Finally got this finished up. I started the first Danganronpa a couple years ago and basically have gotten through the next each successive year, finishing here, on the 7th anniversary of Danganronpa v3: Killing Harmony’s release. As much as I do like them, the overwhelmingly samey gameplay would’ve made them a real trial to play back-to-back-to-back so I think it was the right decision to let each breathe a bit before continuing on. I had obviously heard about v3 through osmosis and @PolaroidJack is a big fan, so I was expecting a lot. While the first half of the game is still too slow for my liking, the final act is so well done that it really catapults it beyond the other games and makes for a memorable experience. Spoilers to follow?
The cast is fantastic, even if I did call a couple of the character twists ahead of time. Kokichi, Miu, Kaede, Shuichi, Korekiyo, Kaito, all very enjoyable characters. Maybe one or two duds in here but that's not too surprising. Pretty much everyone grows or changes in interesting ways throughout the narrative but Miu and Kokichi really stole the show. Aided perhaps by the more vulgar localization, but their unhinged antics really took every scene to new heights. I might prefer Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair as far as a “game” thanks to its cast and the overall tone and narrative path but the actual meat of the narrative of v3 goes beyond 2 for me. I will say though, the Monokubs (this entry's mascots) are such a waste of space. I have no idea what the team was thinking with them. Is it just a gag on the audience that they’re annoying? Because they never serve any narrative role and they almost exclusively make worthless commentary. Monomi in 2 was a fantastic foil to Monokuma, so I’m confused what they were intending with the Kubs. Them aside, every moment is punctuated by the strength of this cast, as is usually the case with this series.
Trial 6 / Final Act (Spoilers)
What makes the finale so special is what it does with the twist. The twist itself isn’t too absurdly shocking - Danganronpa 1 ends with the reveal of the death game being watched and Danganronpa 2 is about a virtual world, this is the next logical step - but where the narrative goes with reflecting on this twist and what it means is what makes it effective. There's a lot of reflection on what makes a piece of fiction, how fiction affects us, and what game development can mean from a business perspective. To this end, at some point in the latter minutes of the game I did genuinely experience the unnerving feeling that the characters were real. That playing the game was looking into another world. Their lives behind the screen and mine in front of it. That's a unique feeling. The added layer of Kodaka’s reflection on how Chunsoft pushed him into this third game rings so strongly in the final chapter that it feels like Kojima on how Konami treated him - lots of questions like “what makes Danganronpa? “Who decides where the story goes?”“Should you give the fans what they want and expect or switch it up?””Can I do that without getting fired?” It's a ballsy ending that feels like it does give closure to years worth of narrative and character work. The reveals hit really hard and do things that just feel pretty unique for the medium. I can see why it might not land for some people, but it blew me away.
Criticism
My main issues are the issues I have with EACH game in the main trilogy -
• They’re too slowly paced - The overarching narrative of Danganronpa is… ineffective. I kept waiting for v3 to tie everything up, make the stuff about the despairs and THE TRAGEDY make more sense and feel less like YA fiction stuff. Obviously, the twist makes this irrelevant. While I love the twist and think it makes the game work, it does cause me to reflect on the fact that the “outside” narrative never mattered. In 1, it was just set up to the death game; in 2, it was only to make the virtual world reveal make more sense; in v3, it’s completely eschewed for the sake of the metanarrative, to its betterment. So I’m a little conflicted in that, on one hand, it does away with any need to criticize Kodaka for delaying story content in each iteration - going “Arrgghh! When will this stuff get explained?!” is pointless when, in reality, the death game was really the focus all along, and I was hyping myself for something that didn’t exist. On the other hand, I did sort of want that explanation, and getting out of it is perhaps a little cowardly - I wanted to see how the hell he could make The Tragedy make sense.
• Relevant story content for the overarching narrative is relegated to the last 2 chapters - While this is partially explained by above, I do still think it’s a negative for the structure of each game that the flow is so identical. Outside of Kaede’s role, everything in v3 is layed out early with the expectation that it won’t be explained for 15-20 hours and, yeah, that’s still the case.
•Wonky action minigames in trials that feel more like hindrance than anything - I like some of them here, and overall, this is an improvement over everything in 2. “Swords Rebuttal” in particular was massively improved now that you can actually read the dialogue before interacting with it. Debate Scrum, while very easy, is probably the best minigame in the series. Really liked it a lot. Otherwise… eh. I don’t ever feel like the minigames add much in Danganronpa. Obviously the central Debate minigame is pretty important for the game’s structure, but I don’t particularly enjoy it or the others. Outside of some truly terrible hitboxes and hit detection on firing truth bullets, the minigames are mostly pretty inoffensive in v3.
• Little interesting content in the free time + extraneous content (like the skills in v3) aren’t easily accessible in a single playthrough - While Danganronpa is on the shorter side for a VN, I still dislike the free time moments for taking away from the narrative. Additionally, they hardly ever feel truly relevant. There are definitely going to be funny moments here and there, but the strength of v3 is in the storytelling and the character interactions, the 1 on 1 date moments aren’t ever anything to write home about. The skills are a really nice addition here, but if you’re mostly just playing for the story, you only end up with a couple of them, which feels like it limits the possible gameplay elements of the trials.
• Controls are still completely asinine, I do not understand why they stayed exactly the same in the transition from a handheld to console. Menus are, overall, incompetently crafted as well. I’m glad this was mostly not the case for Rain Code.
• Fucking insane that this game is still screenshot / recording locked on PlayStation - I’m writing this review on the 7th anniversary of Danganronpa v3’s release, Spike Chunsoft. I don't think spoilers are too worrying at this point.
I just wrote up a lot of criticism, huh? Well, take that and ignore it, because it’s basically completely irrelevant to my enjoyment of the story and the game as a whole.
Presentation
Best it’s ever been. The art, the cutscenes, the music, the voice performances (I played in Japanese). Absolutely knocked it out of the park. Kokichi’s VA makes some incredible things happen in the back half and I really noticed how much work they were putting in. Takada Masafumi’s music is incredible as ever. So many standout tracks in here that really run the gamut of genre. Always a pleasure to hear his work. The art team really solidified all the designs and major elements of the world into a cohesive whole - I looked back at 1 (as well as saw it referenced ingame) and noted how off model the early CGs looked by comparison to v3’s, which just goes to show how much they had improved with them. This is not a spectacularly impressive game but the new UI elements and whatnot feel nice, and the trial UI in particular feels markedly different from prior entries, befitting the end of the series.
I'm finishing Master Detective Archives: Rain Code next and have high expectations just for it escaping the mold of Danganronpa, which only feels natural given the end of this game. Kodaka took a somewhat lopsided death game narrative and wrapped it into an extraordinarily satisfying knot, bringing together all sorts of ideas about the nature of game development, the place of fiction in society, and the very nature of existence. I know this is a controversial ending for some, but for me it was the only logical place for Danganronpa to go, and sends the series out on the biggest bang possible. The story goes on.
The cast is fantastic, even if I did call a couple of the character twists ahead of time. Kokichi, Miu, Kaede, Shuichi, Korekiyo, Kaito, all very enjoyable characters. Maybe one or two duds in here but that's not too surprising. Pretty much everyone grows or changes in interesting ways throughout the narrative but Miu and Kokichi really stole the show. Aided perhaps by the more vulgar localization, but their unhinged antics really took every scene to new heights. I might prefer Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair as far as a “game” thanks to its cast and the overall tone and narrative path but the actual meat of the narrative of v3 goes beyond 2 for me. I will say though, the Monokubs (this entry's mascots) are such a waste of space. I have no idea what the team was thinking with them. Is it just a gag on the audience that they’re annoying? Because they never serve any narrative role and they almost exclusively make worthless commentary. Monomi in 2 was a fantastic foil to Monokuma, so I’m confused what they were intending with the Kubs. Them aside, every moment is punctuated by the strength of this cast, as is usually the case with this series.
Trial 6 / Final Act (Spoilers)
What makes the finale so special is what it does with the twist. The twist itself isn’t too absurdly shocking - Danganronpa 1 ends with the reveal of the death game being watched and Danganronpa 2 is about a virtual world, this is the next logical step - but where the narrative goes with reflecting on this twist and what it means is what makes it effective. There's a lot of reflection on what makes a piece of fiction, how fiction affects us, and what game development can mean from a business perspective. To this end, at some point in the latter minutes of the game I did genuinely experience the unnerving feeling that the characters were real. That playing the game was looking into another world. Their lives behind the screen and mine in front of it. That's a unique feeling. The added layer of Kodaka’s reflection on how Chunsoft pushed him into this third game rings so strongly in the final chapter that it feels like Kojima on how Konami treated him - lots of questions like “what makes Danganronpa? “Who decides where the story goes?”“Should you give the fans what they want and expect or switch it up?””Can I do that without getting fired?” It's a ballsy ending that feels like it does give closure to years worth of narrative and character work. The reveals hit really hard and do things that just feel pretty unique for the medium. I can see why it might not land for some people, but it blew me away.
Criticism
My main issues are the issues I have with EACH game in the main trilogy -
• They’re too slowly paced - The overarching narrative of Danganronpa is… ineffective. I kept waiting for v3 to tie everything up, make the stuff about the despairs and THE TRAGEDY make more sense and feel less like YA fiction stuff. Obviously, the twist makes this irrelevant. While I love the twist and think it makes the game work, it does cause me to reflect on the fact that the “outside” narrative never mattered. In 1, it was just set up to the death game; in 2, it was only to make the virtual world reveal make more sense; in v3, it’s completely eschewed for the sake of the metanarrative, to its betterment. So I’m a little conflicted in that, on one hand, it does away with any need to criticize Kodaka for delaying story content in each iteration - going “Arrgghh! When will this stuff get explained?!” is pointless when, in reality, the death game was really the focus all along, and I was hyping myself for something that didn’t exist. On the other hand, I did sort of want that explanation, and getting out of it is perhaps a little cowardly - I wanted to see how the hell he could make The Tragedy make sense.
• Relevant story content for the overarching narrative is relegated to the last 2 chapters - While this is partially explained by above, I do still think it’s a negative for the structure of each game that the flow is so identical. Outside of Kaede’s role, everything in v3 is layed out early with the expectation that it won’t be explained for 15-20 hours and, yeah, that’s still the case.
•Wonky action minigames in trials that feel more like hindrance than anything - I like some of them here, and overall, this is an improvement over everything in 2. “Swords Rebuttal” in particular was massively improved now that you can actually read the dialogue before interacting with it. Debate Scrum, while very easy, is probably the best minigame in the series. Really liked it a lot. Otherwise… eh. I don’t ever feel like the minigames add much in Danganronpa. Obviously the central Debate minigame is pretty important for the game’s structure, but I don’t particularly enjoy it or the others. Outside of some truly terrible hitboxes and hit detection on firing truth bullets, the minigames are mostly pretty inoffensive in v3.
• Little interesting content in the free time + extraneous content (like the skills in v3) aren’t easily accessible in a single playthrough - While Danganronpa is on the shorter side for a VN, I still dislike the free time moments for taking away from the narrative. Additionally, they hardly ever feel truly relevant. There are definitely going to be funny moments here and there, but the strength of v3 is in the storytelling and the character interactions, the 1 on 1 date moments aren’t ever anything to write home about. The skills are a really nice addition here, but if you’re mostly just playing for the story, you only end up with a couple of them, which feels like it limits the possible gameplay elements of the trials.
• Controls are still completely asinine, I do not understand why they stayed exactly the same in the transition from a handheld to console. Menus are, overall, incompetently crafted as well. I’m glad this was mostly not the case for Rain Code.
• Fucking insane that this game is still screenshot / recording locked on PlayStation - I’m writing this review on the 7th anniversary of Danganronpa v3’s release, Spike Chunsoft. I don't think spoilers are too worrying at this point.
I just wrote up a lot of criticism, huh? Well, take that and ignore it, because it’s basically completely irrelevant to my enjoyment of the story and the game as a whole.
Presentation
Best it’s ever been. The art, the cutscenes, the music, the voice performances (I played in Japanese). Absolutely knocked it out of the park. Kokichi’s VA makes some incredible things happen in the back half and I really noticed how much work they were putting in. Takada Masafumi’s music is incredible as ever. So many standout tracks in here that really run the gamut of genre. Always a pleasure to hear his work. The art team really solidified all the designs and major elements of the world into a cohesive whole - I looked back at 1 (as well as saw it referenced ingame) and noted how off model the early CGs looked by comparison to v3’s, which just goes to show how much they had improved with them. This is not a spectacularly impressive game but the new UI elements and whatnot feel nice, and the trial UI in particular feels markedly different from prior entries, befitting the end of the series.
I'm finishing Master Detective Archives: Rain Code next and have high expectations just for it escaping the mold of Danganronpa, which only feels natural given the end of this game. Kodaka took a somewhat lopsided death game narrative and wrapped it into an extraordinarily satisfying knot, bringing together all sorts of ideas about the nature of game development, the place of fiction in society, and the very nature of existence. I know this is a controversial ending for some, but for me it was the only logical place for Danganronpa to go, and sends the series out on the biggest bang possible. The story goes on.