My interpretation has always been that Maiko, the little girl in Persona 3, is associated with the Hanged Man Arcana because she embodies themes of helplessness and dependence on others. The Hanged Man often symbolizes a situation where one is stuck and unable to change things without external help. Maiko is in the midst of her parents divorce, a situation she cannot control or influence on her own. She relies on the protagonist and other adults for support and guidance, which reflects the Hanged Man's need for assistance to move forward. Additionally, the Arcana suggests a shift in perspective, just as the Hanged Man views the world from an upside-down position, Maiko gains new insights about her situation through the help she receives. This combination of helplessness, dependence, and eventual understanding makes the Hanged Man a fitting representation for Maiko's story in my oppinion.
Came here to say this. The Hanged Man also frequently is associated with being overwhelmed by and thus resisting choices (especially reversed). It becomes upright when one surrenders to inevitability and accepts a new path, as Maiko does by the end of her social link. In the Persona series especially, the Hanged Man often involves suffering and sacrifice, perhaps by oneself or by others you once trusted. Just as Maiko faces with her parents. Her old life is over, no matter that she is too young to cope… without help, anyway. Most of the other SLs in P3 involve death in one way or another: risking it, facing it, dealing with it, running from it. At least the kid doesn’t die. :)
Fun fact: When Makoto Yuki awakens to Orpheus he speaks the Following Qoute. "I am thou...... Thou art I..... From the Sea of thy Soul I cometh. I am Orpheus, Master of Strings"
You rarely take the name of the major arcana as something literal. Tower represents either disaster or a major event that completely changes ones life. Hanged man usually represents being in a situation where someone has little control. Interpretation of tarot is really complicated even without digging into reversed readings.
Yes. I love the interpretation that you and another commenter, brinkofdeath, put forward in regards to the Hanged Man and Maiko. I'm still curious as to what the "Tower" would have to do with Bishamonten, though.
@@maxderrat well as far as I can tell with a quick look through some websites, he's a guardian deity of Buddhist worshipers and guardian of the north. I think associating him with the card that represents major changes and obstacles isn't to much of a stretch.
@maxderrat a lot of those Arcana classifications do break down a bit more than how Arcana relate to the themes of the story of the social link A very micro google aka who knows the accuracy says that the northern direction being associated with danger which would be put together with the destruction of the tower that is the card. It's a danger which one can only survive and regrow from like the monk you help/connect with in that social. That might be why they put him into that classification
@@maxderrat It's worth noting first off, that there exists different versions of personas/demons/shadows/guardians to stress different aspects of the mythological character. Bishamoten isn't always Tower. To the extent he is associated with the Tower, imo it's likely a reference to SMT 1 where the death of the four guardians heralded a great disaster.
Not to mention that reversed readings are a relatively modern invention that was not done in traditional tarot. In fact, some of the earliest decks like the marseilles deck have pip cards that have a singular design that can’t be flipped, similar to regular playing cards.
Fun fact, Mr. Edogawa in Persona 3 is based off a key staff member in Atlus -- Shogo Isogai -- who, along with Kazuma Kaneko, was one of the key creative members in the SMT series and himself incredibly well-versed in mythology and religion. His notable works include SMT2, SMT: Nocturne, Soul Hackers 1, Strange Journey etc.,
P4 has the best example of facing your own shadow for growth, as there are nearly no external shadows as bosses. Each dungeon is based around the Shadow of a party member, and whenever you meet one, the only reason we enter the battle is because your party member denies that the Shadow _is_ part of them ("You're not me!"), thus giving them the power to act separately: "I am the Shadow; the True Self". Once you've beaten them, the Shadow is completely silent while your party member monologues about accepting that side of themselves ("You... are me."), then they vanish, the conflict resolved by facing their negative traits and accepting them for what they are. The Shadow cannot be independent once they are accepted, and so they say nothing. The Arcana system can be a little bit funny in P3, but tarot is *complicated*, and can take a long time to learn. I've been dabbling for over a decade, and it still trips me up every so often, but at the end of the day, tarot interpretation is more art than science. Pharos isn't the Death arcana because he's a harbinger of the end of the world, he's the Death arcana because he represents a radical shift in the reality of the protagonist. It's all about intuiting the intended message from context; the situation around the character in the Social Link is what determines their arcana. Magician characters are inexperienced and self-confident, often jealous, and have something happen to their love interests, Priestess characters are quiet intellectuals who struggle with difficult family lives, Chariot characters are driven and competitive, often to their own detriment, etc, etc.
Bishamonten is of the Tower arcana because of what it represents: a sudden, catastrophic destruction of one’s life, circumstances, and/or path. The warrior personas of the Tower arcana are extremely destructive, usually to themselves as much as everyone else, like Cú Chulainn (of Irish legend), Mara, or Shiva.
I think some of they most representatives personas in the tower Arcana is actually Cu Cuchulain and *Masakado* because, Even if they are powerful Warriors they meet a tragic end. I think one cool persona that could enter in the tower Arcana is Sigfried who also meets a tragic end
I never knew much about tarot and assumed the tower was meant to be phallic and had something to do with male ego. Seeing as thier social links seem to be focused on characters seeking to fullfil their own self satisfaction and overcoming that desire.
7:48 I know I'll sound like a 🤓, but I just wanna correct this, mementos, the tv world and tarter sauce aren't the entire collective unconscious itself, they're parts of the collective unconscious that each represent what desire humanity collectively has during the game, so they all just parts of the sea of souls but not all of it
The psychology and esoteric nature of the protagonist spiritual awakening is what makes these games my favorite RPGs. Especially the dark nature of Persona 3. I love how the series plays with the ideas of archetypal characters and the way the collective unconscious is represented as a deep dark dungeon where in the shadows dwell. Also thanks for blowing my mind with the world card breakdown 😵
You may find it interesting that a lot of the creative team for Persona 3 through 5 are currently working on a new game in the same vein, Metaphor Refantazio, that also seems to be drawing on Jungian psychology. Instead of summoning Personas the characters can transform into creatures called Archetypes that are based on RPG classes (Knight, Magician, Thief, etc.). And you gain access to new Archetypes by bonding with characters who accentuate those archetypes in some way. I dunno if it'll be as focused on Jungian psychology as Persona or if it'll be more broad, though.
I highly doubt anyone will see this but I haven't seen anyone in the comments talking about this, maybe I didn't look far enough into comments BUT, in the minute 19:28 as he shows the meaning of the colors within the card I noticed that the colors matched the color themes of the persona games Red being persona 5 Blue being persona 3 Yellow being persona 4 And green that now we know is the theme of persona 6. I don't think atlus had this in mind back then but is a nice coincidence non the least.
I should've realized the inconsistency with Personas being Shadows and how, while it does use Jungian concepts as part of the story, it is more of a mixture of the concepts that are connected but have different parts. I always loved how Persona was Shadows because it's like the characters learning more about themselves through the repressed parts of their personality and gaining a higher state of being.
Slight thing worth mentioning; the final card you recieve from Igor in P3 is a supercharged version of The World, instead called The Universe. The major arcana are meant to represent challenges one may face in life, and while circumstances vary, all journeys theoretically begin with The Fool. It basically represents that you know nothing about the trials you are about to face as you begin to work towards your goal. Once you've gone through the tribulations of your journey and achieved your goal, you've reached The World. This card represents the accumulation of your experiences, becoming more learned and "worldly" during your struggle. From what I understand, most Persona protagonists recieve The World during the true ending, which helps them put down whatever bad guy is causing trouble in that game. Minato/Kotone, however, are the only known characters to recieve The Universe instead. Igor is even stunned when the card is drawn, stating that the MC is one of the most remarkable guests he's ever had in the Velvet Room. While The World draws power from the Social Links you've forged, The Universe draws power from "consciousness" itself, allowing the MC to basically use "Yin" to fight Nyx's "Yang".
Yup every Persona protag is either capable of or recieves The World (since it means completeness or fulfilment) but the P3 twins are apparently the only Guests in history (at least Guests that Igor has worked with) that obtain The Universe which is a concept so far beyond the The World that I personally interpret it as "The Self becomes God and God becomes one's Self" it makes me wonder if any of Philemon's other Guests have gotten The Universe or if Nylarlathop has ever gotten a champion capable to realizing The Universe.
Yeah I was just about to say this… albeit on a much smaller scale, but you saved me some time and said it better than I could have, so yea that’s a W. I will say that Makoto’s arc is friggin amazing, one of my favorite arcs in the series. Going from this apathetic guy who kinda just did things because he was asked to, to actually sacrificing himself to protect all the friends he met and loves. I wish I could be like him.
I still believe people over-interpret the whole "Universe" thing. It's still The World, almost always when the Arcana is revealed it's always a counter to whatever deity it's against. The use IS definitely situational but always appropriate. All 3 protags are supercharged with power of friendship and always standing alone with the god they oppose. The difference is circumstance, Makoto Yuki survived the incident should've killed him and his parents 10 years ago. "Death" sealed in him extended his life, and soon after cutting his connection with Ryoji and Nyx with The Great Seal he soon follows after. Maybe by mercy or gratitude he was given enough time to last until Graduation Day.
Isn’t Universe the same as the World? I’m pretty sure they just changed it to World in P4 because it was more accurate. Universe implies that there’s something past the world which we have not explored yet. Aliens or other planets or galaxies but how does that tie into Persona?
An example of individuation in the series is all the other side character you help face their shadows, particularly in P4. Upon doing so, they accept the shadow as a part of themselves, and that is how they obtain their personas and grow as people. The game even has it that if they don't they become devoured by the shadow and that this is what happens to most people who get put in the TV world. The game also plays with the idea of identity and perception, as the characters that are subject to the scrutiny of the public have more drastically caricaturized Shadow's to contend with as the shadow is also informed by how we think of ourselves based on how others see us
@@maxderrat We talking bachelor's, masters? Autodidact is badass too and in some ways, even more impressive. Don't have to say, I just find you to be a really interesting and exceptional person.
The middle character in the world arcana card in 3 also represents the messiah archetype as symbolizes by the persona messiah who is a Fusion of Orpheus and Thanatos the two main personas of makoto from persona 3
Thanks for taking a more in-depth look at the series, Max. Persona gets overshadowed by the anime tropes, when in reality it's got some of the best subtext and metaphors ever in a piece of media. My favorite allusion is the symbolism of Sartre's theory about existentialism, that we are "condemned to be free." This is best illustrated by the image of Joker being the inmate in the Velvet Room on his route to rehabilitation. We all work hard to impose our will against one another, as much as our deep relationships with our confidants inform us about who we are, like a mirror image. We have a burden to be free, and we always have to choose. That's the calendar system, showing us that possibilities are infinite, but time is not.
I know it was a joke, but the hanged man represents inevitable failure. Maiko is dealing with the divorce of her parents. I've read the tarot for about 30 years now. The one thing I always say to anyone before reading is that the tarot is a tool. It doesn't foresee the future, it doesn't give you solutions to anything. What it does and does well is propose a random scenario that we then relate to your quandary. By giving you a scenario it forces you to think what to do if that scenario were to come true and thus you gain a deeper understanding of your issues. In any case, the hanged man shows that things will inevitably fail no matter what, either by your own hands or others. So on a positive light it shows survival after a tragedy, coping with loss, coming to terms with your own mortality and yes, realizing your parents divorce is inevitable and not in your own hands.
“one could theoretically face other people’s shadows if they could enter the collective unconscious but that’s a level of woo” isn’t that just what the internet is…? i mean sure there’s stuff people don’t share, but. most of it is on there somewhere in some form tbh. of course the internet probably has shadows and hidden potential too
I believe there is a line in P5 where someone (can't remember who) says that the collective unconscious sounds similar to the internet and Makoto responds that that's an interesting way of looking at it.
@@skolkorYou certainly see a kind of unfiltered version of people online. In a different sense what you see is extremely filtered. I guess insofar as one can confront another's shadow online, you certainly can't overcome it. I wonder what the neo-humans from The Talos Principle 2 would think.
Thanks Max for another amazing video! Please do more Persona videos with more focused topics, those are what grab me the most about SMT aside from the characters themselves. These games are so packed with meaning.
If you find interest in the symbolism of the Persona 3's World tarot, You'll definitely want to give Persona 2: Innocent Sin a look and see how that game handles the connections to Jung, Tarot, and the other plot elements.
I am once again looking at a video through the lens of Destiny and I think I screamed at 16:07 because this seems like what we achieve with Prismatic in The Final Shape, and what was hinted at with all the alchemical symbols in Witch Queen about two years ago. We already had the Light, the physical, and we have been mastering Darkness, the metaphysical, since Stasis. Interesting how "control" was the first aspect of the metaphysical we encounter, then memory through deepsight, egregore. It seems like Eris was guiding us and other characters in Season of the Haunted bu having us help allies content with their inner nightmares and turning them into memory. Now that we have come into contact with the metaphysical strings of the universe with Strand, tapping into the collective unconscious with the Veil enough that we can restore physical objects through memory, it seems like we will achieve apotheosis with Prismatic once we travel through the portal of Light and Dark made by the Witness carving into the flesh of the traveler. The Witness may wear the Darkness like a cloak, but we wield the collective strings like a conductor of a symphony, and we defend a gentle city ringed in spears as the traveler wanted. An end to the samsara of the flower game.
13:00 what Maiko has to do with the hanged man is that she has to choose between going with her mother or her father. The Hanged man is often associated with choosing a path of some sort, and how seeing things from a different perspective can help making a better decision. She's also related with the inverted hanged man, being unable to decide.
Please talk about Persona 1 & 2 at some point! I think you'll love them and they're arguably even more accurate to the Jungian roots of the series than the later titles.
the arcana of the ultimate personas that the protagonists use in 3, 4, and 5 are pretty symbolic makoto yuki in persona 3 uses thanatos, which is aligned with death, and (spoilers) represents how makoto doesn’t fear death and even embraces it. some might argue that his ultimate persona is orpheus telos or messiah though, and i dont really have good enough explanations for those yu narukami in persona 4 uses izanagi no okami, which is aligned with world, and since izanagi was yu’s original persona, this expresses how yu started without knowing anything but eventually grew to be extremely powerful ren “joker” amamiya in persona 5 uses satanael, which is aligned with the fool, and he uses a fool arcana aligned persona to symbolize that he is independent and that he harnesses all the sins to defeat his enemy, and the fool represents how he returns to his normal life
Okay the Carl Jung bit at the start had me fucking dying. But yeah I love how much of persona is actually referential to Jung, past just it's name. It would've been easy to just see a cool name and decide to adopt it for a concept, but they really did a ton of research on the subject and it shows
Tbf to most people Persona is just another way to say "person" in Spanish and Latin. So the name had to have some purpose because what publisher would want to sell a game called "Person".
My only gripe with this video is that you misidentified mascots for animals; mascots have various psychological functions, both for individuals and groups. I'd argue the games get good milage from this even, some aspects that spring to mind: identity formation, emotional connections, social cohesion, psychological comfort, symbolic representation and obviously brand image.
@@HollowGolem I always thought Aigis was the mascot. She appears in more marketing material, is more central to the story, and is more odd and eccentric than Koromaru. In fact all the mascots have a conflict with the concept of "humanity". Teddie wants to learn to be human, Morgana wants to prove/reclaim his humanity, and Aigis wants to understand humans while believing she isn't. I've seen the argument that they combined represent the Ego, Self, and Super Ego but I can't remember which is which.
@@Urekyu The id/ego/superego thing is an interesting way to think about them. Aigis is dominated by her superego in an almost literal way, programmed to do things. Her drive to protect the main character could be seen as a drive a la the id, and her story is about forming an ego (culminating in the Answer). Teddy starts almost as a child, pure id. He just wants to be left alone, happy, and then people keep throwing folks into the TV world and agitating the shadows. He continues to be a being of id late into the game (especially in the Golden content like the beach trip and ski trip), and worries about his identity, almost completely lacking the guidance of a superego (basically just what he picks up from interacting with the team). Morgana has an idea of who he is, a mission, a purpose, and directly interfaces with the world. That's an established, if undirected, ego. He engages in id-driven behavior (lusting after Ann, belittling Ryuji) and the episode around Okumura's palace represents him seeking a higher purpose, a way to fit into the gestalt, which is Superego-driven behavior. So maybe they all start as an aspect of the psyche and their journey is about growing and developing the other two. (And maybe that's why Teddy is the worst of the three in my opinion: he never really finishes that journey, while the others have something like a satisfying conclusion)
@@HollowGolem haha thanks for correcting me but I'll always say Teddie is the best one. You can argue his journey doesn't "finish" sure. But in my opinion the aftermath of Teddie's arc is that he has a life to live and learn in. A new beginning for him. He keeps thinking that the real world is a temporary thing until the IT makes it clear that he is a valued friend they will keep. Teddie becomes the very symbol of the desire for truth throughout the game. I love Aigis to death and Morgana is....Aigis is the best character in P3 but her arc ends in a sort of predictable way for me. While Teddie was a character who kept surpassing everything I thought he was the more I learned of him. I actually think he is the most misunderstood character in the game which hurts. Does he do stuff that is pervy? Yes, I would hate him if he was anyone else and it is one of my only gripes with the game (How come the only anime scene with Marie in it is the 2nd hot springs scene in game Atlus? You couldn't just leave it at one stupid hot spring scene and give Marie more screentime???). But when you consider who Teddie is his behavior is simply in line with the concept of ID. He is a character that grew on me way too much.
I think that it's less the people featured in the Social Links that are meant to map to the arcana - it's more about the arcanas' meanings being the themes of the stories. Mr. Edogawa has this one lecture where he goes through all of the arcana and their meanings all map quite nicely to what the social links are about. Also, when a certain someone speaks a line of dialogue before changing arcana, they pretty much also give away the moral of that arcana's story.
I love this deep dive! It has taught me so much about the themes of a game series that I love so much & also tipped me off to themes that may use in future games. Like "archetype" is something already introduced in Metaphor: re Fantazio as the new name for "Personas" within that game. This was super informative!
Man I'm glad I came across this video. I have always been deeply intrigued by psychology and the theoretical building blocks of the universe, what true "reality" is, and what truly lies within each and every one of us. You've earned a new sub. Its a shame that not enough people are this intuitive and explorative in thought, mainly because games like Persona and others that deal with Jung's ideas and theories and similar ones, often end up having many details lost. Final Fantasy VII Rebirth and in turn the FFVII Remake trilogy itself, is beginning to lean HEAVILY into all of this stuff, turning the Lifestream into more of a Collective Unconscious concept, which is so dope! Not only Carl Jung, but also Buddhism's Yogachara concept. Psychology and the metaphysical should always have a place in fictional media. This shit is brilliant.
there's also something to be said about how the world, as the last major arcana, is the final step in the version of the hero's journey described by tarot and the sefirot in kabbalah - representing the pathway between malkuth and yesod, the final step that indicates "the work is complete", inverting the fool's "blank slate, freshly departed for a hero's journey" motif
I've seen a few analysis suggest that each confidant represents the MC 'Idea' of the arcane in their fools journey. How Goro in P5 represents Joker's idea of Justice in the upright and reversed meanings. Meanwhile Nanako is the idea of Justice to the MC in P3 and as such plays a very different role despite being representative of the same Arcana.
It's interesting that the new game from the same studio 'Metaphor RE:fantazio', which is effectively just medieval persona, has it's own roster of shadows, but rather than being turned into personae they are now fully embracing the title of 'Archetypes'.
Great video, more Persona pls. I'd especially like to know what you think of the shadows of Persona 2 and how they differ from the shadows of the later games. And (Spoilers for late game P4) The twist near the end of Persona 4 where its revealed the shadows aren't just the "true self" but a mix of that and societal/collective perception of that person. Revealed in the Namatame interrogation scene where the group wills his shadow to appear on TV and confess to the murders, but also shows how his desire to redeem himself as a hero was genuine; I take this as evidence that if the collective perception is strong enough, it will begin to force the shadow to conform to it.
I think the reason all the MegaTen and Persona games incorporate so much diverse psychology, spirituality, religion, mythology, etc. is because it was genuinely founded by nerds like Cozy and Kaneko that were real into and passionate about that stuff, some of them borderline occult nutjobs. You can see that in their self-insert characters like Edogawa. I remember Kaneko said it an interview they were supposed to be, "good for your brain, whatever that means." They go real deep into a lot of obscure Eastern stuff you'd never see incorporated into other games. I remember I tried to look up what the Sanskrit symbols used in a lot of Dark spells mean, and it took awhile to figure out they were an obscure variation of Siddham script called Bonji now only ever used in a few esoteric school of Buddhism in Japan, something there's only a couple articles about online that I could find.It really interesting the way they mesh so many concepts from different schools of thought across various cultures, and then find a way to make it cool on top of that. Digital Devil Saga was the dark cyberpunk form of Hinduism I didn't know I needed. The way Raidou Kuzunoha's games depicts Shintoism and living kami in Japan's real-world transitional period from Eastern tradition towards Westernization and "modernity" is refreshing compared to just another "old nature good; new technology bad" story.
10:52 - 11:13 people with Aspergers Syndrome (like myself) spend their entire lives trying to help the shadow unconscious minds of other people while neglecting their own shadow unconscious mind. Trust me, I know. And it hurts, because you realize that no one will ever do the same for you and you lack the strength most people have to overcome your own shadow unconscious mind yourself. Its worse than suicide. its an entire life where you're dying.
I can guarantee you, TK... the vast majority of people lack the strength to contend with their shadow in the way that autistic people do. Autistic people are forced to contend with whether or not their quirks are a result of bad behavior or because of factors out of their control all the time. This is because there are usually people in our lives telling us that we are lazy or selfish. I've found that the vast majority of people that I have met who are autistic, when giving an opportunity to better their lot in life, are trying harder than most neurotypical people.
hello, i came from Smoughtown video where he praises you and i have to say you,re amazing Have a ton of your videos to binge watch, sending you all the love Max
Bishamonten an example of the warrior archetype? Funny thing.. so does Mars and the Tower Card and Mars are associated with each other so they probably linked it that way.
Bishamonten represents the Tower as the "head" of the "four figures" that uphold righteousness and is stern in their ideas of what justice is. A lot of the Tower Arcana has generally war gods with a similiar "exaggerated" personality (even if it initially had mostly "Vile" gods in P1 and P2) and often doesn't have to represent the "whole story" of the tower getting destroyed ( e.g. Seiten Taisei fall from heaven )
So about 18:59 …it’s actually The Universe Card. For some reason it reuses The World Card’s design. So far only the P3 Protagonist has summoned a card from The Universe Arcana.
I'd like to see you take on either SMT: Strange Journey or SMT IV for an analysis video, although they are marooned on dead platforms and screaming for remakes. Your script for the Nocturne video was top-tier and there's so much more to work with, with either of those games.
In regards to your confusion with the representation of the arcana within characters and figures of the Persona series it's often the case that the symbolism of the card is not going to be literally represented, but metaphorically. Maiko, to use your example, is a child forced to endure her parents going through a divorce. Within the symbolism of the Hanged Man, Maiko's situation embodies the confrontation of overwhelming challenge and lack of agency within the circumstance that the Hanged Man stage of the Fool's Journey represents. She is a great representation of this particular symbol. Having thoroughly enjoyed your FMA series, your analysis of Ergo Proxy, and now this video I would love for you to analyze the story of the Fool's Journey within Tarot and learn more about how its concepts are explored or paralleled by the philosophers and psychologists you reference in your other videos.
Great video but one thing I do need to point out and it's just semantics. P3MC gets "The Universe" not "The World". The World is the card the protags of 4 and 5 get at the end. It's the same card technically from both number and meaning in readings but it's from the Thoth deck (same with Aigis' Aeon card).
I think you would really enjoy Persona 2 Innocent Sin - it has a much stronger psychology angle in that the narrative is steeped in the childhood traumas and parental issues of the core cast of protagonists.
(spoiler) i think what Makoto experiences in the end of P3 is the exact same thing that the victims in P5 experienced. it all ties in nicely together across the series
I always thought that Tartarus was in a way a loose reference to the tower of babel where God struck down the tower and made humanity speak in different tongues. Which the same almost happened to SEES tartarus disappears and also their memories about the dark hour which united them. Kinda like how humanity was united in one language until they weren't
It's kinda an inverse in a sense. With babel, humanity tried to rival the heavens. Which could be connected to Mitsuru's grandfather's plan to take the power of the shadows and create time manipulation. Overly ambitious his project failed catastrophically but the Dark Hour remained and Tartarus constructed. Human hubris was struck down by differing opinions and after a cataclysmic event a tower arose.
Honestly, the modern Persona games are pretty shallow when it comes to these themes and ideas, only really approaching things at the most surface level. This especially when you compare to the older titles that stuck much closer to the source material and went more in-depth. In short, the modern titles are basically watered down versions of what the older ones did, yet they get all the spotlight due to being popular. I mean, Persona 2 was a wild ride and the thematic depth that it went to was just insane.
Well, the Arcana are VERY rarely literal in the name and their meaning, as an example, the Tower is a card about chaos and upheaval, the World is about completion, the Hanged Man is about helplessness, or sometimes sacrifice If we wanna assume Maiko (Little girl in P3) DOES make sense on some level, she's going through her parent's divorce, I can't think of something a child would feel much more helpless during, outside of someone actually dying
As a fellow lover of psychology(studying it on a personal and academic level for 18 years), and a fan of the persona series, i absolutely loved this analysis. Very well thought out and enlightening!
yeah you definitely need to do a part 2 or another video on persona because although this was hard to follow for a high schooler I genuinely enjoyed it.
As a psychology and criminology graduate, I'm grateful I can apply what I learnt to understand Persona 5. The moment I deduced what the theme was about before the game came out officially, I was like wow.
Two notes I have to address One: the world arcan card in persona 3 is different, it's the universe and has no persona unlike the world arcan that has izanagi no okami or personas from p1 and p2 Two: the dungeons are not the collective unconsciousness you talked about but in persona 1 and 2 there's a character called philemon who lives in a realm called the sea of the collective unconsciousness
This will sounds stupid when I say it but I’m guessing that the creators of persona theorize and twist the accessibility of the collective unconscious (in general) to present the idea of facing different enemies & stuff like that. Makes good science fiction.
I'm someone who watches videos like these and edits my comments with timestamps and interjections, so please give me a moment to watch through in full and organize my thoughts. 7:54 I would actually argue that the Sea of Souls and the Collective Unconscious (that is, the realms of unreality or "Worlds Of Cognition" as I refer to them) are separate planes, at least within the context of the series. In multiple instances throughout the games, Personas and Shadows are stated to come from the Sea of Souls (for example, Shadow negotiations in P5, Tatsuya Suou's awakening of Vulcanus, and Makoto Yuki's awakening of Orpheus in Persona 3. "I am thou, thou art I... From the sea of thy soul, I cometh...") We even get to see instances where archetypical entities exist within the Sea Of Souls itself, such as the final boss of Persona 3's _Episode Aigis: The Answer_ who I will not be naming for spoiler purposes. There is an inherent connection between the Sea and the local Worlds Of Cognition of each game, of course, but Personas and Shadows aren't exactly born from the Collective Unconscious; they only exist within it. Even entities like the first final boss of Persona 5 who say they were born from the collective human unconscious were not actually; they were born from the Sea, but humanity's collective unconscious called for an entity who could fulfill their wish for control, and the Sea gave that entity to them. I admittedly know very little about the actual psychological side of the story as I literally know all of my Jung from Persona, but this is something important to be clarified. 13:13 I'm going to anyway, because I think its funny you specifically had to ask us not to. Tarot Arcana aren't meant to be taken at face value. Of course Personas of the Chariot Arcana arent going to all be mythological Chariots, but rather there's hidden meanings and keywords attached to the Arcana itself as they represent steps through the Fool's Journey to attain the World. The aforementioned Chariot, for example, is commonly associated with characters who would run headlong into a burning building to save someone, knowing full well they would get burned themselves in the process. Chie, Aigis, and Ryuji are clear examples of such an archetype, though Aigis and Ryuji couldn't be more different personality-wise, yes? Characters of the Hanged Man arcana are typically caught between a rock and a hard place (Maiko being her parents' divorce, and Iwai from Persona 5 being caught in a yakuza power struggle). Other people in the comments here have already explained Bishamonten, so I'm not gonna beat you over the head with that explanation anymore and just keep going. ...Oh. The video's done already? That was... surprisingly in-depth for being a sub-30 minute video! Good stuff!
The hangman means to let go of outdated beliefs if it's upright so it makes sense for a kid who has a different outlook than adults the tower means an unforeseen catastrophe which is something that a warrior would contend with
Excellent video, as always. I just want to point out that the Tartarus in Greek Mythology isn't exactly the Underworld, but a part of the Underworld that is ruled by Hades, but I understand it would be too much information on a part that didn't exactly need it, it's just my nerd brain talking. But it's cool to see you playing and doing videos on Persona, I think you'll give a lot more depth for the community and that's definitely a good thing. Keep up the great work! Also, I would hope to see some more in depth analysis of the story and themes of some of the games. (And I agree about Mitsuru being the best girl)
Do a video that goes in depth into 3, 4, and 5. I'm curious to learn more about this stuff, but more specific to each game, specifically 5 since that's my main game
12:00 i suppose one way to justify the use of "persona" is that in real life rather than interacting with other peoples true selves your persona deals with both peoples personas and the consequences of their shadow
RE: slaying shadows within the collective unconscious rather than personal shadows, I will say that after I had done a substantial amount of personal shadow work over a 14 year period, I then started tackling a lot of collective shadows to better understand them, and from that I learned even more about myself, and found more personal shadows. My collective shadow slaying (integration) lasted another 8 years or so. I did this by reading news articles, Facebook posts, and other polarizing content, especially in relation to ideological agendas and political propaganda, allowed myself to feel emotionally triggered by them, and then asked myself questions about what the pattern would look like in an interpersonal relationship. From there, I'd experience the pattern by playing one of the two sides, with somebody I knew, loved, or randomly bumped into playing the other role, and I'd observe myself and them throughout the process. This is a form of dialectical thinking (and experiencing) that I could somewhat control in a microcosmic set of events, since we don't have much power or control in the macrocosmic plane/sphere of existence, where the problem (thesis) would come in, I'd react to it (anti-thesis), and rather than rushing to conform to a side (conscious/light vs unconscious/dark), or try to get the other party to conform to a side by forcing my views on them, I'd sit with the tension of opposites until a third pathway would manifest in the form of an epiphany, insight, and new higher understanding that brought order to the chaos (synthesis). I called this process "Gandhi Groups" because I was attempting to "be the change I wanted to see in the world" through letting myself witness and observe the things I didn't like in the world in order to find them in my own personal experiences, to transform their patterns in a very personal manner. Jung touched on this in the following quote: If you imagine someone who is brave enough to withdraw all his projections, then you get an individual who is conscious of a pretty thick shadow. Such a man has saddled himself with new problems and conflicts. He has become a serious problem to himself, as he is now unable to say that they do this or that, they are wrong, and they must be fought against… Such a man knows that whatever is wrong in the world is in himself, and if he only learns to deal with his own shadow he has done something real for the world. He has succeeded in shouldering at least an infinitesimal part of the gigantic, unsolved social problems of our day. ~“Psychology and Religion” (1938). In CW 11: Psychology and Religion: West and East. P.140 I learned quite a lot about myself, philosophy, critical thinking, psychology, ideologies, underlying assumptions, and law as a result of living this process.
@@vivvy_0 Very much so, the quality of my relationships, the stability, and the meaningfulness of them all serve a higher purpose that flows harmoniously. It's no longer tied into fate, which is unconscious, but more about purpose and destiny, which is conscious and creative. The key is leaving the dreaded "drama triangle" of victim, villain, and hero in one's own relating and relationship patterns (relating to the microcosm and therefore also the corresponding plane of the macrocosm), and replacing it with the TED triangle of creator, challenger, and coach. It requires a radical level of self-responsibility and self-ownership to stop blaming external villains and rather see them as external reflections of the internal challenges we have within ourselves, to instead intentionally create our life, along with the relationships we consciously agree upon entering into.
These games have a lot more going on than a lot of people are willing to admit. I've studied a small amount of Psychology, so i am far from an expert, but i feel really strongly that (especially)smt iv has something to do with Freud's theories. Flynn is Ego, johnathon is super ego, walter is id. It explains why flynn sees them in the beginning of the story before he has met them
More or less related to the video, but I have two amazing series for you to watch: 1. Turkish series The Gift and 2. Blood of Zeus. The first deals with ancient religions and union of opposites. The second is about Greek mythology. I loved both and 1000% recommend
There is a joke I should make about 'now explain...' one particular Persona in this franchise... but I'll refrain (those who know... know exactly which one I'm talking about)
As a continuation on the discussion of the MC of P3 overcoming the Devouring Mother, he starts the story in a state that is complimentary to it. He is stricken by apathy and intense thanatophobia due to the death of his parents (the thanatophobia being pointed to by Thanatos bursting out of Orpheus during his Awakening). Throughout the story, his connections with people he meets and the lessons learned from challenges he overcomes causes him to lose his apathy and stop fearing his own death, psychologically overcoming the Devouring Mother.
Found your channel thru the nier videos and, surprise, you have an excelent video on one of my favorite series. Also, I have to watch the MGS2 video I just was recomended by the algorithm. Thanks and I await the next persona videos
Best video game series of all time with the Tales series underneath according to my personal opinion. And its because of Persona I wouldn't even known about Jungian psychology or bothered to looked into it.
I'm not a specialist when it comes to the psychology subject matter, as well as the religious imagery you were referring to, but the way you explained it in your video helped me fill out some gaps in the theories I had in regards to this video game series, specially in regards to the inherent meanings of the arcana, as well as the meaning behind the mementos dungeon from persona 5 alongside that game's final boss, to that effect, I am very curious to see your thesis focusing more on persona 5 royal in the future
in certain religion, every human & spirits have innate disposition that has been ingrained to souls. this original disposition could base to things such as archetypes, good & evil, & purpose of life.
I assumed the young girl Maiko in P3R was the Hanged Man tarot card because she would like to hang upside down on the monkey bars which is where you first meet her.
Hey, Zoroastrian guy here, Zurvan is not the supreme god or the creator deity in mainstream Zoroastrianism, Mazdā is, Zurvan is just a time god in Zoroastrianism. He was only the supreme/creator deity in pre Zoroastrian Iranian mythology and also in an extint ancient cult within Zoroastrianism called Zurvanism but not in the main branch of Zoroastrianism itself. In Zoroastrianism, Ahura Mazdā is the supreme god and the creator.
I’ve heard there was a leak that P6’s color will be Green. This might just be an obvious choice, or it might mean that it’s the last in a tetralogy if we see P3-P6 as aspects of The World card. Or maybe it will be a pentalogy, culminating with White.
Hey Max, if you're willing to take a recommendation, I'd love to watch you talk about the game Grime. Here's a summary of the plot and why I think it would be interesting to delve into it: Grime is a metroidvania with souls-like elements that covers topics as the search for one's purpose, the will to survive and the acceptance of death. This is mostly represented by the fact that you play as a little black hole in formation and ventures around - and I kid you not - a dying space giant. The beings in this world are basically divided in two sides: the ones who fear you and treat you with hostility and the ones who welcome you with open arms. This game made me think about the theme you brought on the Drakengard video, about how you, the player, feel about the destruction you brought. At one point in the game, one character even asks you how do you feel about what you're doing, the beings you encounter and what are you going to do to them, what will that make you feel, etc. If you want to play the game, I don't want to spoil it for you, but my personal take is that the protagonist in Grime is more like a "force of nature", just doing what it has to do, and that gave me a little more ease. I hope you're willing to take a look at this, at least let me know if the game picks your interest or not, I'd love to see what else you can take from it's lore. I know you don't usually talk about metroidvanias, but you talked about Hollow Knight recently, so I'm keeping my hopes up. Stay yellow!
oh yeah I gotta second that. I'm not a fan of telling youtubers what they should engage with, but Grime deffo has a lot of substance to delve into that is not being appreciated enough and I'd love to see a video on it by him.
thank you for this video, ever since I replayed recently Persona 4 and realized all the series are based on carl jungs teachings I've been waiting to discuss or find someone like minded.
I always believe that assignment of each Persona to each Arcana depends on how you interpret their archetype evident in how Persona would switch their Arcana around each game. A lot of demonic powerful Persona will switch around between Moon, Tower, Devil, Death. I personally interpret Tower arcana as a strong entity that can prove to be great obstacle to the hero figures and it can be branched into either nemesis character, or just mean looking strong guys. Bishamonten might fit the latter. A lot of it also resulted from gameplay too. Strength and Tower Arcana are usually reserved for a very physically strong Persona, but the stronger are usually associated with Tower as it is a more of a mid-late game arcana than Strength. Interestingly, in the original P3, each Arcana are also leaning toward a specific play type of game element: Magician are fire-inclined most of the time with high magic, Priestess are more ice-inclined, Emperor are more balanced and lightning-inclined, Fortune are to wind, Lover are more support-oriented, Hermit loves their status ailments, Justice are always light-based, Chariot are more about Strike attack with higher endurance, Strength are more about Slash, Tower are more about Pierce. However, in later P4, P5 and the new P3R, these association got switch around more but some strong association with each arcana still remain.
Has anyone realized that even tho the protag for p3 is super cool and interesting and stuff the real vessel for the player within the game is Aigis? We experience the game the way Aigis does, begin by only interacting with it as a pure game in a robotic sense, then we start to bond with the cast of characters and consider them our friends, at the end when we fall in love with the game we finally realize it has to end eventually, and as we hold it dear for all it has given us it perishes in our hands. It's the biggest revelation I've had with p3.
Persona is interesting in its way of presenting information. The persona descriptions, names and outer appearances make me genuinely interested in why they are depicted as what they are, and where those ideas come from. This video showed me that Persona games go even deeper than what I thought. There seems to be so much symbolism as well as religious and psychological concepts... I haven't studied much of anything, but it's definitely interesting.
I've seen something like the monad in the trees and sky when meditating very deeply, didn't know what they were, but it does make me wonder if people under trance or deep meditation have common experiences. Great video.
So, Bishamonten wasn’t just a Buddhist guardian of the north, but in Japanese lore he was also venerated as a god of war. Uesugi Kenshin, the Daimyō of Echigo, was often regarded as being a physical avatar of Bishamonten among his peers. In fact, the Uesugi clan were pretty devoted to the Buddhist faith like how many Daimyō of western Japan (particularly the Kyushu clans) converted to Catholicism. For Japanese players, Bishamonten could give people imagery of wide scale conflict and conquest. Also fun fact: Uesugi Kenshin was also known as the Dragon of Echigo, and due to his association with Bishamonten, the God of War The tower, as others may have already pointed out, represent destruction, danger, misery, but also liberation. Also of note; the tower is associated with _Mars_ in astrology, which as we all know is the _Roman_ god of war. Similarly to the Jungian archetypes, characters with the same arcana fit their own archetypes, and personas of the same arcana fit an overall archetype too. For example: the hierophant represents characters with logical (to a fault) rational as well as figures of parenthood. That is why two of the games have the hierophant tied to a father figure to the protagonist, and three other games tie them to people who stow away their emotions. As for the personas, they tend to represent priestly or saintly figures, or beings of knowledge.
My interpretation has always been that Maiko, the little girl in Persona 3, is associated with the Hanged Man Arcana because she embodies themes of helplessness and dependence on others. The Hanged Man often symbolizes a situation where one is stuck and unable to change things without external help. Maiko is in the midst of her parents divorce, a situation she cannot control or influence on her own. She relies on the protagonist and other adults for support and guidance, which reflects the Hanged Man's need for assistance to move forward. Additionally, the Arcana suggests a shift in perspective, just as the Hanged Man views the world from an upside-down position, Maiko gains new insights about her situation through the help she receives. This combination of helplessness, dependence, and eventual understanding makes the Hanged Man a fitting representation for Maiko's story in my oppinion.
I always thought he was pushing crack
13:12 What'd you sick freaks THINK the rationale was ROFL
@@jasonblundelldobebussingThis guys interpretation is more correct. Funny comedic perception though.
Came here to say this.
The Hanged Man also frequently is associated with being overwhelmed by and thus resisting choices (especially reversed). It becomes upright when one surrenders to inevitability and accepts a new path, as Maiko does by the end of her social link.
In the Persona series especially, the Hanged Man often involves suffering and sacrifice, perhaps by oneself or by others you once trusted. Just as Maiko faces with her parents. Her old life is over, no matter that she is too young to cope… without help, anyway.
Most of the other SLs in P3 involve death in one way or another: risking it, facing it, dealing with it, running from it. At least the kid doesn’t die. :)
I love this comment. Thank you for elevating what was just a dumb joke on my part to genuine insight. This is why I love my audience.
Fun fact: When Makoto Yuki awakens to Orpheus he speaks the Following Qoute.
"I am thou...... Thou art I..... From the Sea of thy Soul I cometh. I am Orpheus, Master of Strings"
You rarely take the name of the major arcana as something literal. Tower represents either disaster or a major event that completely changes ones life. Hanged man usually represents being in a situation where someone has little control. Interpretation of tarot is really complicated even without digging into reversed readings.
Yes. I love the interpretation that you and another commenter, brinkofdeath, put forward in regards to the Hanged Man and Maiko. I'm still curious as to what the "Tower" would have to do with Bishamonten, though.
@@maxderrat well as far as I can tell with a quick look through some websites, he's a guardian deity of Buddhist worshipers and guardian of the north. I think associating him with the card that represents major changes and obstacles isn't to much of a stretch.
@maxderrat a lot of those Arcana classifications do break down a bit more than how Arcana relate to the themes of the story of the social link
A very micro google aka who knows the accuracy says that the northern direction being associated with danger which would be put together with the destruction of the tower that is the card. It's a danger which one can only survive and regrow from like the monk you help/connect with in that social. That might be why they put him into that classification
@@maxderrat It's worth noting first off, that there exists different versions of personas/demons/shadows/guardians to stress different aspects of the mythological character. Bishamoten isn't always Tower. To the extent he is associated with the Tower, imo it's likely a reference to SMT 1 where the death of the four guardians heralded a great disaster.
Not to mention that reversed readings are a relatively modern invention that was not done in traditional tarot. In fact, some of the earliest decks like the marseilles deck have pip cards that have a singular design that can’t be flipped, similar to regular playing cards.
Fun fact, Mr. Edogawa in Persona 3 is based off a key staff member in Atlus -- Shogo Isogai -- who, along with Kazuma Kaneko, was one of the key creative members in the SMT series and himself incredibly well-versed in mythology and religion. His notable works include SMT2, SMT: Nocturne, Soul Hackers 1, Strange Journey etc.,
P4 has the best example of facing your own shadow for growth, as there are nearly no external shadows as bosses. Each dungeon is based around the Shadow of a party member, and whenever you meet one, the only reason we enter the battle is because your party member denies that the Shadow _is_ part of them ("You're not me!"), thus giving them the power to act separately: "I am the Shadow; the True Self". Once you've beaten them, the Shadow is completely silent while your party member monologues about accepting that side of themselves ("You... are me."), then they vanish, the conflict resolved by facing their negative traits and accepting them for what they are. The Shadow cannot be independent once they are accepted, and so they say nothing.
The Arcana system can be a little bit funny in P3, but tarot is *complicated*, and can take a long time to learn. I've been dabbling for over a decade, and it still trips me up every so often, but at the end of the day, tarot interpretation is more art than science. Pharos isn't the Death arcana because he's a harbinger of the end of the world, he's the Death arcana because he represents a radical shift in the reality of the protagonist. It's all about intuiting the intended message from context; the situation around the character in the Social Link is what determines their arcana.
Magician characters are inexperienced and self-confident, often jealous, and have something happen to their love interests, Priestess characters are quiet intellectuals who struggle with difficult family lives, Chariot characters are driven and competitive, often to their own detriment, etc, etc.
wholeheartedly agree with this. thats why, even after almost 2 decades, Persona 4 is still the best.
Bishamonten is of the Tower arcana because of what it represents: a sudden, catastrophic destruction of one’s life, circumstances, and/or path. The warrior personas of the Tower arcana are extremely destructive, usually to themselves as much as everyone else, like Cú Chulainn (of Irish legend), Mara, or Shiva.
I think some of they most representatives personas in the tower Arcana is actually Cu Cuchulain and *Masakado* because, Even if they are powerful Warriors they meet a tragic end. I think one cool persona that could enter in the tower Arcana is Sigfried who also meets a tragic end
Also, Bishamonten is sometimes represented holding a small pagoda tower in his hand
I never knew much about tarot and assumed the tower was meant to be phallic and had something to do with male ego. Seeing as thier social links seem to be focused on characters seeking to fullfil their own self satisfaction and overcoming that desire.
@blakec8549
In some versions of the deck, the card is not even called "The Tower", but "The Lightning".
@@MauM. That makes sense. I guess youtube comments are the means by which all will be revealed
7:48 I know I'll sound like a 🤓, but I just wanna correct this, mementos, the tv world and tarter sauce aren't the entire collective unconscious itself, they're parts of the collective unconscious that each represent what desire humanity collectively has during the game, so they all just parts of the sea of souls but not all of it
The psychology and esoteric nature of the protagonist spiritual awakening is what makes these games my favorite RPGs. Especially the dark nature of Persona 3. I love how the series plays with the ideas of archetypal characters and the way the collective unconscious is represented as a deep dark dungeon where in the shadows dwell.
Also thanks for blowing my mind with the world card breakdown 😵
You may find it interesting that a lot of the creative team for Persona 3 through 5 are currently working on a new game in the same vein, Metaphor Refantazio, that also seems to be drawing on Jungian psychology. Instead of summoning Personas the characters can transform into creatures called Archetypes that are based on RPG classes (Knight, Magician, Thief, etc.). And you gain access to new Archetypes by bonding with characters who accentuate those archetypes in some way. I dunno if it'll be as focused on Jungian psychology as Persona or if it'll be more broad, though.
Carl "Forever" Jung
Much better than Carl "I Like 'Em" Jung
@vladtepes1047 You know my Uncle Carl too?
I highly doubt anyone will see this but I haven't seen anyone in the comments talking about this, maybe I didn't look far enough into comments BUT, in the minute 19:28 as he shows the meaning of the colors within the card I noticed that the colors matched the color themes of the persona games
Red being persona 5
Blue being persona 3
Yellow being persona 4
And green that now we know is the theme of persona 6.
I don't think atlus had this in mind back then but is a nice coincidence non the least.
I should've realized the inconsistency with Personas being Shadows and how, while it does use Jungian concepts as part of the story, it is more of a mixture of the concepts that are connected but have different parts. I always loved how Persona was Shadows because it's like the characters learning more about themselves through the repressed parts of their personality and gaining a higher state of being.
Slight thing worth mentioning; the final card you recieve from Igor in P3 is a supercharged version of The World, instead called The Universe.
The major arcana are meant to represent challenges one may face in life, and while circumstances vary, all journeys theoretically begin with The Fool. It basically represents that you know nothing about the trials you are about to face as you begin to work towards your goal.
Once you've gone through the tribulations of your journey and achieved your goal, you've reached The World. This card represents the accumulation of your experiences, becoming more learned and "worldly" during your struggle.
From what I understand, most Persona protagonists recieve The World during the true ending, which helps them put down whatever bad guy is causing trouble in that game. Minato/Kotone, however, are the only known characters to recieve The Universe instead. Igor is even stunned when the card is drawn, stating that the MC is one of the most remarkable guests he's ever had in the Velvet Room.
While The World draws power from the Social Links you've forged, The Universe draws power from "consciousness" itself, allowing the MC to basically use "Yin" to fight Nyx's "Yang".
Yup every Persona protag is either capable of or recieves The World (since it means completeness or fulfilment) but the P3 twins are apparently the only Guests in history (at least Guests that Igor has worked with) that obtain The Universe which is a concept so far beyond the The World that I personally interpret it as "The Self becomes God and God becomes one's Self" it makes me wonder if any of Philemon's other Guests have gotten The Universe or if Nylarlathop has ever gotten a champion capable to realizing The Universe.
Yeah I was just about to say this… albeit on a much smaller scale, but you saved me some time and said it better than I could have, so yea that’s a W.
I will say that Makoto’s arc is friggin amazing, one of my favorite arcs in the series. Going from this apathetic guy who kinda just did things because he was asked to, to actually sacrificing himself to protect all the friends he met and loves. I wish I could be like him.
I still believe people over-interpret the whole "Universe" thing.
It's still The World, almost always when the Arcana is revealed it's always a counter to whatever deity it's against. The use IS definitely situational but always appropriate.
All 3 protags are supercharged with power of friendship and always standing alone with the god they oppose.
The difference is circumstance, Makoto Yuki survived the incident should've killed him and his parents 10 years ago. "Death" sealed in him extended his life, and soon after cutting his connection with Ryoji and Nyx with The Great Seal he soon follows after.
Maybe by mercy or gratitude he was given enough time to last until Graduation Day.
To add: In the spinoff games Minato/Makoto's ultimate persona is Messiah/Jesus.
Isn’t Universe the same as the World? I’m pretty sure they just changed it to World in P4 because it was more accurate. Universe implies that there’s something past the world which we have not explored yet. Aliens or other planets or galaxies but how does that tie into Persona?
An example of individuation in the series is all the other side character you help face their shadows, particularly in P4. Upon doing so, they accept the shadow as a part of themselves, and that is how they obtain their personas and grow as people.
The game even has it that if they don't they become devoured by the shadow and that this is what happens to most people who get put in the TV world.
The game also plays with the idea of identity and perception, as the characters that are subject to the scrutiny of the public have more drastically caricaturized Shadow's to contend with as the shadow is also informed by how we think of ourselves based on how others see us
Alchemist, psychology scholar: the list of accolades just keeps growing huh
Just those two... and Metal Gear/Silent Hill scholar, but that's all I'm confident in at the moment.
I thought Max, I dunno, was gonna interview a practicing psychologist in this video for a second.
Scholar just means one with knowledge on a topic.@@brentclouse7791
@@maxderrat We talking bachelor's, masters? Autodidact is badass too and in some ways, even more impressive. Don't have to say, I just find you to be a really interesting and exceptional person.
@@Doug_MacArthurthe glazing is CRAZY
The middle character in the world arcana card in 3 also represents the messiah archetype as symbolizes by the persona messiah who is a Fusion of Orpheus and Thanatos the two main personas of makoto from persona 3
Thanks for taking a more in-depth look at the series, Max. Persona gets overshadowed by the anime tropes, when in reality it's got some of the best subtext and metaphors ever in a piece of media. My favorite allusion is the symbolism of Sartre's theory about existentialism, that we are "condemned to be free." This is best illustrated by the image of Joker being the inmate in the Velvet Room on his route to rehabilitation. We all work hard to impose our will against one another, as much as our deep relationships with our confidants inform us about who we are, like a mirror image. We have a burden to be free, and we always have to choose. That's the calendar system, showing us that possibilities are infinite, but time is not.
I know it was a joke, but the hanged man represents inevitable failure. Maiko is dealing with the divorce of her parents.
I've read the tarot for about 30 years now. The one thing I always say to anyone before reading is that the tarot is a tool. It doesn't foresee the future, it doesn't give you solutions to anything. What it does and does well is propose a random scenario that we then relate to your quandary. By giving you a scenario it forces you to think what to do if that scenario were to come true and thus you gain a deeper understanding of your issues.
In any case, the hanged man shows that things will inevitably fail no matter what, either by your own hands or others. So on a positive light it shows survival after a tragedy, coping with loss, coming to terms with your own mortality and yes, realizing your parents divorce is inevitable and not in your own hands.
“one could theoretically face other people’s shadows if they could enter the collective unconscious but that’s a level of woo” isn’t that just what the internet is…? i mean sure there’s stuff people don’t share, but. most of it is on there somewhere in some form tbh. of course the internet probably has shadows and hidden potential too
I believe there is a line in P5 where someone (can't remember who) says that the collective unconscious sounds similar to the internet and Makoto responds that that's an interesting way of looking at it.
@@skolkorYou certainly see a kind of unfiltered version of people online. In a different sense what you see is extremely filtered.
I guess insofar as one can confront another's shadow online, you certainly can't overcome it.
I wonder what the neo-humans from The Talos Principle 2 would think.
Thanks Max for another amazing video!
Please do more Persona videos with more focused topics, those are what grab me the most about SMT aside from the characters themselves. These games are so packed with meaning.
If you find interest in the symbolism of the Persona 3's World tarot, You'll definitely want to give Persona 2: Innocent Sin a look and see how that game handles the connections to Jung, Tarot, and the other plot elements.
I am once again looking at a video through the lens of Destiny and I think I screamed at 16:07 because this seems like what we achieve with Prismatic in The Final Shape, and what was hinted at with all the alchemical symbols in Witch Queen about two years ago. We already had the Light, the physical, and we have been mastering Darkness, the metaphysical, since Stasis. Interesting how "control" was the first aspect of the metaphysical we encounter, then memory through deepsight, egregore. It seems like Eris was guiding us and other characters in Season of the Haunted bu having us help allies content with their inner nightmares and turning them into memory. Now that we have come into contact with the metaphysical strings of the universe with Strand, tapping into the collective unconscious with the Veil enough that we can restore physical objects through memory, it seems like we will achieve apotheosis with Prismatic once we travel through the portal of Light and Dark made by the Witness carving into the flesh of the traveler. The Witness may wear the Darkness like a cloak, but we wield the collective strings like a conductor of a symphony, and we defend a gentle city ringed in spears as the traveler wanted. An end to the samsara of the flower game.
Max’s yellow Persona character gave me whiplash. I would gladly welcome his yellow avatar morph into whatever series he would like to talk about.
13:00 what Maiko has to do with the hanged man is that she has to choose between going with her mother or her father. The Hanged man is often associated with choosing a path of some sort, and how seeing things from a different perspective can help making a better decision. She's also related with the inverted hanged man, being unable to decide.
I can see a relation between the girl and the _Hanged Man_ arcana.
The Hung Man is... a different archetype.
14:11 Ah, a man of culture.
Elizabeth best tbh
@@shira_yone Preach
sadly he is incorect
Please talk about Persona 1 & 2 at some point! I think you'll love them and they're arguably even more accurate to the Jungian roots of the series than the later titles.
the arcana of the ultimate personas that the protagonists use in 3, 4, and 5 are pretty symbolic
makoto yuki in persona 3 uses thanatos, which is aligned with death, and (spoilers) represents how makoto doesn’t fear death and even embraces it. some might argue that his ultimate persona is orpheus telos or messiah though, and i dont really have good enough explanations for those
yu narukami in persona 4 uses izanagi no okami, which is aligned with world, and since izanagi was yu’s original persona, this expresses how yu started without knowing anything but eventually grew to be extremely powerful
ren “joker” amamiya in persona 5 uses satanael, which is aligned with the fool, and he uses a fool arcana aligned persona to symbolize that he is independent and that he harnesses all the sins to defeat his enemy, and the fool represents how he returns to his normal life
Okay the Carl Jung bit at the start had me fucking dying. But yeah I love how much of persona is actually referential to Jung, past just it's name. It would've been easy to just see a cool name and decide to adopt it for a concept, but they really did a ton of research on the subject and it shows
Tbf to most people Persona is just another way to say "person" in Spanish and Latin. So the name had to have some purpose because what publisher would want to sell a game called "Person".
My only gripe with this video is that you misidentified mascots for animals; mascots have various psychological functions, both for individuals and groups. I'd argue the games get good milage from this even, some aspects that spring to mind: identity formation, emotional connections, social cohesion, psychological comfort, symbolic representation and obviously brand image.
Yeah, my bad. Morgana is not a cat and Teddy ain't a bear. :P Koromaru is a good doggie, tho! ;)
@@maxderratI think Atlus considers the actual mascot of 3 to be Aigis. The non-human yearning to be human, just like Teddy and Morgana.
@@HollowGolem I always thought Aigis was the mascot. She appears in more marketing material, is more central to the story, and is more odd and eccentric than Koromaru. In fact all the mascots have a conflict with the concept of "humanity". Teddie wants to learn to be human, Morgana wants to prove/reclaim his humanity, and Aigis wants to understand humans while believing she isn't. I've seen the argument that they combined represent the Ego, Self, and Super Ego but I can't remember which is which.
@@Urekyu The id/ego/superego thing is an interesting way to think about them. Aigis is dominated by her superego in an almost literal way, programmed to do things. Her drive to protect the main character could be seen as a drive a la the id, and her story is about forming an ego (culminating in the Answer).
Teddy starts almost as a child, pure id. He just wants to be left alone, happy, and then people keep throwing folks into the TV world and agitating the shadows. He continues to be a being of id late into the game (especially in the Golden content like the beach trip and ski trip), and worries about his identity, almost completely lacking the guidance of a superego (basically just what he picks up from interacting with the team).
Morgana has an idea of who he is, a mission, a purpose, and directly interfaces with the world. That's an established, if undirected, ego. He engages in id-driven behavior (lusting after Ann, belittling Ryuji) and the episode around Okumura's palace represents him seeking a higher purpose, a way to fit into the gestalt, which is Superego-driven behavior.
So maybe they all start as an aspect of the psyche and their journey is about growing and developing the other two. (And maybe that's why Teddy is the worst of the three in my opinion: he never really finishes that journey, while the others have something like a satisfying conclusion)
@@HollowGolem haha thanks for correcting me but I'll always say Teddie is the best one. You can argue his journey doesn't "finish" sure. But in my opinion the aftermath of Teddie's arc is that he has a life to live and learn in. A new beginning for him. He keeps thinking that the real world is a temporary thing until the IT makes it clear that he is a valued friend they will keep. Teddie becomes the very symbol of the desire for truth throughout the game. I love Aigis to death and Morgana is....Aigis is the best character in P3 but her arc ends in a sort of predictable way for me. While Teddie was a character who kept surpassing everything I thought he was the more I learned of him. I actually think he is the most misunderstood character in the game which hurts. Does he do stuff that is pervy? Yes, I would hate him if he was anyone else and it is one of my only gripes with the game (How come the only anime scene with Marie in it is the 2nd hot springs scene in game Atlus? You couldn't just leave it at one stupid hot spring scene and give Marie more screentime???). But when you consider who Teddie is his behavior is simply in line with the concept of ID. He is a character that grew on me way too much.
I think that it's less the people featured in the Social Links that are meant to map to the arcana - it's more about the arcanas' meanings being the themes of the stories.
Mr. Edogawa has this one lecture where he goes through all of the arcana and their meanings all map quite nicely to what the social links are about.
Also, when a certain someone speaks a line of dialogue before changing arcana, they pretty much also give away the moral of that arcana's story.
I love this deep dive! It has taught me so much about the themes of a game series that I love so much & also tipped me off to themes that may use in future games. Like "archetype" is something already introduced in Metaphor: re Fantazio as the new name for "Personas" within that game. This was super informative!
I'm absolutely in love with this channel, you're amazing sir, don't ever stop
Man I'm glad I came across this video. I have always been deeply intrigued by psychology and the theoretical building blocks of the universe, what true "reality" is, and what truly lies within each and every one of us. You've earned a new sub. Its a shame that not enough people are this intuitive and explorative in thought, mainly because games like Persona and others that deal with Jung's ideas and theories and similar ones, often end up having many details lost. Final Fantasy VII Rebirth and in turn the FFVII Remake trilogy itself, is beginning to lean HEAVILY into all of this stuff, turning the Lifestream into more of a Collective Unconscious concept, which is so dope! Not only Carl Jung, but also Buddhism's Yogachara concept. Psychology and the metaphysical should always have a place in fictional media. This shit is brilliant.
there's also something to be said about how the world, as the last major arcana, is the final step in the version of the hero's journey described by tarot and the sefirot in kabbalah - representing the pathway between malkuth and yesod, the final step that indicates "the work is complete", inverting the fool's "blank slate, freshly departed for a hero's journey" motif
I've seen a few analysis suggest that each confidant represents the MC 'Idea' of the arcane in their fools journey. How Goro in P5 represents Joker's idea of Justice in the upright and reversed meanings. Meanwhile Nanako is the idea of Justice to the MC in P3 and as such plays a very different role despite being representative of the same Arcana.
It's interesting that the new game from the same studio 'Metaphor RE:fantazio', which is effectively just medieval persona, has it's own roster of shadows, but rather than being turned into personae they are now fully embracing the title of 'Archetypes'.
Great video, more Persona pls. I'd especially like to know what you think of the shadows of Persona 2 and how they differ from the shadows of the later games. And (Spoilers for late game P4)
The twist near the end of Persona 4 where its revealed the shadows aren't just the "true self" but a mix of that and societal/collective perception of that person. Revealed in the Namatame interrogation scene where the group wills his shadow to appear on TV and confess to the murders, but also shows how his desire to redeem himself as a hero was genuine; I take this as evidence that if the collective perception is strong enough, it will begin to force the shadow to conform to it.
I think the reason all the MegaTen and Persona games incorporate so much diverse psychology, spirituality, religion, mythology, etc. is because it was genuinely founded by nerds like Cozy and Kaneko that were real into and passionate about that stuff, some of them borderline occult nutjobs. You can see that in their self-insert characters like Edogawa. I remember Kaneko said it an interview they were supposed to be, "good for your brain, whatever that means." They go real deep into a lot of obscure Eastern stuff you'd never see incorporated into other games.
I remember I tried to look up what the Sanskrit symbols used in a lot of Dark spells mean, and it took awhile to figure out they were an obscure variation of Siddham script called Bonji now only ever used in a few esoteric school of Buddhism in Japan, something there's only a couple articles about online that I could find.It really interesting the way they mesh so many concepts from different schools of thought across various cultures, and then find a way to make it cool on top of that. Digital Devil Saga was the dark cyberpunk form of Hinduism I didn't know I needed. The way Raidou Kuzunoha's games depicts Shintoism and living kami in Japan's real-world transitional period from Eastern tradition towards Westernization and "modernity" is refreshing compared to just another "old nature good; new technology bad" story.
10:52 - 11:13 people with Aspergers Syndrome (like myself) spend their entire lives trying to help the shadow unconscious minds of other people while neglecting their own shadow unconscious mind. Trust me, I know. And it hurts, because you realize that no one will ever do the same for you and you lack the strength most people have to overcome your own shadow unconscious mind yourself. Its worse than suicide. its an entire life where you're dying.
I can guarantee you, TK... the vast majority of people lack the strength to contend with their shadow in the way that autistic people do. Autistic people are forced to contend with whether or not their quirks are a result of bad behavior or because of factors out of their control all the time. This is because there are usually people in our lives telling us that we are lazy or selfish. I've found that the vast majority of people that I have met who are autistic, when giving an opportunity to better their lot in life, are trying harder than most neurotypical people.
@@maxderrat I'm not in this spectrum, on the bipolar one, actually, but this is ginormously BASED.
hello, i came from Smoughtown video where he praises you and i have to say you,re amazing
Have a ton of your videos to binge watch, sending you all the love Max
Bishamonten an example of the warrior archetype? Funny thing.. so does Mars and the Tower Card and Mars are associated with each other so they probably linked it that way.
Bishamonten represents the Tower as the "head" of the "four figures" that uphold righteousness and is stern in their ideas of what justice is.
A lot of the Tower Arcana has generally war gods with a similiar "exaggerated" personality (even if it initially had mostly "Vile" gods in P1 and P2) and often doesn't have to represent the "whole story" of the tower getting destroyed ( e.g. Seiten Taisei fall from heaven )
So about 18:59 …it’s actually The Universe Card. For some reason it reuses The World Card’s design. So far only the P3 Protagonist has summoned a card from The Universe Arcana.
I'd like to see you take on either SMT: Strange Journey or SMT IV for an analysis video, although they are marooned on dead platforms and screaming for remakes. Your script for the Nocturne video was top-tier and there's so much more to work with, with either of those games.
In regards to your confusion with the representation of the arcana within characters and figures of the Persona series it's often the case that the symbolism of the card is not going to be literally represented, but metaphorically. Maiko, to use your example, is a child forced to endure her parents going through a divorce. Within the symbolism of the Hanged Man, Maiko's situation embodies the confrontation of overwhelming challenge and lack of agency within the circumstance that the Hanged Man stage of the Fool's Journey represents. She is a great representation of this particular symbol.
Having thoroughly enjoyed your FMA series, your analysis of Ergo Proxy, and now this video I would love for you to analyze the story of the Fool's Journey within Tarot and learn more about how its concepts are explored or paralleled by the philosophers and psychologists you reference in your other videos.
Great video but one thing I do need to point out and it's just semantics. P3MC gets "The Universe" not "The World". The World is the card the protags of 4 and 5 get at the end. It's the same card technically from both number and meaning in readings but it's from the Thoth deck (same with Aigis' Aeon card).
I think you would really enjoy Persona 2 Innocent Sin - it has a much stronger psychology angle in that the narrative is steeped in the childhood traumas and parental issues of the core cast of protagonists.
(spoiler)
i think what Makoto experiences in the end of P3 is the exact same thing that the victims in P5 experienced. it all ties in nicely together across the series
I always thought that Tartarus was in a way a loose reference to the tower of babel where God struck down the tower and made humanity speak in different tongues. Which the same almost happened to SEES tartarus disappears and also their memories about the dark hour which united them. Kinda like how humanity was united in one language until they weren't
It's kinda an inverse in a sense. With babel, humanity tried to rival the heavens. Which could be connected to Mitsuru's grandfather's plan to take the power of the shadows and create time manipulation. Overly ambitious his project failed catastrophically but the Dark Hour remained and Tartarus constructed.
Human hubris was struck down by differing opinions and after a cataclysmic event a tower arose.
Honestly, the modern Persona games are pretty shallow when it comes to these themes and ideas, only really approaching things at the most surface level. This especially when you compare to the older titles that stuck much closer to the source material and went more in-depth. In short, the modern titles are basically watered down versions of what the older ones did, yet they get all the spotlight due to being popular.
I mean, Persona 2 was a wild ride and the thematic depth that it went to was just insane.
Wow. This is definitely one heck of a video. Really changed on how I’ll look at future Persona games going forward.
Well, the Arcana are VERY rarely literal in the name and their meaning, as an example, the Tower is a card about chaos and upheaval, the World is about completion, the Hanged Man is about helplessness, or sometimes sacrifice
If we wanna assume Maiko (Little girl in P3) DOES make sense on some level, she's going through her parent's divorce, I can't think of something a child would feel much more helpless during, outside of someone actually dying
As a fellow lover of psychology(studying it on a personal and academic level for 18 years), and a fan of the persona series, i absolutely loved this analysis. Very well thought out and enlightening!
yeah you definitely need to do a part 2 or another video on persona because although this was hard to follow for a high schooler I genuinely enjoyed it.
As a psychology and criminology graduate, I'm grateful I can apply what I learnt to understand Persona 5.
The moment I deduced what the theme was about before the game came out officially, I was like wow.
Two notes I have to address
One: the world arcan card in persona 3 is different, it's the universe and has no persona unlike the world arcan that has izanagi no okami or personas from p1 and p2
Two: the dungeons are not the collective unconsciousness you talked about but in persona 1 and 2 there's a character called philemon who lives in a realm called the sea of the collective unconsciousness
This will sounds stupid when I say it but I’m guessing that the creators of persona theorize and twist the accessibility of the collective unconscious (in general) to present the idea of facing different enemies & stuff like that. Makes good science fiction.
I'm someone who watches videos like these and edits my comments with timestamps and interjections, so please give me a moment to watch through in full and organize my thoughts.
7:54 I would actually argue that the Sea of Souls and the Collective Unconscious (that is, the realms of unreality or "Worlds Of Cognition" as I refer to them) are separate planes, at least within the context of the series. In multiple instances throughout the games, Personas and Shadows are stated to come from the Sea of Souls (for example, Shadow negotiations in P5, Tatsuya Suou's awakening of Vulcanus, and Makoto Yuki's awakening of Orpheus in Persona 3. "I am thou, thou art I... From the sea of thy soul, I cometh...") We even get to see instances where archetypical entities exist within the Sea Of Souls itself, such as the final boss of Persona 3's _Episode Aigis: The Answer_ who I will not be naming for spoiler purposes. There is an inherent connection between the Sea and the local Worlds Of Cognition of each game, of course, but Personas and Shadows aren't exactly born from the Collective Unconscious; they only exist within it. Even entities like the first final boss of Persona 5 who say they were born from the collective human unconscious were not actually; they were born from the Sea, but humanity's collective unconscious called for an entity who could fulfill their wish for control, and the Sea gave that entity to them. I admittedly know very little about the actual psychological side of the story as I literally know all of my Jung from Persona, but this is something important to be clarified.
13:13 I'm going to anyway, because I think its funny you specifically had to ask us not to.
Tarot Arcana aren't meant to be taken at face value. Of course Personas of the Chariot Arcana arent going to all be mythological Chariots, but rather there's hidden meanings and keywords attached to the Arcana itself as they represent steps through the Fool's Journey to attain the World. The aforementioned Chariot, for example, is commonly associated with characters who would run headlong into a burning building to save someone, knowing full well they would get burned themselves in the process. Chie, Aigis, and Ryuji are clear examples of such an archetype, though Aigis and Ryuji couldn't be more different personality-wise, yes?
Characters of the Hanged Man arcana are typically caught between a rock and a hard place (Maiko being her parents' divorce, and Iwai from Persona 5 being caught in a yakuza power struggle).
Other people in the comments here have already explained Bishamonten, so I'm not gonna beat you over the head with that explanation anymore and just keep going.
...Oh. The video's done already?
That was... surprisingly in-depth for being a sub-30 minute video! Good stuff!
Great comment
Carl Jung - 'No tree, it is said, can grow to heaven unless its roots reach down to hell.'
The hangman means to let go of outdated beliefs if it's upright so it makes sense for a kid who has a different outlook than adults the tower means an unforeseen catastrophe which is something that a warrior would contend with
Excellent video, as always. I just want to point out that the Tartarus in Greek Mythology isn't exactly the Underworld, but a part of the Underworld that is ruled by Hades, but I understand it would be too much information on a part that didn't exactly need it, it's just my nerd brain talking.
But it's cool to see you playing and doing videos on Persona, I think you'll give a lot more depth for the community and that's definitely a good thing. Keep up the great work!
Also, I would hope to see some more in depth analysis of the story and themes of some of the games. (And I agree about Mitsuru being the best girl)
Do a video that goes in depth into 3, 4, and 5. I'm curious to learn more about this stuff, but more specific to each game, specifically 5 since that's my main game
12:00 i suppose one way to justify the use of "persona" is that in real life rather than interacting with other peoples true selves your persona deals with both peoples personas and the consequences of their shadow
Ayo, a Persona video from Max. Fr? 😱
I always thought Takemi was pushing hard cocaine to students. Can we get a peer paper on that topic?
This isn't even his first
She never gives us a single SP item, so no, she doesn't sell any stimulants.
@@LairOfLair ...the invigorate accessories?
@@andrewdorsey1237 damn, forgot about these.
RE: slaying shadows within the collective unconscious rather than personal shadows, I will say that after I had done a substantial amount of personal shadow work over a 14 year period, I then started tackling a lot of collective shadows to better understand them, and from that I learned even more about myself, and found more personal shadows. My collective shadow slaying (integration) lasted another 8 years or so. I did this by reading news articles, Facebook posts, and other polarizing content, especially in relation to ideological agendas and political propaganda, allowed myself to feel emotionally triggered by them, and then asked myself questions about what the pattern would look like in an interpersonal relationship. From there, I'd experience the pattern by playing one of the two sides, with somebody I knew, loved, or randomly bumped into playing the other role, and I'd observe myself and them throughout the process. This is a form of dialectical thinking (and experiencing) that I could somewhat control in a microcosmic set of events, since we don't have much power or control in the macrocosmic plane/sphere of existence, where the problem (thesis) would come in, I'd react to it (anti-thesis), and rather than rushing to conform to a side (conscious/light vs unconscious/dark), or try to get the other party to conform to a side by forcing my views on them, I'd sit with the tension of opposites until a third pathway would manifest in the form of an epiphany, insight, and new higher understanding that brought order to the chaos (synthesis). I called this process "Gandhi Groups" because I was attempting to "be the change I wanted to see in the world" through letting myself witness and observe the things I didn't like in the world in order to find them in my own personal experiences, to transform their patterns in a very personal manner. Jung touched on this in the following quote:
If you imagine someone who is brave enough to withdraw all his projections, then you get an individual who is conscious of a pretty thick shadow. Such a man has saddled himself with new problems and conflicts. He has become a serious problem to himself, as he is now unable to say that they do this or that, they are wrong, and they must be fought against… Such a man knows that whatever is wrong in the world is in himself, and if he only learns to deal with his own shadow he has done something real for the world. He has succeeded in shouldering at least an infinitesimal part of the gigantic, unsolved social problems of our day.
~“Psychology and Religion” (1938). In CW 11: Psychology and Religion: West and East. P.140
I learned quite a lot about myself, philosophy, critical thinking, psychology, ideologies, underlying assumptions, and law as a result of living this process.
does it help finding more fulfilling interpersonal relationships?
@@vivvy_0 Very much so, the quality of my relationships, the stability, and the meaningfulness of them all serve a higher purpose that flows harmoniously. It's no longer tied into fate, which is unconscious, but more about purpose and destiny, which is conscious and creative. The key is leaving the dreaded "drama triangle" of victim, villain, and hero in one's own relating and relationship patterns (relating to the microcosm and therefore also the corresponding plane of the macrocosm), and replacing it with the TED triangle of creator, challenger, and coach. It requires a radical level of self-responsibility and self-ownership to stop blaming external villains and rather see them as external reflections of the internal challenges we have within ourselves, to instead intentionally create our life, along with the relationships we consciously agree upon entering into.
These games have a lot more going on than a lot of people are willing to admit. I've studied a small amount of Psychology, so i am far from an expert, but i feel really strongly that (especially)smt iv has something to do with Freud's theories. Flynn is Ego, johnathon is super ego, walter is id. It explains why flynn sees them in the beginning of the story before he has met them
(6:30) To quote from Raven, "Mother is the word for GOD on the mouths of children everywhere."
More or less related to the video, but I have two amazing series for you to watch: 1. Turkish series The Gift and 2. Blood of Zeus. The first deals with ancient religions and union of opposites. The second is about Greek mythology. I loved both and 1000% recommend
The Gift... I think I've heard that one. Never heard of Blood of Zeus, though. Where can I watch them? Also, how are you doing, Kalypso? :)
@@maxderrat sent you a DM. I think the Gift, especially, would be a great addition to your channel
Holy guacamole, now I understand where Monado comes from (including the use of it in Xenoblade Chronicles)!!!
There is a joke I should make about 'now explain...' one particular Persona in this franchise... but I'll refrain (those who know... know exactly which one I'm talking about)
A certain persona of tower arcana..
As a long time Persona enjoyer, this video makes me happy inside.
Currently playing through Reload right now, being my first Persona/SMT game I'm loving it, just the video I needed
As a continuation on the discussion of the MC of P3 overcoming the Devouring Mother, he starts the story in a state that is complimentary to it. He is stricken by apathy and intense thanatophobia due to the death of his parents (the thanatophobia being pointed to by Thanatos bursting out of Orpheus during his Awakening). Throughout the story, his connections with people he meets and the lessons learned from challenges he overcomes causes him to lose his apathy and stop fearing his own death, psychologically overcoming the Devouring Mother.
Found your channel thru the nier videos and, surprise, you have an excelent video on one of my favorite series. Also, I have to watch the MGS2 video I just was recomended by the algorithm. Thanks and I await the next persona videos
6:31 For anyone who played P5 but not P5R, that definitely seems like a spoiler worth spoiler warning before showing...
7:29 Did someone say. . .MONADO?
I'M REALLY FEELING IT
Makoto is the male aspect fusing with the female aspect of Nyx birthing a New Universe.
Best video game series of all time with the Tales series underneath according to my personal opinion. And its because of Persona I wouldn't even known about Jungian psychology or bothered to looked into it.
The Tool, Carl, & J. Peterson (with a dash of SH) is still my favorite of ur videos.
Hey thanks man! If you like that stuff, you'll like this video. :D
@@maxderrat makes me wanna check out the Persona games even more now, thanks
I'm not a specialist when it comes to the psychology subject matter, as well as the religious imagery you were referring to, but the way you explained it in your video helped me fill out some gaps in the theories I had in regards to this video game series, specially in regards to the inherent meanings of the arcana, as well as the meaning behind the mementos dungeon from persona 5 alongside that game's final boss, to that effect, I am very curious to see your thesis focusing more on persona 5 royal in the future
Since you've taken a look at Persona... How would you feel checking out a puzzle game by Atlus called Catherine 👀
Sawing the template of Joker in MAX form was otherworldly
in certain religion, every human & spirits have innate disposition that has been ingrained to souls. this original disposition could base to things such as archetypes, good & evil, & purpose of life.
I assumed the young girl Maiko in P3R was the Hanged Man tarot card because she would like to hang upside down on the monkey bars which is where you first meet her.
Hey, Zoroastrian guy here, Zurvan is not the supreme god or the creator deity in mainstream Zoroastrianism, Mazdā is, Zurvan is just a time god in Zoroastrianism. He was only the supreme/creator deity in pre Zoroastrian Iranian mythology and also in an extint ancient cult within Zoroastrianism called Zurvanism but not in the main branch of Zoroastrianism itself. In Zoroastrianism, Ahura Mazdā is the supreme god and the creator.
I’ve heard there was a leak that P6’s color will be Green. This might just be an obvious choice, or it might mean that it’s the last in a tetralogy if we see P3-P6 as aspects of The World card. Or maybe it will be a pentalogy, culminating with White.
Hey Max, if you're willing to take a recommendation, I'd love to watch you talk about the game Grime. Here's a summary of the plot and why I think it would be interesting to delve into it: Grime is a metroidvania with souls-like elements that covers topics as the search for one's purpose, the will to survive and the acceptance of death. This is mostly represented by the fact that you play as a little black hole in formation and ventures around - and I kid you not - a dying space giant. The beings in this world are basically divided in two sides: the ones who fear you and treat you with hostility and the ones who welcome you with open arms. This game made me think about the theme you brought on the Drakengard video, about how you, the player, feel about the destruction you brought. At one point in the game, one character even asks you how do you feel about what you're doing, the beings you encounter and what are you going to do to them, what will that make you feel, etc. If you want to play the game, I don't want to spoil it for you, but my personal take is that the protagonist in Grime is more like a "force of nature", just doing what it has to do, and that gave me a little more ease. I hope you're willing to take a look at this, at least let me know if the game picks your interest or not, I'd love to see what else you can take from it's lore. I know you don't usually talk about metroidvanias, but you talked about Hollow Knight recently, so I'm keeping my hopes up. Stay yellow!
oh yeah I gotta second that. I'm not a fan of telling youtubers what they should engage with, but Grime deffo has a lot of substance to delve into that is not being appreciated enough and I'd love to see a video on it by him.
Yet another spectacular video. Thank you so much
You REALLY should look at Mage the Awakening. It's a TTRPG packed to the brim with gnosticism... You literally build your Gnosis to achieve Ascension
thank you for this video, ever since I replayed recently Persona 4 and realized all the series are based on carl jungs teachings I've been waiting to discuss or find someone like minded.
I always believe that assignment of each Persona to each Arcana depends on how you interpret their archetype evident in how Persona would switch their Arcana around each game. A lot of demonic powerful Persona will switch around between Moon, Tower, Devil, Death. I personally interpret Tower arcana as a strong entity that can prove to be great obstacle to the hero figures and it can be branched into either nemesis character, or just mean looking strong guys. Bishamonten might fit the latter. A lot of it also resulted from gameplay too. Strength and Tower Arcana are usually reserved for a very physically strong Persona, but the stronger are usually associated with Tower as it is a more of a mid-late game arcana than Strength.
Interestingly, in the original P3, each Arcana are also leaning toward a specific play type of game element: Magician are fire-inclined most of the time with high magic, Priestess are more ice-inclined, Emperor are more balanced and lightning-inclined, Fortune are to wind, Lover are more support-oriented, Hermit loves their status ailments, Justice are always light-based, Chariot are more about Strike attack with higher endurance, Strength are more about Slash, Tower are more about Pierce. However, in later P4, P5 and the new P3R, these association got switch around more but some strong association with each arcana still remain.
Has anyone realized that even tho the protag for p3 is super cool and interesting and stuff the real vessel for the player within the game is Aigis? We experience the game the way Aigis does, begin by only interacting with it as a pure game in a robotic sense, then we start to bond with the cast of characters and consider them our friends, at the end when we fall in love with the game we finally realize it has to end eventually, and as we hold it dear for all it has given us it perishes in our hands. It's the biggest revelation I've had with p3.
First heard of you through your collab with Resonant Arc.
Love your content, sir.
Thanks for checking out those videos mate! Glad to see you over here as well! :)
Persona is interesting in its way of presenting information. The persona descriptions, names and outer appearances make me genuinely interested in why they are depicted as what they are, and where those ideas come from.
This video showed me that Persona games go even deeper than what I thought. There seems to be so much symbolism as well as religious and psychological concepts...
I haven't studied much of anything, but it's definitely interesting.
Great analysis video, though i hope you would release another video expanding more on persona 1, and 2 ( innocent sin and eternal punishment )
I've seen something like the monad in the trees and sky when meditating very deeply, didn't know what they were, but it does make me wonder if people under trance or deep meditation have common experiences. Great video.
I genuinely get a kick out of seeing James Sunderlands' hip sway when he runs.
You know those hips don't lie.
So, Bishamonten wasn’t just a Buddhist guardian of the north, but in Japanese lore he was also venerated as a god of war. Uesugi Kenshin, the Daimyō of Echigo, was often regarded as being a physical avatar of Bishamonten among his peers. In fact, the Uesugi clan were pretty devoted to the Buddhist faith like how many Daimyō of western Japan (particularly the Kyushu clans) converted to Catholicism. For Japanese players, Bishamonten could give people imagery of wide scale conflict and conquest.
Also fun fact: Uesugi Kenshin was also known as the Dragon of Echigo, and due to his association with Bishamonten, the God of War
The tower, as others may have already pointed out, represent destruction, danger, misery, but also liberation. Also of note; the tower is associated with _Mars_ in astrology, which as we all know is the _Roman_ god of war. Similarly to the Jungian archetypes, characters with the same arcana fit their own archetypes, and personas of the same arcana fit an overall archetype too. For example: the hierophant represents characters with logical (to a fault) rational as well as figures of parenthood. That is why two of the games have the hierophant tied to a father figure to the protagonist, and three other games tie them to people who stow away their emotions. As for the personas, they tend to represent priestly or saintly figures, or beings of knowledge.
Persona 3 was my favorite, happy to hear you've been playing the series.