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Persona 4 Golden features a few different endings that players can reach at the end of the game, all of which hinge on a certain date towards the end of the story. Along with the original true ending of the game that has been a feature since the PS2 release, Persona 4 Golden also adds a new ‘golden ending’ to the game that centers around the new party member Marie.
The first essential choice players will be faced with to achieve the true ending/s will occur on the 3rd of December, 12/3. At this point, players will have to choose the correct dialogue options in the story to avoid the bad ending. If the wrong choices are chosen, the game will end immediately, whereas the true ending leads to hours of more gameplay.
How To Avoid The Bad Ending In Persona 4 Golden
The path to P4G's true ending begins on December 3rd, the correct dialogue choices are as follows. The first dialogue option players have does not affect the ending, but the rest do.
Dialogue Prompt |
Correct Reply |
|---|---|
"What do you want to do...Leader?" |
"Wait a second here..." |
“What’re you trying to say!?” |
“We’re missing something.” |
“Something we don’t know…? What don’t we know!?" |
“Namatame’s true feelings.” |
“What didn’t you understand!?” |
“Something’s bothering me.” |
“Are you even getting at something here, or are you just stalling!?” |
“We’re missing something…” |
“Are we doing this or not!? That’s all I give a damn about right now!” |
“Calm the hell down!” |
Deviating from these answers during this section and allowing Namatame to die will lead straight to P4G's ‘bad ending’ and skip players forward to 20th March. Otherwise, Namatame is spared, the Fool Arcana is maxed out, and the Judgment Arcana is unlocked. This puts players on the path to the true ending.
On 12/5, the party will go over the evidence to attempt to figure out the true culprit behind the murders. Here players will have to correctly identify the murderer in order to once again avoid the bad ending.
Dialogue Prompt |
Correct Reply |
|---|---|
“The person who seems to be the most likely culprit is…” |
"Tohru Adachi." |
“Should you tell your friends about your suspicions about Tohru Adachi being the culprit?” |
"Yes." |
From here, assuming players answered correctly, time skips ahead again to the 20th of March. There’s an important prompt here that requires answering correctly to head to the true ending.
At any point before the 31st of December in P4G, players can complete Marie’s social link story to unlock the newly added Hollow Forest dungeon. While not necessary for the true ending or a romance with this character, it unlocks more lore for the mysteries of the game, while being the most challenging dungeon the game has to offer for anyone looking to conquer the highest peaks P4G has to offer.
How to Unlock the True Ending in Persona 4 Golden
Back to the 3/20, the protagonist of the game will have to speak with every character they’ve reached Rank 10 Social Link with. It does not have to be every character to get the true ending, but each character with a max Social Link will have their own scene at this point, much like in Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal. Once the player has spoken to everyone, they will receive a prompt to return home. It’s very important that this is answered correctly, or players will be locked out of the true ending.
When prompted with “You should return to your house to prepare for tomorrow.” Answer with “No” to progress to the final dungeon of the game. Selecting “Yes” will lead to a ‘good ending’ where the killer is caught, but the true mystery is left hidden.
After this, head over to Junes Food Court and head to the elevator for the IT meeting spot one last time. Players should make sure they're appropriately leveled at this point since there's no turning back. Interact with the elevator and the game will repeatedly prompt the player to go home, players looking for the true ending will have to refuse to head back. In order, the options players need to pick are “No”, “I’m not finished yet”, “Yes”, and then finally “There’s something missing.”
Here players will get a cutscene for their persistence where the IT figures out that this mystery runs deeper thanks to a letter. Players will have to head to the Riverbank to speak to Dojima and Nanako in another cutscene and also head to the Velvet Room to pick up the Orb of Clarity Key Item from its proprietor Igor. On New Game+, the Velvet Room can be visited twice to unlock a ‘super boss battle’ by speaking to Margaret.
After all that players will be directed to the gas station in Shopping District South, where they can speak to the attendant. Players will have to repeatedly speak to the attendant to discover their secret and unlock the final, hidden dungeon of the game.
Players can access the final dungeon from the Midnight Channel, but it will be a point of no return once they do, so players should stock up on equipment and consumables before heading in to fight Persona 4 Golden’s secret final boss.
Defeating this boss will unlock the true ending for Persona 4 Golden.
'Golden Ending' for Persona 4 Golden
Persona 4 Golden also adds a new epilogue for Marie after attaining the true ending. While more of an addition to the ending rather than an ending in and of itself, it’s nevertheless something all of the series' new players will want to see.
To get the ‘Golden Ending’, players will need to completely max out Marie’s Social Link before the completion of the Magatsu Inaba dungeon. This means (ing for the Christmas events that lock players out of actions) players will need to have the Social Link maxed by December 22nd, the latest date to complete the dungeon.
After that, there will be a small addendum added to the true ending that is unique to Persona 4 Golden.
