LIAR GAME

Akiyama playing some 4D chess. Dude had it all planned out from the start. Man’s not a master con artist for nothing. The moment he had that final question, it was game over for everyone. There’s no mutual trust amongst any of them. No plan or alliance was ever going to work. Looks like we gotta wait another week to see the results. If Akiyama isn’t worried they seemingly have ganged up on him, I wonder what he’s got planned.

OK, I’d realised there was another team, but I didn’t know there were three. It’s pretty clear I would lose this game. On the other hand, I know I’m missing something, but I can’t figure out what it is. Maybe Akiyama voted ‘YES’ instead of ‘NO’, doing a trick? Or the boy with the sunglasses pulled some kind of trick? There’s something else going on apart from them forcing a draw, but I just can’t put my finger on it. How intriguing! The episode flew by – it’s really entertaining!

God damn, love how many notches this episode took the mind game writing up. * the other 2 characters actually being impressively competent in their own right * the twist with not just 2 but 3 teams * Hitomi actually being super commendable (beyond being a karate master and master of disguise, lol) pulling all-nighters and working all the way down to the last minute while the round was literally going on to form that 3rd team (also actually like that he wasn't able to think of the strategy by himself and just copied Akiyama's plan but stretched it further; kind of shows that their smarts lie in a slightly different less technical department) * Akiyama clocking multiple tells about Hitomi being X, mainly that part about finding value in observing those that had already lost/were no longer threats and their emotional reactions-showing Akiyama can flex emotional intelligence too on top of the mathematical smarts * a character seeing the bigger picture and visualizing a win beyond the confines of the current round's rules * acknowledging their means to pull an infinite time hack by drawing over and over * etc. A lesser show would've just made this episode completely contingent on the cliché check reveal. The music and visual guides for us smooth brains to keep up were better than ever too. I don't think any new viewer was expecting another 20 minutes to go by and the round still not being resolved, lol. Akiyama making his question another one that parallels the themes and power moving with that instant vote was the cherry on top.

At least this episode had more tension, I'm not sure what trap Akiyama has set, but I'm thinking maybe he's allied himself with Number 15 at some point and he's just a good actor. If they're not allied, then Number 15 would obviously put x2 yes and x1 no if he's paying attention.  Akiyama lying about putting a no when he actually put in a yes makes no sense, because he'd lose if they try to make it a draw. So I'm leaning towards Number 15 and Akiyama being allies since the traitor has created available money to use in the contract, since they weren't using their real name.

Damn I was pretty spot on with the prediction of X being part of other teams (and the reasoning too). But looks like we're not going the route of Akiyama forming another team, I like that. Plus Akiyama really shined this episode, I've been pretty critical of this show but I was pleasantly surprised with almost everything today ^(coincidentally Nao was barely present this episode). Also No.15 actually turned out to lowkey be a boss lol.

Yuji played Nao like a fiddle! And not just her, he'd been playing multiple teams at the same time! Guaranteeing he'd be in the minority every time until the groups had been whittled down enough to secure him an opportunity to take it all! And he's actually skilled enough to fend anyone who would come at him hand-to-hand. I love No. 15 sweating like he had no idea he was under suspicion of being "X" and not knowing how to react to that. But not all hope is lost! Akiyama saw through anything and managed to create a draw! He bluffed his "allies" to bluff his enemeis because he knew his plan wasn't foolproof and he knew 15 stood out too much to be X! Yoji played his hand by revealing the check only he would know about since he had it! Akiyama never trusted him from the beginning! It's fitting, then, that the final round would come down to Akiyama's question and the thing that Liar Game ultimately hinges on: is money the most important thing in the world? And Akiyama throws down the gauntlet by putting down a "no." There's already a "no" in there so how can the remaining three vote in such a way to end up the minority and without ending this in a tie or as the loser? Can they form one last-ditch alliance to succeed? Even though Yoji clearly can't be trusted and they all have a bunch of people they're contracted to pay back by winning? 15 finally speaks! And he seems to be razor-focused on winning and coming up with a way for them all to take home money...within what is deserved by them. Akiyama is just enjoying the show of watching them all scramble and yell at each other over what to do! Did 15 REALLY not cheat when giving out the votes? Either way, Akiyama seems absolutely certain they've fallen into his trap and I'm tempted to believe him.

Have to respect Yuuji for the quick thinking. I expected him to independently come up with the same strategy before the round but he instead stole and repurposed his strategy it. Coming up with such a plan on-the-go was certainly praiseworthy. Unfortunately, he made a fatal error in not instructing the teams to act as if they had lost. Little wonder someone of Akiyama’s skill saw through it instantly. Akiyama’s got some balls in announcing his own vote publicly. As expected, he had pitted other contestants in a conflict with that move. At the end they had seemingly resolved it but Akiyama’s still pretty smug while declaring that they’ve still fallen for his trap. Curious as to what the trap was.

Remember when people hated Nao? Note that she was MVP since she nor the other contestants knew about the 100 million yen being in a check. Akiyama and X know that the yen was in a check. X blabbed out about the 100 million yen check to NAO of all people; the person that X just insulted, looked down upon and being used in X’s plan. Nao pretty much helped Akiyama with the X reveal thanks to the phone call and their teamwork. And Akiyama playing 4D chess like a boss. He’s not even sweating bullets and just poker facing them with X and Red Mohawk panicking and Number 15 I guess making another plan.

I'm guessing the two dumbasses that gave Sunglasses their votes are about to be disqualified, when they described the rules they said if you don't vote within the 6 hours you're instantly disqualified, and I'm pretty confident that sunglasses did not actually put their votes in, so that means him and Akiyama are the only two who voted. So either way he votes himself, neither of them beat the other, so they both split the pot being the last two left. Unless I'm missing something... Maybe Akiyama made a secret deal with sunglasses for this moment, so he's actually going to vote yes too.

The moment you show one your vote, it would be impossible to lose (unless someone is dumb). Because no one would want to vote "No" as that will only result in either a draw or losing the game. But this applies for all 3 people. So you either try to draw to game by voting 'No' or vote "Yes" and hope one of the 2 outcomes- you win or at least one of the other 2 votes 'No". But considering their personality, none would take the risk of voting "No".

Truer words ever spoken on this show! This part was actually clever! I considered the 'multiple teams' thing, that part was fairly obvious, but the 3 way things guaranteeing the minority vote, that was good! We have the benefit as the viewers, but that was obvious too hah. I'm surprised X didn't even consider that, I mean he knew Akiyama suspected something like that, so AT SOME POINT he would have to flip his vote to counter X, whoever he was... That's rich hah. That was good too! (To be fair, I DID notice it, but I thought it was just an 'animation choice' or something, like 'let's not make a scene with them panicking and all'). Maybe I should've seen it coming! Which means you have to play the game... With someone who's proven smarter than you? Good luck! He wouldn't need luck if he played against Nao though, because again proving herself dumb hah. They're not flipping coins here! It's 25% if the winner is picked at random yeah... Not with strategies. Interesting strategy! Reminds me of the strategy the guy used in [Game Show]>!Golden Balls, I think it was called!<, telling his opponent he'll steal the money, just to put them in a reverse prisoner dilemma and all! But there's has to be more to this... Because there's no way he can anticipate how people would react to this scenario; People tend to be unpredictable. So he has to know for sure what people will do, which means: Making another team. For the longest time I've been 90% sure he's teaming up with this guy... And when he said that I bumped this up to 99%; He got the other 2 Yes votes. If he votes Yes as well, this guarantees Akiyama's win, who will stay in the game (just like 15 said he would) to get enough money to share among those who 'participated'. So yeah I think that's pretty clear this is what's happening! (The other 1% would be that he teamed up with X and only pretends to be against him, in a double reverse flip switcharoo thing, but I don't really see it hah).

That would never work. If everyone voted openly, Lets say 15 or 09 were to vote no, then Yuji will just vote yes. Yuji would win, whoever the last person is, they can openly betray the group. lets reverse it and lets say the Yuji and 09 vote yes because they calculate the above possibility, then the last guy can stall and make a deal with akiyama to make him win then split the prize money. Whoever votes last will be at an advantage. They'll all be stupid to vote first. Which is why 15 suggested they all vote at the same time. They would never expect him to betray them at this rate, because he already suggested he wanted the 230 million and wanted to move to the next round.

Very interesting episode. Here's my prediction: No. 15's willingness to move on must be a lie. X basically says that no rational actor would be willing to move onto the next round, and I think he's right. At this point in the game, we can expect anybody still in other than our main pair to be self interested and reasonably intelligent. Since Akiyama knew about X's ploy before this round of voting, he would have had time to contact No. 15, and I think he made him an offer. We've already introduced the legal contracts as a method to make genuinely binding promises in the right circumstances, and No. 15 brought up that a player can access an additional 1.05B by moving on to the next round. So my theory is that Akiyama wrote a contract in which No 15 will throw the game over to him in exchange for Akiyama paying off him and his own legally required debts. This would be worth it for No. 15 if he can get a guarantee worth more than his own split that he listed in the episode, 230M. He is also legally on the hook for his team's debts, so he needs to get that guaranteed too. Now, let's see if the math works out. Narratively, we can be pretty much sure that the contract has to force Akiyama to move onto the next round of Liar Game, otherwise the show ends, so we're hoping the numbers force him to access the additional money. The contract from our team's alliance guaranteed a payout of 143.75M per person. There's no way Akiyama could know if the other teams were different, so let's assume everyone has the same contract. In that case, Akiyama will need to guarantee a payout to five non-X members of our team (excluding Nao and Akiyama for now because they are the main characters and Nao is superhumanly altruistic) and six non-X members of team No. 15, plus a payout of at least 230M to No 15. That gives a total of strictly greater than 1.81125B. This means that Akiyama will be left with a maximum of 228.75M and won't have enough to escape round 3, although depending on No.15's payout demand, he may be able to pay off Nao's debt. I'm sure she'll stick with him regardless, but I have absolutely no idea how she can actually get back into the game at this point. In this scenario, Mohawk Guy's entire team including X get screwed.