loviellie
33 reviews liked by loviellie
Fatal Twelve
2018
diversity win this Yuri romance is still uninteresting as shit
Dead Plate
2023
This review contains spoilers
I am a fan of RachelDrawsThis and have played her previous games but sadly was not a huge fan of this one, which started off promising but wound up letting me down. The ingredients are there but it just lacked that special spice it needed to bring everything together.
The actual tycoon simulator is kinda fun but very barebones and the pacing is odd- in the first few levels I was stuck waiting for the clock to run down BUT later levels were super hectic and I would get stuck working way past the clock just kind of waiting for the dishes to cook. In a way that actually makes it a really good simulation of working as a server but as, like, gameplay it left something to be desired and made it a slog to replay the levels after I realized I'd missed something.
But my biggest complaint about the gameplay is that it doesn't really impact the story at all. You do have to replay a day if you fail to meet the sales quota but other than that there's no real consequences for losing customers, and your only "reward" for doing well is the tip money you can put towards the upgrades. There are a bunch of references to Vince being a harsh boss with high standards so the fact that your actual work performance is never commented on felt like an oversight.
The other issue is that the game is predicated on peppering in small details that will unsettle you and hint at the darker story lurking beneath the posh exterior, but these details feel a bit... sparse. A little bit of blood here, some weird noises there, an uncanny comment or two, but that's all. There aren't many secrets in the restaurant and there's basically no point to exploring it except during the one night shift the game allows you.
I was also surprised by how little change there was from day to day- since the game was forcing me to play through the restaurant shifts I was hoping that there would be new treats to keep me going every day, but they never materialized. Nothing ever really happens in the back alley or the window of your apartment, despite those being two of the only environments available, and the few hooks that appear (the rat, the peephole, the register) don't actually go anywhere. Not as many cutscenes as I would have hoped either. A lot of cool ideas that lack follow through.
Β
(Also, the game introduces a question/answer mechanic during the tutorial and implies that customers will ask you questions, but none ever do. I thought that was odd.)
The strength of the game is, of course, the ambience, art, and characters. The game looks adorable and the few cutscenes we do get are all sleek, stylish, and appropriately creepy. The writing feels natural coming from the mouths of the characters, but the polish of the writing is let down by the story, which sadly wasn't very interesting. The "twist" was like the most obvious choice for a restaurant setting... like wow, the creepy chef was cooking a PERSON? I think I've heard this one.
I think the creators did a good job of trying to flesh out Vince and Rory's characters, but while I got a strong sense of their personalities I was still a bit confused by their motivations so the endings weren't very satisfying. While the two had chemistry, it didn't really seem like they had any sort of actual connection, so the revelation of Vince's obsession and the subsequent struggle just lacked punch. I didn't really get catharsis out of seeing the restaurant burn, but watching Rory die was equally anticlimactic.
I almost wish that the game had also given you the option to take Vince's side and eat his meal because I think that would have been a much more interesting ending- it would have added a hint of subversion to the unfortunately tired story and dovetailed nicely with the traits we saw the characters displaying (Vince's need for control/barely concealed loneliness and Rory's lack of direction/need for affection). Or something, I don't know.
It's always tough to criticize a project like this because at the end of the day, it's incredibly good for something that someone made and distributed for free and I would still recommend giving it a play, but like... if I did recommend it to someone I'd tell them to read the spoiler free endings guide the creator posted because they aren't gonna wanna have to replay the levels if they miss something.
The actual tycoon simulator is kinda fun but very barebones and the pacing is odd- in the first few levels I was stuck waiting for the clock to run down BUT later levels were super hectic and I would get stuck working way past the clock just kind of waiting for the dishes to cook. In a way that actually makes it a really good simulation of working as a server but as, like, gameplay it left something to be desired and made it a slog to replay the levels after I realized I'd missed something.
But my biggest complaint about the gameplay is that it doesn't really impact the story at all. You do have to replay a day if you fail to meet the sales quota but other than that there's no real consequences for losing customers, and your only "reward" for doing well is the tip money you can put towards the upgrades. There are a bunch of references to Vince being a harsh boss with high standards so the fact that your actual work performance is never commented on felt like an oversight.
The other issue is that the game is predicated on peppering in small details that will unsettle you and hint at the darker story lurking beneath the posh exterior, but these details feel a bit... sparse. A little bit of blood here, some weird noises there, an uncanny comment or two, but that's all. There aren't many secrets in the restaurant and there's basically no point to exploring it except during the one night shift the game allows you.
I was also surprised by how little change there was from day to day- since the game was forcing me to play through the restaurant shifts I was hoping that there would be new treats to keep me going every day, but they never materialized. Nothing ever really happens in the back alley or the window of your apartment, despite those being two of the only environments available, and the few hooks that appear (the rat, the peephole, the register) don't actually go anywhere. Not as many cutscenes as I would have hoped either. A lot of cool ideas that lack follow through.
Β
(Also, the game introduces a question/answer mechanic during the tutorial and implies that customers will ask you questions, but none ever do. I thought that was odd.)
The strength of the game is, of course, the ambience, art, and characters. The game looks adorable and the few cutscenes we do get are all sleek, stylish, and appropriately creepy. The writing feels natural coming from the mouths of the characters, but the polish of the writing is let down by the story, which sadly wasn't very interesting. The "twist" was like the most obvious choice for a restaurant setting... like wow, the creepy chef was cooking a PERSON? I think I've heard this one.
I think the creators did a good job of trying to flesh out Vince and Rory's characters, but while I got a strong sense of their personalities I was still a bit confused by their motivations so the endings weren't very satisfying. While the two had chemistry, it didn't really seem like they had any sort of actual connection, so the revelation of Vince's obsession and the subsequent struggle just lacked punch. I didn't really get catharsis out of seeing the restaurant burn, but watching Rory die was equally anticlimactic.
I almost wish that the game had also given you the option to take Vince's side and eat his meal because I think that would have been a much more interesting ending- it would have added a hint of subversion to the unfortunately tired story and dovetailed nicely with the traits we saw the characters displaying (Vince's need for control/barely concealed loneliness and Rory's lack of direction/need for affection). Or something, I don't know.
It's always tough to criticize a project like this because at the end of the day, it's incredibly good for something that someone made and distributed for free and I would still recommend giving it a play, but like... if I did recommend it to someone I'd tell them to read the spoiler free endings guide the creator posted because they aren't gonna wanna have to replay the levels if they miss something.
Persona 3 Reload
2024
Never played but obligated to give it a 10/10 because of how much enjoyment I get from joining a new MegaTen server, making a joke about how Persona 3 was the first Persona game, turning notifications on my phone, and then shoving it up my ass
Venba
2023
Defined by the immigrant experience in Canada while also offering the warmth, comfort, and connections provided by one's cultural background, particularly in cooking, Venba inspires with delightful animation and a hunger-inducing series of gameplay sequences to carry a brief generational drama concerning a Tamil couple and their son. So little is said (perhaps too much) where the actions of deduction allow a decades-spanning story its gracious moments of happiness during distress and occasional food for thought when the future dares to assimilate and destroy the very things one grows to know. There's a little too much quaintness in its storytelling (a random act of violent discrimination, the Ratatouille epiphany, blunt bedroom conversations) to truly feel absorbed in this world. Nevertheless, the clear love and dedication by an indie team aware of its roots serve Venba in ways few experiences could ever provide just plopping the player into a traditional Indian world.
keiichi maebara is the stupidest motherfucker to ever exist
The aftermath of Danganronpa V3 definitely left fans divided on whether or not Kodaka was a hack fraud. It definitely caught everyone's attention when he revealed his new game...where you solve murder mysteries...featuring the same art style as Danganronpa...and even the same composer. Now, I hate to rip off the bandaid, but I don't think it's going to stop this game from bleeding out either way.
The worst part of this game arguably isn't even a part of the game's content; It's how it runs. Loading screens are extremely frequent and decently long. The game is constantly running just below 30 FPS, giving it a very sluggish feel. Almost every time the camera cuts to a different position, some background element breaks for a frame or two. If it only happened a few times, I'd shrug it off, but these glitches in the matrix happen very often. This game's technical issues don't stop with performance and graphics either. I think the person doing sound mixing at Spike Chunsoft may be asleep at the wheel. There are a handful of occasions where voice clips are way louder/softer than they should be. One in particular is a very loud instance of Yuma saying "oh", which jumpscared me nearly every time it happened. Another is the scene where Shinigami boom-kills the culprit at the end of a mystery labyrinth. She's certainly saying words, but if you're not using subtitles, then good luck hearing them as her words get washed away. If audio problems weren't enough, the lip sync for in-engine cutscenes is also distractingly desynced. Listen, I know. I know that saying "the Switch isn't powerful enough for this game" is beating a 6-year old dead horse, but this game just isn't properly optimized for the hardware that they signed off on timed exclusivity to.
Credit where credit is due, this game's world design is top-notch. A dark, gloomy, futuristic city that's constantly plagued by rainfall, punctuated with bright neon lights everywhere. While I wouldn't call it my favorite work of his, Hifumi Takada manages to provide an appropriately chill and mysterious backdrop to this world through his music. I enjoyed the downtime between cases where you could take on optional requests from the residents of Kanai Ward, if only because I got to vibe with this setting for longer.
On the flipside, the Mystery Labyrinth is the other big highlight of this game. It's a nonstop rollercoaster of absurd spectacle as you answer rapid-fire questions, re-create murder scenes, and more. It frames the process of pursuing the truth as if you're exploring some elaborate RPG dungeon. The major component of this is the Reasoning Death Match. People that try to prevent you from reaching the truth in the real world show up as phantoms in the labyrinth, except now they're buffed up and equipped with all the RGB they could find in the dumpster behind Best Buy. In the deathmatches, you literally dodge the phantoms' statements until you find the one where you can literally cut through it using facts and logic. The Mystery Labyrinth has a critical flaw though: it's the most linear "labyrinth" I've ever experienced. I'm not even just talking about the hallways where you hold forward while people talk (I'm pretty sure those segments aren't even masking a loading screen or anything). It's often structured like a straight shot through with questions along the way, and I never ran out of health once. It's a fairly easy affair.
The thing that hurts this game severely is that almost none of the characters stick out to me. Most of them are introduced, barely fleshed out, and discarded like trash by the end of their chapter, never to be mentioned again. Even the ones who are with you for the whole game, like the master detectives, don't really have something to keep you hooked. You can find collectibles in the overworld that give you side-conversations with the other master detectives to help flesh them out a bit more, but you access them through the pause menu, which means, well, y'know. Even Yuma, the protagonist of this game, feels eerily similar to a character from Danganronpa V3. Yuma's just boneless Shuichi! His character development feels like it's traveling in a straight, horizontal line! He spends most of the game doubting himself and being overly cautious, which is a very boring way to portray an amnesiac. The line starts to ascend a little bit by the end, but that's too late. That's always too late, kind of like how most of the cases in this game end in pure deus-ex-machina. Our heroes usually have no good reason to escape their predicaments, but it kinda just happens anyways, and I hate that! The villains are also complete cartoon characters, something that i enjoy to a point. I wish that their behavior was more subdued outside of the mystery labyrinth. It'd make for a nice contrast, instead of them being on full blast the whole time.
There is one character who'll stick with me though, but for all the wrong reasons. I'm not into Shinigami. Kinda feels like Kodaka just inserted his ideal fetishized woman into the game, and while I'm not against that in theory, she leans a bit too far into "what the fuck is even happening" territory far too often for my tastes. This woman is quite literally horny for murder mysteries, and the way she treats the mild-mannered Yuma can feel downright rude at points. She's very mean-spirited, and genuinely annoying on top of that, never hesitating to barf up pop culture references. Only Yuma can hear her, so I found the funniest moments with Shinigami were the ones where Yuma gave no reaction and went about his business, as he should.
Also, I hate to bring this up, but for how Danganronpa V3 ended (don't spoil yourself, if you know, you know), Kodaka sure came back with a game that feels eerily like Danganronpa V4. Instead of Super-High-School-Level students with Ultimate abilities, you have Master Detectives with Forensic Fortes. "Kanai Ward's Ultimate Secret" sounds like it could be "The Biggest, Most Awful, Most Tragic Event in Human History". This isn't a Nonstop Debate, it's a Reasoning Death Match! Shinigami Puzzle? More like "I genuinely would've preferred Hangman's Gambit 2.0"! It borrows so many concepts from DangitGrandpa, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the problems start to surface when I think about how DR used most of these ideas to better effect.
I don't think this is Kodaka's "AI: The Somnium Files". Not even close. At best, it's Danganronpa-adjacent. He's gonna have to smooth out all the rough edges and branch out a bit more if he plans to make this an ongoing series. There is potential here, but it's frequently drowned out by a downpour of tedium and unmemorable writing. This rating could definitely go up at least half a star once it releases on platforms that can actually handle the game. Or you could just, y'know, play Danganronpa.
The worst part of this game arguably isn't even a part of the game's content; It's how it runs. Loading screens are extremely frequent and decently long. The game is constantly running just below 30 FPS, giving it a very sluggish feel. Almost every time the camera cuts to a different position, some background element breaks for a frame or two. If it only happened a few times, I'd shrug it off, but these glitches in the matrix happen very often. This game's technical issues don't stop with performance and graphics either. I think the person doing sound mixing at Spike Chunsoft may be asleep at the wheel. There are a handful of occasions where voice clips are way louder/softer than they should be. One in particular is a very loud instance of Yuma saying "oh", which jumpscared me nearly every time it happened. Another is the scene where Shinigami boom-kills the culprit at the end of a mystery labyrinth. She's certainly saying words, but if you're not using subtitles, then good luck hearing them as her words get washed away. If audio problems weren't enough, the lip sync for in-engine cutscenes is also distractingly desynced. Listen, I know. I know that saying "the Switch isn't powerful enough for this game" is beating a 6-year old dead horse, but this game just isn't properly optimized for the hardware that they signed off on timed exclusivity to.
Credit where credit is due, this game's world design is top-notch. A dark, gloomy, futuristic city that's constantly plagued by rainfall, punctuated with bright neon lights everywhere. While I wouldn't call it my favorite work of his, Hifumi Takada manages to provide an appropriately chill and mysterious backdrop to this world through his music. I enjoyed the downtime between cases where you could take on optional requests from the residents of Kanai Ward, if only because I got to vibe with this setting for longer.
On the flipside, the Mystery Labyrinth is the other big highlight of this game. It's a nonstop rollercoaster of absurd spectacle as you answer rapid-fire questions, re-create murder scenes, and more. It frames the process of pursuing the truth as if you're exploring some elaborate RPG dungeon. The major component of this is the Reasoning Death Match. People that try to prevent you from reaching the truth in the real world show up as phantoms in the labyrinth, except now they're buffed up and equipped with all the RGB they could find in the dumpster behind Best Buy. In the deathmatches, you literally dodge the phantoms' statements until you find the one where you can literally cut through it using facts and logic. The Mystery Labyrinth has a critical flaw though: it's the most linear "labyrinth" I've ever experienced. I'm not even just talking about the hallways where you hold forward while people talk (I'm pretty sure those segments aren't even masking a loading screen or anything). It's often structured like a straight shot through with questions along the way, and I never ran out of health once. It's a fairly easy affair.
The thing that hurts this game severely is that almost none of the characters stick out to me. Most of them are introduced, barely fleshed out, and discarded like trash by the end of their chapter, never to be mentioned again. Even the ones who are with you for the whole game, like the master detectives, don't really have something to keep you hooked. You can find collectibles in the overworld that give you side-conversations with the other master detectives to help flesh them out a bit more, but you access them through the pause menu, which means, well, y'know. Even Yuma, the protagonist of this game, feels eerily similar to a character from Danganronpa V3. Yuma's just boneless Shuichi! His character development feels like it's traveling in a straight, horizontal line! He spends most of the game doubting himself and being overly cautious, which is a very boring way to portray an amnesiac. The line starts to ascend a little bit by the end, but that's too late. That's always too late, kind of like how most of the cases in this game end in pure deus-ex-machina. Our heroes usually have no good reason to escape their predicaments, but it kinda just happens anyways, and I hate that! The villains are also complete cartoon characters, something that i enjoy to a point. I wish that their behavior was more subdued outside of the mystery labyrinth. It'd make for a nice contrast, instead of them being on full blast the whole time.
There is one character who'll stick with me though, but for all the wrong reasons. I'm not into Shinigami. Kinda feels like Kodaka just inserted his ideal fetishized woman into the game, and while I'm not against that in theory, she leans a bit too far into "what the fuck is even happening" territory far too often for my tastes. This woman is quite literally horny for murder mysteries, and the way she treats the mild-mannered Yuma can feel downright rude at points. She's very mean-spirited, and genuinely annoying on top of that, never hesitating to barf up pop culture references. Only Yuma can hear her, so I found the funniest moments with Shinigami were the ones where Yuma gave no reaction and went about his business, as he should.
Also, I hate to bring this up, but for how Danganronpa V3 ended (don't spoil yourself, if you know, you know), Kodaka sure came back with a game that feels eerily like Danganronpa V4. Instead of Super-High-School-Level students with Ultimate abilities, you have Master Detectives with Forensic Fortes. "Kanai Ward's Ultimate Secret" sounds like it could be "The Biggest, Most Awful, Most Tragic Event in Human History". This isn't a Nonstop Debate, it's a Reasoning Death Match! Shinigami Puzzle? More like "I genuinely would've preferred Hangman's Gambit 2.0"! It borrows so many concepts from DangitGrandpa, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the problems start to surface when I think about how DR used most of these ideas to better effect.
I don't think this is Kodaka's "AI: The Somnium Files". Not even close. At best, it's Danganronpa-adjacent. He's gonna have to smooth out all the rough edges and branch out a bit more if he plans to make this an ongoing series. There is potential here, but it's frequently drowned out by a downpour of tedium and unmemorable writing. This rating could definitely go up at least half a star once it releases on platforms that can actually handle the game. Or you could just, y'know, play Danganronpa.
Great potential with cool ideas, terrible writing with awful jokes every 5 seconds, takes you out of the scene's feeling
πππ°πΈ ππΌπ.
Around three years ago, I played Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc for the first time. I really enjoyed it for what it is, it's not good, don't get me wrong, but it's a damn fun game if you're able to turn your mind off. The same holds true for Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair, which I played around the same timeframe as well. I loved it, the writing isn't really good, but it was fun to play that game despite its flaws. Then, of course, I got to Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony. A game I've been utterly confused by for so long now. Then around 2 years later, I met someone so insistent on Danganronpa V3 being some high kino, and I thought maybe I let it fly over my head, so I decided on a replay some time in the future.
Danganronpa V3 is admittedly a step up in every department from the first two games. The UI is much better, the music is genuinely amazing, I enjoyed the cast, and the writing of some of the later cases are genuinely good. Then there's Case 6. I keep running through it in my head as it moves about in there back and forth. The twist is genuinely something I'd normally adore, as the game forces me to confront the state of Danganronpa and what it's become. But I wish I could love it.
The problem with V3's twist is how much it wants to convince you about how it recognizes the faults of Danganronpa when it just doesn't. The impact of this twist nullifies when you consider that this game is written no different from any other Danganronpa game for the first 5 cases. Why do I have to give it praise for a message that I'm fond of and agree with when I know for a fact that it's handled so poorly that you're left with a sour taste in your mouth as you play through the final case? What am I praising? The existence of the message? I like the message but if it's not executed well I can't help but feel as though this game has huge missed potential.
Maybe I'm being hypocritical, maybe I'm being too harsh, but I can't agree with the lens that this game is supposed to be a parody of Danganronpa when it reuses the same tropes and plot points from the first two games but without the satirization. A parody that doesn't parody isn't a parody. It's a copy. Thing is, I'd probably forgive this game for playing into the Danganronpa formula if Danganronpa 2 didn't exist, but when that game already copied a lot of plot threads from the first game, I have to ask. Is this a parody, or is this just how the game was genuinely written? I think the direction of what the message of this game actually is was decided quite late into development, which is why it doesn't quite stick the landing. What really creates a huge dent in the twist is the fact that the game is written like a normal Danganronpa game for 90% of its playtime, which really doesn't mesh well with the message. It's hard for me at certain points to even say that if it was on purpose or a product of poor writing.
There's an emptiness that was felt in my heart when a major scene happened in Case 6. This isn't a game about Hope vs Despair. I thought it was about truth at first, but no. It's about Faith. V3 is a rejection of Danganronpa, and I absolutely love that concept; I just don't love V3. But I don't hate it either, there's a genuine heartfelt message that was put into this game and it's wrong for me to deny that, it's wrong for you to deny that.
The "fuck you" at the beginning of this review wasn't towards the game itself but to V3's loudest critics. I've seen many people call V3 an unsalvagable dumpster fire and rank it as one of their least favorite pieces of fiction. It leaves me utterly confused because 9 times out of 10, these people never even enjoyed the first 2 games to begin with. So what the fuck are you getting mad at? That the game series you've always hated has another bad entry? That your suspicions were confirmed? Danganronpa bad, LOL? The V3 hate doesn't bother me when it's by someone who enjoyed the first two games, or by someone who critiques V3 on its own merits. It's really the people who've never enjoyed Danganronpa in the first place calling this an "embarrassment" that confuses me because this game LITERALLY admits to Danganronpa being bad, but somehow that's not enough. Where does this sheer hatred even come from if you're not a fan of the first two entries? Most of these people deny the message's existence in the first place, which I'll never agree with. I may not like Kodaka's writing all that much, but he agrees with you, and that's still not enough for you, so what else do you want? If somehow a Danganronpa game is utterly loathed by you, then I'm genuinely baffled because at worst these games are nothing worse than a schlocky murder mystery with corny themes.
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony aims high, and I'm sorry to say it kinda misses the mark, but I'll never deny the message Kodaka was trying to say. I apologize to my friend who wanted me to replay V3 to like it as much as him, while I can't say this is a 10/10, I do completely see why you like this game so much. I was reminded a lot of my memories of playing Danganronpa three years ago. Starting Trigger Happy Havoc at 5 am, not knowing what it is, spending 14 hours on Goodbye Despair at one play session, and being left confused at the end of Killing Harmony. I love this series, it's bad, but I had so much fun. So I don't care. I'm glad Kodaka was able to end it on his own terms, and I really hope Rain Code can knock it out of the park.
Concerning the ending, yeah, this "fiction" did touch me. I'll miss it, and I wanna go back to the time when I was able to turn my brain off and have fun with these games. But, in classic series fashion, I'm told to move on, so I will. But alas, I will miss you.
Goodbye, Danganronpa.
Around three years ago, I played Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc for the first time. I really enjoyed it for what it is, it's not good, don't get me wrong, but it's a damn fun game if you're able to turn your mind off. The same holds true for Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair, which I played around the same timeframe as well. I loved it, the writing isn't really good, but it was fun to play that game despite its flaws. Then, of course, I got to Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony. A game I've been utterly confused by for so long now. Then around 2 years later, I met someone so insistent on Danganronpa V3 being some high kino, and I thought maybe I let it fly over my head, so I decided on a replay some time in the future.
Danganronpa V3 is admittedly a step up in every department from the first two games. The UI is much better, the music is genuinely amazing, I enjoyed the cast, and the writing of some of the later cases are genuinely good. Then there's Case 6. I keep running through it in my head as it moves about in there back and forth. The twist is genuinely something I'd normally adore, as the game forces me to confront the state of Danganronpa and what it's become. But I wish I could love it.
The problem with V3's twist is how much it wants to convince you about how it recognizes the faults of Danganronpa when it just doesn't. The impact of this twist nullifies when you consider that this game is written no different from any other Danganronpa game for the first 5 cases. Why do I have to give it praise for a message that I'm fond of and agree with when I know for a fact that it's handled so poorly that you're left with a sour taste in your mouth as you play through the final case? What am I praising? The existence of the message? I like the message but if it's not executed well I can't help but feel as though this game has huge missed potential.
Maybe I'm being hypocritical, maybe I'm being too harsh, but I can't agree with the lens that this game is supposed to be a parody of Danganronpa when it reuses the same tropes and plot points from the first two games but without the satirization. A parody that doesn't parody isn't a parody. It's a copy. Thing is, I'd probably forgive this game for playing into the Danganronpa formula if Danganronpa 2 didn't exist, but when that game already copied a lot of plot threads from the first game, I have to ask. Is this a parody, or is this just how the game was genuinely written? I think the direction of what the message of this game actually is was decided quite late into development, which is why it doesn't quite stick the landing. What really creates a huge dent in the twist is the fact that the game is written like a normal Danganronpa game for 90% of its playtime, which really doesn't mesh well with the message. It's hard for me at certain points to even say that if it was on purpose or a product of poor writing.
There's an emptiness that was felt in my heart when a major scene happened in Case 6. This isn't a game about Hope vs Despair. I thought it was about truth at first, but no. It's about Faith. V3 is a rejection of Danganronpa, and I absolutely love that concept; I just don't love V3. But I don't hate it either, there's a genuine heartfelt message that was put into this game and it's wrong for me to deny that, it's wrong for you to deny that.
The "fuck you" at the beginning of this review wasn't towards the game itself but to V3's loudest critics. I've seen many people call V3 an unsalvagable dumpster fire and rank it as one of their least favorite pieces of fiction. It leaves me utterly confused because 9 times out of 10, these people never even enjoyed the first 2 games to begin with. So what the fuck are you getting mad at? That the game series you've always hated has another bad entry? That your suspicions were confirmed? Danganronpa bad, LOL? The V3 hate doesn't bother me when it's by someone who enjoyed the first two games, or by someone who critiques V3 on its own merits. It's really the people who've never enjoyed Danganronpa in the first place calling this an "embarrassment" that confuses me because this game LITERALLY admits to Danganronpa being bad, but somehow that's not enough. Where does this sheer hatred even come from if you're not a fan of the first two entries? Most of these people deny the message's existence in the first place, which I'll never agree with. I may not like Kodaka's writing all that much, but he agrees with you, and that's still not enough for you, so what else do you want? If somehow a Danganronpa game is utterly loathed by you, then I'm genuinely baffled because at worst these games are nothing worse than a schlocky murder mystery with corny themes.
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony aims high, and I'm sorry to say it kinda misses the mark, but I'll never deny the message Kodaka was trying to say. I apologize to my friend who wanted me to replay V3 to like it as much as him, while I can't say this is a 10/10, I do completely see why you like this game so much. I was reminded a lot of my memories of playing Danganronpa three years ago. Starting Trigger Happy Havoc at 5 am, not knowing what it is, spending 14 hours on Goodbye Despair at one play session, and being left confused at the end of Killing Harmony. I love this series, it's bad, but I had so much fun. So I don't care. I'm glad Kodaka was able to end it on his own terms, and I really hope Rain Code can knock it out of the park.
Concerning the ending, yeah, this "fiction" did touch me. I'll miss it, and I wanna go back to the time when I was able to turn my brain off and have fun with these games. But, in classic series fashion, I'm told to move on, so I will. But alas, I will miss you.
Goodbye, Danganronpa.
You know what, I'm actually going to praise Danganronpa very highly for the first time.
The first game was flawed. In fact a big mess if you look back after playing the triology. The 2nd game improved quite significantly although I would argue that the story and game started to fall off at the end (and I hate everyone praising Nagito, no, he's annoying). Ultra Danganronpa Girls has a minigame in which I will not describe but it sums up the game pretty well. Many anime adaptations and series', manga and other spinoff later, what do you get?
Media coverage. Merchandise and one of the biggest anime game followings. Danganronpa fans are known to be a bit on the crazy side and over the years forms this toxic and weird reputation in the online media. And so when the third game was announced the fans went wild. Another killing game?? Whats gonna happen?? Will the Hopes Peak storyline continue?? And what did the developers do?
They release another Danganronpa. However this time the trials have improved significantly in my opinion, the cast is fun, and overall the game leans on the more crazy side which I root for. What polished fun! Great for the Danganronopa fans?
Then the developers said, "Fuck you." I will not go into the ending much because spoilers but the reason why this game is ranked so highly is because of the way that Kodaka and his team sent off his series with a massive "I genuinely hate what my game and fans have become." And it is so amusing seeing all these people talk about how this game was "Ooh controversial, 2 was better, the ending ruined it for me.." No. Chances are you are the fans that the team has been making fun of all along.
Chunsoft, You have surprised me. You went off extremely slow and decided to finish with the biggest bang I have seen in a franchise so far. Its time to let the behemoth that this series is to rest.
The first game was flawed. In fact a big mess if you look back after playing the triology. The 2nd game improved quite significantly although I would argue that the story and game started to fall off at the end (and I hate everyone praising Nagito, no, he's annoying). Ultra Danganronpa Girls has a minigame in which I will not describe but it sums up the game pretty well. Many anime adaptations and series', manga and other spinoff later, what do you get?
Media coverage. Merchandise and one of the biggest anime game followings. Danganronpa fans are known to be a bit on the crazy side and over the years forms this toxic and weird reputation in the online media. And so when the third game was announced the fans went wild. Another killing game?? Whats gonna happen?? Will the Hopes Peak storyline continue?? And what did the developers do?
They release another Danganronpa. However this time the trials have improved significantly in my opinion, the cast is fun, and overall the game leans on the more crazy side which I root for. What polished fun! Great for the Danganronopa fans?
Then the developers said, "Fuck you." I will not go into the ending much because spoilers but the reason why this game is ranked so highly is because of the way that Kodaka and his team sent off his series with a massive "I genuinely hate what my game and fans have become." And it is so amusing seeing all these people talk about how this game was "Ooh controversial, 2 was better, the ending ruined it for me.." No. Chances are you are the fans that the team has been making fun of all along.
Chunsoft, You have surprised me. You went off extremely slow and decided to finish with the biggest bang I have seen in a franchise so far. Its time to let the behemoth that this series is to rest.
This review contains spoilers
I don't like to make spoiler reviews often because at that point I sort of think people are reading it mostly to see how someone else's opinion lines up with theirs. But this is such a hard game to talk about without The Ending in mind.
I fucking loved this game. The characters are just so charming, the mysteries exciting and fun to solve, and they... mostly tone down the worst parts of the franchise (the weird horny teens, with the caveat that Miu does exist). The new perjury system in trials is such a fun little way to reward players who want to find different paths of persuading people in the trials. I like Psyche Taxi a lot but other minigames don't pull me in much.
I understand why a lot of people don't like the ending, feeling like it devalues the fans or makes the series feel "pointless." But like... the series was never real. That's the point. The game never argues that the series doesn't matter. In fact, much of the climax revolves around grappling with the idea that these characters can matter even if they're fictional. But its also arguing that hey, fandom can get a little out of hand and sometimes stories need to end. And that's okay! I don't think its trying to be cruel about it. Its a genuine effort to give players the ability to end Danganronpa with their own hands and... I think that's a kind of offer a lot of franchises don't often give its audience.
That said, Kaede shoulda been the protagonist and putting that want in the mouth of the final boss does feel weird.
I fucking loved this game. The characters are just so charming, the mysteries exciting and fun to solve, and they... mostly tone down the worst parts of the franchise (the weird horny teens, with the caveat that Miu does exist). The new perjury system in trials is such a fun little way to reward players who want to find different paths of persuading people in the trials. I like Psyche Taxi a lot but other minigames don't pull me in much.
I understand why a lot of people don't like the ending, feeling like it devalues the fans or makes the series feel "pointless." But like... the series was never real. That's the point. The game never argues that the series doesn't matter. In fact, much of the climax revolves around grappling with the idea that these characters can matter even if they're fictional. But its also arguing that hey, fandom can get a little out of hand and sometimes stories need to end. And that's okay! I don't think its trying to be cruel about it. Its a genuine effort to give players the ability to end Danganronpa with their own hands and... I think that's a kind of offer a lot of franchises don't often give its audience.
That said, Kaede shoulda been the protagonist and putting that want in the mouth of the final boss does feel weird.
