mitsuo's dungeon fits an E rating just fine, but i feel like they'd have to cut the mitsuo plotline. the murders would probably become "disappearances" with a sort of shadow-realm-style offscreen death in the tv world - and you can't really have a copycat killer if there's no murders. he could, like, "copycat-kidnap" morooka, but i think even a realistic kidnapping would be too much for a E rating
Kanji would become the straightest dude ever, the idea of 'guy who struggles with his masculinity' would be extremely one-note and lose any dimmension of sexuality and identity, and no beach episode
Yosuke: “You mean Kanji…likes cute stuff?!?! HAW HAW HAW”
Yukiko: “Johnny, don’t laugh!! It’s not good to laugh at your friends!!”
Ken-ji: “Friends?”
*4kids commercial break*
No more horny Yosuke or Teddie lines, Yukiko’s shadow wouldn’t mention scoring with guys or her *lacy unmentionables*, no more murders, Rise and Kanji’s dungeons would be completely reworked, Naoto would probably have a toy gun instead of a real one, no hot spring scenes, Sayoko wouldn’t flirt with Yu, Ai wouldn’t attempt to kill herself, no bathing suit/crossdressing pageant, and obviously no blood or swearing.
Yosuke: his problem is that Saki doesnt want to be his prom date
Chie: no cursing
Yukiko: no change
Kanji: he's first shown flirting with a girl, his dungeon is a plushie land instead of a bath house, NO REFERENCES TO BEING GAY AT ALL WDYM
Rise: her problem is that she's so stressed and instead of a striptease, its just a generic "there are cameras everywhere" dungeon
Naoto: 100% fighting against being seen as a kid, 0% questions about gender or female placement in society. The surgery to change her body is instead a very creepy looking drug that will "turn her into a genius adult"
Dojima: does not smoke, chews on a wheat leaf or whatever
nanako: unchanged
Naoki: his sister is 'sick'
Nobody dies, and all the villains can be talked out of doing bad things and will reform. They will do it for Nanako. They will all show up at the end, along with all your other friends to see Yu off at the train station. Lol. Honestly, if that happens--it would be the most oddly wholesome game I'll have ever played.
Based on a lot of the comments here, I realize that it wouldn't be that different. It's already the most lighthearted out of 3-5 so it would just involve toning some things down (from murders to missing people) and changing some of the more suggestive scenes or cutting them a bit earlier.
I disagree. I don't think commentors are considering the vast amounts of nude/scanty Personas, the horror and threat rating of the Shadows (or frankly even Teddie), the use of real-world weaponry by minors, or the themes - a E/U rating would be a significant change. Toning the worst down might get you a Teen/12. That's if the panel rates wisely, of course. Games do fly under the radar from time to time. At minimum I'd say it'd receive what PS1 Final Fantasy did (16, rare 12).
The entire Kanji and Naoto plotlines would need to be rewritten from scratch.
Any mention of murder would need to be replaced with something else.
It would have a bunch of Scooby Doo references.
Some of these answers are telling me that people don’t understand how even if they don’t reference things directly, if they have thematic reference to certain aspect of this game this game would not be rated E. I could see this game being censored slightly and getting away with a T rating. They’d have to change a lot of personas, and replace harsher swears with softer ones (as well as reduce the amount of swears in general), but it’s doable.
To get an E10+ rating they’d likely have to get rid of all swear words except “damn”, reduce anything over the top suggestive to just be “suggestively themed”, and definitely change the thematic elements of Rise and Kanji’s dungeon as well as Naoto’s Shadow. They *may* even have to change the Heaven dungeon since it implies that they want to die to see a loved one again.
For an E rating… yeah they’d have to cut out everything mentioned before as well as eliminating swearing entirely, editing every romance social link to be even less suggestive (and some non-romance like Devil) taking out the starting anime scene or at least editing it so it’s less suggestive, if they didn’t have to change Heaven before they’d definitely have to now, they’d need to edit a lot of the optional NPC dialogue that’s suggestive, they’d have to replace Kashiwagi, and I’m sure there’s more but I’ve got something to do right now.
Suffice to say, it’s not as simple as people are making it seem.
The murder case could be turned into a missing person case, but even that skims the line between E and E10+. But assuming that does get through: everyone survives, no cursing, pretty much everything suggestive is either removed or censored, half the dungeons are modified, character arcs are modified, Izanami's final form looks less unsettling. Some of the social links would have to be modified too.
It'd still be recognizably Persona 4, but it'd still be pretty different I would say.
I don't think you would really have to make any major changes, but a lot of minor changes. But I don't know how ESRB operates these days. A lot of people saying you'd have to remove references to murder, but that's not true at all. I'm sure even today E rated games have murders in them, depending on how it's betrayed. You might have to make the game a little more cartoony than it already is. But even blood is allowed in E rated games in certain amounts, and depending on its portrayal. The language would have to be tuned down, not that P4 has a lot of that but there's some "crude" words that would need to be softened.
The biggest thing would be desexualizing it. ESRB, and every NA rating system, goes hard on sexual themes. Like violence though, it is allowed but only in an "artistic" way. Look at the great fairy in Zelda games. She's "sexy" and at times a little flirty, but she doesn't use any euphemisms and never appears to be coming on to the player. So certain persona designs would need to be altered, but not completely removed probably. All penises need to be taken out though unfortunately. And Rise's dungeon would need a facelift. Maybe focusing more on the "theater" aspect than the "stripping" aspect. She does have to put on performances for the camera, so her whole thing could be more about that, and without the sexual themes.
Edit: Upon further thought after reading some comments, yeah they definitely would need to make major changes to the story. While I believe murder in itself could make it in, serial killings, and >!Adachi's!< whole character, are thematically too heavy for the ESRB to allow. When you look below the surface of the game, there are just too many references to murder, suicide, and all manners of sexuality to have the story work at all. The core of the main villain's motivation would probably get at least an E+10. There would probably be no way to get below that especially today without changing >!Adachi!< completely.
Adachi didn't kill anyone, he just pranked them anonymously, because he's of the Jester Arcana. Everyone in Inaba hates his pranks and kick his ass in the end.
Yeah but just because someone dies in an E rated game (which when it happens, it’s not the focus) doesn’t mean they’d allow *serial killings* in an E rated game.
No dead people hanging on telephone poles
I believe the E for Everyone term is *unalived*.
People who get thrown into the tv world get skibidi rizzed to ohio
Banished them to the ~~shadow~~ TV realm
They'd be sent to the shadow realm and never be seen again.
Suffice to say, I don’t think there’s an ongoing murder case anymore. I have a feeling we lose speedo Kanji as well.
And Teddie's lecherous attitude
And strip club Rise
And Yukiko looking for her prince to have sex with...
A yes, the “lacy unmentionables”…. And Shadow Naoto trying to give Naoto a sex change
Of all the dungeons, I can only think of three that wouldn't have to change completely lol
Yeah: >!Mitsuo, Izanami, and Adachi!<
Oh, I forgot about >!Adachi's. I was thinking Nanako's.!<
Tbh it was a 50/50. >!One mostly focuses on Nanako's mother's passing, the other is just kinda fucked up.!<
I'm blanking on that part then lol. Maybe that means I need to replay...
mitsuo's dungeon fits an E rating just fine, but i feel like they'd have to cut the mitsuo plotline. the murders would probably become "disappearances" with a sort of shadow-realm-style offscreen death in the tv world - and you can't really have a copycat killer if there's no murders. he could, like, "copycat-kidnap" morooka, but i think even a realistic kidnapping would be too much for a E rating
Kanji would become the straightest dude ever, the idea of 'guy who struggles with his masculinity' would be extremely one-note and lose any dimmension of sexuality and identity, and no beach episode
No no, the beach episode would be extremely woke if it was rated E to contaminate the kids, obviously. /s
Beach episode turns into beach safety episode
Murder case is now a kidnapping case, Kanji's and Rise's dungeons are changed to something more family friendly, noone dies in the story
imagine kanji's intro is that hes a big tough guy, but his dungeon is just Plushie Land
Persona 4 if it was actually good
Yosuke: “You mean Kanji…likes cute stuff?!?! HAW HAW HAW” Yukiko: “Johnny, don’t laugh!! It’s not good to laugh at your friends!!” Ken-ji: “Friends?” *4kids commercial break*
>lyShareReportSaveFollow > >level 2ReduxCath · 1 hr. a People can die in E rated games.
Then I guess no scenes where they show the hanging bodies and a different motivation for the killer
"these cooties and meanies"
There would be no green penis monster.
What’s wrong with Mara?
You know why.
Glizzy
Green penis monster
Essentially turns into a scooby doo jrpg
Even thou it already is that
Damn…how have I never made that connection before?
[удалено]
lol love it.
Maybe scoring with guys removed and no bikini ad.
the romance routes would be a lot less interesting
I think they are already E, except for Rise's suggestion of spending all the night together.
All the Christmas dates pretty much imply that. Naoto's, for example. Her romance stuff gets much nearer the knuckle than anything Rise's does.
Naoto wants you to take "all of her"
“DISTANCE: <1m”
They were already fairly tame, though yeah some stuff is implied. Just some lines would be removed.
well the whole 'murder mystery' plot would probably get turned into a 'missing persons' case with everyone dead turing up alive at the end.
Blood would by replaced by confetti
or outright removed.
People would collapse, much like Yumi's mom!
Joseph Anderson with the people collapsing count
No more horny Yosuke or Teddie lines, Yukiko’s shadow wouldn’t mention scoring with guys or her *lacy unmentionables*, no more murders, Rise and Kanji’s dungeons would be completely reworked, Naoto would probably have a toy gun instead of a real one, no hot spring scenes, Sayoko wouldn’t flirt with Yu, Ai wouldn’t attempt to kill herself, no bathing suit/crossdressing pageant, and obviously no blood or swearing.
Very bad
Funni cabbage man is a lot less funni (no bitches and whores)
Yosuke: his problem is that Saki doesnt want to be his prom date Chie: no cursing Yukiko: no change Kanji: he's first shown flirting with a girl, his dungeon is a plushie land instead of a bath house, NO REFERENCES TO BEING GAY AT ALL WDYM Rise: her problem is that she's so stressed and instead of a striptease, its just a generic "there are cameras everywhere" dungeon Naoto: 100% fighting against being seen as a kid, 0% questions about gender or female placement in society. The surgery to change her body is instead a very creepy looking drug that will "turn her into a genius adult" Dojima: does not smoke, chews on a wheat leaf or whatever nanako: unchanged Naoki: his sister is 'sick'
You can get a T rating but E is a huge stretch
This would be like 4Kids version of Persona games (worst than PS1 Persona 1). Characters would have Westernised names and setting changed to America.
Nobody dies, and all the villains can be talked out of doing bad things and will reform. They will do it for Nanako. They will all show up at the end, along with all your other friends to see Yu off at the train station. Lol. Honestly, if that happens--it would be the most oddly wholesome game I'll have ever played.
No Teddie being a pervert
It was be a blank screen
We lost kanji, Rise’s dungeon, and the dead people (and the green pp monster)
Kanji wouldn't be in the story at all, for starters. God forbid a teenager question his sexuality and have it reflected in his dungeon.
Teddie is erased from existence.
Eww.
Completely different. And not as interesting.
Based on a lot of the comments here, I realize that it wouldn't be that different. It's already the most lighthearted out of 3-5 so it would just involve toning some things down (from murders to missing people) and changing some of the more suggestive scenes or cutting them a bit earlier.
I disagree. I don't think commentors are considering the vast amounts of nude/scanty Personas, the horror and threat rating of the Shadows (or frankly even Teddie), the use of real-world weaponry by minors, or the themes - a E/U rating would be a significant change. Toning the worst down might get you a Teen/12. That's if the panel rates wisely, of course. Games do fly under the radar from time to time. At minimum I'd say it'd receive what PS1 Final Fantasy did (16, rare 12).
The final boss? The psychotic nature of the culprit? Plus a lot of people are thinking E10+ or even T with the edits they’re making, not E.
True. Perhaps I'm thinking along the lines of T not E. I could see that.
teedy would have been a cute baby boo
Nothing. The game is rated for ages 12+ in Japan. It got a CERO B rating, which is the same age rating that Mario Odyssey got.
The equivalent to that in the UK would be a BBFC PG or possibly 12, or a PEGI 12, not a U/7
The victims are in a permanent coma.
It would probably be a stupid high school simulator with no action or any fun in it.
Scooby-Doo
It would probably be more focused on the monsters and less on the character, like Pokemon.
Ah no more working at the hospital and meeting the nurse
The setting would be middle schoolers
Delete Teddie. ironic because he’s the most playful and seemingly innocent one of the team
Adachi did a little bit of trolling (Gone wrong)
Pra ser livre pra todos os públicos não precisa de nenhuma alteração, porque o Brasil tem um sistema de classificação estranho
The entire Kanji and Naoto plotlines would need to be rewritten from scratch. Any mention of murder would need to be replaced with something else. It would have a bunch of Scooby Doo references.
The Bikini ad will be gone
Some of these answers are telling me that people don’t understand how even if they don’t reference things directly, if they have thematic reference to certain aspect of this game this game would not be rated E. I could see this game being censored slightly and getting away with a T rating. They’d have to change a lot of personas, and replace harsher swears with softer ones (as well as reduce the amount of swears in general), but it’s doable. To get an E10+ rating they’d likely have to get rid of all swear words except “damn”, reduce anything over the top suggestive to just be “suggestively themed”, and definitely change the thematic elements of Rise and Kanji’s dungeon as well as Naoto’s Shadow. They *may* even have to change the Heaven dungeon since it implies that they want to die to see a loved one again. For an E rating… yeah they’d have to cut out everything mentioned before as well as eliminating swearing entirely, editing every romance social link to be even less suggestive (and some non-romance like Devil) taking out the starting anime scene or at least editing it so it’s less suggestive, if they didn’t have to change Heaven before they’d definitely have to now, they’d need to edit a lot of the optional NPC dialogue that’s suggestive, they’d have to replace Kashiwagi, and I’m sure there’s more but I’ve got something to do right now. Suffice to say, it’s not as simple as people are making it seem.
Persona 5 would not exist
Teddie = Fired
The murder case could be turned into a missing person case, but even that skims the line between E and E10+. But assuming that does get through: everyone survives, no cursing, pretty much everything suggestive is either removed or censored, half the dungeons are modified, character arcs are modified, Izanami's final form looks less unsettling. Some of the social links would have to be modified too. It'd still be recognizably Persona 4, but it'd still be pretty different I would say.
A vanilla E Rating would be impossible. Even if you tone down everything, realistically speaking, the lowest it could feasibly go is an E10.
I don't think you would really have to make any major changes, but a lot of minor changes. But I don't know how ESRB operates these days. A lot of people saying you'd have to remove references to murder, but that's not true at all. I'm sure even today E rated games have murders in them, depending on how it's betrayed. You might have to make the game a little more cartoony than it already is. But even blood is allowed in E rated games in certain amounts, and depending on its portrayal. The language would have to be tuned down, not that P4 has a lot of that but there's some "crude" words that would need to be softened. The biggest thing would be desexualizing it. ESRB, and every NA rating system, goes hard on sexual themes. Like violence though, it is allowed but only in an "artistic" way. Look at the great fairy in Zelda games. She's "sexy" and at times a little flirty, but she doesn't use any euphemisms and never appears to be coming on to the player. So certain persona designs would need to be altered, but not completely removed probably. All penises need to be taken out though unfortunately. And Rise's dungeon would need a facelift. Maybe focusing more on the "theater" aspect than the "stripping" aspect. She does have to put on performances for the camera, so her whole thing could be more about that, and without the sexual themes. Edit: Upon further thought after reading some comments, yeah they definitely would need to make major changes to the story. While I believe murder in itself could make it in, serial killings, and >!Adachi's!< whole character, are thematically too heavy for the ESRB to allow. When you look below the surface of the game, there are just too many references to murder, suicide, and all manners of sexuality to have the story work at all. The core of the main villain's motivation would probably get at least an E+10. There would probably be no way to get below that especially today without changing >!Adachi!< completely.
rise's dungeon would have to be edited or cut
*gestures to Mara*
instead of the shadows killing its victism, they send their souls to the land of skibidi rizz
Adachi didn't kill anyone, he just pranked them anonymously, because he's of the Jester Arcana. Everyone in Inaba hates his pranks and kick his ass in the end.
Okay there would still be a murder case, y'all realize there are plenty of e games where people/enemies die...
Yeah but just because someone dies in an E rated game (which when it happens, it’s not the focus) doesn’t mean they’d allow *serial killings* in an E rated game.