Karifean's Blog of Visual Novels

It's been a while since I've been this hyped for a game release! So let's churn out this post quickly so I can get back to playing...

The story begins as our new protagonist, Hajime Hinata, enters Hope's Peak Academy for the first time as a freshman. Unfortunately that's where his memory cuts off and the next thing he remembers is entering a classroom where he finds his fellow classmates. 15 other "ultimates" chosen to attend the school.

Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair has a very literal title as in this game, we say goodbye to despair. Our class teacher this time around is the cuddly rabbit Usami and she makes it clear from the start that she wants to support everybody as they get along fine!

And to start with, she takes us all on a school trip together!

Whoa! Turns out there must've been quite a bit a time skip between our arrival at the school and when we enter the classroom.

What's with the pessimism? Of course not! No killing games this time around! This is a fun fun happy school trip!

The opening movie makes it clear this is nowhere the kind of despair-filled mess the first game was:

So our first point of order is to get to know everyone else. For now I'll just talk about the two characters that, of course, immediately stand out above the others for anyone who's played the first game.

Nagito Komaeda (totally not an anagram) here is the Ultimate Lucky Student this time around. As if his look wasn't reminiscent of Makoto enough already. He's a really helpful guy who follows you around for the majority of the chapter, giving extra information when necessary.

This is the guy that gets hyped up the most in discussion about this game, and having finished Chapter 1 by now, I can definitely imagine him ending up as my favorite character as well. We'll see where it goes.

The other one is this guy.

...



So this is the all-new Byakuya Togami, an actual returning character from the first game. His attitude is pretty much the same as before except he comes off as a lot more likable this time around.

As for the rest of the cast, they're all unfamiliar faces.

Here's a list of them.

Maybe I should be commenting on all of them, but I may or may not be wanting to get back to playing as quickly as possible =P

So anyways after we've walked all over the islands and gotten to know every single one of them, we are then told to gather at the beach by Usami. She brought us all swimsuits. It's time to go swimming!

What a wonderful school trip. Nothing could possibly go wrong here.

...well that's not good. And things only go downhill from here as he makes his appearance...

Monokuma is back in all his monochrome glory. He asserts that a school trip where everyone gets along and is all hopeful is BORING and moves to replace the program with something more enjoyable.

Well I don't think I need to say where this is going.

And after making an example out of Usami (whom he changes to match his own appearance more, calling her "Monomi") everyone is left with the same despair as the students from Danganronpa the first.

Cue the real opening of this game.

Now I've already played through the first chapter of the game, but in the interest of preventing spoilers I won't go into detail about what happens. But I will say what I thought about it.

Right now, I'm hooked. What really sold me on this game was the first trial which I've completed less than an hour ago and really caught me off guard. The mystery was overall more complex than anything in the first game, and I don't regret one bit setting the Logic Level to "Mean" this time. Some of the characters really started to shine during the trial and I'm looking forward to get to know some of them during Free Time events, something I could rarely say about any particular Danganronpa 1 character.

Can't say the island setting feels nearly as oppressive as the locked in the school setting, but the overall group dynamic makes up for that. The music is a mixture of returning tracks as well as new compositions which comes as no surprise and works pretty nicely for this game, especially since so far the sound direction has been great. Not that presentation was ever one of Danganronpa's weaknesses =P

If there's just one complaint I have it's with the gameplay. Again. First off I'm not too hyped about doing the whole Pet minigame thing, but eh, doesn't seem like it'll be much effort. What's more annoying is the class trial minigames, specifically Hangman's Gambit which went from pointless to oh my god when will it end. The words are longer, letters take longer to appear and the game is overall more complex which is not a good thing here. Nonstop Debates are pretty much the same as always, Bullet Time Battles got an overhaul but nothing too game-changing, and there's a new thing called Rebuttal Showdown which was rather confusing at first and at this point I just hope they won't become too intrusive =P I know there's at least one more new minigame but it hasn't come up in this first trial.

So now if you'll excuse me I have to grab some food and then continue playing. See you~!