Behind The Scenes: Persona Duality
Because Why Not?
AN: Since we're approaching the finale at long last, I'd like to do a little thing discussing how the story came about, and how much things changed over the course of writing. With this many characters involved, there were a lot of plot ideas that ultimately changed or evolved into something else. So here we go!
Origins – Early Concept
Prior to Persona Duality, In 2010-11 I had done an obvious trollfic for Harry Potter called Hogwarts of Heaven. Unlike My Immortal, it did not involve horrible spelling and grammar, and there weren't any goths or preps. However, it did involve complete and utter nonsense, revolving around a Gary Stu called Chestere Le Valiente. I did about ten chapters or so of this, maybe more, but after a while it got a bit boring. And I realised that I could probably write something serious, maybe in the HP world, or in my favourite game series at the time, Persona. (Hogwarts of Heaven was deleted, but I reposted the first chapter. You can see for yourself just how crazy my imagination was...)
Bear in mind at this point, I was familiar with only the Persona games (this includes Innocent Sin and Eternal Punishment, not so much Persona 1 though), and it would not be until the next year that I broadened my horizons and played Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne (Lucifer's Call in Europe. Are we too stupid to know what a Nocturne is, or something?). At this point, I've played both Devil Survivors, Soul Hackers, and SMT IV. All of which have influenced my writing, I think.
I had considered creating my own Persona-related story for some time, having played through both Persona 3 and 4 many times (and Innocent Sin in 2011) and having loved both of them. So I figured, maybe I could do my own take on a Persona story. The idea of two alternate worlds, one infested with Shadows, one still 'normal', came very early. In fact, one of the first things I imagined was a group of Persona users, trying to fight against a government that was responsible for the mess.
That being said, it took a long time to actually get the ball rolling, considering I was at Uni at the time. I toyed with some character and Persona designs, but no firm ideas really stuck. It was all sort of 'what-if' at that point, as I also considered doing an RP thread for an old forum I used to be in. However, I definitely knew I wanted my lead character to be a female, but not a Wild Card. Mostly because I didn't want to create a special Persona for her only for it to be constantly switched out for stuff like Saki Mitama or Forneus. I had some kind of blonde haired woman at first for that role, and she was already an artist type. That character design I discarded.
It wasn't until I started making the first four villains of the story that things really started to make shape. I hit upon the idea of making a quartet of enemy Persona users that were following their leaders, using the four Archangels that typically are the Law faction in mainline Shin Megami Tensei. (This was when I was doing more research into SMT 1, 2, and the entire series in general, thus gaining an impression of the Law – Neutral – Chaos theme.)
I think the first one of the angel Persona users made was the one that would become Bianca, designed for Gabriel. The other three didn't have a specific Angel in mind, although I think Alastair was destined for Michael. It would be a while before I actually named these characters, bear in mind. I toyed with naming the Japanese one 'Urieru', as he would have Uriel. Then I thought 'no, that's stupid' and went for Kazuya. One of the names given to the SMT 1 hero is Kazuya, and his surname Miyazaki comes from a certain legend in the anime world.
Anyway, with four starting villains and their Personas done – the original idea was for their Personas to be the SMT designs at the time – the next step was to create the main characters. Amara came fairly easily, as I wanted her to be from a faraway place, and thus came her ankh necklace. I gave her the Sun Arcana, so she'd be an optimistic, never say never kind of girl. Nathan wasn't so hard to come with either, as I just had to imagine a strong-willed man in a position of affluence who wouldn't back down from a challenge, and treat everyone honourably.
Serena's design wasn't so hard, but the original personality she had was more or less like Amara's. So I switched her Arcana from Star to Moon, so she'd be more into fantasy and fiction to escape from her unhappy life at home (thus, video games and anime.) The fourth character, Blaine took some doing. I think my initial plan was a sort of youngish black-haired guy, maybe Asian (In fact, he might have looked like Neiji Hyuga from Naruto), but then I thought I should go for an older character to balance it out. So came a guy in sunglasses and a red jacket, with scruffy hair and a mouth like a sailor. He would have been a motorcycle maniac, and quite the barfly. And he'd have a gun. (The other three's weapons stuck early on, too. Don't recall any major issues in that department.)
With those characters in mind, the next part that needed work was the setting. I toyed with using a real life place in America or Europe, or at least a fictional city based on them. I didn't really want to set a Persona story in Japan, as A: the main series does that plenty and B: I didn't feel that I have enough knowledge or experience with Japanese culture. Finally, however, I figured I'd just make my own place. A grand city on a huge island, somewhere far from anywhere else, where many cultures came together.
The six districts didn't come right away, but as far as I can recall neither of their names changed. Saragel, Farawell, and Legarte are just made up words (although if they actually do mean something, then...co-incidence) that sounded kind of Italian/French/Spanish to me, Nova Albion was sort of evoking a 'New England' type of name, Takanawa was taken from Trisha from Family Guy (although there IS a Takanawa in Japan. It's a small neighbourhood in Tokyo), and Kanaloa is the name of a Hawaiian entity of the sea. It was a Persona in Innocent Sin I liked using, too.
The next four characters were invisioned as sort of 'Social Links' to the four heroes – essentially, their best friends/lovers. So thus came Priscilla, Nathan's attractive blonde girlfriend (and I really wish I had made them engaged at the start, or even married. It'd have made more sense, considering how long they were together before the story...), a disabled boy that Serena was friends with called Kyle McDonnell, a guy with a dragon tattoo that Blaine hung out with called Dan, and the mysterious teal haired psychic dressed in a turban that called herself Stella Cleon. That surname was derived from Cleopatra. At this point, nothing about them had really been defined, nor were they planned as Persona users. Stella, however, would be the strange psychic that told Amara about how she would soon wind up in another world...
Eventually I decided I had enough to go on, so began the story in earnest with the chapter 'A Strange Fortune'. Here, Amara would narrate to the readers about how wonderful the city is, and how she was to go to her first job after graduation today. She would be an artist for a teen magazine (I can't remember if that had a 'beta' name. It might have always been Real People.), and her boss Karen would have introduced her to Stella. While this isn't massively different from the current version, no other co-workers were named yet, and it was in first-person.
And that's about it, at least for the early concepts, but for the first draft I put up on FF Net:
First Draft – the Silver Suffering Days
This initial draft was almost entirely from Amara's viewpoint, despite the fact that she wasn't really at the forefront as much as say Yu or Makoto. Occasionally during this 'dummy run', the POV changed to Nathan, Serena or Blaine. Also, I really sucked at spacing back then, and my dialogue was rather sloppy. I still wonder if I'm good at writing realistic speech, but things have been going nicely so far. Sometimes it just writes itself, sometimes it's hard.
Most notably was Blaine's characterisation. He was far ruder than he is now, and generally spent most of his dialogue insulting other characters. If I recall, he ended up saying some nasty things about Priscilla to Nathan's face, which the Blaine we have now would never even think about doing. Sadly I've lost the original chapters I wrote, but first-draft Blaine really sucked as a character. Heck, one reviewer questioned how he could get a Persona.
Also at this point, most of the Ater Vox hadn't made any appearances. They eventually were thought up during this period, alas none of them were defined beyond Archibald being the genius scientist, Nina being Serena's supposedly dead sister, and Nihane being their leader. Josephine, Carlos and Pierre were just kind of there to fill the ranks. I'll discuss the Personas later, but at that point they weren't even going to have unique designs, just Kaneko-designed ones.
In terms of other characters, some names were different. For example, Roger Martinez, Kyle McDonnell, etc. The Ornatu Legion at that time was the Persona Brigade, and with their fake Personas they were completely emotionless and mute. This idea was eventually brought back with the Other Zao, and later the Interitus Legion. When a Persona Brigade member was defeated, they lost their Persona and went back to normal, losing all memory of ever having a Persona forced into their mind.
Also, Shirley Evens didn't exist at all. Lucy was a late addition to the cast, as a girl from Clairdol that would have nursed the injured Other Blaine back to health and defended him against any who doubted him. She was originally a sweeter character, and more of a dormat, but when I realised I didn't have a Devil at that point, she became more like current Lucy.
Matthew and Tara's story of being those 'left behind' in Clairdol had been defined somewhat, but I didn't get around to that story arc. I did have a plan to feature her grandparents a lot more, however I never got round to it. Maybe I could edit in more Clairdol scenes in earlier chapters to show them off, and give Tara more development too.
Kaman the barman was originally a younger and totally unimportant character, without even a hint of character development on the horizon. In fact, his name was originally 'Kadmon' as in Adam Kadmon, perhaps for some kind of symbolism ala Neon Genesis Evangelion, but it got 'corrected' by my spell check to Kaman, which turned out to be somewhere in India. So I figured I may as well make him Indian for some diversity.
Keisha did not exist yet, either. I can't remember how much of Nihane's backstory was set in stone at that point, and Nihane Kronos might well have been his real name. The Eternal Road and Divine Sparks did exist, however, and the Farawell one played out more or less like the true version. I think I had written that Eugene Dwight story about where the Divine Sparks would took place, but the finer details weren't there.
The first draft got up to near the end of the Roger & Karen arc, which didn't involve Archibald or Josephine to my knowledge. Roger had created some kind of virtual reality game that was based on Shin Megami Tensei, except the player had complete freedom over what they did and thus there was no 'goal' other than to do whatever they could. Kind of an unsubtle Chaos thing. Karen, on the other hand, was running a strange kind of cult involving Persona Brigade members in a dojo in Takanawa (and ends up being found there by Josephine in the current story). In that scenario, Amara wasn't there – can't even remember why, I think I just thought it'd be more realistic if one night she was like "fuck this, I'm staying in" - and the other rebels were hidden in a closet there listening in to the 'sermon'. Maybe I should have kept some of that, but I wanted to portray Karen as a weaker woman who needed someone or something to cling to, and thus her being a leader – at least in the Other World – didn't fit in with that.
That about sums the first draft up. I had stopped writing chapters for quite some time, but around May 2012 I decided to just start all over again with the new ideas for characters I had, rather than try and salvage the old story. So on May 31st, I posted a new and improved first chapter, introducing Amara to her colleagues...
Second Draft – The Changes
First person was dropped early on at this stage, as I realised the story for me worked a lot better in third person. It also worked better for scenes in which Amara wasn't present, and it meant I wouldn't have to change the writing style to suit whoever had POV at the time. For the first while, I followed the original draft's plot – the initial five chapters where we meet Amara, Nathan and Serena, followed by the first proper arc when we meet our Holy Cross enemies, Blaine, Aimee and the rebels, and discover just what the other world actually is.
While Zao's role was established prior to this stage (he joins sort of mid-way into Arc 3), his Persona was Anubis, mostly to tie him with Amara. I'll go into what happens with him later, but I quickly decided I didn't particularly like giving him Anubis. Thus came an obscure Zoroastrian divinity called Rashnu, who plays a similar role. That stuck, and it meant I could make a more original design.
The second arc didn't change massively. With Other Blaine's inner turmoil, it made sense for him to remain his bitter self, while the Normal one could be a cocky but endearing biker guy. This time around, however, the Ater Vox debuted in earnest Chapter 26, the first of many Aeternus Meetings. Which was kind of easy scene writing – just have our evil council discuss ominous things. The third arc diverged quite a bit, however, as I changed the way Roger and Karen met each other again, and made them join Aeternus from the start. Thus, Karen hiding in an abandoned dojo, frightened, and Roger becoming rather violent and brash to sustain himself. The virtual reality thing didn't really have a deeper purpose in the plot, so it quickly went.
The Persona Brigade changed, as previously mentioned, yet their designs eventually became established minor characters. For example, a blonde girl with pigtails became Colette. Juan, originally Johan, was a darker skinned guy with black hair. Sheila got the blue haired and orange-eyed girl look. I created them as a sort of military force for Aeternus to throw around, and so I could showcase the SMT demon/Persona designs somewhere. I tried to use demons that hadn't been included in recent Persona games, such as Moh Shuvuu, Xi Wangmu, Mahamayuri, etc.
As the story progressed beyond where the original stopped, I managed to settle on the details for Matthew and Tara's introductions to the story. Tara had previously existed as a minor character that was pals with Nathan and Priscilla, same with Adrian, so I just thought "hang on, I like her design...I'm gonna use her for the Temperance character". Likewise, Matthew became Judgment.
Shirley was made for the Death Arcana, as there was no character for it yet. So I made a blue haired singer character, that would be friends with Lucy, but it took me ages to settle on her name and what she was like as a person. Then I settled upon her becoming a pianist in the other world, that Dan liked listening to.
So to summarise, I didn't like the way the old draft was progessing, so I retooled the story a bit and brought it back, to much better response. I can't think of any really bad review yet, which is nice. Of course, reviews have been sparse, which I've come to expect as my story isn't based around any canon Persona character, barring Philemon and even then he's only mentioned now and again. Heck it took until Chapter 90 for 'him' to make a physical appearance!
I'll go more in-depth into the cast of the story in a later edition of this, after I've published the first of the five final Ater Vox battles. I'll talk about the city itself, the cast of characters, the Ornatu Legion, and once we get there, the ending of the story.
