Characters / NEO: The World Ends with You

This is a dossier for the characters from Square Enix's NEO: The World Ends with You. Per the wiki's spoiler policies all trope names will be visible and there will be plenty of unmarked spoilers. Read at your own risk. Welcome to their game!

For characters that appear in the first game, The World Ends with You, see here.

For Neku as he is portrayed in the first game, see here. For other returning Players as they are portrayed in the first game, see here.

For Minamimoto and the Shibuya Reapers, Uzuki, Kariya, and Coco, as they are portrayed in the first game, see here.

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Players

The Wicked Twisters

In General

A team of players in the new Reaper's Game and the protagonists in the game.

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• Badass Crew: Throughout the course of the Reaper’s Game, they’ve taken on countless foes and come out on top, including hundreds of Noise, multiple Player teams, several powerful Reapers, the illustrious Game Master, and even the embodiment of all Dissonance Noise.
• Dead All Along: Inverted. One of the big twists of Week 2 is that Rindo, Fret, Nagi, and Beat are all actually Alive All Along, having been drawn directly into the Reaper's Game from the real world.
• Floral Theme Naming: The team continues the tradition of the protagonists having names relating to flowers. Rindo's first name is from the Gentiana flower, Fret's first name has the kanji for Peach in it, Nagi's first name refers to the Asian Bayberry, Shoka's first name means Hydrangea flower and her last name can be read as "the sound of cherry blossoms" as an intentional throwback to Neku's last name, and like in the last game, Beat's last name has the kanji for "wisteria" and Neku's last name means "cherry garden". Minamimoto is the Odd Name Out since his Theme Naming is based in cardinal directions for the last game's Game Masters and foreshadows that he isn't really part of the team in the main game unlike everyone else who joins Rindo and Fret.
• Musical Theme Naming: Beat and Fret's nicknames are based on musical terms, Rindo's last name means "playing an instrument", Nagi's last name means "flute player", and Shoka and Neku both have the kanji for "sound" in their first names.
• Naïve Newcomer:
  • Played With. Rindo, Fret and Nagi are understandably new to the Reaper's Game and the UG of Shibuya, only having recently died and being unaware of concepts that other teams are more accustomed and experienced with by the time they start playing the game, such as not even knowing that the Reaper's game is a life-or-Death situation until the end of Week 1. Sho, however, is fully aware of how things work, even if the specifics rules of the current Reaper's Game throw him for a loop at first, such as finding out that Pins no longer need to be wielded by somebody who's compatible with them to use their powers, and as such the team is dependent on his instructions to stand a chance at combating the other teams and avoiding coming in last place. Beat, Shoka and Neku are also similarly aware of how the game works and how to fight much better than Rindo and co, who have to learn as they go.
  • This was actually somewhat Invoked by Kubo, who gave the Time Travel pin to Rindo as he needed somebody to use it's powers to rewind time in order to build up dissonance noise from the erased timelines, hence an experienced player who knew what they were doing wouldn't need to use the pin as much as a newcomer like Rindo would in order to stay on top and avoid disastrous outcomes for their team.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Let's take the roll here. This team consists of: A leader whose defining trait is being indecisive; his Sad Clown best friend; a nerdy college girl who practically defies any kind of categorization; an aloof psychopath; a veteran Idiot Hero who borders on Dumb Muscle; a bitingly sarcastic former Reaper; and a Living Legend. They're an unorthodox bunch, to say the least.
• Stronger Than You Look: The team is new and inexperienced, but despite that, still manage to hold their own against the various competing teams and clash head-on with the Ruinbringers several times, when they've otherwise completely demolished any other team that faces them. This is in part due to Sho's strength and experience as an Ex-Reaper, but of the full team line-up, four of them are alive - with the previous game making it clear that living players are naturally stronger than deceased players - two are defecting Reapers, with all the combat skills that come with it, and one is Neku.
• Took a Level in Badass:
  • Rindo and the others start out barely surviving the first week with Sho's aid, and even still, required outside intervention in order for all of them to survive fighting Susukichi when he didn't even resort to using his full Noise form. By the middle of the second week, with Beat's aid they've become The Dreaded to the other teams for their abnormal strength in combat and being able to face off and fight against the Ruinbringer's members without losing, when the Ruinbringers have been otherwise unbeatable against any other team. By the final week, with the addition of Shoka and Neku to their lineup, they become strong enough to erase Shiba in direct combat and even take on Phoenix Cantus once it's been forced into a form they can actually combat.
  • In Beat and Neku's case, however, it's more akin to them having lost their edge due to circumstances and being absent from the Reaper's Game for 3 years, requiring them to 'get their groove back'- and they're both still noticeably more powerful and competent than Rindo and the others when they join. Neku in particular seems to have honed his skills whilst he was in Shinjuku's UG, though the particular rules of the ongoing Reapers Game in Shibuya actually limit his full offensive potential due to only being able to use one Pin at a time now.
• Trademark Favorite Food: According to the director of NEO regarding the cast's food preferences:
  • Rindo prefers lightly seasoned food.
  • Fret prefers his food to be a little out of the ordinary.
  • Nagi is intended to be a Big Eater.
  • Minamimoto is an intellectual with a penchant for science and mathematics, he likes sweet things to keep his brain active. Also, he seems to love the taste of fruit, cream, and berries.
  • Shoka prefers spicy food.
• True Companions: They all gradually become this throughout the course of the game, with each and every one of them (except for Sho) being willing to lay down their lives for one another.
• Weak, but Skilled: Unlike Neku, none of them, not even Rindo, can use more than one pin at one time, though thanks to the rules of the current Reaper's game, none of them are restricted to a single Pin and attack style like Beat, Shiki and Joshua were in the last game, being able to swap pins and powers with each other without any issues and allowing a unified team with proper teamwork and coordination to fight akin to Neku's ability to mix and match multiple powers in combat in the last game. This also means that when Neku joins the team, the same freedom to use multiple powers actually restricts his full combat potential as he's now forced to use only one pin at a time, rather than being able to wield several of them at once.
• With a Friend and a Stranger: They start off as this; Rindo and Fret are classmates and buddies before the story begins, while Minamimoto's a mysterious individual who only joins them for his own purposes. Nagi also counts as the stranger, since she forms a genuine connection with the two while Minamimoto is being distant and leaves anyway.

Rindo

Rindo Kanade

Voiced by: Yūma Uchida (Japanese), Paul Castro Jr. (English)

Replayer

"Same vision as the one I had yesterday... Is this the future?"

One of the newest Players in the Reapers' Game, Rindo is a high schooler to whom searching for info on his phone is second nature. He prefers to go with the flow, and although he doesn't go out of his way to interact with others, he won't turn them away if they come to him first. Thrust into the Game without even realizing it, he now serves as the de facto leader of the Wicked Twisters.

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• Achilles' Heel: His Mental Time Travel powers only allow his future mind to inhabit his body at prior events during the day, not actually allowing him to physically travel back in time himself. Additionally, this is dependant on Rindo himself being able to remember the events he wants to jump back in time to. Accordingly, mental attacks that affect his state of mind, such as a Plague noise hitting Rindo with Laser-Guided Amnesia, severely handicap Rindo's time traveling utility as he cannot recall the future information to bring back to the past and alter his and his teammate's actions - in fact he initially can't even jump back in time in the first place because he cannot remember the day's events to create an 'anchor' point to leap back to. It's merely sheer luck that allows him to work around this, due to finding a receipt for a beverage he bought at a store that day, which is enough to jog his hazy memory to make an initial time leap and uncover further details about the day's events from his teammates.
• Acquainted in Real Life: He's friends with someone named "Swallow" he met through FanGO and the two regularly text one another, but the two have never met face to face.
• Affectionate Nickname: Fret refers to him as "Rindude". Swallow calls him "Rindragon", though that's most likely his online handle. Nagi refers to him as "Lord Rindo". On some occasions, Beat calls Rindo "Cap'n" and "Champ". Shoka calls him "Fearless Leader" when she joins the Wicked Twisters legitimately.
• Ambidextrous Sprite: Cleverly subverted; he has the Jupiter of the Monkey logo on his T-shirt, but when he's facing to the right, he's rarely seen below the shoulder on the sprites in which it is visible. The biggest exception is the restaurant and Threads menus, in which he is always facing right... and uses sprites not seen elsewhere in the game.
• Animal Motif:
  • Dragons. His first name can be translated as dragon. It’s the basis behind his online handle, Rindragon. Rindo also represents the dragon because he forms a Yin Yang dynamic with Shoka because she can be represented by the phoenix, which is the other half of Yin Yang. Their outfits contrast one another, with Shoka being dark haired and wearing predominantly black and purple and with Rindo being light haired and wearing predominantly white, black and orange but their outfits also have similarities such as having black and white. Shoka is rude and blunt as well as playful while Rindo is quiet and reserved as well as closed off. They both share a discomfort with connecting with others personally and are both indecisive. Different yet similar.
  • Cats. His long coat has both leopard spots and tiger stripes decorating them. It represents how Rindo not only has cunning and guile like a leopard but also potentially inner and physical strength, inner strength he gains throughout the story and physical strength from being a living Player, and as such stronger than dead Players. It can also represents how Rindo acts akin to a helpless kitten at the start of the game.
• Apocalypse Maiden: His time-reversal pin, unknown to him, builds up a massive amount of Dissonance over time, until it will eventually become the core of an Inversion that will erase Shibuya.
• Badass Adorable: He's just as cute as Neku was in the first game, and becomes a very formidable force throughout the game.
• Badass Longcoat: Wears a black knee-length, half-sleeved jacket with white accents and grows to become an incredibly powerful Player.
• Bait-and-Switch: Since his particular Psych is the Replay power, the visions of the future that Rindo receives throughout the week forewarning him of bad endings and unfortunate outcomes for his team must be because he's already used the pin before and is getting 'flashbacks' to the future, right? Wrong. That particular power is actually Tsugumi's psych, and Rindo's power only allows him to travel backwards in time, without any visions attached to it.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Is a normally mild-mannered and polite guy but push him far enough and he can become quite snippy and passive-aggressive.
• Birds of a Feather: With Shoka, as it turns out. Both were directionless in their lives and rarely made their own decisions, instead going along with whatever happened until they eventually found their own interests (Rindo with An0ther and Shoka with Gatto Nero), both of them have had to make difficult decisions that lead to them having to deal with the potential consequences of their choices (Shoka with leaving the Reapers to help the Wicked Twisters, fighting her former friends in the process and Rindo having to decide between his saving his friends and potentially dooming Shibuya if he fails) and both have self-confidence issues and doubts about themselves.
• Blunt "Yes": On Week 2, Day 2, he gets exasperated with Shoka, leading to the following exchange.
  Shoka: You telling me to get lost?
  Rindo: Yeah, I am.
• Character Development:
  • Rindo learns to be decisive and not be a bystander and just hope things go his way. On that same note, Rindo learns to become comfortable communicating with others in-person. He is no longer afraid of having to make active decisions in life rather than hiding behind his phone.
  • Rindo also learns to appreciate Shibuya, and by extension, the world around him, much like Neku did in the first game. Before then, he partially took the place for granted.
  • Rindo learns to cherish his friends. He realizes that they’re what make his life and his world feel special. Before then, he rarely took the time to get to know them. It isn’t until Week 3 Day 2 that Rindo starts trying to understand his friends when he realizes he needs to get Shoka mentally ready to Mercy Kill Ayano.
• Chick Magnet: Though not as much as his predecessor before him, Rindo does end up attracting the attention of a few female (and male) shopkeepers throughout the game, most notably the Cony x Cony, Shepherd House, and Tower Records shopkeepers. Then there’s his Ship Tease with Shoka.
• Classical Anti-Hero: Is constantly plagued by self-doubts and insecurity issues and a large part of his Character Development revolves around him having to get over his Fatal Flaw in order to help save the day.
• Combat Pragmatist: When it comes to using his Time Travel abilities, Rindo can be surprisingly crafty and cunning, often exploiting his enemies’ weak spots in order to turn the tide over to his side, such as when he splits the Deep River Society up by appealing to their desire to shirk their responsibilities in order to ensure that they won’t be able to group up and ambush him and his teammates.
• Contrasting Sequel Main Character: Contrasts Neku in many ways.
  • Unlike Neku, Rindo has no problems having at least one friend (Fret), and seems pretty close with his FanGO friend Swallow. While Neku actively tried to drive people away at first, Rindo at worst gets a bit snarky when frustrated with his friends, otherwise being a nice if shy guy. Also, unlike Neku, Rindo can't use more than one pin in battles. Though he and the others can change pins before battles, no one can use more than one in order to foster teamwork in the Reaper's Game. Unlike Neku, who was killed by Shibuya's Composer, Rindo is a living Player who got unknowingly forced into it by the Executor, who answers to Shinjuku's Composer.
  • His major issue also mirrors Neku's in many ways. Neku's problem was his misanthropy, as he often used his headphones to both block out the sounds of the city around him and keep strangers shut out of his life. Rindo, meanwhile, struggles with indecisiveness and making his voice heard, and thus copes with his inability to make meaningful change in his life by wearing his face mask and limiting his need to talk to other people. Tellingly, Rindo has no problems helping other people in side quests from the start. Put together, the pair of them make up 2/3 of the Monkey Morality Pose before their respective Character Development kicks in.
  • Neku was chosen by Shibuya's Composer because he had a "dense and all-inclusive Soul" and "high Imagination", thus allowing him to use every pin in the game and making him The Ace who could best win Joshua's bet with Kitaniji. Rindo was also chosen by the Composer, but was The Poorly Chosen One, someone who wasn't qualified to win the Reaper's Game, prompting Kubo to feel confident in giving him the Replay pin because he would rely on the Time Travel powers of the pin in order to make it through the game. Neku winning the Reaper's game was the entire focus of Joshua's decision on whether or not to destroy the city, Kubo admits that Rindo was, at best, his backup option if his plans with Shiba didn't work out to erase Shibuya.
• Cosmic Plaything: Just like Neku, he turns out to be literally be this as it’s revealed that everything he had gone through was the result of the Higher Plane (specifically Kubo, Hazuki, and Joshua) and their mechanizations for deciding the fate of Shibuya.
• Cool Mask: He wears a plain black mask to cover the lower bottom of his face.
• Crazy Jealous Guy: Downplayed but he becomes suspiciously curious when it comes to Shoka and her relationship with Kaie and is shown to be blushing after she confirms that they’re just friends.
• Crush Blush: Tends to get this around Shoka when she properly joins the party and the two of them begin to have more heartfelt moments together. This starts when Rindo asks Shoka what her relationship with Kaie is.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Rindo wears a black coat, but he's not a bad person. His power also turns out to be instrumental to destroying Shibuya - when he learns this, he immediately sets said power to defusing the Inversion he's unknowingly built up.
• Deadpan Snarker: Doesn't hold back his quips against Fret when he has them, even sarcastically cheering his friend on when he talks about how awesome he is.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: Can be seen as one to The Quiet One and the Silent Protagonist. Although Rindo is not silent, he also doesn’t want to speak and make active decisions. Normally, those types of protagonists just have to follow along with whatever the plot immediately tells them to do and don’t have to do more than that. Rindo shows what will happen if The Quiet One and the Silent Protagonist is made The Leader and they lack actionability and if the plot does not mold around them so that they only have to do the bare minimum to progress. Especially because Rindo and his team are competing against people who are more experienced in the Reapers’ Game. Because Rindo repeatedly tries to go with the flow, he repeatedly needs to use Time Travel to fix his mistakes. If he didn’t have Time Travel powers, he and his team would either be dead earlier or be in deep trouble.
• Déjà Vu: When he and Fret unwittingly walk into the Reapers' Game, he feels like he's seen this before where Fret was running and then a truck was thrown into the air. Moments later, the exact thing happens, leading to Fret being crushed to death by the truck.
• The Ditherer: His Fatal Flaw is his inability to make the hard choices. He later reveals that he used to be even worse about this, to the extent that he couldn't decide on simple things like what to have for dinner. An0ther's quotes helped him improve, though they far from fixed his issues.
• Et Tu, Brute?: Coupled with the other events happening at around that time, Rindo gets pissed when he finds out that Shoka hadn't joined their team for real but was acting as Shiba's spy. That anger pretty much dissipates after Shoka immediately announces that she's turning against the Reapers and legitimately joins the Wicked Twisters.
• Everyone Can See It: Downplayed. When Motoi confronts Shoka in Week 2 Day 6, Motoi questions Shoka's intentions for helping the Wicked Twisters, accurately coining that she has a crush on Rindo. In the next day, when Shoka is asking Rindo about his powers, Fret calls them lovebirds. Earlier than that, it seems like Fret notices when he reacts with mild astonishment to Rindo snapping at Shoka in Week 2 Day 2. Nagi seems to notice too in Week 3 Day 3 when Rindo is surprised by Shoka being kind to Nagi and Shoka acting like a Tsundere in response.
• Failed a Spot Check: In the true ending, he completely forgot to check the friend requests sent by Shoka, after not hearing from her due to Joshua sending her back to the RG and Rindo failing to find her before stumbling upon her days later.
• Fatal Flaw: Indecisiveness. Rindo, despite being in a leadership position, is very hands-off and has difficulty making meaningful choices while refusing to take responsibility for any failures that arise because of it. This often necessitates the use of his Replay ability to fix the situation, and is symbolized by the fact that his clothing article of choice is a face mask, which covers his mouth and thus limits his ability to speak. Getting over this is the thrust of his Character Development.
• Foil: To Shoka. His character role and character development are opposites of hers. This is fitting because they were designed to have a Yin Yang motif. Rindo is The Protagonist but he doesn’t make any real impact or decisions until the last third of the game. Shoka is seemingly a low-ranking Reaper but it is revealed that she was trying to stop the Big Bad’s plan the entire time, meaning she had an important role in the story the entire time. Rindo was chosen by Joshua and Kubo because he was not fit to win a Reapers’ Game. Not only was Shoka fit, she won hers, which is how she became a Reaper. Rindo starts out the game not giving much thought to Shibuya and he gets disconnected from Fan GO from the beginning of the game and he is forced to have to communicate openly with others and to learn to be more decisive. Shoka starts the game already appreciating Shibuya and loving it enough to try to save it from Shiba in whatever way she was willing to do and she gets disconnected from Fan GO two thirds into the game, forcing her to have communicate openly with others and to learn to be more decisive.
• Foreshadowing: Rindo’s light colored hair and tendency to be holding his phone are quite evocative of Joshua and hint that he is Joshua’s proxy in this Game.
• Friend-or-Idol Decision: At the very end, Shibuya is safe, but not before the rest of the Wicked Twisters were erased. Rindo is given a choice by Haz on whether to let the city stay safe or to go back one last time, but at the expense of empowering the Dissonance even further and without Haz intervening in the new timeline. He goes for it.
• Grandfather Paradox: A variation that doesn't involve killing any familial members. When Time Traveling backwards through a day's events after being hit by Laser-Guided Amnesia, Rindo and the others try using Fret's Remind psych to job his memory and allow him to recall the future information he's forgotten. However, it's utterly ineffective, with Nagi and the others theorising that, since the events that Fret's trying to make the 'future' Rindo recall haven't chronologically happened yet, his psych cannot affect the future Rindo's memories in the 'past' timeline from his perspective, therefore he cannot make him recall information from Rindo's 'past' when time traveling to previous events, as those events are still yet to happen.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: Even with his issues and occasional Jerkass Ball in mind, Rindo is a relatively friendly and polite guy who won’t hesitate to help others in need if they come to him first or sometimes not even that.
• Heroic BSoD: Enters a depressive state after being the only one to survive the assault of the Dissonance Noise and make it back to the UG safely, with his close companions all Erased from existence. By the time Hazuki finds him, he’s kneeling by the Hachiko statue with his head in his hands, lamenting the friends he lost, and can’t even take pride in the fact that he helped save Shibuya.
• Hikikomori: In the announcement trailer, the background text behind Rindo when he's introduced seems to say that while also being aimless and indecisive in his life, he also rarely leaves his home. Averted in the game proper; one of his favorite pastimes is playing FanGO where he goes around the streets capturing monsters.
• Hypocrite: Rindo has a few insulting thoughts about Fret for trusting Kanon so much, yet he blindly follows Swallow's advice even when it's increasingly clear they're also in the UG. In fact, in the same conversation that Swallow refuses to reveal their identity, they tell Rindo it's a good idea to work with the other teams which he immediately accepts when he had been arguing against that stance from Fret just earlier in the day.
• Idiot Ball: He holds it for most of the game regarding Swallow's identity, failing to ask one of his only 2 friends their real name or home city, after 3 years of playing a GPS-based video game together, despite their identity becoming increasingly crucial to the plot. Of course, since Swallow was revealed to be Shoka, it's possible Rindo may have tried to meet with Swallow in-person sometime before the game started, but Shoka's job as a Reaper forced her to refuse. It can also be Rindo not being willing to communicate with them in person. Rindo is already unwilling to meet up with Swallow in person at the very start of the game. One of Rindo's character flaws is not being comfortable with in-person communication and he probably thinks that his relationship with them will change if he meets them in person. Rindo meeting up with and communicating with Shoka in person by the end of the game compared to the beginning of the game where he is only communicating with her through his phone shows him overcoming this.
• I Let Gwen Stacy Die: Poor Rindo is forced to deal with this twice when his friends end up dying in two separate timelines as a result of his Time Travel antics. When he gets another chance to rectify his mistake, he is determined to do everything he can to prevent their deaths from happening a third time.
• Innocent Bystander: He starts out as just some chump minding his own business, but then nearly gets mauled by Noise and is drawn into the plot. Kubo picked him precisely because of this, as he needed somebody with no idea of what he was doing to rely on the Reset Button abilities of the pin to make it through the Reaper's game, constantly building up Dissonance Noise through fixing his mistakes and lost battles, whereas a more experienced candidate wouldn't have needed to rely on the Pin so much.
• Interspecies Friendship: His online friend Swallow is revealed to be Shoka, a Reaper.
• It's All My Fault: He heavily blames himself for the mess the party finds themselves in when fighting Phoenix Cantus, noting that it wasn’t for his frequent time-traveling, the Noise wouldn’t have gotten as strong as it is now. Thankfully, Fret immediately reassures him that it wasn’t his fault and that without him time-traveling in the first place, none of them would still be around to begin with, a statement that Rindo starts to take comfort in.
• Ironic Echo: At the end of Week 2 Day 7, Shiba taunts the Wicked Twisters by saying "we win" after a surprising turn of events. Rindo echoes this exact same statement back to Shiba after defeating him on the final day.
• Jerkass Ball: He's mostly nice and friendly, but he gets mildly snarky and grumpy quite easily when he's reminded he's the Only Sane Man or when he's pressured into making a decision.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia:
  • Can't remember how he died before accidentally participating in the Reaper's Game. Subverted - there's no memory of his death because his death never happened in the first place, he's a rare living player.
  • He's also subjected to this in Week 3, Day 3 from being attacked by a Plague Noise, which is particularly bad for him, as it outright nullifies his ability to use his Mental Time Travel powers if he can't recall the day's events to jump back in time to.
• The Leader: He leads the Wicked Twisters, though he had little say on the matter as Fret accidentally pushed it onto him. He does gradually grow into the role.
• Likes Older Women: When it comes to his Ship Tease with Shoka, who is physically one year older than him and is mentally at least 20.
• My God, What Have I Done?: His reaction when he finds out that EVERYTHING he’s done has only made the Dissonance Noise become stronger and stronger, resulting in Shibuya’s inevitable Inversion. The poor guy is practically catatonic when he realizes this.
• Morality Pet: Interestingly, he acts as this towards Shoka, as it’s thanks to his influence and friendship with her that she’s able to take strides into becoming a better person and helps bring out her softer side.
• Never My Fault: When Nagi Dives into Rindo's mind on Day 3, his inner thoughts are blaming the situation on Fret and Minamimoto while absolving himself of any responsibility. This is an early hint at how far his indecisiveness goes.
• Not a Game: He starts to use the phrase, "this isn't a game" on Fret, but stops himself short, presumably because he knows that the Deadly Game is literally called the Reaper's Game.
• Odd Friendship: The quiet and reserved Rindo is friends with the loud Fret.
• Only I Can Kill Him: A variant. Rindo's Time Travel pin makes him the only one that can go back and set in motion events to allow everybody to overcome the Hopeless Boss Fight that is Soul Pulvis/Phoenix Cantus, a Noise powerful enough that no single player can defeat it alone. This is especially Poignant as Rindo's pin is also the reason why Phoenix Cantus is so powerful in the first place, and whilst Kubo acknowledges that Rindo can hit the Reset Button and undo the destruction of Shibuya, which is unpreventable in the timelines where it's fought before the Final Battle, he also points out that doing only makes the next Soul Pulvis stronger, meaning Rindo only has so many attempts to return through time before it becomes literally unbeatable, meaning that if Rindo fails to get events corrected, Shibuya is doomed regardless.
• Only Sane Man: The only one in the team with a level head on his shoulders up until Shoka and Neku join.
• Peggy Sue: He boasts the ability to turn back time within a given day, which becomes instrumental in helping him survive the Reapers' Game.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The reserved and level-headed blue oni to Fret's energetic and reckless red oni.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Once he changes his future and Nagi decides to ally herself with the Wicked Twisters, Rindo takes one look at her merch bag and immediately wants to make a run for it.
• Ship Tease: With Shoka after she joins the Wicked Twisters, especially after finding out that she's Swallow. He's completely emotionally devastated both times she dies and breaks out into a Luminescent Blush when they reunite in the RG.
• Snark-to-Snark Combat: Occasionally enters into this with Shoka in the first two weeks whenever she tries to get on his nerves.
• Story-Breaker Power: Rindo's Time Travel powers work this way, even despite the limitations, allowing him to do back in time to redo objectives or choices the Wicked Twisters have no chance of realistically completing in the 'present' to allow them to change the current outcome to one more favourable to themselves, or allowing him to redo crushing defeats at the hands of stronger opponents and come back better prepared for the 'rematch'. In a points-based game setup like the current reaper's game, Rindo's power basically allows him the chance to pick the 'right' option every time his team is facing failure, allowing them to make up for their inexperience or poor judgement skills starting out, ensuring they can stay in the game even against stronger, more experienced and ruthless players. Then it turns out that it's literally a Story-breaking power, as every time Rindo turns back time, it builds up Dissonance Noise inside his pin from the timelines he erases every time he undoes a 'bad outcome' for him, feeding the massive Clock Roach Noise that will devour Shibuya come the end of the Reaper's Game.
• Socially Awkward Hero: While he’s certainly not as bad as Nagi, he is quite introverted and prefers using social media than face-to-face conversation. To highlight his growth in that regard, the ending makes a point of emphasizing his putting his phone away before reaching out to Shoka.
• Suddenly Always Knew That: His Mental Time Travel abilities manifest this way, with him all of a sudden knowing about things his friends never told him, or understanding concepts they're yet to engage with personally. It usually takes his teammates off-guard for a moment before they remind themselves of his powers and realise he must have jumped back through time. In a skill-based example, Rindo also technically carries his levels and fighting pins with him when he jumps back through time, which in the case of the jump after facing Shiba, means that he's technically stronger then than when he faced him the first time around.
• Traumatic Superpower Awakening: Watching Fret being crushed to death by a truck causes him to scream for his friend and suddenly turn back time to before Fret's death occurred.
• Troubled, but Cute: Is noted to be good-looking by a lot of the shopkeepers that come across him and he has a lot of internal issues that he needs to learn to work through.
• Unwitting Pawn: That pin with Time Travel power he uses to go through the Reapers' Game? Turns out the Noise within it gets stronger every time Rindo uses it, and it gets powerful enough to erase everything in Shibuya by the end of the final week. Oops.
• Weak-Willed: The Secret Reports note that he's easily swayed by other people's opinions, and has a subconscious habit of adopting them himself without even noticing it.
• Weapon Specialization: Like Neku before him, Rindo seems to be a fan of the Jupiter of the Monkey brand as shown by his orange hoodie with the brand's name on it. He also starts out with the Shockwave pin, a psych heavily associated with the brand.
• Young and in Charge: He’s the youngest member of the main cast at age 15 and is made the leader of the Wicked Twisters, with his development shaping him up to take strides into stepping up to the plate to fulfill this role.

Fret

Tosai "Fret" Furesawa

Voiced by: Chiharu Sawashiro (Japanese), Griffin Burns (English)

Reminder

"Let's bring home the bacon, y'all! Viva la revolution!"

Rindo's happy-go-lucky classmate and fellow Player in the Reapers' Game, Fret boasts the ability to get along with just about anyone. While he styles himself as a natural conversationalist, he prefers to keep things light, subconsciously avoiding subjects that are too serious. He enjoys walking around town with his buddy "Rindude."

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• Ambiguously Bi: Expresses attraction to Shoka (briefly) and Kanon, but was/is a follower of Eiji Oji (who otherwise attracts mostly female admiriers), and when he starts playing Elegant Strategy, he takes notice of how Tomonami keeps smiling at him and "wants to see where it goes." Furthermore, when Nagi (who can read other people extremely well) offered the game to Fret, she laughed and smiled mischievously and said she hopes Fret will find it to his liking, which may indicate she noticed this part of Fret before Fret himself.
• Be Yourself: Kanon and Nagi can tell that his optimistic attitude tends to hide his true feelings. It takes Kanon getting erased for him to finally come to terms with himself and become more honest on how he behaves.
• Book Dumb: Not exactly knowledgeable on the simplest things such as academics or normal common sense, especially when solving some of the riddles of the Reaper's Game. Conveniently enough, some of the riddles involve pop culture, which he is actually very knowledgeable about. He even acknowledges this when Rindo recalled how people were similar to sapiens from a book he read, with Fret joking that Rindo's read one more book than he ever would.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Gets hit with this at the beginning of Week 3 Day 3 when he gets too close to Kanon while she’s undergoing the effects of the Plague Noise, causing him to become infected and attack Rindo, prompting him to jump back into time in order to find a way to prevent this from happening.
• Bromantic Foil: Happy-go-lucky and carefree compared to the more withdrawn and cynical Rindo.
• Brutal Honesty: He usually says what's on his mind from calling out Rindo for texting while walking and whispering that Kaie has "issues" which the other overhears but takes in stride.
• Casanova Wannabe: Constantly tries to flirt with the notably older Kanon and also once suggestively talked about Shoka in a manner that implies the trope. Though, this could be largely an act as a part of his upbeat facade.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: He may be Book Dumb and a bit of an Idiot Hero, but when it comes to utilizing Psychs in combat, he’s just as capable as the rest of the team.
• Delinquent Hair: The right side of his hair is shaved, giving him a bit of an undercut.
• Didn't Think This Through: Whenever Rindo is off in his own head or texting Swallow, Fret sometimes scans an area out of boredom, which leads to him drawing Noise towards them and dragging the group into danger.
• Distracted by the Sexy: The first time Kanon shows up, he's left as a blushing mess and allows her to take the pinpoint away from them.
• Dub Personality Change: Downplayed. While his overall personality is largely unchanged between the English and Japanese scripts, his relationship with Kanon is played straight as a case of Ladykiller in Love in the English version, where in Japanese it is mutually acknowledged as a case of Mistaken for Romance. His subsequent character arc more or less remains intact, however.
• Everyone Has Standards: As much of an Idiot Hero he is, even he has his limits. When the party figures out that the Plague Noise is visible under a blacklight, Beat's first idea on how to deal with a whole swarm of them is to have him run around really fast shining the light so everyone else can fight them all at once. Fret of all people is the one to shoot it down.
• Fanboy: Of Eiji Oji AKA The Prince of Ennui. He tries to convince Rindo that he grew out of him, but Rindo sees right through him. He also seems to be a fan of MKN's works, wondering if he could get her autograph.
• The Fashionista: Fret has good knowledge of fashion stores, particularly the trendier ones.
• Foil: One of the Secret Reports outright describes him and Nagi as this to each other. Fret might be more outgoing and sociable compared to the introverted Nagi, but his character is several times hinted to be just a façade intended to please others, whereas Nagi is genuine and proud of her own quirky self, not caring how others view her.
• Foreshadowing: Many, to his true nature.
  • Nagi seems to bear an immediate and intense grudge against him, often dismissing him both in- and out-of-combat, reacting with annoyance whenever he tries to joke with her, and refusing to engage him in conversation, even when she addresses him first. At first it seems to be that she's simply put-off by his jovial attitude and jokey mannerisms, but when Beat, who is similar to Fret (and hits it off with him immediately) joins the party in Week 2, Nagi doesn't have nearly as many problems with Beat. As it turns out, Nagi could sense from the very beginning that Fret's fun-loving and outgoing personality was only surface-deep and meant to please others. This is likely what turned Nagi off to him; once he makes an effort to start being more true to himself, Nagi noticeably starts warming up to him.
  • Despite ostensibly being The Heart of the group, Fret is usually the one who starts expressing worry, doubt, fear or even outright despair before any other member of the group. It's another hint that his upbeat and optimistic attitude is only skin-deep.
  • Fret acts especially friendly and gives compliments-on-demand whenever he interacts with Kanon...but after the first couple interactions, she begins to dismiss him as "not meaning it" to his frustration. She's right; Fret's only faking it as part of his façade. At least at first.
  • While Fret is usually the first to worry when things go wrong, the visions where Rindo dies have him acting noticeably more distraught. While this obviously makes sense even at first glance since Rindo is his best friend, it takes a much darker turn once it's revealed that Fret's former best friend (before Rindo) was Driven to Suicide and Fret was powerless to prevent it.
• Fun Personified: Fret tends to go with the flow of the situation and his own beat that he often acts by himself without telling Rindo to get his consent, leading to both of them suffering from Fret scanning a horde of Noise or "accidentally" naming their group "Rindo's Group" and even putting Rindo as the leader. Despite them being in the Reaper's Game, Fret doesn't get depressed to know they're both dead...because he doesn't believe it and thinks it's all a very elaborate contest. Turns out he was half-right about that.
• Giver of Lame Names: Rindo isn't too impressed to learn Fret named their team something embarrassing like "The Wicked Twisters" without consulting him. Still, it's more creative than Fret's original choice; "Rindo's Group". (Technically, that was just the RNS' default setting, but that still happened because Fret "got tired of typing", so...)
• Heart Is an Awesome Power: In contrast to abilities like Rindo's Replay, Nagi's Dive, Beat's Soundsurf or Shoka's Telewarp abilities, Fret's Psych allows him to... jog people's minds about important events or concepts he wants them to think about, something that can be done verbally just by speaking to them as well. However, in the UG, this technically gives Fret a benign form of Mind Control over his targets, allowing them to volunteer information relating to any challenges in the Reaper's Game that they need to overcome, even if the Living people providing said information cannot see or speak to the Wicked Twisters. Once the Plague Noise start infecting people, it turns out this ability can remind a brainwashed Empty Shell of their former self, i.e it's an "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight without the "fight", provided it's applied quickly after the Noise within have been erased. In the endgame, this ability becomes the cornerstone of the united fractions' plan to counter Soul Pulvis, with Fret 'Reminding' the living citizens of Shibuya to think positive thoughts to cancel out the negative energy that makes up Soul Pulvis's being, especially since said negative energy is composed of Retgone versions of everybody in Shibuya, further amplified by several other players boosting his 'signal' to them. In a more humorous twist, his power also works just as well on his teammates, allowing Fret to keep them focused and on-point when trying to solve the challenges of the Reaper's game, which gives him great synergy with Beat when he joins.
• Hidden Depths: Beneath his Fun Personified personality lies someone who is actually quite cynical about relationships, feeling that no one is ever truly genuine with others and how it’s meaningless to even try to be, citing his inability to save his best friend from taking his own life as a reason for this.
• In Touch with His Feminine Side: Throughout the game, Fret is shown to have quite a few traditionally feminine interests, mostly relating to fashion. In the ending, he’s even shown to be genuinely enjoying EleStra, a flashy dating sim that is noticeably more catered towards women, per Nagi’s suggestion.
• Jumped at the Call: He's initially very quick to get into the Reaper's Game. He only starts to hesitate when he realizes they're trapped in Shibuya and are in real danger of dying.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia:
  • Fret's unique psych, "Remind", is an inversion of this trope, allowing him to jog other people's memories and help them remember things they may have forgotten.
  • Played straight when he can't remember how he died, however. And then subverted - like Rindo, he's alive, so there's nothing to remember.
• The Nicknamer: Tends to give people nicknames ("Rindude" for Rindo, "Mr. Minami" and "M-Teezy" for Minamimoto, "Shokie" for Shoka, etc.). He's even the one who ends up naming the team "The Wicked Twisters" (behind Rindo's back).
• Odd Friendship: The loud and headstrong Fret is friends with shut-in and somewhat awkward Rindo.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: He goes by "Fret" but his real name when you meet up with him is "Tosai Furesawa".
• Pop-Cultured Badass: As stated above, what he lacks in knowledge one would learn from school, he's very knowledgable on pop culture and even uses it to his advantage during the Reaper's puzzles.
• Pungeon Master: He likes to make puns when he can. His first interaction with Rindo has him tell him to go to "Wunafo". One-oh-four, 104. Rindo's reaction says it all.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The energetic and reckless red oni to Rindo's reserved and level-headed blue oni.
• Sad Clown: Fret constantly uses humor to deflect from things that would get most people down. It's a façade. Fret reveals after Kanon's erasure that he stopped bothering to take things seriously or express his honest feelings after another close friend died; it can be inferred from the dialogue that said friend took their own life independent of Fret's attempts to cheer them up. When he says said person was supposed to be his best friend, he seems about to break down in tears.
  Fret: After that, I figured… What's the point? Why take anything seriously? It doesn't make a difference, and it doesn't make you feel any better either… y'know? Haven't been able to stomach anything too heavy since then. It's too much.
• Shout-Out: He will often say "Kweh", the cry of a Chocobo, as a bewildered response to things.
• Stepford Smiler: The reason he's so happy-go-lucky is because he doesn't take anything seriously in general, believing actual close relationships to be a sham. This all stems from his implied failure to talk his former best friend out of committing suicide.
• Stylistic Suck: Fret's "Remind" psych usually requires him to form a mental image of whatever he wants other people to remember. Said image is depicted as no better than a child's doodle.
• Surprisingly Sudden Death: In the first cutscene of the game, he runs away in an attempt to escape the Noise and ends up getting crushed to death by a flipped truck. Subverted when Rindo manages to go back in time and stop him from being crushed again.
  • Fret's sudden erasure at the hands of the Soul Pulvis in the Final Day' is the Wham Shot that shows that this particular do-over isn't going to go well. Thankfully, Haz gives Rindo one more try, and Fret survives the next go-around.
• Telepathy: Although all players can scan people's minds, special mention goes to Fret calling it his "galaxy brain."
• Useless Accessory: He apparently has a hat hanging off his back pocket, but doesn't actually wear it.

Nagi

Nagi Usui

Voiced by: Mina Katahira (Japanese), Miranda Parkin (English)

Diver

"This whole "Reaper's Game" is most detestable. I give it -200 out of 10!"

Another Player in the Reapers' Game, Nagi is a college student whose youthful appearance leads others to mistake her for a middle schooler. She is deeply passionate about her pastimes, devoting all of her time and energy to her favorite games. Highly perceptive, she is acutely aware of others' emotions, and shows disdain toward those she deems superficial and disingenuous.

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• Affectionate Nickname: Fret sometimes call her "Nagirl" (instead of the usual "Boss"). She hates it, due to a dislike of both name puns and Fret himself. She doesn't mind being called "Pinny" by Beat though.
• All Girls Want Bad Boys: She immediately falls for Sho upon meeting him. However, it ends up being a Subverted Trope, as her attraction to him is because he physically resembles her favorite Elegant Strategy character, Tomonami, and she actually sadly mentions a couple times how his cruel personality differs from Tomonami and makes him less attractive to her.
• Antiquated Linguistics: She uses old-fashioned language (she calls food she likes "positively ambrosial"), has a tendency to us "Tis" insted of "It's" and addresses most people as "Lord" or "Lady."
• Badass Adorable: A very cute, college-aged young woman who’s just as capable of erasing the Noise with style along with the rest of the party.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: She mainly decides to join the Wicked Twisters because Rindo gives her the exclusive EleStra pin she wasn't able to get.
• Berserk Button: She has a serious problem with people who aren't honest about themselves, being The Empath who can get a natural read on people. It's why she has a huge problem with Fret, who she can tell is only superficially outgoing and friendly. On a more comical note, she gets seriously irked by puns, which is another reason she dislikes Fret.
• Big Anime Eyes: Not normally, but some portraits sport eyes that look straight out of a bishoujo manga, complete with sparkles, whenever she's gushing over her Lord Tomonami.
• Big Eater: A good amount of her favorite foods have massive calorie counts, such as the Grand Slam Meat Bowl and the Whole Hog BBQ. She's also the only one that will happily devour the Grilled Alligator, which has a whopping 1200 calories.
• Catchphrase: "Pardon the intrusion!", said whenever she uses her Dive ability. She's also prone to shouting "Sally forth!" in the heat of battle. She also consistently says "I don't believe I was speaking to you" whenever Fret happens to say anything after her regardless of if he was directly speaking to her or not.
• Character Development: Although not as major as the rest of her team (besides Beat and Neku, who already went through their own development in the previous game), she does develop in small, subtle ways, mainly when it comes to how she learns to communicate with people she initially views as incompatible with her own worldview, namely Fret.
  • She analyses people and feels them whether she wants it or not, and due to being a combination of simultaneously open minded and very direct, those not true to themselves strike her as very wrong, in the wrong, or plain bizarre, as shown in her interactions with Fret and how coldly she treats him at first. However, throughout the course of the game, she slowly starts to open up to him and comes to realize his reasons for acting the way he did at first and learns that she does not need to dismiss people right away and look past the surface.
  • She also starts off as fairly passive when it comes to group dynamic and synergy, opting instead to either gush about her beloved Lord Tomononami, EleStra, or both. This is especially notable when tensions start to rise between Rindo and Fret at the beginning of Week 2 and she can do nothing but weakly comment at the tense atmosphere in the air. However, during the course of Week 3, she actively steps up to the plate more than once to help the others sort out their issues and integrates more into the group, truly embracing her role as the Team Mom.
• Chuunibyou: She envisions herself as a character from an old-school fantasy RPG and even peppers her speech with Antiquated Linguistics to complete the image.
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Partially invoked or perhaps played straight. Her manner of speech is too dignified that borders on the dramatic, her obsession with Elegant Strategy goes towards the unhealthy, and she tends to shout insane ramblings during battles. However, seeing past all these leaves one with a very analytical girl.
• Deadpan Snarker: Can get particularly snarky when it comes to Fret and his shenanigans.
• The Empath: Her "Dive" psych lets her see a person's deepest emotions, but she also has a natural read on people. This is also the reason she's so harsh on Fret, as she can tell his character is not being genuine to himself.
• Expressive Shirt: The text on her shirt changes in certain situations, such as when she's ordering at a restaurant or about to Dive.
• Foil: As stated previously, she and Fret. She's simultaneously stated to be closed off and open-minded, heavily contrasting Fret's extraverted, yet close-minded nature. However, both characters can be as intense and emotive as each other (contrasting Rindo's more downbeat attitude).
• Gamer Chick: And a quite proud one at that. Her game of choice is Elegant Strategy, which she makes reference to a lot throughout the story.
• Girlish Pigtails: She wears her hair in two small twin tails while leaving the rest down.
• Hates Being Nicknamed: When she first introduces herself to the party, she specifically requests they avoid making any name puns, which Fret naturally ignores. Whenever he calls her "Nagirl" in the heat of battle, you can hear her groan in frustration. Downplayed, in that it is specifically named puns; the alternative "Boss" that Fret uses isn't so objected to, and Beat's nickname of "Pinny" is something she shrugs off without issue.
• The Heart: Acts as this to the party, providing ample amounts of moral support and insights into emotional issues that the others are unable to comprehend at the moment.
• Hidden Depths:
  • She initially comes off as a moody introvert Otaku, but the story makes a point of demonstrating that she's very well-spoken and good at communicating with others and getting a feel for their personalities despite her lack of willingness to do so. She's also pretty smart as she reveals she was the "Queen Quizster", meaning she topped the leaderboard on trivia for over ten weeks.
  • The main reason why she's so exhausted after a Dive isn't because of the burden of maintaining it but because of the stress she's under due to the fear of failing her friends and letting them down as she cracks when things matter the most. Yet despite this, she always manages to pull through for the team no matter what.
• Jerkass to One: She's respectful to everyone except Fret, to whom she often says "I believe I did not address you" whenever he replies to her comments, as she can tell how much of a Stepford Smiler he is. This eventually changes in the ending, where she is seen addressing Fret (or rather "Lord Tosai") the same way she does to other people she respects.
• Journey to the Center of the Mind: Nagi's unique psych, "Dive", allows her to invade other people's minds, which is useful for getting rid of Noise possession (as Noise tend to be the source of negative emotions in this universe).
• Large Ham: Whether it be swearing vengeance for Rindo's alleged mockery regarding her failure in obtaining a rare pin, calling out her attacks while making wild hand gestures, profusely thanking Rindo for providing her the aforementioned-rare pin, or gushing over Minamimoto.
• Love at First Sight: She becomes smitten over Minamimoto the moment she sees him, mainly due to how he strongly looks like her fictional crush from "Elegant Strategy".
• A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Read: When she first shows her Dive ability to Rindo and Fret, Rindo asks her if her dives are usually that grim looking and violent. She seems a bit uncomfortable as she admits it's the usual thing she sees and it can be incredibly overwhelming. When she first bumps into Rindo and reads his thoughts, she angrily hisses that she never wanted this kind of ability.
• Modesty Shorts: Sports a pair of shorts under the oversized shirt.
• Motor Mouth: She speaks quickly and with a very large vocabulary.
• Nerd Glasses: She wears large circular glasses and is very clearly a nerd, and they also become Opaque Nerd Glasses when she's emoting in some way.
• Nervous Wreck: Is prone to Ocular Gushers and nervously babbling and stuttering when out of her element, under pressure, or all of the above. That said, considering the circumstances of the situation she finds herself forced into, you can’t exactly blame her.
• Nice Girl: Weirdness and Jerkass to One with Fret aside, she is a kind and caring young woman.
• No Social Skills: She immediately weirds out Rindo with her rambling and grows very awkward when trying to talk about things outside of her interests.
• Older and Wiser: Despite her dramatics and poor first impression, she actually turns out to be a lot more emotionally mature than either Rindo or Fret.
• Older Than They Look: She's a 19 year old college student, but acts and looks so childishly that one would be forgiven for thinking she's a middle schooler. She's also apparently used to it, given how she shrugs off Rindo and Fret being shocked about it and acknowledges herself as "lilliputian".
• Otaku: Her entire backpack is decked out in the merch of her favorite character in the game "Elegant Strategy." She even attacks Rindo on their first meeting, believing he was mocking her for missing out on a pin of her favorite character.
• Poor, Predictable Rock: In its most literal sense; whenever the Wicked Twisters try to decide something with a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors, expect Nagi to throw a rock while everyone else goes with paper.
• Purple Prose: Some of her vocabulary is rather ornate. For example, she says food she like is "positively ambrosial."
• Scary Shiny Glasses: Several of her portraits give her this, such as when she's given food she dislikes.
• Shout-Out: When using a charge pin, one of her poses resembles charging up a Kamehameha from Dragon Ball Z. She also uses the same pose on the final attack on Phoenix Cantus.
• Shrinking Violet: When not in her comfort zone of her hobbies, Nagi grows a lot more tongue-tied and awkward in social interactions. Best illustrated on the Pin equip screen, where the other party members pose when selected but she looks up in shock.
• Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: She really does not like Fret, as she finds his Sad Clown behaviors off-putting and fake. When he starts maturing out of it, she notably drops this.
• Team Mom: Due to being older than the younger party members, she acts as this to them, doing her best to diffuse tensions between them and to provide emotional support. This aspect of her becomes especially important in Week 3; when the party is forced to confront the Plague Noise that have taken the form of their former allies/enemies in order to emotionally screw with them, Nagi helps them to overcome their mental baggage and pushes them forward with a combination of honesty and kind words of encouragement.
• Throat Light: Give her food she enjoys and she spews this.
• Womanchild: Played with. She is a college student that acts like an overly excitable and dramatic teenager, except she's actually fairly emotionally stable and quite capable of providing genuinely good encouragement; it's implied part of the reason her first meeting with the Twisters went so awry was that she had been completely unable to affect or be affected by the RG without anyone telling her why for several days, and Rindo "stealing" the pin she wanted was a rant-inducing slight.

Minamimoto

Sho Minamimoto

Voiced by: Takayuki Fujimoto (Japanese), Andy Hirsch (English)

Pi-Face

"So, did you zeptograms have time to process today's mission?"

For tropes pertaining to his appearance in the first game, see his Character page here

An enigmatic Player with dubious motives who agrees to team up with the Wicked Twisters for mutual benefit. Sho is an eccentric genius with a love of math puns and is notorious for his sheer power and effectiveness, but is something of a lone wolf and typically doesn't play nice with others.

Once a Shibuya Reaper and a powerful Game Master in his own right, he was unwittingly manipulated by an Angel in a scheme to save the city from the Composer's will, but was unable to fulfill this purpose and was defeated by the Composer during numerous attempts to overthrow Him. However, during the events of Final Remix, Sho was revived from erasure by the work of a Reaper and now participates in the Game he once commanded.

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• Advertised Extra: He is a party member now, but he doesn't bother explaining his goals to the party, avoids contact with anyone outside the Wicked Twisters, and ends up ditching the group after the first week with only two appearances afterwards, not counting the Another Day episode.
• Affectionate Nickname: He is referred to as "Lord Tomonami" by Nagi, since he bears a striking resemblance to the character of the same name from her favorite game Elegant Strategy. Rindo and Fret shorten his last name down to "Mr. Minami", while Fret sometimes calls him "(My) Minaman". Coco calls him "Mini-Moto".
• Aloof Ally: He's introduced as an ally to Rindo and Fret, but doesn't really care what happens to them and is only accompanying them for his own mysterious purposes. All of his interactions with them are mission-oriented, he never interacts with anyone other than his teammates (except a short conversation with Shoka), and he abandons them once he no longer needs them.
• Alternate Self: Has one in Another Day. The Minamimoto that joins the team (and subsequently allowing you to use him again) in Another Day is heavily implied to be the one from the main game, but another Minamimoto exists at the Expressway Underpass, serving as the game's Super Boss.
• Anti-Hero: Although he was entirely antagonistic in the first game, Sho appears to be on the side of the heroes this time, helping Rindo and Fret out in this iteration of the Reaper's Game. Neither of them have any idea of the chaos Sho created before, and just see him as an aloof, mysterious ally at best, and a strange man at worst. He turns out to only be slightly better than he was during Neku's game; he opposes Shiba mostly because their plans are at cross-purposes.
• Audience Surrogate: While Rindo and Fret satisfy this trope for first-time players, Minamimoto serves as this for returning players from TWEWY. He knows exactly how the Reaper's Game works under Shibuya's normal ruleset, but Shiba is running the Game using Shinjuku's ruleset, and every so often the differences throw him for a loop.
• Big Damn Heroes: During Day 1, he saves Rindo and Fret from a bunch of Noise. He later does it again against some Plague Noise in the Final Day to make things easier for the protagonists in executing their plan to fight off the Dissonance in Rindo's pin.
• Birds of a Feather: The closest he gets to participating in party banter is when the heroes purge a math-obsessed kid of Noise and comment that he'd probably get along with Minamimoto. Minamimoto actually chuckles at that.
• Can't Catch Up: Pointedly averted. The nature of the team's stats - namely, the fact that stats besides HP only improve by eating meals and not by levelling up - seems like it would result in this trope for Sho, who leaves the party at the end of Week 1 and doesn't return until Another Day. However, Sho actually has two different sets of base stats: one for when he joins in Week 1 (23 ATK, 61 DEF, and 31 Style) and one for when he joins in Another Day (173, 161, 291). Barring some obscene stat grinding (those are higher figures than Neku), Minamimoto will be perfectly capable of keeping up with the Wicked Twisters during the post-game. This makes sense story-wise because the Secret Reports imply that Minamimoto still has some of his Taboo powers but chooses not to use them when he fights with the Wicked Twisters, because Shoka says that Minamimoto isn’t any less powerful than Reaper despite being a Player, and because Minamimoto effortlessly erases several Plague Noise in the Final Day’’ meaning Minamimoto’s stats in Another Day may be his real stats.
• Came Back Strong: The Secret Reports theorize that he may have came back differently from his revival in "A New Day" since Coco was only imitating the Noise Refinery Sigil that brought him back before. Minamimoto being able to detect Rindo's temporal powers and end up in Another Day's universe, an act that would either require an Angel's aid or a level of power comparable to the Composer, certainly add credence to the idea.
• Character Development: Downplayed. His motivations and personality have not changed much with the ending making it clear he still a scheming son of a digit. However, as Neku points out he is not nearly as psychotic as he was three years ago. Although his tendency to go off on his own and leave his allies to fend for themselves is still here, when he is actually with them, he provides help without too much of a fuss.
• Crutch Character: Story-wise, the Wicked Twisters heavily rely on his strength during the early parts of the Game. Gameplay-wise, his stats vastly outstrip the others'; he will likely have as much HP as the rest of the team combined in the first week.
• Dangerous Forbidden Technique: Like Joshua did in the first game, Minamimoto jumps to Another Day at some point during or after the events of NEO - a feat that requires elevating his vibe to dangerous levels, with a possible risk of the strain pulling down his base vibe and preventing him from getting home. Unlike Joshua, Sho seems to have reaped some of the consequences; The Stinger for Another Day has him expressing that he "was a fraction of a femtometer away from getting reduced to zero".
• Dare to Be Badass: His favored method of motivating the Wicked Twisters. He diligently reminds them that their chances are slim, but not non-existent and trash talks both them and their opponents to spur them into action. Ironically, he ends up on the receiving end of this in Week 3. He's reluctant to help until Neku reminds him that they both know he's gunning to become Composer - after that, he essentially gives the heroes the plan to stop the Inversion.
• Decoy Protagonist: He’s one of the characters featured in the opening, but he ends up leaving the party after the first week and ends up getting replaced with Beat.
• Diving Kick: The first pin he wears in combat allows him to perform diving kicks at enemies. He even performs a kick like this during the opening sequence.
• Discard and Draw: He lacks any of the Taboo powers he used in TWEWY, instead relying on the same pins as the rest of the team. Similarly, unlike the original Leo Cantus, which as a Taboo Noise required the Light Puck (DS version) or a Cross Combo (Remix version) to damage, Leo Cantus Armo can be freely damaged by any party members regardless of Beatdrop timing, but boasts a Stance System that comes with an armour gauge. He also trades Noise summoning with Flash Step countering and fire related powers.
• Easily Forgiven: Uzuki and Kariya surprisingly are quite lenient with him and let him return to his scheming after everything in Shibuya is resolved, despite Sho being the one who created the Taboo Noise in the first game that caused them and their fellow Reapers so much grief. Neku too is quite easy on him despite just kicking his ass moments earlier. They even share some Back-to-Back Badasses banter once he's added back into the party.
• Enemy Mine: He's still a villain out to take over Shibuya, but since the Executor wants to destroy Shibuya, he helps the heroes out to save Shibuya. Come the end of the game, despite rejoining the Shibuya Reapers, he still notes that the one true benefit this all gave him was bringing the Composer out of hiding.
• Equipment Spoiler: The fact that no threads have bonuses specifically for him hints that he's not sticking around. His specific threads don't unlock until after he rejoins you in Another Day. Curiously, this appears to be because Week 1 Minamimoto and Another Day Minamimoto are treated as separate characters by the game internally.
• Evil Laugh: He occasionally rips out a full-on villain laugh as part of his beat drop banter. The others just...ask him to dial it down a bit.
• Evil Is Not a Toy: Overlapping with Reality Warping Is Not a Toy. Sho absorbs Soul Pulvis on two different occassions throughout the game, trying to make sense of them. The second time, he's in the middle of observing their interdimensional properties when they overwhelm him, transforming him into a berserk Leo Cantus Armo. He's apparently learned his lesson by the time he arrives in Another Day, where he helps the Wicked Twisters' counterparts in dispelling what is implied to be Dissonance remnants from Rhyme, Coco, and his own counterpart.
• Evil Versus Oblivion: This is revealed to be the reason for Sho's Heel–Face Turn in this game as Shibuya's erasure would mean that Sho's ambition to overthrow the current Composer will go up in smoke.
• Experienced Protagonist: Deconstructed. Minamimoto is the only member of the Wicked Twisters who has any idea what he's doing. Unfortunately, this results in them leaning heavily on him to carry them through the first week. When he deserts them, they are left utterly demoralized until they manage to recruit Beat to replace him.
• Face Framed in Shadow: Since he always has his hood up, some portraits, like when eating at restaurants, have his eyes hidden, which adds to his mysterious nature.
• Facepalm: If he is made to eat food he dislikes, or is too full to eat anything, he buries his head in his hand.
• Flash Step: If Sho is the lead character, he will teleport a short distance when performing a dodge, rather than leaping or rolling. This is similar to what he could do as a boss in the first game.
  Sho: So zetta slow!
• Foreshadowing: At the end of the Final Day of Week 1, he crushes a bird Noise in his hand before leaving the Twisters. This is no ordinary bird, but a Soul Pulvis hatched via Rindo's Replay psych, and he uses this information on the Replay of the Inversion to aid the Twisters in exterminating the flock.
• Genius Bruiser: He's a brawler who starts off with a Diving Kick pin, who also peppers his speech with math terminology.
• Genius Sweet Tooth: Alongside said math knowledge, a lot of his liked foods tend to be sweets like ice cream, bubble tea, and parfaits. Smoothies and chocolate-mint are his exceptions, though.
• Good Is Not Nice: Unlike the first game, he's on the side of the good guys this time, being a part of the Wicked Twisters. He's still not quite the nicest guy around though, as he's still quite condescending and gives little to no moral support to his team, but it's still a far cry from how much of a lunatic he was from the first game if he's willing to team up with others in the first place. He is however pretty ruthless to those who oppose the Wicked Twisters, particularly Fuya and Susukichi, ready to kick their asses at a moment's notice.
• Guest-Star Party Member: He joins the Twisters for the first week, before ditching them after getting what he wanted from Rindo at the end of said week. You don't get to use him again, even during the days in which he was part of, until the post-game Another Day.
• Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: Beating Minamimoto's Noise Form in Week 3 does little to impede his rampage, prompting Rindo and the others to just retreat while they can.
• Heel–Face Return: He's a clear antagonist throughout The World Ends with You, and displays absolutely no signs of any redemption arc. In NEO: The World Ends with You, he's introduced as an ally and playable character with no explanation. Eventually, this is justified as he is one of the few characters who caught wind of Kubo's plan to erase Shibuya, which goes against Minamimoto's plan to overthrow the current Composer.
• Identical Stranger: Well rather, one to a fictional character in a Game Within a Game. He strongly resembles Nagi's crush, Tomonami, which makes her fall head over heels for him.
• Insult of Endearment: Played with. He refers to his team members as zeptograms which is slightly higher than yoctograms, which is what he refers to the Players in the first game, and that's what he calls Susukichi here. Given the kind of person Minamimoto is, this could be considered high praise on his part, or he only calls them this because they're slightly more useful for whatever plans he may have... or perhaps it's a motivational taunt.
• In the Hood: His new outfit has him constantly keep the hood of his jacket up, emphasizing his mysterious nature.
• I Work Alone: Downplayed. He fights alongside the Wicked Twisters for his own purposes, but otherwise treats them like moderately valuable tools rather than genuine friends.
  Minamimoto: I don't follow the Associative Property like other Players.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Severely, massively downplayed. He's still a sociopath and a complete prick, but being humbled by Neku and Joshua, and hanging around with the Wicked Twisters has revealed that there is a very, very tiny light at the end of the tunnel. In the end, he saves Kariya simply because he wanted to, in his own aloof way, displays a kind of appreciation to Coco for reviving him, and even joins in with parallel versions of the heroes for Shibuyapalooza just for the hell of it. He's still a very bad dude with ambitions to match, but still does have a tiny heart somewhere in there.
• Lack of Empathy: His most defining trait (other than his love of math puns) is that he really doesn't give a shit about much, his own team included. At best, he's aloof and usually pretty dismissive of them.
• Last-Name Basis: One of the few characters consistently referred to by last name both in-game and out. Many of his nicknames are even variants of said last name.
• Legacy Boss Battle: His Noise form from the first game returns as Leo Cantus Armo. Though revised for the 3D gameplay and possessing a new Stance System, its unarmored form uses the same basic tactics as the original Leo Cantus, the Boss Banter has all the Mad Mathematician lines you'd expect from Pi-Face, and its animations are based on the original's attack sprites. It even reappears as the Super Boss in Another Day, albeit solo this time.
• Leitmotif: "Transformation - NEO Mix", a rearrangement of his theme from Solo Remix, plays when he's introduced, during the Boss Battle against his Dissonance-controlled Leo Cantus form in the middle of Week 3, during his Big Damn Heroes moment on the Final Day'', and for the Super Boss Felidae Cantus fight.
• Mad Mathematician: Predictably, just like in the first game, he peppers his speech with a lot of complicated mathematics and equations, confusing his partners. Luckily, they can simply look up the definitions on their phones to understand him. One of the first things he does is call Rindo and Fret zeptograms, saying they have an infinitesimally small chance of winning, but not precisely zero.
• Nominal Hero: At best he's this. He is on the side of the good guys but primarily for his own reasons and is still an asshole.
• Noodle Incident: In Another Day, the Minamimoto that joins you is all but outright stated to be the main game's version. How he got there and how he returned home isn't explained, but he's there to regain his old power to rechallenge the Composer. That and attend Shibuyapalooza.
• Not So Above It All: He may seem like a serious, powerful Aloof Ally but he still has his moments of hamminess from the first game. His quotes during combat are as laden with math puns as you'd expect, and he even has fun combat banter with the Wicked Twisters. While he usually only shows up for main story missions, one side mission has him express an approving "...Heh." after helping out some kid math genius.
• One-Winged Angel: He can transform into a large bipedal lion Noise called Leo Cantus, though he doesn't do it entirely of his own free will in this game, instead being overwhelmed trying to harness the Dissonance's power.
• Pet the Dog: Goes out of his way to save Coco from some Plague Noise during the last day with no possible gain other than repaying the one who brought him back to life.
• Phlebotinum Overdose: Minamimoto attempts to gain control of the Dissonance created by Rindo's time travel, but it turns out to be too much for him, and he ends up unwillingly transforming into a more powerful version of his Leo Cantus form.
• Product Placement: Minamimoto's coat is based on a real-life piece from Black Honey Chili Cookie. Even though the item doesn't appear in NEO's shop for the brand, the descriptions for BHCC items (being copy-paste and rather condescending to those who aren't interested) is very apropos for Sho's attitude.
• Promoted to Playable: In the first game, he was an antagonist. Here, he's a member of Rindo's party. At least, for the first week - afterwards, he ditches them, only joining up with them again during Another Day.
• Redemption Demotion: An incredibly powerful, near godlike Reaper from the first game, and was one of the major antagonists. Here, he's helping out the protagonists, but starts the game just as fresh and inexperienced as them. Although it's implied after the battle with Susukichi, he still has access to his Taboo powers but simply chose not to use them. In Week 3, Shoka says that even though he's a Player now, he's no less powerful than a Reaper, especially when he was able to threaten Shoka in Week 1 while she was a Reaper.
• Red Right Hand: Oddly enough, averted. He doesn't seem to have any of the Taboo markings he possessed in TWEWY, including the jet-black left hand he had before he himself went fully Taboo.
• Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory: Maybe. Minamimoto figures out Rindo's Replay rather quickly compared to pretty much every other character, hinting that he keeps some memories from previous timelines, but it's also entirely possible that, as a mathematician, Minamimoto's simply observant and open-minded enough to consider the possibility of time manipulation, especially since Rindo does a very poor job at explaining to his friends how he "suddenly" has knowledge of events yet to come.
• Sequel Hook: He's back with the Shibuya Reapers, but he makes no effort to hide that he's still after Joshua and knows where he is, which is immediately followed up by Coco saying she's not done with him yet. The Stinger for completing all of Another Day's optional objectives also indicates that he's after Soul Pulvis's power.
• Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Downplayed. Sho doesn't actually speak with complex words, but his excessive use of obscure and advanced math terms makes him very hard to understand. Rindo and Fret have to actually resort to going online and looking up the definitions of what Sho says, and even then they still don't get it.
  Rindo: ...Says here 142,857 is a "cyclic" number.
  Fret: Meaning?
  Rindo: Couldn't tell ya. Maybe our "new teammate" can fill us in.
• Smug Super: He's one of the most powerful characters in the series, and he knows it. His intro and star-rank quotes really tell you that he thinks quite highly of himself.
  "I don't have time for uninspiring integers."
  "Perfect calculations...deliver perfect results!"
• Spanner in the Works: He was barely accounted for at all in this new game, so he really ends up as this to everyone. He carries the Wicked Twisters through the first week... only to almost ensure their doom by leaving them alone for the more dangerous second week. In the end he gives the heroes the plan to stop Shibuya's Inversion.
• Stance System: Leo Cantus Armo (and Felidae Cantus) will generate Armour gauges at semi-random points during the battle, trading agility for durability. If the gauge is depleted, he'll go back to the high-speed tactics; he'll also get rid of it himself if you take long enough, performing a massive Area of Effect attack in exchange.
• Stealth Hi/Bye: He seems to be keeping a low profile since he tends to avoid talking to others besides Rindo and Fret, disappearing from the scene whenever a Reaper shows up or once a mission is completed. A fantastic example occurs later on, where upon rescuing Coco from some Plague Noise, he simply says "07734", smirks a smug grin, and leaves, much to Coco's annoyance.
• Super Boss: His Another Day self, Felidae Cantus (not to be confused with Mr. Pin), is the ultimate challenge of the game and beating him somehow furthers the mainline Minamomoto's goals.
• Sweet Tooth: A lot of food he loves that gives him tasty bonuses consist of sweets, berries, and alike.
• Team Dad: A very aloof version of one. He ensures that the team can actually fight properly and makes their competitors think twice about messing with them, so long as he actually shows up. The team, Fret and Nagi especially, perform to gain his approval, not that he'd ever give it. He also insults them, only to insult their opponents even more.
• Token Evil Teammate: Downplayed. He's not as bad as he was in the first game, but he only helps out the Wicked Twisters seemingly for his own mysterious reasons. He only really converses with them during missions, calls them zeptograms and sees them as helpful tools, but he does still help them out and acts as the backbone for the group. After ditching the Wicked Twisters, it's revealed that he still plans to overthrow Joshua and still wants to be the Composer, and while it's clear he's still very dangerous, he at least lends a helping hand during the finale to stop Shiba so that there is a Shibuya that he can still try and take over.
• Too Clever by Half: He figures out the deal about the Dissonance on his own and tries to use it for his own gain... Only to get taken over by the Noise which proved too spicy to handle. If it weren't for Neku, he'd likely be finished.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Downplayed. He's still very ambitious and still has mysterious goals of his own, but the fact that he's willing to team up with others is a far cry from the batshit crazy lone wolf he used to be, showing that he's not completely heartless. While he only sticks around with the Wicked Twisters for the first week, he gets along well enough with them as he gives advice on what to do, and he even engages in combat banter with them as well. During the last week, he saves Kariya from a horde of Plague Noise, and in his own unique way, he expresses gratitude to Coco for reviving him.
• Villains Out Shopping: In the middle of traveling to the alternate dimension of Another Day, collecting data for future plans, and similar such things, he decides to check out Shibuyapalooza for no discernible reason other than feeling like it and having the time to spare.
• Wild Card: His motivations for joining this Reaper's Game are unknown, nor how or why he ended up in Shinjuku. However, Fret and Rindo aren't too concerned about his motives since he makes for an incredibly powerful ally and gives them decent tips on how to survive the game as a former Reaper. In the end, he's still after taking over Shibuya and is still aiming for the Composer's spot, and only teams up with the heroes out of necessity. Can't take over Shibuya if there is no Shibuya left, after all.
• Willfully Weak: As the Secret Reports theorize, he's likely even more powerful this time around, even when he turned himself into a Taboo Noise back in the first game, but is severely holding himself back to blend in with the rest of the players. It's pretty telling that even when he's practically Cherry Tapping, he's so powerful that he effortlessly carries the team throughout their first week. When the Twisters fight him in Week 3, they are no match for him, even with Beat and Shoka around. It takes Neku showing up out of nowhere to finally end his rampage.
• Younger Than They Look: Played with. He's chronologically in his 20s already, but retains his biological 18-year old body from the first game due to his revival process and Taboo powers. Even then, Fret and Rindo refer to "Mr. Minami" as if he were a fully grown adult and the likes of Neku and Beat still look noticeably younger than him despite sharing the same biological age. He's even called an "overgrown adolescent" by Uzuki thanks to this.

The Fifth Team Member (Unmarked Spoilers!)

'Neku' / Daisukenojo "Beat" Bito

Voiced by: Subaru Kimura (Japanese), Crawford Wilson (English)

Soundsurfer

"Get in my way and get shredded, yo!"

A former Player who has rejoined the Game as a result of acquiring Shiba's Player Pin. Loud and rambunctious, Beat is a "act first, ask questions later" kind of person and has a life-of-the-party vibe to him, but he is passionate about his friends and will go to any lengths to protect the people he cares about. During the events of Final Remix, Beat witnessed Neku's murder at the hands of Coco Atarashi, and has spent the better part of the last three years searching for his whereabouts. Now back in the Game, Beat joins the Wicked Twisters in hopes of figuring out why he's back and where Neku could possibly be.

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• Affectionate Nickname: Shoka calls him "Worms-for-Brains."
• Ambidextrous Sprite: Which eye his bangs cover seems to depend on which way his character portrait is facing.
• Berserk Button: Don't call him "Neku", he hates it.
• Big Brother Instinct: Just like the first game, though this time the instinct extends to his teammates as he's the senior to most of them. Does overlap slightly with Big Brother Mentor
• Big Brother Mentor: Though his mentoring is largely of the emotional variety. His natural proactiveness and confidence helps the Twisters grow more confident and decisive themselves instead of relying on others which is incredibly important considering how Rindo is like.
• Birds of a Feather: Once he fully reveals himself, he becomes fast friends with Fret in particular due to their shared outgoing personalities. Rindo and Nagi consider them two peas in a pod, an idiot pod. The fact that Fret's particular power helps keep Beat's mind on point and focused on tasks when he used to get distracted or fed up with his inability to properly remember details in the prior game also give them good synergy.
• Boisterous Bruiser: Once he gets back into the groove of the Reaper’s Game, he shows himself to be still pumped and ready to brawl at a moment’s notice. When Kanon introduces herself to him on Week 2 Day 3, he correctly assumes that she’s part of a rival team and is ready to throw down with her, even though the mission for the day is already over. Fret quickly changes his mind from doing so, thankfully.
• Bruiser with a Soft Center: Always down to brawl with Noise but is also much more willing this time around to show off his soft side more often, even openly tearing up when having to help an NPC out in a side quest regarding a family member.
• Butt-Monkey: And nothing here has changed. Because he's still very much a Hot-Blooded Idiot Hero, some of the more level-headed characters take many opportunities to stretch out their Deadpan Snarker muscles at his expense. Though thankfully...many fly straight over his head due to his exceptional thickness.
• Change the Uncomfortable Subject: In Week 3 Day 5, the Wicked Twisters have to take down Plague Noise that have taken the forms of those who were erased. After beating "Motoi", Beat realizes that the next Noise will resemble Kanon, which would undoubtedly affect Fret, and right before he brings it up, Nagi shuts him up and he realizes what's going on.
  Beat: You worried 'bout Fret? I mean, the next Noise to show up is prob'ly gonna be—
  Nagi: [cutting him off] Oh, wherefore must our destination be so far away!?
  Beat: Huh? ...Ohhh. Right, my legs is killin' me already, yo.
• Comically Missing the Point: Prone to it just like he often was in the last game.
  Susukichi: Next time I'll bust out the [Reversi] board and we can go for a round, bro.
  Beat: You skate, too? 'Cause I go around on my [skate] board all the time!
  Nagi: (A wild misinterpretation...)
• Darker and Edgier: Played with in his new design, which would very much fall into this trope if he were actually Neku as he's initially portrayed to be. On Beat, however, the outfit is much more in line with his previous tastes in clothing, and as soon as his identity is revealed he drops the hood and facemask, which were the edgiest elements of the design.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Wears a lot more black than before but he's still firmly on the side of the heroes.
• Distressed Dude: Rindo's party has to save him from the Ruinbringers during Week 2 Day 2.
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": Much like in the first game, Beat prefers that people call him by his nickname rather than his real name. He also hates being mistaken for Neku.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Rindo bumps into him partway during the first week, but they don't fully interact until the second week.
• Headphones Equal Isolation: Averted. He wears them constantly now, but he's no less outgoing than he was in the first game.
• Idiot Hero: He's still just as dense and Literal-Minded as he was in the first game.
• Irony: He still calls Neku "Phones" on occasion, even though he's the one who's always wearing headphones now.
• I Will Find You: Has apparently been looking all over for Neku since his disappearance.
• Jive Turkey: He still talks in slang, drops his consonants, and ends a lot of his sentences with "yo".
• Mistaken Identity: A lot of people mistake him for Neku, including Rindo until Beat sets the record straight.
• Motivational Lie: When he tries to pick a fight with Kubo, he reassures the others that he used to be a Reaper which is true and helps the Wicked Twisters' morale. What goes unmentioned is that he was only a Reaper for a week with zero points earned on the job.
• My Sister Is Off-Limits: In the ending, he misses Neku and Shiki's long-awaited reunion because he was too busy scaring off a guy who was trying to hit on Rhyme.
• Nice Guy: Thanks to his Character Development from the previous game, he has shaved most of the "Jerk" aspects of his Jerk With A Heartof Gold persona and is shown to be nothing more but a kind, supportive, brotherly figure to the Wicked Twisters and the people around him.
• The Nicknamer: Carrying over from the previous game, Beat usually has a nickname for everyone he meets, like "Pinny" for Nagi, "Kitty Girl" for Shoka, and "Hater Skater" for Susukuchi. Less frequently, he'll call Rindo "Cap'n" and "Champ" — and since "Fret" is already a nickname, he just uses that.
• Older and Wiser: He's still a pretty big idiot, but at least he seems to have figured out how to reel back his more passionate emotions when they could be inconvenient for everyone. He also provides emotional support for the party when they most need it, such as the aftermath of Kanon’s erasure, where he brings the party out of their pits of despair with a Rousing Speech.
• Real Men Hate Sugar: Downplayed this time around. If you're familiar with his taste in food in the previous game, you may be surprised to discover that Beat is more tolerant around sweet foods and even likes some, but the majority of excessively sweet stuff is still a hard pass for him.
• Red Herring: When word of the legendary player, Neku Sakuraba, spreads throughout the UG, all of that attention is directed to a disguised Beat. All assumptions of him being the real Neku go out the window after he ditches his hood and mask and reveals his true identity.
• Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory: Unlike the other Players, he can still remember Shinjuku because he has been to the UG before its erasure.
• Rousing Speech: On Week 3 Day 4, the team's morale is at an all time low thanks to the erasure of Kanon and Ayano in pretty quick succession. Fret's depressed, opens up about why he is the way he is, and Shoka's still pretty distraught about Ayano's erasure. After getting taunted by another one of Shiba's broadcasts, Beat takes it on him to rouse the team by telling them to rely on him when the going gets tough, which motivates everyone to keep going.
• Spanner in the Works: His involvement wasn't planned at all - he basically found his way into the game because the Reapers were fishing for Neku with the pins, unaware that he's both already dead and safely secured by Joshua. He ends up derailing things even more than Neku's actual appearance does: he first saves Rindo and co. and then fills in the void left by Minamimoto, giving the Wicked Twisters another fighting chance; even more importantly, he keeps in contact with Rhyme and Shiki who prove instrumental to actually fixing everything on the Final Day. His talent for pissing people off pushes Shoka to be more proactive in helping the Twisters and saving Shibuya but consequently makes it more obvious, allowing Motoi to find out about it more easily and rat her out to the Reapers. In true Beat fashion, he's not even aware that he is this.
• Super-Speed: His "Soundsurf" Psych works this way in cutscenes, with him being capable of executing a Flash Step fast enough to grab Tsugumi's arm before she could blast him with an attack. At one point, in order to get to Motoi's showdown with Shoka faster, Beat decides to save time hunting down groups of scattered Variabeauties all across the district, instead zipping straight to their leader, kidnapping him, and then running back to the Wicked Twisters in order to motivate all rival teammates to rescue their leader, at speeds fast enough that he's only gone for a minute or so from the Twister's perspective and his kidnappee almost hurls from the inertia.
• Team Dad: Fills the hole left behind by Minamimoto's departure. Like Minamimoto, he serves as the team's backbone, driving them forward and biting back at those who disrespect them. Unlike Minamimoto, however, he's actually nice to his own team.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: He still has an ax to grind with Minamimoto and Coco for their actions against him three years ago, and is rather reluctant to cooperate with them in the third week.
• Video Game Dashing: Beat's unique Psych, "Soundsurf", lets him and the party perform these in the overworld. Going to the beat of the current song gives a Groove bonus to the next fight.

The Sixth Team Member (Unmarked Spoilers!)

Shoka Sakurane

Telewarper

See Shoka's bio under "The Shinjuku Reapers" for more details.

The Final Team Member (Unmarked Spoilers!)

Neku Sakuraba

Voiced by: Kōki Uchiyama (Japanese), Jesse David Corti (English)

The Legendary Player

"Shinjuku got destroyed, but I won't let that happen again. Not here."

The main character of the first game. Once an apathetic and introverted teenager, Neku's experience in the Reaper's Game three years ago changed his outlook on the city and life itself, and his actions back then have earned him the reputation of the "legendary" Player who saved Shibuya. Despite winning the Game and returning to life, Neku was soon gunned down by Coco Atarashi during the events of Final Remix, causing him to become trapped in Shinjuku's UG for three years. While trying to escape, Neku teamed up with Coco to discover the reason for Shinjuku's Inversion, but with Shibuya in peril in the present day Neku is freed and returns to his home city, where he teams up with the Wicked Twisters to find a way to save it once again from impending doom.

---

• 11th-Hour Ranger: Neku is the last party member, joining halfway through the final week to help save Shibuya.
• All-Loving Hero: He has become a very kind-hearted and caring person who is supportive of Rindo, is amiable towards Minamimoto (a former enemy of his), and even befriends Coco (who murdered him). Compare that to the abrasive loner he was initially in the first game.
• Ambidextrous Sprite: Notably averted; his jacket has the Gatto Nero branding on the left sleeve, which is visible in sprites where he's facing left but not when he's facing right.
• Artifact Name: Beat and Kariya still call him Phones even though he's long since ditched his headphones.
• Back for the Finale: He was trapped in the ruins of Shinjuku since the events of A New Day, leaving him missing for three years. It's only at the tail end of the game that he is summoned back.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Thanks to his experiences from the previous game, Neku has become a flat out Nice Guy, acting as a nurturing and kindhearted helping hand to the people around him, especially to the rest of the Wicked Twisters. He’s also one of the most powerful forces in the UG and an extremely deadly force to be reckoned with in battle.
• Big Brother Mentor: Acts as this towards Rindo when they meet, helping him to keep pushing forward as they progress throughout the last days of the Reaper’s Game and even advising him from overusing his Time Travel abilities due to sensing the dangers that come with them.
• Big Damn Heroes: Makes a glorious return saving Beat from a Dissonance-powered Leo Cantus and taking him out in one hit.
• Big Damn Reunion: Pulls this with all three of his partners.
• Call-Back: The original version of "Twister" plays when he shows up for the first time.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Displays shades of this. He's never heard of Gatto Nero before despite wearing the brand's name on his shoulder, and several conversations seem to show his sprite spacing out while other characters are talking. Justified in that he's spent three years in a ruined city with little social interaction, so it's understandable that he might be slightly out of it.
• Deep Sleep: Possibly in Shinjuku. Although the exact details of his time there aren't expanded on for the most part, he is implied to be the subject of Joshua's one-sided conversation in Week 1 who he hopes will "wake up soon", meaning he may not have been fully conscious for the extent of it.
• The Dreaded: The mere rumor that he's back in the Game sends chills down the spines of the Shinjuku Reapers - so much so that they make hunting him down a survival focus. The rumor ultimately doesn't pan out, but he does legitimately return later on and with waves.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: To say Neku's been handed a shit hand in life is an understatement, so his happy ending is even more cathartic. He was shot, forced to play the Reaper's Game for three weeks straight, shot again, trapped in Shinjuku's UG which has been turned into a desolate Eldritch Location for three years, then forced back into the Game before finally getting a proper second chance at life and being reunited with Shiki and the rest of his friends.
• Enemy Mine: Unlike Beat, he reacts with amusement if made to fight alongside his old enemy Minamimoto in the post-game.
  Neku: Guess we gotta work together!
  Minamimoto: What, you got a problem with that?
• Fish out of Temporal Water: Being stuck in Shinjuku for three years effectively displaced him from the outside world, and he shows slight difficulty adjusting to modern-day Shibuya by the time he comes back. For starters, he expresses unfamiliarity with the Gatto Nero brand despite wearing its clothing and the brand being practically the hottest brand in the entire city; he's more familiar with the girl who created it than the brand itself.
• Foil: Serves as one to Minamimoto, which is very appropriate considering that Coco intended them to be partners in her desperate "save Shinjuku" plan. Minamimoto was previously a loner of a Reaper who would gladly throw his allies to the wolves if it would serve his purposes, and hasn't changed at all despite initial appearances. Neku was previously a loner of a Player who would unhesitatingly erase his partner if it would get him home, but grew out of it and has become a genuine Nice Guy by the time he returns. Minamimoto gives the Wicked Twisters just enough information to save Shibuya in the interest of becoming its Composer, whereas Neku actively helps stop the Dissonance because he wants to preserve Shibuya as he knows it. Even their outfits compare and contrast: Minamimoto wears a consuming black longcoat with the hood up based on a real item from Black Honey Chili Cookie, whose brand descriptions are all fairly dismissive and copy-paste; Neku wears a brightly-colored coat from Gatto Nero, the brand made by his first partner, and though it does have a hood, he keeps it down.
• Handicapped Badass: Make no mistake, Neku has definitely improved his skills in the 3 years he spent in Shinjuku's UG, as shown by his handling of Minamimoto upon his return, but the particular rules of the current Reaper's Game restrict all participants to having only one Pin to fight with, in exchange for being able to use multiple powers and abilities if they swap their pins out, in contrast to the first game where many participants could only use a single pin and fighting style for the duration of their week. Whilst this means even newcomers like Rindo and Co can have Combo Platter Powers after a fashion, it also means that Neku's unable to be as effective a solo player as he was originally, instead of having to join up with the Wicked Twisters so that they can all combine their different pins in combat, rather than him using multiple pins alone.
• Humble Hero: In contrast to his status as a Living Legend, he is shown to be quite mellow and down-to-earth and even downplays his accomplishments when Fret starts to fanboy around him. It gets to the point that he even turns down an offer from Joshua to stay in the UG and set his sights on becoming Composer in order to go back home to the RG.
• In the Hood: Subverted. Neku's Gatto Nero coat has a hood, but in the style of several Kingdom Hearts characters, he always wears it down.
• Interspecies Friendship: Retains his one with Joshua from the previous game, and has now struck up a new one with the Reaper Coco as well.
• Ironic Nickname: Beat still calls him “Phones”, despite Neku no longer wearing his once-ever-present headphones. In fact, Beat is now the one constantly wearing headphones.
• Kid Hero All Grown-Up: Was 15 years old in the previous game and returns in NEO three years later as a mature and enlightened young adult.
• Legendary in the Sequel: Due to his accomplishments in the last game, Neku is widely respected, feared, and revered by both players and reapers alike.
• Living Legend: Many reapers and players acknowledge him as the Player of Legend from the game three years ago.
• Older and Wiser: Due to his Character Development from the first game, he acts like a mature and reassuring figure to the rest of the party, especially Rindo, to whom he acts as a sort of mentor. It's also hinted that he has a much better understanding of how the world works; he implies that knows the real reason WildKat closed down and he quickly discerns that Rindo's "Replay" is a potential danger. He's essentially NEO's equivalent to Mr. H, except he's playable.
• Odd Friendship: Has formed one with Coco of all people, which is even more impressive considering how she was the one who shot him back in A New Day (though she admittedly has her justifiable reasons for doing so). He’s one of the few people she is ever genuinely nice to and will even go out of her way to help him, even if it’s to do a favor she previously blew off from another figure such as Rindo.
• Sealed Good in a Can: Neku was sent to Shinjuku and stranded there by Joshua after his second death out of a mistrust of Coco and to protect him from people seeking out his abilities. It's not until Shibuya is well on its way to being destroyed that Neku is able to come back.
• Stepford Smiler: Has several pieces of dialogue which imply he's not as calm or cheerful as he lets on. One of his pre-battle lines sticks out in particular.
  Neku: The fighting never ends.
• Triumphant Reprise: A variation. Instead of the more raw sound of NEO, his entry into the fray is punctuated by the original, sweeter and overproduced version of "Twister". This nicely highlights his experience, status as The Paragon and how his involvement changes the playing field.
• Took a Level in Badass:
  • As if he already wasn’t a powerful force of nature at the end of the first game, NEO reveals that’s he been taking even bigger levels as he’s now able to scan Soul within a person, something very few high-level figures in the UG are able to do.
  • To reinforce just how powerful Neku has gotten, in the last game, he and Beat were subjected to a Curb-Stomp Battle at the hands of a Tabooified Sho Minamimoto and couldn’t even lay a scratch on him. In NEO? Neku takes him out in his Dissonance-powered state in one hit, after the proceeding boss battle had Sho taking on pretty much all the Wicked Twisters single-handedly, and being a Hopeless Boss Fight despite their best efforts.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Big-time. In the first game he started off as an apathetic jerk who had no value for other people (even almost killing Shiki when tricked by Uzuki) but became more mature and heroic over the course of the game. In this game, he has lost all his negative traits.
• Vocal Evolution: His voice is noticeably deeper and huskier than it was in the last game.

The Ruinbringers

In General

The best and strongest team of players in the new Reapers' Game.

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• The Ace: They are the top team in the Reapers' Game, ranking first in the score of pins collected and are implied to be very skilled and have really powerful psych abilities. Given Shiba needs the Ruinbringers to keep winning the games for his plans to cause the Inversion in Shibuya, it's likely that he handpicked the most combat capable of the Shinjuku Reapers to serve as the team's public face, so as to ensure that any attempts to unseat them on the 7th day would be for naught.
• Climax Boss: Susukichi and Tsugumi are the final bosses of Weeks 1 and 2 respectively, and are appropriately built up as such throughout said weeks. Shiba also counts for this in Week 3, especially considering he's not the Final Boss proper.
• Fixing the Game: Many players from the other teams suspect there must be foul play afoot, considering the Ruinbringers have stood undefeated for so long when they rarely complete any missions. They're actually a front for the referees, so it's literally impossible to dethrone them legally - to the point where two of their three members are trying to dethrone themselves, because they regard it as both bad in intent and just plain unfair.
• Foreshadowing: Each day ends with the Game Master declaring that another team accomplished the day's mission, but that the Ruinbringers are still the highest-scoring team. They don't even participate in the Day 6 mission at all, which is where the Players are expected to score the overwhelming majority of their points. There's a good reason they're somehow on top despite never doing anything that should increase their score.
• Meaningful Name: They were actually organized to help Shiba prevent any players from stopping the Inversion, which will destroy Shibuya - hence, bringers of ruin to Shibuya.
• Oddly Small Organisation: For a team that stands atop the hectic team battles uncontested, their actual member tally is surprisingly low, being only a mere 3-man team in contrast to the more numerous members of teams like the Deep Rivers, Variabeauties or the Purehearts, and that number includes their leader. Despite their small numbers, each member is strong enough to take on entire teams solo without breaking a sweat. Their low numbers make sense with the reveal that the Ruinbringers are actually all Shinjuku Reapers, meaning their lineup is made up of the toughest members of the Reapers running the games, and in that light, given they're just an extension of the Reapers as a whole, their organisation is actually the biggest in the game.
• The Starscream: The rare heroic version of this trope as two members are secretly trying to stop Shiba from erasing Shibuya.
• Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: As their leader is Shiba, this is given. As gets especially prominent in Week 2, the other teams can bust their butts earning as many points as they want to, but since the Ruinbringers are effectively the ones who announce the score, it doesn't actually matter how much points they earn, as the Ruinbringers announce that they're still on top regardless. The one time of the week this can be defied is the 7th day, as the Ruinbringers can be combated and beaten to put another team on top. The problem lies in the fact that the Ruinbringers are each absurdly tough and powerful on their own, capable of wiping out entire teams solo, which makes sense as they're actually all Reapers, with the associated power boosts and Noise Forms to handle any team with ease. And when Rindo and the others manage to beat Tsugumi regardless, Shiba has no problem blatantly breaking the rules by threatening the Wicked Twisters with being Devoured by the Horde unless they concede their 'defeat' to them, despite the Ruinbringers actually being, by the laws of the game, in last place.
• Walking Spoiler: There is more to them than just being the top player team. They are really Shinjuku Reapers led by Conductor Shiba himself, having formed for the express purpose of prolonging it indefinitely.
• Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing: They have such a commanding lead every week they don't even need to bother with missions to keep the top spot, as can be seen when they sit out Week 1's Scramble Slam entirely. This is yet another sign that the game is rigged.

Ruinbringers' Leader

The mysterious leader of the Ruinbringers. They remain in the shadows during the Reapers' Game and leave gathering points to their underlings, Susukichi and Tsugumi.

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• The Ghost: They are not seen at all during Week 1 and the majority of Week 2. Or so the Players are led to believe.
• Orcus on His Throne: They are never seen gathering points and delegate the task of completing missions to Susukichi and Tsugumi. Understandably so considering he's the Game Master.
• Walking Spoiler: The player never finds out their identity or know what they're all about until late in the game, so they've got to be a pretty big deal. Being the Game Master, rigging the game, and setting out to destroy Shibuya does indeed make him a pretty big deal.

Susukichi

Kaichi "Susukichi" Susuki

Voiced by: Natsuki Hanae (Japanese), Max Udell (English)

"You kids must be the newbies! Oooh, fresh outta the box, ain't ya?"

The first member of the Ruinbringers who Rindo and Fret meet, he is a bit of a chatterbox despite his muscular physique to make him seem more intimidating. He seems to have a thing for the board game reversi, even holding a reversi disc in his hands.

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• Affably Evil: To a point where he barely qualifies as evil. While he's very competitive and brutish, he's in general quite friendly more often than not. He's been opposed to Shiba since the start of the game, and the challenges he presented the Twisters with were his own way of toughening them up should he fail to stop him. In the first version of the Week 3 Day 6 events, he lures the Twisters into a trap - not to screw them over, but rather to keep them safe should Shibuya suffer an Inversion. It's telling that most of his teammates adore him, even the aloof Shoka.
• Affectionate Nickname: Shoka calls him "Big Su". Fret also refers to him as "Susy K" sometimes.
• Animal Motifs: Deer. His shirt has the skull of one, he sprouts antlers during his boss fight, and his Noise form is that of a huge deer/moose.
• Arc Villain: Susukichi is the main antagonist throughout Week 1, representing the Ruinbringers as whole through his loneself. He's not as present in following weeks, although he still shows up occasionally to confront you.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: The second stage of his Noise form, Cervus Cantus, is huge enough to stand in the expressway and still have his head and shoulders above the overpass.
• Berserk Button: Trying to confuse him by manipulating the rules of Reversi, or to a lesser extent asking him questions with no answer, pisses him off. Motoi lies about this, claiming it just sets him off his game, on Week 1, Day 7, in order to trick the Wicked Twisters into getting pummeled especially badly by him.
• Big Fun: He always seems like he's having the time of his life whenever he's on screen, enjoying the competition. He's also a pretty large dude, so big that his hands aren't really meant to use small phones, evidenced in his blurry selfies and spelling errors.
• Boisterous Bruiser: A big, boastful, and largely friendly guy.
• The Caretaker: At times acts like he's responsible for his quiet teammate Tsugumi. According to the Secret Reports, he cares the most about his fellow Reapers out of all the Shinjuku Reapers. He is very loyal to Shiba, but eventually starts to believe he needs to be taken down, but more as a way to help out a close friend who has gone too far and that it wouldn't be just for the good of others but Shiba as well. He also seems very aware of his friends' feelings, as he sympathetically recognizes that Shiba must be very lonely. Even Shoka affectionally refers to him as "Big Su."
• Combat Pragmatist: When he's losing the head-on fight against the Wicked Twisters thanks to Sho's assistance, he just retorts that he sees plenty of openings to win the fight and launches a surprise attack at the weaker and unprepared Rindo that would have killed him if not for Beat's appearance. Since he's actually a Stealth Mentor to the Twisters, it's likely the attack was to highlight how unfavourable it was to rely upon one single member to do the heavy lifting, and that Rindo and the others need to step up individually to become stronger as a team. And if the attack had killed Rindo, then he wasn't going to be of any use to stop Shiba in the long run anyway.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: It's not hard to draw comparisons between him and Higashizawa from the first game; both are The Brute of their respective teams, are the Climax Boss of the first week, both pepper their speech with some kind of word play (Susukichi with Reversi, Higashizawa with food and cooking) and Susukichi's Noise form is a direct homage to Higashizawa's. However, they're separated by one key difference: while Higashizawa is the only one of Kitaniji's Game Masters who is unflinchingly loyal to him, Susukichi is secretly working to undermine Shiba's plans to destroy Shibuya.
• Competition Freak: Shoka claims that Susukichi is primarily motivated by competition, as evidenced by his love of fighting and reversi.
• Dragon with an Agenda: Susukichi is effectively an enforcer for his leader Shiba, but he also goes out of his way to observe and even give a few nudges in the right direction for the Wicked Twisters, which appears to be not part of the Ruinbringers' plan. Knowing Susukichi, one might believe he's trying to groom them into Worthy Opponents so he can enjoy fighting them at full strength, but the truth is that he believes they might have potential to challenge Shiba, preparing them for an eventual bout with the boss.
• Dumb Muscle: In stark contrast to his main game self, Susukichi in Another Day is Kanon's manager, but only speaks in grunts.
• Face of a Thug: Beneath his boasting and intimidating visage, he turns out to be a pretty friendly if loud guy when not directly competing against other players. In fact, he even has good intentions behind initiating these confrontations, hoping to make at least one team strong enough to defeat Shiba.
• Flunky Boss: During the first phase of his final battle, he summons other Noise to act as distractions. These are Easterravens in the storyline battle and Hardcore Puffers in the optional battle with his alpha self.
• Foreshadowing: Deplete a portion of his health during his boss fight, and he'll activate his Power Tattoo abilities, causing them to glow Black or White depending on how he's attacking and manifesting a pair of glowing antlers that he uses to charge at the Twisters for a devastating attack. The antlers are made of Noise graffiti, a tell-tale sign that he's partially tapping into his Reaper powers to amplify his strength without fully transforming into his Noise form, and giving away the fact that he's a Reaper pretending to be a player.
• Genius Bruiser: Going in hand with his reversi obsession, he's way more clever than he appears. It's telling that even Hanekoma, an Angel and a genuine Guile Hero in his own right, praises his intelligence and creativity with the different ways he kept the Twisters safe from Shiba.
• Good All Along: It turns out, he was against Shiba from the very start and had always been plotting to take him down. In the final week, he traps the Wicked Twisters in Shibuya river to save them should the city be erased in the event that he failed. When they evade the trap, he fights them and submits to erasure, content with the knowledge that they can defeat Shiba.
• Hero Antagonist: Is somewhat of one. He sends the Wicked Twisters on various missions and fights them three times, however this is to help them become strong enough to defeat Shiba.
• Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: Beating Susukichi at the end of Week 1 only elicits an amused reaction from him as he proceeds to almost smash Rindo to bits, even though you see him collapsing at the end of the battle proper. Also applies in-universe, as "Neku"/Beat jumping in to save you annuls the match on a technicality.
• I Am Not Left-Handed: Susukichi actually holds back his full strength in Weeks 1 and 2, as he is intent in raising the Wicked Twisters' experience and abilities first and foremost by presenting himself as a powerful, yet accessible opponent. His full strength is only properly unleashed in Week 3, as he takes the role of a final test to see if the Twisters have what it takes to beat Shiba.
• I Know Madden Kombat: Fittingly, a couple of his psychs are themed after Reversi.
• Internal Homage: The fight with Cervus Cantus is a homage to Ovis Cantus, Higashizawa's Noise form from the first game, with both using similar animations and attacks and being fought in the same place, complete with taking place on a rainy night. The first part of the fight being on the ground and the second on the overpass is also a reference to the DS version of the Ovis fight, where Neku fought him on the ground and Shiki fought him on the overpass.
• Ironic Nickname: Beat calls him "Hater Skater", despite the fact that he doesn't skate, nor does he really hate the heroes, especially since he shares the same goals as them.
• Leitmotif: "We're Losing You", a seriously hard, death metal beat which plays during all three of his boss encounters.
• One-Winged Angel: Turns into a giant deer Noise called Cervus Cantus to fight Rindo's party during the final week.
• Recurring Boss: Rindo's team fights him three times throughout the game.
• Scary Teeth: He has rows of exclusively sharp teeth like a shark, and he really likes flashing them.
• Secret Test of Character: He initiates a battle with Rindo's party in the final week to see if they're strong enough to take down Shiba in his stead. He refuses to pull any punches and dies as a result shortly after passing his objective on to them.
• Shock and Awe: As Cervus Cantus, he has several attacks that involve electricity, from summoning lightning bolts to generating waves of energy. The latter attack can either simply repel Rindo and his pals away or be charged into a massive blast that will fry anyone on the battlefield, Noise included, unless cover is taken.
• Smarter Than You Look: He's a huge guy, looks like a thug, and fights like a tank, but there's a reason he's obsessed with a strategy game. He's quite skilled at setting up ambush tactics, and his long-term scheme to sabotage the game is rather clever.
• Stationary Boss: In his third fight, he sits in his position and does not move.
• Stealth Mentor: He's deliberately giving hints to rival teams when you meet him, hoping to find someone capable of stopping Shiba.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Hilariously, because of his size and big sausage fingers, any phone would be tiny and not very user-friendly. His selfies turn out blurry and out of focus, and he can't spell for shit while texting. Fret and Rindo have a laugh over the fact that he hasn't enabled autocorrect.
• Tiny-Headed Behemoth: His head's about the same size as every other character's. It's just that his upper body is massive in comparison.
• Top-Heavy Guy: His legs are practically twigs when compared to his massive upper body.
• Unexplained Recovery:
  • On Week Two, Day 7, the Wicked Twisters collaborate with the Variabeauties, each team splitting up to handle one of the two public members of the Ruinbringers and preventing them from teaming up to crush the opposition. Rindo and the others handily beat Susukichi down and leave Motoi to guard him whilst they turn their attention to Tsugumi, only for him to revive off-screen and easily trounce Motoi as if the fight never happened. Shiba explains this is a function of them being Reapers, as they can recover all their energy and stamina if they're not outright erased by the end of a fight, further highlighting the unfairness of trying to unseat the Ruinbringers by 'fair' means.
  • To a lesser extent, this also applies to his shirt and padlock necklace, as both fights with him in his human form have him apparently remove/destroy the shirt to show off his Power Tattoos and break the chain necklace, leaving only a slice of chain to dangle around his neck, yet the subsequent cutscenes depict him again wearing a shirt and with his necklace whole.
• Unusual Euphemism: Refers to others as "discs" and seems to liken the Reaper's game to the Reversi game board, from black and white discs to regions. He can even be seen flipping a Reversi disc in his hand.
• Villain Forgot to Level Grind: When the Wicked Twisters face him for a Rematch in Week 2, they have a markedly easier time facing him, due to having improved their fighting skills throughout the week's hectic battles, as well as adding Beat and Shoka to their ranks, whereas Susukichi's skills are mostly the same, though he does show stronger variations on his attacks from last time. From a story perspective, the fight is even treated as a warm-up for the real fight against Arc Villainess Tsugumi. It's also Invoked as Susukichi wants the Twisters to be strong enough to take down Shiba if he fails to do it himself. Facing the Twisters with a similar level of power as last time allows him to gauge how much they've improved themselves since last week. When they face him for the final time in Week 3, Susukichi goes all-out, determined to either end Shiba himself or prove that the Twisters are strong enough to do the deed, even at the cost of his life.
• Vocal Dissonance: Despite a very large build his voice is rather high and nasally.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: All his schemes in game are an attempt to train the Wicked Twisters so they would be able to defeat Shiba.
• Wham Line: "Do me a favor. Take down the boss for me… will ya?"

Tsugumi

Tsugumi Matsunae

Voiced by: Yuka Ozaki (Japanese), Ciara Riley Wilson (English)

Trailer

"I am Tsugumi Matsunae. A Ruinbringer."

A mysterious, emotionless girl who carries a Mr. Mew plush. Initially introduced as the Sole Survivor of an Inversion affecting the city of Shinjuku during the events of Final Remix, Tsugumi now plays the Reaper's Game for purposes unknown.

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• Antiquated Linguistics: In Another Day, she has speech patterns similar to Nagi, who's her friend in this universe; for example, they address each other as "Lady Nagi" and "Lady Tsugumi."
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Like Shiki before her, her Mr. Mew plush is able to change size. Unlike Shiki, Tsugumi doesn't have to use her Limit Break to make it grow to the size of a skyscraper.
• Arc Villainess: She's predominantly fought in Week 2, although this is downplayed as she's not as active and involved in antagonising the Wicked Twisters as Susukichi was, with the majority of the week's confrontations being between the various teams instead, as shown by the entire conflict with Motoi. This can be attributed to her being an Empty Shell, as she literally has no will or personality to motivate her to attack the Twisters, and both times they confront her are due to conflict of objectives.
• Beam Spam: Can project dozens of lasers as Grus Cantus, even using them to form grids across the battlefield.
• Call-Back: All of Mr. Mew's attacks are based off what it can do in Shiki's Fusions in the first game, from cloning to changing size to firing Eye Beams.
• The Cassandra: Her prophetic visions and warnings couldn't save Shinjuku.
• Climax Boss: The fight with her at the end of Week 2 dovetails into some very hefty plot twists.
• Cover-Blowing Superpower: Her turning into Grus Cantus is THE big giveaway that the Ruinbringers are Reapers. Susukichi's antlers hint at it, but Tsugumi's transformation is irrefutable. Beat even lampshades it after it's formally revealed.
• Death Glare: Gives a rather unnerving one for a cute and innocent looking girl right before her second fight with the Twisters.
• Doppelgänger Attack: When battling the team in her Noise form, Grus Cantus produces a shadowy double of herself to provide additional fire. When further weakened, she will create another, at one point filling the air with clones to use as ammo for a barrage of fireballs.
• Dreaming of Things to Come: Her Psych allows her to invoke prophetic visions of the future into any target she desires. This is how she is able to show Neku visions of the Inversion during Final Remix, and how Rindo receives visions of impending failure during days where he is able to invoke his Mental Time Travel powers. In addition, due to her Soul being trapped inside Mr. Mew, this was her way of calling for help since her physical body is an Empty Shell which has no way of communicating her predicament.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Tsugumi initially appeared in a secret illustration in Solo Remix unlocked by collecting all Secret Reports, but since she was unnamed and the illustration had no context besides the text "NEW 7 DAYS". She later has her first plot-relevant appearance in the Final Remix exclusive chapter "A New Day", where Neku sees visions of her wandering Shinjuku after it's Inverted, and she is finally properly introduced in NEO.
• Emotionless Girl: She hardly emotes to the point it's a bit off-putting. Justified as her heart and soul are inside her Mr. Mew plush, meaning what we see is an Empty Shell.
• Empathic Environment: The sky is noted to instantly darken whenever she gets pissed or ready to fight.
• Fangirl: In Another Day, she's a die-hard fan of Dëf March and competes with Nagi to see who's been to the most concerts and owns the most merchandise.
• Feathered Fiend: As Grus Cantus, she becomes a humanoid red-crowned crane.
• Foreshadowing: The visual effect when she clones herself is the same as the one around Rindo's visions, hinting that Tsugumi's the real source of the visions.
• Fighting a Shadow: In a sense. The fight with her as "Grus Cantus" is technically only a Empty Shell with Tsugumi's soul being within the Mr. Mew fought twice prior.
• Girls Love Stuffed Animals: Carries around her own Mr. Mew stuffed toy.
• Hero of Another Story: Downplayed because we don’t know much about Tsugumi’s time in Shinjuku, but creative producer Tetsuya Nomura considers her the heroine of the Shinjuku side of the story. She does play a role like a protagonist in that she not only tried to prevent the destruction of Shinjuku, but is also trying to prevent the destruction of Shibuya. According to the Secret Reports, she was one of the first people to suspect Kubo in his scheme to destroy Shinjuku and try to stop him. She also has a design reminiscent of a protagonist with a predominantly light color scheme. She also has several analogues design-wise to Neku such as being the same height as he was in the first game at 163 cm and wearing headphones. Shoka was designed to be a foil design-wise as such because Nomura considers Shoka the heroine of the main story.
• Leitmotif:
  • She's highly associated with "LAST CALL", which plays in the battles against Mr. Mew.
  • "SCRAMBLE" may count since it's the battle theme against Grus Cantus, but it's not exclusive to her. On closer inspection of the lyrics, the lyrics seem to pertain to the relationship between Rindo and Shoka, especially because the track plays almost always when Shoka is in the scene and it plays during the pivotal scene between Rindo and Shoka after the final battle.
  • "Hustle and Bustle" also counts due to it playing during The Reveal of her true personality and sebsequent scenes after. Although much like SCRAMBLE, it's not exclusive to her.
• Light Is Good: She's a Reaper with a primarily bright color scheme, and unlike the similarly colorful-looking Coco, she's a kind girl through and through. The light color scheme is perhaps also a tipoff that she and Coco are actually friends.
• Master of Illusion: She can cloak the battlefield in shadows so that she can't be targeted unless the player gets up close, or produce holographic duplicates of herself to multiply her attacks.
• Meaningful Name: Her full name, Tsugumi Matsunae, means "after the end", fitting for a woman who survived the Inversion of Shinjuku.
• Mysterious Past: Her history is never fully explained, but the Secret Reports do fill in some major gaps. She's the little sister of Shinjuku's Conductor at the time of the Inversion, but when Hazuki went behind the older Matsunae's back and had Kubo initiate the Inversion, Tsugumi grew suspicious and realized Kubo's true nature. To stop her, he stripped her of her Reaperhood and stole her Soul. When the Inversion occurred, Conductor Matsunae found her Soul used the last of his strength to seal it in a Mr. Mew doll before she was eventually drafted into the Ruinbringers.
• Nice Girl: When she finally has her soul back, she reveals herself to be one of the kindest and sweetest characters in the series, even able to snap Shiba out of his funk without much fuss.
• No Name Given: In her cameos in the rereleases of the first game, she never actually appears in relation to anybody else, leaving her with no opportunity to introduce herself. She is finally given a name in the sequel.
• Odd Friendship: She's actually good friends with the rather two-faced and sarcastic Coco, whose schemes in the prior game were all to (unsuccessfully) save Shinjuku from destruction.
• Oh, Crap!: Is shown to be visibly sweating when "Neku" (really Beat) shows up between her and the Wicked Twisters. It's telling about how shaken up she is that she immediately targets the newcomer instead of Rindo and the others.
• Older Than They Look: Downplayed. You’d think she was around the same age as Rindo and Fret, but she’s actually 18 physically.
• One-Winged Angel: Transforms into a crane Noise called Grus Cantus to fight Rindo's party at the end of the second week.
• One-Woman Army: You would think Susukichi is the heavy hitter of the Ruinbringers, but Tsugumi outright puts his skills to shame. A single demonstration of her ludicrously destructive abilities makes the Twisters dread having to fight her again.
• Powers Do the Fighting: In her first encounter, she only fights by way of animating Mr. Mew to attack the party. She actually attempts a regular bullet psych attack after her defeat, but is stopped by Beat before that can happen.
• The Quiet One: In the little dialogue she does have, most of it is just "..." She becomes a lot more talkative after her soul is returned to her body, though even her true self is somewhat soft-spoken.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Her pupils have a subtle red glow. Said glow is notably gone when her true personality emerges. The red glow is most likely a sign of being mind controlled like the characters who wore the O-Pins in the first game and Ayano when she succumbs to the Plague Noise in her, specifically by the Plague Noise for her and Ayano.
• Red Herring: There are a few hints that Tsugumi might be Swallow. Her Social Network profile suggests that she has a connection to Rindo, she transforms into a bird Noise(albeit a crane rather than a swallow), and Swallow stops responding to Rindo after the end of Week 2, around the time of the last fight with Tsugumi. In actuality, Swallow is Tsugumi's fellow Reaper Shoka Sakurane.
• Seers: She's the one sending out the visions that Rindo and Neku see.
• Sequential Boss: The fight with her at the end of Week 2 has two parts: first a rematch with Mr. Mew, then Tsugumi fights the party directly as Grus Cantus.
• Sole Survivor: She's the only one left standing after Shinjuku gets erased at the end of "A New Day".
• Soul Jar: The Mr. Mew in her possession contains her soul, which explains why she acts like an Emotionless Girl.
• The Stoic: Her true personality - while she quite clearly has more emotions and initiative, she's still soft-spoken and introverted.
• Unknown Character: In Solo Remix and Final Remix, she is only ever seen in visions and discussed indirectly; everything about her, even her name, is an enigma.
• Walking Spoiler: In the Solo Remix, she's nothing but a picture tagged on the end of the post-credits scene that plays after collecting all the Secret Reports. In the Final Remix, she's present in Neku's visions during "A New Day", which is only available after clearing challenge fights throughout the rest of the game.
• You Can't Fight Fate: Despite her power allowing her to forewarn Neku and Rindo of bad outcomes for then, every single one of her visions comes true in the end, despite the heroes attempting to avoid them, mainly because they're so scattered and fragmented they can't make out enough context clues to understand what's happening, only understanding in hindsight. It's Subverted with Rindo's particular power, which allows him to return to the day's start with now full context to rewrite events in his team's favour, but the endgame twist that doing so actually built up dissonance Noise to erase Shibuya means that both of them were unknowingly progressing on the path towards Shibuya's inversion without knowing it, despite avoiding said outcome being Tsugumi's goal. It's implied that the fragmented visions are because of Tsugumi's current state of being, as she gives a noticeably clearer vision to Shiba in the Final Day and fully explains the context surrounding it.

The Deep Rivers Society

In General

A group of river enthusiasts whose game-plan is to survive by being cautious and steady-going led by Fuya.

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• All Men Are Perverts: Some of their talks on "bodies of waters" turn out to refer to real-life women they have crushes on.
• Butt-Monkey: They're a bunch of unlikable, pratty dweebs who are way too obsessed with water bodies and who serve to exclusively demonstrate that the Game is no joke. They suffer one humiliation after another until they're ultimately erased.
• Enemy Mine: During the first Scramble Slam, they offer to help you wipe out the Variabeauties by outflanking them when you hit their front line.
• Gang of Hats: All of the members are obsessed with rivers and often make puns based on bodies of water. Aside from their leader, they also all wear tucked-in flannel shirts and jeans.
• Geek: For rivers and bodies of water specifically. They also all wear tucked-in flannel shirts on top of several of their members wearing glasses and having lanky builds giving them a distinctively geeky appearance compared to other characters.
• Long-Range Fighter: The Deep River Societists specialize in long-range psychs and have poor close-range combat skills.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: The Secret Reports state that they've survived at least 30 renditions of the Game, just like the Variabeauties and Purehearts though they're still small fry compared to everyone else. Some dialogue seems to imply they've managed for so long by being at least more competent than complete newcomers, letting them come in second to last as long as new people end up in the UG every week, until the Wicked Twisters unfortunately showed up. The reports even state that the average got much better the moment they were erased (since new teams have to have an Imagination greater than the average, that means no more fodder teams will be joining the Reaper's Game), as the rest of the teams were far more promising than they were.
• Serious Business: These guys are really, really into bodies of water, and their dialogue is just full of water and river related word play.
  Fuya: You can row, row, row all you want, but you won't go gently down this stream!
• Skewed Priorities: Exploited. Rindo is able to turn the tides against their ambush by Replaying and ensuring that several members pursue their hobbies instead of being on duty to fight.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: While they get some characterization with their individual members' interests, they are erased to the last man at the end of week 1 after Susukichi wipes them out and takes all their points.

Fuya

Fuya Kawahara

Voiced by: Yoshiki Nakajima (Japanese), Adam Gold (English)

"You can row, row, row all you want... but you won't go gently down this stream!"

The leader of the Deep Rivers Society. While cowardly, his strategy of playing it safe has been enough to keep his team out of last place during previous games.

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• Arc Villain: He and his team are predominantly fought during the first week, although he's defeated just a bit before the week ends, and both him and the DRS are erased at the end of the week.
• Leitmotif: Three Minutes Clapping (NEO Mix) plays when he introduces himself to the Wicked Twisters, while CHASE plays during his boss fight. Fitting, as you've spent the whole mission chasing after golden Pig Noise and chasing away Fuya's goons.
• Non-Action Guy: Takes a "flight-over-fight" approach to the Reaper's game, which is how he and his team have avoided dropping out. He is forced into action on Day 5 when his ambush on the Wicked Twisters falls apart but he mostly relies on running away, calling on back up, and filling the battlefield with mines. This changes during Day 7, where he tries to take down the Ruinbringers, but ends up defeated, causing his team to lose all their points and thus get erased.
• Ocular Gushers: Cries a river when The Wicked Twisters manage to gain a victory over them on the 5th day of Week 1 despite all of his planning. While Nagi believes it's due to deep-seated insecurities, Rindo suspects that he may actually be fearful for his life. Rindo's suspicions are confirmed on Day 7.
• Sacrificial Lamb: His execution for coming in last place shows the Wicked Twisters that yes, the Game is a life-or-death affair.
• Smart People Wear Glasses: He seems to have a lot of knowledge of Shinjuku and wears a pair of thick glasses.
• Starter Villain: He's the only other prominent antagonist of Week 1 aside from Susukichi, although he's far weaker and less threatening.

The Variabeauties

In General

A group of stylists with a passion for fashion led by Kanon Tachibana.

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• Beneath the Mask: At least one of them shows a more aggressive side behind the ditzy and friendlier exterior, catching the Twisters a bit off-guard.
• Camp Gay: Implied. Their male members have some hilariously fabulous battlecries and they tend to come off as incredibly over-sensitive and vainglorious, but their sexualities are never actually explored. Appears to actually be the case at least with the member Maito, who mistakenly assumes the Purehearts member Sumio is coming onto him and turns him down by stating he isn't exactly his type in a way that indicates the same gender isn't the issue. He later mentions that he finds Sumio irritating, because he constantly keeps pestering him.
• The Fashionista: Their shtick is being the fashionable group, and all of them are decked out in colourful clothing.
• Malicious Misnaming: Some of them refer to the Wicked Twisters as the "Icky Twisters".
• The Rival: Of the 4 teams, theirs is the one that best fits this dynamic with the Wicked Twisters, being competitive with them to earn points in the various challenges, but possessing a sense of honour and fairness, not resorting to underhanded schemes to win like the Purehearts, and even offering to cooperate together to tackle difficult challenges with their combined resources for overall victory such as dethroning the Ruinbringers during Week Two, Day 7 by each individually fighting Susukichi and Tsugumi to prevent them teaming up together and combing their overwhelming combat strength against them.
• Rivals Team Up: During the first half of Week Three, after it becomes clear that the Ruinbringers are blatantly cheating, they team up with the Wicked Twisters to battle them.

Kanon

Kanon Tachibana

Voiced by: Sumire Uesaka (Japanese), Xanthe Huynh (English)

"My eyeliner put up a real struggle this morning... but it looks like my luck has turned up."

The leader of the Variabeauties. Her Psych skills aren't the best, but she more than makes up for it with her charisma and cunning.

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• Authority Sounds Deep: Her voice, at least in the English dub, is pretty deep, and she's a formidable team leader and Player.
• Con Man: In Another Day, she's pushing overpriced books onto suckers.
• Dude Magnet: She has a posse following her in her first appearance, and Fret immediately flushes in her presence as well as gains a crush on her. Fret later admits the reason he didn't attempt to talk to her further was because all the guys behind her made him too nervous to try.
• Dying as Yourself: Fret is able to free her from the Plague Noise's influence before she gets erased.
• Dying Declaration of Love: She accepts Fret's compliments as genuine and calls herself charmed as she dies.
• Everyone Has Standards: She's an unscrupulous player but only when she thinks everyone has equal odds. She has no problems putting rivalries aside once she finds out that the Reaper's Game is actually rigged.
• Face Death with Dignity: In conrast to Fuya and Motoi, who spend their last moments terrified or begging for their lives, Kanon's last words encourage the Wicked Twisters, Fret, in particular.
• Females Are More Innocent: She's the only female leader of an opposing team, and she's the most sympathetic by a good margin.
• Hero Antagonist: The Vamp she may be, but she is shown to care about her team, is honorable, and doesn't at all hold the fact she's a rival of the Wicked Twisters against them. By Week 2, she isn't even an antagonist, having realized that the Ruinbringers are cheating, and willing to allow the Twisters to win now so she has a chance later.
• Interface Spoiler: Looking at the Noisepedia shows that there's no empty spot right after her minions despite Fuya and Motoi having such spots. This hints at the fact that she's not going to be faced directly in combat.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: She's the only other major player (who isn't a Twister) who is genuinely amicable, compared to the whiny Fuya and grade-A asshole Motoi, even if she is unscrupulous enough of a player to steal wins from other teams to keep hers afloat. After she becomes a genuine ally to the Wicked Twisters, the unscrupulous aspects fall by the wayside, leading her to be consistently sweet and cordial in all her interactions with them.
• Lovable Alpha Bitch: Kanon is beautiful and popular, but also seductive and not to be trifled with (which is why her teammates refer to her as "Kween Kanon"). Still, she is nothing less than a good person.
• Ms. Fanservice: Her feminine outfits really emphasize her good looks.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Kanon normally texts with perfect grammar, and is often teasing or flirty in her messages. Her texting Fret in all lowercase and telling him to stay away as the Plague Noise worsens is a sign to him that something is very wrong.
• Red Herring: Her initial introduction has her casually stealing points Rindo and Fret won fair and square (but didn't know about), leading the player to believe she'll become a threat later on. However, she quickly realizes that their team can be very useful without taking advantage of them and honestly gives them pointers.
• Stealing the Credit: Takes the pin that would have rewarded Rindo and Fret some points after taking down the Gorilla Noise. Her Social Network profile states that she's done this in the past to other teams which have left them in dead last place.
• Stealth Mentor: She is this to Fret, giving him advice about how to be more honest with his social interactions instead of a fake sycophant.
• Stepford Smiler: While she puts up a flirtatious and cheerful front, it’s clear from looking at certain dialogue that going through thirty loops of the Game with seemingly no end in sight have taken their toll on her psyche. When the gang dives inside her mind in order to free her from the Plague Noise possessing her, she is shown to be understandably quite bitter about her circumstances and even dryly comments about how she wished that the Wicked Twisters could’ve wiped out the Reapers altogether for her before reprimanding herself for thinking that way.
• The Unfought: Is the only team leader to not come into direct combat with the Wicked Twisters, but you do fight Plague Noise that takes control of her.
• The Vamp: Uses her feminine charms to get what she wants.

The Purehearts

In General

A group of social media influencers led by Motoi.

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• Drama Queen: The Wicked Twisters meet more than one of them acting overly dramatic and talking way too long about something that happened to them.
• Foreshadowing: Motoi's men are particularly fond of scheming, cooperating only for self-benefit and stealing credit for stuff Rindo and his friends achieve. This merely shows that they take after their leader more than initially thought.
• Ironic Name: Motoi is anything but pure-hearted, and his followers aren't any better.
• Language Barrier: Some of them try to imitate their leaders habit of using different European languages, though according to Sumio they all have a hard time understanding and answering their leader through texting.
• Pure Is Not Good: Despite the name they are not pure-hearted, resorting to trickery and schemes to get ahead.

Motoi

Motoi Anazawa

Voiced by: Wataru Komada (Japanese), Nick Thurston (English)

"I’m prepared to help out, of course! The more people working together, the better the résultat."

The leader of the Purehearts. In life, he was a popular social media influencer known as "An0ther" who would treat his followers to philosophical quotes as he traveled the world.

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• Alas, Poor Villain: In spite of all he did, it's hard not to feel bad for him when he gets erased.
• Arc Villain: He and his team are predominantly fought during Week 2, although like Fuya, he's also defeated just before the week ends, and is also subsequently erased at the end of the week along with the Purehearts.
• The Atoner: Downplayed. After he's exposed and his plans are ruined, he confesses the extent of his plagiarism, apologizes for deceiving Rindo, offers to help in whatever way he can, and even tosses one of his usual benevolent platitude memes at Rindo (well after it's been revealed they're all stolen). His cooperation is still motivated by self-preservation, and he still dies begging to join the Reapers rather than face erasure, but that he makes no further attempts to betray you (and sincerely apologizes for being unable to complete the task given to him) seems to indicate that his spiel about how much it hurt to see a disappointed fan in-person for the first time might not have been an attempt to garner sympathy. Saving his own skin still comes first, but he seems to be trying to atone in any way he can within that framework.
• Big Fun: He comes off like this, but he will absolutely play dirty if it means he'll win.
• Bilingual Bonus: In the English dub, he speaks a variety of European languages peppered in his dialogue.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: He is a con artist who has no problem lying and cheating others to save his own skin.
• Blunt "Yes": Does two when his two colors are revealed.
  • Fret asks whether Motoi intentionally gave them bad advice about Susukichi. Motoi says yes, and adds that they fell for it.
  • After losing to the Wicked Twisters, a desperate Motoi is determined that his efforts will not be in vain. When Rindo asks if he means lying and cheating, Motoi says, "I sure do, mi amigo."
• Broken Pedestal: Rindo used to idolize Motoi when the latter posted through his online account, An0ther, since the latter's philosophical daily quotes, tended to resonate with him. He even outright says the Motoi's philosophical quotes helped him deal with his Fatal Flaw of indecisiveness, indicating that he used to struggle with simple choices like what to have for dinner before he started listening to and using Motoi's advice to better interact with his friends and family. Unfortunately for Rindo, he ends up finding out that Motoi's image as a friendly, wise influencer is all a lie.
• Cast from Money: When faced as a boss, Motoi will periodically use his laptop to begin a psych-altered program called FundMePlz. Any active Purehearts will pause and use their phones to send him money to fill up a gauge that will allow Motoi to perform several moves. If no one is around, Motoi is forced to use his own funds in order to summon forth more minions.
• Con Man: It turns out all his content that Rindo idolizes is just stuff he took from others on the net and claimed them all as his own under the nickname "An0ther" to take credit. He doesn't even understand any of the sayings himself.
• Contempt Crossfire: After Motoi's defeat, not only do Rindo and the Wicked Twisters despise him for his betrayal, but Kubo casts him aside for failing to live up to his end of the bargain.
• Creepy Shadowed Undereyes: Visible shadows appear under his eyes when he shows his true colors as a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing.
• Dissonant Serenity: Downplayed; his smile and platitudes are known to give off good vibes, but his superficiality and use of "fancy words" often rub people off the wrong way.
• Evil Counterpart: In a way, he's this to Hanekoma. Both he and Hanekoma have alternate identities that the protagonists look up to, namely CAT for Hanekoma and an0ther for Motoi. However, while Hanekoma turns out to be a genuinely helpful mentor, if a bit mysterious, Motoi turns out to be a self-serving jackass who's only in it for himself, and part of Rindo's character arc involves him realizing this. Finally, while Hanekoma turns out to have been The Man Behind the Man, he's ultimately still helping out the heroes behind the scenes. Meanwhile, while Motoi realizes how awful he's been to the heroes and tries to make amends, it's too late for him, as he gets erased by the end of the second week.
• Evil Laugh: Delivers a devilish laugh during his boss fight if you fail to stop his FundMePlz attack, which sends you right into a game over.
  Motoi: Au revoir, Wicked Twisters! Hahahaha!
• Fat Bastard: A heavyset man who turns out to be manipulative and selfish.
• Foreshadowing: The tip he gives Rindo about the Reversi technique to mention to Susukichi gets Susukichi royally pissed off that he ends up killing Rindo for it instead of being a weakness. This is an early clue that Motoi was deceiving Rindo from the start.
• Formerly Fit: One of his pictures shows that he used to be fit.
• Gratuitous Foreign Language: He peppers his vocabulary with phrases and words from European languages as well as his texts, which give him a learned air that makes him sound wiser and more educated than he actually is. Although other Purehearts know some foreign languages of their own, Motoi is on another level; this means that sometimes his own teammates can't make out what he's saying and have to guess based on context clues. A side quest at one point has Rindo and the others helping his lieutenant decipher his group chat texts to them, with the Lieutenant pointing out that nobody has replied to him because none of them can understand exactly what he's saying, and none of them want to embarrass themselves by saying the wrong thing. The fact that he continues to do so even after being exposed hints that the usage is less to present an image and more out of genuine interest in the languages themselves.
• Hate Sink: He comes off as a nice and inspiring young man who tries to help the Wicked Twisters. However, his confrontation with Shoka on Week 2, Day 6 reveals his true colors, an egotistical asshole who steals quotes from other people as An0ther. Downplayed at the end of Week 2 as he seems to be genuinely remorseful for deceiving Rindo. By the time he gets erased he deserves at least a bit of sympathy.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam: By the end of the second week, he seems to be genuinely reflecting on himself after being exposed as a plagiarist in front of one of his biggest fans and losing his opportunity to become a Reaper. However, since his team remains in last place at the end of the day, he's erased before he gets a full chance to actually try to improve himself or just go back to his old ways.
• Ice-Cream Koan: In contrast to the An0ther poems that Rindo quotes throughout the game, the platitudes he sends to Rindo after revealing his identity tend to come across as this.
  If you want your wet clothes to dry
  Hang 'em where water's in short supply
• Interface Screw: One of his moves is starting a conversation with the Purehearts and flooding the screen with speech bubbles.
• It's All About Me: He has no qualms screwing over anyone else if it means he himself can get ahead, whether it be building a successful social media account on stolen material or trying to make a deal with Kubo to become a Reaper while leaving his teammates to almost certain erasure. Even in his final moments, he begs Shiba to spare him by insisting he's destined for greatness and doesn't deserve to be erased.
• Jerkass Has a Point: While Motoi is a manipulative liar, he is absolutely correct that the Reaper's Game is completely rigged in the Ruinbringers' favor, and fighting them fairly will just end up in defeat anyway, so conning and tricking other rival teams is as much valid as any other tactic.
• Know-Nothing Know-It-All: Doesn't really understand any of his stolen platitudes, though he does seem to understand other languages pretty well.
• Leitmotif: "Hustle and Bustle" is used as his boss theme, though it plays regularly in the overworld at certain parts.
• Plagiarism in Fiction: His quotes as An0ther were really just random ones he liked and stole for himself. He justifies it by saying he was giving the sayings exposure that they otherwise would not have had, but he does not seem to actually care.
• Pragmatic Villainy: As much as Shoka hates Motoi, she's fairly confident that he won't betray Rindo and Kanon on the final day of Week 2. If he does, the Variabeauties and Wicked Twisters will be eliminated, leaving the Purehearts as the Ruinbringers' only opponent in the following week and guaranteeing his erasure.
• Shadow Archetype: Acts as one towards Rindo. Much like Rindo, he was indecisive about what he wanted to do or who he was, to the point that he can only find purpose in his persona as An0ther adopting others’ words and viewpoints as his own. Due to the circumstances of the Game and how rigged it is, this aspect of his personality only became worse as he becomes more and more desperate to survive doing whatever means necessary and unlike Rindo, he never gets the chance to reflect and change this flaw due to his untimely Erasure at the hands of Shiba. In that sense, he’s an adult version of Rindo who never got the chance to actually grow up.
• Status Buff: One effect FundMePlz can do is to temporarily raise the attack power of Motoi and his Purehearts.
• Stealing the Credit: He sets himself up as the mysterious benefactor helping the Twisters during Week 2, since Shoka can't exactly come out and say she was the one helping a Player team.
• Stupid Evil: His sabotaging of the Wicked Twisters' fight with Susukichi would not have benefitted him in the long run because he would still have to deal with the Ruinbringers in the next Week or two unless he was already planning to worm his way into the Reapers. Especially if he accounted for the Deep Rivers Society trying to defeat the Ruinbringers in a last-ditch attempt to get out of dead last and losing. Having the team with the most potential to dethrone and get rid of the strongest team do that would have made the next Week easier for him. Having less teams around would also make it so that his team has to work harder to not end up dead last. Case-in-point, his team is the second team to get erased in the game because they earned the least number of points in Week 2 which would have happened even if he got rid of the Wicked Twisters and didn't manage to worm his way into the Reapers. As discussed in his Pragmatic Villainy entry, he might have considered this possibility, but his actions come off as poorly thought-out in retrospect.
• Unwitting Pawn: Kubo plays him rather well in Week 2.

Reapers

The Shibuya Reapers

In General

A group of Reapers hailing from Shibuya. Three of them — Uzuki, Kariya, and Coco — return from The World Ends with You.

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• Demoted to Extra: In-universe. Due to most of their leadership's getting wiped out in the first game and Shiba's taking charge, the Shibuya Reapers are mostly relegated to sideline jobs. It's to the extent that Uzuki was the Game Master before Shiba took over.
• Friendly Enemy: Especially in comparison to how they acted in the first game, they are far friendlier to the Players this time around.
• Heel–Face Turn: Once Shiba reveals his true colors, they start actively helping Rindo and his party during the final week since they wish to prevent Shibuya's erasure just as much as the protagonists do.
• Winged Humanoid: What notably separates them from their Shinjuku peers, who don't seem to possess them until they go into their One-Winged Angel forms (though there are background Shinjuku Reapers with visible wings in one of the flashbacks, none of them appear in the present-day story itself).

Uzuki

Uzuki Yashiro

Voiced by: Satomi Arai (Japanese), Kate Higgins (English)

"Looks like even death is no cure for unbridled idiocy."

The former Game Master of Shibuya, who was promoted from the rank-and-file following the events of the first game. She still holds a significant position with the Shinjuku Reapers in command, though the way they run things frustrates her to no end.

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• Berserk Button:
  • Abandoning one's partner pisses her off more than anything. When Hishima refuses to speak with Shiba just hearing about it from Rindo is enough for her to call Hishima up and scream at him for it.
  • Threatening Kariya or seeing him in peril really sets her off. She gets furiously concerned when she sees that Kariya was in danger from the Plague Noise, mistakenly believing that the Wicked Twisters were at fault. When Fret offers to help, she immediately snaps at him, thinking he's about to finish Kariya off, although her anger was misfounded.
• Field Promotion: She'd managed to rise to the rank of Game Master by the time Shiba and the remaining Shinjuku Reapers came to Shibuya seeking a new home. This might have something to do with pretty much every other reaper involved in the previous game being erased facing off against Neku, and Kariya not being interested in getting promoted, leaving her the one most likely to ascend the ranks in the resulting vacancies.
• Friendly Enemy: Thanks to the new player-versus-player format of the Reapers' Game she no longer has any incentive to actively antagonize players, and as a result she's on much better terms with the Wicked Twisters than she was with the heroes of the first game. This also extends to the returning characters, as her interactions with Beat only have her getting mildly annoyed by his stupidity at worst, and when Neku joins the party she's genuinely relieved to see he's okay.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Presents herself as nothing but a ruthless Reaper but when push comes to shove, she shows herself to have a kind and caring side, as shown throughout her interactions with the Wicked Twisters.
• Odd Friendship: The late game reveals she's friends with Hishima, which proves instrumental in getting him to persuade Shiba.
• Punch-Clock Villain: It is all but outright stated that her and Kariya thoroughly detest how Shiba runs the Game and only follow because they would be erased otherwise. By the final week, they decide to turn against Shiba as they feel their loyalty is to Shibuya itself.
• To Be Lawful or Good: This is one of her main struggles throughout the game. She's on the side of the Reapers, but it's clear she's not exactly happy with her position, especially since she and Kariya are seen as outsiders among the Shinjuku crew. It takes persuasion from Kariya and Rindo's team to get her to accept that what Shiba is doing is completely wrong and she should do something about it.
• Took a Level in Kindness: She has mellowed out considerably since the first game; while she's still quick to anger it's a far cry from the Hair-Trigger Temper she had there and the cruel, manipulative side she once had is gone. By the end of the game, she even allies with the Players to save Shibuya. She also shows great concern for Kariya whenever he goes missing.
• What the Hell, Hero?: After learning from Rindo that Hishima won't talk to Shiba, Uzuki calls him up and delivers a scathing lecture about how you don't abandon your partners the second things get tough and forces him to go confront Shiba.
• You Are in Command Now: She was the highest-ranked Reaper still alive after Neku was through with them, so she became the interim Game Master until Shiba showed up.

Kariya

Koki Kariya

Voiced by: Anri Katsu (Japanese), Andrew Kishino (English)

"No need to thank me, man. Just doin' my Reaperly job—for once. Heh."

A laid-back Reaper who was Uzuki's partner three years ago. With the Reapers' role shifting from hunting down players to observing them, Kariya now spends his time secretly helping out struggling new teams where he can.

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• Almighty Janitor: He's still recognized as one of the most powerful Reapers in Shibuya. Most notably, an offhand comment of his near the end of the game indicates he's aware, to some degree, of the existence of the Angels, a secret only Composers are supposed to know about.
• Aside Glance: One of Kariya's portrait sprites has him looking in a direction that could just as easily be interpreted as either "behind himself" or "towards the viewer". Most of the time, it's clearly meant as the former, but he does have one line at the tail end of the game that comes across as the latter.
  Kariya: [Minamimoto]'s a real character, that one. But hey, can't complain, as long as he's on our side.
• Distressed Dude: He ends up having to be saved twice during the final week due to getting possessed by Plague Noise Kubo controls. The party saves him for the first time and Uzuki does so in the second one.
• Friendly Enemy: Even more so than the previous game. Kariya offers helpful advice to the protagonists from the beginning and is on very friendly terms with them throughout the game. The closest thing to a fight he has with the Wicked Twisters is when he's possessed by Plague Noise, and they're able to save him from getting taken over completely. By the end of the game, he and Uzuki are openly working with Rindo to put a stop to Shiba's plans.
• Punch-Clock Villain: It is all but outright stated that he and Uzuki thoroughly detest how Shiba runs the Game and only follow because they would be erased otherwise. By the final week, they decide to turn against Shiba as they feel their loyalty is to Shibuya itself.
• Took a Level in Kindness: While Kariya was rather affable in the first game, he is even more so this time around and outright helps the heroes a lot, instead of just causing less trouble for them than Uzuki.

Coco

Coco Atarashi

Voiced by: Marika Kouno (Japanese), Kitana Turnbull (English)

"My, what a fabulous day! I'm just tickled to be back in the lovely city of Shibuya."

The self-proclaimed "Cute Reaper" and a member of the Shibuya Reapers who became a Canon Immigrant in The World Ends with You: Final Remix. Although she has a cute and endearing exterior, the façade quickly falls apart to reveal a rather foul-mouthed and snappy girl who can and will talk back the moment someone gets on her bad side.

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• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: While this game reveals that she had good intentions for her previous actions, her personality is still as rotten as ever.
• Cute, but Cacophonic: She's given a voice in this game, and it's a pretty high-pitched and squeaky one. And she can be downright obnoxious with it.
• Easily Forgiven: While she had her reasons, Neku calls her a friend despite missing 3 years of his RG life thanks to her and no end of worry to his friends.
• Forgiven, but Not Forgotten: Despite having forgiven her, Neku, the guy she killed hasn't forgotten what she did. As the person in question puts it:
  "Kind of hard to forget someone who shot you."
• Good All Along: Well, good is a pretty big stretch considering her two-faced and sarcastic personality is not really an act. However, her villainous actions in the Final Remix were all a desperate attempt to (unsuccessfully) save Shinjuku from erasure, and she's just as set on saving Shibuya. Of course, Joshua also tells Neku that he doesn't trust her.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: While she can become very aggressive and foul-mouthed, she does help save Shibuya and actually cares about her friends.
• Kid with the Leash: She sees herself as this to Sho, being that she was the one who resurrected him. However, Uzuki and Kariya doubt that he'll kneel to her so easily.
• Older Than They Look: You wouldn’t look at her small and childish appearance and think she was 19, physically, older than several of the characters and the same age physically as Ayano.
• Odd Friendship:
  • One wonders how she and the genuinely nice Tsugumi became such close friends in the first place.
  • With the kind-hearted and caring Neku as well (who she shot dead), one does wonder how THAT friendship formed. To be fair, they had three years and Neku is forgiving.
• Perfectly Cromulent Word: She's traded out her Valley Girl speak from the last game for these kinds of words. It adds to the false sense of whimsy she attempts to invoke.
• Pet the Dog: She genuinely cares about her friend Tsugumi.
• The Reveal: Her actions in Final Remix are finally explained. Coco murdered Neku in a desperate attempt to protect Shinjuku from the Inversion and to save her best friend Tsugumi. Although the Inversion was unable to be stopped, Coco forged a partnership with Neku to investigate the reason for the city's erasure, but with Shibuya itself now on the brink of destruction once again and Tsugumi's life on the line, Coco has returned to Shibuya to play her part in saving both.
• Scary Teeth: Just like in the last game, she gains rows of sharp teeth whenever she's annoyed or angry.
• Sequel Hook: She mentions not being done with Minamimoto at the end of the game, which is just after he mentions having located Joshua and making clear he's still after the Composer's seat.
• You Are Too Late: She murdered Neku in order to send him to Shinjuku to prevent its erasure, but he arrived too late to save anyone.

The Shinjuku Reapers

In General

A group of Reapers hailing from Shinjuku. They came to Shibuya to run the new Reapers' Game.

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• Affably Evil: In a distinct contrast to the Shibuya Reapers from the last game, most Shinjuku Reapers are pretty polite and friendly with players, with Shiba and Kubo being the only major exceptions. And it turns out the latter is mind-controlling the former, and Shiba is actually a pretty nice guy himself once free of The Corruption.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: With a few exceptions like Shoka and Susukichi, the Shinjuku Reapers have a generally darker, more professional look compared to the colorful, streetwise Shibuya Reapers from the first game, not to mention being far more polite and organized. This is best reflected on Uzuki, who, as former Shibuya Game Master, still holds a significant rank within Shiba's organization and sports a more corporate-friendly look. This makes some sense as the real-life Shinjuku is considered Tokyo's business center in contrast with Shibuya's nightlife-based culture.
• But Now I Must Go: During the ending, the remaining Shinjuku Reapers (excluding Shoka who was sent to the RG) decide to return to their home city to rebuild it, though Tsugumi hopes to visit Shibuya again one day.
• First-Name Basis: Unlike the Shibuya Reapers, they tend to use each other's first names, with only Kubo being referred to by his surname.
• A House Divided: Pretty much every officer in the Shinjuku Reapers is disgusted by Shiba's plan to erase Shibuya. This has resulted in some members secretly working against him from within (Susukichi and Tsugumi), some members actively opposing him (Shoka), and some members choosing to not get involved and observe from sidelines (Kaie and Hishima). Subverted, as it turns out Shiba wasn't actually doing so of his own free will. When he breaks free, he happily unifies both Reaper factions to save Shibuya.
• Lack of Empathy: In contrast to the officers, the grunt Reapers from Shinjuku show no sympathy for Shibuya's plight. One Support Reaper on Week 3 Day 2 even takes issue with Shoka siding with the Wicked Twisters, failing to understand why she chooses to protect Shibuya instead of just erasing the place and moving on like they did with Shinjuku.
• Resignations Not Accepted: Reapers leaving the Shinjuku crew accept erasure once their current Game is done.
• Significant Birth Date: Their primary motif is determined by a corresponding lifeform depicted on the Hanafuda card that represents their month. Shiba has the butterfly for June, Susukichi has the deer for October, Tsugumi has the crane for January, and Ayano has the Iris flower for May.
• True Companions: In contrast with the internal strife and backstabbing of the Shibuya Reaper higher-ups in the first game, various comments and flashbacks paint the Shinjuku Reapers as being much more of a tightly-knit group. At least, that was the case before Shiba suddenly changed for the worst and Kubo entered the ranks, which split the group apart. The Shinjuku Reapers reconcile after Shiba is freed from Kubo's control.
• Ungrateful Bastard: The Shibuya Reapers took them in after Shinjuku got destroyed, only to find that the Shinjuku Reapers were responsible for Shinjuku's erasure and are trying to do the same to Shibuya. Turns out it's mostly just a corrupted Shiba (controlled by Kubo) who wants to erase Shibuya.

Shiba

Shiba Miyakaze

Voiced by: Daiki Hamano (Japanese), Shaun Conde (English)

"Greetings, sheeple of Shibuya!"

An Officer of the Reapers, one of the Shinjuku Reapers, the new Game Master slash Conductor in charge of the new Reapers' Game.

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• Abnormal Ammo: In the final phase of his boss fight, he launches beams and a massive meteor consisting of the inert citizens of Shibuya themselves bound together as attacks.
• Animal Motifs:
  • Butterflies. He wears a butterfly necklace around his neck, and in his boss fight, butterflies follow him wherever he warps around.
  • Sheeps, to a lesser extent. He greets the Players as "Sheeple" when everytime he makes an announcement. His descision to become both the Conductor and Game Master has been compared to the sole shepard of the flock.
• The Atoner: He decides to take on the task of rebuilding Shinjuku as penance for assisting Kubo in its destruction.
• Authority Equals Asskicking: Befitting a Conductor and leader of the Shinjuku Reapers, Shiba is very, very dangerous in battle. While some of that is attributed to Kubo secretly giving him additional oomph, for the most part Shiba's power is all his own - and unlike Megumi, the previous Conductor, Shiba doesn't even have to use a Noise form. Rindo spends a good chunk of the Final Day Replays specifically trying to avoid fighting Shiba simply because the Twisters would be too winded to tackle anything else afterwards.
• Bad Boss: He doesn't care what happens to other Reapers as long as he wins the Game, in stark contrast to how he used to be three years ago.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: Like his predecessor, he wears a snazzy all-black suit - albeit without a shirt - and is an exceptionally powerful son-of-a-bitch.
• Battle Aura: Sports a golden glow around himself in his fight.
• Big Bad: He's the Game Master and main villain who plots to destroy Shibuya. Except not; he's actually Kubo's dupe.
• Butterfly of Death and Rebirth: He wears a gold butterfly necklace and given he's a Reaper, it's only fitting.
• Catchphrase: "Greetings, sheeple of Shibuya", "Got some red-hot news for ya", and "With that, I bid you adieu", all said during pretty much every single broadcast to the letter.
  Beat: Ain't this guy ever mix things up?
  Nagi: I cannot recall hearing any other variations.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: To Megumi Kitaniji, the Conductor from the first game. Both run the Reapers' Game while the Composer is out of the UG, which means Joshua's rules are undefined; however, while Megumi continued as though Shibuya's usual rules were still in play, Shiba exploits the opportunity to enforce Shinjuku's rules on the Game. Megumi kept the Reaper's Game relatively fair up until the third week, and his reasons for participating were to save Shibuya by imprinting on the citizen's minds. Shiba, by contrast, rigs the game from the very start by supporting the Ruinbringers, who comprise of Reapers from Shinjuku, and has no love for Shibuya as he aims to destroy it (although this is due to Kubo manipulating him). This also extends to their boss fights; while Kitaniji is a Time Master who partners with a brainwashed Shiki, Shiba's powers lean more towards spatial manipulation and uses clones of himself to fight.
• Control Freak: Rather than be the Conductor to a separate Game Master as is normal, Shiba takes both positions for himself, something that's noted to be highly unusual. He also doesn't employ Harrier Reapers for their usual task of sending Noise after Players, instead leaving most of them idle while pitting the Players against each other instead. He used to operate more similarly to a standard Game Master before Kubo got his hands on him.
• Dark Is Evil: He's the leader of the Shinjuku Reapers, the Game Master of the Reaper's Game, wears an all dark suit and takes pleasure in watching the Players fight for their lives. Subverted, when it turns out he was under More than Mind Control, and when he realizes he's an Unwitting Pawn, he's horrified enough to pull a Heel–Face Turn.
• Doppelgänger Attack: During the second phase of his boss fight, he creates several clones of himself to attack the Twisters.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Despite trying to say otherwise, Shiba is shown to still care for his best friend Hishima and other companions as well when he gets his mind back together. When Hishima is the first one to get Erased by the Dissonance Noise in the second timeline, Shiba is downright heartbroken.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Even Shiba is completely put off when he has to introduce Rindo's group as... "Rindo's Group", since Fret hasn't come up with a proper name by then.
• Faux Affably Evil: Speaks in a warm and polite manner when he is clearly going to do something really bad. Subverted when it turns out he was under mind control by Kubo, and his real personality is more genuinely friendly.
• Fights Like a Normal: While he's able to Doppelgänger Attack and Teleport Spam, he notably attacks using basic sword and bullet psychs, much like the rival Players. He even lacks a Noise Form, and it's implied to be because he's got so much control over his powers and fighting abilities that he doesn't need to rely on one to be a serious threat to the heroes.
• Heel–Face Turn: In the Final Day' and Final Day'', Hishima exposes Kubo's manipulations and convinces him to stand down and ally with the Wicked Twisters to save Shibuya.
• He's Back!: Judging from the reactions of his fellow Reapers, this is essentially what happens when he decides on his Heel–Face Turn.
  Shiba: I haven't felt a fever like this in years. Now let's get out there and burn this Game to the ground.
• Hidden Agenda Villain: Like Megumi before him, Shiba has his own agenda to follow behind the Reapers' Game, with several other Reapers in on it.
• Hidden in Plain Sight: In Week 3, he taunts the remaining players to come find and defeat him to win the Game. Where was he the whole time? The Scramble Cross, one of the most common starting points for each day for the Wicked Twisters and the place where Rindo and Fret started the Game and not a hard place to find or access compared to Kitaniji’s base of operations, which needed a specific Reaper pin to get into. It’s especially hilarious because the place where the Wicked Twisters, his biggest threat, start in Week 3 when he is making his taunt is the Scramble Cross. Justified because there are many buildings in the Scramble Cross and none of Shiba’s allies know where he is unlike Kitaniji’s.
• Hot-Blooded: He appears as cold and cruel, but Nagi notes that underneath he's actually extremely passionate about his goals and methods. His daily broadcasts are always tinged with the same fire related word play while he's getting pretty excited at how the Reaper's Game will turn out. He shows this side a lot more in Week 3 with The Reveal that he is both the Game Master and the leader of the Ruinbringers, with him essentially baiting the other Players into taking him on.
  Nagi: I assumed him to be the cold, calculating type, but he seems to grow quite hotheaded without warning. He is unexpectedly — how shall I put it? Mentally unbalanced, for lack of a more gentle phrasing.
• It Amused Me: The Secret Reports speculate that Shiba holds Scramble Slams to have Players fight each other out of amusement.
• Karma Houdini: For all his part in destroying Shinjuku, attempting to destroy Shibuya, and bringing living people into a rigged Game that's gone on for over a hundred cycles with almost every Player erased, he's Easily Forgiven by his old friends and remains the leader of the Shinjuku Reapers as he leaves to rebuild Shinjuku. Downplayed, as by that point it was known he was under Kubo's control and once freed, he goes out of his way to save Shibuya from his own actions.
• Kick the Dog:
  • It's implied that he convinced Ayano it was a good idea to inflict herself with Plague Noise; to punish Shoka for her betrayal and Ayano for standing up for her. The taunting broadcast message he has for Shoka is much less ambiguous.
  • He has the Plague Noise look like Ayano and the erased Player team leaders on W3D5 to twist the knife on their deaths further.
• Last Ditch Move: At critical health, he performs his clone barrage again and ends with a meteor heading for the battlefield.
• Leitmotif: "Unpainted" serves as his boss theme, which while cool as hell, is a surprisingly mellow beat with soft vocals and decidedly sorrowful lyrics, which serves to illustrate that there's a lot more to him than a veneer of a power-hungry psychopath.
• Mask of Sanity: Nagi claims he has one, hiding his Hot-Blooded nature behind ostensibly cold and collected speeches. Over the course of the game, especially Week 3, she is proven right.
• Master of Illusion: He employs mirages of himself in conjunction with teleportation in order to obscure his position, and between phases he creates an illusion of the Players being back in the RG, only for the people around them to start spontaneously transforming into Noise.
• Meteor-Summoning Attack: At one point of his boss battle he will summon a meteor that will slowly descend upon the battle field, prompting you to destroy it before it causes massive damage.
• More than Mind Control: The Secret Reports make it clear that Kubo has been exerting his malignant influence to change his personality for the worse. His influence breaks after Hishima and Tsugumi reveal to Shiba that Kubo's been using him.
• Mr. Fanservice: He's a handsome young man that doesn't wear a shirt beneath his jacket, leaving his chiseled torso in clear view. Even during his boss battle when he summons his clones, one of them can be seen lying down seductively in midair.
• No Shirt, Long Jacket: Isn't wearing a shirt under his suit and his full chest is in view.
• One-Winged Angel: Averted. He has no Noise Cantus form and fights as a humanoid Reaper the whole time. He doesn't even sprout the Reaper's wings.
• Personality Powers: Averted. One would think a Hot-Blooded man who can't stop talking in fire and heat metaphors might be Playing with Fire, but he isn't. He does, however, create several clones of himself to fight them with, analogous to a heat haze causing one to see double or mirages of somebody.
• Pre-Final Boss: He's the last boss fought before the reveal of the true mastermind. Other than a fight against normal Plague Noise, the only other bosses remaining in the main game are Soul Pulvis and Phoenix Cantus, which are both different incarnations of the same being.
• Power Floats: During his boss battle, he spends most of it floating. In fact, sometimes he will be standing in middair, sometimes even upside down.
• Sequential Boss: Shiba's battle has three phases in total, although only the first and last actually involve him at all. The middle one pits the party against an assortment of random Noise instead, which serves as a break between the two Shiba fights.
• Signing-Off Catchphrase: "And with that, I bid you adieu.", said at the end of all of his broadcasts. At one point Fret gets so sick of hearing it that he mockingly parrots it after the broadcast is over.
• Sinister Shades: He wears a pair above his head.
• Skewed Priorities: Even after his Heel–Face Turn, he's insistent that his Game continues and once everything is done, declares the Game a draw.
• Sore Loser: Another major point of difference between him and Kitaniji - whereas he was a Graceful Loser who accepted his defeat with affability and dignity, Shiba hates losing more than anything. Some of this characteristic can be seen fairly early on with his major Control Freak tendencies, and the fact that he's been rigging the game for his own team to keep winning repeatedly. When he is defeated and erased in the first version of the Final Day, he goes out cursing and is in complete denial of what had just happened. In the final version, once Phoenix Cantus is dealt with, despite everything that just happened, he still refuses to concede to Rindo and settles for a draw. Keep in mind, this is after he's been freed of Kubo's control, meaning that this has been a flaw of his from the start.
• Spell My Name With An S: The kanji in his name, as well as the katakana shown when he introduces himself with his full name, is read as Shiiba, but the second "i" is omitted from all translations of the game.
• The Starscream: Thanks to the manipulations of Kubo, he was the one who rallied the other Shinjuku Reapers against the city's Conductor.
• Teleport Spam: He loves turning himself into a swarm of butterflies to move around.
• True Final Boss: Of Another Day. Shiba must be fought after defeating Cervus Cantus Alpha, Grus Cantus Alpha, and Iris Cantus Alpha, and upon his defeat, the credits will roll again.
• Try to Fit That on a Business Card: Shinjuku Reaper, Conductor, Game Master, Leader of the Ruinbringers, and Executor (self-proclaimed and false).
• The Unfought: Played with. While you do get a proper boss battle, it only happens in a timeline that Rindo rewrites with his Replay ability.
• Unwitting Pawn: Kubo has been pulling his strings for the past three years.

Kubo

Tanzo Kubo

Voiced by: Taisuke Nakano (Japanese), Xander Mobus (English)

"Nyeheh! Not bad! You've got moxie, kid."

A Reaper who takes an interest in Rindo and Fret, even going up to meet the two himself.

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• The Beastmaster: While all Reapers have some capacity to summon and command Noise, Kubo is extremely skilled with them. He's capable of creating powerful variant Noise, and commanding them in ways other Reapers can't hope to match. One Reaper the party can meet looks up to Kubo as his inspiration, and seeks to become a Noise Master like him one day. Late in the game, he demonstrates that he can even command people the Noise have infected.
• Beware the Silly Ones: His behavior, taunts towards the heroes, his goofy laugh, and over the top expressions may make him seem like he's not worth taking seriously, but he's still a very powerful Reaper who is pretty adept at summoning and controlling Noise. In truth however, he's more than just a powerful Reaper.
• Character Tic: He has a habit of pointing at his forehead. It's a hint that he's smarter than he looks.
• Foreshadowing: His color scheme and Character Tic are quite similar to Joshua’s. He’s an Angel just like Joshua but lower in the hierarchy.
• Giggling Villain: Rindo and co. can usually tell he's nearby thanks to a distinct "Nyeheh!".
• Gonk: He's drawn to be as much of a Slimeball as possible and makes a lot of rather hideous and exaggerated facial expressions.
• Jerkass: He's a straightforward asshole with no real hidden heart of gold underneath.
• Last-Name Basis: He's the only character who debuts in this game who goes by his surname, which is all the more notable considering that the Shinjuku Reapers prefer First-Name Basis.
• The Name Is Bond, James Bond: He introduces himself with his surname, then his full name.
• Non-Standard Character Design: His face is noticeably more detailed than the other characters, all to highlight how scummy he looks.
• Sinister Schnoz: His large hooked nose stands out as particularly distinct compared to the somewhat slight and inwardly curved noses every other character has. It just serves to make him unpleasant to look at.
• Slimeball: He's smug, obnoxious, and condescending from the moment he's introduced, and Rindo and Fret become very uncomfortable around him when they first meet.
• Smug Smiler: His default facial expression is an obnoxious-looking smirk.
• Useless Accessory: He seems to be carrying around a clutch purse, but it doesn't seem to have much use outside of fashion. It’s probably meant to sell the illusion that he is a low level grunt because only nameless Reapers carry bags and he is missing the purse when he makes his big reveal.
• Verbal Tic: In the English dub he refers to Rindo and Fret as "youse".
• Walking Spoiler: There is a lot more to this character than it appears at first glance. See the Executor entry below for his true identity.
• Younger Than They Look: Zig-zagged. Despite being called "Gramps" or "an old asshole" throughout the game, he's actually 31. However, Reapers in general are shown in NEO to not age, which implies that a Reaper's given age refers to when they became a Reaper. He does at least indulge one character by talking back to them saying "That ain't the tone to take with your elders, kid" and "Kids these days, I'm tellin' ya".

Kaie

Kaie Ono

Voiced by: Shoya Chiba (Japanese), Josey Montana McCoy (English)

" I shall reveal the deepest of truths. Let the spirits guide me—or rather, let me guide you toward the answer you seek."

A quiet fortune teller who runs a digital fortune-telling shop at Spain Hill.

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• Brooding Boy, Gentle Girl: A platonic example with Rhyme, with her being very calm, positive and reassuring, while Kaie is more nervous and quiet, to the point she sometimes talks for him.
• Commonality Connection: He and Rhyme bond over their interest in computers.
• Dark Is Not Evil: He wears dark clothes and is one of the Reapers, but overall seems like a nice guy and even helps out Rindo and Fret, offering them advice and his services. He even helps Rhyme during the Final Day as part of the plan to stop Kubo's Dissonance Noise.
• Elective Mute: Although he can speak, he's far more comfortable talking through text despite being a few feet away. He does admit that he's got issues after Fret whispers about him having some.
• Emoticon: His usual face belies his expressive texts to Rindo and Fret, which usually end with one of these.
• Exhausted Eyebags: Has some slightly dark bags under his eyes.
• Face Death with Dignity: When speaking to Hishima he admits that he's accepted that if Shibuya has a similar fate to Shinjuku, he'll calmly go down with the ship. In his own words, he doesn't see the point in stopping the inevitable.
• Fortune Teller: He runs a shop for this purpose on Spain Hill, and invites Rindo and Fret to visit. Various Reapers are shown enlisting his services throughout the game.
• Goal in Life: To digitally archive every phenomenon. It helps that ever since the first game the supernatural things in the series have indeed been explained through code and frequencies.
• Gracefully Demoted: He used to be one of the most highest-ranked Shinjuku Reapers, before Shiba decided they aren't neeeded.
• Intelligible Unintelligible: At one point, he answers to Rhyme by making a long series of sighs and other small noises, and she rather comically understands it all perfectly.
• Mistaken for Romance: When first meeting him and seeing him interact with Shoka, Rindo suddenly becomes jealous and assumes the two could be dating, which isn't true in the slightest.
• Nice Guy: He's very polite and helpful to the Players despite being a Reaper (aside from very occasional mild snark, like when he pointed out to literal-minded Fret that his blushing was a figure of speech.) He ended up becoming fast friends with Rhyme despite not really being in the same side. Notably, he noticed Shoka's loneliness and inability to make friends and gave her her Fan Go account to help with that, for no other reason than wanting to help her make friends. He is genuinely happy when he learns she's become true friends with the Wicked Twisters.
• Odd Friendship: He and Rhyme first contact each other communicating through computer and continue talking with each other that way, helping each other, despite not really being on the same side. When they eventually meet for real, they're already become close friends and get along great, with her being capable of speaking for him and understanding his unintelligent sounds percectly. He also shows his familiarity with her by quoting her "as Rhyme would say."
• Real Men Wear Pink: He wears chunky, turquoise jewelry, and his bright pink cell phone case is bunny-shaped.
• Science Wizard: He is a fortuneteller and one of his sprites implies he can levitate his phone on air, and he's also the creator of the Reapers' Apps, often on his computer and understands the supernatural through technology and science.
• The Stoic: On the surface. His usual expression doesn't change much, but he's much more expressive using emoticons when texting others. The voice narrating these texts indicate that underneath, he's actually something of a Nervous Wreck.
• The Unfettered: Very much averted in that while his main concern is his research and life goal to digitally archive every phenomenon, he is genuinely a nice guy to boot and is happy to help people just for the sake of helping.
• Voiceover Letter: Well, voiceover texts, anyways, but his RNS messages are voiced this way during the denoument. Although that's the only voiced cutscene where Kaie addresses other characters, the non-voiced cutscenes present his texts as speech bubbles coming from Kaie himself to convey the same effect.
• You Can't Fight Fate: His conversation with Hishima comes across as this. It’s also possible that he’s grown attached to Shibuya like some other Shinjuku Reapers and doesn’t want to leave it even if it is in danger of getting destroyed.

Ayano

Ayano Kamachi

Voiced by: Ayane Sakura (Japanese), Erin Yvette (English)

"Learn my name and know it well: Ayano Kamachi. I advise you to to stay out of our business."

A high-ranking Shinjuku reaper and Shiba's former second-in-command who dotes on Shoka.

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• Big Sister Instinct: Took Shoka under her wing when she first became a Reaper and loves her like a younger sister.
• Cleavage Window: Her suit dips in the front, showing a decent portion of her chest.
• Driven to Suicide: She inflicts Plague Noise on herself thinking it's the only thing serious enough for Shoka to meet up for in a bid to convince her to rejoin the Reapers.
  Susukichi: She musta been willin' to do anythin' to make you two a pair again.
• Face of a Thug: Shoka mentions that Ayano has "a mean RBF" when describing her to a Reaper.
• The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry: In Another Day, she's explicitly sisters with Shoka and the two immediately get in a fight since the iguana is (supposed to be) Shoka's pet.
• "Instant Death" Radius: She has a whirlwind barrier around her that'll damage any melee fighters until it's temporarily taken down with ranged attacks.
• Last Ditch Move: At critical health, she traps every party member except Rindo and Shoka and goes up to slap them hard unless they're freed first. Her Alpha fight, on the other hand, begins the fight with this attack, and only targets Shoka.
• Leitmotif: Shibuya Survivor plays during her boss fight.
• Love Makes You Evil: Her obsession with protecting Shoka causes her to take some drastic actions. However, the worst of it is the result of the Plague Noise's influence.
• Number Two: She is stated to be Shiba's current second-in-command, but she does very little to assist with running the Game. Then again, it's later revealed that Shiba has made such rankings obsolete, with he himself wishing to be the sole high-ranked one as both the Conductor and the Game Master, with no close allies with the questionable exception of Kubo.
• Non-Standard Character Design: Unlike every other Reaper with a Noise form, her Noise form is based on a plant rather than an animal.
• One-Winged Angel: Transforms into a Noise called Iris Cantus in a desperate attempt to take Shoka back to the Shinjuku Reapers during the final week.
• Parrot Pet Position: She has a lizard that's usually draped over her shoulder.
• Satellite Character: Her entire character revolves around her relationship with Shoka, and her boss fight and erasure serve to strengthen Shoka's resolve to stop Shiba.
• We Named the Monkey "Jack": According to the Social Network, her pet iguana is named after Shoka. In Another Day, it's instead named "Iggy".
• Yandere: Gives off some heavy vibes of this trait towards Shoka when under the influence of the Plague Noise.
  ''I won’t ever let you leave my side again! Even if I have to tear you limb from limb, I’ll gather up all the pieces and take them with me!"
• Younger Than They Look: Ayano despite looking like the oldest and most mature woman in the game is only 19 physically, the same physical age as Coco.

Hishima

Hishima Sakazuki

Voiced by: Shunsuke Takeuchi (Japanese), James Austin Kerr (English)

"I fear it may already be too late."

A Shinjuku Reaper who used to be friends with Shiba.

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• Brutal Honesty: He does not mince words when it comes to telling truths.
• Deadpan Snarker: Very deadpan. In tandem with Brutal Honesty, he tends to be biting and sarcastic.
• Fashionable Asymmetry: He only wears one glove, on his right hand.
• Morality Chain: To Shiba, being his best friend and the only one he'll actually listen to.
• Out of Focus: While the rest of the Shinjuku Reapers are introduced near the start of the game, he only appears during the third week, and doesn't do much of note until the final day where he manages to convince Shiba to call a truce with the Wicked Twisters until they've dealt with Kubo.
• Pet the Dog: Throughout the course of the third week, whenever he appears, he gradually shows off more and more hints that he isn’t as heartless as he initially appears, giving the Wicked Twisters hints about how to solve their current predicaments.
• Smart People Wear Glasses: Has a rectangular pair on.
• The Stoic:
  • He's a very reserved man who almost never smiles or raises his voice.
  • Subverted in Another Day. That Hishima is much cheerier; even his voice clips are more excitable.
• We Used to Be Friends: Hishima used to be Shiba's best friend and his closest ally until Shiba became mad with his Dissonance powers and destroyed Shinjuku.
• What the Hell, Hero?: After failing to convince Hishima to talk to Shiba, the Wicked Twisters tell Uzuki who gives him an enraged talking to about how he effectively abandoned his partner as soon as things got bad and forces Hishima to go confront Shiba.

Shoka

Shoka Sakurane

Voiced by: Akari Kitou (Japanese), Bailey Gambertoglio (English)

"You nerds seriously thought you still were still in Shibuya? This is the UG, dummies!"

A Reaper tasked with managing the Reaper's Game and monitoring the Players. She doesn't enjoy her current task, having grown bored of the Game in its current state, and hopes someone will come along to shake things up.

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• Affectionate Nickname: Fret Calls her "Shokie" while Beat calls her "Kitty Girl."
• Alliterative Name: Shoka Sakurane.
• Animal Motif:
  • Cats. She wears a jacket that resembles Shiki's Mr. Mew.
  • Birds. The swallow and phoenix respectively. Shoka represents the swallow because that is her online handle. Shoka represents the phoenix because she forms a Yin Yang dynamic with Rindo because he can be represented by the dragon, which is the other half of Yin Yang. Their outfits contrast one another, with Shoka being dark haired and wearing predominantly black and purple and with Rindo being light haired and wearing predominantly white, black and orange but their outfits also have similarities such as having black and white. Shoka is rude and blunt as well as playful while Rindo is quiet and reserved as well as closed off. They both share a discomfort with connecting with others personally and are both indecisive. Different yet similar. Also, like the phoenix, Shoka died once before becoming a Reaper and is revived to life as a human at the end of the game.
• Back from the Dead: Joshua bringing Shoka back to RG essentially means that she is back to being a living person again.
• Badass Adorable: Her outfit may be modeled after a plush toy, but she is still a Reaper and has the combat skills to back it up, as shown by the effortless Curb-Stomp Battle she delivers to Motoi when he tries to challenge her. When she later defects to the Wicked Twisters, her experience as a former Reaper makes her an invaluable part of the team when it comes to combat. All while she has tons of adorable Ship Tease moments with Rindo, complete with Luminescent Blushing.
• Beneath the Mask: She's pretty sour and passive-aggressive during her early interactions with Rindo and Fret, but the reveal that she's actually Swallow points to her being much warmer and more caring beneath the facade.
• Berserk Button: Mistaking Mr. Mew for anything other than a cat. She adores the Gatto Nero brand and its mascot, and gets very annoyed when Fret and Beat keep mistaking him for a pig or a bear.
• Blatant Lies: She gets two in rapid succession on Week 3, Day 6. First, she calls Susukichi "Big Su," then immediately denies saying it when asked about it. Second, after Susukichi tricks the Wicked Twisters and traps them in the Shibuya River, she claims that she sent Susukichi a text telling him to die, when, in fact, she sent him a message frantically demanding to know where Shiba is, since she doesn't want Suskichi to get himself killed.
• Blunt "Yes": In the ending, when Rindo asks if she's fine with getting erased after the Reaper's Game, Shoka says yes, noting, "I've made my peace."
• Cat Girl: She wears a jacket modeled after Mr. Mew, and the ears and tails even act as if they're real. Concept art shows the soles of her high tops have cat paws printed on them.
• Catchphrase: "Later, losers", said every time she exits a scene. It's also what she says to Rindo before she dies during the second iteration of the final day.
• Character Development: Shoka like Rindo learns to not just go with whatever options are in front of her. The reason why Shoka even became a Reaper was because she was aimless in life and wasn't happy with her life before playing the Reaper's Game. This is why it takes Shoka until Week 2 Day 7 to fully turn on the Shinjuku Reapers despite helping the Wicked Twisters in secret the whole time partly because she didn't want to leave her life as a Reaper at the moment, despite growing to hate being one. She becomes content with getting erased for or because of opposing Shiba because she is finally making her own decisions in life. More subtly, she also becomes nicer after joining the Wicked Twisters for real, although this might just be Shoka's real colors showing, because based on her texts with Rindo, she's always had a kind side.
• Closet Geek: She's Swallow, a gamer obsessed with an online phone game.
• Conflicting Loyalty: She's torn between her loyalty to her friends in the Shinjuku Reapers and the Wicked Twisters. Even after joining the latter for good, she finds it hard to fight against Ayano and Susukichi.
• Cute Little Fangs: Bares them at one point when facing off against Motoi and goading him to come and attack her.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Highly implied. When Rindo talks to her on Week 3 Day 2 when trying to convince her to potentially Mercy Kill Ayano, she reveals about how even after winning her own Reaper’s Game in Shinjuku, she had no intention of coming back to life and was even fine with potentially getting Erased before being offered the chance to become a Reaper, suggesting that she didn’t exactly have the happiest life before dying. Later comments reinforce this even more; when Rindo asks her about what she plans to do after coming back to the RG, she starts to sarcastically comment about how “maybe she’ll end up in some fancy ass house, part of some picture-perfect family” before dismissing the idea.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Played with. She clearly has her own agenda when she speaks with the others Reapers on finding a potential Player. However, she's at least bit helpful towards Fret and Rindo when explaining the Reaper's Game to them. Eventually though, she is kicked from the Reapers, and even while spying on the Twisters while playing with them during Week 2, Day 7, she decides to stay with the Twisters for the third week. Played straight because she was trying to stop the destruction of Shibuya the whole time and was helping out the Twisters from the start to do that.
• Deadpan Snarker: Every other word she spouts is dripping with this. Even after she Takes a Level in Kindness and joins the Twisters, she takes every opportunity she can to needle Beat.
• Deathbed Confession: She confesses to Rindo that she's Swallow as she's dying on the second run through the final day. When Rindo rewinds time with Hazuki's help, he mentions that he now knows her identity.
• Death Seeker: It is heavily implied throughout the game that Shoka has a passive suicidal ideation brought onto the particularly painful circumstances surrounding her life. Throughout the game, it is shown that she has little-to-no regard for her own life unless it concerns the people she cares about and even then, she’ll still toss it away for them if the stakes are high enough. Ayano is possessed and is about to attack the party? Shoka throws caution to the wind, ignoring Rindo’s warnings, and almost gets herself killed. Her reaction to her inevitable Erasure at the end of the week due to her not being a Reaper anymore? She’s more concerned about how it will affect Rindo rather than how she’s going to, well, fade away from existence. At the end of the game, when Shiba offers her a chance to become a Reaper again, she refuses, not wanting to spend another moment of her unlife watching life around her pass by.
• Deuteragonist: Rindo and her are three of the first characters to technically appear in the game, with her showing up in Rindo's text chat with her. She has one of the most important roles in the story, sabotaging the Game and stopping Shiba from destroying Shibuya. Out of all the Reapers and non playable characters, she interacts the most with Rindo and his team. She appears almost as much as Rindo, Fret and Nagi, the first three permenent party members, making her one of the "new four". If she doesn't appear in person during a chapter, she appears as Swallow instead in Rindo's text messages. She also gets the second-most amount of character development after Rindo. She also gets the last pivotal scene of the story with him at the very ending. Furthermore, in the end credits, her actors are billed right after Rindo's, the main protagonist. Creative producer Tetsuya Nomura considers her the heroine of the story and mentions that the team had to avoid coining her as the heroine to not spoil her role in the story.
• Dub Personality Change: A small change in characterisation that led to the Japanese Shoka being a completely different character than the Localised Shoka. The reason she was rude in the original was because of her seemingly apathetic attitude, brushing off other people quite brusquely. However, the localisers instead characterise her rudeness by making her an overly aggressive snarker, closer to the Western idea of how they view rudeness.
• Dude Magnet: She's quite pretty, getting the attention of a few guys throughout the story. She catches Fret's attention with him hoping she's at least real and has a Reaper admirer who hopes to climb in the ranks so he could gift her whatever she wanted. Above all though, she has big Ship Tease with Rindo.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: Right behind Neku in this regard. Becoming a Reaper altogether not only involves dying yourself and surviving the Game, but continually participating in it in afterlife. After being emotionally pretzeled, betrayed, marked for erasure, and put through general hell, she comes to terms with the fact that nothing will be left of her once the Twisters win. Not long after, Joshua throws the dog a bone and decides to resurrect her properly in the RG. By blindly tossing her in some random location in Shibuya and having Rindo find her - just because the dog's been thrown a bone doesn't mean the owner still isn't a giant asshole. After weeks of searching for each other, they finally reunite at the Scramble Crossing with a healthy dose of Maybe Ever After. Though... to add a small insult to injury, Rindo's been ignoring all of her friend requests all that time since she's had to create all new contact information. Ironically, Rindo would’ve been able to find Shoka sooner if he was still preoccupied with his phone.
• Enraged by Idiocy: Of the Wicked Twisters, she's probably the least tolerant of Beat's Idiot Hero tendencies, though she still does care about him as much as the other members of the team do.
• Expressive Accessory: The tail of her Gatto Nero hoodie behaves like it's a real tail. The ears of her hoodie also behave like real ears.
• Fighting Your Friend: She ends up having to do this against Ayano and Susukichi during the final week.
• Foreshadowing: Tons of hints surround her regarding her true identity as Swallow.
  • When Rindo chats with Swallow in the beginning of the game regarding FanGO, they reveal that they’re currently in Shibuya and are in fact at the Scramble Crossing at the very moment. When Rindo and Fret find themselves in the UG, guess who’s the very first person they meet within the Scramble?
  • The very fact that Swallow is able to still communicate with Rindo online despite all of his other contacts being Erased from existence hints at their involvement within the UG and the fact that they’re still around to reach his messages as Player team after Player team gets Erased also hint that they’re most likely involved in the higher echelon of the UG, such as perhaps a Reaper. Another hint that they’re a Reaper is that it’s implied that they’ve been in the UG longer than Rindo and the only way they can communicate with anyone in the RG online and play FanGO is if they’re a Reaper.
• Foil:
  • To Tsugumi. Creative producer and character designer Tetsuya Nomura designed her to contrast directly design-wise with Tsugumi to represent how Shoka can be seen as the heroine of this game and to represent how Tsugumi can be seen as the heroine of Shinjuku. Tsugumi has a light color scheme while Shoka has a dark color scheme. Mr. Mew is incorporated into their designs but on different levels. The only element of Mr. Mew Tsugumi has in her design is her Mr. Mew plush that she carries around while Shoka’s design is heavily based on Mr. Mew, wearing a hoodie inspired by Mr. Mew. They have nearly the same colors in their designs but with different schemes. Tsugumi’s main color scheme is white and red with some black while Shoka’s main color scheme is black and purple with some white and red. They are also foils in their roles in the story. Tsugumi seems to be more important than Shoka because of her appearance in A New Day, because Tsugumi was conceived many years earlier, and because Shoka seems to be just another Reaper in the beginning. Tsugumi was initially conceived to be the heroine of this game but ended up getting a small but still impactful role. Shoka became the heroine instead and got a big role.
  • She also contrasts Motoi in quite a few ways. Both of them have online personas that have had an influence on Rindo in some manner, whether it’s indirectly through a shallow, viral Internet personality spouting empty platitudes (An0ther) or directly as a personal friend that gives meaningful advice and encouragement (Swallow). Motoi also tries to use his identity as An0ther to try and manipulate Rindo to do his bidding through a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing act whereas Shoka puts up a Jerkass Façade in order to both hide the fact that she’s been helping Rindo and the Wicked Twisters all along and to subtly encourage them to survive the Game. Motoi remains desperate to survive even after his apparent Heel Realization, whereas Shoka is practically a Death Seeker.
  • To Kubo. Both are low-ranking Reapers who show up mainly to be the Troll to the Wicked Twisters. That's where their similarities end. Shoka is a young teenager physically who wears black predominantly while Kubo is an adult who looks middle-aged physically who wears white predominantly. Shoka adopted a Jerkass Façade and she can be considered the heroine because she acts to save Shibuya from destruction while Kubo's Jerkass act is genuine and he is the Big Bad acting to destroy Shibuya. Shoka is actually genuinely helpful to the Twisters while Kubo is not. Shoka is actually a low ranking Reaper while Kubo is actually an Angel. It's telling that Shoka unambiguously despises Kubo.
• Heel–Face Turn: Double Subverted. She deserts the Shinjuku Reapers to join the Wicked Twisters at the end of Week 2. Then it turns out she only did so to deliver information about Rindo's powers to Shiba, but after spending time with them and fully resolving to commit to saving Shibuya from Shiba, she joins the Wicked Twisters for real, who accept her without much of a fuss.
• Heroic Sacrifice: She helps Rindo's team win the Game during the final week even though she knows she will face erasure once the game is complete due to not being a Reaper unless she rejoins them. As she no longer wishes to participate in any more Games, she has been setting herself up for this. Ultimately subverted as Joshua decides to intervene and let her go to the RG after the game so she can join Rindo.
• Hidden Depths: The bitingly sarcastic Perky Goth Reaper who needles the main party for her own amusement turns out to be a hugely self-sacrificing, kind-hearted girl who struggles with being depressed and tries her best to help one of her only friends survive a rigged game against her former found family and ultimately comes to appreciate life again after spending time with her new friends.
• Hime Cut: Her hair is styled in this fashion.
• Humanizing Tears: Even a blunt Deadpan Snarker like her has her moments of weakness, like her tearful reaction to betraying her fellow Shinjuku Reapers to join the Wicked Twisters and having to see most of her new/old friends die at multiple points in the story.
• Insult of Endearment:
  • She usually calls Fret and Rindo "losers" before she leaves, but she does seem to care for them a bit.
  • She calls Beat "Worms-for-Brains," even when she's clearly concerned for them.
• Ironic Echo:
  • After Motoi, who'd noted that only stupid people trust strangers, begs Kubo for a second chance, Shoka remarks that Motoi would be stupid to trust a stranger. Kubo is amused that Shoka threw the other person's words back in his face.
  • She often says goodbye to the Wicked Twisters with "Later, losers." She repeats the phrase as she's being erased in a more tsundere-ish manner.
• Jerkass Façade: Downplayed. She can be snarky and sharp-tongued, but she dials up that aspect of her personality when she's interacting with them as a Reaper compared to after she joins the Wicked Twisters or when messaging Rindo as Swallow.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: She hates her job of monitoring Players and is very blunt and to the point, but she still puts in the effort to do it well and is actively trying to sabotage Shiba and Kubo's plan to erase Shibuya.
• Older Than They Look: Reapers retained the age at the time of their death. Shoka has been a Reaper for four years and was 16 years old when she first joined. When Joshua revives her, she apparently stick being a 16 year old but mentally 20.
• Nice Girl: Downplayed; she is initially very hostile towards the Wicked Twisters and most other people too, but after properly joining Rindo and his team, she shows a much more caring and empathetic side to her, though she can still have some jerk-ish tendencies, especially towards Beat. While communicating with Rindo as Swallow she is very kind and helpful towards him, showing that she is truly a good person at heart.
• Perky Goth: Wears mostly black with some faint dark eyeliner, but has a playful, teasing personality.
• Ship Tease: She gets a lot of this with Rindo after joining the Wicked Twisters.
• Sixth Ranger: Joins the Wicked Twisters at the end of Week 2.
• Smug Super: Though not quite to Minamimoto's level, she's very confident in her abilities and tends to downplay impressive scores.
• Soul-Crushing Desk Job: Downplayed. She is not very thrilled about being stuck with the job of monitoring the Players.
• Stepford Snarker: Puts up a tough, sarcastic front even when things start going to hell around her, such as having to deal with the possibility of mercy killing Ayano and taking on her former Shinjuku friends.
• Teleportation: She's able to tap into any of the Cool Gates around Shibuya and use them to teleport to hard to reach locations. It's her unique psych, "Telewarp".
• Token Good Teammate: Zig-zagged. While most of the Reapers aren't really evil, and she does reveal Rindo's powers to Shiba so she can become a Reaper again, she has been secretly trying to stop Shiba and helping the Wicked Twisters.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Played with. She's initially quite hostile to the Wicked Twisters, but when she reveals that she's fond of them, it lightens into playful teasing. The fact that she was helping them behind the scenes and that's she's been Rindo's supportive friend for years implies the latter is closer to her true temperament.
• Tsundere: Acts as a light type A towards Rindo, generally getting embarrassed whenever he takes note of her hidden kind side and blushing up a storm.
• Two Girls to a Team: She and Ayano are the only women of the Shinjuku Reapers. Subverted because Tsugumi is also a female Reaper of the Shinjuku Reapers. She's the second girl in the Wicked Twisters though.
• Welcome Back, Traitor: Right after she's revealed to have passed information about Rindo's time-traveling powers to Shiba, she decides to side with the Wicked Twisters for real, which is received with little fuss.
• Wham Line:
  • On Week 2, Day 6, near the start of her encounter with Motoi, she accuses him of "tattling" on her to Kubo and Ayano, revealing that she was helping the Wicked Twisters and that Kubo is only out for himself.
  • On the second run through Week 3, Day 7, she, while dying, regrets not being able to play FanGO with Rindo, revealing herself as Swallow.
• When She Smiles: When she is not acting like a Troll and smiling genuinely, it’s adorable. Ayano and Rindo think so.

Others

Swallow

Swallow

An online friend of Rindo's whom he met through FanGO and is constantly texting them even in the UG.

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• Acquainted in Real Life: Is friends with Rindo through FanGO with the two regularly texting one another, but having never met in real life. At least, until Rindo starts playing the Reaper's Game, although he never knows who Swallow is until near the end of the game.
• Ambiguous Gender: Swallow is referred to with gender neutral pronouns. Though it turns out Swallow is actually Shoka, which means she's a girl.
• Animal Motifs: A swallow, of course, even used as their profile icon.
• The Faceless: At the start of the game, Rindo and Swallow have never met face to face, and the reason Fret drags Rindo to Scramble Crossing is that he believes the two could actually meet one another in person if Swallow was just there. Or, at least, that is what Rindo thinks - she's actually the first Reaper met in person.
• Foreshadowing: Swallow is a more important character than they're let on to be, if the fact that Rindo can still text them in the UG is any hint. Given that they're in fact Shoka, this means that even when all of the other teams are erased, her account still is active, letting Rindo realize that they are a Reaper - before then, he thought they were a Player.
• Two Aliases, One Character: "Swallow" is just their online handle; Rindo has never met them in person and doesn't know their real name. However, the fact he's able to stay in contact with them from the UG suggests they must be someone involved in the Reapers' Game, meaning the Wicked Twisters have likely run into them without even realizing it. And they have; the account belongs to Shoka.

MKN

MKN

An internationally famous street artist, known for her use of orange in both her graffiti and her wardrobe.

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• Capitalism Is Bad: One of the other reasons she deliberately painted over Rindo and Fret's hint for their mission?
  MKN: (reading her thoughts) Is this supposed to be 104? Uh-uh- we aren't glorifying capitalism on my watch. Time to spray over it!
• Color Motif: Orange.
• Connected All Along: A sidequest during the final week reveals she's the beloved granddaughter of croaky panic shopkeeper Tamao Sasai.
• Do Wrong, Right: In her perspective, if you want to paint graffiti on the walls, at least put some effort into making it look good.
• Intentional Mess Making: She's not above painting over other people's graffiti because she's disgusted by their lack of effort.
• Meaningful Name: Scanning a civilians mind reveals that her name actually stands for "Mikan" (also the name of an Orange, seedless fruit). The whole orange ensemble is starting to make sense now.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Although she seems to hide her eyes behind sunglasses, it really doesn't help that she's basically a walking orange spot among a crowd of people.
• Reused Character Design: She's a very simple all-orange palette swap of a random Shibuyan woman, given a name.

Ken Doi

Ken Doi

A master of all things ramen who originally owned the Ramen Don store in Dogenzaka. After falling ill one day, Doi treated his illness with Indian herbal remedies and traveled to India, where he discovered the wonders of Indian curry. Hoping to bring back what he learned to Japan, Doi closed Ramen Don and reopened as an Indian curry specialty store called Spicy Curry Don.

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• Cool Old Guy: A very friendly curry chef who makes food not just to fill his own pockets but also to make his customers happy.
• Creator Cameo: He's modelled after the game's director, Tatsuya Kando.
• Demoted to Extra: While he was never a major character, here he doesn't even play a role in any of the missions and is limited to sidequests and visits to Spicy Curry Don.
• Friendly Rivalry: The Social Network mentions that he has a friendly rivalry with fellow curry restaurant owner Aadiv. When the two have free time, they are said to check out other curry shops together.
• Luke, I Am Your Father: Possibly Sho's father if the events of the first Game's Another Day can be trusted. At one point in the first game, Sho calls him pops and Ken Doi later asks "When did my kid grow up so fast?"
• Supreme Chef: After three years, and a journey of culinary discovery to India, he's decided to make curry instead of ramen. Upon opening shop he's concerned about customers seeming dissatisfied with his food, but it turns out that it was only because all of the dishes on his menu look and smell so delicious that they regret not being able to try all of them in one sitting. This inspires him to add a combo platter to the menu.

Oji

Eiji Oji

A big-time celebrity and "Prince of Ennui" in Shibuya's RG whose blog, "F Everything", gets 100,000 hits per day. After three years, he's still surprisingly popular.

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• Bandwagon Technique: Whenever he discovers something he likes, he "F's it", and that thing instantly becomes super-popular among his readers.
• Cluster F-Bomb: Subverted; the "F" of "F Everything" stands for fabulous.
• Compliment Backfire: He compliments Eiru's voice as "delectable," but Eiru and his agent think he means "detestable" and get offended. It takes Fret's Remind power to resolve the misunderstanding.
• Demoted to Extra: While he was never a major character, here he doesn't even play a role in any of the missions and is limited to sidequests.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: He seems to have grown out his hair so it goes down to his shoulders and parted his bangs to the right side.
• Non-Indicative Name: His title of "Prince of Ennui" makes more sense before you learn that the F is for Fabulous. Scanning him during the first week has him desperately trying to remember the most important ingredient in Ken Doi's Ramen. His joy once Fret reminds him that it's "Love" is definitely not something one would associate with "Ennui."

Ryoji

A self-proclaimed "jack of all trades" whom the Wicked Twisters run into on occasion, much to their regret.

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• Achievements in Ignorance: On Day 5, he's found himself in the position of having to sell some rather ugly pig plushies. With a little help from Rindo, he manages to sell enough of them that it turns all the Noise in Shibuya into Pig Noise out of sheer collective buyer's remorse.
• Bad Boss: He's evidently not an easy man to work for, as he saddles people with shit chores or all the chores. The Twisters end up having to dive into several people and cleanse them of Noise, all because he pissed them off in some way.
• Complexity Addiction: Hiring him requires running all around Shibuya to find stickers with QR codes on them, then solving a puzzle with each code to get the digits of his phone number, then solving another puzzle to arrange them.
• Con Man: He's usually selling junk to people, though he's also a legitimate vendor with a Reaper store sticker.
• Psychic Powers: According to the promotional material, he was born "highly psychic" and has a deep connection to the UG that isn't normal for the residents of RG. This makes him a popular choice for the UG residents to use and influence for their own purposes. He himself does not appear aware of the fact.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Coupled with the Wicked Twisters themselves, in this case. On Week 1 Day 5, he's saddled with the unenviable task of selling some ugly-ass pig plushies. When Rindo imprints him with a winning sales pitch, the plushies start selling like crazy. Except...everyone who buys one ends up experiencing such intense buyer's remorse that it causes absolute havoc in the UG. So go figure that the Reapers make the fifth day mission tracking down a golden Pig Noise, hidden somewhere among the horde of fakers spawned from Ryoji's plushies.

Spoiler Characters

Due to the nature of the following characters, spoilers are unmarked to avoid redundancy and due to the Spoilers Off policy regarding said characters. You have been warned.

The Executor

Tanzo Kubo

Voiced by: Taisuke Nakano (Japanese), Xander Mobus (English)

"Devour it all! The barrier! The Reapers! The Players! Everything! This whole city's gettin' cleansed."

While initially appearing as a Reaper under Shiba's command, the endgame reveals that he is an Angel like Hanekoma from the previous game. He empowered Shiba with new powers and set him on the path to erase Shinjuku. Now he is trying to do the same to Shibuya.

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• Big Bad: The true mastermind behind the plot to erase Shibuya.
• The Chessmaster: He plays both Shiba and Rindo like fiddles for much of the game.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: To Hanekoma and Kitaniji from The World Ends With You. While they did engage in some shady actions, they ultimately meant well as they did everything in their power to prevent Shibuya's erasure; Hanekoma is a playful friendly person who inspires Neku to develop as a person while Kitaniji had an amicable relationship with Joshua and worked within the bounds of his authority. In contrast, Kubo is actively trying to erase Shibuya, does nothing to hide his vicious Jerkass nature, mercilessly uses Shiba and Rindo for his own ends, and lets the power he attained from Hazuki rapidly get to his head.
• The Corrupter: To Shiba.
• Deader than Dead: Kubo gets exorcised from reality. That's right, not erased, "exorcised". He's essentially written off reality altogether, as if he had never existed in the first place, so no one will be ever attempting to revive him since they wouldn't remember who he was to begin with. The only thing which remains when Rindo turns back time is the Noise in his Reaper Pin.
• Devil in Plain Sight: He's quite Obviously Evil, but the true twist regarding him is just how evil he truly is.
• Didn't See That Coming: He mockingly brings this up when first revealing himself as the true orchestrator of Shibuya's destruction, as well as the existence of the Soul Pulvis in Rindo's Replay pin. Then he himself gets hit with this in the second confrontation when Hazuki exorcises him, since he'd accounted for every move made in the Reaper's game besides the ones his superiors were capable of making.
• Exact Words: When he introduces himself he says "I'm with the Reapers." not that he is a reaper.
• Evil Counterpart: Again, to Hanekoma. Both of them are Angels who rely on agents to enact their wills. Hanekoma loves Shibuya and does everything in his power to save it, even if it means becoming labeled as a Fallen Angel. While Hanekoma does manipulate others for this goal, he is genuinely friendly and helpful to them. In contrast, Kubo is a heartless monster who tries to destroy Shibuya. He only sees his pawns as means to an end and throws them away when they are no longer useful.
• Evil Old Folks: The heroes often make disparaging remarks regarding his age, and even the most self-serving and malevolent of the Reapers in the previous game can't match up to his sheer sadism.
• Fallen Angel: He's an Angel from a higher plane of reality than the main characters, but he's gone rogue and is slaughtering innocents motivated by nothing but his own bloodlust.
• Fatal Flaw: Pride. Kubo's primary plan to win his game with Joshua through Shiba is essentially foolproof, but he opts to give Rindo the Replay Pin, his backup plan to destroy Shibuya, out of sheer sadistic desire to rub it in Joshua's face when his own proxy is the one to erase the city. In the process, Kubo gives Rindo the means to actually win against Shiba, ultimately ruining all of Kubo's plans.
• Fixing the Game: He rigged the game beyond even Shiba's unfair fixing of the matches in the Ruinbringers' favor so that no matter who wins, Shibuya's erasure is ensured. It takes a divine intervention from Shinjuku's Composer and combined efforts of all Reapers, surviving Players both past and present, and the people of Shibuya to change this outcome.
• For the Evulz:
  • Unlike Joshua, whose desire to destroy Shibuya in the first game was driven by his growing misanthropy, Kubo doesn't appear to have much motivation for what he's doing outside of him just reveling in causing destruction because he thinks he's been allowed to.
  • During the second confrontation with Soul Pulvis, Rindo's Replay pin has already used its once-a-day rewind powers, and thus cannot be used by him again to restart the battle again, but Kubo still goes out of his way to break the pin before Rindo's eyes just to drive home to him how there's no hope left for him to change Shibuya's fated outcome.
• Hate Sink: He was already a Slimeball, but once the true depths of his scheming and ruthlessness is revealed, he shows himself to be even worse, wanting to destroy Shibuya largely out of bloodthirst and sadism. Everyone, including Shiba after he regains his sanity and breaks free of Kubo's control, turns on him once they realize he's the real villain.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: The time-traveling powers he gave to Rindo as a plan B for his plot to destroy Shibuya end up derailing his plan A before solving itself, with a little help from Shinjuku's Composer.
• Internal Reveal: While the existence of "Angels" has been known for years by the audience thanks to the Secret Reports, Kubo's the first to ever reveal their existence to the cast.
• Just Between You and Me: He reveals himself as the Executor and reveals the extent of his plans to ensure the destruction of Shibuya no matter who win the games, aware that Rindo can use the Replay pin to restart the day and forewarn the Reapers and his fellow players about his plans, but still lets him go ahead with it regardless, unconcerned with any changes he might make to the timeline. It's Justified as if Rindo chooses to go back in time, he'll merely make the Soul Pulvis even stronger than it was the first time around, and Rindo can only rewind to a single day's worth of time, and by the beginning of the Final day, the number of rewinds he's accumulated throughout 3 weeks have made Soul Pulvis already overwhelmingly strong enough to wipe out everybody in the city, so there's nothing Rindo can actually do to stop him even if he knows about his plans in advance. Sure enough, despite facing a united group of Players and Reapers, the Soul Pulvis still wipes out everybody else but Rindo and Kubo again, meaning nothing short of divine intervention would upset Kubo's plans regardless of what choices Rindo made on his second Rewind.
• Karmic Death: Kubo gave pins to Rindo and several of the Wicked Twisters that bring them into the Reapers’ Game but basically erases them from existence in the RG. Kubo almost succeeds in fully erasing them from existence by killing almost all of the Wicked Twisters and he instead receives this fate from Hazuki at an even worse level, ceasing to exist even to those in the UG who aren’t an Angel. To rub it in further, Hazuki gives Rindo another chance to save his friends, undoing Kubo’s actions and ultimately making Kubo’s actions All for Nothing when Rindo succeeds in stopping the Dissonance Noise. Also counts as Irony because spent the game pretending to be a grunt. Now he gets to be barely remembered by everyone like a grunt.
• Kick the Dog: After the Soul Pulvis erase everything else on the first Replay of the Final Day, Kubo decides to break Rindo's Player Pin just to rub in how he had no chance of victory. This act of pointless cruelty was followed seconds later by Kubo's exorcism.
• Knight Templar: Shinjuku's Composer Hazuki Mikagi enlisted his help in cleansing Shinjuku. Unfortunately, Kubo doesn't stop there and tries to do the same to Shibuya, which results in the Composer's exorcism of him, completely wiping him from existence altogether.
• Light Is Not Good: He's an angel who has developed a sense of vicious bloodthirst and enjoys the suffering of others.
• The Man in Front of the Man: He is the one pulling the strings on Shiba (and Rindo), all while posing as a mere Reaper subordinate to the former.
• Near-Villain Victory: Subverted- it becomes an outright villain victory for Kubo the first two times Soul Pulvis is faced during the final day, as it's simply grown too strong for the Reapers or the Players to take it down even as a united force, requiring literal divine intervention to restore Shibuya the second time, and even then Hazuki is unable to bring back the lives lost to the Soul Pulvis before he interfered. It only becomes this the 3rd time around, as Rindo is able to help work out a plan in advance- one ambitious and large-scale enough that it requires the aid of pretty much every named character in the game, alongside the unwitting support of the living RG citizens of Shibuya, to weaken the Soul Pulvis enough that it can be realistically fought and beaten. And it's worth pointing out that Kubo was erased from the timeline by the 3rd go-around, so his plans were only able to be upset once he himself was taken out of the picture by a higher power than himself- something neither the Reapers or the Players were aware of or counting on the first few times they confronted him, meaning it was actually impossible for them to win his rigged Reaper's Game with their own strength alone.
• Non-Action Big Bad: Justified since he is not allowed to interfere with the planes directly as an Angel, so he has to indirectly manipulate someone to do his bidding. He alludes to this when talking to Beat, claiming he 'isn't allowed to fight back' and confidently stating none of them would last a second if he could. Once his identity as an Angel is revealed, it's made clear this was simply a hard fact, rather than a boast on his behalf.
• No Ontological Inertia: Averted. Even after he's exorcised from existence, completely removing him from existing in the past as well, the products of his schemes continue to exist (largely due to Rindo still existing) when Rindo makes one last time jump, forcing Rindo and his friends to take care of them for good.
• Obviously Evil: It was never really that hard to see that Kubo was bad news from the moment he was introduced. The twist is that a man as blatantly evil-looking as him is actually an Angel.
• Oh, Crap!: The first and only time he showcases this emotion is when he sees Hazuki's Death from Above beam cutting through the Soul Pulvis noise swarm and hearing straight for him, knowing he's screwed and unable to understand why his boss is interfering at the eleventh hour, right as Shibuya's being eradicated. All he can do is emit a wordless scream.
• Our Angels Are Different: Kubo is an Angel like Hanekoma.
• Out-Gambitted: By Joshua regarding Rindo. Rindo's apparent status as The Poorly Chosen One gives Kubo the confidence to give him the Replay pin as a backup plan to destroy Shibuya, which introduces the only weakness in Kubo's otherwise unbeatable main plan.
• Overzealous Underling: Hazuki ordered him to obliterate Shinjuku, but he has decided to go a step further and do the same to Shibuya because he thinks he's allowed to. Hazuki effortlessly puts him in his place for this.
• Ret-Gone: What Hazuki does to him for overstepping his boundaries - he's not just erased, but exorcised. Also, a bit downplayed since Rindo and Shiba still remember him, but only vaguely thanks to Haz and Rindo respectively reminding them.
• Satanic Archetype: A cruel and smug angel who enjoys making people suffer and wants to bring about the Apocalypse for at least two cities, and eventually is obliterated when he gets arrogant enough to gainsay his Composer. Yep, he fits.
• Slasher Smile: His default Smug Smiler expression goes into this once he starts gloating at the end of the game.
• The Sociopath: His slimy, arrogant personality is no act, and he takes glee in watching Shibuya disappear while rubbing Rindo's suffering in his face. As nebulous as the Angels' goals are, it's clear he genuinely enjoys causing destruction.
• The Unfought: While Rindo and the gang face his Soul Pulvis/Phoenix Cantus Noise during the game's climax, Kubo himself never directly faces them in combat and is ultimately taken care of by Hazuki. Justified in how absurdly powerful Angels are; when Hanekoma was fought in the previous game, it was as the ultimate postgame superboss, and he was still holding back to test an Alternate Universe version of Neku's capabilities; even in endgame it would be nigh impossible for the Wicked Twisters to defeat Kubo, especially since they're already facing a Hopeless Boss Fight from Soul Pulvis.
• Villainous Plan Inertia: Even after he is exorcised from reality, his Soul Pulvis still stand ready to annihilate Shibuya and the Wicked Twisters have to destroy them separately.
• Wham Line: Kubo delivers a few of them during The Final Day.
  • "Like I always say, you gotta expect the unexpected. Be prepared for a future ya didn't see comin'. And that future arrives forty-four minutes and forty-four seconds past four PM. Neheh! And now, it's showtime."
  • "Plot twist, kid! Believe it or not, I'm an Angel from a much higher plane than this here UG. And yours truly has been tasked with executing the Inversion."

The Dissonance

Soul Pulvis/Phoenix Cantus

A swarm of bird-shaped Noise, formed from all the cognitive energy (referred as "Dissonance") left behind by souls that were lost to the timelines Rindo erased whenever he activated his Time Travel powers. It is a creation devised by the Executor, Tanzo Kubo, with the purpose of "cleansing" Shibuya. It's also the Final Boss of the game, taking the form of a gigantic phoenix when the Wicked Twisters think up a complex plan to take it on.

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• 13 Is Unlucky: Phoenix Cantus has thirteen tail feathers, one for each time Rindo turned back time. The player must take them down one by one during its boss fight.
• Amazing Technicolor Battlefield: The fight against Phoenix Cantus takes place inside a monochrome version of the Replay background, a dark void surrounded by "white holes".
• Chekhov's Gun: Plenty of minor details throughout the game hint at its existence, although they are usually framed as unimportant or not worth dwelling much into:
  • Rindo often notices a flock of birds flying in the distance at the end of specific days (the ones where his powers are activated), but otherwise does not make the correlation between them and his Time Travel - or that the flock is bigger every time it appears. Sho also kills a bird the third time the flock appears, which releases Noise symbols - because it is a Noise.
  • There are a few times where Rindo's teammates talk about certain implications regarding his time traveling that directly relate to the nature of this being, such as Fret casually bringing up if his present self just pops out of existence whenever Rindo goes further back in the past to alter the timeline further. He's not quite wrong - the present Rindo altered is destroyed utterly, and its remnants become Dissonance - and from there, Noise.
  • Rindo's Reaper Pin slightly becomes more elaborate and animalistic in design as time goes on (whereas his teammates' pins remain the same from the beginning), further hinting that it's gradually building up to something. By the end of the game, it begins looking suspiciously like the symbol of the basic bird Noise enemy.
• Clipped-Wing Angel: The Phoenix Cantus is this to the Soul Pulvis. The latter is simply impossible for the protagonists to beat by themselves due to their sheer numbers. However, Kaie and Rhyme's plan to combat it greatly reduces their numbers, and as the Secret Reports clarify, Hazuki interfered and fused all of the Soul Pulvis into one large Noise so that the Wicked Twisters could focus all their efforts on a single target, finally allowing it to be beaten.
• Clock Roaches: A powerful Noise born from abuse of time travel.
• Close-Contact Danger Benefit: Grazing Phoenix Cantus' second phase's Bullet Hell attack with a dodge rewards some Groove in return.
• Cognizant Limbs: Its tail feathers are prehensile and a major part of the fight. In fact, in the second phase, you have to destroy all of them to remove the Phoenix's barrier, and there's so many of them the battle is practically over by the time you can actually smack the bird in the face.
• Dragon Their Feet: The problem with Rindo turning back time to try and save his friends at the end of the game is that, even with Kubo being Ret-Gone, his actions aren't, which means Phoenix Cantus will still appear.
• Easter Egg: While it can be dodged without doing so, dodging its fireball attacks to the beat of the music will fill the Groove meter.
• Eldritch Abomination: It's a giant monster made out of dark Noise that are themselves products of the energy from deleted timelines, that will destroy a city so completely the living will never recall it was there.
• The End of the World as We Know It: Kubo created this thing just to bring the Inversion (a city-wide erasure from existence) to Shibuya.
• Feathered Fiend: The Dissonance takes the shape of a deadly swarm of bird Noise that erase anything they touch. When the protagonists actually manage to come up with a promising countermeasure, the whole swarm fuses into a single phoenix-like being.
• Final Boss: It's the final opponent of the main story, battled by Rindo and his companions to save Shibuya from erasure.
• Four Is Death: According to Kubo, The Soul Pulvis is set to be released from Rindo's pin at 4:44:44 PM.
• From a Single Cell: The first round with Phoenix Cantus destroys it save for a single rainbow-colored Soul Pulvis bird, which quickly regenerates into the full Noise. The second time around, the party completely obliterates it with a Killer Remix to prevent it from resurrecting again.
• Giant Flyer: The Phoenix Cantus form of the Dissonance is about as big as a small building.
• Greater-Scope Villain: Of Another Day. The ravens are present for the Felidae Cantus fight, and it's implied they're responsible for trapping Rhyme and Coco in their dreams. Minamimoto still seems to be pursuing them for their power.
• Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: Beating the Soul Pulvis does jack shit to it, as the Noise still proceeds to erase all of Rindo's friends the same way it did the first time. Justified as whilst Rindo and the rest do erase part of the Soul Pulvis' bird bodies from the fighting, there are thousands more spawning endlessly throughout the fight- enough to swarm and surround the background whilst they're combatting one 'clump' of them in the fight, so even if they destroy one part of it, there's simply too many for them to get them all before they're overwhelmed and erased.
• Hopeless Boss Fight: Twice. The first time, it manages to destroy everything without Rindo and Co. managing to do anything about it gameplay-wise. The second time, even with Rindo having prior knowledge of the thing and earning Shiba's help, he and the others are still unable to win because it's just so damn overwhelming. It takes the third time for a perfect, city-wide operation involving everybody's special powers to allow the protagonists to even stand a chance.
• Horde of Alien Locusts: The flock of Soul Pulvis appears to have no instinct other than to consume everything in sight. Humans, Players, Reapers, buildings, and the surrounding land are all fair game; the birds will descend on them en masse and leave nothing behind. Kubo is able to direct the flock and give it specific targets, but they will consume everything in the city even without his direction.
• Meaningful Name: Pulvis (meaning fine particles, such as dust, sand, or ashes in Latin) is the root of the word pulverize. Soul Pulvis, then, are the ashes left behind by each individual soul when Rindo burns away a timeline with his powers. This also explains why the flock of Soul Pulvis becomes Phoenix Cantus, and why a single remaining Soul Pulvis is enough to resurrect Phoenix Cantus. It is a Phoenix literally rising from the ashes.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Rindo used his time travel powers for his team to avoid terrible outcomes, but unbeknownst to him, he was creating an even more terrible outcome. Downplayed, in that everyone recognizes Rindo had no idea he was helping its creation and blames Kubo more for its existence.
• Outside-Context Problem: While it's technically just Noise, the Soul Pulvis/Phoenix Cantus's creation requires a highly specific method that is reliant on exploiting an inherent flaw of Time Travel, of which only one character has access to (and was granted to him by an Angel, a being from a still-mysterious higher plane). A significant portion of the Final Day is dedicated to gathering info about the nature of this flaw and how to combat it.
• Phlebotinum Overload: The real purpose of Rindo's pin is to act as a storage for Dissonance, a phenomenon described as timeline-erased soul energy according to Kubo, meaning said energy increases every time Rindo travels back in time. This energy eventually overflows during the endgame, creating a highly destructive Noise that erases all of Shibuya, forcing one last time jump to kill it while it forms.
• The Phoenix: The Noise swarm ultimately takes the form similar to that of a Chinese Phoenix in the final confrontation against it. Also, just like the myth, it can revive itself (but only once), meaning it has two phases.
• The Runt at the End: Cantus Noise are usually transformed Reapers (or in one case, an Angel). Phoenix Cantus, however, is simply an amalgamation of Soul Pulvis, which are already a type of Noise. In this manner, it has more in common with the Canor Noise from TWEWY, being a "boss" counterpart to smaller, individually insignificant Noise (with Cornix being a giant Raven and Vespertilio/Pteropus being souped-up Bats).
• Sealed Evil in a Duel: To an extent, this is the situation Rindo ends up in with it. He cannot defeat the Noise alone, but he can use his Time Travel power to go back in time and try to set up a more favorable outcome to multiple parties fighting it, and since the Noise has already built up inside his pin to a sufficient amount by the point he rewinds to, it's release is inevitable regardless of whether Kubo is still around or not, meaning it will emerge automatically and destroy everything unless it's killed in battle. Kubo notes this is an option Rindo can take to stave off the destruction of Shibuya from his Point of View, but isn't too concerned with him doing so, as every Replay Rindo does only makes the Dissonance Noise inside his pin grow, meaning the Soul Pulvis will be stronger each time he faces it.
• Synchronized Swarming: During the fight with the Soul Pulvis, the birds arrange themselves in the form of other Noise such as wolf and bear Noise.
• Time Is Dangerous: It's a direct consequence of Rindo traveling through time, and it gets stronger the more he does.

The Conductor of Shinjuku

Matsunae

An unknown Reaper who served as the overseer of the Reaper's Game within Shinjuku prior to its Inversion and was the older brother of Tsugumi Matsunae.

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• All There in the Manual: His existence and impact on the story are only mentioned in the Reaper Reports.
• Big Brother Instinct: Rather then escape Shinjuku, He used his remaining strength to save his little sister's Soul before he finally died.
• Last-Name Basis: His first name is never revealed within the story or the Secret Reports.
• Posthumous Character: He's already dead by the time the events of the game occur.
• Small Role, Big Impact: He was the one responsible for saving Tsugumi from Erasure by sealing her Soul into Mr. Mew.

The "Purifier" of Shinjuku

Hazuki "Haz" Mikagi

Voiced by: Seiya Konishi (Japanese), Nicolas Cantu (English)

"Tell me, Rindo. What is it you find so special about this city?"

The former Composer of Shinjuku turned Angel, who appears at the end of the game. He offers Rindo one last chance to travel back in time and save both Shibuya and Rindo's friends.

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• Ambiguously Evil: Hazuki was the one responsible for erasing Shinjuku by having Kubo infiltrate his own Reapers to perform the job and, according to the Secret Reports, is in favor of erasing Shibuya as well despite clearly interfering to save it. He also makes a genuine apology to Rindo for Kubo's actions and offers Rindo another chance to save both Shibuya and Rindo's friends. It's implied that he had underlying motives in exorcising Kubo and helping Rindo, mostly to force Joshua into interfering as well.
• Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: After Shinjuku's Inversion, he was made an Angel.
• Authority Equals Asskicking: As a Composer-turned-Angel, he is likely just as powerful as Joshua and he shows it by obliterating Kubo from the existence in this world in one shot.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: He's fine with ordering the destruction of a city full of innocent people but doesn't seem to hold any contempt towards humans, unlike Joshua at the start of the first game, instead finding them curious, as indicated by his observations of Shibuya. It turns out that he was just following Joshua's example like a student emulating his senior, not quite yet knowing that Joshua had changed his view on humanity after his experiences in the first game. Even though he effectively removed the problem in Shibuya by erasing Kubo and his Noise creation, he still chooses to motivate Rindo to go back in time to save his friends, even though it could potentially mean Shibuya being destroyed. The last bit actually is traditionally out of character for him, as he notes to Joshua in the secret ending
• Deus ex Machina: He shows up out of nowhere to smite Kubo and the Dissonance on The Last Day' after all hope seems lost and restores Rindo's player pin which lets him Replay one last time.
• Humanity Is Infectious: A possible explanation as to why he let Rindo save Shibuya if the secret ending is anything to go by, assuming he had no other ulterior motives. He notes to Joshua that it was very unlike himself to give Rindo that chance in the first place.
• I Never Told You My Name: Haz calls Rindo by name at the end of the tour which catches his attention since he didn't introduce himself.
• In-Universe Nickname: His name is Hazuki but he goes by Haz.
• Last Episode, New Character: He's literally introduced over halfway through the Final Day, when everybody sans Rindo has already died to the Final Boss twice. More specifically, he shows up at the start of the third run through the Final Day, which begins with Rindo in the RG without his friends.
• Light 'em Up: How he obliterates Kubo. Just like Joshua from the first game.
• The Man Behind the Man: He was this to Kubo, helping set up Kubo to orchestrate Shinjuku's Inversion against the wishes of its Conductor. However, by the time of NEO, he realizes that Kubo is overstepping his bounds by orchestrating Shibuya's Inversion and personally sees to it that Kubo gets his just desserts.
• Mathematician's Answer: When Rindo questions his identity, he's less than helpful.
  Rindo: Who are you?
  Hazuki: Hazuki.
• Motor Mouth: During the segment where Rindo shows him around Shibuya, his speech bubbles go by so quickly that it's hard to keep up.
• Ret-Gone: He doesn't erase Kubo, he exorcises him. Meaning, he effectively removes all memory of Kubo from the world, to the point that even after going back to before the excorcism, Rindo discovers that no one knows who Kubo is.
• Shadow Archetype: Downplayed. He's very similar to Joshua pre-character development, as he doesn't understand humans and feels destroying Shinjuku was a necessary act, insisting he was cleansing the city. However, unlike Joshua, he doesn’t hold any contempt for humans, but also never learned to appreciate them as the Shibuya Composer did.
• Trickster Mentor: By showing Rindo Shibuya without his friends and stating how much risk is involved in turning back time, he motivates Rindo to go for that one last jump in the timeline to save everyone.
• Tsurime Eyes: He has exceptionally sharp-looking eyes, giving him a more sneaky appearance and contributing to his enigmatic characterization.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: He originally tasked Kubo with just cleansing Shinjuku. Sadly Kubo got overzealous and attempts to erase Shibuya as well.
• Vocal Dissonance: Similar to Joshua though perhaps not to the same extent, he sounds a fair bit younger than he looks.

The Composer of Shibuya

Yoshiya "Joshua" Kiryu

Voiced by: Ryōhei Kimura (Japanese), Aaron Spann (English)

"Need a hand there, partner? No one invited me to this little reunion."

The Composer of Shibuya who returns from the first game. The ending reveals that he has been taking steps to indirectly oppose the Executor's plan to erase Shibuya.

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• Affectionate Nickname: Calls Neku "partner" despite their pact no longer being in place. And this time, Neku reciprocates.
• Authority Equals Asskicking: As Shibuya's Composer, he is the most powerful being in the area.
• Back for the Finale: Aside from his brief cameos as The Faceless, Joshua does not make a proper appearance until the final day.
• Call-Back:
  • He gives the same introduction to Rindo and Shoka as he did to Neku three years prior.
  • During the same scene, "It's So Wonderful", the title song from the original game, plays for the first time.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Joshua appears briefly at the beginning of the game as a random passerby who picks up the pin that Fret threw at Rindo and gives it to him, mirroring how he appeared in the original game when Neku formed his first pact with Shiki.
• A Friend in Need: He shows up while Neku is trying to Sync with the entirety of Shibuya's Imagination, for no other reason than the fact that his presence would help stabilize Neku by reminding him Joshua was there. The Secret Reports even specify that he didn't take any actual action, despite Haz expecting him to.
• The Gods Must Be Lazy: While Joshua could have personally gotten involved from the beginning to stop Kubo since Kubo was overstepping his boundaries in his attempts to erase Shibuya, Joshua is more than willing to let Rindo and his team handle the mess. But then again, the ending does reveal that he did vow to directly intervene had they failed.
• Greater-Scope Paragon: The Secret Reports reveal that he deliberately chose Rindo as his new proxy for NEO's Reapers Game, opposing Kubo and his proxy Shiba. However, Joshua does not participate in the game at all, unlike the first time, and is more than happy to let Rindo deal with the problem himself. The Secret Reports suggest that this was an intentional display of the Wicked Twisters' and Shibuya's strength, as they are able to vanquish the Phoenix Cantus without his intervention beyond a few encouraging words.
• Head-in-the-Sand Management: Played with. Joshua knew Kubo could become a threat, but did absolutely nothing while the Angel wrecked havoc on Shibuya, letting at least dozens of people get unfairly Erased and forcing everyone else to do all the work. He does claim he would have stepped in had things truly gotten dire, which raises the question of how bad do things have to be for Joshua to decide enough is enough, given he doesn't act on the Final Day before Rindo activates his Replay the first time nor before Kubo is exorcised the second time.
• Immortality Begins at Twenty: Played with. In both games, Joshua always appears to be the same age as Neku, looking fifteen in the original and eighteen in NEO. However, his Composer form in the first game resembles a young adult, so it may be he doesn't age and is simply altering his appearance.
• I Will Wait for You: His monologue over the Scramble is implied to be a Talking to the Dead type scenario with Neku, and indicates he's been waiting the past three years for his return.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: While clearly on the side of good this time, his words still drip with condescension. On top of that, his method of letting Shoka into the RG is via a "game" of Hide-and-Seek: i.e., he instantly teleports her to a random location in RG Shibuya and she and Rindo have to find each other.
• Pet the Dog: As a token of appreciation to Rindo and Shoka for saving Shibuya, Joshua brings Shoka back to the RG. Of course, knowing him, he simply "puts her back on the street with the rest of the stray cats" and have Rindo to find her somewhere in the city. It took them weeks to be able to see each other again.
• Took a Level in Kindness: The events of the first game seem to have given him some hopes for humanity as he is firmly against Shibuya's destruction, indirectly helping the protagonists. Also, in the ending, he allows Shoka to go to the RG so she can join Rindo and her friends there and gave Neku the choice to be his successor as Shibuya's Composer without a fight before reviving him and parting on good terms with him. The secret ending reveals that he can't help but wish for humanity to succeed in overcoming their flaws.
• When He Smiles: Despite his original status as a Smug Smiler, his new set of sprites feature a softer, more genuine smile that he first shows off during his reunion with Neku.
• Vague Age: In both games he appears as the same age as Neku, being fifteen in the first one and likely around eighteen in NEO. However, his true Composer form in the first game resembles an adult, so it's unclear exactly how old Joshua is or if he's actually aging.
• Vocal Dissonance: More apparent now considering his physical form has visibly aged up. Only applies in the English dub, though.
• Voluntary Shapeshifter: Implied. Joshua always appears to be whatever age Neku is, despite his Composer form in the first game looking like an adult, making it likely Joshua is intentionally changing apparent age.

The Hacker

Raimu "Rhyme" Bito

Voiced by: Ayana Taketatsu (Japanese), Ashley Rose (English)

The Brains of the Family

Beat's younger sister, as well as his partner from the Reaper's Game. She spends most of the game trying to find him, and teams up with the Wicked Twisters in Week 3 to stop Soul Pulvis.

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• Back for the Finale: While she makes cameos in between-day cutscenes, she only appears in the flesh on the final day.
• Brooding Boy, Gentle Girl: A platonic example with Kaie, with her being very calm and reassuring, while he is more nervous and quiet, to the point she sometimes talks for him. Makes sense, as she's already had a similar calming role with her brother.
• Call-Back:
  • Her character description in the Social Network mentions that she discovered a natural talent for hacking while searching for a new dream, alluding to the fact that her entry fee (her dreams) was not returned to her at the end of the previous game due to getting Erased.
  • In Another Day, Rhyme has thoughts of her alternate selves, including being turned into a Noise or acting as a spy for the Black Skullers in the previous game's Another Day.
• Commonality Connection: She and Kaie bond over their interest in computers.
• Hackette: Managed to become a genius hacker between games, to the point of being able to hack directly into the RNS in order to communicate with Beat.
• Odd Friendship: She first ends up contacting Kaie, a Reaper who is some years older than her (and that's just his physical appearance,) through the computer and they continue talking with each other that way, helping each other. When they eventually meet for real, it's clear they're already become quite close and get along great, with her being capable of speaking for him and understanding his unintelligent sounds perfectly.
• Touched by Vorlons: Because of her previous experiences in the UG she's able to retain her memories of Shinjuku despite its erasure, as well as being able to see living players in the UG (but not dead ones or Reapers) when they're normally invisible to people in the RG. A secret report implies that only someone who is aware of the existence of the UG would have been able to hack into the reapers' RNS messaging app.

The Old Friend

Shiki Misaki

Voiced by: Anna Hachimine (Japanese), Heather Hogan-Watson (English)

The First Partner

Co-creator of the Gatto Nero fashion brand and one of Neku's closest friends. She is a former Player who served as Neku's first Partner in the Reaper's Game, and through his actions was able to be brought back to life. However, they are once again separated after Neku is killed in Final Remix, and she has spent the last three years waiting for his return.

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• Back for the Finale: Arrives back in Shibuya after being away for a time to repair Mr. Mew and save Tsugumi on the final day.
• Bespectacled Cutie: Not to the same extent as Nagi, but she's a mousy girl with cute glasses.
• Call-Back: The ring on her pinky finger is the same one Eri - and consequently, Shiki herself in the UG - wore during the first game.
• I Will Wait for You: She, Beat and Rhyme are implied to have been coming to Hachiko every day since the Game ended to wait for Neku's return.
• Legendary in the Sequel: Downplayed in that it's not specifically her who's famous but rather Gatto Nero, the fashion brand she created alongside Eri using Mr. Mew as the design basis and mascot. That said, Shiki, along with Eri, did create a popular fashion brand while they were in high school and, according to her Social Network profile, she's one of the rising stars in the design world, so she's worked her way towards success.
• Out of Focus: She only shows up in Week 3 to repair the Mr. Mew doll containing Tsugumi's soul, as well as to wish Neku luck right before the final battle.
• Tears of Joy: She starts crying upon finally reuniting with Neku again in the RG after waiting three years.
• Teen Genius: At a mere 18 years old, she's already created an extremely popular fashion brand called Gatto Nero.
• Took a Level in Badass: While Shiki herself stays out of the action, Mr. Mew has gotten a lot stronger this time around. In the first game he was just Shiki's basic method of attack, while in NEO he's the game's Infinity +1 Sword by way of the Black Cat Ensemble.
• Ultimate Blacksmith: Every single pin she's created is an ultimate weapon in its own right, particularly the Black Cat set that serves as the game's Infinity +1 Sword, implying Shiki's pin-making abilities are on par with Hanekoma's. Her contribution to the story, repairing the Mr. Mew doll containing Tsugumi's soul and releasing her from it, is also noted in the Secret Reports to be a feat that only an Angel could otherwise achieve.
• Unseen No More: We finally get to fully see what she actually looks like in the RG.

The Author of the Secret Reports

Sanae Hanekoma

The Producer of Shibuya. Because of his actions in the previous game, he doesn't make a physical appearance, but authors the Secret Reports.

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• All-Powerful Bystander: As an Angel, he's on at least the same level as all of the other heavy hitters of the setting. As punishment for his actions in the previous game, however, he's under even tighter restrictions than they are, not being allowed to even communicate with the Players.
• George Jetson Job Security: Played with in that while Hanekoma was previously on the run from the other Angels when he was last seen, in the three years since he's somehow regained his position as Shibuya's Producer, presumably at Joshua's insistence. However, he's still being punished for his actions by being subjected to even greater restrictions on his behavior than most Angels, which keeps him from helping to resolve the plot and means that WildKat is closed and CAT is on hiatus.
• The Ghost: Outside of a brief mention by Neku and Secret Reports, he makes no appearance in the game.
• God's Hands Are Tied: Due to being under greater restrictions, he is unable to give even indirect aid this time. He shows exasperation at this in secret reports as he wishes to help Rindo grow as a person like he did for Neku in the first game.
• Greater-Scope Paragon: As the peeks at Angel culture we're given push them more towards Greater-Scope Villain territory, Hanekoma remains the biggest good guy of the franchise.
• Hopeless with Tech: Downplayed and more like hopeless with digital media. Hanekoma has a befuddlement with social media, which makes sense because he came from a time before smart phones, which gives him slight hippie vibes. He coins that social media has good and bad effects on communication and the paradox that digital media can help people expand their world knowledge wise and communication wise but also hinder it if people don’t choose to look past it. He believes that a work of art can’t truly be seen if it’s just seen through a screen and he also wants to consult Kaie, the creator of the RNS on how to properly transition to digital media with his art.
• Kicked Upstairs: He's been returned his authority as the Producer is a proper Angel once again, but at the same time he's quite literally been relegated to a Soul-Crushing Desk Job instead of a more proactive role this time around. The Secret Reports he writes aren't just for the personal enjoyment and an info dump for the players, but actual desk reports he's had to write to the Powers That Be.

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