On the flipside, spending time with people is more effective when you're carrying a Persona of the same Arcana as them.
That principle isn't the only way Persona's two halves compliment one another: a central element of the games progression is accomplishing goals efficiently, before the deadline approaches for a mission. Balance is key, both for the player, and for the game's design; and this philosophy is one of the many reasons Persona is an incredible and unique series.

Why is Persona cool?

To start, the premise is great - playing through each day over the course of many months cultivates a strong fondness for the places you frequent, and an even greater fondness for the people you meet and interact with. The games encourage you to prioritize what you care about most, you are meant to do what you want to do, more or less like real life. It's up to you to pursue Social Links with characters you enjoy, to do the activities you like or the ones that help better you as a person, and to explore the mysterious "counterpart world," prepare yourself for what's ahead, and complete tasks on time.
Your decisions are your own - do you care most about being smart, charming, or bold? Do you care more about being charming enough to get close to certain people, or would you rather first focus on your friends who don't need that? Who are you most interested in; the regretful monk spending time in the club, or the shady businessman with the infectiously catchy theme? Maybe you've become very invested in listening to the sick young man at the park, or maybe you've come to really enjoy talking to your club-mates.
You may have decided to try and close the gap between you and your guardian, or you may have decided to try getting to know the back-alley doctor, or the downtrodden politician, or the aloof shop owner. Which of your close friends and party members are you most invested in? Do you want to focus on supporting your friend who's been ostracized, or is helping another friend get past life as a shut-in your absolute highest priority?
There's tons of great characters, and getting to know people from different walks of life is central to Persona. Like real life, the conversations with each person can range from fun and simple pleasantries, to tough questions, to genuinely really thoughtful and touching moments. Some characters struggle with issues that you or someone you know may have struggled with, and some of those issues may be ones that would be difficult to find tackled in any other game; whether it be dealing with self-loathing and depression, deteriorating family life, jealousy, ostracization, or many, many other topics. Characters are something Persona does a fantastic job with.
Forming priorities makes for a personalized experience, so for that reason I advise against using a guide that maximizes Social Links on your first playthrough. It's tempting to follow a guide, but you playing the game as you would on your own makes the experience even more genuine, and strengthens the already stellar social sim segments.
The game's two sides supporting each other through the the Velvet Room makes for a remarkably resonant experience: seeing your Social Links allow you to create powerful Personas is rewarding; and noticing the observations you make about the real world influence the landscape of the alternate one keeps the scenario engaging. Seeing the game adapt elements of Jungian psychology is similarly interesting, as several key aspects of the series can be traced back to those ideas. Not only does it have a universal impact on the series through the Velvet Room and the concepts of Personas and Shadows, but each game also provides their own ways to mix the concepts into their stories, which also sport their own specific themes apart from each other.
In tandem with that idea, Persona's music, art, and atmosphere are all superb and unforgettable; due to them each sharing a core foundation, but splitting into different directions, giving each game a unique personal identity that they all understand extraordinarily well. One of the best ways to see this is through each game's key color; Persona 3's cool blue, Persona 4's bright yellow, and Persona 5's striking crimson. Because they're so distinct, I'd like to talk about Persona 3, 4, and 5 in their own sections, which should introduce, and hopefully explain why each of them are individually strong games, as well as great contributors to an excellent series.

Persona 3

As mentioned before, Persona 3 would be the first in the "modern" line of Persona games; bringing many of the series conventions with it, such as Social Links, the calendar system, and a focus on modern audio and visual design, among other things.
The game's color of cool blue is evocative of its melancholic feel - Persona 3 is about the heavy topic of death and loss. But even though life is merely a journey to the grave, it must not be taken without hope. Persona 3 is also more principally about forming bonds with people so that they'll have memories of you, finding the resolve to live even when it doesn't feel worth it, and spending your time wisely, because life is fleeting, yet meaningful. What I said on Persona being about prioritizing what's most important to you is especially prevalent here, as that idea directly ties back to the core themes of the game, creating a great resonance across the entire experience.
This is also told through the journey of Persona 3; an adaptation of the Fool's Journey of the Tarot. As you move into the dorms of Tatsumi Port Island's Gekkoukan High School, you'll make an eerie voyage across the city, staying conscious during an enigmatic time right at midnight, the Dark Hour, which incapacitates all but a few individuals. Upon your surprisingly safe arrival, you'll settle into the dorm. A short while later though, the Dark Hour gets more perilous, due to the arrival of a Full Moon. When the moon's glow is whole and clear, a terribly powerful Shadow will appear, each one numbered with one of the major Arcana.
Under this stress, you'll awaken to your Persona, marking your entry into the organization of S.E.E.S., who scale the enigmatic tower of Tartarus to end the Dark Hour and eliminate the Shadows who inhabit it. But scaling Tartarus isn't your only concern in the Dark Hour; as the Fool Arcana, you'll also need to defeat the Full Moon Shadows and prepare for a showdown with the 13th Arcana, Death; all the while making sure to take care of your regular, everyday life.
The setting and atmosphere of Persona 3 is tremendously effectively told through its art: though the game is certainly dated by today's standards, the art direction is excellent, and more than makes up for it. It sports strong environment design across Tatsumi Port Island's many areas, cultivating a sense of comfort, with a powerful feeling of "relaxed" order and refinement, that is relayed by the sort of modernized art P3 uses. This contrasts with the supernatural elements and designs of the game's Dark Hour, in a way that creates a special sort of harmony in dissonance, as the hemispheres give weight to each other, working very well to illustrate different sides of an experience.
There's also an interesting layer of abstraction to the art, with an emphasis on minimal shading, even in the animated cutscenes, which makes for an compelling style that makes the game stand apart, even from it's peers. It'd later be adapted in other ways to create some fantastic art, like this piece for the movie, and art for Dancing in Moonlight, among other things.
Persona 3's identity is also sold extremely well through its music. The audio design at play here is downright fascinating, and extraordinarily captivating. Like the art, it has a resounding sense of well-planned contrast, and it features a focus on both eerie electronic themes, and especially its own distinct brand of hip-hop. The sincerity it puts behind tracks like Iwatodai Dorm and the similarly cheesy, yet endlessly hype Mass Destruction makes them impossible not to love. Whether Joy is adding color to a walk with a friend, or When the Moon's Reaching Out Stars is offering melancholy and purpose while planning out the day, or the eerie yet invigorating Master of Shadow narrates an encounter, there is always a song playing that supports the mood immensely. P3 is a musical journey, and there's still many tracks you'll encounter that'll continue to demonstrate that, and I just can't spoil them.
Persona 3 is available on PS2, and a director's cut, Persona 3 FES is also on PS2. There's also another edition, Persona 3 Portable, for PSP. It features the option to play as a female protagonist, with some different Social Links, although it doesn't allow free roam. It's difficult to recommend one over the other, because the free roam of FES makes the environment feel more alive, but I am especially fond of the additions and changes that the female protagonist's route through the game offers.

Persona 4

P4 followed shortly after 3, but took a fairly different approach - rather than following Persona 3's outwardly melancholic themes and color scheme, Persona 4 adopts an extremely peppy and bright yellow.
This carries sort of a double meaning - while P4 is much cheerier than many of the other titles Atlus has developed, but it's also referential of the game's themes of escapism. Behind the happy-go-lucky veneer is the fact that there's been a series of murders committed in the small town of Inaba. The police and detectives have been unable to make any headway into the case, driving the unrest higher. All the same, everyone attempts to continue living a peaceful existence in the town.
In the face of this threat, it's up to your team of Persona users to get to the bottom of this. If that sounds familiar, that's because it's extraordinarily similar to the premise of JoJo's Bizzare Adventure Part 4: Diamond is Unbreakable. But because of that, many aspects that make Diamond is Unbreakable a strong manga, such as the setting, tension, and atmosphere, similarly make Persona 4 a strong game.
You'll be transferring to Inaba to live with your uncle, arriving in the wake of the shock, so you'll be hearing various rumors around town. One of them stands out in particular though - the urban legend of the Midnight Channel. Supposedly, by viewing a TV during midnight during torrential rain, something very strange will occur. The rumors aren't unfounded, and you'll find yourself able to access a world existing in the backside of the TV.
What you'll come to realize, though, is that this place is even more unusual and hostile than it would initially appear - in this world, there exists Shadow forms of individuals - repressed and unconscious feelings of malcontent with oneself; which stand as the major bosses of P4. If someone can accept themselves this way, they may awaken to a Persona. Learning this, along with conversing with a friendly resident of the Midnight Channel, leads to the creation of the Investigation Team, who use the Midnight Channel to reach out to the truth, and attempt to solve the case of the murders plaguing Inaba.
Core to P4, is acknowledging things for what they really are, and using that to grow. This manifests in different many ways across the game, but for the Investigation Team, it allows for a close group of pals who meet often just to mess around, as they get more comfortable with each other. The relaxed nature of time with friends makes for an interesting dichotomy with the creeping tension of living in Inaba, as everyone tries to make the most of the position they find themselves in.
Persona 4's design is similarly very strong, following the tradition established by P3. The art is heavily pop inspired, extending to its take on the supernatural elements, and emphasizing its more upbeat nature compared to its predecessors. The music follows suit, with incredibly memorable tracks like Heartbeat, Heartbreak and Signs of Love, among many, many other great tracks that accompany your time in Inaba, characterizing it as something special.
Persona 4 is available for PS2, and the remastered Persona 4 Golden is available for Vita. Because of the welcoming atmosphere, it's also a very good game to enter the series with, easing you the eccentric and odd elements that give Persona it's unique flavor.

Persona 5

Persona 5 is the most recent main series Persona game, released in 2016 (JP)/2017 (West). With the shift to HD development, it took about 8 years in total for P5 to release after P4. But, taking their time proved to be well worth it, as Persona 5 ended up being one of the most acclaimed, passionately adored, and memorable games of 2017; likely even the whole console generation, and maybe beyond that too! Even Sakurai himself is a massive fan!
The upgrade in visual presentation brought by P5 is immense, immediately you can see that the models in Persona 5 are gorgeous. In fact, the whole game is gorgeous. Joker's announcement trailer wasn't just for show, it's inspired by the intro of Persona 5. Persona's trademark superb art direction runs wild here: everything from the title screen, to the various menus, to elements of the battle mechanics, and far, far beyond, absolutely everything radiates style. But it's not just style for the sake of it - the art at play is purposefully evocative of the picaresque stories that inspire P5, and actively support the game's themes; doing so with a signature striking crimson.
After an encounter with a belligerent man harassing a woman, your efforts to intervene have landed you on probation, as that man was a powerful politician. This altercation also leads you transferring to Shujin Academy, your new high school; and lodging in the attic of the Leblanc Cafe, under the supervision of your new guardian.
As fate would have it, things can never quite become peaceful: at night you'll arise in the Velvet Room, and after a fairly austere introduction, you are informed of your "role." You'll settle into your new school the next day; but before you get too comfortable, something very strange happens: when you attempt to get to school again, alongside another student, the two of you arrive in a sinister and unnerving location where the school is meant to be. You've stumbled into the Metaverse, a mirror world where people's warped thoughts change the landscape. Here, cognition is key; what people think dictates how things work.
And if someone's thoughts are especially distorted, the Metaverse responds with the creation of a Palace - a counterpart to a location; inhabited by Shadows and dictated by how that person feels about the original place. This first one you come across is Shujin itself; turned into a castle by an absolutely vile and abusive teacher. A lone friendly resident of this world will instruct you of the rules of this place, especially the critical ability to "steal hearts." If you send a calling card to provoke the Palace owner, a precious "Treasure" will appear in the Palace. Stealing it will cause the Palace owner to acknowledge the damage they've caused, admitting their crimes. You'll use this to take down that awful teacher, as the school administration tries desperately to save face. This operation forms the Phantom Thieves, who seek to use this new power to bring hope to the downtrodden, like creating rivers in the desert.
This vision and purpose is where the use of crimson manifests; a color of anger and indignation, that's also suave and striking - a perfect match with the identity of the Phantom Thieves, and Persona 5 as a whole: when those with power are able to trample others under their heel, and apathy sets in as abuse and manipulation feels inevitable, the only recourse is to wake up, get up, and get out there; because that's the only way life will change. With your new abilities, you play the role of vigilante heroes, who take down the manipulative and help those in need, giving them the reminder they need that it's worth trying to control your life and fight for change. This is your method of reforming society.
Just about every component of the game supports your nature as the Phantom Thieves - your Personas are famous rogues, the Palaces all take the form of heist locations, like tombs and museums; the Social Links are now a network of Confidants that come to support your exploits in different ways; and the dungeons now sport a stealth system for your Palace infiltration.
The gameplay improvements bring out even more of the game's strengths; dungeon exploration is perfected, as you explore visually impressive and elaborately designed Palaces at a brisk pace, with fluid movement. The battles are streamlined immensely by the iconic battle UI; where instead of scrolling through menus - every action corresponds to a button. It doesn't sound like much, but the effect is huge, and it improves the game feel from great to sublime. Demon negotiation returns from Persona 1, 2, and SMT; the Shadows you fight can now provide items, money, or even join your arsenal of Personas, from a negotiation. They're as weird as always, so be prepared to play along with them.
While experiencing the game's many hours, and the different feelings within them, you are treated to what is likely some of Meguro's best work - the music of P5 is legendary. I've scattered many tracks throughout the post, and I think they're all excellent on their own; consisting of some of the smoothest and most invigorating music you can find, but what's especially impressive is how wonderfully they support the parts of the game they are found in - the music of P5 is a narration of the game in a way that few others match.
Just as the previous titles, P5 converges its art, music, gameplay, and themes exceptionally well; but P5 might even surpass them in that respect. Every single component is exemplary on it's own, but the way each aspect supports the other ones creates a truly incredible synthesis, and a truly sublime larger whole. A very short list on some ways the parts of the game play off of one another:

1. The music sells the themes, with incredible songs composed of lyrics that detail the mood and emotions of a scene, resulting in some truly spectacular moments.
   
2. The themes are relayed by the art, with the inspiration from comic books and grafitti evoking the images of underdogs and rebellion, so that the themes are constantly present, whether you're investigating Palaces, deepening relationships with Confidants, or even just equipping some new armor.
   
3. The way you fight and traverse the Palaces resonates with the premise of the game, as you sleuth across the dungeons looking for a path to the Treasure, dispatching of enemies with maneuvers they never saw coming.
   
4. Often times, many elements will be supporting each other at once. Upon sending a calling card, the tension rises to a fever pitch - executing your plans to topple corrupt individuals, as your signature theme plays while the Palace owner is getting increasingly desperate to stop you; the art selling each of the Thieves' unwavering determination, and the whole Palace set to absolute maximum security, reflected by alert level. These moments, and many more, are truly brilliant.
   

Persona 5 brings the series into the new age in an exemplary way, and is available on PS3 & PS4 for $20. I cannot recommend it enough, and it's essentially the perfect starting point for Persona, and even SMT as a whole. If you go into it with an open mind, it can easily become one of your favorite games ever, along with a franchise of many more.
I can't say for sure, of course, but I think some form of Persona 5 on Switch is likely. I hope with all my heart.
I hope this thread was interesting, and a good introduction!
Persona is such a special series, and I'm beyond excited to see more people experience it; and I simply can't be grateful enough that Joker is included in Super Smash Bros., among the greatest names gaming has ever seen.
It still gives me the dumbest smile just thinking about it.
...And you probably already know what I wanna say.