When I pitched The Well of Images to one of my writing buddies, he mentioned that using the collective unconscious as a fantasy world sounded a lot like the Persona video games. Knowing nothing about the series, I thought I would try the newly-released Persona 5. It was lots of fun. You play as Akira, a high school student on parole from juvenile prison, serving time on a false charge. On your first day of school, you discover that you and your new friends have the ability to enter the “cognitive realm,” a world that reflects reality as people perceive it to be. When someone has a selfish and distorted view of reality, it creates a “palace” of theirs in the cognitive realm, which their “shadow” rules over. When their shadows are defeated, their real-life counterparts see the evil in what they have done, and publicly confess their crimes in tears.
The wide variety of characters were extremely well-written, showing multiple dimensions of both the heroes and villains. It was cathartic to confront the twisted minds of a crime ringleader, an abusive mentor, a CEO who treated his employees like slaves, and others. All the while, threads of mystery piled up. Akira’s false conviction, the police’s tendency to look the other way, the mysterious deaths in the subway, all began pointing toward one man, Masayoshi Shido, the favored candidate for Prime Minister.
Finally, after many play hours of vigilante action, you take on Shido’s palace. The stakes: the entire country, and vengeance for a life ruined by a false conviction. Tension builds as you fight your way through the palace, defeating progressively harder mini-bosses and wrapping up side-plots, until the final battle is at hand. And then . . . it is just like any other boss battle. Shido’s shadow has a few forms, and then he is defeated. You steal his treasure and escape the palace.
Now at this point, you’re expecting a twist. You know Shido knows about the cognitive realm, and it has been foreshadowed that he has techniques to keep his heart from changing even if his shadow is defeated. However, back in the real world, Shido appears on public TV and starts confessing his crimes and schemes, before the news people cut him off. And then, well, that’s it. All that buildup for him to go out like a whimper.
But the game is not over. There is another palace, the palace of the people. Its ruling shadow is Yaldabaoth, not a reflection of a human like the other shadow rulers, but a god born of humanity’s desire to give up their free will and responsibility . . . which would have been cool, except it has nothing to do with the 90-hour-long story you have been playing up to this point. You defeat him because it is what the game wants you to do, not because you have any investment in what is going on anymore. The moment that was supposed to be the climax has already happened, and by now, you have played the game for so long that you just want it to end.
So what went wrong? What could the writers have done differently to deliver that epic, satisfying ending that the players have been excited for the whole time? The answer is to integrate Yaldabaoth and Shido into the same plot. My version of Persona 5’s ending goes like this:
When Shido appears on TV after his shadow has been defeated, he confesses nothing. Instead of being full of sorrow at the atrocities he has committed, he is even more confident than before, boasting that he has the country in his fist. Yet still, the people flock to support him. It appears that the main characters have failed. However, just like in the actual ending, they discover the final palace, the palace of the people, where the shadows of the people huddle in their voluntary prisons moping about there being no hope and giving up their decisions to a ruler. In the actual ending, Shido is among them. In my version, he is not.
When they meet Yaldabaoth in my ending, a distorted version of Shido’s face is stuck to his body. The characters learn that Yaldabaoth has existed for years, plotting to subdue humanity, and has been using Shido as his vessel. The collapse of Shido’s palace allowed Yaldabaoth to take control of Shido’s body, and increase his influence over humanity. Shido’s face cries, “freeeee meeeeee!” suggesting that his heart was indeed changed when his shadow was defeated, but he now has no control over his actions.
When the main characters defeat Yaldabaoth, Shido is freed to confess his crimes. After that, my version ends the same way the actual story does. Shido is put in prison, Akira is acquitted, and all the other threads are tied up. The players are left satisfied with a good twist and a properly-built climax.
I liked most of Persona 5. It was very well-written, and had amazing graphics and music. I know the writers had the skill to make the ending worthy of the rest of the game, but we are left with what we got. So the least I can do is to learn from their mistake, and avoid it in my own stories.
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