Nope, only 1 and 2. I'll need to look into those
Btw have you read DR0 or IF (Edit: I ended up reading IF right after writing this message =P) and if so what did you think of them and should I read them as well? :P
>the twist being that there is no twist is a great if done well Agreed >which I think it was here Disagreed is what it is in a nutshell =P I do get what you mean with defying expectations set by the predecessor though, I had that same experience with a certain other visual novel I may or may not have already given the highest recommendation I could give. I really liked how it built upon its much more blindly idealistic and shounen-esque spiritual predecessor and slowly tore down its unrealistic idealism (without getting all cynical in the process =P), and also how it literally has characters laughing at how ridiculous some of its twists were. Which hit all too close to home because at that point having it be basically a repeat of the predecessor's reveals was my best theory
To put it more simply - the twist being that there is no twist is a great if done well, which I think it was here
I just like how the game goes about twists - from an outside angle, making it something completely different, rather than something that would play into an expected resolution. The impostor reveal didn't disappoint me simply because I thought it was incredibly original that something so intriguing is just played as something so minor, especially since that was actually the impostor's M.O. - he was completely unremarkable on his own, so no one really knew who he was. But yeah, we all take in media differently and that's awesome
This was quite interesting for me to read through, as none of these I consciously picked up on, some in fact I interpreted quite differently. Monokuma rehashing the twist was to me Monokuma addressing the elephant in the room that everyone's thinking might be a thing again this game, precluding it from being a twist and instead just making it part of the setting from the beginning. In that sense of course it's a fun undercutting of the first game (cue screenshot of Monokuma saying "only a hack would keep that sort of twist hidden until the end") but nothing you really miss out on if you just play the second. The first victim I'd say played more into my expectations rather than defying them since having a 'capable leader' around massively brightens the atmosphere for all characters and in reverse losing him heavily dampens it so I rather expected him to get offed early on. And seeing the impostor have so little a role was more of a disappointment than anything And as for that final bit, I felt it could go either way and wasn't all that surprised that person got killed. Just goes to show we engaged in these games quite a bit differently ^^
Well, the first thing is Monokuma stating that they all lost their memories of their time together at school. The player is lead to think that it's impossible - rehashing the big plot twist from the first game would be so lame. But they do just that, except it makes sense in the context of the universe and makes total sense as it's not played up in the slightest. The we have the first victim - in both games its someone that's built up to be incredibly important for the rest of the game, but that completely changes once they bite it. Additionally, the impostor was built up even more as it was a returning character, but not only is that expectation defied by him playing no role, even the "big reveal" that he's an impostor and not Byakuya is just hand waved instead of being the big deal you'd expect him to be, as he's one of the most important players in the first game. Then there's the suicide you'd expect but this time around, the cuisine victim isn't labeled the killer because of a technicality where this isn't actually a suicide, and your Kirigiri stand-in that you'd expect to stay with you till the end, just like Kyoko, dies after that penultimate case. There's more examples on TV tropes but those are the ones that I remember standing out the most, atm
I'd actually like if you went into more detail as to what things you're referring to in particular with that^^ I never had the explicit feeling that DR2 in its construction and writing specifically played on your knowledge and familiarity with the first game.
Still, I don't think the experience would be complete, because you are still expected to pick up on them. Which is what I meant about going on the meta level and subverting expectations - you expect certain things to go a certain way not just because you're aware of certain tropes, but because analogous events happened in the last game.
Well those same things are hinted at across DR2 just as well, aren't they?
