Board 8 > Zelda plays Danganronpa for the first time (spoilers)

(+) Yeah! (+)

ZeldaTPLink posted...

Those comic book presentations are the best part of this game. I hope the sequels have more of it.

For all the minigames Danganronpa as a series likes to fuck with and make worse, the comic books remain virtually untouched.
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MrSmartGuy posted...

ZeldaTPLink posted...

Those comic book presentations are the best part of this game. I hope the sequels have more of it.

For all the minigames Danganronpa as a series likes to fuck with and make worse, the comic books remain virtually untouched.

Yes!

MrSmartGuy posted...

And I'll just go ahead and ask if there's a reason to tell him that at this juncture.

First off, I actually remembered this from a previous topic:
ZeldaTPLink posted...

I read the ending of Dr. McNinja thinking it had 3 parts for some reason (I guess I just assumed it), and when it ended on Part 2 I was pretty annoyed.

Second, you guys are WAAAAAAAAAAAAAY too sensitive on 'spoilers'. Do you consider it a spoiler when you're reading a book and you see you're getting toward the end, or when it has a table of contents that lists how many chapters something is?
Or when you hit pause on a movie and it shows you the time left?

That's not a spoiler. It's a facet of the interface you're using to experience the story.

Sudden twin reveal! We can't have mystery game without one.

I like Junko already. She's completely nuts.

It makes sense, though. She played Monokuma for days. That was probably a prt of her personality showing.

Talking about motives reminded me of this phrase from TF2: As long as there are two people alive on Earth, someone will want someone dead.

HOLY SHIT. Genocide Jill knew everything from the start, and didn't bother to say it. Amazing.

So the start of the game was too years ago, and nobody noticed. Did they not notice their bodies growing and changing, either?

This is like that scene at the start of Avengers Endgame where they kill Thanos. After he wiped out half of the cast and destroyed the world. An empty victory.

I guess the game won't reveal what the Tragedy was, but I'm getting a parallel to the real world. In the game, it seems people progressively became more aggressive and hateful, and relationships became polarizing, until the civil unrest got out of control and turned into a chain reaction. We haven't gotten to that point in real life, but it's worrying how society keeps getting more polarized.

I mean, the Ultimate Despair also played a role, but they could have just been the catalyst. Maybe stage a terrorist attack, or spread fake news, and give people a reason to want to kill each other. So they all became animals.

An extended argument where you have to convince everyone, and if you get to the end, you take damage. Attack despair with hope. Cheesy, but nice.

Junko is about to kill herself. Time to cick the SPARE button.

Meh. I guess this isn't Undertale.

So they get to leave. Into an apocalyptical word. But they have no choice but to press forward and try to rebuid it.

And Monokuma still lives! - DUN DUN DUN

ZeldaTPLink posted...

Did they not notice their bodies growing and changing, either?

Pretty sure at one point Kyoko asks what Monokuma did to her body. I believe that was her noticing two years of growth
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hombad46 posted...

ZeldaTPLink posted...

Did they not notice their bodies growing and changing, either?

Pretty sure at one point Kyoko asks what Monokuma did to her body. I believe that was her noticing two years of growth

Yes, but you would expect that to be a common subject in their daily conservation, not something only the Ultimate Detective can notice.

And I got that the "body" thing referred to the memory loss. Because Kyoko was aware she had forgotten what her role was.

Anyway, time to go to DR2!
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Anyway, cool game. The plot is very good, and I loved how Case 5/6 was set up from the start. Really makes the whole thing feel like one big puzzle.

The weakness is easily the gameplay. All minigames are terrible, as others have mentioned, except the comic book one. This game I played with both logic and gameplay set to the middle difficulty (and couldn't find where to change it during the game). Next one I might set gameplay to the easiest and logic to the hardest, like some guy has suggested.

Aesthetics are great, too. Soundtrack is great, cutscenes are pretty cool, especially the execution ones. It really adds to the suspense and gore of the game.

Some things were not very clear. Junko's story, for example. Like she was just born with despair and decided to screw everything up? Would like some more clarification. It seems her "despair" is an allegory for depression, but it would be interesting to see her story. Will the following games elaborate on her and her sister?

I think I'll rank the characters now, then move to the 2nd game. I considered doing a character rank for all the series, but I guess I'll just merge the rankings for each game once I'm finished.

Also we are intentionally kept in the dark with The Tragedy, but I think it will either be revealed in future games, or kept hidden on purpose since it seems to be more of an abstract thing. I'm fine with either.

I'm this close to googling Junko to find out if she has a more elaborate backstory. Someone stop me.

You get more of the story in the sequel. It's worth being in the dark about until then.
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Dark Young Link posted...

You get more of the story in the sequel. It's worth being in the dark about until then.

That's all I needed. Thanks.

Ok, let's rank them.

I'm aware there are other games/media, so consuming those might change my opinions of the characters later on. If so, I'll just update the rankings after that. I'm just dieing to talk about the characters right now.

#17: Toko Fukawa

Let's start with the obvious. It takes a lot of work to make a character as aggressively bad as this one.

Half the time she is being a nymphomaniac mashochist. Which is funny maybe the first time, then it gets old, but the game keeps hammering that non-stop. In trials, in investigations, in any moment that is supposed to be serious.

The other half, she is just a complete, unrepentant bitch. She decicates herself to being unpleasant to everyone around, and trying to bully whoever seems to be the weakest person in the room, usually Hina. Over time, the sex maniac side becomes more proeminent over the bitch side, but that doesn't help much.

GJ doesn't redeem her. Because after the initial joy of seeing GJ, you realize they are separate personalities and you'll still have to stand Toko for as long as she is alive (which is all game). It doesn't help that we never get an explanation on how she developed a second personality, which would maybe help connect her to GJ. She is just a masochist who happens to share a body with a serial killer, that's it. I could consider them as a single character and put them closer to the middle of the ranks, but that wouldn't change the fact Toko sucks.

The game also forgets she is a writer, to the point even Hiro lampshades it at some point. I mean, writers are cool people, and writer characters tend to be smart and interesting. A lot could have been taken from that to develop Toko into a more compelling character, but they never use that chance.

Put her in any of those AA full character lists, and she is Bottom 5. She's that bad.

#16: Yasuhiro Hakagure

Unless Toko, it seems they actually tried to make this guy likable. But they failed spetacularly. The first issue is that he feels less like a character and more like a random amalgamation of occultist babble.

I'd like to compare him to Hifumi. Hifumi also has a "profession" that is not very respectable and is a disgusting person all around. But with Hifumi, it seems they actually made some effort to learn what otaku culture is about and write a character who feels like a real person. You may not appreciate Hifumi, but you get what he is about. He likes 2D girls and he has a lot of appreciation for his art and the art of his peers.

Hiro just randomly spouts crap about the future, and aliens, and ghosts, and fails to make sense. Sometimes he's energetic about it and sometimes he's angry that you are mistaking his "work" for "the occult", whatever that is. There are characters in fiction who are all about occultism, but even when they are fake, they still try to make you feel like their field is some kind of science. With Hiro, it feels like someone read a bunch of occult books and randomly plastered sentences from them into his dialogue. He is less like an "Ultimate Clarivoyant" and more like that guy from college who is trying to make a quick buck by reading the future of depressed undergraduates.

They tried to make him the comic relief, but it doesn't work well because the stuff he says is too random, so like I said before, he rarely lands his jokes.

Hiro's other issue is how he is used a plot device. He has the IQ of a plant, so whenever you need to make a trial longer, or when you need some very obvious concept to be explained to the audience, or you when need a scapegoat, you bring Hiro into the fray, have him act like a dumbass, and there is your filler. But that is lazy writing, and is made annoying by the fact Hiro is a bad character.

The reason he is not dead last is that sometimes he is funny, and his English dub helps at that. Also there is a side of him that is this cool dude that can be chill even when other characters are nervous, but it's very rare, as he's usually the first to panic.

Hiro, amusingly, isn't actually lying about his abilities
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#15 Kyotaka Ishimaru

This one might surprise some, because I hardly talked much about Taka all game. But the reason is that I was always expecting Taka to have this moment and develop into something interesting. And he never did.

He is part of a common character archetype. He is the student council guy who is crazy about following rules and wipes the other kids into shape. Some other examples are Gamagoori from Kill la Kill, and Iida from Hero Academia. But those two are much better, because their status as a moral compass allows them to be noble and heroic. They believe in the system when others don't. They can be empathetic and sacrifice themselves for justice. They can have character arcs where they come to terms with the necessity of breaking rules sometimes.

Taka is nothing of that. His main job is to get people not to be late for breakfast. Then he predictably loses his shit about Mondo due to him being a delinquent. Then they do the sauna contest, and he spends the rest of Chapter 2 being Mondo's bro. Then Mondo dies and he goes catathonic. Then he finds a way to simulate Mondo in the AI and turns into a weird super saiyan. Then you think he's going to be an interesting character now, and he dies immediately after. The end.

It feels like the developers didn't know what to do with him, so his arc is a bunch of random events. He doesn't get to be the team's moral compass, because Sakura is much better at that. Taka not only fails to break character, but he doesn't even do the good things about his character properly, because others do for him.

Hbthebattle posted...

Hiro, amusingly, isn't actually lying about his abilities

That somehow makes sense.

#14 Leon Kuwata

The poster child for the short end of the stick. Case 1 is all about Sayaka, and someone was needed to kill her in quasi-self defense, then get executed for it. So Leon gets to be the only killer in this game who is less interesting than his victim.

Because he doesn't last long, he doesn't get a deep character arc. He was a star baseball player who now wants to be a musician. A potentially good story, but it's given away in a single dialogue and never developed from that.

I don't have much more to say. I don't blame Leon for being uninteresting, because someone had to be.

#13 Mukuro Ikusaba

I was undecided between her and Leon for #13, but she won because her backstory sounds pretty dope. I said "sounds", because the only thing we get are some notes from a student profile.

She has some dialogue at the start but I barely remember it, and the only thing I remember is her talking about photoshop, which turned out to be a lie crafted to improve her Junko disguise. And that's plot, not character, so no points here.

I feel bad for ranking her this low because I feel like a proper backstory could shoot her up maybe 10 positions upwards, and maybe we'll get it in future installments. But for now she's just the decoy that was necessary to hide Junko until the end.

#12 Makoto Naegi

How many words do you need to make a full description of Makoto? Two. "Shounen" and "Protagonist". Makoto has been described.

Makoto is not a bad character per se. It was clear what the developers wanted from him: he is basically Link. He's the neutral character the audience relates to. He asks the right questions and reacts obviously to things.

He never hinders the game's immersion, except for that one time where you're forced to hide information from Kyoko. But never adds much, either. His supposedly big moment is being the Ultimate Hope at the end, but he accomplishes that by yelling generic heroic phrases. He does sacrifice himself to save Kyoko, but it's not clear if he was expecting to die either, so he doesn't get many herosim points. He is more intelligent than almost everyone in the cast, but compared to other intelligent mystery game protagonists, like Phoenix and Apollo, Makoto lacks a personality that makes it feel he's making great insights, instead of just following the logic the player makes him follow. The insights and the bluffs all come from Kyoko anyway.

I wonder if the next games' MCs have more than one dimension.

#11 Hifumi Yamada

We now leave the tier of the super bland characters and enter the one of the cliche characters who are generally well written.

Hifumi started with the lowest ceiling of the entire cast. He is the stereotypical otaku. He is weird, perverted, repulsive and anti-social. He was never going to be a great character no matter what they did with him. And he's not.

But over time, he kind of grew on me. Like I said in the Hiro post, they made some effort to make him look like a living, breathing person. His jokes are funny more often than not. He's got some funny voices. And he's more or less a victim here. He kills Taka because Celeste lies to him, so he thinks he's being a white knight. In the end, he manages not to go down as a scumbag.

I also thought his participation in Case 3 was pretty cool, even if the case itself was not great. I didn't think Hifumi would ever succeed at killing someone, but he went, designed a robot suit, killed Taka, played dead and moved Taka's body around.

Hifumi didn't have much potential, but he managed to be good enough, and he left before his presence would start to get old, unlike a certain clairvoyant.

#10 Chihiro Fujisaki

Disclaimer: I will refrain from discussing whether Chihiro is transgender or not, and will use male pronouns because that seems to be the game's default.

Chihiro sucks. There, I said it. Half his lines are "sorry". You try to get Chihiro to interact with other characters in any way and he clams up and starts apologizing. Being weak is his only mode, and the one time he decides not to be weak, he is immediately offed.

The gender thing makes him more interesting, but again, it's revealed after he dies, so it never adds to his conversations or anything like that. It's more of an informed plot attribute that provides a twist and eventually a reason for Mondo to kill him.

Chihiro might be under Leon if it stopped at that. But then something magic happens: Alter Ego is introduced. Chihiro's programming skills cease to be just an informed attribute and eventually make him one of the group's MVPs, when Alter Ego saves Makoto from execution. Because of Alter Ego, Chihiro plays a bigger part in the team's victory than Toko, Hina or Hiro.

I considered ranking Chihiro and Alter Ego separately, but then again, Alter Ego's personality is basically the same as Chihiro's. And I view Alter Ego as an expression of what was good about Chihiro's character, manifesting after his death. Hidden from everyone, he created the first true Hope of the game, and that source of hope then decided to sacrifice itself to save everyone. Alter Ego is not particularly interesting to talk to, but it is badass. And that's enough to place Chihiro above Hifumi.

#9 Mondo Owada

Kuwabara!

This is the highest a character with Mondo's depth can get. He doesn't have much. He is the stereotypical delinquent. But damn, he's funny and likable as hell. His voices are all hilarious. I loved seeing him swear at Monokuma and other random characters.

His backstory is pretty good, and the maturity he shows when he's found guilty is remarkable (unlike Taka who gets a breakdown in his place). He was jealous of his brother so he challenge him to a race, his brother died and now he blames himself for it. He is a genius leader who make his gang very powerful, but he still doesn't feel worthy of the title. It's a very tragic story.

I really liked him, and I think if he had lived longer he could have gained more dimensions, kind of like Hina did. But he dies earlier and ends up belonging to the lower half in terms of character depth. It's less about him, and more about the people who are above him.

hombad46 posted...

ZeldaTPLink posted...

Did they not notice their bodies growing and changing, either?

Pretty sure at one point Kyoko asks what Monokuma did to her body. I believe that was her noticing two years of growth

That line, coupled with the elaborate machinery in the Physics lab and the mysterious locked Bio Lab, made me wonder for a while if the big twist was that the characters were all clones of the real students who'd died in the massacre in Classroom 5-C (since Kyoko's clone wouldn't have the same scarring), and maybe the killing game had happened several times already, with the same people being killed and cloned every year.
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ZeldaTPLink posted...

In the end, he manages not to go down as a scumbag.

I mean every murderer but Sayaka/Leon knows ahead of time they're dooming literally everyone else if they get away with it.
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kevwaffles posted...

ZeldaTPLink posted...

In the end, he manages not to go down as a scumbag.

I mean every murderer but Sayaka/Leon knows ahead of time they're dooming literally everyone else if they get away with it.

Probably, but then I feel it's more likely Hifumi just forgot about that.

ZeldaTPLink posted...

Next one I might set gameplay to the easiest and logic to the hardest, like some guy has suggested.

This was me, for the record.

And I will clarify that Mean Logic for the second game isn't even comparable to Mean Logic in the first game. I believe in the first game, even with Mean Logic, you stick with three Truth Bullets for basically the whole game, and maybe get to five by the end? Whereas the second game fucking starts you with seven, and you'll eventually end up with nine a little past halfway through, IIRC.

(I still went with Mean Logic and Kind [Medium] Action difficulties for DR2 and v3 and thought they were perfectly reasonable)
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ZeldaTPLink posted...

kevwaffles posted...

ZeldaTPLink posted...

In the end, he manages not to go down as a scumbag.

I mean every murderer but Sayaka/Leon knows ahead of time they're dooming literally everyone else if they get away with it.

Probably, but then I feel it's more likely Hifumi just forgot about that.

Even then, as far as he knew Celeste was going to kill someone else to get out.
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TC, Id be curious for your thoughts/rankings of the executions. Leons really struck me as super violent when it happened. I would play the game on my Vita during lunch breaks at work, and happened to be at a Starbucks. When he was killed, I had one of the moments of looking around me and thinking Did anyone else here see that on my screen just now, because theyd probably wonder just what the hell Im watching...

Being bludgeoned with batted baseballs until you die would be a torturous way to go out. Slow and painful.
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Without going into details (and please everyone else don't do that either), Leon's is my favorite execution in the first two games.
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Pretty cool rankings so far, though I'd have put Taka a bit higher.

Also I'd say DR2 and V3 have much better character writing, with even the worst ones still probably better than half of DR1's cast. >_>
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I'm taking a break because I have no idea how to sort the next 5.

With all things being close enough, take their designs into account if you haven't already.
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ZeldaTPLink posted...

kevwaffles posted...

ZeldaTPLink posted...

In the end, he manages not to go down as a scumbag.

I mean every murderer but Sayaka/Leon knows ahead of time they're dooming literally everyone else if they get away with it.

Probably, but then I feel it's more likely Hifumi just forgot about that.

The whole scene with Celeste demanding tea from Hifumi only to throw it back at him and force him to do it again is pretty much to establish how much she has him wrapped around her finger. Celeste could have told him to do anything and he wouldnt have paid mind to the consequences, especially since she was exploiting Hifumis desire to escape the school as well.
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tcaz2 posted...

you guys are WAAAAAAAAAAAAAY too sensitive on 'spoilers'. Do you consider it a spoiler when you're reading a book and you see you're getting toward the end, or when it has a table of contents that lists how many chapters something is?
Or when you hit pause on a movie and it shows you the time left?

The difference is that those are media where the exact length is fixed and known from the start. If you were playing a D&D adventure, would you like the DM to tell you how many play sessions it would be before it was over? Even sports have the element of needing overtime, which nobody would appreciate having spoiled for them because it trivializes regulation play.
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#8 Junko Enoshima

This was a hard one. Positions #4 to #8 were hard to sort out. Those are the characters who are really good for some reason, but still are missing something that makes them the objectively great characters of the game.

Junko joins the game at the near end, after you find out she is the murderer. Actually, that is an unfair assessment. She joins in the beginning, acting as Monokuma. That's right, I've decided to judge her and Monokuma as the same character (even though it seems Monokuma exists beyond the scope of DG1, but she was the one playing him so she deserves the credit).

Turns out that doesn't make a big difference to her character. Junko as a character is random, emotional and hard to figure out if she is being serious or not. She seems very mentally unstable but also kind of troll. She is fun to interact with in court. The same applies to Monokuma, which is just one of the roles she acts as.

Both Junko and Monokuma have strong presences in the game. In a way, they are Danganronpa. They made the game, conducted it and were responsibe for most of its major events. Monokuma is a very effective villain, even if it's usually too silly to connect to. He is fun to hate and most of his jokes are great.

But that is Junko's problem. Connection. I still don't know what her deal is. She wears a multitude of masks, but we never know who the real Junko is. She killed her sister and we don't know if it was an elaborate act of trolling or if it came from a previous resentment (as it is implied). She wants to be executed because she apparently loves despair that much. I guess the most likely interpretation is that she is an extremely depressed person and she did all of this to just escape from her life. She destroyed everything because she hates everything, then killed herself because she hates herself. But that's an interpretation, it could have been spelled out in the game.

Junko seems interesting but she came a bit too late and a bit too fast, and left without answering all questions. She is similar to Mukuro, who could also use some more characterization. So she stays below all the other characters who got more complete arcs.

azuarc posted...

If you were playing a D&D adventure, would you like the DM to tell you how many play sessions it would be before it was over?

Yes. I have a real life schedule I need to plan.

There is slightly more you get of Junko's personality and motivations in further Danganronpa media, but for the most part, DR1 is pretty much all you need to really get what Junko is all about. She is basically the embodiment of chaotic evil, especially the first half. She hates hope because it's predictable and boring, and likes spreading despair because it's chaotic and interesting, and that's really all there is to it.

When I personally finished Danganronpa 1, I was very dissatisfied with the final chapter, because deep down, I was hoping the big bad would be...... I guess relatable, or at least understandable in their motivations, and it's just not in Junko's character to be understandable in the slightest.

I wouldn't feel the need to go into this, given you basically have set-in-stone plans to keep going with the franchise, but the sooner you kinda "figure out" Junko, the easier it is to come to terms with what Danganronpa as a series has to offer the player. Better to just accept that it's not a very deep story as early as possible so you can settle in for a super dumb, but super entertaining ride.
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#7 Aoi Asahina

This one was also tricky. Hina is one of the more protagonist characters in the series, having survived until the end, and she doesn't suck like Hiro and Toko. She feels more like a person than some of the characters above her. But she is also very vanilla.

Hina has a simple role in the story: she is the happy and optimistic girl who balances out all the gloomy assholes who stay alive because they are intelligent enough to stay alive. She is not particularly unique and you don't pay much attention to her early on.

But Hina's character arc is one of the best in the game. It's very organic. She slowly breaks, as the reality of the game gets to her. She finds emotional refuge in a friendship with Sakura. Then Sakura is found out to be a traitor, and Hina doesn't know what to do, getting into fights with other people. Sakura kills herself, and Hina becomes the protagonist of the best trial in the game, wanting to kill herself and everyone to punish them for their crimes. She proves she isn't really dumb, just not a monster like the Byakuyas and Kyokos of the world, and that she shouldn't be underestimated. She is then spared, and upon learning of Sakura's true intent, she becomes a defender of hope. She doesn't do much more until the end of the game though, and becomes more of a background character.

It's not a very elaborate arc, but real people don't have very elaborate arcs. They react slowly to their environment and sometimes have breakdowns, like Hina did.

And Hina is just likable to have around. Her balancing act is very important. You end up being fond of her because she is just a nice person you'd want to be friends with.

She is vanilla, but is a very well written vanilla.

MrSmartGuy posted...

There is slightly more you get of Junko's personality and motivations in further Danganronpa media, but for the most part, DR1 is pretty much all you need to really get what Junko is all about. She is basically the embodiment of chaotic evil, especially the first half. She hates hope because it's predictable and boring, and likes spreading despair because it's chaotic and interesting, and that's really all there is to it.

When I personally finished Danganronpa 1, I was very dissatisfied with the final chapter, because deep down, I was hoping the big bad would be...... I guess relatable, or at least understandable in their motivations, and it's just not in Junko's character to be understandable in the slightest.

I wouldn't feel the need to go into this, given you basically have set-in-stone plans to keep going with the franchise, but the sooner you kinda "figure out" Junko, the easier it is to come to terms with what Danganronpa as a series has to offer the player. Better to just accept that it's not a very deep story as early as possible so you can settle in for a super dumb, but super entertaining ride.

Fair enough. But I've seem a lot of deepness in characters, as I'm writing right now. I guess it's just the villains who are not deep, and they could be

I approve of these rankings so far. All of my top four are still left, along with three other choices that ought to be in the upper half.
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Dang, Hina is my favorite character in DR1 by a decent amount. Sakura #2, then a really sharp drop off to uh....... Kyoko I guess? I dunno, the important thing is DR1's cast sucks.
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#6 Sayaka Maizono

The Ace Attorney series has a rule: whenever the protagonist thinks someone is innocent, they are. Phoenix and co. have undying faith in their clients, and will never give up on defending them. It's common for the client to be a close friend of theirs, usually a girl, who they will defend because they know the girl is innocent. In 6 games, I've never seen the series have the balls to break that rule.

Danganronpa did it. In case 1-1.

Meet Sayaka. Introduced as the obvious love interest of Makoto, in a classic "first girl wins" harem anime trope. You get the story about how she was into him in high school but never got the chance to talk to him. You make a promise to protect her.

Then she tries to kill someone and pin the blame on you.

This had a very powerful effect for me. It hammers the idea of "anyone could be a killer". It shows the game wants to break expectations and tell a good character-driven story, and it made me want to keep playing. I don't think I can play another DG game, look at any character at the start and think they can't be a killer. All thanks to Sayaka.

Sayaka's arc is simple, but well-written. She is a pop idol, the kind of profession that is not known for lasting long. She feels every second passing through her, and knows her career is walking torwards an inevitable end. So the idea of spending an unknown amount of time locked in a school makes her go insane. And fear of losing her friends jut adds to it. So she looks for the frist idiot who is willing to take the fall for her and quickly comes up with a plan to leave. Then she gets stabbed, and she regrets it and tries to at least save Makoto, because she wasn't really a monster, just a desperate celebrity.

Sayak's arc isn't very long though. It's short and sweet. So she doesn't break into the Top 5.

MrSmartGuy posted...

Dang, Hina is my favorite character in DR1 by a decent amount. Sakura #2, then a really sharp drop off to uh....... Kyoko I guess? I dunno, the important thing is DR1's cast sucks.

I really like Hina, but she is just not interesting or unique enough to get that high. She is a great person, but not that great of a character.

Junko is my goddess
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MrSmartGuy posted...

Better to just accept that it's not a very deep story as early as possible so you can settle in for a super dumb, but super entertaining ride.

yeah, for this reason, monokuma is by default the best DR char in DR1 to me.
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#5 Celestia Ludenberg

Celestia's position in the Top 5 is a bit awkward. She isn't that deep, and her murder case kind of weakens her, because of how sloppy it was.

But Celestia is just too cool. She forms an Obviously Evil duo with Byakuya, in a way you expect them both to be killers. (I made a prediction one of them would be innocent to subvert expectations. Thought it would be Celestia, but it was Byakuya).

Her English dub deserves praise, because I love the way she talks. It is a kind of formal and sarcastic tone. She is this weird alien character who is unfazed by everything yet is very intelligent and contributes to the investigations. She is mean, but not too mean that she is intollerable, like Toko. She has a strong presence early in the game.

And her murder case was sloppy, but it was also the first premeditated kill in the series, and it gets praise for how elaborate it was. She just had to reduce the number of steps involving her yelling and pointing out to things, because it fucked with her alibi.

In the end, she gets closure to her arc, when it's revealed she was just pretending to adapt. She really wanted to leave... to become a vampire queen in a castle! Then she makes the first and last manifestation of sadness, and shows everything may or may not have been an act. Similarly to Junko, she wears a thick mask, but unlike Junko, you could see a glimpse of the person behind it before she went down.

I guess this is a case of design beating everything. In terms of visual, voice, and everything design, Celestia is just great, and she beats characters with better arcs than her, like Hina.

Most of your top characters are gonna be ones I rank at the bottom. DR1s cast was really poor. Like I think I even ranked Makoto high just because he wasnt an unlikable prick or super dumb/annoying lol

swordz9 posted...

I think I even ranked Makoto high just because he wasnt an unlikable prick or super dumb/annoying lol

About that......
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