You're Really Somethin', Kid.

[rionaleonhart]

I saw that futuresoon was posting about a game called Your Turn to Die, and my response was, 'Well, this sounds likely to be up my street from the title alone.'

I investigated.

It was up my street.

Your Turn to Die is a game in the strangely populous 'a bunch of people are abducted and put through traumatic, murder-filled trials for mysterious reasons' genre; it feels very inspired by Zero Escape and Danganronpa, with a little more emphasis on horror. (I don't know why there are so many games on this theme, but I'm not complaining for a second.) Mechanically, it's closer to Ace Attorney, although there are various minigames. The game is available at no cost, but I've been watching a Let's Play by ManlyBadassHero instead. A lot of Let's Players can get a bit loud and overexcited, so I'm enjoying Manly's style; he's engaged with the game and reacting to things, but he's also relaxed and soft-spoken. (This works extremely well when he's reading Keiji's lines.)

Frustratingly, the game is episodic and as yet unfinished, but there's a solid amount out already. It's remarkably high-quality for a game that was released for free and translated unofficially!



Poor Joe. He was a good kid. I like that, given the options 'you die, everyone else survives to continue the killing game' or 'you and your friend survive and escape, everyone else dies', he aimed for the option that meant he could live rather than going for self-sacrifice, but he took the trouble to tell everyone that he didn't harbour any bitterness towards them when they scuppered that plan. He didn't want to die, but he didn't want people to be haunted by his death either.

(I also enjoyed how extremely fucked up his execution was. Poor Sara, given a button and told 'if you press it fast enough, it'll slow down; maaaaaaybe it'll stop?' I love that she's still desperately pressing it long after he's died.)

And then Sara starts being haunted by horrible hallucinations of Joe! I'm so in favour of this.

Riona: FUTURESOON WHY WOULD YOU GET ME INTO ANOTHER DEATH GAME
futuresoon: ahahaha YOU WERE EXACTLY WHO I WAS HOPING TO GET INTO IT. "the protagonist having hallucinations of her horribly-murdered best friend is an actual game mechanic," i thought, "riona absolutely needs to see this." but i didn't want to spoil.

Sou's backstory is really interesting! He's such a survive-at-all-costs lying little shit because he learnt that this killing game's been simulated countless times with AIs, and he never survived the simulations, and he desperately concluded, 'Well, if I have a 0% chance of survival, I'm going to have to make myself into someone else who maybe can survive.' (Are we the real people this time, or is there a chance this is just another AI simulation?) I also love that, despite his efforts to pretend otherwise, he genuinely cares about Kanna.



I'm shipping Keiji/Sara and it's going to bring the fandom police down on my head (Sara is seventeen; Keiji's age is unspecified, but he's definitely over twenty; parts of Tumblr are convinced that so much as thinking about these two fictional characters kissing is an Actual Crime). I just really enjoy the ambiguity of Keiji. Is he actually flirting, or is he just playing around? Is he untrustworthy, or is he the most trustworthy person here? He's so cagey (no pun intended) about his past and his motivations. He's probably my favourite character, and his interactions with Sara are really interesting. Maybe I should write slightly unsettling Keiji/Sara-tinged fanfiction.

My favourite response I've seen to anti-Keiji/Sara sentiment: 'oh no, someone call the poli... oh wait.' Keiji is a police detective.

There's a character in this game who's mockingly addressed at one point as 'Cubetaro Hamburger', and his real name (Q-taro Burgerberg) is genuinely sillier than that.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Well, chapter 2 part 1 is done and dusted! This was written stream of conscious style during the chapter (and consequently may seem to contradict itself), but I’ve also added some stuff occasionally to prior theories. Much longer than chapter 1, huh? Also, sorry, still can’t respond to your main post due to not being at part 2 yet.

SPOILERS ABOUND (also please don’t spoil me for chapter 2 part 2, ty)

I told you I’d also play through chapter 1 to get a hang of the controls. This means I’ve been able to have somewhat of a retrospective look at chapter one, and in doing so, I have clearly found the funniest line of the first chapter:

Gin [to Sou]: “Just make up some lie, meow! You’re honest to a fault, woof!”
Yup, that Sou. HONEST TO A FAULT.

So the intro scene with Kai was fairly enlightening. So Kai works for Sara’s father, and seems to have been appointed as something along the lines of a bodyguard but from the shadows? Hence, why Sara sees him as her stalker: he’s not done a very sleuthy job of following her around. Of course, this beggars lots of questions about Sara’s family, and why this is necessary. Interestingly, it also reminds me of the kidnapping scene in chapter 1: Sara’s father is absolutely nowhere to be found, but I noticed on my playing it that when Sara gets yanked into the room for the First Trial, there are three hands. So even if you count Kai as being involved on this part (and that’s not a given as we clearly run into him on the street), there’s someone else, too. Possibly Sara’s father is involved…? (Later edit: Or is this part of the running plan – knock her out and run! Although, er, it obviously went wrong if that’s the case. Or Kai wasn’t involved at all in the knockout – I can’t remember whether Sara inferred the one who knocked her out was her stalker, or stated that she actually recognised him as her stalker and therefore it was Kai.)

Attractions: I took along people I liked, with an extra side of who I thought might not pick up other clear chips as others might find them less useful. So, I like Keiji and Gin for example, but if both were options, I’d typically go for Gin as I figured less people will be willing to partner the kid as they’d think they’re gonna have to carry him. Other times if I thought somebody seemed particularly suited for an attraction, I’d team with them.

Tokens: This was so hard. That chapter intro with Gin made me super wary of the effects of tokens, especially since the kid is literally handing them out like candy but won’t take anything in return. Then I thought it might actually be a double bluff, and anybody who isn’t trusted by not having traded away any tokens might be in trouble too. So I took some and I felt terrible, because I JUST WANT TO TRADE, Gin. No freebies! Also, it occurs to me that I don’t necessarily have control of my own tokens. I don’t remember how the rules were phrased, but say if I swapped 20 tokens with Kanna, and 20 with Sou, could Kanna then use my own tokens as currency and trade them to Sou instead of her own…? (I use Kanna and Sou as the example as they’re the two who explicitly work together, even if Kanna may be doing it in a spy capacity currently.)

-timydamonkey (with more posts incoming)

[(Anonymous)]

Here is where I ended up with tokens: Keiji 20, Q-taro 10, Reko 50 (0), Gin 30, Nao 30.
And with hallucinations: 70 (down to 0 in medical room)
I don’t see what the text is getting at here. Is it a mistranslation or did I miss an oddity? Can’t be the ‘big sis Sara’ because he literally calls her that all the time.
Sara: “But it’s only a one-time payment. I’ll play with you for free next time, Gin.”
Gin: “Gotcha, woof! I’ll play using big sis Sara, meooow!”
Sara: (Did he misspeak, or…? Oh well.)

There’s been lots of Gin this chapter. This makes me more nervous that he’s a goner. And deeefinitely don’t forget that chapter intro. (Although, we didn’t get loads of some of the characters who died in chapter 1, too…)

Mishima on the monitor: Maybe Nao? She’d determined to move forward and not keep speaking to him, but maybe she was tempted? And I typed this before her pretty sus reaction. Also, Keiji is pretty sus too. EVERYONE IS SUSPECT ALL AROUND.
Let’s return to: NEVER LOOKING AT ANYTHING IN MY ROOM TO AVOID TRIGGERING ANY MORE HALLUCINATIONS.

REKO, YOU KNOW I CAN’T ACCEPT ANYBODY PUSHING BUTTONS UNLESS I CAN SAVE MY GAME THE SECOND BEFORE. Also, the problem with this room of lies is that if Reko and I get 3 chips each, then when we get 10 clear chips, we effectively have to back out of doing other attractions and if she is doing similar to me and helping along people like Gin, Kanna, Nao who otherwise might not get paired, then there is a problem that they might never get enough chips. Especially if we can’t give away chips: if Sara could earn, say, fifteen, then give five away, that’d be awesome, but it seems way too easy and I’m sure that this set-up has been designed to murder more people rather than cheerful cooperativeness saving the day. Also, I’m concerned that this “final attraction” will also close all the other attractions, even though gameplay-wise that wouldn’t work as pretty much everyone would be dead. (Room of Lies, the gloves, the bang… if Reko has been replaced by a doll I will be very unhappy. Since we are in a world where some dolls can talk.) (Later edit: Okay, I am really, really proud of myself on this one.)

-timydamonkey

[(Anonymous)]

Y’know, I kind of respect Kanna’s line of reasoning: Yeah, in the Main Game Sou was terrifying, but he undeniably did lead various lines of discussion and if he hadn’t then it could have gone very badly wrong. And Sou, for all that he isn’t a thoroughly pleasant person, is smart. To use the Town of Salem example, he’s the guy who knows the tricks and how to play strategically, even if it doesn’t win him any friends. (I don’t believe his amnesia, though. I think he knew he’d blew it as far as trust was concerned and that was the nearest he could do to a reset so that he doesn’t immediately become the easiest to kill – he can’t play jester every Main Game.) (Later edit: Score!)

A lot of people want to talk with me about Reko (prizes! Suspect!), but I’m going to cheerfully ignore them as I think Sara would assume she knew the reason because of the discoveries, and would want to focus on other leads. That’s not to say that she doesn’t disagree that she’s acting oddly, though.

We’re pretty stuck on this Kai’s parents theory, though I really don’t feel it suggests that at all – what it suggests is simply the organisation link. Also, Keiji does not look too happy that we entrusted the laptop to Q-taro rather than him. (Also, Q-taro, don’t tell us where you’re going to hide it…!)

”Kanna… just can’t see Alice as a bad person…” KANNA, HE IS A LITERAL MURDERER. Also, not that she knows, but Alice has plenty of motive in regards to Sou given the discussion he had with Keiji. Although, maybe Alice just wants some of Sou’s tokens, since I’m pretty sure that’s whose Keiji and him were discussing getting in the monitor room yesterday.

Medical office ghost: -walks in- -sees the window- NOPE. –walks out- -game won’t progress- …My poor hallucination percentage… I mean, it clearly isn’t one given that Alice knew about it, but memories seem bad right now.

Theory: The first smashed monitor is Sou’s. We know there’s something fishy with Sou in relation to Alice’s past, and the screens are for buying personal information on the others. Who would most need to protect that personal information? Sou. And he’s the one to have the opportunity to smash the screen. (Although, Keiji is also very tight-lipped on his past…)

-timydamonkey

[(Anonymous)]

Interesting things from chatting to AI Reko: Reko said earlier that she treasured her bongos, AI Reko doesn’t have a clue what she’s talking about. (Later edit: Their memories are updated every six months, so I suppose the other scenario rather than it being a lie is that something changed in the six months since it was programmed in, since we don’t know when they were last updated.) She values her family, and her own life. Also, she can’t answer questions about the Death Game, however there’s a suggestion that there may be something in common.

The video of Keiji and the woman: hm, I’m very glad I spoke to him beforehand rather than taking Gin’s tokens (GIN, YOU WON’T TRADE, I DON’T WANT YOU TO END UP WITH NOTHING. Maybe we should just tell him we’re Pokemon card trading instead.) because it makes that play off just slightly better: they are obviously acquainted. Although he’s certainly more callous there, not to mention the situation is more suspect, rather than just shooting them on the job for example.

Things I don’t like: NOT BEING ABLE TO SAVE. Oh dear, this does not look good.

Options I would take if I were braver: “Q-taro, are you… trying to buy a soda?!” And now we can always ask, remember that time when Q-taro as good as murdered us? (Also, geez, he’s been doing some good trades if he has 200 tokens, but still has 40 of his own. I just assumed he’d been told that, say, keeping hold of any of your own tokens meant death. I am totally smart.) The answer is clearly NEVER TRUST Q-TARO.

-timydamonkey

[(Anonymous)]

Incidentally, this makes me realise that somebody should write a Death Game AU of the Bunker Diary. Seriously, it’s like three quarters of the way there already. There’s definitely attempted killings and death traps for the trapped characters along with the other general mindfuckery, and really where everything goes wrong is when they break the kidnapper’s rules. As we all in this genre know, you gotta follow the rules. (This is why you saw that newspaper article about how it was relentless misery, by the way. The writer clearly is not a fan of Death Game set ups. Also, no happy endings.)

The notes: now this explains something I wondered earlier. I thought it was a bit suspicious that in the Main Game last chapter, Sara and Q-taro’s occupations were incorrectly listed due to the paper switchup, but Keiji’s still appeared to be accurate. That becoming ex-detective works nicely for me: he wasn’t totally lying, but it’s not just coincidence that it lined up correctly. Also, after the discussion that Alice and Keiji had about Alice’s murder, it is extremely interesting that Sou is not listed there. Neither are Kai and Joe – is it because neither were intended to be here but tried to rescue Sara? And, so far as I can see, Nao also isn’t listed (unless she is the most surprising boxer ever). Very curious, unless we’re missing a page. (I typed this up while holding the screenshot on the 4 pages, so it wasn’t clear this would all be brought up.) And if we are missing a page, it seems like they’ll all be 0.0%ers assuming this is some sort of vote because of how it’d total up. (A vote of who will survive/win?)

The difference between the 2 ending sequences to chapter 2 part 1 is… very interesting. This game creator is giving themselves a lot of work to pull this off.

I was going to keep on writing until the end of chapter 2, but realised how long this is, so mid chapter split it is!

-timydamonkey

[rionaleonhart]

yessssss, I was so pleased to wake up to this

Gin is so cute in the token trading section. He just wants to buy your time!

Gin: “Gotcha, woof! I’ll play using big sis Sara, meooow!”
Sara: (Did he misspeak, or…? Oh well.)

I think it's just that 'play using big sis Sara', as opposed to 'play with big sis Sara', is odd phrasing.

Also, Keiji is pretty sus too.

I love that Keiji is just as suspicious as possible at all times, while also being weirdly kind and supportive. He's so good.

We’re pretty stuck on this Kai’s parents theory, though I really don’t feel it suggests that at all – what it suggests is simply the organisation link.

graveexcitement and I also couldn't really see where the 'Kai's parents' theory came from; maybe something was lost in translation?

Maybe we should just tell him we’re Pokemon card trading instead.

Ha, yes!

It's great to see your experiences with this game. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the rest of chapter two!