Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 Golden Game Journal - Part 3

 10/12/2020 -

So after rescuing Kanji, I make good progress on some social links and social stats. I also happen to unlock Tanaka's shopping show. This guy was great in Persona 3. I could only buy stuff for the 1st week though, as I spent the rest of my money on a Mega Beef Bowl which did wonders for my social stats. I also read Beginner's fishing, so i'm looking foward to some fishing. We meet up with Kanji and he joins our party. I am hoping I can unlock his S-link soon.

The crew meets up at Junes and does some actual detective work, which is really cool. I like games that do stuff like that. Even if you already know the solutions or twists, it's still nice to see the characters deduce them. Anyways I unlock the scooter and head back to the Bathhouse to grind and fight the optional boss.

- Intolerant Officer

Ok so he's not really that hard, he just takes a while to take down. His Bufu attacks were troublesome, as Rasakasha is weak to it so he defeated me. On the 2nd attempt, I actually won since I chose to use Power instead, who while doesn't have Rasakasha's strength, does have the buffs and debuffs I need. Also Yukiko kept evading his ice attacks so that was good. He did get 2 lucky shots though and killed her, but I revived her right after. It wasn't really a notable fight though.

So after that I scoured Yukiko's castle for extra money and those table shadows for a request. I spend the next day completing requests and stuff. More social life stuff happens, and then Yosuke, Kanji and head to Okina City where we have one of those Operation Babehunts that the recent Persona games likes to do. I get some lady's phone number. This then leads to an actually funny scene with the lady's father. After that, we are introduced to Hanako, who is some ugly bitch who wrecks Yosuke's new motorcycle. Damn I feel bad for him. It feels like his butt-monkey status is gonna go too far to be funny soon.

When the camping trip happens, the girls makes some shitty food, and then we all spend the night in a tent. The next day swimsuit stuff happens and Yukiko has some really violent reflexes i just noticed that. Anyways, we get introduced to everyone's favorite simp, Rise. She appears on the midnight channel so the guys go investigate it. There's this nice short casual conversation about tofu Yosuke should get and it was kinda charming. I dunno, just sudden casual conversations like that really sells stuff for me.

Like, it can be funny like in Aqua Teen Hunger Force, but it can be charming in things like this. It really sells the idea that the Investigation Team are real friends, unlike S.E.E.S. in the previous game, which was a more professional group. Does that make sense? Sorry for the ramble.

After talking with her we do a stakeout and then meet some shmuck fan who, suprise suprise, isn't the culprit. That night, Rise appears on the midnight channel proper and decide to go to the tv world to investigate, which we find Teddie having a crisis. Yu cheers him up and then starts the Star S-Link. We then start searching for clues. I then accidently start the Empress S-link. Not that i'm complaining. I tried to fuse Ose but fucked up and accidently replaced Power Slash with Evade Fire. I swear never allow those skill mutations happen mark my words.

So I tell the clues to Teddie and then he takes us to Marukya Striptease. I power through the dungeon until the 7th floor. And then it crashed. Great. I gave up and closed the game. I'll finish it twomorrow.

10/17?/2020

Oh god I waited too long to write this part. Ok lemme see if I can remember what happened. I made it to the end without any more trouble, used a goho-m to refill on SP and fused some better personas, then went to fight the next 2 bosses.

- Shadow Rise

Wow, those animations sure are wild to say the least. Glad no one was behind me when I was fighting her. She wasn't hard, got through the sripted part. Then Teddie pulls an epic move and kills her, which results in him having some goofy portaits.

Teddie then haves an existential crisis which results in him shitting out a shadow, who is actually kinda creepy. His booming voice and high iq talk-say is pretty unnerving. It gets mad and I enter the real boss of this dungeon.

- Shadow Teddie

Ok, so this guy was actually a bit of a challenge, and i've been waiting for a good challenge. Teddie sports a lot of health and a lot of strength so killing him took a while. All of his attacks are telegraphed by a buff or debuff though, so it's easy to tell what he will do. He knows some strong ice spells, which is trouble for Yukiko and I, who has all of my good buffs on a Pyro Jack. Thankfully, I had a King Frost with some debuffs and a Ganga with Crazy Chain, so I was doing alright actually.

Yosuke took a lot of damage and Kanji, favoring physical attacks, doesn't have much to spare, so I had to keep healing them. Now, when he was down to less than a quarter, he started charging his Nihil Hand. I got cocky and thought I could cancel it. The buffs ran out and I couldn't cancel it, despite dealing at least 800 damage to him. He does his attack and I got EXTREMLY lucky as my party manages to dodge it. I continue to beat him down and when went really reckless and started to spam my attacks until he's down. It was so fucking satisfying dude. First try too.

So, we left with Rise and spent the rest of the deadline days with social links, even started Kanji's. Did a lot since I completed the dungeon on the first day. After making good progress on all that, it turns out Mooruka has been killed. Crap, I kinda liked him. Everyones in dispair over this but they quickly get re-motivated.

Then it turns out Teddie has come to reality, where he reveals his human form, which makes Chie and Yukiko wet. As the rest goes off to get ice cream, Chie does a shitty thing and used Yosuke's money to buy sharp clothes for Teddie without even telling him, putting him into deeper debt. Yosuke gets rightfully angry. After they fight Rise joins our team alongside Teddie. Then we get properly introduced to Naoto and stuff.

Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 Golden Game Journal - Part 2

 10/8/2020-

After Yukiko's been rescued, I proceed live my life as a normal schoolboy. I've been having money troubles though. Since i'm starting out with bottom-tier stats, there's little for me to do. All I can do is do my social links. But the days towards Yukiko's recovery are rainy so I can't do most of them. The only thing I can do is start the Sun social link. I chose the drama since i've heard it was better than the music club.

I tried to get myself a good sun persona but as I said, i'm low on cash. I guess that's the importance of having a general dungeon that you can go whenever, which this game doesn't, opting instead for story dungeons that disappear when you complete them, leaving you with nothing to do. I think i'm starting to appreciate 3 & 5 a little more now.

Side-note: Holy crap it's so sad and painful to see Nanako coping with her loneliness. Jesus Christ.

1/9/2020-

Thank you, Yosuke.

So, Yukiko recovers and later joins the Investigation team. Chie just won't shut the fuck up about meat. I  feel like it'll get old real fast. It doesn't help that her voice is very loud, and kinda super autistic. Reminds me of that music camp girl from American Pie. I'm liking Adachi though. He just feels very likable, y'know? Also Yukiko. I'm liking Yukiko so far. Maybe that's because she's always next to Chie, though. 

Ok so I was wrong about the dungeon thing. You can go back, but only after the deadline is done, which is still pretty gay. Anyways, I go back to the Castle for grinding, because my party is 3 levels behind Yukiko. I left after reaching the 8th floor to heal. I unlocked some quests and went back to face the Contrarian King.

- Contrarian King

Ok so this guy's a fucking dick. He drains fire so Yukiko is demoted to the designated healer. I didn't realize that he takes more damage from Zio and Bufu skills until later. I ran out of revival beads and once he killed Yosuke I gave up and closed the game. My 2nd attempt was even worse, as this jackass did rampage on it's 2nd turn, killing everyone except MC. I decided to grind some more.

More everyday stuff happens and I start the Hermit social link by accident and the Justice social link. When a thunder storm comes in, I decide to scare Chie and it was funny. I have also been studying diligently. I then cheer up Nanako about her dead mom. The next few days are the exams and I was doing it well but then I clicked the wrong answer by accident. What the fuck. So I learned how to make Beef Stew and started Adachi's social link, the Jester, also known as the alternative to the Fool. (Sidenote: I didn't do his social link after that. Busy with other links and stuff.) 

The Midnight Channel comes on and we see Kanji. The next day, Chie tried too hard to sound smart and it was funny. Later we go to the Tatsumi Textile Shop and encounter a slender young "man" there. We spot a familiar looking scarf... it's the one the that was tied up in a noose in the room in the TV World. The plot thickens.

We proceed to catch Kanji getting a hard on for the "boy" in all blue. The next day we do a stake out like real detectives. I start new social link with Yukiko and Yosuke and Chie get chased by an insecure Kanji, and then we get chased by him again because of his own insecurity. We watch the Midnight Channel again, where we catch a flaming Kanji hosting a very homo show. It was funny as hell dude, especially that little caveman walk he did at the end.

Imagine seeing that on a completely blind playthrough holy shit.

Everyone's reactions I assume

So I hold another Investigation Team meeting and get introduced to the Fox's abilities. But I can't test it out as Yukiko won't let me go until tomorrow. I ended up doing some social links instead. The next day I found my test scores and got an average grade. Damn finger slip. I met up with the effeminene looking boy and found out some traits of Kanji. I don't know why we needed to hear this guy say some words to find out how to describe Kanji but ok. So I get back into the TV World, test the waters in the bathouse, left and fought the Contrarian King again. First attempt back was going good until he did rampage and killed us all.

The next attempt he didn't pull any of that shit and I beat him. I was satisfied to say the least. I continued to grind and left to start the Hierophant social link and made a garden with Nanako. I was gonna go back that day but I accidently went back inside and I wasted precious time holy fuck. Anyways, the next day I go to the Bathouse and face every enemy I see to gain those precious levels.

- Shadow Kanji

So we meet up with Kanji and he rejects his sensitive side so his Shadow-Self turns into a boss. This one managed to be harder than Shadow Yukiko. It didn't start off too well, as I mixed up the weaknesses of the his back-up goons. I made sure to fuse Rakshasa for this fight as i've heard he's pretty good for this fight. When fusing him I made sure to give him Rakunda, which turned out to be a really good decision, as one of his Mooks keeps buffing his defense, which would've been hell for me.

I also made sure to use the Diamond Shields i've been saving up. They're a real life saver, saved my ass many times in this fight. Kanji's Poison attacks weren't that bad, and his rage attacks didn't exactly slowed me down either. In fact, an enraged Chie actually defeated one of his goons for me.

Everything was going steady until he killed Yukiko. I was slipping up after that, especially since his other goon kept using Heat Riser on him. I spent a turn reviving Yukiko so Yosuke wasn't defending and I was expecting Kanji to murder him with his charged attack but Yosuke took it like a champ! I took this opportunity to recklessly attack him while he's charging his attack and I was able to finish him off with the MC. It was super satisfying guys.

So after all that I see Kanji punch out homo-Kanji and it was real cool and epic and stuff. He transforms into a persona and we go back home. Have I mentioned how good the voice acting in this game is? Troy Baker has pretty good range. I think i'll like Kanji, he seems like a likable character I am looking foward to his social link. Also he's not gay you self-righteous fucks.

(Ok so I forgot to record my stats please forgive me)

update

Ok so since the last post i've been writing the journal down but never uploading them. I was planning to write more but i've moved computers at that time, so I just finished the game for my own leisure. I will have scheduled posts for the entries that I do have.