How Persona 5 Royal Changes Those Homophobic Scenes
After we reported that P5R had a few scenes reworked in localization, we can now see how some of them play out in the new game.
www.gamespot.com
The original scene:
Uncanny Voice: Oooh, a real huuuge catch, you say? I'm getting pumped too!
Scruffy Romantic: What a cutie! And so muscular too. I give you an 85 out of 100!
Ryuji: Gah! Wh-Who are you!?
Beefy Trendsetter: Gwahahaha! I'm the naughty troll of Shinjuku! I'm gonna eat you up!
Ryuji: H-Hey, wait... Lemme go!
Ryuji: Dude, help! You can hear me, can't you!?
Ryuji: You just gonna leave me here like this!? C'mon, your best friend's in trouble here!
Beefy Trendsetter: Hehehe, what an energetic studmuffin, I'll give you all the freebies you could ever desire!
Scruffy Romantic: The night is young, and so are you! Let's party it up!
The new scene:
Deep Voice: Ooh, you're right! He really WOULD be a natural! But, a graphic tee with plaid pants? Ugh, kill me now.
Ryuji: Whoa, who the hell are they!?
???: Oh, hell has nothing to do with it, honey. I'm Angel--straight out of heaven!
???: And I'm Julian. Julie, if you're feeling saucy!
Angel: What a cutie! You'd never guess he was into the drag scene... I say we show him the ropes!
Julian/Julie: You can't deny it! We saw you peeking into Crossroads! Well, sweetie, if you're curious, we'll help you look DIVINE!
Ryuji: Wait, hey, it's not like that--
Ryuji: Dude, help! Tell them we were just investigatin', or something!
Ryuji: You just gonna leave me here like this!? C'mon, your best friend's in trouble here!
Julian: Oh, honey, you've got the chutzpah. And those cheekbones--I LOVE it! That's what it takes to be a star!
Angel: Just follow my lead, stud! We're gonna put your name in lights! And I know just the dress for you...
Its definitely... better, but it still relies on harmful gay stereotypes to make an uncomfortable joke. I don't get why they went to the effort of entirely recontextualizing this scene when they just swapped some harmful stereotypes for different ones. :/