Danganronpa Series - aka Demented Animatronic Bear Gets People Murdered: the Game

[skykiii]

I was gonna make a new topic, but I decided to search and see if one existed.

Full disclosure, I never actually played the games. Until recently they weren't available on a platform I owned (and one of them--Ultra Despair Girls--still isn't).

So I know the series via Lets Plays. For Dangan 1 and 2 I watched MangaMinx's Lets Plays. For V3 I went with CinammonToastKen because all the other LPs I saw were like a hundred videos long, whereas Ken's was more reasonable. (Mangaminx didn't do an LP of v3, but she did post a video explaining that she wasn't going to).

Funny thing is I later learned Ken's LP is controversial among fans.... because he criticizes the game. Which I think says a lot about the fanbase.

..........................

Anyway.

for me Dangan is a series that is weirdly.... broken and yet endearing. It's like, its fun, but its also fun-damentally retarded.

Like take the core conceit of the games: There is this super high school that recruits people for having Ultimate/Super High School Level "talents." But these talents can be anything from just having a position of power (Ultimate Biker Gang Leader), to basically Autism Superpowers like Ultimate Housekeeper, to actual superpowers like Nagito's luck or Junko's Ultimate Analysis abilities.

Like, besides the millions of logical questions this raises (like how they even find all these people, whether these "talents" are just a naturally occuring thing in Dangan's world or if they only became a thing after Hope's Peak was founded, how the fuck do you decide that one guy in particular is the "Ultimate Fanfic Writer" or one girl is the "Ultimate Gamer", etc.) one problem I have is the series seems very wishy-washy with this concept.

What I mean is, the series keeps bringing up the talents but they rarely ever actually play into the story. Like just for example, there's one murderer who actually used his talent as part of his crime... and he's literally the only one in the entire series. Other than that and cases like Nagito, basically the talents don't amount to anything.

Another weird thing for me though is.... well, I got into Dangan because I like murder mysteries. But Dangan is one of those franchises where it doesn't always stick to the murder mystery premise and seems to think you care about the world its building. I legit don't understand the point of things like a lot of the spinoff light novels that are just "here's an adventure one of the characters had outside the game." They remind me of those Detective Conan OVAs where its just Conan having some silly side-adventure with his friends. Look, nobody plays Clue and says "wouldn't this game be more fun if we rearranged the books on this shelves and ignored the whole murder thing?" Nobody plays Simcity wanting the city to be already built and for the player to actually control a hot dog vendor on a street corner.

That said, recently I have thought of giving Ultra Despair Girls a shot (in Lets Play form since that's the only one not on the Nintendo Switch) since some aspects of the setting are kinda cool... even if the reason the world is corrupted is kinda... you know... retarded.

So somehow, a stupid bear (wording vaguely so I won't have to remember to spoiler mark everything) somehow caused "The Most Despair-Inducing Event in Human History." I'm sure we've all made the stock joke: Oh, so Velma caused the apocalypse. [replace "Velma" with bad media or event of your choice]

Actually, its funny... every time a novel or an anime tries to explain what the Event was, its always something that's not far off from that joke. I almost feel like its best to only play the games and ignore the other media entirely as they always come off like bad fanfiction (even though apparently the game's creator had a hand in a lot of it).

While I liked the games, one thing that did always bother me was the whole Hope vs Despair thing and basically, how everyone has a retarded attitude about it. I just watched the anime Danganronpa 3 and there's a guy who wants to literally kill anyone who is "tainted by despair."

It reminds me of something the Nostalgia Critic said with regards to Care Bears: what exactly constitutes "caring?" Do you get a visit from the Bears if you say you don't care what your friend decides to buy you for lunch?

By the same token, is the guy in the DR3 anime saying he'll kill anyone who lets out a melancholy sigh?

Like... it's just an emotion. You can't be despairing 100% of the time, and you can't be hopeful 100% of the time. Having generally optimistic or pessimistic personalities is a thing, but the stupidity reminds me of the movie The Happening where just having your survival instinct removed means people immediately commit suicide.... except here its apparently Despair Makes You Evil (although you can apparently conveniently control it when the narrative calls for it).

I've also never jived with the villain saying they want everyone to feel despair because its so wonderful. To me that makes about as much sense as saying "I want to live in a world where you always feel that sense of relief you get after eating when you've been hungry for hours, but you feel that relief all the time." Like, if the villain was just crazy and people said as much, that would be one thing... but the problem is everyone else in the setting acts very similarly.

Granted... this is a thing I can forgive when I keep in mind this game was made for teens and pre-teens. When you're at that age, this shit might legitimately be deep and thought-provoking for you. If you're a grown-ass adult though, yeah it sounds stupid, and you just keep wanting someone to show up and point out to the characters how fucking autistic they all sound.

And yet....

..... This is the series that gave us the legendary Gundham Tanaka and his Dark Divas of Destruction. So I can never hate it.

 

[GenociderSyo]

If your not really into the shooter portion of UDG just max out Toko's stun gun batteries and scissors and she can pretty much one shot entire groups.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Since it references Danganronpa and it's barely ever talked about, did anyone play Zanki Zero: Last Beginning? It's a weird game made the same creators where you play a small group of people in a post apocalypse that undergo rapid aging and after they die they immediately reincarnate as children. So the gameplay is a sort of weird real time DRPG where you fight enemies and pick up items in a dungeon to make consumables/weapons but every trip the characters get older until they die and get reborn, changing their stats as they age.

It's not good if anyone is wondering, way too slow and clunky but the plot is interesting in the setup and revelations and the ending was absolutely perfect.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Actually I'll just write what happens in the game since it is interesting and there probably isn't any good recap. It's gonna be an effort post so forgive me for double posting.

Zanki Zero features couple of amnesiac characters who find themselves on an island being blamed for causing the apocalypse by the Monokuma equivalent that references the biggest meme shit anime in Japan, and they don't have a lot to do but explore islands that somehow drift next to the home island. They quickly find out there are weird beings called clione living in those islands and that they can use those clione for special abilities but with a steep price, as well as experiencing the rapid death and rebirth thing with the mechanism being in an arcade machine for some reason. It works by each character having essentially a usb in them that keeps their data after they die, and having it destroyed will mean they are on borrowed time. There one character that doesn't age rapidly which is one girl that also always respawns at the same age, and always missing an arm and a leg.

Anyways each island focuses on the life story of one character, some of them are really dark. There is less levity from Danganronpa, one of the big findings is that there are similar arcade cabinets on each island and they output a monstrous looking boss enemies keep respawning after they are killed, who are important figures from the respective character's life.

So here are the heavy spoilers:

Spoiler

The characters discover that they had the Final Fantasy 8 twist of all of them knowing each other in childhood (nevermind they were all of different social class) and were friends, with the girl that doesn't rapid age being the leader. At least until their childhood secret base is infiltrated by a psycho that kills the girl extremely violently (in a pretty horrifying scene where the psycho tells the kids that they can vote on who's going to die, the girl tries the third option of voting for the psycho but everyone else votes on her because they always relied on her to sort things out), of course they all mentally suppressed the event. And the girl was (of course) a child genius that could have averted the incoming apocalypse, which happens due to her father making clone tech for immortality and reviving dead people, and terrorists fucking shit up causing humanity to go extinct in a grey goo incident and the only things left are animals and failed clones (ie, the cliones). The setup of waking up on an island in the game was caused by the girl's brother who masqueraded as one of the main characters as revenge for causing her death (which they had no real chance to avert). Also the bosses the party faced wasn't people from the party's past but the party members themselves being endlessly revived as failed clones, fucking metal.

But there are more twists, the girl's father was also alive (as a robot) and tries to do something which I don't remember, but probably dooming the world. The party manages to beat him but not before he kills the girl and destroys her usb, so she only has one restart left and this time she revives as a baby with all limbs. Furthermore the party finds out that the arcade machine reviving them degrades with use and will eventually stop working altogether. The ending has the girl grow up, the arcade machine breaks and each character dying of old age while telling everyone else goodbye (which is very touching). Finally the girl is alone, but the ending pretty much states she found out another survivor and starts a new generation of humanity with him.

 

[skykiii]

@wtfNeedSignUp have you played either World's End Club or Yurukill: The Calumniation Games? Both are supposed to be spiritual successors to Danganronpa. I played a demo of the latter and I can totally tell its by the same people.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

@wtfNeedSignUp have you played either World's End Club or Yurukill: The Calumniation Games? Both are supposed to be spiritual successors to Danganronpa. I played a demo of the latter and I can totally tell its by the same people.

I didn't know they were from the same creators, I'll might give Yurukill a chance since it's on My Steam wishlist.

 

[ShitLurker]

Actually I'll just write what happens in the game since it is interesting and there probably isn't any good recap. It's gonna be an effort post so forgive me for double posting.

Zanki Zero features couple of amnesiac characters who find themselves on an island being blamed for causing the apocalypse by the Monokuma equivalent that references the biggest meme shit anime in Japan, and they don't have a lot to do but explore islands that somehow drift next to the home island. They quickly find out there are weird beings called clione living in those islands and that they can use those clione for special abilities but with a steep price, as well as experiencing the rapid death and rebirth thing with the mechanism being in an arcade machine for some reason. It works by each character having essentially a usb in them that keeps their data after they die, and having it destroyed will mean they are on borrowed time. There one character that doesn't age rapidly which is one girl that also always respawns at the same age, and always missing an arm and a leg.

Anyways each island focuses on the life story of one character, some of them are really dark. There is less levity from Danganronpa, one of the big findings is that there are similar arcade cabinets on each island and they output a monstrous looking boss enemies keep respawning after they are killed, who are important figures from the respective character's life.

So here are the heavy spoilers:

Spoiler

The characters discover that they had the Final Fantasy 8 twist of all of them knowing each other in childhood (nevermind they were all of different social class) and were friends, with the girl that doesn't rapid age being the leader. At least until their childhood secret base is infiltrated by a psycho that kills the girl extremely violently (in a pretty horrifying scene where the psycho tells the kids that they can vote on who's going to die, the girl tries the third option of voting for the psycho but everyone else votes on her because they always relied on her to sort things out), of course they all mentally suppressed the event. And the girl was (of course) a child genius that could have averted the incoming apocalypse, which happens due to her father making clone tech for immortality and reviving dead people, and terrorists fucking shit up causing humanity to go extinct in a grey goo incident and the only things left are animals and failed clones (ie, the cliones). The setup of waking up on an island in the game was caused by the girl's brother who masqueraded as one of the main characters as revenge for causing her death (which they had no real chance to avert). Also the bosses the party faced wasn't people from the party's past but the party members themselves being endlessly revived as failed clones, fucking metal.

But there are more twists, the girl's father was also alive (as a robot) and tries to do something which I don't remember, but probably dooming the world. The party manages to beat him but not before he kills the girl and destroys her usb, so she only has one restart left and this time she revives as a baby with all limbs. Furthermore the party finds out that the arcade machine reviving them degrades with use and will eventually stop working altogether. The ending has the girl grow up, the arcade machine breaks and each character dying of old age while telling everyone else goodbye (which is very touching). Finally the girl is alone, but the ending pretty much states she found out another survivor and starts a new generation of humanity with him.

Thanks for this. I've been curious about it for a long time but having heard the gameplay sucks I never took the plunge. I am mildly tempted to look for a silent playthrough though.

@wtfNeedSignUp have you played either World's End Club or Yurukill: The Calumniation Games? Both are supposed to be spiritual successors to Danganronpa. I played a demo of the latter and I can totally tell its by the same people.

And thanks for mentioning those, I wouldn't mind playing another danganronpaesque game.

 

[skykiii]

Right now I'm watching a Lets Play of Ultra Despair Girls. It looks like a fun game, though a bit easy... I'm watching Mangaminx's videos and in the first eight parts she's only used Genocide Jack ONCE (not counting that parts where the game forces it). I feel like I could play this... if it could somehow be played on Linux and without needing Steam.

I do have to agree with her on one point though.... I hate the way kid with the leather mask drags out all his lines. It gets really annoying to listen to.

 

[The Real Me]

Right now I'm watching a Lets Play of Ultra Despair Girls. It looks like a fun game, though a bit easy... I'm watching Mangaminx's videos and in the first eight parts she's only used Genocide Jack ONCE (not counting that parts where the game forces it). I feel like I could play this... if it could somehow be played on Linux and without needing Steam.

I do have to agree with her on one point though.... I hate the way kid with the leather mask drags out all his lines. It gets really annoying to listen to.

She's definitely right not to use Jack much, I only ever chose to use her once or twice to deal with some tedious enemies. And yeah, Jataro is bad but just wait until you see more of the pink girl, I think she's meant to be funny but because the game was made by the Dangan developers, they try to sexualise her and everything involving her is super jarring and uncomfortable. I'm typically not that susceptible to being grossed out by media but whenever she showed up, I could only cringe and think "What degens put this in the game?"

 

[skykiii]

She's definitely right not to use Jack much, I only ever chose to use her once or twice to deal with some tedious enemies. And yeah, Jataro is bad but just wait until you see more of the pink girl, I think she's meant to be funny but because the game was made by the Dangan developers, they try to sexualise her and everything involving her is super jarring and uncomfortable. I'm typically not that susceptible to being grossed out by media but whenever she showed up, I could only cringe and think "What degens put this in the game?"

They're more than degens, they're Dangens.

So, played a demo of World's End Club, the other Danganronpa spiritual successor (apparently Kodaka or whatever is involved with it)....

.... One thing I should mention is that for both the "successor" aspect is not IMMEDIATELY obvious. Yurukill makes you play a shmup segment first, and World's End Club has a weird prologue platformer section before getting to the part that's actually DR-like. That said, once you get to the main story the similarities quickly mount--just over a dozen people in games that are designed to play at people's distrust of one another with a promise of personal gain or even just basic survival, where defeat means death, headmastered by a villain that is clearly trying to be the new Monokuma.

Yurukill is more visually similar... specifically to Danganronpa v3. World's End Club tho has a unique artstyle and the design of the characters... I quickly began to call them "the Digi-destined." Also just going by the digital box art/store image, World's End Club seems to think the character Vanilla is gonna be a breakout.

Thing is, a sense I'm getting is I'd probably more enjoy just watching Lets Plays. Though that was a sense I got with Danganronpa as well... some of the gameplay bits actually seem a bit irritating, so at times I was glad someone else was putting up with the B.S. and I was just enjoying the story.

By the way, this made me laugh more than it had any right to.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Thanks for this. I've been curious about it for a long time but having heard the gameplay sucks I never took the plunge. I am mildly tempted to look for a silent playthrough though.

I think I've been maybe too harsh, it's not painful to play, but the gameplay is too basic with too much time spent gearing up/stripping your party as they get closer to death. The game has a journo difficulty that just removes the entire combat aspect, making it more of a VN.

 

[ShitLurker]

I think I've been maybe too harsh, it's not painful to play, but the gameplay is too basic with too much time spent gearing up/stripping your party as they get closer to death. The game has a journo difficulty that just removes the entire combat aspect, making it more of a VN.

Mmm, OK, so it's a tedium vs interest sort of deal... I'll keep in the backlog for now then, though there is a lot of competition in there.

 

[skykiii]

I just finiahed watching Mangaminx's lets play of Ultra Despair Girls.

One thing I didn't know when I made my earlier post is that Minx actually did 17 videos (the last video being four hours) but for some reason her own playlist only lists 15 of them. Someone else compiled a playlist that had all 17 parts though. I knew something was wrong when part fifteen (which covers the whole Nagisa trying to help Komaru escape ordeal) was over but there was still clearly lots of game to go.

So..... I was warned that the game gets whack when you get to the chapter primarily dealing with that pink-haired girl. But now that I've seen it.... the thing is, I think what the game designers were actually going for with her pratfalls and such was more "cutesy" rather than outright sexual, but if that's the case then it shows that the writers were rather tone-deaf.

By the final part of the lets play, I was so ready for this to be over that I did something I almost never do and actually started just skipping through or even speeding up the footage until it got to the story-relevant bits. The only other time I did this for Dangan was when I was watching CinammonToastKen's LP of V3 and there was an entire video where he just went through seeing all the different Love Hotel cutscenes, which I gave precisely zero shits about.

Part of this was that the final chapter felt like a drag just from a story perspective, and also this was where I was getting irritated with some aspects of Minx's playstyle--she seems to forget what her combat options are (there were many instances where she could've solved a problem by getting Jacked, but didn't, and for some reason it rarely occured to her to use anything besides the basic Break bullets). To be fair, its possible she was just sick of the game too... I've often noticed this phenomenon where when you're burned out on a game your skills also noticably degrade at it.

The basic feeling I've gotten about Danganronpa is that the three main visual novels are worth playing--or at least watching someone else play. But you can give the middle finger to movies, manga, and even spinoff video games. Even when they're decent, they're rather insubstantial. Knowing that some kids took over a city doesn't make the mythos better. Knowing that apparently the Despair Event happened because Junko happened to meet a guy who wanted to make not-Ghibli anime that brainwashes people does nothing to enhance the story. If anything all this extra stuff weakens it.

I happened to also watch (or at least, put on as background noise) NezumiVA's autistically long takedown of the Danganronpa 3 anime. I basically agree with a lot of what her and her co-host for that episode said. I didn't absolutely hate the DR3 anime, but it really did feel like something written by some intern who didn't know much about the franchise and had to get something out in a hurry.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Okay finished Yurukill. It's pretty bad. The most apt description for it is "bare bones", I wouldn't be surprised if 90% of the budget went into hiring VAs and the whole game was made by one guy in a month.

The VN segments are too short for start, the cast is already very small as it is but you barely have time for them to interact with each other. It's usually just the different competing teams (which are either duos or triplets) talking in their own segment. Most of the characters are generic anime tropes as opposed to the larger than life characters in Danganronpa. The puzzles themselves are either retardedly obvious or ridiculously obtuse, the game itself is completely linear and you can only solve puzzles at the specified order. There are also barely any event CGs which is absolutely ridiculous for a big names producer. Also some of the cases where you need to put evidence are ridiculous, like proving a character couldn't stab a character because the blood stain ona weapon are from stabbing from a right angle but the accused is left handed based on event cg 15 minutes earlier.

The game itself is pretty much fully light hearted compared to Danganronpa, none of the crimes or events are overly horrific and the body count is extremely low rather than having a fraction of the characters surviving (minus the cases most everyone survived because it was all a simulation).

The bullet hell stages are pretty disappointing, they don't have any unique twists or enemies, it's as generic as it can be. It doesn't help that the investigation segments just completely kill the pace once they happen and they are inorganic as hell. To compare to something like Touhou (that I played around 15 years ago), here is a fight against an enemy with eyes that cause madness:

The art is ugly with huge realistic eyes on the characters, I don't know what they were thinking. The performance is terrible on the Switch, if getting the log in a VN isn't immediate, the developer should consider other work. Also playing a bullet hell on a switch was fucking retarded on my end considering the stick drift killed me several times.

 

[PHILLIP BANKS]

game looks interesting
where to start

 

[The Real Me]

game looks interesting
where to start

You're best off just starting with the first game and seeing how you like it after the first two trials. I enjoy the series but there will be multiple times across each entry where you say "that is a bullshit leap in logic" or "this character is unfunny and annoys me greatly." Also, the protag of the first game is a complete moron, you just have to get used to that.

 

[TVB]

game looks interesting
where to start

One and two are good, so I'd say start with the first and travel along with the second.

 

[PHILLIP BANKS]

One and two are good, so I'd say start with the first and travel along with the second.

OMG ITS PEETAH!

 

[skykiii]

Okay finished Yurukill. It's pretty bad. The most apt description for it is "bare bones", I wouldn't be surprised if 90% of the budget went into hiring VAs and the whole game was made by one guy in a month.

The VN segments are too short for start, the cast is already very small as it is but you barely have time for them to interact with each other. It's usually just the different competing teams (which are either duos or triplets) talking in their own segment. Most of the characters are generic anime tropes as opposed to the larger than life characters in Danganronpa. The puzzles themselves are either retardedly obvious or ridiculously obtuse, the game itself is completely linear and you can only solve puzzles at the specified order. There are also barely any event CGs which is absolutely ridiculous for a big names producer. Also some of the cases where you need to put evidence are ridiculous, like proving a character couldn't stab a character because the blood stain ona weapon are from stabbing from a right angle but the accused is left handed based on event cg 15 minutes earlier.

The game itself is pretty much fully light hearted compared to Danganronpa, none of the crimes or events are overly horrific and the body count is extremely low rather than having a fraction of the characters surviving (minus the cases most everyone survived because it was all a simulation).

The bullet hell stages are pretty disappointing, they don't have any unique twists or enemies, it's as generic as it can be. It doesn't help that the investigation segments just completely kill the pace once they happen and they are inorganic as hell. To compare to something like Touhou (that I played around 15 years ago), here is a fight against an enemy with eyes that cause madness:

The art is ugly with huge realistic eyes on the characters, I don't know what they were thinking. The performance is terrible on the Switch, if getting the log in a VN isn't immediate, the developer should consider other work. Also playing a bullet hell on a switch was fucking retarded on my end considering the stick drift killed me several times.

Thanks for saving me a purchase. I didn't finish the demo because I just kinda lost interest. One thing I will say is I kinda hated the lady with the fox mask.... she felt to me like a blatant attempt to create a new Monokuma, but she just lacked the bear's charm and instead just came off as annoying.

I'm not sure if this is a case where the demo has a different story than the main game.... the demo's story involved a dude who was accused of setting an apartment on fire and thus killing people, and it turned out the girl he was paired with (who basically looked like a recolored Kyoko Kirigiri) was a survivor of the afformentioned arson... a twist I saw coming immediately but which of course the game tries to drag out. I got just past this event where the girl wants to kill him and he talks her out of it, and by that time I was bored and ready to do something else.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Thanks for saving me a purchase. I didn't finish the demo because I just kinda lost interest. One thing I will say is I kinda hated the lady with the fox mask.... she felt to me like a blatant attempt to create a new Monokuma, but she just lacked the bear's charm and instead just came off as annoying.

I'm not sure if this is a case where the demo has a different story than the main game.... the demo's story involved a dude who was accused of setting an apartment on fire and thus killing people, and it turned out the girl he was paired with (who basically looked like a recolored Kyoko Kirigiri) was a survivor of the afformentioned arson... a twist I saw coming immediately but which of course the game tries to drag out. I got just past this event where the girl wants to kill him and he talks her out of it, and by that time I was bored and ready to do something else.

I kinda liked her actually, she has some good moments later on. But the plot is just too uninspired to make use of her.