*stares at spoilerish avatar image*

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*Looks away whistling innocently*

*stares at spoilerish signature image*

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*scuttles away like zoidburg*

Nice to know I wasn't the only person disappointed by DR's ending.

C-A

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Hey, I've mentioned a couple times that the first game's ending was crap, for pretty much the same reasons in that post.

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True. Then it's nice to know that there are even more people who do not like the way DR ended. And I pretty much agree with this guy, if they had kept themselves to Battle-Royale, it would have been fine. Not every story somehow need to involve the entire world.
Especially if they don't properly explain it.

C-A

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999's ending made a shipload more sense than DR's ending. Everything else he said was accurate.

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Can't say anything about that since I haven't played that game or the rest of its series.

C-A

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Well DR ending made sense if you think of it as a series and not a single game with no sequels so i will never understand why all of you talk trash about the ending when its supposed to be a damn cliff hanger sheez

Because even the sequels, prequel-novels or spin-offs don't give an adequate answer what Mankind's Worst Despairing Despair With Ketchup On Top Event was. At least, to me. They don't give me an answer that not only says "This was what caused the event" but also one that explains "And this is why it affected the entire world".



Also, you cannot leave out important plot details "just" because something is meant as a series. From what I recall, DR was never even thought of to be a series from the get-go, so less reason to not reveal the plot details. It's like putting important plot explanations into a light novel that is not sold with the game and, in the Japanese case, never gets an official translation or release in the western market. You goddamn well don't do that. It doesn't make the developers look smart or good, just makes them look either stupid in that they think they are incapable of properly explaining things (especially in DR since that is Visual Novel - you know, a genre that is BUILT around explanation through lots of text) in the game or makes them look greedy as fucking anything because "Eh, they're all idiots. They'll buy it."



C-A

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You aren't nearly the only one.

Of course, there was tons of stuff I didn't like way before the ending~

No idea why that guy hated 999's ending, though.

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Which was ultimately the main goal of DR: make money. If it was to make a decent game, we wouldn't have characters covered in pepto-bismol instead of ketchup.
This is my take on what the developers were thinking:

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Well, apparently the blood was pink to prevent the rating from going even higher.

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Still looks ridiculous. And that only applies in Japan. A scene from another game on the PSP, Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, was censored in Japan to lower the rating, so when it came overseas, the scene was reverted to the original intent. DR was rated M when it came to America, so there was no reason not to change it, unless the developers feared that the fandom would go berserk at the sight of real blood in DR.

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Same can be said about any game series that shells out games for profit like for example Final Fantasy:SHSL Ultimate money hungry series. Honestly I saw nothing wrong with the ending of DR except for the few plot holes like the state of the world outside but then again it mostly likely because they tried to do like Schrödinger's cat theory.

Basically, they looked at Battle Royale and decided: "Let's rip this off... but make it funny!" (cause you know, Battle Royale had absolutely zero comedic instances in it) At least I think that was their plan... I'm still not sure if I was supposed to take DR seriously or see it as a total parody of itself.



The game was already labeled as 17+ in Japan, correct? Isn't that the highest setting already? What are gonna upgrade it to: Ultra Mega Violence? And if they really wanted to keep the rating decent but without somehow making the deaths look stupid, why not do it like Onee-chanbara Zombie Slayer? An option in the menues, where the blood could either remain red or be displayed as purple grape juice.



Hey now, if you really wanna call something a cash cow franchise, at least use Shin Megami Tensei, Persona or even Mario - actually, out of the four mentioned, I think Mario would be the best. We have Mario platformers, puzzles, an RPG, the Kart series, those terrible, terrible learning-with-Mario games, and even Smash Bros.



That's another problem with the revelations... what was the point of putting Monokuma onto the famous monuments? Again, am I supposed to laugh or be horrified? If the latter, why? It's just... your mascot upon which you seem to have built your entire Despair crew is a... it's a goddamn teddy bear voiced by Doraemon! It's like they are asking to not be taken seriously...

C-A

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Well DR has always made fun of themselves in each game so far so maybe It can be a parody of itself




I don't think SMT and Persona made more games than Final Fantasy combined. Well Mario is the supreme rule of all the cash cow franchise so no argument there.



It was pretty much to show that the world as everyone knew it is gone and that now the Ultimate Despairs are the rulers? Well wouldn't you be afraid of Monokuma if you were witnessing robotic versions of himself murdering your love ones and family

They could've done that much easier (and more seriously) by showing said monuments destroyed or crumbling.



...I'd wonder if I can get my hands (or they their hands) on a stun gun and short-circuit the shit out of them. Or grab an axe and go The Wizard's Apprentice on it. And that wasn't shown in the scenes we got from the outside world in DR, anyway. We saw humans... wearing... monokuma masks... IT'S TOO GOOFY! I CAN'T TAKE THIS SERIOUSLY AS A THREAT!

C-A

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It was just their way of adding insult to injury when it came to making Monuments of Monokuma.

Well you gotta remember yes they were wearing Monokuma masks but it doesn't make them any less scary especially when they carry extremely dangerous weapons and mass murder people by the thousands, Also don't forget the fact that almost all of the world was doing this. You gotta think Logically about it sheez

(the point being that while it would be cliché, it would still make more sense)

The problem here boils down to how it was executed. A post-apocalyptic world with terrorist groups wearing Monokuma masks? Odd, but can be scary if done right. A post-apocalyptic world with terrorist groups wearing Monokuma masks in the last thirty minutes of a murder-mystery visual novel? Why? What's the point? It just doesn't have any form of narrative consistency.

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...So I realized months after the fact that I never posted my thoughts on AE here. Braindump time!

The one-sentence: it's not the world's strongest game, but it's helped a lot by its heritage (even if that's what's holding it back sometimes).

For slightly more detail: it's absolutely a Dangan Ronpa game, and that works both for and against it. On the 'for' side, it means the game is absolutely dripping style; almost everything about the visual presentation is eye-popping, the music is appropriately bonkers, the story is absurd.

On the 'against' side, it turns out there's only so much you can do to adapt a Dangan Ronpa game to TPS. While I liked AE's plot, the game absolutely suffers from pacing issues as a result. In both the other DR games, there was the overarching major plot, which wouldn't really start to show its hand until chapter 4 or so, and then the per-case plots. All AE has is the overarching plot, and for the first three chapters or so you feel like you're making very little progress in it.

The game also relies on the DR tradition of loud and crazy casts - and like the story, it doesn't quite work as well in TPS as in a VN. AE has no issue throwing a litany of colorful characters at you (and sometimes killing them off immediately after), but the TPS gameplay requires Komaru and Fukawa to keep moving, generally on their own. The end result is that while Komaru and Fukawa get plenty of room to develop, much of the side cast feels a little thin. This was an issue in the original DR games, but they were able to help alleviate that via Free Time. The closest to that AE has is documents left by characters, and while that helps, there's only so much you can do to give depth to people you hardly see.

All that aside, the plot itself is pretty good, and the characters the game does take the time to focus on mostly work well. I'll go into more detail in the spoiler section below, but suffice to say the team still has a knack for writing legitimately disturbing villains when they need to. The overall plot, while slightly predictable (though maybe that's just the crazy of DR1 and DR2 catching up), is pretty interesting and engaging, with a climax that is appropriately bizarre and satisfying. The game also has some legitimately unsettling scenes - I can see why it was rated D.

Since it doesn't fit anywhere else: yes, there's still gratuitous fanservice stuff this time. The game makes some effort at deconstructing and parodying it at times (one character's last-second "I'm actually 18!!!!!" did get a bit of a chuckle) but that doesn't change the actual fanservice. (Just once, I'd like a Japanese Vita game that avoids some form of the "touch girl with panel" minigame.)

But beyond all the plot, what about the game? Well... it's not bad. In fact, it's a perfectly serviceable third-person shooter, with some nice elements (puzzle-solving, etc.) thrown in. (I could have gone for just a little more variety in level design - while the environments change, what you're doing in each area rarely feels super unique.)

The trouble is the game's plot and dialogue tend to undercut the parts you actually play. Cutscenes are fairly frequent, and if you take the time to search out hidden items, you'll probably be getting stopped to listen to Komaru and Fukawa discuss a random book they found every couple of minutes. There are also occasionally just really long cutscenes - near the end of the game, you're given a save point after a boss and then treated to a solid hour of dialogue/cutscenes before play picks up again.

That's not the worst thing ever! DR is a story-based franchise with its roots in VN gameplay, so I know a lot of people won't really mind. But as it stands the balance makes for a weird half-VN half-TPS experience at times that doesn't always flow well.

Overall, if you're a DR fan, absolutely play this game. It fills out the world and its backstory, and it applies the series' signature style to create a very vivid setting and atmosphere. You're also the most likely not to mind the large chunks of dialogue (and to be honest, I probably would've been a little more favorable to them if Japanese was my native language). If you've never played DR... well, first of all, pretty much every main plot point for DR1 and quite a few for DR2 are spoiled in this game, so you'd probably want to play those first anyway, but in any event it's harder to recommend then. (Not mentioned above - the game leans on its connections to the rest of the series pretty heavily at times; a lot of references/jokes only work knowing what's come before.) The core gameplay isn't bad, but it's not inherently strong enough to outshine the flaws imposed on it by the story.

Spoiler thoughts under the tag!

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I don't notice the weapons because I'm too concerned to look at what basically amounts to a Monokuma mask sticker on top of an image. It really looks like that - I guess it kind of makes sense, make yourself look as dumb as possible, so nobody will take you seriously, giving you a surprise element when you attack them.

As for what sumguy said, it being revealed only in the last 30 minutes of the game (I'd more say last hour because they fucking talked too much about Hope and Despair in the end), wasn't really what bothered me. It's the execution.

If you want me to take you seriously, you gotta look serious. Or, if you want to look goofy, at least be entertaining. Which, on a technical level, Monokuma himself is with his jerk attitude at times, but that isn't enough to make me look past the fact that he's a damn mechanical puppet moved by...



I know I bring him up a lot, but Ghirahim is just such a good example of a villain for me who looks kinda weird, acts goofy at times, but still overall intimidates me because HE changes from polite to bloodthirsty within seconds. The mastermind... switches personalities from robotic-nothing-matters-voice to hyper-bubbly-Maya to suck-my-presidential-cock-bitch confident to am-so-emo-it-makes-mushrooms-grow-on-me. That... that's not frightening. That's just... goofy.



I can tell everything about the game would grind my nerves... I recall beginning to hate DR's music as I went along in the LP, none of the style looked that good to my eyes and the story... well, you already called it absurd. As for loud and crazy cast, I GUESS you can have them in a shooting game... I think there's that shoot me in the face guy from, what was it, Borderlands? He's crazy enough and Tiny Tina is neat, so... you can have them.

D? ...D for Dick?

Eh. Shoko from Futari H! was funnier cause she's a loli and when there was a sex scene with her, it repeatedly reminded us that she's actually 24.

Dear god, that sounds like the last trial in DR...



Ah, so it goes the Final Fantasy II route in that.

As for the spoiler section, no idea who these characters are, though two names seem to scream "We have a reveal behind us" which you seem to indicate there is. As for saying that the villain is actually terrifying, that actually does sound wonderful.

C-A

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CERO (Japan's rating system) has the following ratings:

A: All ages
B: 12+
C: 15+
D: 17+
Z: 18+ only

As far as I'm aware, all DR games are rated D. I suppose there was a chance of it being rated Z if the blood was red.

Note that Z isn't necessarily the equivalent of AO from ESRB; Killer is Dead was rated Z in Japan and M in the US. Different sensitivities between countries and all that.

Just noticed in DR2 there is a lot of foreshadowing haha.

I literally laughed for like five minutes when I saw this. Like, did you mean to make a boat reference?

Anyway, Dangan Ronpa! I've watched the anime, played the first game, and I'm working on the second game now. I will agree with some earlier posts - yes, SDR 2 is miles better than DR1, so far at least. But I have a question...

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Because they cut out plenty in every murder--even the first one--to keep each trial half an hour.

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To be more precise: budget only allowed for 12 episodes and they failed to find a good way to compress the plot while keeping the trials mostly intact, whether it was due to tight production schedule or just bad writers.

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It was not self-defense!

Also, another reason might be because they created the DR anime for people who had already played the game, so they knew these details, and wouldn't be too bothered that they got skipped. (It's like the Persona 4 anime, they do not bother to actually hide anything that was remotely considered a plot twist in the game, because the anime was made for people who had already played the game, including the True Ending)

C-A

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Maybe the anime decided to go after Danganronpa IF, where it IS presented as self-defense, wanting to calm the victim down from a freak out, hence the banging on the bathroom door... though exactly HOW you end up stabbing someone in the stomach when you try to calm them down when they are weaponless I do not know...

C-A

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And Another Episode has been confirmed for an English release this fall!

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Bolt I could kiss you right now for this news!!!

More news on it

Awesome! Another game for the Vita I may end up getting. I'll have to watch a demo or something first though.

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There fixed it for you

Different gameplay style than DR1 and DR2. I'm not so in love with the DR universe that I'll buy any game with the DR name. Like I said, I'll have to see if the gameplay style appeals to me.

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I posted the trailer on the random chat thread so you can check out the gameplay style from there.

Never trust a trailer.

C-A

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There you go Cat

Here is the trailer