Hilarious In Hindsight / Persona 5

• A major aspect of Madarame's arc was how he plagiarized the works of his own students to obtain fame and fortune for himself, while pretending to be a paragon of the art world. The increasing prominence of NFTs have caused many to draw comparisons to the Madarame situation, specifically how NFT proponents exalt it as a revolution for artists even though the actual technology is routinely abused for art theft and get-rich-quick schemes. It got to the point of fans joking that Madarame himself would've gotten in on the racket... and that was before unauthorized NFTs of the Sayuri began circulating online, drawing a parallel to both the Sayuri counterfeiting racket Madarame himself ran, and the fact that the Sayuri wasn't even his painting to begin with.
• A real world example: During the Hawaii trip in September, Yusuke's plane which was originally set to fly to Los Angeles gets diverted to Hawaii because massive storms in LA made it too difficult to land. This takes place in September (and the in-game calendar corresponds to the year 2016 despite the "20XX" moniker). In real life September 2016, California was suffering from a several-years long severe drought that was impacting the entire state and causing all counties to enact water usage restrictions. However, in late January 2017, California actually did get hit by a series of massive thunderstorms that miraculously ended the drought, including Los Angeles, so Yusuke's plane scenario would have been right on target with reality had it occurred a few months later.
• Okumura's Palace takes place in a space station, with his Shadow self in particular being a Darth Vader Expy. The game was released in Japan before the international release of Rogue One, which focuses on another Ragtag Bunch of Misfits stealing stuff to rebel against evil forces, albeit this time from the army led by the very man Okumura's Shadow pays homage to. Not only that, but the game is heavily implied to take place in 2016, the same year Rogue One was released; the final dungeon even takes place in December, the same month as said film's release.
• When beginning your first time working at Crossroads, Morgana muses about the possibility of the MC needing to cross-dress. Cue Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight, where the MC gets a cross-dressing costume.
• In Sae's Palace, Futaba makes a reference to Super Smash Bros. here◊. Fast forward to December 2018 at The Game Awards and Joker himself debuts as a fighter in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Suffice to say, a lot of fans never saw it coming.
• One of the retro games that Joker can play in his room is called Punch Ouch, an obvious riff on Punch-Out!!. Now, as a fighter in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Joker can go head to head with Little Mac, the star of the actual Punch-Out!!, and fight in the boxing ring from that game. Other Games also include Star Forneus, a riff on Star Fox and Ganbale Gomemon, a riff on Ganbare Goemon. Joker can fight the main stars of Star Fox and against a Mii Fighter dressed up as Goemon.
• One lyric in "Life Will Change" says the (Phantom Thieves) aren't a "Robot A.I. challenging you." But in Persona 5 Strikers one of your party members, Sophia, is exactly that.
• One of Morgana's DLC costumes is the black ranger of Neo Featherman, in Avataro Sentai Donbrothers, their black ranger, Inu Brother, is also a Super-Deformed character like Morgana.
• Frequent references to the "Metaverse" take on a different tone after the massive push by Meta (formerly Facebook) from 2021 onwards towards their idea of a "Metaverse" (broadly, virtual worlds and augmented reality accessed via VR headsets), something that quickly became an object of derision.
• Persona 5 gaining a reputation of being a "gacha killer" becomes this come the reveal of the production of the mobile game Persona 5 X in 2023. The "gacha killer" now has its own gacha game.
• In Pokémon Crystal, a trainer that can be fought at the Battle Tower is a Teacher named Kawakami. Makes you wonder if it's really a coincidence.
• Makoto inviting Joker to see the latest Like a Dragon movie with her. At the time of Persona 5's initial release, it was just a sneaky reference to the Japanese title of the Like a Dragon series, entitled Yakuza in the West; by 2020, the reference was made more apparent by Yakuza: Like a Dragon using it as the subtitle of the game, and then in 2022, the franchise was rebranded in the West from Yakuza to Like a Dragon with all subsequent releases.

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