Shiho as the Player

Discuss hypothetical mods that nobody has taken on yet. Modders can choose to consider these ideas for their own projects.
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Strychnine
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Hello everyone! I'm a bit buzzed right now (or maybe more so), but I would like to introduce a mod I've been thinking about for a few days now:

Shiho Suzui as a the player!

I've been thinking about building her as a Phantom Thief named "Doll." The thought came to me as I listened to a fan theme for Shiho's palace (found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOW2s_23YPs). Reading through the comments gave me the idea of her rebellious spirit being something beautiful and intricate, yet mechanical the way a doll would be. I already have an idea of how I would like her outfit to look, but I'm a bit afraid to post it because it accentuates her curves, and that may be a bit insensitive to a r*pe victim.

I have a lot of modding experience, from several other games, but Persona will be a franchise that's entirely new to me. Shiho was always one of my favorite characters; she was one of the first students to be kind to the player. and she always seemed to have such a sweet demeanor. It genuinely pissed me off how she was just set up to be the disposable woman to advance the plot, and how she never received and characterization besides being a victim of Kamoshida's sexual abuse. I wanted to give her an outfit that would help her reclaim herself from what Kamoshida did, but I'm also afraid that it may be seen as objectifying her if I don't keep her skin completely covered up.

Anyway.

I was wondering it anyone would be able to help me decrypt the files for Persona 5 Royal. I have the USA .pkg file, and the links I used if anyone is able to unpack it using a jail-broken system. (I did buy the actual game, but was not able to successfully extract it). These links are not mine, but hours of sleuthing finally gave me the sources I was looking for (links will not be posted publicly; please PM me for the links to the .pkg parts, which you will have to manually reassemble). I attempted to decrypt it on my own console, but to no avail; the latest update seems to have invalidated my modifications.

This will be an incredibly stupid question, but would it be possible to simply take the files from P5R and port them to a P5 PS3 .pkg?
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ReLyf
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Strychnine wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 9:17 pm
"Persona 5 Royal. I have the USA .pkg file"

"This will be an incredibly stupid question, but would it be possible to simply take the files from P5R and port them to a P5 PS3 .pkg?"
1st question :
we need the actual .cpk not just the .pkg because
Image

2nd question :
no, if it were that easy P5R modding would be a big thing already


My statement :
Why dont you just try and mod normal vanilla P5 ? because waiting for modding Royal is probably going to be a long time from now because of
Image

(i tried my best explaining with the knowledge i have so im probably wrong)
Random human with one braincell

and most of the thing i make wont make sense
or looks very very bad
so dont question it
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ShrineFox
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Indeed, right now it would be easiest to mod the PS3 version unless you have a Japanese fake PKG and PS4 firmware 6.72, and even then, sadly no way to dump and mod the English version yet. Others have made progress backporting models and animations from Royal to the PS3 though, so it's possible at least.

As for the Shiho idea itself, yeah, the tricky part is being sensitive to the fact that she's an abuse survivor without mischaracterizing her. There's already a lot of complaints about how P5 handled Ann, from the skimpy outfit to her getting put on the spot right after Kamoshida's castle to pose nude for Yusuke... Even the way they included Shiho in the Kamoshida boss fight in Royal screams objectification. While I'm sure the intention was to make Kamoshida even more hateable, it didn't do much to flesh out his already two dimensional character. They already more than made their point by then. The story of P5 would be a lot more interesting if the antagonists were as fleshed out as the main cast.
That aside, I do see where you're coming from with the name "Doll" and the mechanical aspect, but I also worry it doesn't really reflect her rebellious/empowered side, rather that of a "subservient puppet," as Haru would say. But there's also the possibility that in the role of Joker, with the wild card and all, unless you rewrote the whole opening of the game it wouldn't even be canon anymore in the context of the mod that she was ever abused. It would be like an AU where she came to town instead.
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CaptainSwag101
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I agree with what Shrine said. I'm not the best at thinking up story details, but perhaps the story could be that Shiho came to town as a transfer student or whatnot (though perhaps not as a criminal, unlike Joker. Heck, maybe she could transfer to Shujin together with Ann). Once at Shujin Academy, Kamoshida could either target Ann or Shiho or both, and either the abuse that ensues--or just her defiance of said abuse before it happens--is what leads to the manifestation of her Persona. Could be an interesting take on the character, though it would admittedly follow a very similar path to Ann's awakening, so additional rewriting of story might be required to keep things unique.
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Strychnine
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I'll be honest, I have no idea what I was trying to articulate here. Sorry about the linguistic maze I put you all through. :P

Regarding the .pkg file: I initially thought that one of the reasons it hadn't been decrypted yet is because it was difficult to find the actual USA .pkg file. Now, being a bit more informed about Sony's ungodly encryption, jailbreaking, etc., I see that it isn't even possible to extract with the current firmware and Homebrew applications.

I guess I somehow reached the conclusion that it would be possible to extract the PS4 .pkg, take all the files, and replace the ones in the PS3 .pkg so that all of the new content would be playable in the original P5. I have no idea why I thought this would work, because it has never once worked like that in any of my previous modding projects.

I'm sorry I put this under the Mod Requests forum. I actually intended this to be an idea that would be completed by me, rather than requesting someone else to do it for me (aside from help with decryption).

My plans were this:
  • Alter the sound files as much as possible. Shiho has little dialogue in the game, so I thought the snippets I did have to work with would be better for a protagonist replacement, rather than a party member. Ren doesn't talk all that much to begin with, thankfully. I was hoping it would be possible to extract the sound files from the USA P5R at least, because the cognitive Shiho has cries that could work for when the protagonist is damaged. I would also try to change party member dialogue towards Shiho by replacing audio/textual instances of "he/his" with "she/her" wherever possible.
  • Alter the script/plot in a way that would somehow make sense. A complete overhaul wouldn't be possible, so the vanilla animations wouldn't make any sense when paired with the mod, but I could at least alter the player responses to seem more in-line with her personality.
  • Create a Phantom Thief model for Shiho. I use 3DSMax regularly, and I have a lot of experience with meshes, morphs, bones, etc. Creating a new costume for her would be the easiest part of the mod for me. Texture modding is also one of my specialties, with my trusty (and free) program GIMP. I also wanted to create other outfits for her, like casual and sleepwear models.
  • Alter animations. This would be the trickiest part for me, most likely. I do have a few of Shiho's animations to work with, but it isn't nearly enough to replace all of the Protagonist's animations. Most of them would need to be built from scratch, or modified from existing ones like Violet's or Haru's, the latter of whom is similar in body size to Shiho.
  • Alter Portraits/GUI elements to reflect Shiho as the protagonist. Goes hand-in-hand with my texture editing skills, but I also have a nifty Wacom tablet to use for completely drawing new images.
I would also give Ann her long hair from P5: DSN. It has nothing to do with Shiho, but it's borderline criminal that we never got an Ann with her hair down.

This would be a very lengthy and time-consuming mod, but I would love to at least attempt it. It would give me something to work on while I pray for Dinosaur Planet's possible release in the Nintendo Gigaleaks.

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My logic behind the code-name "Doll" was also rather insane, but it made sense at the time. There was a picture of Haru in the P5 Artbook with her hair pulled back in a ponytail, with a rose headband. I saw it, and thought, "she looks like a porcelain doll." And then I thought, "Shiho would look awesome with that hairstyle."

And then I thought about a story my grandmother told me a while back. She had this beautiful porcelain doll when she was little, but she didn't take all that good care of it, and eventually ended up accidentally breaking it.

The trouble came when she tried to put it back together. She told me that doll was deadly (and exaggeration, yes, but it was the description she used), and the broken pieces cut up her hand enough to leave some pretty noticeable scars.

The words she used always stuck out to me: "I never thought something so beautiful could hurt me so badly."

To me, Shiho's a bit like that broken doll. She served as a plaything for the plot, and was cast aside after she was broken. Everything Kamoshida did disturbed me, but what bothered me most is the whole "Defiled Forever" trope that she got branded with afterwords. I feel like, had she been given the chance, she could have been the porcelain that tore Kamoshida to shreds.

I also wanted to make her outfit absolutely beautiful, like a doll's, to subvert the tarnished image Atlus portrayed her with. She had so much more potential than she was given. -.-
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ReLyf
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Strychnine wrote: Mon Sep 14, 2020 3:20 pm I guess I somehow reached the conclusion that it would be possible to extract the PS4 .pkg, take all the files, and replace the ones in the PS3 .pkg so that all of the new content would be playable in the original P5.
If this was possible some mad man would already ported most PS4 games to PS3 since modding is easier that way

also i dont think PS3 "Language" is the same as PS4 "Language" because different handler
but i dont fucking know what im talking about
and then theres the EBOOT.BIN which is the thing that actually handle what file to load
and PS4 "EBOOT.BIN" is afaik 100% different
but then again idk what im talking about

but all i do know is doing that isnt possible
Random human with one braincell

and most of the thing i make wont make sense
or looks very very bad
so dont question it
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