WMG / Your Turn to Die

Sara's father is a doll

More specifically, the version of Sara's father that appears in the Flash Forward at the end of chapter 2 is a doll with an AI in it, much like the Fake Reko but with his personality edited to be accepting of the games. After all, Kai being sent to infiltrate Sara's family to monitor her doesn't make sense if Sara's father is involved in the Death Game himself, and Sara's father while talking with Kai clearly cares a lot about his daughter. Alternatively, Sara's father as shown in the flashback is the doll while Sara's real father is one of the masterminds of the games and had it planned from the beginning, raising her for the role with the doll. Sara's father, being programmed to care about his daughter, would also, of course, refuse to monitor her for a sketchy organization, thus necessitating Kai. This would also tie into Gashu's final statement towards the players, for them to "question their upbringing".

Sara is a doll all along

At least, the Sara we play as. The Memoriam mentions a 17-year-old girl who is remarkably like Sara but she died in the third and final trial (perhaps suicide after the deaths of everyone she loved in the previous two trials). That may have very well been the real Sara who died, and the Sara we play is her copy. However, unlike other dolls before like the Fake Reko, this Sara, who we play as, is a more "perfected" version of a doll that is more like an Artificial Human which can explain why she can bleed while dolls like Fake Reko and Ranger cannot. The point of the Death Game was to ensure that this Sara would survive as she would take place at the top of the underground organization.

There are two or more Saras, and the "real" Sara may be another doll.

She could be an advanced doll capable of bleeding as the above WMG suggests. It's possible though that an AI Sara already proved herself to her creators and was promoted to the leader of their organization, and this Sara left a "clean copy" without any of her experiences to act as her personal data in Chapter 2 for the current participants. This also explains the Sara lookalike seen in the endings of Your Turn to Shine.

All the trial participants are dolls.

Taking the above guess a step further... Perhaps all the characters are dolls that are programmed to believe that they're the originals(like the fake Reko). The game statistics aren't based on simulations; there's been several previous iterations of the death game played out with similar sets of dolls. The death game may be some sort of ethics test in order to see if AI can share the morality of a human being.

• Partially jossed for several participants because doll's can't bleed. Joe is drained of his blood, Kai's suicide involves blood, Alice can be seen bleeding, Reko bleeds when stabbed (Rio Ranger comments at this point that the fakes can't bleed), Nao bleeds when crushed, and Sou is seen bleeding from his head. There are also several game overs which aren't mentioned, because the game overs may not be canon, that feature blood. A majority of the rest have game overs featuring blood. 1 or more of the remaining participants may be dolls but not all.

This is just another simulation.

The Memoriam and Sara's visions are just leftover data from previous tests and these versions of the participants have also been given false memories of life before being captured. This would also explain the cave-in demolishing the emergency exit in Chapter 2. The world simply doesn't exist beyond that point.

The name of the group that created the Death Game is a Significant Anagram.

While this only works in English, Asunaro can be rearranged to form Sara, Nuo, which means "to promise Sara" in Chinese. This could in turn suggest the whole Death Game is being conducted by (a version of) Sara or for her, somehow.

There are two Saras...

The real one who we play in the Prologue, and a 'nearly perfect' Doll who was entered into the game in her place, thanks to her father making a deal with the organization to try and save her. Sara herself is naturally unaware of this... at least our Sara isn't.

• While this isn't a point for or against it, there is a moment at the beginning of chapter 2 where Sara is bleeding after breaking a mirror while beset by hallucinations. While this would normally be a point against her being a doll, it's important to note the whole sequence is a nightmare, and we do not definitively see her bleed as of yet, leaving the possibility of being a doll open.
  • Sara does actually bleed in some of the Game Overs for failing an attraction, so unless she's a more advanced make of doll that can bleed (as suggested by an above entry) it seems unlikely that she could be a doll.

The final choice with be a Sadistic Choice between Sara, Gin, and Keiji

This was inspired from what I noticed in the Memoriam where the girl who looks like Sara not only had her best friend (who parallels Joe) die but she also lost two others who were close to her - a boy who was much younger than her, and a man who had views like her. This sounds a lot like Gin and Keiji, and the screenshot that showed during that moment definitely had a figure that looked like Keiji dying on the left. However, as neither Keiji or Gin die in the second trial, perhaps the third one will involve them with Sara having to choose one to survive, or, alternately, choosing to nominate herself for death while saving them both.

Miley is the traitor within the kidnappers' organization who Keiji speculates about.

First off, he briefly says something the first time he brings up the theory, implying he might suspect it's her, and there's no way in hell Keiji doesn't know more than he's letting on, constantly subtly goading Sara into reaching the correct conclusions throughout their interactions.

Onto Miley herself, though. Sure, she plays the part of a complete reveling sadist, but her "smiling doll" moniker has already been shown to be some degree of a thematically-enforced "Smiling Doll" theme. Even if it does turn out that she's cruel, however, she has clearly acted in ways against the interests of the game. She told Shin Tsukimi about exactly why he was guaranteed to die, as a result giving him a chance to survive. When speaking to an unseen party on the first floor, she claims that Gashu is going to destroy the Main Game, a fact which couldn't be further from the truth - he's literally loyal enough to its completion unimpeded to cheat and die for it.

She then leaked the victory statistics to Sara, something Gashu was extremely displeased to find out she'd done. Lastly, the Hope Spot throughout 2-2's Main Game was started by her suddenly overriding the screen to tell them Gashu had cheated and interfered with the game in some way. Hell, even when this failed, he shot himself, as a result depriving the kidnappers of one of their implicitly most important members.

• It's possible that Sou learning of the game statistics really was part of his trial, though. The result of him learning that he was most likely to die in the game was to make him hostile and suspicious of everyone, which impeded his ability to work with the group. Sue Miley may have given Sou a "chance" to survive the game, but Chapter 2-2 established pretty clearly that if Sou had been working with the group from the start then the entire group would have had a much better chance at surviving thanks to his hacker skills, meaning that Sue Miley telling Sou about the statistics played into the cruel irony of the game as well as anything else she's done.
• As for the rest of it, Gashu also may have been loyal to the game's completion, but he did break the rules—rigging a card trade to make it almost guaranteed that Nao will die instead of Kanna. Since the game creators' motives aren't revealed yet (the fact that Kai calls the game a "mission" for them probably means that the rules really are important enough to justify Sue Miley stopping the game) that may well have been a violation worth interrupting the game for. Likewise giving Sara the statistics may have been displeasing to Gashu because it meant they would be able to use it to figure out his rule violation, not because it was actually bad for the game.

There will be a Sadistic Choice involving Gin, Q-Tarou and/or Keiji... and fire.

• Gin's surname, Ibushi, is written with the kanji for 'Boiled rice' and 'Cover'; while different kanji are used, it also sounds like the Japanese verb for 'Fumigation' — burning out with smoke. (The same verb can also mean 'Torment', for extra fun symbolism.)
• Q-Tarou's full name is a pun on not just hamburgers, but BBQ.
• Keiji's surname, Shinogi, is 'Bamboo grass' and 'Tree/Wood'. It also happens to sound like the Han character for 'stove' or 'bright'... and as noted above, Chapter 2-2 suggests some troubling parallels with the past.

In all likelihood, somebody here is going to burn. And lucky us, we're probably going to get to choose who.

• Confirmed as of Chapter 3 Part 1 (Section A)... Kind of. The section ends off with Keiji forced into a coffin that can cremate instantly.
  • Fully confirmed as of Chapter 3 Part 1 (Section 2): Keiji manages to get out of the coffin, but Q-taro takes his place as part of a Thanatos Gambit. Thankfully Sara is spared the Sadistic Choice in this case.

Ranmaru is actually Ryoko.

Whether it be as a doll or an actual human, Ranmaru seems to grow attached to Sara rather fast during Chapter 3 Part 1 (Section A). It's established that the Dummies have to kill their living partner before the time limit, else they die instead. And yet, if you go through the route with Sou alive, the section where the real Sou Hiyori begins a deadly game of tag by making Sara the target has Ranmaru taking on the role of "it" so Sara doesn't have to shoulder the burden. He makes a near-immediate choice to risk his own life for a partner he's meant to kill to survive. What if that's because Ranmaru already has a connection to Sara? What if Ranmaru is really Ryoko, one of Sara's best friends from her high school? Maybe either the Ryoko Sara knows was just an alias, or Ryoko took the place of the real Ranmaru for reasons unknown.

• Jossed. They're two completely different people with no connection to one another.

Mai is the Asunaro traitor.

Unlike the other dolls, she's still missing the clothes (specifically the gloves) that Ranger stole from her corpse (they can be seen in the Victim Video). In addition, her girly food-themed getup greatly resembles that of Miley and Maple. It's been established that only the human Floor Masters wear dessert-themed clothes - Miley is chocolate, Safalin is melon soda, and Gashu is tiramisu.

• Adding onto this, she's the only doll still capable of blushing (something that requires blood to do) and Q-taro is able to knock her unconscious despite another doll (Ranger) remaining conscious even after getting shot in the head.
  • Counter-point: going by that logic dolls shouldn't be able to sweat, either, and yet several of the other dummies (Hayasaka, Anzu, Ranmaru) can—even accompanied by changing complexion in shock for the latter's case, which wouldn't even be possible if they were all artificial. It seems more likely to be a program that allows them to blush (or just artistic license).
  • Yes, but blushing is specific to Mai. Ranmaru didn't blush when Sara held his hand. None of the other dolls have blushing sprites.
• Jossed, it's is confirmed Hinako. The Hinako that has been with us is really a human pretending to be the Hinako that died in the victim video. She was working alongside Midori for/during the Banquet until she died.

The Death Game is the beginning of an Assimilation Plot.

With advanced AI's that are nearly flawless imitations of people, combined with robot bodies that are also almost perfectly replicas, the real purpose of the Death Game may be a way of perfecting these duplicates to the point that the ones running the game can Kill and Replace whomever they want with a Doll.

The true mastermind is Meister, the man in the painting from the Russian Roulette room in Chapter 1.

Arguments:

• His name refers to him being a "master" of the room, but may have a bigger significance.
• In Chapter 3, when picking a name for Sou/Midori, if you try using the name "Meister", he will frown and tell you succintly to "pick another name". This is an unique reaction, implying that Meister has some kind of a bigger significance.
• It would be suitably dramatic for the Big Bad to turn out to have been a seemingly insignificant Chekhov's Gunman.
  • He's also wearing the same suit as the man in the painting (a.k.a the winner of the first Death Game) in Gashu's room.
• As of Chapter 3, Part 1-B, this theory is partially confirmed: Meister is the man who runs the Banquet game, although it's not clear how high his position is in the organization.

Joe is in on the Death Game.

Arguments:

• His first appearance has him suddenly pop up and ask Sara about what she is doing. Totally not suspicious.
• When he makes a phone call, we don't hear it. It could be that he contacted ASUNARO to tell them that Sara has blundered into their trap.
• He had at least one conversation with Kai, who was involved in the Death Game and had been "stalking" Sara.
• There was also this image of Kanna in her childhood that features a boy who looks a lot like Joe. Remember that Kanna is an orphan from a certain orphanage funded by ASUNARO, and Q-Taro also came from that same orphanage. This could explain how he was able to know of the two (along with Kugie) and get them into the game.
  • Jossed. Chapter 3-1B shows that Joe is a victim like anyone else, brought in to hinder Sara (much like how Nao was brought in with Mishima). In fact, Midori reveals this when he's trying to get Sara to become more cruel and self serving, if Joe was truly in on the game, he would have revealed her best friend's role in it to shatter any remaining bonds she had left.

The mastermind of the Death Game is Gin.

Arguments:

• Gin's neck is always conveniently hidden in sprites, official art, and even Nankidai's artwork on twitter. His collar has never been seen, so it's possible that he's not wearing one.
• In Chapter 2, depending on whom Sara chooses to spend time with, Gin may say that "I'm gonna play using Big Sis Sara!" Following this, Sara thinks to herself, "Did he misspeak?" That line of Gin must be important.
• The game has been quite insistent on making you trust Gin. For example, when Ranmaru reveals that there is a traitor in the Discussion Room, Sara thinks of suspicious figures... excluding Gin. Setting you up for betrayal, perhaps?
• Several Game Overs in Chapter 2 involve Gin's death. Gashu is willing to kill himself for ASUNARO, so it wouldn't be surprising for Gin to do the same.
• Determined from Gin's birthday (March 13), age (12), and grade (6th), the events of the Death Game take place between March 13 and early April, before Gin would enter his first year of middle school... yet he makes absolutely no indication that he was about to graduate from elementary. Perhaps Gin wasn't planning on going to middle school, instead fully intending to give his own life to ensure that ASUNARO's machinations ran smoothly?
• Gin remarks that Keiji "smells like a lady-killer" long before the truth about Megumi is revealed. Was Gin referring to Keiji's flirty nature, or does he somehow know things that he shouldn't? After all, Midori, who is a Floor Master and thus explicitly in on the Death Game, also calls Keiji a lady-killer should you try to name him after Keiji...
• At the end of Chapter 1, Joe says, "I just can't see any of you as bad guys. Even Sou and Alice...must be good people, really..." Sou and Alice both respond to this with "..." but they're not the only ones. Gin also responds with an ellipsis, and for no apparent reason—unless he really is a "bad guy" and should've been included in Joe's list.
• After Alice's true identity is revealed, in Chapter 2 Gin once refers to him as "the girly murderer". The small problem is that Alice is hinted in Your Time to Shine to be a trans man. Best case scenario, Gin was being Innocently Insensitive. Worst case scenario, we've got a Politically Incorrect Villain on our hands.
  • According to vgperson's translation notes, in the Japanese text the character in question usually uses the typically masculine personal pronoun 'ore' but when he is nervous he switches to the feminine 'atashi' and uses very feminine language in general. So that is most likely why Gin called him girly.
  • Or could Gin be referring to Alice leaving Hinako to die during the first trial, therefore actually making him a girly murderer
• What's the deal with Mew-chan? When Gin converses with it, is it just a child playing with a toy, or is he really communicating with it somehow? Mew-chan is also said to be much heavier than it looks, so maybe it's concealing something within it. Perhaps Mishima's missing head?
• Gin is a 12-year old elementary schooler who nicknames practically everyone, has a childish Verbal Tic, and is quick to offer comfort towards others. That sounds like the perfect recipe to be Beneath Suspicion.

Your Time To Shine takes place in Alice/Sou "logic" route

• The ending for if Everyone Lives has the simulation being shut down by the orders of someone looking like Sara. Considering her stern behavior and willingness to kill the virtual selves by shutting down the simulation, it's clear that this Sara has prioritised the "logical" options of disregarding "fake" and "worthless" lives in favor of "real" and "usable" ones.

Everyone who has an animal motif in their character is likely related to Sara's background

• Gin (dog/cat), Joe (dog), Gashu (crab).

The Man in the Memorandum is the original Shin Tsukimi

• Going with the theory that this is all a simulation, the Man in the Memorandum is basically trying to recreate the original Death Game and see if there was ever a way to save the high school girl he admired and possibly even loved. This plays into two victory chances, namely that of Sara and Shin. The girl was charismatic and is still clearly well thought of by the Man in the Memorandum, so he may have unconsciously tipped things slightly in Sara's favor (only slightly; a 15.5% chance of victory is still an 84.5% chance of failure after all). Conversely, the Man in the Memorandum hates himself for his failure to save the girl, and as a result, Shin gets a 0.0% chance of success and also has a rather unpleasant personality, reflecting the Man in the Memorandum's self-loathing and desire for the girl to succeed, even at the cost of his own life.

The Man from the Memorandum and the Girl from the Memorandum are respectively Jin Mutou and Touko Rikuno

• The CGs of the original Death Game depict the Man wearing what appears to be a hoodie - similar to the same hoodie that Jin wears in Your Time to Shine. The Girl is shown to be wearing a jacket and a ribbon; Touko has a similar ribbon, wears a similar jacket around her waist and is only a few years older than the Girl: assuming that Touko was indeed 17 at the time she died, then her Age Lift in the simulation could be Jin subconsciously giving her the future that he felt as though she "deserved" - Jin's own middle-aged appearance can be excused by the years he lived after the initial Death Game.
• Jin also has an initial low opinion of Touko, calling her a "cheeky rich girl", yet ultimately feels guilty about leaving her behind and attempts to escape the island with her in tow. The Man was similarly confused when the Girl was chosen for Russian Roulette, yet developed an almost suicidal devotion and admiration towards her afterwards, to the point that he was left in an everlasting state of grief upon her death.

Keiji's childhood idol is Joe's father

• Building off of this, Joe is involved with the Death Game because he's trying to look into his father's death.
  • When Keiji introduces himself as a cop, it's enough to make Joe initially regret distrusting him, yet later that same chapter, he expresses uncertainty about the veracity of this story, as if he'd come to learn about or think about something that hadn't occurred to him in the moment.
  • When Gin says he hates his stepfather, Joe reacts to his words, but doesn't comment on them, and simply invites him to play when they get out.
  • Small detail, but in Chapter 3 Part 1 Section B, Mr. Policeman refers to his soon-to-be-born child as a "he", meaning it could be Joe, since he is male.
  • Also related to this theory, VGperson's translation notes mention how, when speaking of his unborn son, Mr. Policeman described wanting his child to have a "jou ni atsui," or 'passionate name.' The implication of the word choice is strong in the original text.
  • The file name for the overworld sprite of Mr. Policeman's hallucination is outright called "gennei-taduna.png" - Joe's surname in the Nihon-Shiki system.

Emiri Harai (aka Sue Miley)'s love interest was Gashu

• In Kai's letter to Sara, he mentions how his father, Gashu, was driven mad by the organization. In the file on Michiru Namida and Emiri Harai, aka Tia Safalin and Sue Miley respectively, the file states that the best way to extract Harai would be to drive the target of her affections mad. Therefore, it is likely that the target of Harai's affections was Gashu Satou.

• This is unlikely; the reason Asunaro wanted to extract Emiri in the first place was because she fit Gashu's recruitment criteria.

The final chapter will have at least one Gainax Ending

• Most likely, it will happen on the Sou/Shin route, and will probably involve making a choice that seems illogical, or will be effectively a Rewatch Bonus, as it will require jumping on a twist early, before anyone could telegraph it on the first playthrough. The other possibility is that it may require somehow abstaining from a vote in the Main Game and throwing the entire Death Game off the rails.

Sara will die in at least one ending of Chapter 3-2

• More specifically, on the Kanna/Emotion route. Sara's Character Development on that route has been around her steadily putting the group's needs ahead of her own, a far cry from her simulation self who was willing to throw everyone under the bus to save her own hide. The logical conclusion of said character development would most likely be a Heroic Sacrifice to save the others from certain death.

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