Ryuji Sakamoto

**Ryuji Sakamoto** is a playable character from *Persona 5*. He is a student at Shujin Academy who lives a double life as a Phantom Thief.

## Design

Ryuji has short spiky dyed blond hair and dark brown eyes. According to Sadayo Kawakami, his hair is naturally black. He has a noticeable widow's peak and his eyebrows are unusual in that he lacks the outer sides. He is shown to be muscular.

He wears his winter school uniform a bit modified. It consists of the standard black blazer, unbuttoned to reveal a yellow t-shirt with a comic style star symbol and the word 'ZOMG!' He has plaid trousers rolled up to reveal his ankles. His pants have black suspenders that hang down instead of being worn on his shoulders. He has a white belt. His white sneakers have a rising sun flag motif.

His summer school uniform is the same as his winter's, except his yellow t-shirt is replaced with a red one reading 'NO MO RULES' and he no longer wears his blazer.

His burglar outfit consists of matching black jacket and pants with knee pads, a red ascot, combat boots, a pair of yellow gloves, and a skull mask.

Due to his injury, he walks and runs with a slight limp, and occasionally trips if he overexerts himself.

In *Persona 5: Dancing Star Night*, he retain his Shujin Academy uniform except he wears a yellow with black "X" design and a red tattered scarf, and yellow and light blue sneakers with matching laces. He wears sunglasses on his head, a golden chain bracket on his right wrist and metal bracket on his left wrist.

## Personality

Ryuji is known as a disruptive "problem student" at school whose bad behavior causes all sorts of trouble for the teachers.[1] His rebellious, mischievous and disobedient nature are the perfect qualities to be a Phantom Thief.

He is a bit short-tempered, easily taking offense from even the slightest of comments from others and can sometimes even resort to violence. In the opposite way, Ryuji can make harsh comments of his own without thinking of the consequences, which is the very thing that causes the hostility between him and Morgana. He tends to be very blunt about his feelings without showing any hesitation, especially in regards to his hatred of selfish adults. He can be clumsy and overly energetic sometimes, which usually results in loud outbursts that most times include accidentally revealing himself and his friends as the Phantom Thieves. This consequently helped Makoto Niijima to identify him and the others when she was tailing them.

Beneath his seemingly delinquent-like behavior, Ryuji is actually a kind and altruistic person who is still trying to cope with his inability to continue becoming an athlete after the injury he suffered at Kamoshida's hand. He deeply cares for his mother and takes fervent effort as an athlete to relieve her worries; he reveals his father was an alcoholic who beat him and his mother and then left, so he his mother is the only family he has. Ryuji also cares for the afflictions of others around him, such as when he attempts to help end the abuse of the volleyball team. Around his close friends, he is upbeat, friendly, and straightforward.

Hobby-wise, apart from being on the track team, he also does muscle training. He can drink a 500mL bottle of carbonated water in one go which he did as training during his track and field club days. When he was active, he could also do 1000mL bottles. He is often impatient and has a habit of tapping the ground with his toes when he's bored, and prefers to get "straight to the point" during conversations. He claims he never reads, and his artbook profile claims he only reads manga.[2] He plays video games.[3] He likes ramen especially, and is fussy about the flavor and texture of the noodles.

## Battle Quotes

* "*I'm all fired up!*" (Using Shotguns)
* "*Perrrrsonaaaa!*" (Summoning Persona)
* "*Wipe em, Persona!*" (Summoning Persona)
* "*Captain Kidd / Seiten Taisei!*" (Exploiting enemy's weakness with Persona skill)
* *"Hah/ Eat this/ Get wrecked!"* (Attacking with offensive skill)
* *"Up to you, man!"* (Using Baton Pass)
* "*Leave it to me./ Taggin in!*" (Receiving Baton Touch)
* "Hang in there!" (Using Harisen Recovery)
* *"Don't just stand there!"* (Shielding Protagonist)
* *"Now or never, man?"* (Follow-Up)
* *"Need a hand?"* (Follow-Up)
* *"Gonna knock you out!"* (Initiating Follow-Up attack)
* *"I'm on it!"* (Initiating Follow-Up attack)
* *"Just stay there!"* (Hold-Up enemies)
* *"For real?! / No way!"* (When an enemy dodges his attack)
* *"Try to keep up!"* (When Ryuji dodges an enemy's attack)
* *"I-I a-ain't a-afraid..."* (Ryuji is inflicted with Fear)
* *"Sorry / Whew!"* (When someone heals him)
* "*This is the it!*" (Initating All-Out Attack)
* *"All right! Time for some pain!"* (Initiating All-Out Attack)
* *"Let's tear em apart!"* (Initiating All-Out Attack)
* *"And don't come back!*" (All-Out Attack finishing touch)
* "*Slam!"* (All-Out Attack finishing touch)
* *"That's all she wrote!"* (All-Out Attack finishing touch)
* *"Time to go wild!"* (Tactics changed to Act Freely)
* *"Beat 'em down!"* (Tactics changed to Full Assault)
* *"Hold back huh?"* (Tactics changed to Conserve SP)
* *"Playin' it safe."* (Tactics changed to Heal/Support)
* *"You're the boss."* (Tactics changed to Direct Command)
* *"Who's next!?"* (Battle results)
* *"Yeah! Nice!"*(Battle results)
* *"Ha! Losers!"*(Battle results)

## TMNT X Pokemon

As a troublemaker, he does things his way. He often argues with Raph and Ryuko a lot but gets along with Mondo

## Trivia

* Ryuji's name referencing Ryōma Sakamoto (坂本 龍馬) from the bakumatsu period is supported by his Confidant subplot which is an allusion to the blade wound incident in Iguchi village (井口村刃傷事件?): A lower samurai Toranoshin Ikeda (池田 寅之進)'s brother was killed by a higher samurai for possbily shoulder bumping. Informed by the witness, Ikeda quickly arrived at the scene and killed the two superiors for revenge. This serial murder stoked the tension between the lower and higher samurais in the next day. Sakamoto as a fellow lower samurai helped mediate, but things actually settled down after Ikeda had performed honor suicide by seppuku and confiscation of the salaries of Ikeda's and his brother's families, while the superiors' families received virtually no punishment for the initial killing. The unequal treatments led to desertion of many lower samurais including Sakamoto and his later comrade Shintarō Nakaoka (中岡 慎太郎) from their serving clans who were disappointed by their higher-ups' suppression.
* In the Japanese version, Skull self-proclaims "Phantom Thieves' Captain Kirikomi" (怪盗団の切り込み隊長, *Kaitō-dan no kirikomi taichō*)? which loosely means "Assault Captain" or "Captain Foodie" (which could be an intentional double entendre.) "Captain Kirikomi" is a reference to the Marauding Captain card from the *Yu-Gi-Oh!* series. "Kirikomi" precisely refers to curing fish slices from Hokkaido regional cuisine. The term was later borrowed for naval boarding in ship-to-ship combat, referring to the grappling hooks for closing the distance between the ships.
	+ The official translation in-game is "charge commander."
* Ryuji's civilian shoes are censored in the Chinese and Korean versions of the game, due to containing the Rising Sun Flag.[4] The symbol is offensive in many other Asian countries when they suffered from Japan's invasion during World War II; Atlus removed it out of courtesy when the issue was brought up.
* Just like with Makoto Niijima and Goro Akechi before, the official twitter account for the Persona series posted a "Happy Birthday" message for Ryuji on July 3, 2017 JST.
* Only in the English version, after escaping Kaneshiro's Palace Ryuji comments in the gang's message group "*I'm a Phantom, on a steel horse I ride*." This is a reference to Bon Jovi's "Wanted Dead or Alive" from the 1986 album "*Slippery When Wet*" to which Makoto follows up with continual reference by stating that she is not *wanted*.
	+ In the Japanese version, this conversation is completely different with Ryuji stating he wants to drive a stolen bike and Makoto instantly denies hers to be stolen from elsewhere.

### Appearances in Other Media

* *Chain Chronicle*: Skull, Warrior class. (Article in *Chain Chronicle* Wiki)