Characters / The World Ends With You-The Players

People brought into the Reaper's Game against their will, they have no choice but to play or face erasure.

Go here to go back to the main character page.

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Players as a whole

• Adventure Duo: Neku and Beat and Neku and Shiki to a lesser extent. Neku is always serious and sarcastic, while Beat is goofy, impulsive, and stubborn. Shiki tries to pretend to be always cheery, but it turns out that she's not exactly what she appears.
• Back-to-Back Badasses: The entire premise of the Reaper’s Game is based around the Players eventually becoming this trope if they want to win their lives back.
• Color-Coded Characters: Neku ranges from blue to purple, Shiki from red to magenta or pink, Joshua is light blue, and Beat is green. They even partner up in Chromatic Arrangement Red, Blue, Green order. Rhyme ostensibly would be yellow or orange to complete the set.
  • In Another Day their color code doesn't match their auras, however. Neku is Blue, Shiki Green, Beat Yellow, Joshua Pink/Rainbow, and Rhyme Black.
• Combat and Support:
  • Combat: Neku Sakuraba, the main protagonist.
  • Support: Shiki, Joshua, Beat, and Rhyme.
• Dysfunction Junction: As a result of everyone needing to give up the one thing most precious to them specifically, and often having Dark and Troubled Past of their own to deal with on top of that, the Reaper's Game is designed to set up these. It doesn't help that most of them remember how they all died.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Neku starts out flat out despising his would-be partners, but thanks to the trials they endured together and learning about each other’s Hidden Depths, he eventually grows into this with them.
• Four-Philosophy Ensemble: Neku starts out as the Cynic before eventually becoming the Realist, Shiki is the Conflicted, Beat is the Optimist, and Joshua is the Apathetic.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble:
  • Neku (Phlegmatic): After his Character Development, he becomes more generally calm, peaceful, and patient with his partners. He also seeks peace and consistency, wanting very much to escape the Game.
  • Shiki (Sanguine): Warm, happy, imaginative, and courageous, with a bit of flightiness as well.
  • Beat (Choleric): Ambitious, impulsive, quick to anger, and full of energy and passion.
  • Joshua (Melancholic): Analytical, refined, and incredibly cynical.
• Freudian Trio: Neku's Partners
  • Id: Beat — Tends to rely on brute force, often gets mocked for his lack of critical thinking skills by pretty much everyone, even himself sometimes, and for good reason.
  • Superego: Joshua — Most detached from how other people feel, and secretly The Chessmaster of the entire game to boot.
  • Ego: Shiki — Appeals to both Neku's humanity and his logic to do the right thing.
• Hidden Depths: All of these kids are a lot more complex and layered than they initially seem, especially in the cases of Shiki and Beat. Considering how one of the major themes of the game revolves around the concept opening up to others and expanding your horizons, this makes perfect sense.
• Idle Animation: All four main playable characters have these whether they’re in or out of battles.
  • Neku will close his eyes start jamming out to the music playing in his headphones while occasionally peeking a look of one of his eyes every now and then.
  • Shiki will start playing the around on her cell phone while in the overworld and start chatting and occasionally chat and laugh on it while in battle.
  • Joshua flips a few strands of hair away from his face while occasionally darting his eyes across the area.
  • Beat moves around his arm in a tough guy manner and cracks his neck.
• It's a Wonderful Plot:
  • Neku: Double subverted. Neku at first is jaded, apathetic, and not interested in helping people. Clearly, that would mean something bad happened in his own life. Later in, it is revealed his life never was hinted to be something as tumultuous nor unstable as anyone troubled and in dire straights enough to off themselves as with many others who find themselves in the Reaper's Game- He was merely targeted for having a great imagination and his misanthropy was the result of something like a bad break up; ie he was in a bad situation at the worst time. His amnesia of the incident where Joshua shoots him serves as the weight that binds him and tests his morality and humanity. Rather than he being a soul about to lose themselves, Neku plays the role of the angel who guides the lost to being found.
  • Shiki: Played straight to the end. Shiki's scenario sees that her appearance was important because ultimately to her lesson, looks and imagination are not everything. Whether her accident was coincidental or in fact suicide, her death ultimately leaves an irreplacable rift which Eri will never be able to succeed as a designer or forgive herself as a person over. Because of this, Shiki realizes the worth of her life and sees how important it is she must win her right to live again.
  • Joshua: Played with. This time, even Jesus Christ/God/The Big Bad himself needs a fall back to earth to realize that though the complaints are loud and the Chains Of Command are shackling and draining on his spirit up above, not everything back on Earth is absolute crap and that there are those who will do good in the world when given the right push to do so. Through being with and experiencing Neku's trials and actions, even someone as villainous as he was shown the light of his errors and halted his own command to herald the Apocalypse.
  • Beat: Deconstructed and reconstructed. Through Beat, he had nothing going for him IRL. He was flunking out of school, already had a shakey relationship with his parents, got kicked out of the house when dying his hair was the straw that broke the camel's back, and was about to see a hard life out on the streets, either squating homeless or hacking at hard labor just to get by. Thing is, Beat aimed to be a professional skateboarder despite all of his social shortcomings, and Rhyme, the only other family member who loved him, accidentally was killed with him in an attempt to run away with him. The Reaper's Game was the only thing he saw was the way out, and from then on, his ambitions didn't just include him being a pro thrasher, but making it up to Rhyme that he got her into all of his bad life business, and ruling all of Reaperdom to let them know who really is in charge.
• Kid Hero: Neku, Shiki, Joshua and Beat are all 15, according to the manual. No idea how old Joshua actually is, especially considering his true form, which looks much older.
• Nice Mean And In Between: Rhyme and Shiki are Nice for generally being the nicest of the group, Neku and Beat are In-Between for their Jerk with a Heart of Gold qualities while Joshua is Mean for his Jerkass moments.
• Picky Eater: Your companions have certain goods they don't like. Neku in particular hates muffins. Shiki is the most picky out of everyone, having the lowest amount of neutral reactions and being either first or second in every other category.
• Rescued from the Underworld: They are trying to achieve this for themselves and the others.
• Short Teens, Tall Adults: Even Beat, by far the tallest of the 15-and-under group, is teeny in juxtaposition with any given character over 17.
• The Team: The whole premise of The Game is predicated on teamwork, without a partner you will cease to exist. Who's teamed up with who and when varies but the main players hit most of the Five-Man Band archetypes. Neku is the protagonist and The Hero. Shiki is The Heart, she easily makes friends with the others and has the most feminine interests like fashion. Beat is a Dumb Muscle variety Big Guy. Rhyme is The Smart Guy as she's physically the smallest, drops proverbs and other nuggets of wisdom, and is the brains to Beat's brawn when they're paired up. Joshua is The Lancer as a cheery enigmatic foil to Neku's brooding blunt personality. He also has some traits of The Smart Guy since he knows the most about the game. Shiki, Beat and Joshua all end up helping Neku in the Final Battle, making them even more solid.
• Theme Naming: There is a subtle Floral Theme Naming for Neku and his partners in their surnames: Sakuraba means '"cherry garden", Misaki translates to "beautiful blossom", while Kiryu and Bito contain the characters for "paulownia" and "wisteria" respectively. Rhyme's surname is Bito as well.
• Trademark Favorite Food: The game uses this as a gameplay mechanic: how much a character likes a certain meal affects the Sync Boosts you get. Of the four beginning ramen types, Neku likes Shoyu Ramen, Shiki likes Miso Ramen, Beat likes Tonkotsu Ramen, and Joshua prefers Shio. Shiki has a fondness for sweets. Beat meanwhile likes fast food while Joshua is disgusted by it. Neku likes ramen and Mexican food.
• Vitriolic Best Friends: All of them with Neku.

Neku Sakuraba

See The World Ends With You - Neku Sakuraba

Shiki Misaki

"Let me in! Tell me what you're thinking!"

^{Click here to see Shiki as she appears in the anime} 

^{Click here for spoilers}  "Once you see the real me... will we still be friends?"

Voiced by Anna Hachimine (JP), Heather Hogan-Watson (EN), Lupita Leal (Latin American Spanish)

Neku's first partner in the Reaper's game. Shiki is a cheerful aspiring fashion designer with a stuffed cat named Mr. Mew.

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• Absurdly Sharp Claws: Despite not technically having any claws due to being a plushie, Mr. Mew is able to tear through multiple Noise, which includes the likes of dragons, rhinos, and mammoths, quite easily.
• Action Girl: She is more than willing to take on any Noise in order to survive the Game.
• Adaptational Angst Upgrade: While the events surrounding her and Neku's separation at the end of the first week are shown to be quite heartbreaking at first, she at least was able to share a heartfelt goodbye with Neku before gently disappearing up above, blissfully unaware of her being made Neku's entry fee. In the anime? The poor girl is shown to be in pain while she's slowly fading away and is made fully aware that she will be used as Neku's entry fee for the next week. In the end, she can only tearfully call out Neku's name in fear and agony while she's unable to actually touch him before finally fading away altogether. Ouch.
• Adaptational Attractiveness: Downplayed. While Shiki is an adorable young lady, her overall body structure is quite lanky and downright anorexic due to the game’s art direction. In the anime, her appearance is much more realistically proportioned, giving her a much more healthier and livelier look.
• Adaptation Dye-Job: In the anime, her red hair is much more brighter compared to the game’s more lighter look.
• Age-Appropriate Angst: A 15-year old girl with huge insecurity and self-image issues when it comes to her best friend finds herself unwillingly taking on said best friend’s appearance in a Deadly Game that forces her to have to come to terms with her own flaws as a person? It’s really no wonder that Higashizawa’s Breaking Speech was able to send her into a Heroic BSoD.
• All-Loving Hero: Shiki is incredibly kind and caring to just about anyone she meets. Eri even notes this about her, saying how she always cared about people and noticed the little things about them.
• Always Someone Better: She reveals later on in Week 1 that she feels that Eri is this compared to her, making Shiki feel quite inadequate in comparison.
• Appearance Angst: Shiki has huge self-esteem issues regarding the way she looks and is incredibly self-conscious about this when compared to her much more popular friend Eri. As if that isn’t enough, she’s also been forced to take on the appearance as said best friend due to her Entry Fee, making her feel even worse.
• Art Attacker: Shiki uses the stuffed plushie she sewn as a kid to fight for her in combat during the Reaper’s Game.
• Back for the Finale: She is the first partner for Anguis Cantus, the Final Boss' first form.
• Badass Adorable: Her attacks can deal some very heavy damage. And she manipulates a stuffed animal to inflict said damage.
• Bad Liar: Whenever she tries to distract from a particular subject, she isn’t exactly subtle about it, which Neku picks up on multiple times.
• The Beastmaster: Variation 4 with a animated stuffed cat.
• Beneath the Mask: She presents herself as an energetic, ditzy Genki Girl when in reality she has cripplingly low self-esteem and jealousy issues and secretly hates herself for it.
• Berserk Button: Loose buttons make her madder than anything, making them a literal Berserk Button.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: All Shiki wanted was to cast away her old self and be more like Eri, thinking that would solve all of her self-esteem issues. Thanks to the Reaper’s Game, she gets to literally become Eri, only to find that in actuality it only made her problems worse.
• Beware the Nice Ones:
  • Higashizawa learned the hard way not to trifle with this girl's emotions.
  • Run away from a battle enough times and she’ll get hilariously miffed at Neku, to the point that she even bawks like a chicken to mock him.
• Be Yourself: The crux of her character arc. Overtime, Shiki learns that it’s okay to be herself for, as Neku himself puts it, Shibuya has room for all types of people. She’s Shiki and there’s nothing wrong with that.
• Big Damn Heroes: She, along with Beat, come in just in the nick of time to help Neku out in the final battle with Kitaniji.
• Big "OMG!": Repeatedly shouts this in Another Day upon seeing the Prince, who she is a fan of. Joshua thinks that she’s having a stroke.
• Big Sister Instinct: She opens up to Rhyme very quickly when they first meet and the two of them become very good friends. When Rhyme gets Erased and Higashizawa reveals that he was the one who set up the trap leading to that point, Shiki gets PISSED and jumps straight into action to get revenge on him for Rhyme.
  • In the anime, she is the first to attack the Shark Noise in a desperate attempt to save Rhyme from its jaws. Unfortunately, it has no effect whatsoever.
• Blush Sticker: Gets a very faint pair whenever she's flustered and/or embarrassed.
• Book Ends: She and Neku first meet one another by the Hachiko statue at the beginning of the game and later reunite at very end by the same statue with Shiki in her true form this time.
• Boring, but Practical: Although she generally has the least damage output of the three partners, she has by far the simplest mechanic for getting fusion stars, allowing you to perform fusion attacks much more frequently. In addition, her finisher's invincibility frames make her an excellent partner for defeating harder bosses during the post-game after the option to choose partners is unlocked.
• Boyish Short Hair: In her true form, showing her with short brown hair and bangs that cover each side of her face.
• Brainwashed: By Kitaniji in the first fight with him.
• Break the Cutie: Almost undergoes this after Higashizawa attempts to use her Entry Fee to force her into a Heroic BSoD in order to make her more easier to Erase. Thankfully, her Character Development allows her to overcome this.
• Broken Bird: Underneath her Genki Girl personality lies an emotionally troubled young woman with crippling self esteem and self-worth issues.
• Broken Pedestal: Implied with Eri. Shiki views her as perfect and flawless, which is all the more reason her comment about how Shiki is not meant to be a designer hurts her so deeply. Thankfully resolved in the end, as their fight turned out to be a misunderstanding, and it's revealed Eri needs Shiki as much as Shiki needs her.
• Brooding Boy, Gentle Girl: She’s the energetic, kind-hearted Gentle Girl to Neku’s sarcastic, cynical Brooding Boy. It’s thanks to her influence that Neku is able to eventually outgrow this.
• Character Development: Her upbeat, ditzy attitude? It’s actually all an act to hide her crippling self esteem issues, in an attempt to live up to the image of the person whose appearance she is forced to have, which Higashizawa takes advantage of to force her into a Heroic BSoD Thanks to Neku, she is able to finally accept herself for who she is and gain the strength to confront Higashizawa.
• Chronic Hero Syndrome: Shiki is almost always willing to lend out a helping hand to anyone that needs it, much to Neku’s ire. Later on, this ends up influencing him to the point that he ends up helping others just by thinking about Shiki.
• Combat Stilettos: Averted in her real form, yet again.
• Compliment Backfire: Played absolutely for drama in her backstory. Shiki and her best friend Eri work together to design and make clothes, with Eri doing the designs and Shiki taking the construction. Shiki always felt inferior and wanted to be a designer too, and the eventual argument about this culminated in Eri telling her she "just wasn't suited to being a designer." She meant that Shiki was such a good, detail-oriented seamstress that turning her attention to designing would be a waste of her skill, but Shiki took it... poorly. And ran away crying. And died in an accident before Eri could explain.
• The Conscience: Is this for Neku, constantly encouraging him to think about people other than himself, appealing to the better half of his humanity, and generally influencing him to do the right thing.
• Covert Pervert: In Another Day. When Neku suggests that the group check out the Shibuya River, she protests against it, not wanting to trudge through a dirty sewer. However, when Joshua starts flirting with Neku and even proclaims to want to spend some "quality time with him", Shiki suddenly gets ''very'' interested and changes her mind about not going in.
• Creepy Doll: Neku seems to think that Mr. Mew is this and to be fair, Shiki does state that he just sort of does his own thing in combat, which would understandably unnerve anyone out.
• Crutch Character: She has elements of this. Since female clothing has high bravery requirements, she begins with a high bravery stat, making her easier to equip than Neku, Joshua, and Beat. Her attack chain also has frames of invincibility at the end, making Button Mashing for the top screen a more viable strategy.
• Cute and Psycho: Has shades of this in Another Day. At one point, when Neku defeats Eiji Oji in a game of Tin Pin Slammer, she gets pissed at this and even tries to assure to him that she’ll personally see to it that Neku gets FLOGGED later on.
• Cute Indignant Girl Stance: Tends to do this in one of her sprites whenever she gets particularly annoyed by something.
• The Cutie: The most outwardly friendly, cheerful, and optimistic out of Neku’s partners.
• Cynic–Idealist Duo: Fulfills one half of this trope with Neku, being the Idealist to his Cynic.
• Demonic Dummy: Mr. Mew, but only implied. Since all the media related to the game make him out to be cute, we'll tell you the creepy part now—Shiki just levitates Mr. Mew; she does not control the thing. And why is that? Shiki animated him via a pin called Groove Pawn with the Psychokinesis psych to animate Mr. Mew, according to the Japanese manual.
• Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: Similar to Neku in this regard, Shiki reveals that despite her aspirations to be a designer, she feels that she isn’t qualified enough to fulfill the requirements to be one and feels inadequate compared to her more talented friend Eri, which pushes her to act like the latter in order to gain some semblance of a purpose compared to her old self.
• Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?: Does this to Higashizawa at the end of Week 1. No matter what, she is getting back to Eri.
• The Ditz: Shows tendencies of this at first. It's all a fabrication.
• invoked Doing It for the Art: One of her main motivations for becoming a fashion designer: she simply wants to make clothes because she likes it and makes other people happy.
• Dork Knight: An optimistic, Endearingly Dorky All-Loving Heroine with a huge penchant for kindness and bringing out the best in people (Neku in particular)? Yeah, she definitely qualifies.
• Endearingly Dorky: Shiki's upbeat, energetic personality, ditziness, and love for fashion and sewing definitely makes her this. This is compounded even more with her true appearance, which that of a Shrinking Violet.
• Eye Beams: In her Level 3 Fusion, Mr. Mew gains the ability to shoot two beams of energy from its eyes that dart around the battlefield a bit before ultimately growing into the size and covering the entire area with a gigantic blast that attacks every enemy at once.
• The Faceless: Downplayed, but when you finally see her real self, it's from the mouth down.
• Fangirl: In Another Day, at least, which has her become a massive fangirl for the Prince and 777. It gets to the point that she even becomes the leader of multiple fangirl groups and becomes angry at anyone that insults them or her groups.
• The Fashionista: Just like her friend, Eri. Shiki's such a fashion hound that she tries to get Neku to wear some trendier clothes, claiming he could stand to look cooler. She also has a fairly high Bravery stat, meaning she has a wider range of outfits, although that could be to enable her to wear girls' clothes more easily (since they tend to have higher requirements than normal).
• Fatal Flaw: Her envy issues concerning Eri being Always Someone Better in comparison to her end up causing her a LOT of heartbreak throughout the game.
  • When Eri tries to suggest to Shiki that her talents are more suited towards becoming a seamstress instead of being a designer, Shiki takes it incredibly badly and runs off crying, which unfortunately ends up with her death in an accident the next day.
  • Later on, when entering the game, she ends up giving up her appearance as her Entry Fee, forcing her to take on Eri’s appearance instead. At first, Shiki is happy about this little outcome, finally having the chance to be someone other than what she views to be her inadequate real self, and even takes on Eri’s bubbly personality, only for the whole thing to make her envy issues turn out even WORSE so it only reinforces the fact that she will never actually be Eri, which Higashizawa exploits in order to have her undergo a Heroic BSoD. It takes Neku to help her to realize the value of her true self and hear Eri express how much Shiki meant to her for her to ultimately snap out of it.
• Fighting Your Friend: At the end of the game, she gets possessed by the Red Skull pin and is forced against her own will to fight Neku and Beat alongside Kitaniji, which they aren’t very happy about.
• First Friend: To Neku. Shiki is the one who brings him out of his shell throughout the week they have playing the Reaper's Game. Shiki being taken as his entry fee is proof of how Neku grew to care about her, and it gives him the determination to win the game for her sake.
• First-Name Basis: Neku often calls her "you" or refers to her as "Stalker", but refers to her by her first name after they win against Higashizawa, much to her pleasure.
• Foe-Tossing Charge: In Final Remix, she can have Mr. Mew do this to push back enemies and keep them in place.
• Foil:
  • To Neku, being a cheerful, empathetic, energetic Nice Girl to Neku’s initial sour, cynical, self-centered Jerkass personality. However, it then gets revealed that they’re both lost and confused about themselves, which Neku himself notes and relates to.
  • To Joshua, despite not having any face-to-face contact with him in the main game. She constantly encourages Neku to be more thoughtful and caring for others, appealing to Neku’s better nature, whereas Joshua tries to passively encourage Neku to give in to his hatred of others and self-defeating cynicism. She is also more supportive and encouraging of Neku in contrast to Joshua’s constant trolling of him.
• For Happiness: One of the key factors behind her desire to be a designer. As she herself says, “cute clothes make people happy”, and she herself wants to help out with that.
• "Freaky Friday" Flip: Shiki gave up her identity as her entry fee, playing the Reaper's Game in the guise of her best friend Eri.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: Shiki, as a fashionable girl, has the highest initial Bravery stat despite being the first partner you get.
• Genki Girl: Presents herself as an energetic, playful girl to Neku when they first meet, which gets on his nerves quite a bit. However, this turns out to be just Shiki acting in a Stepford Smiler manner, as her real self is actually quite the Shrinking Violet.
• Girly Bruiser: An adorable young lady with a love for fashion and her stuffed cat...who also has no problem tearing apart multiple Noise with said stuffed cat.
• Girly Girl with a Tomboy Streak: Loves fashion, sewing, and stuffed animals and tends to be associated with pink. She also happens to be a very formidable fighter with a Good Is Not Soft attitude.
• Girls Love Stuffed Animals: Carries around Mr. Mew, a stuffed cat she designed herself and was her first sewing project.
• Gleeful and Grumpy Pairing: The Gleeful to Neku's Grumpy. Whereas Neku is much more troubled and prone to brooding, at least at first, Shiki is a bright and seemingly cheeful young lady who tries to keep the pair's spirits up.
• Good Is Not Soft: While Shiki is most definitely a Nice Girl, she is also not one to hold back in a fight and will Erase any Noise or Reaper that gets in her way. Higashizawa learned this the hard way.
• Good Old Fisticuffs: How Mr. Mew attacks a vast majority of the time.
• Green-Eyed Monster: She was jealous of her friend Eri, but gets over her issues after hearing Eri talk about her in Day 6.
  "There was nothing special about me at all. I hated myself. I wanted to change, to be somebody else. To be Eri."
• The Heart: Generally keeps Neku grounded to reality and is a large part of the reason of why he changes for the better. She's also the most feminine member of the group by far and she has the easiest time socializing with others.
• He Is Not My Boyfriend: When the Cosmic Corner seller mistakes her and Neku for a couple, she is immediately flustered and waves her arms in protest.
• Heroic BSoD: She doesn't take the implications the GM throws at her about her entry fee very well. She gets better eventually though.
• Heroic Resolve: Thanks to Neku’s encouragement and Eri’s indirect affirmation of their close friendship, she is able to break out of her Heroic BSoD and gain the motivation to fight for a second chance at life.
• Heroic Self-Deprecation: Thanks to a combination of being trapped in Eri’s body and underlying jealousy issues she had towards her even before the Game, Shiki has a LOT of self-worth issues. Thanks to her Character Development, she overcomes this.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: Is this with Eri. Shiki even states to Neku at one point that she owes Eri everything.
• Hidden Depths: Quite possibly the best example of this in the cast. Shiki is a pretty, cheerful Genki Girl with a bit of a ditzy personality and a huge passion for fashion, to the point that Neku thinks of her to be nothing but shallow at first. However, as it turns out, her personality was all an act, and her physical appearance in the UG is not that of her own because it was used as her entry fee in the Reaper's Game, but of her friend, Eri, a talented seamstress who she finds herself very jealous of and feels incredibly guilt for having said jealously. She’s really a Shrinking Violet who has huge self-esteem issues regarding her physical appearance and lack of talents compared to Eri though, thankfully, she learns to overcome her insecurities thanks to Neku helping her learn that it’s okay to be Shiki and that there’s nothing wrong with that.
• Hipster: In Another Day. When she and Uzuki both find out that they like the same music artist, they immediately get into an argument over who liked him first.
• Huge Schoolgirl: It's up to you to decide if it's just the angle of the shot◊ (big spoilers on the other side of that link), but RG Shiki seems to compete with Beat in height in the ending credits. Considering the NEO's height chart (which shows Shiki is actually one of the shortest characters from both games and confirms the anime's chart shows Eri's height, considering people usually don't lose height), it is all but confirmed to be just weird perspective. Regardless, in NEO, both Beat and Neku see a pretty big growth spurt over the course of three years.
• I Am Not Pretty: When her true appearance is revealed, she’s shown to be quite adorable. However, despite this, she insists that she’s nothing special compared to Eri.
• I Just Want to Be You: Shiki was incredibly jealous of her outgoing, talented best friend Eri. So much so, in fact, that when she entered the Reaper's Game, she essentially BECAME Eri, copying her appearance and bubbly personality after she lost her real appearance as her entry fee. Thankfully, her Character Development allowed her to come to terms with her issues and learn to appreciate her true self.
• Improbable Weapon User: She fights with an animated stuffed cat named Mr. Mew that she made by herself when she was little. Shiki doesn't actually control him, however... but at least he's pretty nice. The manual states that she has a pin called "Groove Pawn" that is what's animating Mr. Mew.
• Invulnerable Attack: Her finisher grants her invincibility frames.
• It's All My Fault: After Rhyme’s untimely Erasure, she blames herself and Neku for not being able to rescue her in time and claims that they’re all responsible for it.
• It's Personal: With Higashizawa, who uses mind games about her selfishness and jealousy of Eri to screw with her.
• I Will Wait for You: At the end of the first week, she promises to wait everyday for Neku at the Hachiko statue while he goes through another week of the Reaper’s Game. After Neku is sent to the UG again by Coco at the end of Final Remix, she spends the entire three years leading to the events of NEO waiting for him.
• Jack of All Stats: How she functions as a partner. While Beat is Difficult, but Awesome with a combo and Fusion system that rewards the player for getting mixing and matching pairs and Joshua has a Stance System with two different functions that have their own strengths and weaknesses, Shiki is relatively straightforward and easy to play around with, with her invincibility frames and simple Fusion system making her a solid choice all around that doesn’t necessarily specialize into anything.
• Karmic Transformation: While she wasn't transformed into something she hated, Shiki's entry fee was her own appearance, resulting into her transformation into her best friend she sorely envied.
• Killer Rabbit: Mr. Mew may look soft and cuddly, but don’t be fooled. Shiki will have no problem using it to tear down foes at least twice its size if she feels like it.
• Killer Teddy Bear: Mr. Mew is essentially this, being a stuffed cat that can tear apart Noise with its bare hands.
• Kindhearted Cat Lover: Is hinted to be this due to her Mr. Mew plushie and in how her Fusion mechanics take on images of cats.
• The Kirk: Is the most balanced emotional wise out of Neku’s partners, generally the one who tries to appeal to his sense of humanity and logic in order to get him to do the right thing.
• Legendary in the Sequel: In NEO: The World Ends with You, Mr. Mew has gone from a somewhat crude plush toy Shiki made as her first sewing project to the mascot of Gatto Nero, a new fashion label that's rapidly gaining popularity in Shibuya.
• Long-Range Fighter: Doesn’t particularly engage in enemies herself and instead prefers to use Mr. Mew to pummel her foes into oblivion.
• Magic Skirt: Despite her skirt, no matter how many times she jumps up, gets knocked down, or more, she never shows anything close to resembling a Panty Shot.
• Manic Pixie Dream Girl: She isn’t really like that at all. It's only after she genuinely opens up to Neku about her issues that Neku starts truly becoming a better person.
• Marionette Master: We did say something about her stuffed cat, right?
• Meaningful Name: The word "Shiki" translates directly to thread, reflecting on her talent for sewing, and her knowledge of trends in Shibuya. She is the only Player in the game who visibly cares about fashion and trends beyond their effects in battling Noise.
• Mega Neko: At her highest Fusion level, Shiki can make Mr. Mew grow into a giant Eye Beam-spewing cat.
• Morality Chain: Is essentially this to Neku, spurring on his development to become a better, more empathic person. It gets to the point that just thinking about her motivates him to hear out other people's problems.
• Morality Pet: Shiki ends up being this for Neku, as it’s due to her actions and influence that he takes genuine strides into becoming a better person and learning to embrace other people as a whole.
• Nice Girl: She's very easy to get along with and is the most part quite patient and supportive of Neku. This ends up paying off in the long run as it’s thanks to her being this that Neku starts to improve for the better and become a genuinely good person.
• "Not So Different" Remark: As Neku himself notes, she turns out be just as lost and confused as he was, sorting out her own internal issues as well. This realization not only spurs his Character Development, but it also immensely improves their friendship.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: She's sharper than she lets on. For one thing, she, along with Rhyme, were the first ones to pick up on the Players’ ability to subconsciously influence trends.
• Opposites Attract: How her friendship with Neku functions. Neku is a sarcastic, asocial Jerk with a Heart of Gold with a penchant for being brutally honest and covering up his insecurities and inner turmoil with tons of snark whereas Shiki is a insecure, socially aware Nice Girl who tries to cover up her insecurities and inner turmoil with smiles and laughter. After they go through several trials together, this dynamic actually ends up helping them both grow as people, with Neku helping Shiki to learn to value her true self and Shiki helping Neku to learn how to value other people.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: Feels this way in comparison to both Eri and Neku, insisting that she doesn’t have an ounce of the things that make them stand out. It takes Neku talking to her and a reaffirmation of her close friendship with Eri for her to outgrow this.
• Panthera Awesome: Mr. Mew is a stuffed example of this, being able to tear apart Noise, Reapers, and other such enemies with its bare hands, clone itself, and grow into a giant version of itself that’s even able to shoot Eye Beams.
• Pink Girl, Blue Boy: Her aura’s color is pink in contrast to Neku’s blue.
• Plucky Girl: Even after her aforementioned Heroic BSoD and coming back at the end of the third week after being stuck in limbo and being informed that she and the others will have to possibly take on the Conductor and Composer for their second chance at life, she still remains upbeat and optimistic. It takes a lot to bring this girl down.
• Poor Communication Kills: And how. When she and Eri started working on a design, she finds herself becoming frustrated with being unable to come up with a good design, which ultimately culminated with Eri telling her that she isn’t meant to be a designer, wanting to tell her that her skills were more suited towards being a skilled seamstress. Unfortunately, before she can get the latter sentence out, Shiki takes this quite poorly and runs away crying, and actually ends up dying the next day in an accident.
• Positive Friend Influence:
  • She is this for Neku as it’s thanks to her genuinely kind-hearted nature and influence that he eventually starts to care for people besides himself and become a much better person for it.
  • Eri was also this to her originally, inspiring Shiki to follow her passion for sewing and making her want to be something more, before her jealousy set in.
• Power Floats: When she gets possessed by the Red Skull pin and made to fight under Kitaniji’s bidding, Shiki suddenly gains the ability to float up in the air when attacking Beat from above, even though she shows no such ability anywhere else.
• Prepare to Die: When she and Neku use their level 1 fusion attack.
  Shiki: Ready to die?
  Neku: Then die!
• Pstandard Psychic Pstance: Occasionally uses this pose, fitting how she is the one animating Mr. Mew.
• Puppet Fighter: In Final Remix's co-op mode, player two can move Shiki and attack with Mr. Mew independently of each other. However, since both Shiki and her stuffed minion are invincible, there's not much reason for Shiki to move unless she ends up too far away from the enemy to effectively use the Mr. Mew Lariat.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Happens to her in endgame, just like 90% of the cast who get brainwashed by the Red Player Pin. She is then forced to fight both Neku and Beat alongside Kitaniji with no control over what she’s doing.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The red to Neku’s blue, acting as a cheerful and energetic foil to Neku’s snarky and sullen demeanor.
• The Resenter: A sympathetic example for it turns out that she was incredibly jealous of her friend Eri when she was alive and believed her to have everything Shiki didn’t have, which she felt terrible about. She later outgrows this trope after coming to terms with her own issues and owning up to them.
• Rude Hero, Nice Sidekick: The patient, thoughtful, and friendly partner to Neku, who is generally more cynical, anti-social, and bad-mannered.
• Sad Clown: She seems to be energetic and playful but later on, she reveals that her personality was all an act, and her physical appearance in the UG is not that of her own because it was used as her entry fee in the Reaper's Game, but of her friend, Eri, a talented seamstress who she finds herself very jealous of. Shiki's angst is resolved when they overhear Eri talk about how greatly she looked up to Shiki before the day of her tragic accident, and Neku and Shiki become far more motivated to win the game.
• Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: The Energetic Girl to Neku’s Savvy Guy.
• Sizeshifter: In the anime, Mr. Mew is shown to be able to suddenly shift in size to act as a landing cushion, which Shiki uses to her advantage to save Neku from a nasty fall.
• Shipper on Deck: Another Day has her as a Yaoi Fangirl, and she's happily excited about it.
• Ship Tease: Gets this a lot with Neku. The Cosmic Corner seller even mistakes them for a young couple, which Shiki and Neku object to. Shiki even blushes over this.
• Shoryuken: Her combo finisher is a rising uppercut alongside Mr. Mew featuring invincibility frames.
• Shrinking Violet: Her true personality. She’s incredibly insecure and has low amounts of self-esteem, to the point that she even tries to copy her friend’s mannerisms in a ultimately failed attempt to “improve” herself. Somewhat subverted though in that she was only copying the "bubbly and cute" parts of Eri's personality, meaning both the assertiveness and general friendliness she shows are all her own.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: She basically tells Higashizawa to screw off after she decides she has had enough of his mind games.
• Small Steps Hero: Even in the middle of a mission, Shiki still tries to help out people whenever she can, much to Neku’s chagrin.
• Spanner in the Works: It’s only noticeable in hindsight, but it’s thanks to her influence on Neku that he generally becomes a much better person who is in turn able to convince Joshua to give Shibuya (and subsequently humanity) another chance.
• Spin Attack: In Final Remix, she can have Mr. Mew do this in the form of the Mr. Mew Lariat, which can also be used to stunlock enemies.
• Stepford Smiler: Shiki poses as her best friend Eri because she thinks the real her is "inadequate".
• Stripperiffic: Set this skirt just an inch lower and you have a game rated 16 and above. Not so with her real self, though...
• Sweet Tooth: She has positive reaction to every food item that could be described as sweet (except Cola).
• Take Me Instead: At the end of the first week, when Kitaniji tells her that she’ll be brought back to life without Neku due to her scoring the highest in the Game, she immediately objects, offering up her chance at revival so that Neku can go on and she can play the game again for a second chance. Kitaniji, however, promptly rejects it. It's unclear whether his "the Composer's choice is absolute" statement is true, or if he just suspects that Neku is acting as the Composer's proxy.
• Take Off Your Clothes: When Shiki sees that a button on Neku's pants isn't sewn on right, she demands he take off his pants to let her fix them. He doesn't really interpret it as a come-on, but it's pretty awkward anyway.
  Shiki: NOW! PANTS OFF!
• Textile Work Is Feminine: Is noted to be quite talented at sewing and even carries around a needle and thread on her at all times.
• Tomato in the Mirror: Shiki, as she appears in the Underground, is really taking on the guise of her best friend Eri because she's incredibly self-conscious about her own appearance.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: Girly Girl to Rhyme. And Tomboy to Eri.
• Villain Respect: Thanks to her Heroic Resolve and overcoming him, she gains this from Higashizawa before his Erasure.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Whenever Neku acts like way too much of a Jerkass for her liking, Shiki is more than willing to call him out. Like his cold dismissal of Rhyme’s Erasure.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: In contrast to Neku’s relentless cynicism, Shiki constantly tries to see the good in other people and will do her best to keep an eye out for people to help in need.
• Yaoi Fangirl: She doesn't hide it very well in Another Day.
  Shiki: I'm coming too. If anything happens, I wanna be there to see—I mean stop it.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: What she eventually learns about herself. Neku and Eri both reconfirm to her that she is a kind-hearted, talented young lady with a penchant for discovering the little things in others and how no one can take that away from her.
• You Are Worth Hell: After everything she and Neku have been through together, she becomes incredibly close to him, to the point that she was even willing to give up a second chance at life just so Neku can be revived instead. However, Kitaniji puts a stop to that real quick.
• You Cannot Grasp the True Form: Parodied: If you seek out Joshua before starting the main plot in Another Day, he explains that she still looks like Eri because you're still seeing what you expect to see.^note And also because the devs didn't have the time to make a whole extra sprite set for her true appearance. The fun thing with this explanation is that he says it to Neku, who has no reason to question this and no idea what he's talking about; it's really meant for the player.

Yoshiya "Joshua" Kiryu

"Only by allowing strangers in, can we find new ways to be ourselves."

^{Click here to see Joshua as he appears in the anime} 

Voiced by Ryōhei Kimura (JP) and Aaron Spann (EN)

A mysterious boy who showed up in the UG unexpectedly. Despite his air of arrogance and secrecy, his knowledge of the UG becomes helpful to Neku... when he feels like giving it. Has a long history with Hanekoma.

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• Affectionate Nickname:
  • "Josh" or "J" by Hanekoma.
  • Neku also begins to call him Josh as the week progresses, a subtle hint to how he's warming up to him despite appearances.
  • He also gives these out to Neku, such as "partner" and "dear", and has a habit of referring to him as "my Neku" on occasion. In the anime, he calls him Neku-kun, and is the only one of his partners to use the honorific.
• Agent Peacock: Incredibly camp to the point where he can wear women's clothing from the get go, but also without a doubt the most sickeningly cunning player in the entire game. The fact that he's the Composer only furthers this.
• All Work vs. All Play: During Week 2, he’s the All Play to Neku’s All Work, constantly trying to get Neku to forgo the mission of the day and to relax in favor of messing around and furthering Joshua’s pursuits of his own goals for his benefit.
• Almost Kiss: In the final episode of the anime, he leans in towards Neku, there's a close-up of their mouths almost touching, he says Neku's name... and then returns his missing memories.
• Always Someone Better: Is this towards Sho. No matter how many times Sho tries (and fails) to kill him and how many times he gains more power in order to do so, Joshua is always one step ahead of him.
• Ambiguously Gay: Flirts with Neku, shows zero interest in women, is fond of pointing out Homoerotic Subtext between other characters, peppers his dialogue with gay innuendos and is unapologetically Camp. He turns it up to eleven in Another Day and is even associated with rainbows, leaving the ambiguous part questionable at best.
• Animal Motifs:
  • Dragons. His associated brand is Dragon Couture, the "-ryu" part of his name is phonetically the same as the Japanese word for dragon, and Megumi's Noise form becomes a dragon upon absorbing him.
  • To a lesser extent, rabbits, since one of his key items is the Bunny Parka. Fittingly, they both have a connection to the moon.
• Archenemy: To Sho Minamimoto, being the one who constantly thwarts his attempts at becoming the Composer multiple times through the form of constant Curb Stomp Battles.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: Being a Badass Bookworm, he is able to pull this off. When he and Neku are attacked by Taboo Noise, he is able to instantly deduce that they can only be significantly damaged by either one of them holding the Light Puck (original DS version) or by doing a Cross Combo (Solo Remix version). Neku is genuinely impressed by this quick deduction only for Joshua to immediately ruin that effect by acting smug about it.
• Badass Bookworm: An incredibly intelligent Player who regularly rubs his intellect in, who is also more than capable of wiping out anything that so much as looks at him funny with his cell phone.
• Badass Fingersnap: With just one snap of his fingers, he is able to destroy the giant Snake Noise symbol that was wiping out Players in the anime.
• Beam Spam: His aerial attack fires beams from the sky, which are more powerful than his ground combos and hits an entire group of enemies.
• Beware the Silly Ones: A smug, spoiled 15 year old Jerkass who starts off as incredibly weak, with powers that include dropping pianos from the sky with his cellphone, constantly teases (and occasionally flirts with) Neku, is the only male character who can wear girl's clothing the moment he becomes playable, and is the only person in the entire game who can use a mobile, apparently because he didn't get the message about them being banned. When it becomes apparent that the current situation is more dire than he thought, he stops playing around and becomes the most powerful partner of them all, raining huge beams of holy light down on to enemies with his cellphone rather than pianos. He's also the Big Bad. And God.
• Big Damn Heroes: In the anime, when the mission on Day 5 takes an unexpected turn. A giant Snake Noise symbol appears and starts erasing Players left and right and would have erased Shiki and Neku had Joshua not intervened.
• Big Ego, Hidden Depths: Joshua can get pretty damn arrogant at times, occasionally referring to his sheer brilliance and his often haughty attitude towards others, especially Neku. Despite this, he is shown to have some surprising insights on humanity and actually shows some willingness to at least try to understand other people. Not to mention the fact that the whole reason he was trying to destroy Shibuya was due to the his belief that its complacency would end up poisoning the world at large, only for him to change his mind due to his interactions with Neku.
• Birds of a Feather: Once Neku finally comes around to him, the two get along rather nicely due to their shared nihilistic worldviews and love of snarking. Neku even admits that he was the first friend that he could ever relate to during the ending. This is proven genuine by the game's end.
• Brilliant, but Lazy: Heavily presents himself as this to Neku, regularly bemoaning having to do missions and suggesting that they let the other Players handle them. It gets to the point that when Neku questions him on his ability to summon holy beams of light, his reasoning was that he hates working up a sweat.
• Broken Ace: Possesses great intellect as well as a flexible and creative mind, is shown to be incredibly powerful with a vast amount of Imagination, and is even revealed to be the Composer of Shibuya, making him the most powerful force in charge of it. By all accounts, Joshua should be considered perfect, but, due to his condescending and arrogant attitude, these qualities of his tend to be overlooked by Neku and make him incredibly difficult to work with. On top of that, his growing misanthropic mindset and disgust with Shibuya almost enabled him to wipe the city entirely off the map, only to be convinced otherwise by Neku and his actions.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Loves to watch children’s TV programming, constantly messes with his own partner, is able to crossdress surprisingly well, and is just a Troll overall. He’s also a master manipulator, one hell of a chessmaster and is also the Composer to boot.
• Byronic Hero: Much like Neku, he fits this trope to a tee. Cynical and jaded? Check. Intelligent and introspective? Considering how much of a Badass Bookworm he is, check. Attractive? His Bishōnen looks more than qualifies him. Morally complicated? Hoo boy, check.
• Car Fu: His primary form of attack (when he's not in God Mode, anyway) is to conjure cars and other large metal objects to drop on opponents.
• Character Filibuster: Whenever he isn’t acting like a total Jerkass (and even when he is), Joshua loves to drone on and on about various things of interests, whether its philosophical contemplation, random bits of trivia about Shibuya and its culture, or explaining more about the rules and systems of the Reaper’s Game. Neku tends to get particularly annoyed and/or frustrated whenever he does so.
• Clairvoyance: According to the Secret Reports, Joshua normally possesses a certain degree of clairvoyant foresight in his Composer form. However, due to having to put a limiter on his abilities in order to disguise himself as just a regular Player, he is unable to access this ability at will, clouding his supertemporal vision.
• Colony Drop: His Level 3 special drops the Moon onto Earth.
• Creepy Child: Looks no older than fifteen and can be especially creepy at times, what with his flippant attitude towards the concepts of life and death and perpetual habit of shooting angsty teenagers in the face. Is it really any surprise that he turns out to be the Composer?
• Crucified Hero Shot: His idle pose when he's in the air gives off shades of this.
• Cultured Badass: Incredibly refined and knowledgeable about a wide variety of interests and cultures and is also one of the most powerful characters in the story.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Deals this out to Sho TWICE throughout the game. First when Sho tries to shoot him while in the UG, with absolutely no effect whatsoever, and second when Sho tries to confront him while in his Taboo form only for him to get crushed by Joshua’s Mind over Matter abilities, heavily implying that Joshua didn’t even need to break out his beams in order to take down Sho.
• Cutscene Power to the Max: His "Jesus Beam", when it's first introduced, kills a Taboo Rhino almost instantly. While it is quite powerful, it would normally take at least a full combo to do so (and, the opponent being a Taboo noise, Joshua would need the light puck). Justified, however, in that Kariya says that if Josh ever used that level of power again, he'd be erased...by Uzuki.
• The Cynic: Even more so than Neku, which is saying something. Throughout the game, Joshua regularly expresses his utter contempt for other people, believing humanity to be inherently flawed and unable to readily change. It’s thanks to his interactions with Neku that he is able to overcome this and ultimately decide to spare Shibuya.
• Dangerous Forbidden Technique: The Secret Reports reveal that his dodging Level i Flare by jumping to Another Day was this. Moving to parallel worlds requires uptuning one's vibe much higher than is common for anyone but Angels; as Joshua isn't an Angel, there was the risk that his base vibe would suffer from the strain, possibly stranding him in Another Day. When Joshua doesn't show up when Hanekoma expected, the Producer worries he'd run afoul of the consequences and goes after him. (Thankfully he'd just been sidetracked by Tin Pin Slammer and had plenty of vibe to get home.)
• Deadpan Snarker: He is vastly intelligent and uses it to snark at Neku whenever the opportunity presents itself (which is pretty much all the time).
• Death from Above: What he specializes in, whether it’s dropping random objects from the sky or summoning holy beams of light from the heavens.
• Death Glare: In the anime, he gives Neku a very intimidating version of this once he picks up on Neku scanning him.
• Description Porn: When ramen is concerned.
• Deuteragonist: Out of all the partners Joshua is the most important to the story, Especially since his character development stops the game from having a Downer Ending with him erasing Shibuya.
• Expy: There is absolutely no way that he isn't based off of Kaworu Nagisa. Though he has the smugness cranked up.
• False Friend: The entire plot of his week is determining whether or not he's this. Turns out he was at first, though his time with Neku changed him.
• The Fashionista: Downplayed. He enjoys shopping, favors a range of stylish clothes from expensive brands, and is condescendingly surprised at Neku's knowledge on the subject when it's brought up, but his usual outfit is rather plain compared to his informed taste.
• Fire/Ice Duo: When he and Neku activate their Level 2 Fusion, Joshua summons a storm of ice meteors on his end while Neku summons a rain of fireballs and meteors from his.
• First-Name Basis: In both the Japanese version and the anime, Neku only calls him by name after his seemingly Heroic Sacrifice.
• Flanderization: In the manga, where he goes from Ambiguously Gay to taking pictures of Neku's ass on his phone.
• Foil: Neku and Joshua are very obvious foils, and it can be argued that this contributes significantly to both of their character developments. Neku is a brooding, anti-social loner who’s suspicious of other people whereas Joshua is more cheerful and more willing to engage with others if it’s to his own benefit. Both have very negative outlooks on the world, initially, and have extraordinary trouble understanding other human beings around them. Joshua even goes so far as to constantly point out these similarities between them, egging Neku on about it, until Neku points out that he actually has a desire to understand people and not just give up on understanding them altogether (which comes as a genuine surprise to Joshua.) Also there's the fact that Joshua was responsible for Neku's death and involvement in The Reapers' Game, making him technically an antagonist all along, which makes their similarities equal parts interesting and ironic, and even emphasizes the different viewpoints between the two of them. It's also implied that Neku's change of heart over the course of the game is what spurs on Joshua's change of heart and ends up actually saving the day.
• Friendless Background:
  • Heavily implied to be this way for him. As Hanekoma confesses to Neku, in a way, Joshua has been alone his entire life. This gets expanded upon even more in the secret ending where he is shown genuinely wanting to be friends with Neku and the others but being unable to do so.
  • On top of that, the few relationships that he DOES have end up backfiring on him since both Kitaniji and Hanekoma were willing to turn on him for the sake of their own beliefs, with the former deifying him but not really being his friend and the latter opting to kill him in order to protect Shibuya. In the end, Neku is quite possibly the only one that Joshua can refer to as a true friend since Neku couldn’t bring himself to shoot Joshua despite the latter giving him all the reason in the world to do so.
• The Gadfly: Deliberately messes with Neku on several occasions throughout the second week, most likely to gauge whether or not Neku truly changed for the better and attempt to justify his plan to destroy Shibuya.
• Gentleman Snarker: Incredibly so and boy, does he love rubbing it in.
• Good with Numbers: Is able to instantly deduce numbers and equations in an instant, which he loves to rub in Neku’s face. It’s what allows him to understand Sho’s insane ramblings as well as the missions be sends out.
• Giggling Villain: Though more of a Token Evil Teammate than an outright villain, Joshya giggles constantly and the only expressions he shows tend to fluctuate between "smug", "smartass", and "condescending".
• Guile Hero: Joshua has a very in-depth knowledge of human nature most likely as a result as his role as Composer and he uses this to his benefit multiple times throughout the game, most notably when he gets two of the members of Def March to crack during his intense interrogation of them when investigating the case of the stolen mic through a combination of honeyed words and sharp observations. Neku is simultaneously both impressed and disturbed.
• Hair Flip: In one of his idle poses.
• Heroic Sacrifice: At the end of the second week, when Sho activates a last ditch ultimate attack in an attempt to take down both Players with him, Joshua pushes Neku out of the way and takes the full brunt of the blow in order to shield him... only for this to get Subverted later on when he turns out to have not only survived but that he faked the entire thing. However, it should be noted that there was a genuine risk of him actually getting Erased for real by the blast so a part of that was indeed genuine.
• Holy Hand Grenade: Later on in the game, he reveals to have the ability to summon holy beams of light from above to spam his enemies to death with. Needless to say, it enables him to do a LOT more damage than what he was able to do beforehand.
• Homoerotic Subtext: A LOT of it from his end when it comes to Neku, much to the latter’s ire. He constantly flirts with and teases him throughout multiple occasions, with Another Day taking this aspect up a notch.
• I Lied: On Week 2, Day 3, he claims that the mission for the day is to reach Cat Street within 15 minutes, resulting in him and Neku making a mad dash to get there in time. Once Neku reaches the destination, he realizes that he never had a timer on his hand, and that Joshua was just lying to trick him into going to Cat Street. He doesn’t even deny it, either.
  Neku: You lied to me!?
  Joshua: Kinda, yeah.
• Improbable Weapon User: His cell phone, which he uses to drop random objects such as cars and signs on enemies. He also uses it to summon beams of holy light because he's the Composer.
• Insufferable Genius: Even more of one than Minamimoto because of his Jerkass tendencies.
• In Touch with His Feminine Side: Has willingly dressed in feminine clothing at least once, is shown to think of shopping as fun, and some of his most powerful items are noted to be primarily associated with women’s fashion brands.
• Irony:
  • In the Remix versions, one of his combat lines is "How's my aim?" in a sarcastic "Of course it's awesome" tone. However, because his Partner Pin is activated with a downward slash, a first-time player will find his (read: their) aim lacking until they get used to compensating for the knockback of whatever psych they have Neku using.
  • His teaming up with Neku turns out to be this. In spite of his attempts to revert Neku back to his previous mindset, their conversations instead allow Neku to reflect on his experiences and beliefs and grow from that, and it's Neku who ends up changing him for the better instead.
  • Implied with his backstory. Hanekoma remarks on how he was alone his whole life, and that same loneliness and alienation he felt from being able to see the UG seems to have resulted in his hatred for the RG and eventual death. Yet his role as Composer leaves him just as isolated, if not more so, and his increasingly negative views of people stemming from that leads him to eventually plan Shibuya's destruction.
• I See Dead People: Joshua knew about the Games before dying himself. Notably, he's not alone; a few nameless NPCs can see Noise and Reapers.
• It's Personal: Not so much like the other examples, but he has it with Minamimoto, since he's trying to kill him and take his place as the Composer.
• Jerkass: Tends to insult Neku fairly often in a grating tone of voice, particularly when the player isn't doing particularly well in battle. And then there's the whole "killing Neku to use him as a pawn to destroy Shibuya" thing.
• Jerkass Has a Point: On Week 2 Day 2, Neku, fed up with Joshua's neglecting the missions in favor of his personal agenda, tells Joshua that he can't afford to fail, since Shiki became his entry fee, meaning that she'll be lost forever if he doesn't clear the game. Joshua plays the World's Smallest Violin, and coldly tells Neku that everyone has something precious to them and that he isn’t anything special compared to them. It's fairly callous, but over the course of the week, Neku eventually starts caring about other people, even those he doesn't know, and realizes that, just like him, they all have something to fight for and all deserve to win just as much as he does, so Joshua has a point.
• The Lancer: He's the partner who Neku has the most clashes with throughout their time together, with their entire week being centered around Neku's lack of faith in him. To further this, his worldview is almost identical to the one Neku spends the entire game trying to get rid of.
• Lean and Mean: Neku even notes himself to be a pipsqueak when he first meets him.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The one most prone to doing this in Another Day, whether it’d be instantly recognizing an NPC and bemoaning having to face an “unnamed character” or explaining to Neku that the reason Shiki looks nothing like her real self is because the developers couldn’t be bothered to make new sprites for her. Neku is, understandably, quite confused.
• Let's Get Dangerous!: He at first insists on not wanting to work up a sweat at all during the game and generally puts the bare minimum effort in, that is until he and Neku encounter a particularly dangerous Taboo Noise. Cue Joshua deciding to let loose and summon a holy beam of light to wipe out said Noise in one hit. Needless to say, Neku is appropriately caught off guard by this.
• Light 'em Up: Can summon holy beams of light from above to target enemies and rain down massive amounts of damage on them.
• Long-Haired Pretty Boy: He has long shoulder-length hair which contributes to his androgynous features.
• Long-Range Fighter: Prefers to hang back from afar and let his cellphone and Jesus Beams do the talking.
• Magical Camera: During Week 2, Hanekoma, on Joshua’s request, upgrades his and Neku’s phone to have their built-in camera be able to take photos of the past up to three times a day. On top of that, Joshua is even to use his camera to temporarily stun enemy foes and move them to the other side of the screen in order to open them up to his attacks.
• Magikarp Power:
  • In the DS version, when you first get him, he's... not quite as good as Shiki was. He doesn't deal damage until he completes a combo chain and his sidestep isn't anywhere near as useful as Shiki's block. When you get the camera upgrade for his phone, he's a bit better, as he gains the ability to stun enemies, but he's still not very powerful. Then, when he starts levitating, he easily becomes the best partner in the game.
  • Downplayed in Solo Remix due to the changes in the partner system; he drops an item with every use of his Partner pin, and he can't get hurt himself. That being said, his combo starts with rather weak hits, his Partner pin being 'slash' activated means accuracy is a bit of a trial, and you'll go through most of his psych before you finish a combo. He again deals more damage when he starts levitating, and his combo length is altered so that you'll activate the finisher at the exact halfway point... assuming your hits all land, because it's still activated with a slash.
  • The Final Remix plays like the Solo Remix with single-player, but Co-op play completely averts this; he has three attacks from the beginning, and although acquiring his levitation sticker is still a power boost, it's not dramatic enough to qualify for the trope.
• Mind over Matter: In Final Remix, when controlled by a second player in Co-op mode, he gains the ability to telekinetically pick up objects and enemies and make them slam into one another. It's the only ability from his grounded moveset that he can still use after he starts levitating.
• Mr. Exposition: Whenever Hanekoma isn’t around to fulfill the task as the game’s main source of exposition, Joshua is more than happy to step up to the role, albeit in an incredibly smug manner.
• Mysterious Past: Like Neku, his past is one of the only ones that isn't fully explored within the main Players, with the only bits and hints coming from Hanekoma and Joshua himself.
• Mystical Waif: A rare male example. He randomly makes a pact with Neku, is arguably Really 700 Years Old, and in a twist ending turns out to be the Big Bad, who does a Heel–Face Turn after the final boss.
• Nerves of Steel: Even whole confronting several difficult tasks and challenges, Joshua almost never loses his cool. Justified considering his status as the resident Physical God.
• Never My Fault: Even if you never get hit on Neku’s end of the screen, Joshua will still go out of his way to insult him and insinuate that he needs to do better in battle if you get a low score in the post battle reports. On top of that, if you end up dying, he’ll even blame you for getting them both killed.
• Noble Male, Roguish Male: Played with in regard to his dynamic with Neku. Joshua is incredibly cheery, refined, and dignified and speaks with an often worldly and enlightened vocabulary. By contrast, Neku is much more dour, aloof, and acts in a more aggressive manner, at least in Week 2, often speaking with a blunt and straight to the point attitude. However, whereas Joshua is a huge Jerkass with a penchant for cynical tangents about humanity and outwardly messing with others to get under their skins, Neku is a burgeoning Jerk with a Heart of Gold who gradually begins to open up to others and treat people with respect.
• Non-Standard Character Design: Out of all the main characters in the game, Joshua is rather mundanely dressed, especially by Square Enix standards—he looks more like an NPC than a protagonist. Even his default wardrobe's color scheme is just shades of gray. It serves as striking symbolism and rather jarring contrast to the fact he's basically God.
• No Sympathy: When Neku pours out his motive for wanting to complete the missions in Week 2 as fast as he can (saving and bringing Shiki back to life with him), Joshua isn't very moved and plays the World's Smallest Violin card when it comes to him, bluntly telling him that compared to everyone else, his motive isn't as special as everyone in the Game has something important to them.
• No Social Skills: Again, much like Neku in this regard. Joshua regularly expresses his inability to connect with others and even outright says at one point to Neku that understanding people isn’t hard- it’s flat out impossible. After seeing how much Neku has changed, however, he comes to change his tune a bit and even ends up sparing Shibuya because of it.
• "Not So Different" Remark: He himself regularly notes the similarities between him and Neku, with both of them being incredibly cynical of other people and being huge snarkers. Neku himself even admits this in the game’s ending, claiming that he felt that with Joshua, he had finally made a friend that can understand him.
• Not So Stoic: While he is for the most part unflappable, even in the midst of the Reaper’s Game, there are times in which he is caught off guard and is actually genuinely surprised.
• Out-of-Character Alert: Instead of being presented as the unflappable, cheery, and enigmatic figure as he is in the main game, in A New Day, "Yoshiya" is a wimpy, stammering Shrinking Violet that gets frightened easily and always goes by his full name. This helps tip Neku and Beat off that something is seriously wrong with Shibuya.
• Perpetual Smiler: In contrast to Neku, Joshua almost always has a smug smile on his face.
• Pillar of Light: Can summon deadly holy beams of light from above to strike down anything that opposes him.
• Powers Do the Fighting: Isn’t much for physical combat and instead focuses on either dropping random objects on his enemies or striking them from above with his beams of light.
• Power Floats: When activating his deadly Jesus Beams, he floats above the ground in a Crucified Hero Shot.
• Pragmatic Hero: He’s more than willing to get his hands dirty when it comes to the Game, such as when he purposely sabotages Shooter’s Red Kaiser to make it so that the opposing Players can win by default, making them able to complete the mission.
• Pretty Boy: A very slender and attractive young man with feminine features and a talent for crossdressing. He even gets referred as the trope on two occasions; once by a Support Reaper and the other time by Kariya.
• Princely Young Man: Thanks to a combination of his attitude and his position as Shibuya’s Composer, he definitely qualifies as such. He’s of the Gentleman type, putting on a cheerful front to hide his true enigmatic and crafty nature and is almost always up to something.
• Real Men Wear Pink:
  • The Frilly Parasol is one of his better items.
  • His outfit may be composed of several Natural Puppy items in alternate colors, including a shirt whose description states "Every girl needs one!"
• Red Herring: Midway through week 2, Neku remembers Joshua shooting at him, implying he was his murderer. Then it's revealed he was shooting at Minamimoto, who killed Neku in the crossfire. Then it's revealed that Minamimoto didn't kill Neku in the crossfire; he ran away, and then Joshua murdered Neku in cold blood.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: During Week 2, he’s the cheerful, calm, and enigmatic Blue to Neku’s grumpy, passionate, and blunt Red.
• Sarcasm Mode: Tends to engage in this more than once when it comes to Neku.
  Neku: [referring to Joshua’s tracker] I thought you were looking for the Shibuya River.
  Joshua: I am.
  Neku: Uhh... I don’t see any rivers.
  Joshua: Thank you, Neku.
• Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Heavily downplayed but Joshua tends to speak in overly formal language and uses complicated words such as "egregious", most likely in reference to his Insufferable Genius qualities and disconnect from regular social norms.
• Shadow Archetype: Joshua can be considered the logical extreme of Neku’s previous mindset, with both of them having trouble being able to understand others, only instead of showing outright disdain like Neku, he opts for a more smug, self-righteous temperament. However, unlike Joshua, Neku develops a desire to actually understand people and not give up on them altogether, which comes as a genuine surprise to Joshua.
• Sidetracked by the Gold Saucer: Proof that Square-Enix is making too many addictive games: the last Secret Report reveals that the reason why he does not show up during the third week is because he was too busy playing Tin Pin, having friends, and being a normal kid for once, in Another Day.
• The Smart Guy: He's without a doubt an absolute genius, and boy does he like to rub it in! His brains allow for him to keep up with Minamimoto with relative ease and are responsible for him and Neku occasionally bending the rules of the game in their favor. Justified in that not only is he essentially cheating, but he made the rules!
• Smug Smiler: His default expression, highlighting his Insufferable Genius tendencies.
• Smug Super: Is incredibly arrogant and condescending towards others, often showing off his vast intellect and abilities for his own amusement. Thing is, however, he actually CAN back these up thanks to his position as the Composer.
• Snark-to-Snark Combat: Regularly engages in this with Neku, who more than often enough is unable to keep up with Joshua’s constant barbs.
• The Spock: By far the most pragmatic of Neku’s partners, almost always suggesting leaving the other Players to deal with the missions and generally acting the most detached.
• Squishy Wizard: When floating, his attacks are much more stronger and can hit enemies much more rapidly compared to on the ground. On the flip-side, however, he’s also a sitting duck when in the air and can be susceptible to some nasty hits if he isn’t careful.
• Stab the Scorpion:
  • Played with. Neku's initial flashbacks lead him to think that Joshua killed him, but the one he gets just before fighting Minamimoto suggests that Minamimoto was the shooter, and Joshua was trying to save Neku. In the end, though, it's subverted - after driving Minamimoto off, Joshua did, in fact, kill Neku.
  • Played straight in "A New Day"; Neku starts having visions, one of which is Joshua shooting him again. The actual event when the vision comes to pass is Joshua shooting at Coco, who has just shot Neku.
• Stance System: How his ground and air combos function in the DS version. When he’s on the ground, Joshua can’t attack until he’s fully done completing a combo chain and can be interrupted before doing so but he’s also able to dodge more effectively and can stun/teleport enemies with his phone camera, leaving them open to attacks. Not only that, but he’s also able to unleash finishers that can attack all enemies on one side when he targets them all. On the flip-side, he can attack with every hit in the air and unleash screen-clearing beams of light on both ends when he inputs the right amount of combos (usually six or more on a single enemy) but he’s also much more vulnerable and can suffer from some nasty knockback damage if caught off guard.
• Stupid Sexy Flanders: In one particular instance, a Reaper refers to him as a pretty boy and even has him dressing up in Natural Puppy clothes. When he does do, the Reaper is momentarily stunned and even admits that he actually pulls it off.
• Sucksessor: Neku is not pleased when the second week rolls around and instead of getting to work with the first person to break through his shell, Shiki, he's stuck with an insufferable, condescending prick who clearly knows more about the game than he's letting on and may or may not have been involved in Neku's death.
• Taking the Bullet: Jumps in front of Neku to protect him from some Noise in the anime, though unlike a later scene, the attack wasn't deadly.
• The Tease: Shamelessly flirts with Neku and delights in using innuendos whenever he has the opportunity.
  Joshua: Fabulous, Neku. You won again. Hee hee... You sure know how to show me a good time.
• Token Evil Teammate: Not exactly evil, but compared to Neku's other partners, Joshua is a smug asshole who hides things from his partner to manipulate him into doing what he wants. He's also the only one of the three who doesn't attempt to reach out to others, instead preferring to shut them away; the exact opposite of the game's message. Maybe him being one of the Big Bads wasn't such a twist after all.
• Trickster Mentor: Some of his interactions with Neku come across as this, as he teaches Neku more about the inner mechinations of the Reaper’s Game and how it works under the guise of trying to make a fool out of him. Such as showing Neku the way to the Composer’s chamber under the guise of him tracking down something with his cellphone.
• Troll: He LOVES to mess with Neku, regularly making a fool out of him and testing his patience.
• The Unfought: He's the only partner who is never fought under any circumstances. Even though he's the Composer and one of the main orchestrators of the plot.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Once Neku comes around to him, their relationship remains incredibly snarky and antagonistic but Neku is left extremely guilty after his apparent death and claims that Joshua was the first friend he could ever relate to, and Joshua ends up sparing Shibuya because of the bond he forged with Neku. Even their battle dialogue is extremely snarky, as you can see with their Level 1 fusion.
  Joshua: Follow my lead!
  Neku: Screw that!
• Vocal Dissonance: Admit it, when you first heard Joshua's voice, you were surprised that it was coming from the mouth of a 15 year old boy. It's even more jarring in the sequel, where he has the same voice but an older physical form.
• Walking Spoiler: There's a lot more to his character than it seems. See The Composer entry for further details.
• Wham Episode: Joshua's entire week is one of these. All of Neku's work in the previous week is rendered meaningless as he has to replay the game, this time with Shiki as his entry fee. Beat is now a reaper out for his blood and the Noise can now attack at random and are much, much stronger. To make matters worse, Joshua is unbelievably smug, keeps secrets from Neku and may or may not have killed him in the first place. And at the very end when Neku finally realizes Joshua wasn't his killer, Joshua takes the bullet for him leaving Neku broken and with a massive guilt complex. Then Joshua reveals himself at the very end of the game to be The Chess Master with a plan. However, this plan is notably broken the moment he partners with Neku, as he originally said he would not do, but with Minamimoto causing unplanned for havoc, and a need to educate him about the Game more, it was required.
• Wicked Cultured: He is knowledgeable about a variety of subjects, which he loves to constantly rub in Neku’s face.
• World's Smallest Violin: After Neku explains what happened in the previous week and how his new friend Shiki became his entry fee for the second week (which is why Neku can't afford to lose and has little patience for anything that might hurt his chances of completing the missions), Joshua quotes this trope by name and then tells Neku that he isn't the only player who has something important riding on winning the Game.

Daisukenojo "Beat" Bito

"Come back when you grow a pair!"

^{Click here to see Beat as he appears in the anime} 

Voiced by Subaru Kimura (JP), Crawford Wilson (EN), José Ángel Torres (Latin American Spanish)

A hot-blooded young skater who'll go out of his way to protect his friends, no matter the cost to him. While Neku likes to keep his thoughts to himself, Beat will always say what's on his mind.

---

• Accent Adaptation: In the Japanese version, Beat would often use informal language, considered rude when used with strangers. This was replaced with ebonics in the English version, which has similar social connotations.
• Action Hero: His modus operandi when it comes to the various obstacles in his way. He prefers to leave the thinking to his partner while he goes in to overwhelm his foes with a combination of sheer brute force and ferociousness.
• All There in the Manual: The manual reveals that he uses a pin named Respect to control his skateboard.
• Aloof Big Brother: Used to be this to Rhyme, with his parents’ favoritism of her driving him to repeatedly push her away from him up until the day he and Rhyme died, causing him to outgrow this.
• Always Save the Girl: Beat is incredibly devoted to Rhyme and puts her at the top of his priorities, to the point that he’s willing to undergo a Face–Heel Turn in order to find a way to restore her to her former self.
• Attack! Attack! Attack!: His solution towards practically anything is to just go up and keep beating on whatever is in his way until it breaks. And if that doesn’t work, keep doing so anyway. This is even reflected in his gameplay, where he focuses on constant heavy damage and barely if ever goes on the defensive.
• Badass Adorable: Once you get past the already-thin tough-guy exterior, Beat is a warm, honest, kindhearted sweetheart who is fiercely devoted to the people he loves and will take on what is essentially the afterlife in order to protect them.
• Bash Brothers: Becomes this with Neku when Week 3 comes around. Together, the two of them become a practically unstoppable force against the various Noise and Reapers that come their way.
• The Battle Didn't Count: Even if you land a significant number of hits (or manage to defeat him in New Game+) on him in his Reaper Beat form, Neku will be gasping and mocked for being too weak to be worth fighting.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: The reason he ultimately saves Neku from suffering an untimely Erasure at the hands of Uzuki, Kariya, and an incredible amount of Noise? It was because Neku returned to him Rhyme’s pendant when they fought before.
• Being Evil Sucks: Flat out says that being a Reaper was lame and that the good guy look suited him better. As a result of his subsequent side-switching, Konishi gives him a few days to live, before he'll fade away.
• Berserk Button: His Embarrassing First Name. Whenever someone calls him by that, Beat’s first reaction is to either freak out or threaten to beat them up for saying it.
  • On a serious note, threatening Rhyme’s safety in anyway or making her sad is not a wise idea to do around him.
• The Berserker: His modus operandi when it comes to any situation that comes his way. Even if the odds are constantly against him, Beat will never give up and will keep fighting on to his very last breath, regardless if there’s any strategy to be had.
• Beware the Silly Ones: Beat is shown to be incredibly silly and goofy at times, with his Malaproper, Idiot Hero tendencies, and copious amounts of Large Ham, but when the chips are down, he is shown to be an incredibly effective fighter.
• Big Brother Instinct: His motivation towards Rhyme. He values her more than anything.
• Big Damn Heroes: Does this three times throughout the course of the game. First, when he and Rhyme take down the Day 3 golden bat, thus preventing every other Player from getting untimely Erased. Then, at the beginning of the third week, saves Neku from getting Erased by Uzuki, Kariya, and a whole bunch of Noise by forming a pact with him and helping him escape. And finally, along with Shiki, comes in just in the nick of time to save Neku from getting Erased by Kitaniji.
• Big Eater: Probably, judging by his appetite in Another Day and his "I Live for Food" pin.
• The Big Guy: Unlike the other kids, he's got some meat on his bones and has the strength to back it up.
• Blood Knight: When it comes down to it, Beat is always up for a good brawl. He even gets incredibly deflated at one point when a mission seemingly looks to be nothing but an easy-going walk.
• Boisterous Bruiser: "Come back when you grow a pair!" Even going into a round with low health will get a confident "Bring it, yo!" though that's not always the case.
• Boke and Tsukkomi Routine: Develops one with Neku during their partnership. In the Another Day continuity, he's a stand-up comedian with Rhyme, as well.
• Book Dumb: Beat's not traditionally smart, but his impliedly-horrible performance at school doesn't seem to have much to do with how smart he actually is.
• Brains and Brawn: Fulfills half of this dynamic with Rhyme and Neku. Whereas he’s the most straightforward and brash, the latter two are much more calm and analytical.
• Bromantic Foil: Towards Neku, being the goofy, hot-headed foil to Neku’s more serious and cautious nature.
• Brother–Sister Team: With Rhyme, though she doesn't realize it.
• Bruiser with a Soft Center: His first instinct is usually to wail on whatever is causing problems for him, giving him the appearance of a thug, but deep down he's a pretty sensitive and caring fellow.
  Rhyme: [in KH3D] Beat looks and talks like a punk, but there's a heart of gold in there somewhere.
• Bully Hunter: When he sees Neku getting ganged up on Uzuki, Kariya, and an army of Noise, he gets incredibly pissed and jumps straight into the action to join Neku in beating them back.
• Butt-Monkey: Thanks to his Idiot Hero tendencies, he tends to get ragged on by a majority of people, from the villains to even Neku, his own partner. This even extends to Another Day, where his attempts at comedy fall so flat that Rhyme flat out tells him that they’re not laughing at his jokes. They’re laughing at him.
• Cannot Tell a Joke: In Another Day, his attempts at comedy fall flat at best.
• The Champion: For Rhyme. Beat has always made it his #1 priority to protect and save Rhyme at all costs. To accomplish this, he is willing to try (and fail) to take the brunt of a moving vehicle for her, engage in a Deal with the Devil with the Reapers and join them in order to find a way to restore her to her original form, and even take on what is essentially GOD (the Composer) in order to bring her back to life.
• Character Development: During Week 1 (as reinforced by flashbacks to him and Rhyme), he has no capability to think things through. By the time of Week 3... well, he still has no capability to think things through, but he realizes this and defers to Neku's judgement. Also, he goes from "the walls don't break" to "I'ma break this wall", although that might have something to do with his acquisition of keypins.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: Unlike Neku’s other two partners, Beat relies on his raw physical power alone to take down Noise and does a pretty damn good job while doing it, showing off incredible reflexes and Olympics-level agility while on his board. In fact, in Week 3, he even physically smashes down a Level 1 wall with nothing but his sheer strength and bullheaded attitude.
• Childish Older Sibling: His younger sister is much better behaved and academically accomplished, something their parents nag Beat about. That, in turn, spurs Beat to resent her.
• Close-Range Combatant: Unlike Neku’s other partners, Beat mostly specializes in using his incredibly acrobatic skateboarding skills to engage Noise and the like in close range.
• Cool Board: He fights with his skateboard, and it's cool as hell.
• Combat Parkour: Beat is incredibly acrobatic in combat, being able to pull off impressive feats of gymnastic flips and maneuvers on his skateboard.
• Comically Missing the Point: Especially evident with his interactions with Konishi, who's more clever and underhanded than he is. A lot of it, though, stems from him taking things more literally than intended.
  Kariya: If you fight us, you die. Right now, you're treadin' on thin ice.
  Beat: Ha! You're the idiots, yo. I aint treadin' on thin ice! Shibuya ain't cold enough for ice, stupid!
  Uzuki, Kariya, Neku: [......]
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: While the way he talks and acts might seem not very bright, he is definitely a force to be reckoned with in battle.
• Deal with the Devil: Essentially forces himself into one with the Reapers when he joins them in a desperate attempt to try and revive Rhyme, only to ultimately backout when he sees them ganging up on a defenseless Neku.
• Desperately Craves Affection: An interesting interpretation when you take a closer look at his first Entry Fee. His first Entry Fee was Rhyme’s memories of HIM, implying that the one thing he cared about most was her thoughts towards him, instead of Rhyme herself as a person. Considering his status as The Unfavorite in his family and cripplingly low self-esteem, it’s not hard to see why he would value Rhyme’s opinion of him so much. However, after losing her in Week 1, Beat is forced to reevaluate what Rhyme truly meant to him and in Week 3, she herself gets taken as Beat’s Entry Fee, signifying how much Beat had come to truly value her.
• Determinator: On the 7th day of his week, he starts to fade out due to not having erased any Players or scored any other points as a Reaper. His reaction? He just "pulls himself together" and keeps on fighting.
• Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?: Regularly does this in the game, trash-talking the various amounts of Reapers who come to stand in his and the others’ way.
• Didn't Think This Through: A lot of the actions he does after Rhyme is erased are this. He joins the Reapers because he believed there was a way to salvage her soul using them. It really didn't have an option for that. He speculates Hanekoma is the Composer because the Red Skull pins and Player pins are made from the same source. Points to him for trying, but Neku's earlier experience with Joshua debunks that theory. He thinks beating the Composer and becoming one himself will let him do what he wants, without considering the fact the Composer is practically a god and outmatches anyone else. Most important of all, he tends to rush headfirst into anything if no one like Rhyme can stop him, which is what Beat learns during his week with Neku. He learns, but he doesn't put that into practice.
• Difficult, but Awesome:
  • In the DS version, you'll either hate or love his Fusion Star mechanic. If the cards are properly placed, enabling you to get a "combo" of card pairs with progressively increasing values, you can potentially get enough stars for a Level 2 special move in a single combo, but it's often hard to find the cards you need, and you lose all of them if you take too long.
  • In the iOS / Switch versions, getting his special move takes the same time it takes you with other partners, but the multiplier mechanic can either give you a big multiplier or a small one depending if many cards match all at once when taking one card out.
• Diving Save: How he and Rhyme died in the first place, with Bear diving to save Rhyme from being hit by a car, but he didn't push her out the way of it, he tried to shield her with his own body. He admits this was really stupid in retrospect.
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": His real name is "Daisukenojo," which he hates.
• Dumb Blond: He's not that book smart. It's noticeable by just about everyone in game, especially when compared to Rhyme, who's also blonde and younger than he is, but shows more forethought and wisdom than he does. Some of it might be from the pressure of the situation, as he seems to focus more on getting things done than thinking things through, which is understandable seeing as his main goal is to save his sister.
• Dumbass Has a Point: As unhappy as Konishi is when he points this out, he does have a point that, for all of her talk about how of everything is going according to her schemes, she sure had to deal with quite a lot of "unforeseen circumstances."
• Dumb Muscle: He's not a bright kid, school-wise, but he's strong. If he does seem bright, chances are he is simply recalling what Rhyme explained to him and just rephrasing things his way.
• Embarrassing First Name: His reaction to anyone saying his real name is freak out and maybe threaten them afterwards.
• Emotional Bruiser: Wears his heart on his sleeve and is prone to emotional outbursts and inner turmoil. Not that this stops him from kicking Noise to curb.
• Endearingly Dorky: Between his comical overreactions, Malaproper word play, and generally being a huge softie underneath the tough guy act, Beat definitely comes across as this.
• Face of a Thug: Although he looks rather intimidating at a first glance, Beat is actually a rather goofy and amiable fellow who looks out for the little guy whenever he can.
• Face–Heel Turn: At the end of the first week, after Rhyme gets erased, he defects to the Reapers in search for a way to revive her.
• Failure Knight: Heavily views himself as this, seeing as he fails to protect the person most important to him three times in the game.
• Fatal Flaw:
  • As Hanekoma himself notes in the Secret Reports, Rhyme is his greatest weakness, which Reapers such as Uzuki and Konishi use to their advantage by holding her Soul hostage and forcing Beat to comply by their demands.
  • Beat’s Leeroy Jenkins tendencies also tend to bite him in the butt more often than not, such as when he accidentally triggers a trap that gets Rhyme Erased when she tries to save him. He notably cites this as one of his greatest failings and even asks Neku to help keep his head in the game in order to accomplish their goals more efficiently.
• Fearless Fool: Beat can be rather brash, reckless and impulsive at times.
• The Fettered: Even though Beat willingly joins the Reapers in order to find a way to bring back Rhyme and is ordered to personally kill Neku and sick Noise on defenseless Players, he ultimately refuses to compromise his moral code and chooses to go back to the side of the good guys, even when doing so puts his life at a severe risk due to his betrayal.
• Fight Magnet: He, along with Neku, basically become this during Week 3 when Kitaniji initiates Emergency Call on the Reaper’s Game, essentially painting a large bounty on their heads for the Reapers to come and collect in order to get themselves promoted.
• Fire-Forged Friends: With Neku. At first, they couldn’t stand one another, with Beat even taking on a mission from the Reapers involving him trying to Erase Neku. However, over the course of the game, they gradually come to respect and care for each other and the two of them become Bash Brothers when Week 3 rolls around.
• Foil:
  • The game manual openly states that Neku and Beat are complete opposites. The former is a Deadpan Snarker who gradually learns to open up to people and fight for the sake of people besides himself, while the latter is especially devoted to his partner and sister to the point where he would join with the Reapers in the hopes of restoring her to normal. However, they both have massive guilt complexes over their failure to protect what mattered the most to them and Neku even notes how he can relate to Beat’s confession on how he wasn’t crazy about anything when he was alive.
  • He also fulfills this with Rhyme as well. Beat seems Hot-Blooded and devoted to becoming the best skater ever, while Rhyme is calm, but doesn't have a dream of her own. It eventually turns out that they're the opposite of how they seem at first; Beat initially lacked motivation, while Rhyme "had a million reasons to live", in Beat's words, and she kept believing in him.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: He’s the impulsive, hotheaded slacker Foolish Sibling in comparison to Rhyme’s more careful and cautious Responsible Sibling nature.
• Force and Finesse: The force to Neku’s finesse. Whereas Neku is more careful and cautious when it comes to the situations he faces in the Game, Beat charges in head on with no regard for his safety.
• Fragile Speedster: He certainly knows how to skateboard, but doesn't do it in a way that could be called "safe." He's also incredibly fast on his board while he's a Reaper, but doesn't have a lot of defense.
• Freak Out: Does this twice throughout the third week, with his character sprites changing while doing so. Understandable, considering how the more the week passes by, the less time he has left to live.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: In the story, he’s a Dumb Muscle with a tendency to act in a Leeroy Jenkins manner and engage in situations without thinking and no regard for foresight, prompting Neku to try and keep him under control in order to put his strength into good use. Fittingly enough, he’s Glass Cannon with potential for incredibly high damage output due to the nature of his Difficult, but Awesome fusion card mechanics. However, fail to plan out his attacks and use the mechanics to your advantage and Beat can cause unneeded amounts of damage to himself.
• Glass Cannon: Same as the above; great at damage-dealing, not-so-great at damage-taking.
• Ground Pound: In his Reaper form, he can slam the ground hard enough with his board in to create a small shockwave that can knock Neku off of his feet if he isn’t careful enough.
• Guilt Complex: Heavily blames himself for what happens to Rhyme throughout the game, to the point of insisting that she has more claim to enjoy the most out of life than he can ever hope to have.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: Despite coming off as an overly violet thug, Beat is at his core a genuinely sensitive and kind-hearted fellow who is fiercely devoted to the people he cares about.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Has a tendency to get riled up very easily and threaten beatdowns on whoever it is that manages to tick him off.
• Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: The battles against Reaper Beat, which end with him getting away even if you can actually defeat him.
• Heel–Face Revolving Door: Starts off as a Face only to become a Heel after Rhyme’s Erasure before ultimately becoming a Face again.
• Heel–Face Turn: In the beginning of the third week, in which thanks to a combination of Neku’s genuine kindness and him seeing the Reapers gang up on him has him ultimately renouncing becoming a Reaper and joining up with Neku as his Partner.
• Heroic Self-Deprecation: He doesn't hold a very high opinion of himself at all. This is after seeing how his actions ended up hurting his sister the most, which was something he never wanted.
• Heroic Willpower: He’s able to shrug off continually fading away from existence itself through nothing but his sheer determination in trying to save Rhyme.
• Hero with Bad Publicity: Week 3, he and Neku get hit with this due to Kitaniji placing a bounty on their heads and placing the UG on Emergency Call, causing almost all of the Reapers to try and hunt them down for their perceived threat to the sanctity of the UG.
• Hidden Depths:
  • Beat comes across as nothing but a no-good thug with no self-awareness whatsoever but, in actuality, he’s actually quite well aware of how much he comes off as an Idiot Hero and hates himself for it, feeling that because of this, it has gotten the people he loves hurt.
  • Despite his Hot-Blooded personality, Beat reveals himself to have been a rather laid-back slacker who took life at his own pace, much to his parents’ ire, and that his dream of becoming a professional skateboarder was nothing but a Motivational Lie in order to help Rhyme out of her own depressed funk over her lack of dreams.
• Hidden Heart of Gold: He tries (keyword being try) to cultivate an image of being a tough-as-nails hardass thug around other people but he’s just so soft-hearted and affable that it doesn’t really work and only ends up amusing his friends.
• Honor Before Reason: Despite looking to be nothing but a thug, Beat is actually shown to be quite the honorable person. Examples include him helping Neku out against the Reapers after seeing him get ganged up on despite the risks in doing so, sparing 777’s life after besting him in a fight, and sparing Uzuki and Kariya after taking them down in their berserk states on the grounds that they don’t seem like fundamentally bad people.
• Hopeless Boss Fight: The three fights against Reaper Beat are only played as hopeless—the only actual restriction is time. On your first playthrough you simply have to stay alive for that long, while on a New Game Plus you can easily beat him within said time limit provided you're strong enough. When he's fought as Blue Noise in New Game Plus, there's no time limit.
• Hot-Blooded: Apparently, before he came to the UG, he was rather laid back and would only take things at his own pace. This all goes out the window once the Game starts, however.
• Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Is the Huge Guy to Rhyme’s Tiny Girl.
• I Can Still Fight!: His reaction towards slowly fading away from existence due to not accumulating enough points as a Reaper? Pull himself back together in order to keep on fighting for Rhyme.
• Idiot Hero: Often comes across as this to the others due to his short sightedness and screw ups. He hates himself for this, feeling that he isn’t able to be there for the people he loves the most when it really counts.
• If I Do Not Return: Tries to invoke this with Neku before their fight with Konishi, asking him to take care of Rhyme before Neku promptly tells him to shut it and say that it’s his job to do so.
• I Let Gwen Stacy Die: Happens THREE times over the course of the story for poor Beat, with Rhyme being the unfortunate victim of all three occurrences. It influences a lot of his actions throughout the game and troubles him greatly.
  • The first time was before the Game, when he tried to push her out of the way of an incoming car only for both of them to get killed instead.
  • The second time is during Week 1, when Rhyme pushes him out of the way of an incoming Swing Shark and gets chomped thereby.
  • The third time is during Week 3, when Konishi snatches Rhyme's Noise form off his shoulder and crushes it until there's nothing left but the pin full of her Soul.
  • The Final Remix gives him a FOURTH happening in "A New Day", when the various happenings make him suspicious of the Rhyme he finds there, prompting her to repeat the Week 1 incident when a Dissonance Shark looms. Thankfully, this one doesn't stick.
  • Unfortunately, the fifth time this happens DOES appear to stick, as Beat witnesses Coco shooting Neku in the back, and then Neku disappearing afterwards before he could do anything to prevent it. It's not until NEO that we learn that Joshua was able to save Neku by sending him to Shinjuku.
• Implausible Boarding Skills: Beat fights using his skateboard, which involves him vaulting forward and grinding the board across enemy faces. He can even repeatedly bounce on foes as his aerial attack. All this is done while Beat is essentially stationary; he does not build momentum for any of his skateboard attacks.
• Incredibly Lame Pun: With a name like Beat, this was inevitable.
  "Ready for a Beat-down?"
  "The beat is on!"
• It's All My Fault: Feels that if he hadn’t gotten into an argument with his parents as stormed out of the house, Rhyme wouldn’t have had to follow him, thus she would never have had to cross the street with a speeding car coming right at her, leading to Beat failing to protect her from the crash and ensuring that both of them got killed.
• I Shall Taunt You: In a surprisingly intelligent move, Beat repeatedly taunts Konishi in a ploy to draw her attention towards him while Neku works on a way to snag Rhyme’s pin away from her, which actually ends up working as Neku then proceeds to use said pin to deal a crippling blow to Konishi.
• It's Personal: With Konishi, for destroying Rhyme's Noise and reverting her to a pin right in front of him, then threatening to break the pin.
• Japanese Delinquents: Fits the bill for one appearance-wise, due to his punkish attire, rough vocabulary, distaste for school, and generally rebellious nature against the rules placed throughout the Reaper’s Game.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: While he can certainly be rough around the edges and come off as a overly violent thug, his heart is ultimately in the right place and he is fiercely devoted to the people he loves.
• Jive Turkey: Yo. The localization has him speaking this way. His speech in the Japanese version was that of a typical delinquent.
• Keet: Generally acts in a loud, easily excitable manner and is shown to be incredibly energetic when it comes to various situations.
• Knight Templar Big Brother: He has a sister, Rhyme, who he feels responsible enough for to do a Face–Heel Turn to save her.
• Large Ham: An in-universe example, too. His comical overreactions get lampshaded by other characters, one who even remarks it looks like something out of a comic book.
• Leeroy Jenkins: Tends to charge in headfirst into the fray without warning, which causes his partners much exasperation.
• Leitmotif: "Tatakai".
• Lovable Jock: A pro skateboarder who tries to act tough but is mostly goofy and kind, something he is embarrassed by when it's pointed out.
• Malaproper: Substituting "vegetant" for "vigilant" and "imprecious" for "impressive" is only the start. In "A New Day", he hears the word "mischief" and asks who Miss Chiff is, then proceeds to refer to Coco as "Miss Chiff" after realizing she was responsible.
• Mangst: After what happened to Rhyme, he gets prone to doing this. It gets especially noticeable in the third week as he struggles not to break down from the sheer stress of everything that has happened to him.
• Manly Tears: Is shown to cry quite a bit throughout the game, most notably when it comes to Rhyme and their past in general. He’s also shown to be holding back tears at the end of the game as well, when he and Rhyme reunite with Neku by the Hachiko statue.
• The McCoy: The most outwardly hot-headed and emotional of Neku’s partners, generally relying on brute force and raw instinct to see his way through.
• Memento MacGuffin: Rhyme's pendant becomes one for him. It becomes quite important later on, when Neku finds it on the ground and returns it to Beat, who later returns the favor by saving his life.
• Minion with an F in Evil: As a Reaper, he just ignores his duties outright, even when it comes from the Conductor, who is basically his big boss. The closest he gets to actually following an order is attacking, but failing to Erase, Neku and Joshua.
• Mr. Vice Guy: While Beat is by no means a bad guy, his impulsive, hot-headed nature tends to bite him in the butt whenever he gets too ahead of himself, which is something he himself acknowledges.
• Muscles Are Meaningful: Unlike the other Players, he’s quite well-built for his age and is shown to be nothing short of a powerhouse in battle, specializing in close-range combat with his skateboard in order to deal out heavy amounts of damage.
• My Greatest Failure: Heavily views him pushing Rhyme away before they died and failing to protect her three times as this, with him wanting more than anything to make up for it.
• The Nicknamer: Aside from Rhyme, he tends to refer to everyone else by some moniker, generally based on their appearance. Neku is "Phones", Kariya and Uzuki are "Lollipop" and "Pinky" respectively, and so on.
• No Indoor Voice: He himself even lampshades this at one point.
• No-Respect Guy: Tends to get a lot of disrespect from Reapers and Players alike.
• Not What I Signed Up For: Says this almost word for word when Konishi confronts him on his inability to gain points during his tenure as a Reaper, stating that he didn't join just to sic Noise on Players.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business
  • He's typically Hot-Blooded and reckless, but even he's nervous about the prospect of fighting with Kariya on Week 3, Day 4. Neku lampshades this.
    Neku: Who are you and what have you done with Beat?
  • More seriously, Beat is at a loss for words when he sees the spot where he and Rhyme died. Neku repeats the above question.
• Parental Issues: Beat doesn’t exactly have the best relationship with his parents. On top of the fact that nothing he did ever seemed to be good enough for his parents, he was also The Unfavorite compared to Rhyme, who his parents always negatively compared him to. This eventually leads to him to just give up on himself, hoping that his folks would do the same... and they did, sans Rhyme.
• Parents as People: Implied with his folks. Despite the fact that they were constantly pressuring Beat to get better grades, be more like his sister, and berating him when he didn't give results, they are implied to still very much care for Beat, as evidenced by the fact that a memorial was left for both him and Rhyme where they died.
• Playing with Fire: In Final Remix’s Co-Op mode, he gains the ability to leave trails of white fire in his wake that damage any enemy that happens to get caught up in it.
• Plucky Comic Relief: In Another Day and to a lesser extent in the main game. Neku's week with Shiki was a learning experience, his week with Joshua was traumatic, but his week with Beat tends to be seen as the most light-hearted, at least whenever Konishi isn't around. Beat spends most of the game being Hot-Blooded and getting into humorous situations because of it.
• Real Men Hate Sugar: Aside from cola, Beat's reactions to eating sweet foods are neutral at best — don't even try to give him crepes or ice cream.
• Recurring Boss: During Week 2, when he gets issued a mission from Kitaniji to eliminate Neku and Joshua. While you can potentially beat him during any of his encounters if you’re skilled enough, it’s more often than not that you likely aren’t and thus, if you’re able to survive against him long enough, the game just continues on regardless of whether or not you’re able to beat him.
• Redemption Quest: Views him trying to bring Rhyme back to life and restore her to her original form as this, feeling that she shouldn’t have to suffer because of his mistakes.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: An alternate red to the cool-headed (blue) Neku, who describes him at one point as a "freakin' rhino".
• Relative Button: Mess with his little sister Rhyme or threaten her safety in anyway and Beat can and WILL kick your ass. Uzuki, Kariya, and Konishi learned this the hard way.
• The Resenter: Turns out to be this in regards to Rhyme back in the RG. Due to how much his parents tended to rag on him yet dote more on Rhyme, Beat began to push her away from him, up until the day they died.
• Roaring Rampage of Rescue: Together, he and Neku tear through several Noise, Reapers, and Game Masters in order to try and rescue Rhyme from Konishi’s clutches.
• Rude Hero, Nice Sidekick: Beat hotheaded, impulsive and somewhat rude, while Rhyme is relatively friendly if a bit reserved, and follows Beat's lead.
• Say My Name: Will sometimes yell "RHYYYYYME!" if you get a Game Over with him as your partner. He has the same defeat lines as an enemy as he does as a partner, so he can also do this if you somehow manage to beat him during the storyline, potentially foreshadowing his motivation for joining the Reapers.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: When Week 3 starts, he tosses aside his order to Erase Neku and willingly joins him after seeing just how unfair the odds are against him and ultimately goes against the Reapers.

• Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Played with in regards to him and Neku. While Beat is noticeably more well-built compared to Neku’s rather skinny stature and acts like a hardened thug in contrast to Neku’s more calm and collected nature, Beat is also quite the sensitive fellow underneath his facade and is shown to rely a lot on Neku’s judgment and calls when it comes to the various situations they find themselves in.
• Shrine to the Fallen: Gets one where he died.
• Sibling Team: Is this with Rhyme, his little sister. Unfortunately, she’s completely unaware of this due to her memory loss of him.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: Again with Rhyme. While Beat is short-tempered, passionate, and The Big Guy, Rhyme is patient, more methodical, and The Baby of the Bunch.
• Simpleminded Wisdom: While he's not the most school-smart of Neku's partners, he does have some practical knowledge, and he's too straightforward of a guy to keep secrets from him, which, combined with having already been to Hell and back with the other, make them the most effective team when they pair up.
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: While the other kids aren’t particularly squeaky clean when it comes to their language, Beat is the most foul-mouthed of the bunch, to the point that the game has to use Symbol Swearing for him TWICE just to hide his language.
• Sleeves Are for Wimps: Fits with his thug image and shows off his muscular arms.
• Spanner in the Works: His Heel–Face Turn in Day 1 of the third week provided Neku with the partner he needed to survive.
• Survivor's Guilt: It’s later revealed in Week 3 that he suffers from this, heavily blaming himself for Rhyme’s death. He feels that if he hadn’t had an argument with his parents and stormed out of the house, Rhyme wouldn’t have to follow him and thus get hit by a speeding car. Following that, her Heroic Sacrifice for his sake only made this feeling grow even more.
• Taking the Bullet: Tragically tried doing this to save Rhyme from getting hit by a car, but managed to get them both killed instead. A more successful version of this happens later on when he saves Neku from an unexpected attack during the final moments of the game.
• Too Dumb to Fool: Konishi suggets - though disingenuously - that this is why she couldn't get the better of him.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: After Rhyme’s Erasure and becoming a Reaper, he becomes a lot more aggressive and condescending towards Neku whenever they fight, even when Neku outright begs him not to fight. Fortunately, however, he reverts right back to his normal self when Neku gives him Rhyme’s pendant, which then prompts Beat to ultimately turn away from the Reapers.
• Tough Love: His parents were constantly pressuring him to get better grades, be more like his sister, and berating him when he didn't give results. Eventually he just gave up trying all together.
• Trauma Conga Line:
  • Just as bad as Neku if not even more so. To wit, he’s:
    • Had to deal with being The Unfavorite in his family compared to his sister
    • Died in an attempt to save said sister in a car accident (and winds up getting her killed as well)
    • Watched his little sister die again with her sacrificing herself to save him from a Noise shark attack.
    • Joined up with the Reapers in an attempt to restore Rhyme back to normal only to get told that he has to kill Neku in order to prove his loyalty to the Reapers.
    • Was unable to kill Neku anyway due to him showing kindness towards Beat and giving him Rhyme’s pendant.
    • Get told that he’ll die in five days due to not accumulating points in his time as a Reaper and almost fades away from existence on the last day.
    • Had to watch Rhyme die AGAIN but this time in her Noise form and is forced into a wild goose chase in order to get her back from Konishi.
    • Gets trapped in the place that he and Rhyme died in and is constantly reminded of his fuck-ups.
    • Is forced to deal with the possible revelation that due to Rhyme not winning the game in the first place, she’ll lose her Entry Fee forever and subsequently be unable to ever remember him.
    • Gets an emotional kick to the balls from Konishi with her revealing that Rhyme’s memories was HIS Entry Fee and that hers was something else, flat out implying that she never loved him and mindfucking with him.
• Tsundere: He can be pretty harsh at times, has a hot temper, and cannot spit his feelings out in standard ways. However, when he’s around the people he cares about (like Rhyme and later on Neku), he softens up quite a bit.
• Underestimating Badassery: Throughout the game, a large portion of the cast tend to underestimate Beat’s prowess due to his goofy personality and impulsive nature. This ends causing a lot of their downfalls since his unpredictability and resolve ends up throwing a huge wrench into the bad guys’ plans.
• The Unfavorite: Compared to Rhyme.
• Unskilled, but Strong: Shiki uses her doll to deliver punches and uppercuts. Joshua uses his phone to play with highs and lows, which results in summoning things from bikes to cars to drop on enemies. Beat just rams into things with his skateboard.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Beat's motives for becoming a Reaper and agreeing to kill Neku and later for trying to become the Composer via Klingon Promotion are to bring his friends and particularly his sister Rhyme back.
• When All You Have Is a Hammer…: Unlike Shiki and Joshua, who at least have multiple ways of attacking, Beat’s only method is to hit things really, REALLY, hard with his skateboard, which he fortunately happens to excel at. Most notable in the Final Remix's co-op mode, where Shiki's attacks with Mr. Mew and Joshua's various Telekinesis/Jesus-Beams have different animations in contrast with Beat's attacks mostly the same animations as single-player.
• Would Hit a Girl: Is more than willing to take on female Reapers such as Uzuki and Konishi. Justified as the circumstances of the Game and how dangerous the two can be requires him to attack back.
• You Fight Like a Cow: Tends to insult his enemies with every combo he does, even after the fight is over, hilariously enough.
  Beat: (after taking out the last Noise) Come back when you grow a pair!

Rhyme

Raimu Bito

"We don't have time for mistakes either. Haste makes waste!

^{Click here to see Rhyme as she appears in the anime} 

Voiced by Hitomi Nabatame (JP) and Kate Higgins (game) Dani Chambers (anime) (EN)

Beat's Game partner, who puts on a cheerful face and provided emotional support to Neku and the other Players.

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• Adaptational Badass: While Rhyme was hinted to have some level of fighting capability in the game through her taking down the golden bat Noise with Beat, we were never shown what exactly she can do in combat. In the anime, she is shown to be able to shoot green energy beams from her hands to attack Noise with great efficiency.
• Adaptational Villainy: In Another Day, she's batting for the other team this time.
• Advertised Extra: Despite constantly being on advertisments and getting a lot of merchandice, she's the only one of the main group who isn't a playable partner, and in fact gets erased quite early on, though her fate drives a lot of the story during the final week of the game and she ultimately becomes a Player Pin.
• And Then John Was a Zombie: After several days of battling Noise, Rhyme undergoes an Emergency Transformation and eventually manifests as one. Downplayed in that the transformation only serves to introduce her as a Living MacGuffin, rather than invoking any Internal Conflict on her part.
• Animal Motifs: Squirrels, thanks to her Noise form.
• Badass Adorable: Falls into this after getting turned into a Squirrel Noise. She may look cute and cuddly but her pin when summoned can deal a lot of damage towards an enemy due to its Difficult, but Awesome nature and she is in fact incredibly instrumental in dealing the final blow towards Konishi in her boss fight.
• The Baby of the Bunch: Is the youngest Player in the group and is noticeably much more doted on compared to the others, to the point that even Neku goes out of his way to be nice to her in his own way once he starts to open up. When she gets Erased in her Heroic Sacrifice, everyone is shown to crushed by this.
• Big Brother Worship: She's well aware of Beat's many flaws, but she accepts him for who he is anyway and still loves him all the same.
  Beat: Yo, I could rob a bank and she'd still be there for me.
• Brother–Sister Team: With Beat, though she doesn't realize it.
• Cheerful Child: Tends to take everything with a calm smile and some words of wisdom.
• Cloudcuckoolander's Minder: Helps keep Beat’s eccentricities and focus in check and was even the one who taught him the fundamentals of his own Fusion mechanic.
• The Cutie: To the point where even her Noise form is a Ridiculously Cute Critter.
• Deadpan Snarker: Is this, surprisingly enough, in Another Day towards Beat, bringing him closer to reality whenever he starts to act foolish.
  Beat: Yo, right? I'm a genius.
  Rhyme: Or just dim.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: She’s the much more mature and rational-minded Responsible Sibling to Beat’s hot-headed and impulsive Foolish Sibling nature.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: She's the most innocent of the characters in the game being the youngest and sweetest.
• Half the Man He Used to Be: What happens to poor Rhyme in the anime. Instead of mercifully being informed of her death via Gory Discretion Shot, we are shown Rhyme's demise a la Noise Shark by seeing her getting chomped in half with her top part being shown dangling out of the shark's mouth. Ouch.
• Hand Blast: In the anime she shown to be able to shoot green energy blasts from her hands to attack Noise.
• Heroic Sacrifice: She does this to save Beat from getting erased by an ambush Noise.
• Killer Rabbit: Don't let her cute face above fool you, she's just as capable as the other players of using pins to win this game. Made a bit more literal when she became a cute Squirrel Noise after being erased; when used by Neku, the Rhyme pin falls squarely under Difficult, but Awesome.
• Living Emotional Crutch: For Beat, to the point that when she gets Erased, he willingly joins the Reapers in an attempt to eventually find a way to bring her back to life.
• Nice Girl: Is always calm and reassuring with Beat, whereas most of the other characters express at least some annoyance when putting up with him.
• Only Mostly Dead: She's saved from erasure by Mr. H turning her into a pin.
• Parental Favoritism: Unfortunately for her brother Beat, who received the brunt of their criticism as a result.
• Ridiculously Cute Critter: She comes back as an adorable red squirrel Noise after Beat becomes a Reaper..
• Rude Hero, Nice Sidekick: She’s the kind, patient, and polite sidekick to Beat, who is rude, short-tempered, and ill-mannered by comparison.
• Sacrificial Lamb: She gets erased in the first week by falling into a not-so-obvious trap set by Kariya and Uzuki.
• Satellite Character: An odd justified version of this for Beat. Her fee for entering the UG was unspecified (and according to the Secret Reports, gone forever, because she didn't make it to the end of the week), Beat's fee was her memories of him.
• Sibling Team: Is this with Beat, her older brother. Unfortunately, she’s completely unaware of this due to her memory loss of him.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: With Beat. They're basically complete opposites in terms of personality and demeanor.
• Sixth Ranger Traitor: In Another Day, she pretends her pins were stolen by the Black Skullers and joins Shooter's Kindred Spirits team, only to betray the Spirits while they were distracted by Kariya and Higashizawa. However, she did this because she thought getting rid of Tin Pin would help Beat focus on his comedy routine more.
• Stepford Smiler: Heavily implied at one point in the game. Beat reveals during his week that during their time together, Rhyme was heavily berating herself about her lack of dreams in comparison to the other Players in the game, to the point that she was contemplating not competing to come back to life since she had, in her own words, nothing to live for. It takes Beat making up a Motivational Lie about his own dream in order to give her the strength to keep moving forward.
• Straight Man: To Beat for a while.
• Summon Magic: Eventually, Neku can summon her Noise form to attack, via the Rhyme Pin, starting with the end of the fight with Tigris Cantus.
• Women Are Wiser: She's much more book-smart than Beat.

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