The second half of my “Let’s Examine Persona” series is ready! You can watch it below!
Yesterday, I said that I’d make a blog post about Osana today. However, I feel like there’s something more important that I need to discuss. I’ll talk about Osana tomorrow. Here’s what I want to talk about today…
Unfortunately, my first “Let’s Examine Persona” video wasn’t received as well as I hoped it would be. A lot of people commented that it seemed like the entire focus of the video was about stealing from Persona.
In most cases, Persona 5 simply:
- Provided me with good reference footage of something I was already planning.
- Reminded me of things that I had already considered in the past.
- Gave me an excuse to talk about something that I’d always wanted to talk about, but never had a reason to mention in any of my previous videos.
Just take a look at the things that were mentioned in the Part 2 video…
- Low-Detail Students – I pitched this idea last year.
- Morning Conversations – Gave me an excuse to talk about one of Yandere Sim’s potential game design flaws, and one potential solution.
- 2D Backgrounds – A clever way to have story cut-scenes without modelling environments. (Persona wasn’t the first to do this, either.)
- Headphones – Seeing students wearing headphones in Persona gave me inspiration for students that couldn’t be distracted by noises. This is not an actual game mechanic in Persona, but is a game mechanic in another stealth game.
- Book Bags – Something I’ve considered for over a year, but never had a reason to mention.
- School Store – Something I’ve considered for over a year, but never had a reason to mention.
- Culture Festival – Something I’ve considered for over three years, but never had a reason to mention.
- Student Stalkers – Something I’ve discussed with fans for years, but never mentioned in a video.
- Streets and Stores – I pitched this idea months ago.
- Umbrella Technology – Obviously, this bit was a joke.
In other words, this was a “Persona-themed” video where I discussed a bunch of concepts that Persona reminded me of, or provided reference footage of things I wanted to do in the future. This wasn’t a video about stealing features that Persona invented.
Now, let’s examine the previous video:
- Chatter Effects – The idea was pitched by Furipasart last year. It was a good idea, but I forgot about it until I saw something similar in Persona 5.
- Student Reactions – An original concept from Persona 5 that might benefit Yandere Simulator.
- Memorial Services – An aspect of real life that would be an appropriate addition to Yandere Simulator.
- Better Transition Screen – “My screen is boring, Persona 5’s screen is exciting, I should also try to be more exciting” is not an idea I should have to defend.
- School Props – “My corridors are empty, Persona 5’s corridors are not empty, I should try to decorate my corridors” is not an idea I should have to defend.
- Third Eye – “Yandere Vision lacks polish, Persona 5’s equivalent has a lot of polish, I should also try to have a lot of polish” is not an idea I should have to defend.
- Uniform Variety – Something I’ve wanted for over three years, but never had a reason to mention.
- Opening Animation – Something I’ve discussed with fans for years, but never mentioned in a video.
- Student Comments – An original concept from Persona 5 that might benefit Yandere Simulator.
- Art Style – I never said that I wanted to directly copy the Persona art style, I said that I was considering something similar. The reason why I’ve taken an interest in the Persona art style is because it’s very difficult to find an anime art style that translates well into 3D models. Persona 5 has proven that its art style works in 3D, which is why I feel confident that a similar art style would work out for me.
Most of the things I discussed in my previous video were features that I was already considering, or aspects of Yandere Simulator that currently lack polish. Only two of the things I discussed in my previous video were actually original concepts from Persona 5 that I think would be very beneficial if directly transplanted into Yandere Sim.
Obviously, I’m aware that what makes a game special is how unique it is, and that if a game copies too many elements from other games, it’s no longer unique, and thus it’s no longer special. I know that it would be stupid to take another game and start copying all of its features until I’ve made a replica of it. However, if you look at the list of everything that I discussed in this video and the previous video, you’ll see that there were extremely few times when I actually discussed the idea of taking any original concepts from Persona 5.
Considering all of the above information, I feel like the reaction to my previous video was completely unjustified, and so I simply had to take the time to write a blog post defending these two videos.
Tomorrow, I’ll write and post the Osana-related blog post that I said I’d post today.
Thank you for following the development of Yandere Simulator.
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I’ve been following the developmemt of this game for a while, and I really like the concept. I honestly believe that Yandere Simulator would be so great with diverse characters and their unique traits (I won’t even complain about the punny names). I hope you read this, YandereDev, despite your tight schedule. What hooked me (and other fans; surely I’m not the only one!) to YanSim is because IT IS A BRILLIANT IDEA BY YANDEREDEV WITH HELPS FROM HIS DEDICATED VOLUNTEERS, not just some game full of the developer’s favorite things taken from his favorite video games projected into the game creating a pile of mess. I like the current artstyle of YanSim as it is, why you have to copy Persona’s style? Or Danganronpa? Or Hitman? Or whatever other popular video games named? Besides, you’ve promised two days ago that you’ll post something about Osana. If you did, you could have made your haters to shut their mouth up by proving that they are clearly wrong about their negative opinions on you, rather than making excuses on your latest video. Just stop worrying about hateful comments and focus doing what you have to do. I’m sorry for the long rant and thank you for anyone who decide to read up until this point.
I really enjoyed the Persona’s videos. It made clear that YandereDev have HUGE plans to improve Yandere Simulator. Nice job!
makes me sad that people just don’t understand that you is just using persona series as a reference for the future mechanics (most of them already planned) of yandere sim
These all look like fun additions! Persona is a great series to take inspiration from! I can’t wait to see how you implement them!
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I personally think the Persona Art style or something similar to it wouldn’t be too fitting for the game. Don’t get me wrong, I find it really pretty, but somehow, the artsyle gives it some sort of “Adulty” feel or something, which kind of reminds me of cities and the busy life of an adult person , kind of the same feel like the anime “City Hunter” gives me. I guess, I would prefer it if YanSim would have a cuter, shoujo like art style, similar maybe to Natsuiro High School to really give it more of a feel of a Japanese High School and innocence. This gives more of a creepy vibe of game and will be effective to give more of a shock. Persona Art Style just doesn’t have that feel to it and feels a bit more “western”.
I completely agree!
Oh yessss
It would be weird if the store clerk was invincible but it would also be EXTREMELY FUNNY.
Maybe there could be a mechanic where you throw paint on the window? Or trigger the shutters to close and it takes the clerk a second to get them back up?
I feel like the jokes about how the store clerk is secretly a god could be great. I also think killing someone like this could be a a major inconvenience later, so making them immortal would help with that. On the other hand, having consequences to needless killing is a huge benefit to this type of game, and being able to kill someone like this could make sense. Perhaps you could cause some sort of mayhem they have to leave to help with, or they aren’t there during certain times of days. The ideas you mentioned would also make sense, though the paint one would have to be handled carefully.
My school had a store which was only available during lunch and was in its own room. It could be possible that there would be just a teacher in there during that timeframe or have the student council run it. Might be an opportunity to learn more about the final rival before having to deal with her, make it easier to spy on her when she isn’t directly interacting with senpai or it could just be that time stops when you’re inside the room. Either way, this would likely make a danger zone as there would be other students trying to use the store and everyone around could potentially react to a nearby murder.
Meaning if a rival had a habit of being around the store during certain days it could make it easy to have witnesses. Along with making it easier to kill in other areas if you can lure anyone away by having more people gathering at a specific point.
Wait, does the Persona 5 protagonist constantly carry a cat in the bag?
Morgana, yeah.
Honestly, I was fine with the Persona videos. It was a proper examination, like the Hitman videos. (Why are people not okay with Persona but said nothing about Hitman?) To be fair, Yanderedev DID post that he was going to be uploading two new videos, so if you don’t like that he was going to do so beforehand, you could’ve suggested earlier.
Just a few thoughts from me:
1. I still don’t think low-resolution filler characters are a good idea. Persona 5 gets away with it because you’re never supposed to do any significant interacting with them (compared to Yandere Simulator which basically rewards you for interacting with more people). I think that if you really wanted to do this to give the school more life, you should only use low-resolution characters in situations where Yandere-chan would not normally be able to interact with them (For example: someone running through the halls with an important message. Two characters having some kind of argument or heated interaction. Someone asleep in the halls.)
2. Seriously, do not do the whole” got the idea from a conversation I heard” angle. It comes off way too much as hand-holding. I understand ,though, that seamlessly implementing a tutorial is hard, but I have an idea. What if you had thought bubbles like that, presented as Yandere-chan’s own thoughts. Maybe set up a “think session” during classes where Yandere-chan is thinking to herself about how to dispose of the rival of the week. (“Doesn’t she eat lunch on the roof? It’s a long way down…” “You know, there is that giant trunk in the gym I could stuff someone in.” “If I bury the body in the garden, what’s to stop police dogs from digging it u-wait..lightbulb, dogs are still animals, so I’ll bet if I leave a rabbit or something above the grave, they’ll stop there.” Things like that.). It would sell Yandere-chan as an intelligent killer then and could definitely add to her personality. You could even add a “pay attention” quick-time event that would reward Yandere-chan with additional stat points if she makes it and/or take away stat points if she doesn’t. And of course, you could add the option to disable hints and still do the quick-time event.
3. Wouldn’t it be easier to play the cutscenes in the actual play environment (like Dragon Age or early Call of Duty games do) rather than create entirely new, dedicated animations and backdrops?
4. Headphones could be useful. You could also make having headphones on against school policy, so students with headphones would get flagged down teachers…or Yandere-chan herself could purposefully wear headphones and walk past a room she needed to get into but needed to get rid of the teacher, who would then call her out on the headphones, and lure said teacher out by running away; it honestly makes more sense than setting a radio outside. That way, Yandere-chan, when caught, would be let off with a warning since she couldn’t reasonably hear the teacher, and then while the teacher goes to the main office to put them up to be claimed later…
5.. Make the person running the school store info-chan, but have only Yandere-chan know who she really is. It makes more sense than having her in a one-person “Info Club” and gives her the same kind of freedom and leverage. She leads a double life, and can be bribed to either make up a story, “forget” something bad happened, or discreetly sell Yandere-chan things off the record (for an appropriate price increase, of course) so the police don’t start wondering why she’s bought 7 school uniforms.
6. Love the stalker idea.
7. Here’s an idea for bookbags: Have it so that Yandere-chan can carry maybe one or two things on her person (plus a cell phone) but have the norm of the school be that everyone keeps their bookbags in their lockers or in their classroom for most of the day. If Yandere-chan is nearby at the site of a murder and is carrying her bookbag, it would be highly suspicious and, if not searched right there, at least noted in a police report. This could actually tie in really well with your idea for the photography club; since the club pretty much requires you to carry around a bulky camera that can only be reasonably carried in a bookbag (or maybe give the camera a specialized case she can carry that no one will bother to check or note in any reports), and they are trying to be detectives, so would naturally be the first ones on the scene of a murder, Yandere-chan showing up with her bookbag would look perfectly normal.
Speaking of clubs, I also had a few ideas club perks.
Here’s what I think after watching the videos
1.)
Make the game span over an entire year.
As mentioned in the videos the Persona series has been an inspiration and gave great examples for how to implement cool features. However, one thing that makes Persona really interesting is that there are countless events which give great oppurtunities for special ways of doing stuff like seducing, killing and so on.
For example a fireworks festival at a shrine in summer. Yandere-chan could invite a “friend/rival” to the festival and lure her to a secluded space to do whatever she wants to do. Or at the school festival in fall there would be a bonfire and dancing at the end of it. There could be a intrigue to make one student attack another and being expelled putting one rival out of commission.
Another reason would be replayability. If the game spans over just a few weeks you need to spend everyone second wisely for there is no time to waste. If there is no option to do stuff that doesn’t necessarily exist to reach the ultimate goal of dating senpai, I feel like the game will lack substance because the main point is not to kill everyone who stands in yandere-chan’s way (even though I feel it should have that option too) but to reach senpai. She needs a huge amount of social interaction that is more than a simple compliment to have it feel real.
2.)
Yandere-chan needs “trustworthy” companions.
This one is rather difficult to actually implement, I believe. However, as I mentioned above yandere-chan needs social interactions and might even help someone that got bullied or extorted for money or something similar and that character will help yandere-chan (as long she doesn’t become a murdering hobo) out of gratitude and friendship. On the other hand one character might want senpai, so she (or he which would be very interesting) tries to become friends with yandere-chan to betray her later on or reveal that all the time she/he used Yandere-chan to her/his advantage.
3.)
Irregular schedules
In 10 weeks eliminating 10 rivals does sound like fun, however, that would make senpai a “chicks magnet” of enormous magnitude. AND would make things seem way too unreal and simple. If the game spanned over months instead of weeks you could make the deadlines for yandere-chan be irregular. For some she would have a month to react for others she would have just 2 weeks or something. If you add a dynamic deadline things get even more interesting, like something yandere-chan did, made her rival act faster putting the deadline on an earlier date or hindered her rival and gives her more time. On another note, how does yandere-chan even get to know who her rival is and when they will “strike”?
4.)
Yandere-chans student life
With no time to spare there is no time to live. As I see it Yandere-chan barely feels like a student and more like a monster. However, is that really what she should be? Does she not have any humanity inside of her and just outright murder people all the time? I believe the answer would be no (at least most of the time). If there is a route to not kill anybody but still reach her goal than she needs time to be a adolescent girl which has more to her than an obsession of senpai. As mentioned above, friends are an option, part-time jobs with interaction with colleagues or a position in the student counsil would make her feel alive and relatable.
Final words:
I realize that all these suggestions are primarily about the story of which we do not know much as of yet. However, considering the amount of interesting features that are present and are yet to come there is very few to be criticised on the mechanical part of the future game. However I am concerned that the story might not be on par with the technical side of things. A great game needs both a good programming underneath and an interesting story. Considering the very difficult theme of YandereSim I believe that the story needs to shine very brightly for there is no real predecessor (at least as far as I know of). Furthermore the setting and the baseline of the game give great possibilities for multiple interesting routes to achieve the goal.
Anyways, great work so far YandereDev! I know you will keep up the great work on YandereSim!
PS: Sorry for my crappy english “\(°/-\°)/”
I have a sudden urge of discussing this so forgive me lol
1.) Interesting! …although I’m a bit skeptical YanSim would have a mechanic this sophisticated. It’s only a game with “one man developer” after all. But who knows, maybe there’s a miracle. Finger crossed.
2.) Imo Info-chan is kinda trustworthy. She would never leak your true nature and would willing to help you, as long as you have the panty shots. There’s also friendship/betrayal route with Kokona as the test subject, implying that this feature is already considered.
3.) Agreed, Senpai-the-enormous-chick-magnet is so lame (not only students fall in love with him but also a nurse AND a teacher, like, wtf???). About the rivals’ identity, I think YanDev already talked about how to obtain various information in-game in one of his video, so that people who don’t watch his YT videos would still able to know how to play. There has been no update about it lately and so far the only way to obtain information is through Info-chan.
4.) Pretty much similar to (1.)
I think the bookbags should be replaced with backpacks..-because all students use backpacks..
its fucking jpan idoit
WOAH TECHONOGLY
Gotta be honest, sincerely said, i have been on the internet era since 1996 (i was a kid during that time) and till now, at the moment i read this post, apparently I just know that San Francisco is the home of great NBA 2K MT
and legendary big name on the internet. The Uber is everywhere and lots of asian country utilized Uber apps and even cause dissatisfaction among taxi driver.I basically do not know how the winner is being selected, but my guess it is maybe depend on the trend and the rising people using it
With the Store in the school I have a few ideas;
1. It’s on a timed session so there are times you can go through there and times when you have to use the back exit.
2. You get to know the store-keep as a coward and they faint at any little sight of blood.
3. The area where you get food is behind a frosted non-seethrough window that you have to knock on, you hear a few crashing noises then the window opens up and the store-keep says that they were busy out back, and most of the time they listen to music so don’t expect them to always answer.
4. The store-keep has a secret and if you find that out and blackmail them, they’ll keep their silence.
5. With maybe no. 1 in place, there could be a school girl that if you kidnap and put pictures of the student in an envelope when the shop keep isn’t there that they keep silent as you have their sister/daughter/best friend.
I dunno, when you brought up the section I had multiple ideas that you could probably get away with. 😀
Wouldn’t the stalker idea work better if she catches the attention of the photography club?
I know you’re not stealing from Persona, but even if you did I wouldn’t see a problem in the same way that I don’t see a problem in the similarities between The Witcher 3 and Skyrim. Or Age of Empires and Starcraft. Don’t even get me started on racing games. It’s a ridiculous mindset to demand that every little thing has to be original. If a feature is nice, then by all means copy it, regardless of whether or not you’ve already thought of it before. There is no need to reinvent the wheel.
I enjoyed both of your parts and found it really nice to see how much sense it makes to include various Persona features in Yandere Simulator as well.
You probably know already that haters are at least 10 times more likely to post than lovers and 100 times more likely to post than more or less indifferent people, so just keep weighing their respective opinions accordingly. 🙂
I feel like the Morning Conversations approach can work but not all too well with explaining certain scenarios. In those cases another option could be something like hearing Yandere-chan’s thoughts during a certain instance at her house. You could even say that in place of the emotions she doesn’t have, her “heart”(a voice inside her head) awoke and started speaking to her once she saw senpai. It would also give her a motive for why she started to want to kill her rivals and provide tips for Yandere-chan.
Hi there yanderedev! I watched both videos talking about persona and the examination on it and I have a few comments and suggestions as to what you could use certain features you may plan to implement for!
First off, I’d love to see a more mature art style to Yandere simulator, even if the characters are simple they can still have a flair to them depending on what art style they are portrayed in, so I am very excited for that change.
For the in store clerk and whatnot maybe you could have it so that you can purchase possible lunches to give to others to befriend them or even poison them by mixing in a chemical from the science lab. You never know how yandere wants to take care of witnesses or rivals. Also maybe have the clerk open and close a certain time of day or have it so you have the store front and you have to ring a bell or something to get her attention. So then it wouldnt be a problem for her to see yandere chan committing a crime if she was pre-occupied sleeping or on her phone. You could even have her close down for a few days because something was traced back to the store and now they are investigating the inattentive clerk instead of yandere chan.
As far as the street and store options maybe the street store can offer things you cannot get at the small school store. And maybe there is an arcade on that street where senpai is supposed to meet a potential rival for a date at. There could be various small shops like clothes, food, arcade and whatnot on the one strip of street you may implement into the game.
For backpacks into the game I like the idea! I feel for yandere chan it could be a customization option to have one to store her items or to have it on her person in a modified skirt. If the latter is the option Im sure she’d take her backpack to not stand out. Maybe even implement backpack and not having them in the character uniform diversity. But most characters rather than not use backpacks when going to school, or even a small purse or something for girls who carry their books in their arms.
Everything else and even the things I commented on I loved the idea of. And I hope that this small post from a fan helped you get a better grasp of how you could use those minute concepts like the store clerk in your game without it being an instant game over due to the clerk being behind a counter and unreachable.
Have a great day! 😀
Instead of Morning Conversations, how about Yandere-Chan watches TV Shows at home and gets ideas from them?
The clerk could bd an ally who slips you dangerous items and/or an extension on info-chai. It makes a lot of sense that a character who desires to know a lot about the student body would have a post where she can inconspicuously interact with them and watch them from a distance.
For the store clerk- maybe she is so bored at her job that she listens to music and falls asleep with headphones on? At certain points of the day (or maybe all day) she would fall asleep and you could buy things from her by tapping on her and waking her up. She would stay awake for a little while longer before putting her headphones back on & falling asleep again. While she is asleep, that gives the player a chance to commit murder or do something else scandolous while she is right in front of you.
This also gives the player a sort of an option. Should the player commit murder right here and now while their target is in a vulnerable position, or do they really need an item that needs to be bought, but the store clerk will be awake and the target will probably walk away before she falls asleep again? 🙂
And if anything, you could replace the store store idea with different vending machines.
I’m looking for the yandere simulator related game aren’t gore and blood or killing for the revenge. I want to see if someone can change from yandere to non-yandere simulator games. Means with a normal Japanese school life. But my dream is about the story is little the same compairing to yandere simulator somehow it needs to be more romantic relate and free roam around school. That’s the game!!! The game i am looking for with no blood, no killing or murder, maybe some bully or gossip, or horror. I hope this future game that i have been dreaming of it will coming true one day. I like yandere sim but not too much blood or killing or dark evil. It’s Raise a lot of concern for me a lot though. No offending! I’m just come here and telling you guys with respect about the game. Thank you for listening.
I absolutly enjoyed persona’s video ….yandere dev , you don’t need to defend your self …persona is an awsome game but love sick yandere simulator is more more awsome than persona series and any game series in the world ….for the haters who disliked the idea of yandere sim getting some inspirations from persona 5,in facts 99% of the thoughts are planned and considered before the persona5 come to life …it just throws the spots on the points that yan dev was looking for an occations to revealet to the world …don’t depress the poor man !! i love yandere dev ..please continue on making love sick more amazing! ….there is one point i really really hate it in the persona video…about the character art styl and models …i don’t like perona’s characters art besides they are so pretty but i’m fond of the current art style…please don’t change it to somthing similar to that…. imagime how awsome would be the finall character models wih the same art style but with more slender bodies and flexible expressive faces like the mmd …also imagine a town with the current artstyle of yandere simulator just like the single art street currently in the game (in front of the school / the neighborhood) …imagine it like natsuiro’s town hhh it would be SUPER CRAAAZZZZYYYYY!!!!! i would name it sisuta town ….who liked my suggestion please reply me with you appreciations so if it is plenty yandere dev would see it … thx for reading !
I mean I haven’t seen this commented on much but do the people who are accusing you of “stealing” from the Persona games realize that the Persona games are not the first ones to use those concepts either? Everything new is built upon ideas that came before it. It’s the unavoidable fact of creating new things, that what you experience as the creator will impact your creation, whether consciously or subconsciously.
You don’t need to defend yourself YandereDev.
I think it’s be funny of you made Midori the school store clerk. That way, even if you kill her, she’ll just be back again the next day. Won’t remember anything [since she was just replaced with another clone, obvoously] but it’d be a funny Easter Egg for people who watch your videos, as well as a way to not have to fully design and plan around a store clerk
Just some ideas involving the Store Clerk:
The Store Clerk Investigator:
– What if the clerk had ties with the police (or perhaps they’re an investigator) that has suspicions regarding the school in the fact of how the principal/school administration and the police seem to wave off missing people or the death of students or etc so easily? And perhaps they could be like Iwai on how they make comments with every purchase. (i.e. “you’ve been buying an awful lot of uniforms” after Ayano buys more than 1 extra uniform, assuming that the player doesn’t like to use the panty shots for Info-chan.)
– There could also be the idea of the clerk appearing later on in the game (the first few weeks, for example, could have the school store is closed due to unknown issues that could later tie into the police/investigator-being-the-clerk idea).
A Mother’s Friend:
– Since it’s been confirmed that Ayano’s mom is VERY similar to Ayano herself, it could be possible that she just happened to find a twisted individual who accepted her for her (possible) murderous and harmful ways. If the store clerk is a beloved friend of her mom who knows about the yandere tendencies, that she could be a valuable ally in pretending that she didn’t see anything.
What if the clerk like into cha n was in on it and sold illegal stuff like poison
Hey YandereDev, I just recently watched your Let’s Examine Persona videos (even though it is 3 years late). I love how you are taking some ideas from the Persona series and implementing them into Yandere Simulator. I am a fan of both. I have been watching people play Persona 5 and seen how great the detail is in the game, and it’s simply amazing.
What I wanted to say was check out Persona 5 Royal! It has more content in it, but I heard there were numerous changes to how the story progresses. Persona 5 was already a great game, but Atlus took it even further and made it greater.
Now, I’ve never played the Persona games, and I really only know about Persona 5 (both vanilla and Royal) by watching people play the game, but it still hasn’t stopped me. I want you to play Persona 5 Royal (only if you want to though), or at least know what is different about Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal. I want to know how you’d feel and react to something like this. I was wondering if you could find something in Persona 5 Royal that you would like to include in Yandere Simulator.
Please let me know! I just find things like this very interesting.
Aw, it makes me happy that you’re interested in that!
I don’t have enough spare time to play huge RPGs, though…