Persona 4 Golden Guide: Catching the Sea Guardian

So you want to catch the legendary Sea Guardian in Persona 4 Golden for the fame, the glory, and . . . the trophy? No problem. Follow this simple guide and you’ll have those bragging rights in no time.

Step One: Get the Fishing Pole (and Hook)

To get the fishing pole, you need to talk to the old man who stands near the river during the day. He’ll give you the fishing pole, but you won’t be able to use it until you get a hook – and that’s where things get tricky.

Go talk to the kid who stands at the shrine during the day. He’ll give you a bug (Tatsuhime Ladybug) in exchange for a random drink from the vending machines in the shopping district.

At night, go to the Pub and chose the “talk” option. The lady will talk about her “son” Akihiko, who it turns out is a fish. If you give her the bug, the fish will spit up the fishing hook. (She won’t talk to you until you have at least one jewel in your inventory, which you’ll get randomly as a drop in battles.)

Note: If you come back later and give her another bug, she’ll give you the “breadcrumbs” as bait, which you can use to catch Red Goldfish, the easiest fish to catch and which you need for the ghost at the shrine’s first request as well as one of the quests later (Quest #13: I Wish I Didn’t Fear Cats, necessary to complete the Fox’s social link).

Now that you have a hook and the pole, you can go fishing!

Step Two: Get Bait

To catch bugs, you need the bug net. After June 4, if you talk to the boy at the shrine (the one who gave you the ladybugs earlier), he’ll mention he saw a net somewhere. Return to the shrine at night and talk to the ghost (she’s hiding near the fortune stand in case you didn’t see her before), and she’ll give you the net.

You MUST talk to the boy about the net before the game will let you start catching bugs. Once you have the net from the ghost, talk to him during the day and he’ll tell you he has a new one and you can keep it. THEN you will be able to start catching bugs.

Once a day, you can catch bugs in the grove of trees near the shrine. You can try either during the day or at night, and you’ll catch different bugs depending (night is a better time to try to catch the bugs needed to catch the guardians, and bug catching doesn’t use up time).

The closer to “perfect timing” you get, the more bugs you’ll catch. (You can also increase the number of bugs you catch by reading a book: Catching Bugs and World Class Bugs.)

Honestly, there is no way other than practice to get “perfect timing.” There really isn’t a good visual or audio cue; you’ll just have to get a feel for it. In theory, you’re supposed to hit the button right when the exclamation point appears above your head, but I’ve found this unreliable. Instead, try to hit X right before your net is at its highest point and you’ll get “perfect timing” (which will trigger the trophy if it’s your first time).

The bait you’ll want is the Inaba Jewel Beetles right now. You don’t need perfect timing, but it’ll definitely help. You might want to wait until you have a few of these in  your inventory before you try to fish for the River Guardian, in case your line snaps or you lose the bait.

Note: You have to attempt to fish at Shinchiri Beach (see below), which will make the old man at the river request for you to catch the Guardian, in order for you to catch any Inaba Jewel Beetles.

Step Three: Catch the River Guardian

In the original game, there was only one guardian, but in Golden, there are two. You need to catch the River Guardian first.

Try to make sure you have relatively high diligence (and/or you’ve read Beginner Fishing) to increase the amount of tries you’ll have.

Go to the river on a RAINY day (or night) and use the Inaba Jewel Beetle as your bait. Cast your line, and wait for the big ripples. This fish will be harder to catch than most; it’ll help if you’ve read the advanced fishing guide (Expert Fishing) so you have the triangle option to help you reel it in. If your line breaks, try again. It shouldn’t be too hard.

Note: If you talk to Daidara with the River Guardian in your inventory, he will make it into a weapon for Kanji (Quest #60: Acquire the Samegawa’s Guardian).

Step Four: Get the Sea Rod

Now you can talk to the old man by the river during the day and show him the River Guardian. He’ll give you the Sea Rod, which lets you fish in the ocean at Shichiri beach.

Step Five: Catch the Sea Guardian

You’ll need the Genji Beetle in order to catch the Sea Guardian. You’ll also need to have unlocked Shichiri beach by riding your scooter three times.

Go to the beach on a rainy day and fish using the Genji Beetle as your bait. It helps if you’ve read the advanced fishing guide (Expert Fishing) as this one is tough to reel in.

Cast your line and look for the BIG ripples/splashes (see above picture). If you don’t see this, REEL BACK IN by pressing the circle button. You won’t lose your bait or a fishing attempt for doing this (as long as you do so before a fish takes the bait).

Keep casting and recasting until you see the big ripples/splashes. They are very obvious. Once you get that, fish as normal. This one will be really hard to reel in without snapping the line. I think it took me three tries (and I had read the expert fishing guide) before I finally snagged him.

This will be TOUGH. My best advice is practice, and control of the left analog stick – and be patient/conservative with pressing the circle button. Try to keep the fish as close to the blue as you can as much as you can even when you’re not pressing circle. This will help minimize the chance of snapping the line and help you draw the fish in closer, faster.

Just keep trying until you get him. Once you do, the trophy will pop. Show him to the old man to finish his quest (the last Fox quest, #15, necessary for maxing that social link), and revel in your glory.

You can catch more than one river and sea guardian, too, if you’re patient and have the bait. The guardians will restore full SP to whomever “eats” it in battle.

Note: Although in the original game, if you feed the guardian to the hungry cat, you can finish that quest (normally takes about 20 fish) right away (Quest #22: Cat Needs Food Badly); however, I found this didn’t work in P4G, at least not with the river guardian.

Good luck with catching the guardians. Hope you found this guide helpful! I’m hoping to do more to help you trophy hunters/completionists, including one for how to get all the books for that evil, evil “read all books” trophy!

Don’t forget to check out my review if you haven’t already!

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