Let’s talk about this fun little series! With two mainline visual novels, a currently airing anime to tie up all the loose ends, a spin-off (but still important) third person shooter game, numerous side stories and a planned soft-reboot with Danganronpa V3 later this year, there’s a lot to talk about.
Feel free to discuss the entire franchise without spoiler tags, but please tag spoilers for other works with [spoiler] tags, providing adequate context in parenthesis.
Oooooh, where do I begin? I fell in love with the series (and remember the horror and garbage that was 2013 DR fandom) around 2013. Going into it from Umineko is actually ill-preparing yourself, since Chunsoft really loves to spit in the face of Knox and Van Dine (especially considering how some trials aren’t solvable with the clues presented, and most of the twists, while some are hinted at if you look carefully, usually have little hinted at in the game).
One thing I love about the fandom is how brilliantly it weaves the pop culture references into itself without it being obnoxious. Leon in the first game is a full reference to Sid Savage of the Sex Pistols down to murdering Maizono in the shower, Ibuki in the second game is a walking K-On reference, and Sonia in the second game is a Nirvana reference from the emblem on her uniform to her last name to the name of her country. There are also many numerous JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure references weaved in that a friend of mine who loves JoJo missed them the first time (Mondo Oowada and his brother are a reference to the protagonist of Part 4 down to the hair, CRAZY DIAMONDS, and their names making up Diamond, the pose Junko uses with her hand over her face is a reference to the one and only Dio Brando and she uses his catchphrase “MUDA MUDA MUDA” during the Machine Battle Talk, Nagi’s first scene has him saying “I’m not a Stand user”, and there’s one JoJo reference in the second game). There’s the infamous Titty Typhoon skyline which I’ve heard is a reference to the movie From Dusk til Dawn. There are so many references worked in, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
The characters really shine, and for most of them, the characterization comes in the Free Time Events. It works well for a story that focuses more on the story, and you have the chance to replay chapters to focus on the FTEs. The characters are memorable to the point people forget the story.
My favorites of the series are SDR2, Another Episode, and Zero (plus the IF game). SDR2 to me has the most likable characters (and Hinata is a truly relatable protagonist with being the talentless snarky but caring guy he is). Another Episode introduced the first playable female characters and to me, was the first game to not sugar coat the awful things that happened to the characters, especially with the back stories of the Warriors of Hope. Zero is an absolutely required novel set that sets up a lot of things for SDR2 that may have come out of nowhere like the Reserve Course and Izuru Kamukura (and it introduces the really under appreciated Matsuda, Ryouko, and Gives some love for Mukuro). If was a story put in with SDR2 that the player could get after beating the main game, and it is an alternate idea where Naegi regains his memories in DR1 during chapter 1 and prevents Mukuro Ikusaba’s death, leading to a divide between the Despair sisters (and it’s where Ikusaba’s crush on Naegi is confirmed). I’m somewhat watching the DR3 anime and to be honest, I thought I’d hate Future Arc, but they’re going in a wiser direction than Despair Arc. (Seriously, poor Hinata got all his screen time stolen and Nanami is only vaguely like her game self, what about the other kids, Kodaka?! At least Future Arc is gonna borrow hard from AE and Hagakure is most likely gonna live, please let the family people reunite!)
Perhaps the thing I don’t like about it is that a lot of the fanservice, particularly with Tsumiki and Kotoko, is extremely misguided (especially since with Kotoko, getting stripped down is cringe-worthy with her being a kid who was also molested by adults). And I really don’t care for the Fujoshi of the fandom who reduce characters to an OOC version of themselves for gay porn and hate on female characters like Tsumiki who have more likely chances of ending up with the male characters due to better chemistry. Then again, the DR fandom is notorious for viewing a Japanese series in a solely Western lens (ala Chihiro gender arguments), so there are idiots out there who ignore anything canon and insist their interpretation is right. But once you avoid those people, you can enjoy the series.
I think I got into Danganronpa sometime in 2014. I knew it was a game, but I did not have a Vita then- so what I did instead was to watch the anime (kept hearing emulating the PSP version caused glitches and whatnot). The anime was shit, but I was hooked anyway- more thanks to the characters, gameplay (from FTEs to the investigations to the trials) and style than the plot, which is usually what I look for in a VN. The class trial and battle royale plot devices are amazing, though I believe they are underutilized in both games since I think we could really use a grim Danganronpa game (but I know I am pretty much alone in that, heh). And no, DR3 mirai-hen doesn’t satisfy that need due to being an anime and lacking class trials 
.
DR2 is my favorite in the series (particularly Case 5 is a masterpiece). I hate Another Episode -was just a huge disappointment all around save for the “being fucked up” part. As for DR3, I preferred the premise of mirai-hen but I prefer the way Zetsubou-hen is progressing.
Favorite characters:
-Mikan
-Komaeda
-Monokuma
-Leon
-Togami (DR1)
Aww. I actually really enjoyed it, mainly due to Komaru and Co. I liked her character and development a lot. The atmosphere was great, too; it really brought back a lot of the good stuff from DR1 that wasn’t as particularly powerful (in the beginning) of DR2.
Really, I like all DR stuff so far, except some of the light novels, which I heard were bad. DR0 was great, though. I do wish, in some deep part of my soul, that they’d go in deeper on the underlying themes/philosophical questions, but I have a feeling that’s what DR3 is leading up to as “the conclusion” of the Hope v Despair saga. Let’s hope for some delicious, very satisfying twists, reveals, and conclusions…
Also, @Funyarinpa, are you going to play DR1 on Steam, now that it’s out? Maybe too late, since you’ve been spoiled of the good stuff, haha.
So my best character cosplay arrived today.
I quite enjoyed both DR games, albeit more as pure entertainment than anything else. And man they’re so much fun. The more I think about them though the more I appreciate them. Helps that DR3 is my current AOTS with every new episode being wonderful.
Did I forget to mention that I bought all three games later last year? Haha!
I’ve only seen the first anime, but I do plan on reading the VNs someday. Just need to find the time as well as buying them all~ xD
So I finally caught up with all the Danganronpa anime!
That latest episode… Holy shit
It’s probably bad, but that latest episode of Despair Arc had me laughing hysterically during the scene where anybody who’s seen it knows that it’d be messed up to laugh during it. But honestly, that part was so true to DR and the singing of an Evangelion song over it and pink fountains (which reminded me of that one ending in School Days) all combined were ridiculous. But still so very true to DR.
I started playing this but stopped (to participate in the first Higurashi tea party actually) I had just finished the first murder mystery and was early in investigating the 2nd. I should go pick it back up, I wonder if I should do the 2nd chapter over again…
I had tried to watch the first anime, but I hated it by the time I finished episode 1. I could tell though that most of the things I disliked would work in a game setting. It sounds though like after you play the games you should watch the anime?
You can skip the anime for Danganronpa 1 as long as you finish the first game; the game covers all that and much, much more. The anime itself adds nothing.
The anime you need to see is Danganronpa 3: Future and Despair sides. They occur after Super Danganronpa 2 and Danganronpa: Ultra Despair Girls (the sequel and the PS Vita “action spin-off” respectively), so play those two first (after the first game, naturally), and then watch DR3. It’s the conclusion to everything, so it naturally spoils everything before it. Definitely stick to the playing order for this one: DR --> SDR2 --> DR: UDG (DR3 does spoil this, and it’s a good experience regardless) --> DR3
Also, if you can, find a translation of Dangan Ronpa Zero and try to at least get a summary of it so you are prepared for SDR2, and some things in DR3. A couple of the plot points people thought came out of nowhere (the reserve course, the talent research peoject, the student council) are all introduced in Dangan Ronpa Zero. It starts off slow but gets to be really good with the characters being the main pull (and the fact a character states that they’re a fan of Home Alone is really hilarious). So, DR1, DR Zero, SDR2, AE/UDG, and then DR3. (Though in all fairness, they seem to be Retconning the hell out of both Zero and SDR2 in DR3.)
“Retcon” is a strong word. There were things in DR2 (haven’t read DR0) that were vague enough to leave open multiple interpretations but if you looked at them in isolation, that is pretending DR3 didn’t exist, their solution was rather obvious and intuitive (like Mikan’s beloved or Chiaki being only an AI) or not that important (like Nagito not knowing who Izuru is). And now they’re picking those up and adding different details and truths that tie them together.
Either way the anime is wonderful so far.
Oh, I really like things that have stories in different mediums, so knowing there is a LN that is decidedly canon is interesting indeed.
I would call some of the things, especially pertaining to DR Zero, a huge Retcon. Like the fact that in SDR2, MonoKuma falsified a file so Nagito wouldn’t know who the “traitor” is among the students and had to rely on his luck to ensure that the “traitor” was the one who killed him and Chihiro being connected to them via birth date and name. And Hinata hating Hope’s Peak and choosing to go through the Kamukura Project with the intention of impressing Nanami is a giant disservice to the fact that Hinata is extremely self-conscious about the lack of talent that Komaeda goading him about in in SDR2 gets to him worse than anything else Komaeda has said. Not to mention that for the Twilight Syndrome case, it feels far too extreme for Satou to have jumped straight to murdering Natsumi, since all we were shown was Natsumi talking bad about Koizumi once instead of the constant bullying implied in SDR2. MonoKuma has lied before, but going about it the way the anime has in regards to those particular plot points is essentially saying “You know that stuff we established? Disregard it.”
As for the DR Zero stuff, the kanji used in the survivor (if we can even call that guy that) is completely different than what was used in the novel, and the fact his fate feels so uncertain is contradictory to the novel because that student was the only survivor and Matsuda has to extract information from him. In addition to that, one of the characters, Isshiki Madarai, or one of the many of him, was one of the victims in the student council killing.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the anime (Yukizome is an absolute treasure and the anime wouldn’t be the same without her), especially Future Arc where everything is surprising. But as much as I love seeing the kids from SDR2, these obvious continuity errors and the focus not being on Hinata or the other SDR2 kids is really cutting into my enjoyment of the Despair side. And it’s not like Zero isn’t a what if novel like IF was, it’s basically required material for DR3 at this point.
But yes, DR Zero is a really good set of novels. I hope they license the novels soon! Here’s a Zero translation (it’s a lot better than the one from the SA forums.) http://steampunktietime.tumblr.com/post/106314958860/dangan-ronpa-zero-translation-masterlist
To anybody still watching DR3, was anybody else kinda disappointed by the ending? I mean, I don’t like killing characters needlessly, and the series definitely shouldn’t have ended in a miserable way where nobody is happy, but most of the comatose characters walking around with no issues whatsoever and looking like their pre-Hope’s Peak selves in spite of the DR1 characters aging, the whole needless torture porn that was Nanami’s death, literally everybody but the dead Future Foundation Characters and dead DR1 and AE characters getting to live and be happy, REINSTATING HOPE’S PEAK AGAIN, even more retcons and basically screwing over SDR2 so it pretty much never happened and Zero getting nothing more than cameos, I feel like this was a bunch of rushed stuff that doesn’t mesh well. I really am the most upset about the SDR2 characters, though. They are WAR CRIMINALS brainwashed with a dumb method that felt cheap and easy to break out of for what we were told, and until Despair Arc came along, Future Foundation had every right to want them dead. But nooo they were brainwashed and thus it isn’t their fault that they destroyed the world, everybody in FF is a meanie. I for one just wish they had done Future Arc and made Despair Arc about the FF members, since so many were gone before we even got to know them well like the DR1 characters.
[Negativity incoming]
I played Danganronpa last year, coming from Ace Attorney and 999, and it was pretty disappointing. The story felt disjointed and the mysteries were either laughably predictable and solvable from the get go, with the character taking ages to come to the same conclusions most people would have arrived at hours ago - (some level of incompetence is okay, but here it was absolutely infuriating. Might have been more interesting if for example amnesiac Kirigiri had been the mc instead of mr. average, but no, they just had to make the most uninteresting character in the entire cast the lead.) or the information that you needed to make progress just wasn’t presented. That’s not how you write mystery. And then there was the brilliant idea of ‘spicing up’ the discussion by including gameplay elements, which just felt horribly out of place and would have only served to distract from the puzzle solving if there had been anything like that.
The art style was nice though, and Monokuma was a fun antagonist.
I’m still slowly working through the first Danganronpa (all the VN-ness made me have to put it down for now) but I get what you mean to some degree. In a lot of ways Danganronpa feels more like a drama and the court sessions feel almost more like a test to make sure you were paying attention. I kind of felt that way about Ace Attorney though too - I find the two games to be very comparable.
The only classroom trial mechanic that really bothers me is the rhythm game section - mostly because I am terrible at rhythm games so I can leave that section feeling somewhat cheated.
I really like Danganronpa so far though. I’m on Chapter 5 right now, and the only painfully obvious mystery for me thus far was the one from chapter 3. With all the whispering on the topic I am really looking forward at this point to getting into the greater series plot though.
I do agree that the first DR is not nearly as interesting once you’ve done the later games or other games. A lot of it was built on being surprised by the premise itself with little focus on characterization outside of the story’s chapters (since the main reason to know characters is to get skills for gameplay with the conversation being a caveat. Heck, the whole School Mode thing didn’t even exist for the game until it was re-released with the second). And I think Naegi is meant to be bland so the player could easily just pretend it’s them in the game. The DR series really knows that it’s treading on Knox and throwing all care to the wind with it (since clearly, some cases aren’t solvable by what you’ve gained in the initial investigation, which is a huge no no for fair play whodunnit). The first game runs on the player being surprised by it.
The second game is better about characterization, and there’s a good reason for it that’s quite a spoiler for it. The protagonist in the second game definitely has a personality of his own, and it’s ultimately somewhat better at not giving the middle finger to Knox.
The middle game, Another Episode/Absolute Despair Girls, is a break in gameplay by making it a third person shooter, starring Naegi’s little sister (who is far more expressive than her brother) and Fukawa and her split personality as the playable characters. It’s set before the second game, but it’s wise to play DR2 before this, as this cleared up some hinted things.
And there is a novelization, Zero, that’s a prequel to the series (though the anime seems to treat it like it never existed) There are two novels in it, and there are translations as well as complete summaries. It stars Ryouko Otonashi but switches POVs quite a few times, and due to her obsession with her therapist as well as her amnesia, Ryouko is quite repetitive. It came out before DR2 and clarified not only important points in there, but also some things in the first game.
Lastly is the DR3 anime, which just ended on Thursday. Obviously, there’s a lot of operating on “you know these games so we won’t explain stuff” for the arc about the past, Despair Arc. Future Arc is the more original story with new characters, set after DR2. It wrapped up with an episode called Hope Arc. However, there’s a thing between the end and Hope Arc that is slated to come with the new DR3 game.
Lastly is the (HOPEFULLY) unconnected New DR V3, starring the first class trial girl protagonist. It’s set in a prison and seems to be about lies rather than truth, and comes out next year.
I’ve never been able to get into Dangan Ronpa. My old best friend used to be aaaabsolutely obsessed with it, or at least the anime. I tried to watch it, but I didn’t like it. ((My ex also is pretty obsessed with Tokyo Ghoul, which I can’t make myself like either.))