#set in the Kanna/Alice lives route because that's personally my favorite

[kasterarts]

Moving Forward. (Spoilers for YTTD up through 3-1b)

[beanieman]

Who I Think Is Least To Most Likely To Die In The Next Chapter

6. Kanna

I don’t think it makes sense with Kanna’s arc for her to die on the emotion route. The theme’s of her story are realizing her life has value, and she’s not a useless burden. 

For Kanna to be killed after that just reaffirms the incorrect view she had about herself during the second main game. It would be cruel for her to die at this point, and I don’t see her character taking that direction. 

5. Reko/Alice

To put in simply, I think they’ll get at least one route to finish their arc’s. At least I hope so! This is a bit short, but honestly it’s the reason I think they’ll make it through. 

4. Gin

While I think Gin has a higher probability of dying on the logic route, I still think he’s decently safe.

I think he’s going to make it out in the emotion route. The lesson of saving Kanna is that protecting children is always the correct decision. With that as an overall theme, I can’t see Gin getting killed off. 

Then we have the logic route. I worry more about this route, because Sara loosing Gin would be a direct parallel to Shin loosing Kanna, and we know how YTTD like’s it’s character’s going through similar experience’s. 

However, I will say that Gin is the most cared for person in the logic route. He’s closest to Sara, Shin, and Keiji. I can’t see them letting him die easily, and that make’s him safer than the rest. 

More Undercut

3. Shin

I don’t think Mister 0.0 is out of the woods yet. As we know from the Yabusame’s, detriment characters aren’t safe, and Shin is still the most hated person in the group. 

If there’s another main game, he’ll be the first person everyone want’s to majority vote. Unless he gets sacrifice or keymaster, he’s as good as dead. However, with only four people being left it is possible for him to get either card.

His number is 0.0 for a reason, and I think that’s enough to point out why he’s not safe yet. I am however very curious whether he’ll be able to dodge his fate or if it’s set in stone. `

2. Sara 

Sara doesn’t have the best outlook. While she has the highest survival rank in the AI’s, I don’t think that bodes well for Sara narratively. To me, it make’s the most sense for Sara’s character arc to end in two ways. Either she escape’s with everyone and doesn’t cause unnessacary bloodshed, or she sacrifices herself so the other’s can live. 

Either way, these action’s would show how different she is from her AI counterpart. I do think her survival is more likely on the emotion route, but on the logic route she already has someone that wants her dead more than anyone else. 

I also think it’s interesting how 3B established the lack of need for Sara’s POV. When Sara passes out, we see everything through Keiji’s viewpoint, so who’s to say Sara couldn’t die and Keiji/Gin/Shin couldn’t take over as protagonist? 

Overall I don’t think Sara is safe yet, but Nankidai has also said she’s his favorite character, so maybe she has some plot armor. 

1. Keiji

I’m worried about Keiji. Through the game, Keiji has had an intense urge to live. It’s not out of an instinct, but because of the the need to punish himself for the sin’s he’s committed. To him, living with guilt is his deserved retribution. So that leave’s a question. Where does that arc go? 

In my opinion, I think it has a pretty high chance of ending in death. I could see his character dying out of love for the found family he’s made. If he lives for guilt, it make’s most sense for me for him to die for love. 

Another reason he might be on his way out is his logical viewpoint. One of the game’s themes are how you should embrace your emotions, and logic doesn’t often lead to the best outcome. So I think Keiji’s arc could end with him dying in a very emotionally charged way. For example sacrificing himself as the majority vote during a main game. Or getting the sacrifice card and not being able to go through with deceiving everyone. 

I feel like two of Keiji’s arcs are easily wrapped up by his death, and that doesn’t make me feel confident about his survival. 

[genoc1d3r]

my turn to cry - thoughts on 3-1b

ok this has actually gotta be my favorite chapter cause holy shit so much stuff happened.

I played the Alice/kanna route and afterwards I watched a vod with the reko/shin route in which ranmaru and naomichi died before the banquet, so BIG SPOILER WARNING FOR BOTH ROUTES

Mafia Princess Sara??: Ok so first off, back in the beginning of 2020, I had a theory that Sara was a mafia heiress and that the death game was supposed to be something to “prepare” her. And that her memories were wiped or she was initially supposed to be kept blind to this whole thing (In 3-1a when everybody saw the consent form for the very first time everybody felt a sense of deja vu, except for Sara. Because why would they need her consent when she is the sole focus of the game and it’s all for her) This theory was mainly supplied by my confusion surrounding the hiring of Kai, cause why would mr Chidouin hire a former assassin to protect her?? How did he even know Kai??? But yeah, the whole thing with Shinobu Gokujo and deciding a new don through a death game just adds a lil more validity to this theory.

Sara’s real father: I also had a mini theory that Gashu Satou was her real father, but that was mostly cause of their hair color and how it would def make Sara’s hair color make more sense genetics-wise (but kai has black hair, so its most likely that his mother had black hair, which would also disprove this mini-theory but yk im not here to prove it just talk about it). And that Gashu knew of Mr. Chidouin and gave Sara to him, and it would also explain why mr Chidouin chose Kai of all people to look after her and why Kai could only watch her from a distance, in case she realized the truth that he was her brother/half-brother or something. 

GREENBLINGS CANON AAAAAAAA: I love this, I love this so much oh my god. Now I can replay and cry after 2-2 cause nankidai hates us :’). I dont have an issue with this specifically, I’m just a bit bothered by how the whole thing went. There was some buildup yea, and the cg with kanna, kugie, and shin was amazing. And that lil bit about nice hallucinations made me tear up a bit. But, then everybody kinda just moved on? and idk this whole chapter was a fuckign roller coaster I could barely keep up.

Autistic Gin <3: I’m autistic myself and I have seen many characters who are autistic-coded or exhibit many signs of autism but have never been straight up confirmed (Ex: Vera Misham from Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney). And even then, these characters usually share similar personality traits like being aloof and reserved. So it’s nice to see that Gin is representing autism in a relatively realistic manner with his hyperfixations, vocal tics, and issues with socializing. Even after nearly dying like 17 times he’s still doing well and I genuinely wish for his survival and happiness.

Ranmaru’s death: Both of Ranmaru’s deaths, (if you or if you don’t fail the electricity absorption minigame) the death feels so... off? I was really attached to him as a character, yet his death didn’t impact as much as Joe’s or Nao’s did. During his Banquet death, one second he had his really cute smiling sprite but then whoops oh no guys weird drill screw thing kills him (again). I still can barely comprehend it because it all just happened so fast. Like no cg or anything. I was honestly kinda disappointed. The “delayed” one does a better job at his death scene, but again, it was wayyy too quick and completely dismissed as everybody just moves on to defeat Maple 2.0. I at least would’ve appreciated a better transition than Midori just saying “well anyways–”

 Ranmaru’s extremely quick descent into madness in the shin route: I actually liked this idea of Ranmaru willing to go to such extremes for Sara. However, theres barely time for any of this to develop? Like again, everything just happens so fast??? I would've definitely liked if there were little hints around before the body discovery that ranmaru was gonna do something like this, just a little time for development would really be cool.

Mr. Policeman/Mr. Tazuna???: After I finished, I actually looked on the wiki to see if it said anything about his son that he mentioned and I found this: 

But yeah thats cool

The thing about Q-taro: I’m gonna say it now, I’ve liked Q-taro ever since the aftermath of 1-2, and Q-taro haters have added absolutely nothing to this fandom. Everybody saw him as a child-hater, I see him as a guy who’ll do anything to survive and succeed. I mean that wish is kinda what got him into the death game. And yeah he did try to leave that one time, but that’s what getting thrown into traumatic killing games does for you, most people don’t want to die, they want to live, no matter what it takes. We can’t all be the main character and choose to cooperate with everybody and be the “good” person in that situation. Even Sara has those extremely selfish moments and those intrusive thoughts of winning and leaving. 

This whole thing should also be applied to Ranmaru. Ranmaru has gone through so much shit in such a brief amount of time, to the point where he was considering to/actually kill people to escape with the one person he trusted in this hellhole. In that situation, Sara’s kinda at fault here, cause without Joe she’s lost her sense of morality which resulted in her becoming selfish and well... honestly kinda toxic. This emotional manipulation is really what set Ranmaru off, however it was 100% his decision to fucking kill somebody and murder’s bad. Still love him though.

But back to Qtaro, I really enjoyed the extra substance given to him in this chapter, it’s nice to see the development from being selfish to feeling deep remorse to protecting the dolls of the first trial victims, most notably Mai. As he completely forgives her for stabbing him. The chapter did a great job at fueling my already intense love for Q-taro (and it actually convinced my best friend who claims to hate Q-taro with every bone of her body to like him too!) I also love the father-son dynamic between him and Gin. I find this relationship to be really important cause Gin’s father is an abusive alcoholic and Q-taro’s an orphan who’s never had a proper role-model in his life. So it’s beautiful that despite not having anybody there for him when he was younger he can still be a good figure for another child.

Predictions/hopes for the next part: 

I just want to see whether Shin already knew about Kanna being his sister, and if he doesn’t I want a reveal. Right. Now.

A Ranmaru/Joe/Q-taro/Kai/ “Hinako” revival, p l e a se  they died so soon

More info about the people involved in the Hades Incident/Shinobu Gokujo

More info regarding Meister

Sara going on Maury

Who tf is “Hinako”????

I really hope that there isn't any specific good/bad ending. Like I want every ending to be equally bad and good yk? like equal consequences and good stuff.

Yo wtf happened to Sara’s mom?? Is she gonna come back and play a more important role in the story?? Are her parents gonna come back as floor masters???

I want things to actually change  depending on whether you picked Alice or reko, cause so far they’ve played extremely minor roles.

[oumakokichi]

since youve mentioned playing YTTD, do you have any ships for it, or just any bonds in the story you enjoy?

Hmm, YTTD is one of those stories where I’m more invested in the plot and the mysteries overall than in shipping, so I haven’t given it a lot of thought!

This isn’t really meta or anything of the sort, but I’m not sure how many of my followers are caught up with YTTD spoilers, so I’ll put this under a cut just in case!

I’d say the only real romantic ship I really got attached to was Nao/Reko—they had such a great dynamic overall, I loved nearly all of their interaction. The way that Reko made so much effort to help Nao recover from Mishima’s death, the way Nao realized that something felt subtly off about Reko in the first part of chapter 2, realizing that the Fake Reko was a different person from the Reko that she’d come to know for most of the game so far… all of the development between them was so good.

I’m pretty sad Nao is dead as of the end of chapter 2 and that there’s no real way to save her (other than getting a massive bad ending, not that I blame her for lying in the main game when that was really the only option she had). I wanted to see even more of her and Reko interacting, potentially even the two of them getting out alive, so Nao’s death felt a little like her development was getting cut short. She and Reko are still both fantastic characters though.

The only other romantic ship I’m tentatively invested in that I can think of off the top of my head is Ranmaru/Sara, because what we’ve seen of their interactions in chapter 3 so far is pretty great. I like that it’s so easy for Sara to get him flustered, and that he really seems to want to genuinely help her despite the twist about the dolls’ real role in the game that Midori set up. It’s also nice to see Sara getting to befriend someone completely outside the main group that she’s gotten to know for most of the game, and having someone who can help take some of the pressure off of her instead of leaving most of the responsibilities to her.

Obviously we’ll have to see how things turn out between them in the rest of the story, but all in all, it seems like a cute ship! I’m not quite as invested in it as I am Nao/Reko, but that’s mostly just because they haven’t had as much interaction. Depending on how long Ranmaru sticks around for chapter 3, it’s possible they’ll get even more great moments together.

As for non-romantic bonds in the story that I enjoy—I have quite a lot of those! I like how character-driven YTTD feels as a story, and the varying occupations and ages of the characters allows for a lot more focus on bonds like family, or mentorship. For example, Mishima isn’t around for a very long time, but we still have time to see how much he genuinely cares about Nao and wants to protect her and help her grow into the best person she can be. When he dies, it’s a pretty horrific and heartwrenching moment even that early on because we’ve seen firsthand what a good person he is, and how much Nao looks up to him.

One of my favorite non-romantic bonds that’s been shaping up so far is probably between Sara and Sou (as in Shin, not Midori). I definitely wouldn’t say I ship them, but the actual potential for friendship between them is so good. The two of them are also such well-written narrative foils of each other, with Sara constantly on the brink of collapse from trying to hold the group together while Sou is being eaten alive by his own paranoia and desperation pretty much 24/7.

Once we know more about Sou’s mindset, it’s so easy to see why he acts the way he does towards Sara—of course every gesture of good will she makes look suspicious and calculated, knowing that she’s not only got the highest rate of survival in the entire killing game but is also so undeniably important and central to why the game is even taking place at all. There are already a lot of implications that Sou has had a rough time in the past from trusting overly-friendly, charismatic people (like Midori), so his severe mistrust of Sara specifically makes a lot more sense in hindsight.

And at the same time, Sara herself is never any less sympathetic. She’s such a fantastic protagonist: we want to root for her precisely because of how desperately she’s trying to make things work in spite of everything falling apart around her. Her trauma, particularly from feeling so personally responsible for Joe’s death, lives alongside her and shapes her every bit as much as Sou’s paranoia does. It’s equally easy to understand why she wants Sou to stop fucking around in the main game and be their ally for once, and why she keeps reaching out to him in spite of how blatantly he mistrusts her.

I would really, really love for the two of them to genuinely become friends in the Sou route of chapter 3. It’s hard to tell if that’s really going to happen—Sou is nothing but resentful right now because of Kanna’s death, and clearly biding his time to get back at the rest of the group for “killing her.” But I really hope that is what happens in the end. Between Midori and the dolls presenting a much bigger threat, and the fact that we’re probably going to finally get some important revelations about Sara’s greater role in all of this soon, I think there’s a real chance for Sou to pull through and put aside his grudges while genuinely pitching in as an ally for once.

I also absolutely adore Reko and Alice’s sibling relationship—Alice in general is one of my favorite YTTD characters so it’s always really hard picking which one of them I want to survive. The fact that both of them so clearly wanted to put the past behind them and go back to being siblings, but never actually knew how to say so or how to interact with each other during the main events of the game is just so sad. I feel like the regrets they have with each other are very compelling, and I hope we get to at least see some more interaction between them in YTTS if nothing else.

Thank you for this question, anon! It was really fun to go through and think of which character dynamics I’ve been enjoying the most in YTTD so far!

[beanieman]

Some Thoughts I Had About Kai’s Island Mode Events

Spoilers Undercut

- Out of all the events, I liked Kanna and Nao’s the most! If I had to choose a least favorite I would say maybe Reko’s just because of my personal preferences, but I actually liked every free time event! I think my ranking for Kai’s events would be Nao, Kanna, Joe, Sara, Mishima, Alice, Q-Taro, Shin, Gin, Keiji, and then Reko. 

- I found the reunion ending the most interesting, but I have no idea what it means. Ranmaru mentions Sara coming from off island, so the Sara with her hair down is different from the Sara that was living on the island.

- The whiplash I got between Q-Taro’s first and final even was so strong. After the first event I was really preparing for Q-Taro to open up to Kai and get a deep dive on the thoughts we first saw explored in his flashback, and then we got muscless Q-Taro which was the scariest thing YTTD has ever produced. 

- I kind of hated the cooking mini game. I tried so hard to like it, but I just couldn’t get into it. 

- Because Kai protests when Gin mentions him finding a wife, I’m headcanoning either gay or aromantic Kai now. Also I’m taking bisexual Joe as canon. 

- I give it two months before someone makes a feeding fic about Kaishin.

- I’m glad they explored Kanna’s dynamic with her parents more. She never really brings them up, for the most part she’s focused on Kugie, so it was nice to learn more about them. Though her third event made me feel really bad about being a logic route player. Won’t change my decision though. 

- Is Rei disproven as Midori? Because Midori is clearly set up as a character that exists in the simulations now, so to have him be the same person as Rei could be done but would be tricky. 

- I’m taking Kai’s island mode as canon confirmation that he could knock anyone in the cast out. If someone other than Kai or Shin was majority voted Shin would have been screwed. 

- I didn’t think I could hate Gashu anymore. Then Kai talked about how he was made to withstand shocks and drink poison. But on another note, does anyone else find it interesting that Kai talked about withstanding shocks when we have the mini game about taking shocks to save Ranmaru in 3B? 

[beanieman]

do you prefer the reko or alice lives route? what about the logic and emotion route?

The Alice lives route for sure! He's my canon choice regardless of the route I'm playing, to the point I get thrown off for a second when I see content with the Reko lives route.

I like Reko a lot, but I feel like her arc is over after 2-1.I feel like Alice still has more left to do, and overall contributes more to the story. For example, if you keep him alive you get to see what happened with Sou's murder, and he gets to learn that he killed Hinako, which I feel like could lead to some interesting plot stuff. Plus his "I can't vote for anyone's little sister" is one of my favorite lines in the whole game.

As for the Shin/Kanna choice, I mostly prefer the logic route. I know it's the unhappier route, but that's how I like my death game content. Because of the setting I want a little bit of drama, y'know? I also enjoy how unpredictable Shin is, and the dynamic he has with Sara, Gin, and Keiji after the second main game vote.

Having said that, I also really enjoy the emotion route! Kanna's a fantastic character, and unlike Reko I don't think her story is over by any means. I like seeing her will to live grow, and how strong she's become with Sara's support. Plus, sometimes I am in the mood for happier things, which her route unarguably is. I just find the logic route a tad more interesting, which is why I personally prefer it.