Timeline

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Spoiler warning: Plot and/or character details follow.

NOTE: THIS PAGE CONTAINS LOTS OF SPOILERS.

Introduction

The game's timeline consists of 3 weeks, each of 7 days. (Please add anything about post-game; I haven't reached that part yet..)

Neku's partner changes each week.

Each day usually (but not always) around the time Neku gets a mission from the Game Master, and ends with Neku fulfilling the mission's objectives.

Following are the highlights of each day (story events, opportunities to obtain missable items, side stories, etc.):

Pre-game

Unknown pre-game: The Producer, acting as the designer CAT, creates the Udagawa mural which contains the subliminal commands: "Enjoy the moment", and "Gather together". These are selected to result in Shibuya becoming a focus point for people's imaginations.

9 days pre-game: The Composer announces his plan to erase Shibuya to Kitanji. Kitanji offers to "fix" the people of Shibuya, and stakes his life on his ability to do so. Kitanji's 30 day timer starts.

1 day pre-game: Sho Minamimoto attempts to murder the Composer in the RG. His attempt fails, and he flees. The Composer then murders Neku to create a Proxy, then retires from the game.

Week 1

Partner: Shiki.

Day 1

• The Reapers' Game begins. The first round of notable players:
  • Neku: Murdered by the Composer. Entry fee: his memories.
  • Shiki: Died in an unknown accident. Entry fee: her identity.
  • Beat: Died in a car accident attempting to save Rhyme. Entry fee: Rhyme's love for him.
  • Rhyme: Died in a car accident. Unknown.

• Neku first meets Shiki at Hachiko.

• Neku obtains Pyrokinesis pin.

• The Producer, Sanae, descends from the Plane of the Angels to the UG to observe the running of a game without an active Composer.

Day 2

• Neku first meets Beat and Rhyme outside Shibuya Station.

Day 4

• Rhyme is erased by the Swing Shark.

• Beat is taken to WildKat by Sanae, and at some point, recieves the Rhyme pin.

Day 5

• First appearance of Reaper Creeper.

Day 6

• Joshua contacts Sanae to make his initial request for upgrades to the mobile phones.

• The Red Skull pins are popularised among the Shibuya RG.

• Beat tries and fails to use the Rhyme pin to summon Rhyme's Noise form. Although Sanae did give him that ability, it seems he has not figured out how to use it.

Day 7

• Beat flees WildKat to ask the Reapers how to summon Rhyme's Noise through her Pin.

Aftermath

• Shiki is chosen for reincarnation, but rather than being brought back to life, is taken as Neku's subsequent entry fee. This is in fact a bluff by Kitanji, as without the Composer, he is not actually able to bring her back to life.

• Beat chooses to join the Reapers, believing this to be necessary in order to summon Rhyme's Noise form.

Week 2

Partner: Joshua.

Day 1

• The Second run of the Reapers' game begins. The notable players:
  • Neku: Re-entered. Entry fee: Shiki.
  • Joshua: Abnormal entry. No entry fee.
  • Beat: Playing as a Reaper this time around. No entry fee.

• Joshua - who is in fact the Composer - forces a Pact with Neku so as to be able to protect and teach him.

• Sanae completes the tracking application for the mobile phones, and calls Joshua to let him know it is ready.

Day 2

• Desperate to prevent the loss of Shibuya, Sanae tells Minamimoto the secrets of how to create Taboo Noise; Sanae thus becomes a Fallen Angel. Minamimoto was chosen, it appears, because of his conviction against the Composer and his reputation as a loose cannon; even bizarre behaviour would be considered normal for him. Minamimoto subsequently ceases setting missions, focusing on using Taboo Noise to assault the Composer.

Day 3

• Joshua visits Sanae to collect the tracking application. While Joshua tells Neku that it tracks the Composer, in fact it tracks the Conductor, Kitanji.

• Beat, desperate to prove his loyalty to the Reapers, attacks Neku.

Day 4

• Beat attacks Neku for the second time.

Day 5

• The tracking application is modified. Although Joshua claims this is a revision, in fact, the tracker has been specifically rewritten to detect the Shibuya River.

• Beat attacks Neku for the third time.

Day 6

• Taboo Noise runs amok across Shibuya, attacking both Players and Reapers.

• Joshua is forced to use the power of the Composer to erase Taboo Noise. Kariya detects this, but fortunately a regular Reaper like him has never met the Composer (he only deals with the Conductor) so he does not recognise Joshua. He only believes that Joshua is playing the Game as a living person.

• The Producer and Composer both observe that the Red Skull pins have the effect of imprinting Kitanji's mind upon their wearer.

Day 7

• Kitanji overrides the mission distribution system and sends a specific mission to the Players: erase Sho Minamimoto, the rogue Game Master.

• Sho Minamimoto is erased by Neku and Joshua.

• Joshua pretends to sacrifice himself to defend Minamimoto's final attack, in fact leaving the area to return to only observing the Game. Kitanji again has to avoid admitting that he can't reincarnate Neku without the Composer, but does so by ruling that Neku's partnership with Joshua was illegal. Kitanji also forbids Neku from playing the game a further time, as Kitanji's own timer will run out at the end of the following week.

Week 3

Partner: Beat.

Day 1

• The third run of the Reapers' Game begins. The notable players:
  • Neku: re-entry. Entry fee: the other players.
  • (added later) Beat: voluntary entry after abandoning the Reapers. Entry fee: Rhyme's pin and Noise form.

• In a final attempt to erase the proxy, Kitanji initiates a Game with only one player, which thus that player cannot survive.

• Beat betrays the Reapers to form a Pact with Neku, thus saving him.

• Sanae finds Minamimoto's Taboo Noise Refinery sigil in Udagawa, and corrects it, ensuring his rebirth. As this is strictly forbidden, he initially reports that he was attempting to deface it.

Day 2

• Kitanji issues the Emergency Call, suspending the Composer's authority, and requires reapers to wear Red Skull pins for the first time.

• Konishi erases Rhyme's noise form, and steals the Rhyme pin from Beat. She issues the "hide and seek" mission, and hides in Beat's shadow, hoping to panic them into a critical error of judgment.

Day 3

• Konishi passes a fake copy of the Rhyme pin to Uzuki and Kariya for them to use in harrying the players. She does not tell them that it's a fake.

• Uzuki, as instructed, attempts to play tag with Neku and Beat for the fake Rhyme pin. When she is caught due to her own error, she directly attacks Neku and Beat.

Day 4

• The Red Skull pins are activated and Kitanji's consciousness begins to impress itself on Shibuya.

• Kariya sets up a series of puzzles for Neku and Beat with the fake Rhyme pin as bait. When they solve them, he attacks Neku and Beat directly, then teams up with Uzuki for a second attempt. Only after they are both defeated do they realise the Rhyme pin is fake.

Day 5

• Sho Minamimito is revived as Taboo noise via the corrected Refinery Sigil.

• People and Reapers alike are now trapped in the cycle of repeating Kitanji's thoughts.

• Kariya and Uzuki, now possessed by their Red Skull pins, attack Beat and Neku again.

Day 6

• Minamimoto attacks WildKat in search of the Composer, but fails to find him there. Sanae finds the Composer playing Tin Pin Slammer (most likely, he has shifted to the alternate Shibuya where Another Day takes place), and leaves WildKat to go and get him, leaving behind the final Keypin to the Shibuya River.

• Beat and Neku encounter Minamimoto in Cadoi City. They fight him, but are unable to defeat him.

Day 7

• The imprinting via the Red Skull Pins is complete. Shibuya is frozen.

• Konishi is revealed to, and defeated by, Beat and Neku.

• Sho Minamimoto breaks through the Shibuya River Wall and attacks Joshua, but is defeated again.

• Beat and Neku pass through the broken Wall and destroy Kitanji's final noise forms. Kitanji's mission timer reaches zero, and he is erased.

• Joshua reveals himself as the Composer, and challenges Neku to a final duel. Neku refuses to participate and is apparantly killed.

Post-game

• The changes in people brought about by the game reconfigure Shibuya. The Composer abandons the plan to erase it, and the Producer believes it has now become the ideal parallel world.
• Neku, Beat, Shiki and Rhyme meet in front of the Hachiko statue.
• (Special Ending) Hanekoma and Joshua watch The four former players from atop a building. Hanekoma notes that Joshua seems 'down' about something and tells Joshua that 'it's their world, we can't just--' before Joshua leaves. Hanekoma laughs a little and says 'some people just can't take 'no' for an answer', spreads a pair of wings, and follows after Joshua.