Socialization is a mini story mode in the game that focuses on bonding events between Ruka Kayamori and other characters.
This mode can be accessed either via main story Free Time period, or via character menu. However, accessing via the menu will cause a Life Point to be consumed for each unread event.
Overview[]
The socialization stories shows mostly Ruka's interaction with the other Seraph Squad members. Technically, it is part of Main Story as the main way to unlock the stories is to go through stated "Free Time" moment of the story and all socialization stories will mention the current situation of the Main Story involved.
The completion of bond events will upgrade Bond Rank of characters involved, which is needed to unlock character stat upgrades.
Mechanics[]
During Free Time, a few character bubble will pop up along with other co-curriculum sections. Player will be able to pick which socialization to be read at the said time, in which they will be automatically transported to the location where the character is. Sometimes the character will send a message to Ruka instead, where a pop up to read the socialization will appear after that.
Reading the socialization will cost a Life Point if done outside the Main Story section. A popup to refill it via Life Stone will also appear if the player does not have any Life Point.
During the socialization, some gameplay element will also appear, and Battles are also common. However the difficulty is easy, especially if the player already have the character with high levels even if the battles only used A-level memoria.
Bath Time[]
A "bath time scene" is added for each socialization event completed, usually on the night after free time. This scene is skippable via an option that automatically appear after Ruka's dialogue on that time, and no additional reward would be given for this scene. It is included in Socialization menu's recollection of the day and the recollection will only stops if Ruka skips or done with the scene.
The scenes are uniform in general especially with Ruka's ending line "Nothing beats bath time", but they will feature line variant of interaction between Ruka and the character she bonded with on that day.
NPC/Group Socialization[]
There are few socialization stories that appears in the main story timeline that happens to be an NPC or group socialization instead. For example, Chapter 4 Part 1 introduces story for Makiko Asami and group stories for each squad other than 31A.
These stories gives similar rewards to other Socialization, however they are not accessible via the Socialization menu but rather via story replay of the main story (there are no problems to navigate to any free time in the story however).