Tldr: Danganronpa 2’s new cast is strong enough to overcome the game’s problems, and the last chapter is intriguing enough for it to be a worthwhile sequel and a game that i enjoyed overall and can wholeheartly recommend to those who enjoyed the first, but the gameplay changes make SDR2 a chore to go through in times, and more than all it made me realize why i liked the first title so much.
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Spoilers ahead
Are the characters in the Danganronpa series the best part of it?
Thats what i thought about when i went through the first chapters of SDR2. The characters were, for the most part, more interesting to me than the first game, and while the writing got weirder and weirder, I could understand what they were going for and quite frankly, I was happy to see how the most important part of the game was improved so much from the first game. Yes, the first cast is pretty great too, but on the second title there was almost no character that i didn't want to learn more about, unlike the first game which had some i truly didn't care about….. Except for one. Nagito is interesting, and to me he represents the bad in the side of hope, and in retrospect i do like how he kind of represents how the future foundation see the cast - something to get rid of, something to look down upon rather than try to give hope to, HOWEVER the idea that he exists solely to be annoying for the 80% of the game isn't something i can just brush off, no matter how much the payoff is good, and i don't think it's even THAT good in his case
More importantly however, the more i played the game, the more the gameplay felt just flat-out bad. Even simple stuff such as moving the camera on the open areas (NOT effected by reticle) speed were so slow, and the game on the switch felt like its hogging along, with simple stuff like opening the menus taking few seconds at times. for a game whose one of its goals is to make me go explore and talk to everyone and see new stuff, especially thanks to the new XP system, that was a real problem.
The changes don't end here, and the trials which were spoon-fed to you, with Makoto literally telling you the answers after each debate were butchered in a way that i didn't believe was quite possible. After all, i was annoyed by how easy the first game’s trial was, so i should be thankful the second game makes them noticeably harder, right?
No more spoon-feeding. instead, the trials have new mini-games and modified mini-games that just drag on and are so annoying to go through, or just bombard you with options to confuse you. Maybe i was jaded already by the new sword minigame, the much-worsened hangman and logic dive but i actually started to dislike how many truths bullets the game throws at you. It was so confusing, and i don't really even understand why that choice was made. The biggest problem the first game had was literally giving you to answers, and i think getting rid of that was enough to make the trials more interesting. There were no needs to make the trials uber complex, gameplay wise, that was never the issue with them. But, at the very least, the mysteries gotten harder to solve even without the gameplay parts, so that a positive already.
…But that just made me realize how unimportant the induvial cases were to me on the first game. Yes, the cases were super easy, but there was a bigger mystery throughout the game, of Why is the killing game happening that defines the first game more than everything. I dont know if the same level of mystery can continue in a sequel, considering we already had some understanding of the world after the first game, but i think how the same mystery was handheld in the second game is quite poor in some many ways.
The game already drops strong hints about whats actually going on way earlier than the last chapter, but on the last chapter it just flat out tell you Everything you need to know before the final trial for… reasons? Info dump after info dump is given to the player and in one short chapter most of the mysteries are just given to you, without any effort, without any lead up in my opinion, and thats even ignoring how weak the solution is with a simple “its a computer-generated world so everything is possible!” as an answer.
as you go to the final trial, before even a second started, you pretty much can see how the game ends. I was wishing i was wrong. I was wishing so much they could surprise me even a bit, to not go so full generic and predictable. Something must be left up in the air… right?
The first game ends up with the main cast beating Monokuma and Junko by themselves. Monokuma challenges them to discover and understand the mysteries and they manage to do it. Sure, the “Ultimate hope” superpower helps them to really defeat her by the end, but it was truly them using their brains. Seeing the mastermind finally getting punished was so rewarding - and i couldn’t feel it a tiny bit as i was going through the ending of the second game. The themes of hope and despair were in the first game, and they were always a bit annoying in how they simplify the world and basically are a magic solution to everything, but here they are quite literally, a magic to solve everything by the end. Barely anything to really discover or to, just wait for the ultimate hope to save you.
The last chapter manages to be epic and interesting on its own right, and it does provide a lot of lore that i loved reading about, but it just misses the mark big time in making the entire experience rewarding in my opinion. I liked the second cast for who they were, and in the end the “real cast” just comes in and solves the day in such a simple way. Yes, you can argue they survived the game, so they did do something but this leads to my final point.
What is the best part of Danganronpa? what makes me keep playing it?
After playing SDR2, the answer to me is obvious: The world of Danganronpa is, whatever its the history, why the killing games are happening, the themes of hope and despair but most importantly, the REAL mystery of why all of this happening. this is the driving force behind it to me. The characters and style are major part of it too and at the end there's the actual concept of finding out “whodunit” - and the problem for me is that SDR2 improves on that aspect and fails on so much else.
---
Spoilers ahead
Are the characters in the Danganronpa series the best part of it?
Thats what i thought about when i went through the first chapters of SDR2. The characters were, for the most part, more interesting to me than the first game, and while the writing got weirder and weirder, I could understand what they were going for and quite frankly, I was happy to see how the most important part of the game was improved so much from the first game. Yes, the first cast is pretty great too, but on the second title there was almost no character that i didn't want to learn more about, unlike the first game which had some i truly didn't care about….. Except for one. Nagito is interesting, and to me he represents the bad in the side of hope, and in retrospect i do like how he kind of represents how the future foundation see the cast - something to get rid of, something to look down upon rather than try to give hope to, HOWEVER the idea that he exists solely to be annoying for the 80% of the game isn't something i can just brush off, no matter how much the payoff is good, and i don't think it's even THAT good in his case
More importantly however, the more i played the game, the more the gameplay felt just flat-out bad. Even simple stuff such as moving the camera on the open areas (NOT effected by reticle) speed were so slow, and the game on the switch felt like its hogging along, with simple stuff like opening the menus taking few seconds at times. for a game whose one of its goals is to make me go explore and talk to everyone and see new stuff, especially thanks to the new XP system, that was a real problem.
The changes don't end here, and the trials which were spoon-fed to you, with Makoto literally telling you the answers after each debate were butchered in a way that i didn't believe was quite possible. After all, i was annoyed by how easy the first game’s trial was, so i should be thankful the second game makes them noticeably harder, right?
No more spoon-feeding. instead, the trials have new mini-games and modified mini-games that just drag on and are so annoying to go through, or just bombard you with options to confuse you. Maybe i was jaded already by the new sword minigame, the much-worsened hangman and logic dive but i actually started to dislike how many truths bullets the game throws at you. It was so confusing, and i don't really even understand why that choice was made. The biggest problem the first game had was literally giving you to answers, and i think getting rid of that was enough to make the trials more interesting. There were no needs to make the trials uber complex, gameplay wise, that was never the issue with them. But, at the very least, the mysteries gotten harder to solve even without the gameplay parts, so that a positive already.
…But that just made me realize how unimportant the induvial cases were to me on the first game. Yes, the cases were super easy, but there was a bigger mystery throughout the game, of Why is the killing game happening that defines the first game more than everything. I dont know if the same level of mystery can continue in a sequel, considering we already had some understanding of the world after the first game, but i think how the same mystery was handheld in the second game is quite poor in some many ways.
The game already drops strong hints about whats actually going on way earlier than the last chapter, but on the last chapter it just flat out tell you Everything you need to know before the final trial for… reasons? Info dump after info dump is given to the player and in one short chapter most of the mysteries are just given to you, without any effort, without any lead up in my opinion, and thats even ignoring how weak the solution is with a simple “its a computer-generated world so everything is possible!” as an answer.
as you go to the final trial, before even a second started, you pretty much can see how the game ends. I was wishing i was wrong. I was wishing so much they could surprise me even a bit, to not go so full generic and predictable. Something must be left up in the air… right?
The first game ends up with the main cast beating Monokuma and Junko by themselves. Monokuma challenges them to discover and understand the mysteries and they manage to do it. Sure, the “Ultimate hope” superpower helps them to really defeat her by the end, but it was truly them using their brains. Seeing the mastermind finally getting punished was so rewarding - and i couldn’t feel it a tiny bit as i was going through the ending of the second game. The themes of hope and despair were in the first game, and they were always a bit annoying in how they simplify the world and basically are a magic solution to everything, but here they are quite literally, a magic to solve everything by the end. Barely anything to really discover or to, just wait for the ultimate hope to save you.
The last chapter manages to be epic and interesting on its own right, and it does provide a lot of lore that i loved reading about, but it just misses the mark big time in making the entire experience rewarding in my opinion. I liked the second cast for who they were, and in the end the “real cast” just comes in and solves the day in such a simple way. Yes, you can argue they survived the game, so they did do something but this leads to my final point.
What is the best part of Danganronpa? what makes me keep playing it?
After playing SDR2, the answer to me is obvious: The world of Danganronpa is, whatever its the history, why the killing games are happening, the themes of hope and despair but most importantly, the REAL mystery of why all of this happening. this is the driving force behind it to me. The characters and style are major part of it too and at the end there's the actual concept of finding out “whodunit” - and the problem for me is that SDR2 improves on that aspect and fails on so much else.
NOWITSREYNTIME17
10 months ago