Board 8 > The Definitive Ranking Of All Cases And Characters From Danganronpa 1/2

(+) Yeah! (+)

DEFINITIVE. Sorry if you disagree but this is the canon version of the rankings. I called it first so it counts.

I finished playing Danganronpa 2 in my playthrough topic and I am now doing the very hard business of ranking all the cases and characters from the first two games while I finish up Demons Souls prior to starting Ultra Despair Girls. I just finished playing Danganronpa 2 and finished a re-watch of the first game less than a month ago so everything is relatively fresh in my head. I have some fairly cookie cutter opinions but also some that will likely get me yelled at if I ever bump into the manifestation of the official Danganronpa fandom.

Feel free to post your rankings and/or yell at my bad opinions! Actually, scratch that second thing.

THE RANKINGS THUS FAR:

M&M In A Bowl Full Of Skittles Tier:
40) Toko Fukawa
39) Ultimate Imposter

Scrappy Doo Tier:
38) Teruteru Hanamura
37) Natsumi Kuzuryu
36) Hifumi Yamada
35) Sato

Drinking Almond Milk When I Thought It Was Supposed To Be Regular Milk Tier:
34) Monomi
33) Fuyuhiko Kuzuryu
32) I'm debating between two characters so I can't even give a clue yet. This will either by my shortest write up or one of my longest, though.

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Taggity

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fuyuhiko so low means your list is trash. sorry friend, you screwed the pooch big time.

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Suprak the Stud posted...

DEFINITIVE.

Sorry man I don't make the rules.


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I already expressed my sadness for my #2 boi getting shafted

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Please note: do not spoil in this topic. TC has not yet played UDG/V3/watched 3.

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Oh duh. Thanks for posting that. I forgot to mention that in the first post but yes no later spoilers please!

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tag

Monomi too high

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Well, at least Fuyuhiko isn't under Teruteru nor Hifumi, so it's not all bad.

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Tag

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There's a Danganronpa one-half?

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there's a danganronpa zero

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Also a Danganronpa If

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And a Danganronpa F

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Up next: Quite arguably the dumbest survivor.

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Hiro probably

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If it's not Hiro, it's Akane or maybe Kazuichi...but it's probably Hiro. Unless you take dumb to mean "why did this person have to survive" and you really hate Fuyuhiko, which is defensible, too. No way Hina goes out this low.

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"dumbest survivor" is definitely a heated battle between Hiro and Akane. For me though, Hiro is so dumb it actually boosted him a few spots ahead of some other low-tier characters because it leads to an all-time Danganronpa comedy moment when you have to argue Kyoko isn't a ghost. like lmfao. It's so dumb but also hilarious. He'd rank ahead of Akane for me based solely on that.

Akane is just... i don't even know, really. Nothing about her character ever landed with me, the opposite, really.

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But boobs.

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Hiro is actually entertaining so here's hoping for Akane

Impostor is way better than the character they were impersonating tbh

Remind me, are you the person who shits on Byakuya at every opportunity? I know someone does.

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That's me!

#32: Byakuya Togami
Main Cast (Male) Ranking: 12/16
Survivor Ranking: 9/11
Ultimate Ability: Ultimate Affluent Prodigy
Actual Ultimate Ability: Ultimate Affluent Asshole

Welcome to part two of my three part series characters Suprak hates that you like and will get you to stop reading my rankings because of my terrible opinions. I apologize in advance. Well, not really advance, anymore. I apologize halfway through. I actually thought placing Byakuya this low was more controversial than Fuyuhiko, but based on some recent responses I might actually be wrong about that and more people hate Byakuya than I thought. Well, ok, I dont totally hate him. This tier is really for characters I more have a notable dislike for even though they do some good stuff every once in a while. That happens to pretty much perfectly describe how I feel about Byakuya, so in a way he is the perfect embodiment of this tier.

I mightve been a bit unfair with my clue, as Byakuya is probably not the guy that stands out when you think of really stupid characters. There are some painfully dumb characters that make it out of these games alive, and Byakuya at least isnt accusing people of being ghosts or drooling in the corner while everyone is investigating. I will stand by my accusation though, as I think Byakuya does some of the dumbest things of any character in either game. And what is annoying is how the game keeps insisting he is smart, when his every action is serving as evidence to the contrary. Maybe it would be safer to say he is less dumb and more so egotistical that he cannot fathom how other people think and it leads him to doing a series of really dumb actions throughout the course of the game but it still leads to so many dumb things.

Byakuya is positioned as the villain early in the game, which could be sort of fun. Some upcoming spoilers, but I did like how they did this with Nagito in the second game. But Byakuya doesnt work nearly as well because Byakuya, despite loudly announcing every chance he gets that he and he alone understands how this game works, has no fucking clue how this game works. He keeps announcing how he will kill someone and how it will be glorious, and it ranks up with the dumbest action taken by any character in either game. When Fuyuhiko does this in the second game, I got more of the impression that he was bluffing. Hey guys Im a big tough yukuza and I do big tough things because Im a big tough guy and not two toddlers sitting on each others shoulders in an expensive suit. With Byakuya though, it is pretty clear he means it. He talks about it in his free time events, he brings it up multiple times throughout the course of the game, and he loudly proclaims it every chance he gets in a group setting. The game wants you to know that Byakuya is out to kill someone and is meant to be that element of danger (and the constant red herring) in the back of your mind. Oh shoot someone is dead well Byakuya said he wanted to murder someone by drowning them in his Scrooge McDuck money binmaybe it was him sort of thing. By doing this though, they make Byakuya look like an idiot.

I could not stop thinking that the absolute DUMBEST way to pull this off is to tell everyone you were going to do it before you do it. It serves no purpose. If youre not an idiot, you do it like Celeste. You tell everyone how great it is and how we need to get used to living here even if you hate living here. Thats devious mastermind stuff right there. Byakuya saying Im going to win this game by murdering someone is like going up to someone and saying Im going to throw a surprise party for you two weeks before your birthday so you're surprised. Now, part of this isnt his fault as a character. Part of this is on the writers for not thinking how to add in that element of danger. Nagito is great because hes insane and doesnt care if people know hes up to crazy stuff. Byakuya, who at least outwardly says he wants to win the game, hampers his chances of doing so by telling everyone. Now, of course he keeps telling everyone so chapter 4 can be more dramatic when he gets mad at tells Monokuma hes bowing out of the game and is going to fight him and him alone. His whole character was set up for that late game face turn, but the way they set him up as a heel comes off clumsy. He can be a rich jerk and a snob and an elitist asshole (and he is, even later in the game). Fine! Great! Perfect! What he cant do is be the super smart character and the character loudly telling everyone how he is going to murder when the plan needs to be to get away with murder. Part of this can be explained away by the fact he is an egotistic bastard that thinks he is so much smarter than everyone else he doesnt care that hes tipping his hand. But it is precisely because of his ego that he is so 1) annoying and 2) dumb.

Oh, and speaking of dumb, what I really want to talk about with Byakuya is the single dumbest red herring in either game. Dumber than Hiro passed out in a robot costume. Dumber than whatever the hell Peko was trying to do in case 2. Dumber than anything else you can think of. Byakuyas plot to implicate Toko and then himself to figure out who the smart characters were and who he needed to watch out for was one of the most eye-rolling moments for me in either game. Not because I thought the writing was bad or because it didnt fit Byakuyas character, but because it did fit his character and really cemented my thoughts of him being an egotistic idiot. He frames Toko and himself for a crime after seeing Mondo walk away from Chihiros corpse. He lazily implicates Toko, which he assumes will then implicate himself, and he does this all because otherwise the case would be too easy and he wouldnt know who his true worthy opponents were in this game. Im just going to go out on a limb here and say framing yourself for a murder when the punishment is death is shockingly stupid when you have no reasonable escape plan.

I meanwhat exactly was his plan here if someone didnt figure it out?

condescending Byakuya voice Of course you fools would think it was me. You and your commoner brains. But now is when I pull back the curtain so even your ant sized brains can understand
Mondo Nah, were ready to vote now.
Makoto Yeah Monokuma lets vote
Byakuya, surprised pose Wait, hold on. See, the truth is Mondo committed the murder! I saw him walking away from the body.
Makoto But how would he know about the Genocide Jack stuff?
Byakuya Ah, ok. I see how that might be an issue. Heres the thing though. I did all that stuff. All the set up and finding a paint brush so I could make BLOODLUST look like it came out of a typewriter and then I took Chihiros corpse and I posed it so you would THINK it was Toko and then would THINK it was me but it wasnt really.
Makoto ok, yeah were ready to vote now.

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Likeumyour evidence that it wasnt you was that you saw someone else do it? You know who has no reason to believe you? Literally everyone at the trial. There is some circumstantial evidence pointing at Mondo, sure, but do you really think your fellow classmates are going to believe this when 1) you continuously insult them, 2) you taunt them by telling youre going to kill on a daily basis, and 3) you admit to doing all the other extra stuff around the murder (other than moving the crime scene) for the benefit of nothing else than making things more difficult? No one is going to believe that. When you point evidence at yourself, you cant just later go lol just kidding and expect people to believe you. This is such a colossally stupid plan with no benefit. Do you want to see who is good at deduction and solving these murders? Just dont disclose the fact that you saw Mondo do it. You get mostly the same information and dont risk dying to get it.

I mean, I know I just went on this huge aside here, but that isnt even the main reason I dont like Byakuya. I dont like him because hes annoying, and pompous, and just kind of an asshole. His big face turn at the end consists of him still being mostly an asshole at all times, but just not an asshole that is constantly threatening to kill us. Hey. Byakuya. That isnt a face turn. Thats just you doing the bare minimum to be a normal, functioning member of society. Hes supposed to have this big moment in the fourth case where he realizes the error of his ways (which, again, is triggered by him being dumb and not bothering to actually think through all the evidence because he is so sure of his superiority), and the pay off is 1) he says please when he asks for Kyoko to tell him what he missed in case 4 and 2) he now deigns to bless us with his presence which is something I was perfectly fine going without. He isnt significantly better than he was before his face turn. He just isnt actively planning to murder us now. He still talks down to us even though he continuously does dumb things (arbitrarily forcing Kyoko to give up her key because she cant remember anything) or makes stupid oversights (somehow forgetting he had Kyokos key so she couldnt have gotten into her room). He still has gross interactions with Toko. He still is basically the same character that I didnt like before, just a slightly less toned down version of it.

This should also explain a bit why a couple of other characters were so low. Ultimate Imposter is annoying enough as a concept, but he was imitating someone I didnt particularly like in the first place. Fuyuhiko was giving me Byakuya flashbacks, but just a redundant version of it. I just dont like this character archetype, I think is my biggest problem. The snob elitist who talks down to everyone but then sort of realizes the error of his ways and vows to be slightly less snobby and slightly less elitist maybe if he feels like it. Hes always acting like were lucky to be talking to him, which was absolutely not the impression I was getting from talking to him. He spends four whole cases as essentially a one note character who was lab created to be hateable. It is kinda hard to put that genie back in the bottle at this point, and by the time they tried to make him more likeable it was basically too late. He was another character, like Toko, that the first game forced me to lug around against my will.

As for why he is this high even though I just wrote a mini-essay complaining about him, he does get slightly more tolerable in the final case. He still isnt humbled, but he is at least humbled to the point where he doesnt sound like a trust fund douche every single time he talks. Maybe all my hatred was concentrated at Toko at that point, but he wasnt as annoying in the fifth case and definitely a bit better in the sixth and I probably wouldnt have minded as much if I didnt have all these negative feelings toward him stored at that point. His role also at least makes sense in the context of the game. You need a character like this for tension, even if I didnt think he was executed all that well. I dont mind the idea behind him if they had toned down a couple of things just slightly. Oh, and his voice actor I found to be a lot better than Fuyuhiko. I could honestly swap these two, but the main thing to me came down to liking the voice actor here better.

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YESSSSSSSSSSssss

oof

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Suprak, you do realize he's the Ultimate Affluent Progeny, and not the Ultimate Affluent Prodigy, right?

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You know, I always mix up which one it is, and I'm sure I'll forget by the next time I type it out.

(But I do remember his free time of having to best all his siblings to take over as the head of his family, at least)

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Suprak the Stud posted...

Oh, and speaking of dumb, what I really want to talk about with Byakuya is the single dumbest red herring in either game. Dumber than Hiro passed out in a robot costume. Dumber than whatever the hell Peko was trying to do in case 2. Dumber than anything else you can think of. Byakuyas plot to implicate Toko and then himself to figure out who the smart characters were and who he needed to watch out for was one of the most eye-rolling moments for me in either game.

lmao fair

Byakuya's shit in 1-2 is legitimately perhaps the dumbest action taken in the series. I only differ from you in that rather than eye-rolling I just kinda laughed at how stupid it was. Like "Hiro needs to a non-stop debate to prove that Kyoko is, in fact, not a ghost" it rolled into the "so stupid it's hilarious" category for me. I also kinda liked his... character development over the course of the game, with it implicit in his appearance in 2-6 that it has continued seeing as he followed Makoto into the other "actually maybe this is the dumbest action taken in the series" plan.

I mean, he's not one of my top characters, but I do think he's among the best in DR1 and certainly the best that is actually around for the long haul (Sayaka) or isn't wrapped up in endgame spoilers/retrospective realization/IF (Junko, Mukuro) which idk I guess counts for something to me. Were he instead in DR2 I think I wouldn't be as forgiving on him because that's a much better cast and he would not at all stand out.

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xp1337 posted...

Were he instead in DR2 I think

?

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Up next: the character I think they had the hardest time writing

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See, hating Byakuya makes sense. I disagree, but I can understand that perspective. People who dislike Fuyuhiko enough to rank him so far behind other characters I have to assume just didn't understand the character at a fundamental level.

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Im sure thats what it is.


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Fuyuhiko isn't dreadful, but he's kinda meh outside of a couple of great scenes. Still better than Akane or Nekomaru. Byakuya is dislikeable, but his presence alone makes the game more entertaining and because of that I like him as a character.

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Yeah I understood the point of Byakuya for sure. I just didnt really like interacting with him ever. Especially because they were constantly pairing him with Toko for scene after scene I hated.

And I agree with that assessment of Fuyuhiko. I didnt hate him past twist but I also found him kind of dull. I fully understand Im in the minority here but I like the weirdos with the big personalities.

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The only good use of Toko/Byakuya in DR1 was the time where he came into the dining room to tell them something, Jack was like "I'D FOLLOW YOU TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH" and he was like "alright well I'm out bye" then started walking out the door and then quickly broke into a sprint. That got me laughing pretty good.

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#31: Kyoko Kirigiri
Main Cast (Female) Ranking: 15/16
Survivor Ranking: 8/11
Ultimate Ability: Ultimate Detective
Actual Ultimate Ability: Ultimate GameFAQ

So I think this is the ranking where I lose the last shred of Danganronpa cred I had. The good news is that this should be the last bad opinion I have for a while. Kyoko was just someone that didnt resonate for me like she did for a lot of people. I always see here near the top of lists or at the very least towards the middle, but I just couldnt get into her as a character. The ending of Danganronpa 1 was rough for me because I was stuck with Toko who I hated, Byakuya who I did not like, and Kyoko who I also wasnt a huge fan of. Kyoko was definitely the least offensive of these three. I do not hate Kyoko, but she was definitely more bad than good for me and a lot of the stuff I did like did not come until near the end of the game when a large part of my opinion had already been formed.

My main problem with Kyoko though is she feels like she hampers pretty much everything else in the first game. Kyoko by necessity needs to be this super genius because of her ultimate ability, so it is always she that is figuring things out. Because of this, the entirety of the cast in the first game comes off like bumbling morons outside of a couple of characters. I felt like they wrote themselves into a corner by throwing the Ultimate Detective into the game and having her live to the end. It would be like if one of the characters in this cast was Sherlock Holmes, and because of who they are you need them to be like two steps ahead of everyone else so their character fits. It makes sense for her character for her to always be like hey you can figure this out Makoto you already have all the clues, but it doesnt make her a particularly fun character. I actually thinks Kyoko makes the rest of the cast worse just by her being around. The writers always need to figure out some way for Kyoko to be the smartest person in the room, and there are so many times she gets in the way of the game.

In a way, Kyoko is what takes place of the confirm and logic drive mechanics from the second game. They hadnt thought of that yet, so instead Kyoko just serves as an exposition drop in a lot of the cases. Rather than having us figure things out, Kyoko pops up once or twice a case to just spoil things. Theres a part in the third case where she just up and says what if Hifumi wasnt actually dead. Now, this is something I myself had figured out way earlier, but it wasnt something Makoto had figured out in game. And, instead of having him figure it out, Kyoko just rushes in and shoves him to the side so she can scream it at everyone who is listening. She does this in basically every single case (except chapter 5, I suppose) in the entire game, and it honestly gets annoying after a while. Shes like this Mary Sue that is great at everything and just keeps giving us the answers to things that wouldve been more fun to have been figured out.

Im also not a huge fan of her personality. I think possibly as a nod to Sherlock Holmes (or at least the old movie versions of Sherlock Holmes) she comes off as relatively personalityless. Shes kind of emotionless, this crime solving robot that doesnt seem to have any interest in things that arent related to murder cases. She does have little scenes where she shows some spark, so it isnt as though she is totally bland, but even outside of trials a lot of time she feels like exposition, the character. Shes there to tell you things in a very matter of fact way and chew bubblegum, and shes all out of bubblegum because it is made out of erythitol, xylitol, maltitol, isomalt, fructose, and ten other things she will slowly list off to you. It is strange she is an end game character, and yet I had absolutely no free time events done with her until I was in the post-game mode. I just wasnt particularly interested in what she had to say. I was assuming it would be something bland and passionless, and there were so many other characters Id rather hear from. Even characters I thought I hated, because at least that is some sort of emotional response rather than the dull dialogue Id get out of Kyoko.

There are also a couple of story related events I want to briefly go over to help support my Kyoko is more annoying than fun thesis. The first, and I admit this is petty, is the hissy fit she throws when you dont tell her about Sakura right away. She has spent the entire game holding secrets and being mysterious and the first time Makoto has a secret, she goes into high school scorned girlfriend mode and starts giving Makoto the silent treatment. Hes even like I just need to confirm something please wait because he is being a good person and doesnt want to out Sakura unintentionally, and Kyoko reacts like no greater indignity has ever befallen anyone in the history of ever. She spends most of the chapter sulking and refusing to talk to Makoto. Kyoko, I dont have time to deal with this shit right now. People are getting MURDERED and I cannot deal with high school relationship level drama. I expected lots of stuff in this game, but Kyoko pouting in the corner and posting passive aggressive Facebook statuses was not one of them.

But that isnt really what Im still irked about. No, what Kyoko needs to answer for is GETTING MAKOTO MURDERED OUT OF SELFISHNESS. Ok, I understand that there is more to it than just that and there is a certain sense of self preservation going on since Byakuya is being is usual overconfident self without knowing what the hell is going on. But still, the trial in chapter 5 (if you get the true ending) is Makoto basically going we should believe in Kyoko and Kyoko going yeah but maybe Makoto though. I know shes stalling for time because she hasnt figured out the case, but that doesnt change the fact she gets Makoto straight up murdered. She has no clue Alter Ego is going to show up to hero ball the whole thing, so she has to know that what she is doing risks getting Makoto killed. Monokuma ending things early obviously threw a wrench in her plans, which I might be more forgiving of if the end result was not a Makoto pancake. She couldve been honest with what was going on and where she was and why she and Makoto both have an alibi for part of the night, but she goes the be mysterious and vaguely hint hey it could be Makoto route of things which IS NOT COOL KYOKO MAKOTO DOESNT WANT TO DIE EITHER. Her reasoning is basically hey if I die we wont figure anything out which is 1) vain as hell and 2) probably true because everyone else drank the idiot juice to make Kyoko seem even smarter in comparison. But still, she has the choice of being honest and putting herself in more danger or trying to stall and putting Makoto in more danger, and she picks the latter and doesnt look back.

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With all that being said though, there are plenty of things I did like about Kyoko. I particularly appreciated Chapter 6 Kyoko, even if I was still mildly miffed she almost got me killed. The scenes where she is trying to piece together what is going on with her dad were great and they do explain her cold personality for most of the game a bit more. Basically any time Kyoko lets some cracks through and she shows some emotion, it works out well. And I also did appreciate her in comparison to Byakuya. While I didnt like the way the game used her and how she was just handing out solutions all the time, the one exception I was willing to make was whenever she was dunking on Byakuya during one of the trials. She has the sort of intelligence Byakuya thinks he has so whenever she is able to throw it in his face a little bit it would warm the cockles of my heart. Oh, and soup can on the head Kyoko might be the cutest art in either game. There are a couple of others that are close, but in terms of character sprites that has to be one of my favorites. It almost made up for the fact I was down in the garbage because of her in the first place.

I know this is probably much lower for Kyoko than most lists, but I just cant bump her up any higher in spite of the stuff I liked. This is the more good than bad tier, and thats absolutely where she slots in for me. She is another one that would be at least one tier up if they had made a little change, and I would guess that if the game had the mechanics of the second game, they wouldnt have been in such a box when writing here character. She always felt like a crutch to me. The writers didnt know how to work something into the gameplay, so it would be eh just have Kyoko tell everyone. Thats really why she places so low for me, and Id be more willing to overlook some annoying character choices in some of the cases and the low points of her personality if it wasnt for this. Im not going to argue with someone who likes Kyoko because with her I definitely at least see the appeal. She just wasnt someone I was a huge fan of. Sorry Kyoko stans.

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Anagaram posted...

Suprak, you do realize he's the Ultimate Affluent Progeny, and not the Ultimate Affluent Prodigy, right?

i didn't realize this and i've been a danganronpa fan for years

okay "fan" is too big a word. i reluctantly play them and sometimes enjoy them.

i'm not sure exactly what could bring someone to resonate with kyoko, tbh. one of life's mysteries.

Kyoko isn't great (I forgot her name and referred to her as Boring Girl until about chapter five) but I think she's a little bit better than you ranked her and has good free time events compared to most of the others in DR1 especially

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*lowers pitchfork*

Oh, okay...that makes sense...

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Kyoko is fine

she mostly shines by being one of the only not-terrible characters at the end of the first game. They let all of the dumbest characters survive until the end, and also Kyoko (and yes, as much as I love Hina, she's a dummy)

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the mind boggles. valid complaints sure but looking at the characters still on the table I just don't get it

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Yeah, I'm definitely not as big a fan of Kyoko as most people are. She gets really petty and uptight for no reason a lot.

#31 out of the first two games is still very low to me, though.

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Gasp

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