Persona 5 Developer Threatens Gamers Who Share Too Much Of The Game

Persona 5 may have open-world elements, but at the core, it's a linear story full of delights and surprises. Now, its developer is drawing a line in the sand for streamers who might spoil the plot for others.

"Our masters in Japan are very wary about it," reads a post on Atlus' U.S. website, addressing spoilers.

"If you decide to stream past 7/7 (I HIGHLY RECOMMEND NOT DOING THIS, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED), you do so at the risk of being issued a content ID claim or worse, a channel strike/account suspension," it says.

7/7 refers to July 7 in the game's school year. Considering the school year only begins in April, that means streamers need to stop broadcasting a mere one third of the way through the game's story. Atlus has also blocked the PlayStation 4's sharing features while playing the game, and the post gives specific examples on what is--and isn't--acceptable for players to share online. Here are their guidelines:

• You can post however many additional videos you’d like, but please limit each to be at most 90 minutes long.
• No major story spoilers, and I’ll leave that up to your good judgment. If you need some guidelines, avoid showing/spoiling the ending segments of the first three palaces. While you can show initial interactions with Yusuke, avoid his awakening scene, and that whole deal about THE painting. Also, don’t post anything about a certain student investigator.
• I know I mentioned not showing the end of each palace, but you can grab footage from the Kamoshida boss fight. However, don’t capture video from the other major boss fights.
• Must not focus solely on cutscenes/animated scenes, should prominently feature dungeon crawling/spending time in Tokyo.
• You can post straight gameplay or have commentary.

"Please, PLEASE do not post any specific plot points or story spoilers, and only talk about the game in broad strokes," writes Atlus.

After our reviewer Lucy James played Persona 5 for more than 80 hours, she was in awe of the way the game expertly told its story.

"Its cast approaches complex issues and takes on overwhelming odds with a clarity and gusto that can only be born from teenage naivety, and there's a refreshing, cathartic quality to being part of that," she wrote, giving the game a 9/10.

"Just like in the real world, things aren't always black and white, and the game does an excellent job of showing how even well-meaning actions can have adverse consequences...It's a refined, effortlessly stylish RPG that will be talked about for years to come." she said.

No wonder Atlus wants to encourage players to discover the deep storylines for themselves. For everything Persona 5, including Lucy's review, check out our full coverage right here on GameSpot.