I often wonder if it was because I played this game in a bubble or because the series hadn't reached the height of its popularity at the time that I was able to experience this game the way I did.

For context, I knew about this series because it'd been mentioned in passing here and there, and while I can't remember exactly how I even found out about it, it didn't really have the reputation it does today. I'm not saying this is a good or bad thing, simply that I had no knowledge of what I was about to experience.

At the time, I enjoyed DR1 quite a bit, and DR2 was one of those things I saw bits and pieces of because of store pages and what not but that was it. When I got to actually play it, I loved it. It blew DR1 out of the water for me, and I enjoyed just about every bit of it.

The thing about Danganronpa 2 is that it is tailor made to work against what the player knows about the series. It's actually funny in some instances because there's a lot of dramatic irony already- instances where we know things the character's don't- and the game will subvert the player's thoughts and expectations with the characters in the game being genuinely clueless as to what's going on. This is something that continues into the 3rd game, I think Kodaka just likes doing it to be honest.

Anyway as for the actual game, it's good. I think generally speaking it's a lot better than the first game, both in terms of the character and the story itself. The roles of each character and the dynamics that are formed are generally more endearing, which makes the island feel more alive and fun.

To be honest I don't really have to much to say specifically outside of that back then I was a big fan of Nagito as a character and having replayed it, especially in a world where he's been memed to the point that people know him more than his game, I still think the role Kodaka chose to give him is unique and fun.

Ending song's a banger and Ekoroshia goes really hard. By the way, did you know that a pentagon has five sides?

Much like with the first Danganronpa, I was privileged enough to not be spoiled on this game at all despite having many Danganronpa-obsessed friends as a teenager. I knew that white-haired twink made people crazy, yeah, but nothing specific.

But yeah, I understand now.

Seriously though, this is a great follow up to the first game, and I really enjoyed being able to go through it finally. Hard to say whether I like it more than the first, but it's definitely close. Very strong recommendation from me if you played and enjoyed the first game.

Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair is a great sequel to Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc. In my opinion, it does everything wayyyyy better: the characters, the music, the setting, the lore/worldbuilding, the murder mysteries, the class trials, the executions, everything, except a few things that I'll discuss in this review. I will say that this game is my favourite of the series.

To start off is the setting. Without any spoilers, I will say that it certainly is a unique one. Unlike THH's school setting, 16 students are trapped on a remote island called Jabberwock Island. Whilst not initially set to participate in a killing game, and instead being guised as a School Trip, created by Monokuma's sister, Monomi/Usami. It isn't until Monokuma takes over the entire island and orders the students to start killing each other. I just love the island setting, and its soo different from the school setting that we had gotten used to in THH. There's a variety of areas, so there's really zero chance of getting bored of looking around the different parts of Jabberwock Island.

Story wise, it mostly has the same premise as Trigger Happy Havoc, however with the inclusion of a Chapter 0. The story this time around is much better, and it has more sub-events, which was one of my main critiques about THH. Without spoilers, the murder mysteries in this game are much more creative, and the different motives are also great (such as the Twilight Syndrome Murder Case, The Despair Disease, and Starvation). Cases are overall great except one in my opinion, but I won't specify which, it just seems very sloppy and quickly-put together, and the pay-off just doesn't make much sense. The execution of that case is also arguably the worst in the series. Chapter 5 is actually cinema and is great and probably one of, if not the best chapter in the entire series. The ending and the twist is also just batshit insane and crazy, I love it. Overall, the story in this game is fantastic with only one noticeable miss.

The class trials. They are SO much better in this game. There is an actual diverse amount of minigames now and the cases are more well thought-out and not super obvious on 'who-dunnit' to the point where they're actually really enjoyable. You can either agree or refute different statements, an improved Hangman's Gambit (hooray..), Rebuttal Showdown which is arguably the best addition because you go head-to-head with one other student in a debate to prove them wrong. There's also a logic dive where you get to play a little scrolling minigame to deduce what events happened when. These are great additions and made the game that much more enjoyable.

Also want to further talk about deaths and executions. The deaths are just way better in this game, and the executions are great, besides one of them being a little silly, and the other a lot bizarre, the rest are really emotionally driven and make me care about the characters that much more, even if they are murderers.

Character wise, we got some more diversity, but it still seems pretty tropey. We have the normal guy, the psychotic guy, the skirtchaser, the uwu gamer girl, the energetic girl, the vulgar boy, and the bitchy girl, among others. The free-time events are essentially the same concept as the previous game, just with different characters. I think the events in this game gave the characters more development and more personality and allowed them to further stand out. Overall, a great cast of characters with just a few duds, but others are great.

The music in this series continues to slap, and when it slaps, it slaps HARD.

Overall, a great game and I enjoyed my experience once again with it. There's still little replay value, but I would recommend this game if you enjoyed Trigger Happy Havoc.

(Played via Decadence)
I guess to start with the main thing, while I do have my problems with this game, I do think this is a big improvement on 1 and a pretty good game.

To quickly go through my issues, most of the minigames I do not like (new Hangman's Gambit especially), and I feel Chapter 5 and 6 really drag at points

But as for praises, this game's lineup of characters is so much better (Many more enjoyable characters), the Island I find much more interesting than Hope's Academy, and they went and fixed some dumb stuff from the first game, like dropping Re:Act entirely, giving hints for what each panel needs and what each part represents in the Closing Remarks, and really tightening up the ranking system so (from my experience on Mean-Mean) getting A ranks isn't something you can get with extreme ease

Also has a really good soundtrack too and some cool executions