Long story short, Yuyuko was in two previous games, both murder mysteries. Firstly was blankstate, with a Mafia-styled premise based around guilt. Secondly was cravencastle, which was more traditionally-based with conscious killers and tailored executions.
Primarily in Blank State, the killers were possessed by evil entities that fed off their unresolved guilt and committed murders. At first, no one knew why they were there, and their "host" had them solve these murders via a storytelling proxy based on the guilt in their hearts. Fortunately, Yuyuko was never possessed nor murdered by these spirits. Unfortunately, her closest canonmate Youmu Konpaku was mistakenly executed in the second trial, believing herself to be the guilty party for "allowing" Yuyuko to endanger her own life in canon. Although Maya Fey was able to channel Youmu's spirit and reveal that the dead were still sort of around them, talking to Youmu did jack squat to alleviate her feelings of helplessness. The guilt of believing she had let Youmu die by not arguing her case better was a guilt she carried with her for the rest of the game. That, combined with her life as a human were used as character frameworks to pin her as suspects two different cases. Although she had kept it hidden for obvious reasons, her nature as a suspect forced her to reveal her living days and subsequent death to the game as a whole. Naturally, this left her distraught as get-all.
Though they managed to save a good number of the possessed by erasing their guilt, this ended up hurting them in the end, because the cat revealed that they had all been transported into his domain for a chance at saving their lives--three more people needed to die for any of them to be able to go home. Although Yuyuko aimed to stay alive for the sake of having the Saigyou Ayakashi sealed up again, her good will and desire to save Maya's life bit her in the ass, and she ended up getting killed in an overpowered three-way fight to the death with Kouha Ren (who was being channeled by Maya) and Kaoru Nagumo.
Ultimately, though, she and Youmu achieved their somewhat-happy endings. After some bargaining with the cat, the living players banded together to rescue the dead, giving them a small chance at saving themselves once again. Yuyuko, in particular, was rescued by Kaoru from the Saigyou Ayakashi, ironic considering he was the most responsible for her earlier death. Despite having a significantly reduced chance at saving their lives, she and Youmu set out for Gensokyo again with hope in their hearts.
....which would be all fine and dandy, if she didn't get kidnapped on the way home and stuck in a televised murder mystery game. All of Yuyuko's memories of Blank State as well as a good deal of her canon ones were temporarily locked away (though she regained them after her death). On the flip side of things, she herself was the victim of the fifth week, having her powers canceled mid-flight and crashing to the ground. In a bout of the most ridiculous irony ever, it was because of her kind nature and desire to save the life of Maya yet again.
Yuyuko has since made her peace with the going-ons at Blank State, though she is still somewhat bitter towards her killer (Phoenix Wright) for murdering her in such an underhanded manner, and outright using Mei as bait. She holds no such hostility towards Kouha and Kaoru, as it was both a combat death fought fairly and things worked out in the end regardless. Despite Maya inadvertently "killing" her in both instances, she still fairly likes her and holds no ill will towards her. Although Maya was able to capitalize off of her second death by retiring from the game, Yuyuko is merely happy that she actually did save her this time, albeit in a roundabout way. She and Austria also mutually apologized, as they came to see each other's point of view on the situation regarding Youmu. As Austria was the true culprit and let Youmu take the fall for her, Yuyuko was understandably angry with her when they met in the graveyard--as even though Yuyuko assisted in taking down her possessed body, she was still responsible for Youmu's death in a way. Nevertheless, they ended things on a peaceful note.
Notably, she was also close with Mei Misaki and (sort of) Kaoru. Mei was her closest friend in the castle, the two having stuck together after a temporary bout of hopelessness on Mei's part. Yuyuko was privy to the details of Mei's history that she otherwise kept locked away, and vice versa. Despite the clashing personalities, she enjoyed the girl's company--though this was used against her in her murder. As Mei had been non-lethally poisoned in order to draw Yuyuko away from the crowd, she directly witnessed Yuyuko's death and felt semi-responsible for it. Unable to do anything from her position in the graveyard, Yuyuko focused most of her frustration on beating up Phoenix. Hooray...? As per Kaoru, they were "closer" in Blank State than in the castle, but she still took amusement out of bothering him. That's really the core of it--he gave her the reactions she liked, and so she kept subtlety prodding him, even after he revealed himself to be a human-hating genocidal maniac. Which, directly speaking, is the type of person Yuyuko is least likely to get along with. Nevertheless, he did save her from the wrath of Murdertree, so she still rather likes him and believes she owes him some sort of favor. Ye Olden Times gotta stick together, or something like that. Surprisingly, her relationship with Youmu didn't change much in-game.
Outwardly, Yuyuko is cheerful to a fault and always optimistic (though not to a point of stupidity). She enjoys talking to people and sticking her nose in places it doesn't belong, and welcomes everyone with open arms and an open heart. She likes humans by default, and if any in her watch find themselves in trouble, she will make sure that they end up safe and back in their rightful place. She treats her bodyguard, Youmu, more like a dear family member or treasured companion than a servant, which is indicative of her general way of forming bonds -- it doesn't take a whole to get her to like someone and latch onto them.
However, her sunny side isn't without its downfalls, that being she's a bit of an airhead. Yuyuko has an infamous love for food and anything relating to it; she won't hesitate to steer conversations into the realm of food, and is said to always have a food-related quip on hand. Her attention span is limited at best, her mind constantly wandering astray from relevant topics. She's easily distracted to a ridiculous level, following and fixating on anything that catches her fancy--such as when she tries to resurrect her own corpse because she wondered whose corpse it was in the first place, belying the whole can of worms that opened up. At worst, she once forgot what she had for breakfast that morning, and put her focus on trying to eat a sentient night sparrow character because she "looked tasty." "What does this button do?" seems to be a question she asks often, or forgets to ask in preference of pushing the mystery button first and asking questions later.
But Yuyuko is undeniably an actress -- it's subject to debate how much of her outward personality is just that, an act. It's heavily suggested that her airheadedness is all a carefully-constructed ruse for the sake of entertainment, and at the very least, she does play dumb at convenient times. In reality, she's proven herself time and time again to actually be incredibly intelligent, and perceptive to a frightening degree. Yuyuko is cunning and a very good manipulator, managing to out-gambit both her closest friend, Yukari, and a great deal of the Lunarians, as proven when she managed to interfere in a carefully-planned trip to the moon that was already being pseudo-sabotaged by two different parties. It resulted in her waltzing into the moon's capitol in broad daylight (relatively speaking), allowing her to steal things from their treasury...even though all she took in the end was a thousand-year-old bottle of sake, which brings us to: Yuyuko often does things or makes comments to rile people up or make them uncomfortable, as getting reactions is a source of amusement for her. She teases Youmu on a regular basis and is often intentionally vague when people ask her questions just to see them get irritated. In that case, Yukari expected her to make off with expensive treasures or legendary weapons, yet all she presented was a bottle of alcohol. Yukari is oft-touted as the series' master manipulator, yet even she can't always read Yuyuko or predict her movements.
Otherwise, Yuyuko is what you'd expect from the daughter of a nobleman, and the last remaining head of the Saigyouji family. She's a bit spoiled, and as such can come off as lazy and flighty when she expects people to do things for her or pick up after her, and she can be a tad bit entitled. She's also a voracious reader, probably contributing to her intelligence. Fitting her position, she is charming, ladylike, and cultured. Although Youmu is supposed to be her swordsmanship instructor, she often forgoes lessons because she finds swordfighting 'unrefined,' and doesn't feel like wasting her time with it. Yuyuko takes her position as the head of the Netherworld (and really, all grave, serious situations) as no joking matter, dropping all presets of being an incompetent, bumbling ditz. Despite her overall eccentricity, she was given her position of power for a reason. It's difficult to make her truly angry, and she finds it hard to hold grudges, even with wrongdoings against herself....though when she does get mad, it's said she's terrifying.
But such a summary is incomplete without mentioning Yuyuko's life as a human. Back then, she was an anxiety-ridden girl suffering from severe depression and lack of self-worth due to the fear of her powers. Canon doesn't make it clear whether or not her powers would go off at random, or if it was an isolated incident or two, but either way it is what instilled most of Yuyuko's morals into her. As such she values the lives of the innocent, particularly humans, to big degrees. As she became amnesiac after she died, she was something of a blank slate and her personality changed accordingly. Having forgotten the toll her powers took on her and those around her and essentially coming into the world as a supernatural being from the very start, she viewed her powers trivially, calling them 'fun' and flippantly disregarding the heroines' pleas for her to stop her insane corpse-resurrecting plot. She was more arrogant and foolhardy, and it wasn't until she regained her sorrowful human memories that she also regained a large amount of her humility and kindness.
no subject
Primarily in Blank State, the killers were possessed by evil entities that fed off their unresolved guilt and committed murders. At first, no one knew why they were there, and their "host" had them solve these murders via a storytelling proxy based on the guilt in their hearts. Fortunately, Yuyuko was never possessed nor murdered by these spirits. Unfortunately, her closest canonmate Youmu Konpaku was mistakenly executed in the second trial, believing herself to be the guilty party for "allowing" Yuyuko to endanger her own life in canon. Although Maya Fey was able to channel Youmu's spirit and reveal that the dead were still sort of around them, talking to Youmu did jack squat to alleviate her feelings of helplessness. The guilt of believing she had let Youmu die by not arguing her case better was a guilt she carried with her for the rest of the game. That, combined with her life as a human were used as character frameworks to pin her as suspects two different cases. Although she had kept it hidden for obvious reasons, her nature as a suspect forced her to reveal her living days and subsequent death to the game as a whole. Naturally, this left her distraught as get-all.
Though they managed to save a good number of the possessed by erasing their guilt, this ended up hurting them in the end, because the cat revealed that they had all been transported into his domain for a chance at saving their lives--three more people needed to die for any of them to be able to go home. Although Yuyuko aimed to stay alive for the sake of having the Saigyou Ayakashi sealed up again, her good will and desire to save Maya's life bit her in the ass, and she ended up getting killed in an overpowered three-way fight to the death with Kouha Ren (who was being channeled by Maya) and Kaoru Nagumo.
Ultimately, though, she and Youmu achieved their somewhat-happy endings. After some bargaining with the cat, the living players banded together to rescue the dead, giving them a small chance at saving themselves once again. Yuyuko, in particular, was rescued by Kaoru from the Saigyou Ayakashi, ironic considering he was the most responsible for her earlier death. Despite having a significantly reduced chance at saving their lives, she and Youmu set out for Gensokyo again with hope in their hearts.
....which would be all fine and dandy, if she didn't get kidnapped on the way home and stuck in a televised murder mystery game. All of Yuyuko's memories of Blank State as well as a good deal of her canon ones were temporarily locked away (though she regained them after her death). On the flip side of things, she herself was the victim of the fifth week, having her powers canceled mid-flight and crashing to the ground. In a bout of the most ridiculous irony ever, it was because of her kind nature and desire to save the life of Maya yet again.
Yuyuko has since made her peace with the going-ons at Blank State, though she is still somewhat bitter towards her killer (Phoenix Wright) for murdering her in such an underhanded manner, and outright using Mei as bait. She holds no such hostility towards Kouha and Kaoru, as it was both a combat death fought fairly and things worked out in the end regardless. Despite Maya inadvertently "killing" her in both instances, she still fairly likes her and holds no ill will towards her. Although Maya was able to capitalize off of her second death by retiring from the game, Yuyuko is merely happy that she actually did save her this time, albeit in a roundabout way. She and Austria also mutually apologized, as they came to see each other's point of view on the situation regarding Youmu. As Austria was the true culprit and let Youmu take the fall for her, Yuyuko was understandably angry with her when they met in the graveyard--as even though Yuyuko assisted in taking down her possessed body, she was still responsible for Youmu's death in a way. Nevertheless, they ended things on a peaceful note.
Notably, she was also close with Mei Misaki and (sort of) Kaoru. Mei was her closest friend in the castle, the two having stuck together after a temporary bout of hopelessness on Mei's part. Yuyuko was privy to the details of Mei's history that she otherwise kept locked away, and vice versa. Despite the clashing personalities, she enjoyed the girl's company--though this was used against her in her murder. As Mei had been non-lethally poisoned in order to draw Yuyuko away from the crowd, she directly witnessed Yuyuko's death and felt semi-responsible for it. Unable to do anything from her position in the graveyard, Yuyuko focused most of her frustration on beating up Phoenix. Hooray...? As per Kaoru, they were "closer" in Blank State than in the castle, but she still took amusement out of bothering him. That's really the core of it--he gave her the reactions she liked, and so she kept subtlety prodding him, even after he revealed himself to be a human-hating genocidal maniac. Which, directly speaking, is the type of person Yuyuko is least likely to get along with. Nevertheless, he did save her from the wrath of Murdertree, so she still rather likes him and believes she owes him some sort of favor. Ye Olden Times gotta stick together, or something like that. Surprisingly, her relationship with Youmu didn't change much in-game.
As of her previous time in Haven, she also updated to the end of her previous game.
However, her sunny side isn't without its downfalls, that being she's a bit of an airhead. Yuyuko has an infamous love for food and anything relating to it; she won't hesitate to steer conversations into the realm of food, and is said to always have a food-related quip on hand. Her attention span is limited at best, her mind constantly wandering astray from relevant topics. She's easily distracted to a ridiculous level, following and fixating on anything that catches her fancy--such as when she tries to resurrect her own corpse because she wondered whose corpse it was in the first place, belying the whole can of worms that opened up. At worst, she once forgot what she had for breakfast that morning, and put her focus on trying to eat a sentient night sparrow character because she "looked tasty." "What does this button do?" seems to be a question she asks often, or forgets to ask in preference of pushing the mystery button first and asking questions later.
But Yuyuko is undeniably an actress -- it's subject to debate how much of her outward personality is just that, an act. It's heavily suggested that her airheadedness is all a carefully-constructed ruse for the sake of entertainment, and at the very least, she does play dumb at convenient times. In reality, she's proven herself time and time again to actually be incredibly intelligent, and perceptive to a frightening degree. Yuyuko is cunning and a very good manipulator, managing to out-gambit both her closest friend, Yukari, and a great deal of the Lunarians, as proven when she managed to interfere in a carefully-planned trip to the moon that was already being pseudo-sabotaged by two different parties. It resulted in her waltzing into the moon's capitol in broad daylight (relatively speaking), allowing her to steal things from their treasury...even though all she took in the end was a thousand-year-old bottle of sake, which brings us to: Yuyuko often does things or makes comments to rile people up or make them uncomfortable, as getting reactions is a source of amusement for her. She teases Youmu on a regular basis and is often intentionally vague when people ask her questions just to see them get irritated. In that case, Yukari expected her to make off with expensive treasures or legendary weapons, yet all she presented was a bottle of alcohol. Yukari is oft-touted as the series' master manipulator, yet even she can't always read Yuyuko or predict her movements.
Otherwise, Yuyuko is what you'd expect from the daughter of a nobleman, and the last remaining head of the Saigyouji family. She's a bit spoiled, and as such can come off as lazy and flighty when she expects people to do things for her or pick up after her, and she can be a tad bit entitled. She's also a voracious reader, probably contributing to her intelligence. Fitting her position, she is charming, ladylike, and cultured. Although Youmu is supposed to be her swordsmanship instructor, she often forgoes lessons because she finds swordfighting 'unrefined,' and doesn't feel like wasting her time with it. Yuyuko takes her position as the head of the Netherworld (and really, all grave, serious situations) as no joking matter, dropping all presets of being an incompetent, bumbling ditz. Despite her overall eccentricity, she was given her position of power for a reason. It's difficult to make her truly angry, and she finds it hard to hold grudges, even with wrongdoings against herself....though when she does get mad, it's said she's terrifying.
But such a summary is incomplete without mentioning Yuyuko's life as a human. Back then, she was an anxiety-ridden girl suffering from severe depression and lack of self-worth due to the fear of her powers. Canon doesn't make it clear whether or not her powers would go off at random, or if it was an isolated incident or two, but either way it is what instilled most of Yuyuko's morals into her. As such she values the lives of the innocent, particularly humans, to big degrees. As she became amnesiac after she died, she was something of a blank slate and her personality changed accordingly. Having forgotten the toll her powers took on her and those around her and essentially coming into the world as a supernatural being from the very start, she viewed her powers trivially, calling them 'fun' and flippantly disregarding the heroines' pleas for her to stop her insane corpse-resurrecting plot. She was more arrogant and foolhardy, and it wasn't until she regained her sorrowful human memories that she also regained a large amount of her humility and kindness.