Persona 1 Illustrator Denies the Protagonist Is Queer

Kazuma Kaneko, now 61 years old, is a famous artist who became widely known for his work at Atlus, more specifically on the Shin Megami Tensei series. One of the games Kaneko Kazuma worked on was the original Persona, released in 1996.

For the first Persona, Kaneko Kazuma served as the art director and was responsible for designing both the characters and the demons that appear in the game.

Kaneko Kazuma is also very active on Twitter, frequently answering questions from fans, and one recent question caused quite a stir.

Someone asked:

“Did you intentionally make the Persona 1 protagonist look queer because he was meant to be a player self-insert, so both men and women could put themselves in his shoes?

Or was there another reason behind that design choice? And… is he wearing any kind of lipstick?”

Below is the appearance of the Persona 1 protagonist:

Well, I had no idea some people believed the Persona 1 protagonist was queer, but let’s see what Kaneko had to say.

“I didn’t think that deeply about it. The person I used as a model was an idol who, besides being very handsome (with a masculine appearance), also had a clean and refreshing kind of beauty. So I simply thought it would be good to portray him that way.”

Basically, what Kaneko said was, “No.” He simply based the Persona 1 protagonist’s appearance on a male idol from that era (who, according to Kaneko himself, was masculine). He wasn’t thinking about whether the character was gay or anything like that—he just thought the look was cool.

His response led many people to criticize the person who asked the question. Here are some reactions:

• “Western fans: ‘Character X is queer.’ Japanese designer: ‘I made him look like that because it looked cool.'”
• “To be fair, Japanese male idols in the ’90s really did dress like that.”
• “We’re losing the concept of bishounen.”
• “I always thought Persona was a coming-of-age drama about Japanese high school students (like the ones from the ’80s and ’90s). If a shaved-headed, muscular tough guy showed up in a coming-of-age drama, it just wouldn’t feel right.”
• “Modern Western ‘fans’ aren’t smart enough to understand bishounen.”
• “I love how the answer is always something simple lol. Fans really overthink everything.”
• “I like how sometimes things are much simpler than they seem. Not everything has some super deep meaning or hidden backstory. Sometimes it’s just: ‘Well, the guy was handsome. That’s it.'”
• “If a character modeled after Tomoya Nagase is being called ‘queer’ or ‘androgynous’ by foreigners, then maybe all Japanese men look queer to them.”
• “Not once—not even for a single moment—from the game’s release when I was completely obsessed with it until today, have I ever thought he looked queer…”
• “I kind of get why people say he looks a bit queer, and the fact that he’s based on Nagase-kun just makes the design unbelievably perfect…”

That’s it!