'Persona 5: The Animation' release date news: Main protagonist's name revealed

A promotional poster for the video game by Atlus, 'Persona 5.' Facebook/AtlusUSA

The big announcement from the Japanese video game development company, Atlus, has finally been revealed. As it turned out, the company's most popular Japanese role-playing game (JRPG) title to date, "Persona 5," will be getting its own anime series titled "Persona 5: The Animation," and it is scheduled to be released in the first quarter of 2018. The announcement was made during an Atlus Christmas Eve event. 

It may delight the numerous fans of the beloved Atlus title to know that the original voice actors of the "Persona 5" video game will be returning to do some voice work for the anime series. The Japanese video game company has also released some teaser screenshot from the series, showing the bespectacled main protagonist in the middle of the hustle and bustle of the urban Shibuya streets. 

Even though it may have been marked as "Super Secret Information," the name of the main protagonist of "Persona 5: The Animation" has been revealed to be Ren Amamiya, which, even as early as now, is already being dubbed as canon. In the past, there have been disparities between the given names for the previous "Persona" protagonists from the manga and the games. In the manga version of "Persona 5," the main protagonist is known as Akira Kurusu.

When translated into English, the main protagonist's name means "lotus." In Japanese, the lotus is a symbol for ridding one's body from sins. This is a very appropriate name for the character since this is the main focus of the plot, as well as the gameplay. 

According to the video game and the manga, Ray Amamiya will be playing a phantom thief who has special powers to infiltrate the hearts of evil-doers and "steal" their innermost desires in order to make them better people. 

"Persona 5: The Animation" is scheduled to premiere sometime in April 2018. 

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