I say tentative, because it’s still a working theory and I can only 100% confirm one route, but the theory seems to hold and I’ve gotten an ask that wanted me to share it despite its incompleteness. On to the guide/theory! I’ll try to explain best I can.
PLEASE DO NOT REPOST WITHOUT CREDIT AND A LINK TO MY BLOG. You are free to share this information on other websites, but please credit me. It takes a lot of time to test all this stuff and then type it up. Don’t be a dick.
It might make the most sense to start with the things I’ve tested and learned about how the game operates since I haven’t confirmed every route yet and give you the strategy, and then I can tell you how I personally got so-and-so’s BREs. I’ll reblog this as I edit and confirm each new route. Once I’ve confirmed all of them, I’ll probably make a new post that’s more organized than this one.
Please let me know if it works or doesn’t!
Under the cut to save a dash.
Observations:
. Branches route to BRE only when you do not have a minimum number of hearts. Contrary to popular belief it is not based on participation. (BRE1 for Casual Story seems to be an exception to this rule, or this may be because you can’t get as many hearts in casual common route vs deep common route.) If you have enough hearts, it seems to route to good end by default, but in any case, good vs bad end is based on your choices. BRE is hearts. This is why Bad Answers give you hearts. Without enough hearts, you fail the checkpoint and get BRE instead of Bad End.
. In Casual Story you need minimum participation of ~55% each day (give or take a couple points) to pass the first branch after Day 5. Participation is not cumulative. You can’t get 100% on Day 5, skip Day 6, and still pass Day 6/7 to go for BRE2. (In Jaehee’s route I did 100% Day 5, skipped Day 6, and got BRE despite having ~100 hearts, which was enough to pass with ~55% on both days.)
. In Deep Story participation doesn’t play a role in whether you pass the Day 7 branch. (I skipped every day of the first branch in Jumin’s route and still passed the branch. Jumin hearts are really easy to get in common route.)
. In Casual Story you need a minimum of 55 hearts to achieve a character’s route. If you do not have 55 hearts, you get the common route bad end.
. Deep Story requires 80 hearts.
All that being said, in order to get all the endings with as little replaying as possible, you cannot play each day beyond ~60% participation without risking having too many hearts for when you reload to do BRE. For maximum enjoyment, I recommend saving all the BREs until you’ve finished all the other endings.
General Strategy:
To be as efficient as possible... Check your backup save before reloading. You might get lucky and be able to reload for free.
NOTE: VN mode does not count towards participation. If you are faced with choices in VN mode, just choose the answers for bad end and don’t worry about it. If you’re following this guide, you won’t be able to earn enough hearts to pass Day 10, and you will still get BRE2.
For Days 1-3 play common route earning (roughly) equal hearts for each character. I recommend going for about 60-70% each day during common route if you’re doing them all at once in Casual Story, otherwise you risk not having enough hearts to pass the Day 7 branch for BRE2, if you only have 55% participation on Days 5-6. Deep route unconfirmed.
Save late on Day 3. This will be the save you reload when it’s time to do the next route. **If you don’t want to worry about “being efficient” and are fine pursuing one route at a time, just do only ~55% on each common route day.
On Day 4 earn hearts only for the desired character, no more than 70% participation. You may wish to save now, and skip Days 5-7 entirely if you’re playing deep route to avoid the risk of getting too many hearts on Days 5-6 (this is unfortunately pretty easy to do).
Day 5 get up to 60% participation using Good Answers. **If Jaehee or Jumin route, save. This is the save you will use to reload after getting BRE1.
Day 6 55% with good answers. Save. This is the save you will use to reload after getting BRE1.
Stop playing until the game branches on Day 7 (Day 6 if Jaehee route). This will get you BRE1.
After BRE1, reload your Day 5 or Day 6 save to pick up where you left off (so after the save time).
Day 6 play up to ~60% using Good Answers.
Day 7 play as if you were going for ~55% with Good Answers. Depending on the route, you won’t be able to get more than 50% before the branch, so honestly don’t worry about it.
Pass the Day 7 branch, stop playing, and let that baby cook!! :)
BRE2 happens at the 3rd branch on Day 10.
Rinse and repeat.
Confirmed:
......................Participation on
Route........ || Day 5 || Day 6 || Day 7 || Hearts
JAEHEE
|| BRE1.............0%.........0%.......................... >100
......................100%........0%.......................... >100
|| BRE2 .............54%.....58%........................ ~110
**Minimum hearts needed to pass Day 6 is unknown, but probably around 100.
......................Participation on
Route........ || Day 5 || Day 6 || Day 7 || Hearts
YOOSUNG
|| BRE1............0%..........0%.........0%......... >100
.......................54%.........63%.......36%....... ~127
|| BRE2 ...........63%..........63%.......36%....... ~133
**Minimum hearts to pass Day 7 is ~133. (Because Yoosung’s route branches later than Jaehee’s, you need more hearts to pass the Day 7 branch. Because I entered Yoosung’s route with only ~60 hearts, the chats I chose to participate in for my original 54/54/27% participation did not give me enough hearts to pass the branch. It took multiple tries to find the minimum; 127 hearts is just the most I had while still failing.)
......................Participation on
Route........ || Day 5 || Day 6 || Day 7 || Hearts
ZEN
|| BRE1............0%..........0%.........0%......... ~60
.......................63%.........9%.........0%......... ~104
|| BRE2 ...........63%........63%.......66%....... ~173
