P5X Censors Classic Persona Demons: Mara Gets a Hat to Hide Its... 'Weapon', Male Demons Forced Into Skin-Tight Pants

A game that literally markets itself as "the official Persona mobile experience" just slapped a hat on Mara — the franchise's most iconic demon, which is literally designed as a giant phallic symbol. Yes, a hat. You can't make this up.

After P5X (Persona 5: The Phantom X) went live, NGA forum users wasted no time pulling up before-and-after comparisons of censored demon designs, turning the thread into a full-blown "nostalgia destruction" showcase. The OP posted multiple comparison screenshots and vented: "Anyone who's played the original Persona games would laugh-cry at Mara. I downloaded this game purely for the P-series nostalgia, and this is what we get?"

Based on the screenshots, multiple classic Persona demons got the censorship treatment. Mara was hit the hardest — a helpful commenter in reply #10 explained for the uninitiated: "For context, Mara's original design is literally a penis with a face. Now they gave it a hat to cover the top." Reply #13 mourned: "They even censored Mara in the Incubus line. How are we supposed to make male Succubus builds now?" Meanwhile, reply #9 found dark humor in the situation: "They put a condom on Mara — this is basically a safe-sex awareness campaign."

Beyond Mara, the male demon designs also got hilariously overhauled. Reply #18 fumed: "What kind of fetish is this? Putting skin-tight leather pants on male demons? Why not go all the way and add stockings too?" Reply #4 echoed: "The leather-pants demon is genuinely unbearable — I can't stop laughing."

However, the community couldn't agree on when exactly the censorship kicked in. Reply #6 was adamant: "I guarantee the paid beta didn't look like this — zero model changes." But reply #11 pushed back: "These demons have been censored since the first closed beta." Reply #15 corroborated: "Not true, they looked like this in the third beta test." So the censorship may have arrived earlier than some players remembered.

The OP also shared a Bilibili video link showing the before-and-after comparison, noting that "Mara doesn't seem to be in the official version yet" — implying some demons were preemptively censored before they even made it into the game. They didn't even get a chance to appear uncensored.

Reply #17 cautiously tried to post an uncensored original image with the caption "This should be safe to post, right" — the careful wording alone tells you everything about the climate. Reply #2 was more lenient, noting the fourth design with the full-body stockings "actually looks okay." Reply #16, upon seeing the censored Mara, simply couldn't contain themselves: "That last one sent me. What kind of bootleg Mara is this?"

In the end, P5X's censorship saga perfectly illustrates a painful truth: when you sign up for nostalgia and the nostalgia itself gets censored, all that's left is the meme material.