I've been replaying virtues last reward, the middle entry in the zero escape series, and I'm being reminded constantly why this game is by far the best of the three IMO.
The axle the entire narrative spins around is the AB / ambidex game. It's basically a modified version of the prisoners dilemma that's meant to be played multiple times in a row, where the choice to ally or betray will win or lose points. Getting to nine points allows you to escape the wacky death game (condemning everyone yet to reach that number), and getting to zero points will cause you to die. Who is facing who each round is largely random (you usually have the ability to decide between one of three characters being your opponent in the next round), and about half of the players are paired up each round, having to make a single decision together.
What this means in practice is that you are always paying so much attention to the way characters talk, building a mental profile of them, deciding whether they are who they present themselves, because your life literally depends on it. With the number of routes and timelines in the game, you slowly get a very strong predictive sense for how each member of the cast will act in each round of the AB game, not just based on their own personalities but how the relationships among the cast in general have progressed in this particular timeline. The pairing of characters makes this even more complex, as their differing motivations and incentives keep you guessing as to who's ultimately going to be making the decision for them.
The need to understand other characters for the sake of your own survival slowly morphs into a more holistic mode where you make choices to sculpt the timeline as a whole, seeking that elusive best possible ending where everyone works together. Some characters are inclined towards self-interest only if the route conspires to keep them isolated or paired up with the more nasty and duplicitous members of the cast. My tendency to compulsively pick the friendly options, while often resulting in initial betrayal, resulted in a lot of routes where self-interested characters just couldn't keep up the emotional distance required to be an asshole, and ultimately we'd end up working together. Very few characters are static, and the ones closest to it are really interesting fixtures on the gameist level because you can rely on them to make a certain impact on the characters you pit them against.
And then there's the fact that the same character, at the same point in the story, might not make the same decision twice! This is one of the most electric parts of the system, the way it anticipates your slow move towards puppet master as you complete more routes. When you return to a decision point, like a round of the AB game, sometimes your decision won't be the only thing that changed, even if you can't think of a reason why. The mechanism that allows this to happen is half characterful brilliance, half convoluted high concept sci-fi, but it always hits like a goddamn truck.
Awesome game.
