Are you ready for your third boss battle for Persona 5 Royal? By now, you've recruited Makoto Niijima as you help her deal with Junya Kaneshiro, the conman targeting teens around Shibuya. His palace takes the form of a bank, with all the people outside presenting as walking ATMs to denote just how Kaneshiro sees the folks he's exploiting.
A jerk like him deserves to be taken down a peg, and thankfully, Joker and the Phantom Thieves are just the people to do it. Let us help you make this scumbag repent for his crimes after you kick his ass in this boss battle.
Updated January 30, 2023: We've added a video guide to this article that shows you exactly how to defeat Shadow Kaneshiro in Persona 5 Royal.
Preliminary Information
The first step to winning this fight is assembling an all-star team of Thieves to join Joker, as well as picking Personas with the right affinities and attacks.
Yusuke’s fire weakness makes him a weak link, and Morgana has good skills, but may not survive with his electric weakness. This is especially true since Piggytron is able to use One More. If it homes in on their weaknesses, it does extensive damage to that party member, and gets a second attack, too.
Your best bet here is bringing anyone that has moves that cancel status ailments, as Shadow Kaneshiro, Piggytron, and the two Special Guards all have moves that will likely inflict them. Be that your teammates or Joker’s Personas, your team runs the risk of being inflicted with burn, fear, sleep, shock, and forget. You’re able to get items that negate them as well, so be sure to stock up before the fight. Amrita and Amrita Shower are good moves to have on you for this fight, as they heal all non-special ailments for your party.
Additionally, you might want to bring someone with healing skills. Makoto will warn you at the beginning how intense some of Shadow Kaneshiro’s attacks will be, and she’s warning you for a reason. Both Shadow Kaneshiro and Piggytron have attacks that can easily decimate your team if you don’t shield when you have to and heal when you can.
It doesn’t hurt to have some revival items, too. Just in case.
Battling Piggytron
After you’ve watched him turn into a neon fly, your fight begins with Shadow Kaneshiro climbing into a ridiculously oversized piggy bank mech, Piggytron. The name is a lot cuter than the enemy itself, as Piggytron is a real pain in the ass.
Piggytron has the following attacks in this stage:
|
Attack |
Effect |
|---|---|
|
Ocular Vulcan |
Heavy gun damage to one foe. |
|
Metabolic Wave |
Medium physical damage to all foes. |
|
Missile Party |
Medium fire damage to all foes with a chance to inflict burn. |
|
Fear Gas |
Medium chance of inflicting fear to all foes. |
It doesn’t have weaknesses you can exploit, so it’s relatively wise to focus your SP on debuffing Piggytron first, as its attacks will mean business, and then hit it with physical attacks when you’re able to conserve SP for the next phase.
Beat on Piggytron until you knock its HP down enough for Shadow Kaneshiro to tell you he’s getting pissed.
Ultra V.I.P. Form
Now that he's mad, Shadow Kaneshiro will pop out of the mech and begin spinning it. Piggytron isn’t too dangerous at first, but this secondary form is where your team might take real damage.
With Shadow Kaneshiro picking up speed, Piggytron is now able to use an attack called March of the Piggy which can absolutely crush your team if you’re not prepared.
Any time you see that Piggytron is spinning faster, have anyone who’s taken some hits guard. This attack inflicts severe almighty damage, which is going to demolish anyone whose health isn’t in good shape.
The good news about this form is that you’re able to attack Shadow Kaneshiro directly during this gearing-up stage for March of the Piggy. If you’re able to sacrifice the HP or can confidently recuperate it after, this is a worthwhile way to knock out Shadow Kaneshiro’s health early, as you’ll be fighting him directly in just a moment.
Because after Piggytron has taken enough damage, Shadow Kaneshiro will ditch it, coming out of the mech to fight you himself.
… Kind of.
Shadow Kaneshiro And His Guards
Because Kaneshiro relies so much on his payroll, when he comes out to “deal with you busters himself,” he’ll be doing it with money. Your fight isn’t just against Shadow Kaneshiro, but also his two guards: Bodyguard-for-Hire and Hitman-for-Hire, two more shadows that absorb and deal damage on Shadow Kaneshiro’s behalf, respectively.
Because he’s got a bodyguard, you’ll struggle to hit him at first. You’ll need to deal with Bodyguard-for-Hire somehow to actually inflict damage onto Shadow Kaneshiro, as if the guard is functional, it will sometimes block Shadow Kaneshiro.
Unfortunately, Shadow Kaneshiro and his goons gets the first moves here, and he’ll do his best to put the Phantom Thieves to sleep with Lullaby. Anyone who’s asleep will take Technical Damage from the coming attacks from the guards, too. Technical damage is increased damage done to anyone suffering from a status ailment.
Shadow Kaneshiro has the following attacks:
|
Attack |
Effect |
|---|---|
|
Special Guards |
Summons a Bodyguard-for-Hire and Hitman-for-Hire. |
|
Kill Reward Up |
Tarukaja on Hitman-for-Hire to raise attack. |
|
Guard Reward Up |
Rakukaja on Bodyguard-for-Hire to raise defense. |
|
Lullaby |
Medium chance to inflict sleep on all foes. |
|
Snap |
Medium gun damage to one foe. |
|
Zionga |
Medium electric damage to one foe with a chance to inflict shock. |
|
Make It Rain |
Light physical damage to each foe ten times, for damage equal to 70 percent HP. |
This is where those status ailment-curing moves we discussed earlier come in, as you’ll really need to wake up anyone this attack knocks out. Between how hard Shadow Kaneshiro can hit with some of his other attacks and how powerful Hitman-for-Hire is, Technical Damage can easily wipe your team.
The great news for you is that Technical Damage applies to Shadow Kaneshiro and his guards, too. And with the guards strong against every attack that they don’t nullify or drain, putting the guards to sleep is your ticket to victory.
While the guards are down, use multi-target attacks for a multitude of benefits. Not only will downed shadows take Technical Damage that almost recovers what you lose from their strengths, but Shadow Kaneshiro is your real target in this fight. The guards are irritating, sure, but if Shadow Kaneshiro goes down, the fight is over.
Because of this, go for the multi-target attacks while status ailments are active, and if you’re only able to put one shadow to sleep at a time, focus on Bodyguard-for-Hire to increase the likeliness of hitting Shadow Kaneshiro directly.
A rather frustrating attack that Shadow Kaneshiro has is Make It Rain, which he busts out at half HP to deal light physical damage worth 70 percent of current HP. The good news is that, while this attack definitely does a good amount of damage, by default, it will never be fatal.
70 percent is definitely a lot, but since it will never attack harder than that, it can’t fully deplete anyone’s HP if it hits.
It won’t be long, however, until Shadow Kaneshiro runs out of money — he’ll try to Make It Rain a second time but come up short on funds. If the guards are still around when this happens, they will leave immediately if they’re no longer being paid. So much for loyalty, right?
Without anyone on payroll to take the fall for him, all you’ve got to do from here is hammer on Shadow Kaneshiro with everything you’ve got. He won’t really attack from here, spending his turns “being remorseful,” but don’t fall for it.
Give him everything you’ve got and finish depleting his health to end the fight. After the cutscenes when he goes down, you’ll just have to hit the deadline to continue onto the next palace.