Profile
Name: Goro Akechi (明智 吾郎)
Age: 17
Melee Weapon: Beam Saber, Serrated Sword
Ranged Weapon: Ray Gun, Silenced Pistol
Arcana: Justice
Persona: Robin Hood, Loki
Outfit: A cavalry-style outfit combined with a red mask with a long beak similar to that of a medieval-era plague doctor, or a Japanese tengu. Alternate outfit is a black knight motif complete with enclosed helmet.
Character References
Goro is loosely based on the fictional detective Kogoro Akechi, written by Edogawa Rampo (real name: Tarō Hirai) in multiple stories between 1925-1962. Like Goro, Kogoro is a genius who dresses well, seeks an infamous thief capable of wearing many different masks (the "Fiend With Twenty Faces"), and most of his cases take place in Tokyo.
Goro's true Persona, Loki, is popularly known as a shapeshifting trickster god in Norse mythology, referring to his own role as a hidden Trickster in the game created by Yaldabaoth.
Background
Early Life
Goro is a high school student who moonlights as a detective, similar to Naoto Shirogane from Persona 4, to the point where Goro is hailed as the "Second Coming of the Detective Prince," though it's never stated if Goro or Naoto are aware of each other. As a young prodigy who excels in academic work as well as detective work, Goro often finds himself called in to appear on several TV and radio shows, and he relishes the spotlight.
However, Goro's public face hides a much darker personality. He lets slip to the Protagonist that he was a bastard born out of wedlock to a single mother by a dad who abandoned her as soon as he found out about her pregnancy. The mother soon died from the stress of raising Goro, leaving him all alone.
At some point before the start of Persona 5, Goro discovered that his father was Masayoshi Shido, the cruel politician who saw everyone as a mere means to his end of gaining power. Goro soon stumbled into the Metaverse on his own and was granted the "Wild Card" power, similar to that of the Protagonist. Unbeknownst to him, Goro was given this power by the god Yaldabaoth, who planned to give the power to him and the Protagonist as part of a rigged game to prove that humanity no longer needed free will.
With this new power, Goro decided to approach Shido, and offered to help him eliminate all obstacles in his path to power. Using his ability to enter the Metaverse and use a Persona, Goro caused multiple people across Tokyo to have mental breakdowns or even go completely brain-dead, under Shido's hidden direction. Not only did this help remove Shido's rivals, but Goro could place himself as a detective who uncovered the culprit behind the actions, when he was secretly the one causing them.
Goro secretly planned to gain enough favor with his father that he would backstab him once he acknowledged their relationship. However, a new group of Persona-users interfered with his plans.
The Protagonist and his party hear from the Shadows of both Madarame and Kaneshiro that a "black-masked" person has been hopping between Palaces, using them for his own benefit. Meanwhile, Goro finds himself drawn into the debate over the "Phantom Thieves of Hearts," as they continue rising in popularity due to several criminals being reformed by them.
Goro himself makes several public statements that their tactics are criminal in themselves, and pledges to hunt them down for the police. Afterwards, he starts hanging out at Cafe Le Blanc, hoping to get close to the Protagonist.
When the Phantom Thieves steal the Treasure of the CEO of Okumura Foods, the team doesn't notice the black-masked person slip in and kill Okumura's Shadow with a silenced pistol, leaning to Okumura's brain-death in the real world before he can name his co-conspirators. After that, Goro makes a public statement that he doesn't believe the Phantom Thieves were responsible for Okumura's death, convincing Makoto to put her trust in him when the Thieves are running low on options.
After blackmailing his way onto the team, Goro helps the Thieves fight through Sae Niijima's Palace in order to change her heart, allegedly to find the "true culprit" behind the mental shutdowns. In truth, Goro sets up a police blockade to capture the Thieves once they finish stealing the Treasure, then pin the mental shutdowns on them. The Protagonist is captured trying to escape, and is later placed in a hidden interrogation room. Akechi then shoots him dead with a pistol he stole from a guard, passing it off as a suicide.
In Shido's Palace
While giving more interviews about his fight against the Phantom Thieves, Goro realizes that there was something he missed. On top of that, Shido calls on him to cause more mental shutdowns of anyone who might be disloyal to the cause.
Goro travels into Shido's Palace and confonts the Phantom Thieves, realizing that they tricked him into shooting a fake Protagonist in the Metaverse while the real one survived. He complains that they ruined his plan to sabotage Shido's ambitions, and attacks the Thieves. First by revealing his power to make Shadows go berserk, which he used on people that Shido wanted humiliated and not just brain-dead.
When the Thieves dispatch the Shadows, Goro then attacks them with his moveset from his short time with the Phantom Thieves, including his Persona, Robin Hood. The Thieves beat him, then Goro begins screaming that he doesn't understand how the Protagonist has friends and confidants who rely on him while he has desperately clawed his way this far. He then unleashes his final form, the Persona Loki, and his outfit changes to that of the black-masked person hinted in previous Palaces.
The Thieves manage to take him down in this form as well, offering him a chance to join them. However, the offer is cut off when a Shadow version of Goro appears, telling the real one that Shido planned to lay all the blame for the mental shutdowns on him, and then kill him once he was elected. Goro decides to use his last bit of strength to lock himself in the chamber with the Shadows, allowing the Thieves to escape Shido's Palace.
After a few gunshots are heard, Futaba says that Goro doesn't show up on her radar. Goro's fate is unknown.
Royal Edition
In Persona 5 Royal, Goro's story follows a similar pattern, but he is now a full Confidant that the Protagonist can spend time with, often in the Kichijoji area. He invites the Protagonist out to the nearby darts and billiards club and the jazz club, while talking about his past. At Rank 8 Confidant level, Goro will challenge the Protagonist to a duel in Mementos with his Robin Hood persona. After defeating him, Goro admits he was holding back, and tosses a dueling glove at the Protagonist, saying that he despises him and hopes to defeat him some day, foreshadowing the events that will happen in the Good Ending of the story.
On Christmas Eve, after the defeat of Yaldabaoth, a living Goro appears next to the Protagonist and Sae, offering to confess his crimes and put himself behind bars in order to ensure Shido's demise. However, on New Years Day, he is mysteriously released from the police station without any charges or restrictions. Goro meets up with the Protagonist, confirming that something is wrong with their world they find themselves in, as everything seems too perfect.
Goro ends up joining forces with the Protagonist and Kasumi Yoshizawa to hunt down the source of this new distortion in reality, eventually finding their way to a new Palace that appears in Odaiba and its Ruler, Dr. Maruki. While Maruki repeatedly offers the Protagonist a chance to willingly accept this new reality, Goro refuses each time, and demands the Protagonist refuse as well while they remain allies.
The day before the Phantom Thieves are set to face Maruki, Maruki appears at Cafe Leblanc himself, telling the Protagonist that Goro is only alive because the Protagonist secretly wished for him to be alive and redeemed, and outside of Maruki's reality Goro would disappear. Goro again refuses to play along, and demands that the Protagonist refuse Maruki's deal one last time.
In the Bad Ending, if the Protagonist takes Maruki's deal, Goro storms off, but appears later with the rest of the party, happily celebrating their respective graduation from school.
In the True Ending, Goro and the other Phantom Thieves storm Maruki's Palace and take his Treasure after a grueling battle. Afterwards, when reality reverts to its previous state, Goro is again missing after sacrificing himself to help the Phantom Thieves defeat Shido. However, as the Protagonist is about to depart by train back to his hometown, he catches a glimpse of what appears to be Goro's school uniform.
Gameplay
When the Phantom Thieves plan to storm Sae Niijima's Palace, Goro joins the party as a playable party member, with Robin Hood as his Persona. Robin Hood uses both Bless and Curse element attacks, but also carries a Megidola attack that can strike any enemy regardless of affinity.
P5R Changes
During the third semester, Goro rejoins the party, but only has access to his black knight Loki form. Loki only has access to curse element spells, but can also use a powerful single-target physical attack, a Debilitate spell that temporarily lowers all stats of a single enemy, and a Megidolaon spell that strikes any enemy regardless of affinity.
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