Tear Jerker / Your Turn to Die

You'll probably be crying too.

Given how the 'Death Game by Majority' has scooped up a bunch of random strangers, aiming to pit them against each other and vote on which of their number should be sacrificed, it's only natural for the tears to start falling, especially once your companions start getting whittled down.

As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.

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• Kanna brings the pain when she breaks down during the group introductions, revealing that her older sister Kugie was killed during their First Test. Poor girl has a nervous breakdown over the memory of what she'd just witnessed.
  • Not long afterwards, her first instinct after recovering enough to move around on her own again is to seek out Sara and ask about how she managed to pass her First Test, since she and Joe went through the same type of trial, as did Nao and Mishima. It quickly becomes clear that she believes she's responsible for Kugie's death — and when others attempt to convince her otherwise, she angrily insists:
    Kanna: I... Kanna... killed her sister...! Her sister was frantically trying to help! But Kanna's an idiot... She didn't listen...!
• The first death, with how the victim's last action is to push Nao away so she doesn't burn herself trying to get the collar off his neck. In the aftermath, Sue Miley celebrates by mocking Kanna for wetting herself and calling her a "sister-killer," punching hard on that deep-rooted fear of hers.
  • Twisting the knife further is the group discovering just a little too late that nobody had to die in the Test Vote. If the vote had tied, with everyone voting for themselves, they all could have made it out alive.
  • As if that isn't bad enough, the Main Trial brings with it the revelation that Mishima convinced Nao to vote for him, then voted for himself as well to ensure she wouldn't end up with the most. A noble, but ultimately Senseless Sacrifice that left her mentally scarred by his demise...
• Perhaps the first true Gut Punch of the game comes at the climax of the first Main Game, when it's revealed that Joe is the Sacrifice. It's not just the cruelty of how he dies, but the fact that Sue Miley dangles false hope in front of Sara in the form of a special button, presenting her — and the player — with a Mini-Game to try and keep him alive. But all you're truly doing is prolonging his suffering...
  • The execution ends with Keiji having to step in and stop Sara from jamming on the button even after Joe's already succumbed to his wounds.
  • Even before the execution itself, Sara's explanation of her deductions about the card roles is what leads both her and everyone else to realize that Joe has the Sacrifice card. The more she explains, the more horrified she becomes as she realizes the implications of what she's just said...
  • Her deteriorating mental state after these events is truly painful to witness too. Not only does she lose her fire she starts hallucinating Joe as a vengeful monster out to kill her and has nightmares so bad she's afraid to sleep until Keiji stays with her. She's so unstable Keiji actively tries to shield her from all reminders of Joe, going so far as to snap at Gin for trying to give her Joe's little plushy cuz he knows she'd snap...
• Satou Kai choosing to be Defiant to the End, spending his last moments slitting his wrists and encouraging the others to keep resisting their captors to the best of his ability.
  • Before that, however, comes his tearful reaction when he realizes that the others are likely about to vote for him to die. He begs for them to target the sneering Sou instead, who laughs and mocks his efforts, even cheerfully bidding him farewell. After the vote is finalized, he can only bow his head, resigned to his fate.
• Seeing Sara with Exhausted Eye Bags in Chapter 2, drained by the stresses of the deadly game and taking too much responsibility onto herself — blaming herself for not being able to prevent what happened.
• Sou's Character Development in Chapter 2 is nothing short of tragic. While he retains his "uncooperative jerk" personality, he slowly gains more and more empathy for the other participants. He eventually comes up with a solid plan for escaping the game (while taking everyone with him), which is only foiled by the masterminds blowing up the entrance to stop him from getting his way. While he remains adamantly manipulative during the Main Game, once the topic of Gashu willingly switching the cards around comes up and Sou realizes he and the others have a chance to live, he abandons all pretense of being selfish and begins fervently allying with Sara to prove Gashu made an error. He almost succeeds too, only for Gashu to kill himself in order to keep the game running and forcing either him or Kanna to be executed. In the end, either Sou dies himself, or his Morality Pet bites the dust in a fairly brutal execution.
• The first named ending of the game: Massacre. In order to obtain this ending, Sara must vote for Nao, knowing that she has the Sacrifice Card and is doomed to die otherwise... but that this entails sacrificing everybody else. Everyone else's reactions are quite heart-breaking - Gin, Q-taro, and Reko/Alice can't believe you betrayed them while Kanna is tearful yet accepting. Keiji, however, is silent in disbelief with his horrified expression saying it all. Sou simply tells Keiji, "This is reality."
• If you don't vote for Nao and save her from the Sacrifice card, the game parallels Joe's death in giving you a little minigame—this time not to save her, but to spare her the agony of her execution method by killing her instantly with a switch. But Nao's hysterical begging not to die makes it impossible for the player (and Sara) to press the switch, even as Nao's waist is being slowly crushed by a metal vice. It's especially cruel given that Sara is desperate not to make the same mistake she made with Joe, but still can't do it.
• If you vote for Sou, he laughs weakly and says that's just fine with him and muses that Sara hated him enough to want to kill him. Sara's eyes lose their shine and she gives a half-hearted agreement, followed by him laughing. For all of Sou's desperation to save Kanna, it almost seems to imply that part of him hoped that Sara would choose to spare him.
• In 3-1A, the real Sou Hiyori taunts Keiji by revealing that Sou manipulated Keiji into shooting the policeman that Keiji had looked up to since he was child. Constantly calm, dependable Keiji snaps at this revelation and in a state of absolute fury vows to kill Sou. It's shocking to see. And if that wasn't bad enough, even if Keiji loses to Sou, Sara can try to save Keiji by sacrificing herself and taking the "tag" from Keiji, only for Keiji to refuse with a smile - even in his rage and despair, Keiji's still concerned for Sara.
• Earlier in 3-1A if Kanna had been voted for at her request, Sou attempts to cover up his pain by claiming that he was disappointed that he couldn't continue to manipulate her and that she would have chosen him to escape the Death Game together (though it could also be a passive-aggressive jab at the other survivors that they spared him because they needed him). Keiji quickly points out the flaw in this logic, deducing that if Kanna DID get the majority vote and was actually The Sacrifice as he believed, she would have saved Sara and not him. This causes Sou's facade to temporarily shatter and proclaim he was well aware of this since the beginning... and yet he still wanted to save her. Keiji points out that Sou must hate them for making his efforts all in vain to which he bitterly comments that they need to move forward.
• The Victim Videos are a mix between this and Nightmare Fuel. Perhaps the worst part isn't just that they died, but that most of them died without ever knowing why they were there in the first place.
  • Anzu, after failing to escape the shackles holding her to the ground, is given ten seconds to say her final words before a set of spikes impale her. She spends her last moments calling out to her parents and begging for someone to save her, screaming that she doesn't want to die right before she's Impaled with Extreme Prejudice. Sara decides, even if she doesn't know her name, she wants to avenge her.
  • Ranmaru's video consists of him slumped against a wall, bleeding from a massive stomach wound. He admits that, while his life was pretty boring and he didn't care about the future, he wasn't expecting his life to end like this.
  • The fact that Hinako, a middle-schooler, isn't miserable or even upset as she's on the brink of death. When Rio Ranger taunts her about how she's going to die, she thanks him.
  • Mai is forced to play Russian Roulette with a pair of guns or else her collar will tighten and suffocate her. She's literally sobbing in fear and desperation, and eventually has no choice but to pick one. Sadly, she chooses wrong.
  • Kurumada also gets a special mention as he was this close to actually passing his trial, but got stuck with the button right in arm's reach. Him going from threatening his captors to the realization he's going to be crushed to death is hard to watch.
  • Hayasaka's own video is troubling to watch, with the man pleading for his life and that all he wants is to just go home. When he realized he's screwed, he vows to curse both the organization and Sara's name from hell.
• In Chapter 3-1B, when Kurumada realizes that Keiji is charging the spare Midori head, he falls to the ground and starts crawling toward him. At first he seems aggressive, even pointing out that his injuries were because Keiji got trapped in the coffin... but eventually he starts tearfully pleading with him to not forsake the other Dummies.
• You spend Chapter 3 getting to know the Dummies and bonding with them. By the end of Chapter 3-1B, it is only possible for one of them to left alive, and even then, their battery goes out shortly after the end of the banquet. For all the kindness the human survivors show the Dummies, Sara still ends up prioritizing the human Gin, a fact that she's painfully aware of.
• Maple is generally very sweet and friendly, to the point where even the guide on defeating her tells you to befriend her. Chapter 3-1B is not kind to her. After the first fight with her, the player learns that she was technically supposed to be on the side of the survivors and kill Midori, but he implemented a love program to keep her from doing so. Then Midori takes her for some "upgrades", turning her into a Body Horror robot with various A.I.s attached to her. During her second fight, she's pleading with the survivors to run while the terrified Shin AI pleads for help. It's entirely possible for her to end up killing Mai. When she's finally defeated, she decides to kill Midori, but she ultimately fails.
• Before you go into the banquet, Kurumada says that he'd like to hear a song at least one more time. If either Yabusame is alive, they can grant this request, which causes some of the other Dummies and humans to join in with the singing. While this moment is definitely warm and wholesome as there's calm before the storm, if you talk to Kurumada again and failed the first fight with Maple, he will no longer respond, having died from his wounds but with a look of satisfaction on on his face.
• Q-taro's Thanatos Gambit to deceive Midori which involves him doing a Heroic Sacrifice. Upon hearing from Safalin that his wounds are too fatal, he formulates a plan where he goes into Keiji's execution coffin instead to trick Midori into thinking Keiji was still inside, fully aware that he will be burned alive in it. Mai pleads for him to not do it, but becomes resigned from his conviction as she helps him formulate his plan by having Safalin retrieve his doll to continue with the plan.
  • When this all comes to light and explained by the doll Q-taro, Gin is in tears and cries as the doll hugs him before shutting down, even calling him "Mr. Q-taro" rather than "Muscle Gorilla".
• A flashback with Sou and Shin reveals that Shin knew that he had a sibling by blood and wanted to meet them, but was worried that his sibling would probably be disappointed to have him for a brother.
  • If Shin died in 2-2, Sou reveals just who was Shin's sibling: Kanna. The same girl that he had swayed Sara into letting him getting the majority vote so that she could live. And to make matters worse, just like Miley did with mocking Kugie's death, he says it directly into her face.
  • Shin wanted to become someone his sibling would have been proud of, but when he actually met Kanna, he spent the entire time with both of them alive putting on a Jerkass Façade instead. Sure, Kanna still likes him, but it still stands that they could have had a better relationship if not for them meeting in a death game.
  • Probably the saddest part is that even despite all of the above, Kanna still believes that Shin is a good person, and is willing to sacrifice her life just to keep him from becoming a murderer. Even though Shin used and manipulated her for a lot of the time, Kanna still ultimately believed in him...and that was before she had any idea that they were related.

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