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Lost Judgment sees Yagami finally learn the real name of the original game’s Cane Man, but there’s more to the revelation that meets the eye.
In the original Judgment, protagonist Takayuki Yagami found himself fighting against the mysterious Cane Man, a Matsugane Family member who uses his namesake to fight opponents. While in that game, Yagami also befriended Ryo Suzaki — Cane Man’s lazy brother — a lot about the character was left ambiguous. However, Lost Judgment actually features a big revelation about Cane Man.
Early into Lost Judgment, Yagami can meet up with Tashiro, a gaudy yakuza from the first game. Following the dissolution of the various clans, Tashiro threw in with a tech company and became a level producer for Paradise VR in Yokohama. Soon, this starts a quest line called “Paradise VR Upgraded!” in which Yagami must play against a number of different advanced AI with the faces of characters from the first game, including Ryo.
After beating the AI based on Ryo, Yagami remarks that he never actually learned Cane Man’s name. That’s when Tashiro reveals Cane Man’s actual name is Masashi. However, that’s not all. Tashiro then says, “Ryo is Masashi — or Cane Man, whatever you wanna call him. […] So Cane Man’s got a split personality. It’s like, inside this one dude’s head, there are actually two dudes.” Initially, Yagami doesn’t believe Tashiro, but the ex-yakuza insists, saying that it’s pretty obvious. They look identical, including in their hair and clothes. They’re also “never in the same place at once.”
If Yagami beats all of the advanced AI, those whose likenesses Tashiro used appear to shake him down over the unauthorized use of their images. Among them is Masashi/Ryo, who is identified by the dialogue box only by his family name: Suzaki. Initially, Suzaki denies that Ryo and Masashi are the same, and he gets angry at Tashiro for claiming that he has “split personalities.”
Tashiro, though, insists that he was telling the truth and says that, at one point, Masashi spilled food on himself and Ryo appeared moments later with the same stain. Suzaki then makes things confusing by saying that not all rumors about him are necessarily false. He refuses to clarify when Yagami asks.
The implication of this revelation about Suzaki is that he has dissociative identity disorder (DID), in which a person has multiple personalities. Overall, there’s not a ton of evidence presented in-game that would lend itself to a definitive diagnosis of Suzaki having DID. However, it’s clear that’s what Lost Judgment is trying to communicate. Tashiro, for example, uses the word “switching,” which is a term used to indicate when a different personality (generally referred to as an alter or part) takes place.
In terms of Lost Judgment‘s treatment of DID, there’s really not much to say on that front. Tashiro seems to treat Suzaki’s condition as something relatively normal, and despite his initial confusion, Yagami accepts the validity of that diagnosis. Still, Ryo is generally characterized as quite violent, and the dialogue between Tashiro and Suzaki indicates the latter is something of a megalomaniac. Both of those additions do complicate the game’s choice to introduce DID, even in this limited capacity.
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