LogFAQs > #934567345

#39. Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair


Danganronpa is another series I need to get back into! I enjoyed the first two games, and then I tried to play Ultra Despair Girls, which isnt necessarily outright bad. Its just mind-numbingly boring, and I couldnt bring myself to finish it. As such, I still havent worked up the motivation to play V3, despite all the good things Ive heard about it. The moral of the story here is, Dont play bad games in series you care about, especially if they arent essential to the canon!

Anyway, I think I liked the first Danganronpa game more as a concept than as an actual game. Not to say it was bad (because it is enjoyable), but its rough around the edges and the cast is hit or miss. The idea of a group of promising young people being trapped inside a location with seemingly little hope of escape and being forced to find ways to survive is very compelling and reminded me a lot of Lord of the Flies, which was a cool book I read in high school. I think Danganronpa 2 took some of those rough edges and smoothed them out, resulting in a generally improved experience (except for Improved Hangmans Gambit, which is the biggest misnomer in the series!). That being said, I think this game is a bit sillier and doesnt take itself as seriously as the first game, which can be good and bad. The first game is set inside a school building, which is a pretty sterilized environment and adds to the tense atmosphere. The second game is set on a tropical island, which sometimes feels at odds with the atmosphere the game is trying to convey. The characters tend to be a little wackier than the cast from the first game, too.

But overall, Danganronpa 2 blows the first game out of the water. I do like the cast a lot better. It replaced a thoroughly uninteresting protagonist in Makoto with Hajime, whos a bit more cynical and sarcastic. You also had some really good supporting cast members, with Chiaki, Sonia, Gundham, and Fuyuhiko being my favorites. Even the characters who arent that great still serve their purpose well, such as Mikan and Nagito. Monokuma is still largely annoying, but at this point, Ive just learned to accept that he isnt going away! I think the cases are much better than the original, too, especially the last two. The ending of Case 5 was such a gut punch, and the presentation and the atmosphere combined to maximize the effect. I feel like opinions on the ending are pretty split, but I loved it. Then again, Im usually a big fan of over the top stuff like that, so it worked for me!

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