Forum - View topicANNCast - Danganronpa Deep Dive
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justsomeaccount
 Posts: 471 |
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Uoh, Oren! That's interesting.
Welp, to sum up quick my opinions (note, in keeping with the rules of the podcast, there will be V3 Spoilers unmarked), I like the franchise well enough, liking the 1st one, really liking the 2nd, thinking "eh" and "bleh!" from DR3 and Ultra Despair Girls respectively (for opposite reasons too: DR3 I liked the journey but didn't like the destination, UDR the opposite), and V3 I am still not sure what I think of it, I have very mixed opinions, but if I had to say I'd say I like it like the 1st one. My biggest grab for the 2nd honestly is that while the character archetipes are much more eccentric and unique, they're also way more relatable and human, in the way they interact with one another mostly, which makes its plot, while a little shakier, much more enjoyable than the 1st for me, which had a better structured plot but less compelling characters. In fact, I'll defend Hajime from the beginning, his pessimistic but more direct approach was very refreshing and relatable, and his interactions with the other characters are way better that I found him compelling even from the beggining, same with later, which is why he's still my favorite main character (Shuichi is easily the 2nd though. I don't care for Makoto and Komaru the same except the final chapter gives her some favors at least). I'm also one of the persons who really don't care and got into Junko, in the first game she called my attention in an eccentric sort of way but nothing special (she felt very gimmicky to me), and afterwards she got old quickly for me and is not even special in my mind (hell, I think I like the mastermind from V3 more than her, and she's not even an independent villain but a representant). But anyway, I'm mixed about V3's ending, I expected some of the meta twists while playing (the initial scene is telling) but not that it went THAT far straight right into directly condemning its audience. It may be because of different demographies I've run into but I've never found people in the Danganronpa fandom in the way the game portrayed them, the fanbase I found has always been very dedicated to the characters that already exist and loving them beyond the game lifespan (which yes, affects the way they relate to fiction games beyond "now I feel more hopeful/despaired!" *throws it away*), instead of treating the characters in a "use and throw" kind of way. I've seen other kind of death-game trashy works like that (which by the way I can enjoy too) and I could find it more accurate if they were like other fandoms, but not this franchise in specific. I think the "hope" addiction and mindless consumerism can be accurate, but the rest feels too divorced from my experience, so I completely get why so many fans are angry about this conclusion like an unfair attack on them, and I don't think those fans are in any way what the game accuses them to be. It's also kind of the problem with SUCH an explicit meta message, if it was a little toned down maybe it could have given food for thought without SO DIRECTLY confronting the audience in a way I think it's unfair. It's interesting and ballsy, sure, and I guess Kodaka has a probably more accurate perspective on its fandom than me, but it's too much, too explicit and too meta that it's unnerving (it kinda makes me tired of meta stories in general for a long while), even if part of me respects the guts, the message/exploration about lies/truths and the fact that this choice was actually approved and realized for such a succesful franchise. So I'm very conflicted about it, but it definitely doesn't let you indifferent, that's for sure. |
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GhostStalkerSA
 Posts: 425 Location: NYC |
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Huh, this the second time I've heard orenronen's voice, the first being an Interview Dumptruck he did with Patrick Klepek when he was still with Giant Bomb in like 2015.
Count me in as one of the people who got into Danganronpa from his SA LP. Actually having an account made following that thread a lot easier, though I still can't imagine the absolute amount of work it took slowbeef to moderate that thread. What with people trying to share accounts, teenagers paying their :10bux: with their parents' credit cards but not lurking before posting and getting probated for breaking rules all over the place because they didn't realize that SA was not tumblr, some skeevy fan art being posted in thread by said new accounts, the sheer amount of bitching on tumblrs following the LP whenever Lowtax put the paywall back up and their salty tears feeding the goons in thread, etc. Got used to orenronen's translations of the game (Super High School Level and all that, Genocider Syo, plus their titles and not shortening names like NISA did to some in the first game), and remember laughing hard alongside the rest of the thread at some of the titles that fan translation he mentioned came up with (Luckster? One-percenter for Mondo? Oracle? WTF). Never could get used to the usage of "Ultimate" that they went with instead. One of the biggest things I remember about that LP thread was in the first couple of pages right after all the characters were introduced, and someone twigged onto the fact that there was something not quite right about Mukuro as Junko, based off of her facial expression or whatever. And then she died soon after when Monokuma was introduced. Soon after, a meme was born in thread calling Junko the mastermind, complete with Hagakure in the Ancient Aliens professor pose, the text "JUNKOS" out front. imagine our surprise when that meme came back in full force during Case 6. It's a shame that he and Fedule abandoned their LP of DR2 when it was announced that it was getting an official release, since the two of them put so much damn effort into it. I think HappyWinter also helped them touch up some of the text in the game art so that it would make more sense to English readers, like with the end of the arcade game that led to the murder in Case 2. Then again, I also remember a guy who apparently judged the hell out of Akane because of her outfit choice in her intro and called her a slut or something, eating a probation for that real quick. DR really did bring out some of the worst in goons and people joining just for the LP, so much so that it became a joke pretty damn quickly. Godspeed slowbeef... Never got much further than DR2, when the tumblr hordes were going crazy for the game after the official release was announced. Maybe I should look into the rest of the series now, I guess. |
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BodaciousSpacePirate
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Orenronen and Slowbeef are taking part in a "Visual Novel Book Club" of Danganronpa V3 on Slowbeef's YouTube channel, so if your entry point to Danganronpa was the SA LP, their current stuff might be a great way to get back up to speed. |
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Roxas4ever
 Posts: 152 |
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Structuring the podcast the way you did was brilliant. It allows those of us who haven't finished all of the content that is out to participate in the conversation without being spoiled. So kudos for that!
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Sports_Medicine
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I really liked V3 to me it has the best game play and most ambitious story but DR2 still remains my favorite game in the series for having the strongest overall cast, more emotionally engaging moments, and the most difficult murder trials (cases four, five, and two of the second game are my favorites in the series).
Jacob's opinion's on each entry of the series seem to pretty much mirror 99% of my own even down to some of the smaller details such as finding the 2nd trial of the 3rd game to be our least favorite overall or our thoughts on the spinoffs. Speaking of spinoffs I have to agree with Oren that it's shame that Zero never received an official translation because not having read it causes people to completely misunderstand Junko's character, since that was the only place that is unfortunately the only place to really shed light on what Junko is really like on the inside; DR1, DR2, and the Despair arc focus on Junko purely as the mastermind of the killing school life, killing school trip, and the tragedy respectively. As a mastermind Junko pretends to be a sociopath that was born into despair and serves as a living embodiment of it without any positive feeling or emotional attachments but as we see that this simply isn't true. The side of her that lusts for despair is definitely and obviously real but it's only a part of who she is and if anything she is a living embodiment of contradiction. To this point it's actually very fitting that Monokuma serves as her avatar during the killing games because he's half black and half white (even though that's not what Kodaka meant for those colors to represent in the game). I'm paraphrasing a bit from a character analysis I wrote before but I think the first step to understanding Junko is the remember that in the Danganronpa universe amnesia doesn't change who a person is fundamentally but rather resets them to an earlier state so Ryoko is neither an alter ego as with Hajime and Izuru nor is she putting on a facade put rather it represents what she was like before she became ultimate despair (similar to the class 77 after being put in the hope restoration program). The fact that she was able to predict Ryoko's thoughts and actions beforehand and script entire scenario's around that means that she realizes that to be a part of her deep down. This was also part of the reason that I theorized that Junko could not have been born as a despair but rather became that way because of her talent (which was validated a year later when DR3 came out). Now since Ryoko merely represents Junko at an earlier state and since amnesia doesn't change a person's personality you would think she would act the somewhat similar to the Junko we know but not only is she different she's almost the direct opposite in many ways which brings to light many interesting contradictions in Junko's character. The biggest and most obvious one is their attitudes towards despair; while Junko actively embraces and seeks out despair with a single-minded obsessiveness, Ryoko actively avoids and denies anything that might even have the slightest potential of causing her despair often choosing to go into complete cognitive dissonance by using her amnesia to shield herself. Her entire "it has nothing to do with me" strategy is built around the fact that she is completely unable and unwilling to deal with anything despair inducing. The other big one is her reaction towards death and violence; on one hand Junko made a reserve course student cut his own head off with a saw just to prove a point and is most known for gleefully executing numerous students during the mutual killing games. Ryoko however doesn't deal with death or violence well at all; she completely freaks out when she finds a dead body, perhaps to an even greater extent than others that have been in the same situation, and even after she's forgotten about it reading about it in her diary causes her to panic again. An even better example exists towards the end of volume two when Ryoko is given a chance to kill the Madarai brothers with a strong motive to do so but not only can she not bring herself to do it she actually breaks down and starts crying at the idea. Yeah the same Junko that forced students to kill each other in the mutual killing games breaks down in a hysterical fit of tears at the thought of being forced to kill someone in order to save the one she loves. Even Mukuro was surprised at this and had to go off script in order to proceed. This to me heavily suggests that Junko is someone that inherently despises violence and despair possibly more than anyone else in the series but because her talent causes her a extreme degree of boredom which only seems to get worse over time and despair is the only thing that seems to cure it she came to crave it more and more until it warped her mind completely. Her Ultimate Analyst ability is described as a brain intensive talent so it's likely that her brain became messed up similar to what the despair video did to the DR2 cast. This actually fits in with a theme of DR which is that great talent can be both a gift and a curse; Junko is by far the most naturally talented person in the series especially since she can add the talents of other Ultimates to her talent, this would seem like a great gift but it comes with a curse of boredom that for her can only be cured with something as chaotic as despair. The Kamakura project aside Junko had the most potential to become the world's hope but tragically instead became the opposite. The person that hates despair but due to their talent became the living embodiment of it. I also noticed some other contradictions of character between Junko and Ryoko though not as significant. Junko and Monokuma both act really perverted and make frequent flirtatious or sexual comments towards or about others but when Ryoko is on the receiving end of this from Kamishiro we see that she is very uncomfortable and annoyed with being aggressively flirted with or from hearing sexual innuendo and sexual dialogue. Her sense of modesty is also different because when she first sees Mukuro who is disguised as herself she thinks that her skirt is too short, she's revealing way too much cleavage, and the overall outfit is tacky and ostentatious. The outfit in question is of course her signature look so that's quite a surprise to see her say that about her own style and as Ryoko she chooses to dress more conservatively. For her part Junko seems to hate her appearance as Ryoko which is hinted at being closer to her normal appearance without makeup, hair dye, and the gyaru fashion sense. This could possibly hint a self esteem issue on her part and young Junko does in fact refer to her self as being ugly but that aside there's no question that Ryoko and Junko don't see eye to eye in this regard which is yet another contradiction between them. That's not even getting into the fact that Junko's ultimate title is as a stereotypical gyaru while she is in fact a hardcore otaku, possibly even bigger than Yamada, which is as far apart of a social image disparity that I can think of. The last thing I noticed which isn't a contradiction but rather a fun reversal of circumstance but Junko incessantly insults and mocks Mukuro and Monokuma does it for all the students as well but in Zero Junko is the one constantly being insulted and mocked by others most notably by Matsuda who is pretty harsh towards her but even Mukuro disguised as Junko insults and bullies her sister (though she was only following the script). Unlike during the mutual killing game Mukuro does really well impersonating her sister to point that it was initially hard for me to tell which appearances were her in disguised and which were the real Junko that had regained her memories, I was really impressed. I think the last chapter of Zero after she regains her memories, shows the internal contradiction of Junko better than anything else. The part of her that craves despair was ecstatic at the horrible things she'd done and usually this is the only part of her we see but in Zero the more human part of her is shown to be emotional devastated by her actions and filled with extreme regret, grief, and self hatred. Despite being the only character from the 78th class that you can't do a free time event with and not receiving any real character focus, Zero makes her one of the most complicated and interesting characters for me. If one character was so much in love with someone that even a combination of anterrograde and retrograde amnesia couldn't erase their feelings, you wouldn't think Junko would be that person. Other than Junko my other favorite characters are Fujisaki and Asahina from DR1, Hajime, Ibuki and Chiaki from DR2, and Kaede, Himiko, and Shuichi from V3. Even though there won't be any more killing games I at least want an AU slice of life anime based of the interactions in the talent development plan, it can't be worse than the future arc from last year at least. |
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orenronen
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That would be HelloWinter, who's still awesome. I really regret not being able to finish the SDR2 translation. My DR translation is awkward, but, mostly thanks to Fedule's editing, I really enjoyed the stuff we did on SDR2.
I was only on the first episode (and I'd like to be on the last when that happens), but the rest are going to be just the regular VNBC crew. But it's a fun podcast and you should definitely listen to it if you've played the game (or playing along with them), and like hearing people talking about it! |
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ThatGuyWhoLikesThings
Posts: 1031 |
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My thoughts on each entry can be described as such.
Danganronpa 1 - Hasn't held up quite as well as 2 in my opinion, but still a mostly remarkable game with a number of strong moments. Characters aren't as eccentric, over the top, and thus memorable as later casts but that can certainly help make them much more relatable, which is a strength in and of itself. Probably the weakest point are the individual mysteries. 1, 2 and 3 are kind of a joke from a mystery standpoint. The ultimate solution to Case 4 is easy to see coming in my opinion, but all the individual motivations behind the scenes are effective and unpredictable and the emotional fallout of it is still incredibly strong even to this day that I still think it's a case that works extremely well and can be considered one of the best. Fave characters: Chihiro, Sakura Least fave: Leon, Hagakure Danganronpa 2 - Generally regarded as the pinnacle of the series. Not sure I would quite agree anymore, but just about all of the praise is well-deserved. If DR3 didn't exist and destroy what made this game's cast work so incredibly well I would argue it had the strongest set of characters even including V3, but alas, not everything works out. Probably the best individual cases in the series, with 3 being the weakest link but not being outright bad. 4 and 5 are some of the best mysteries I've seen in fiction (although admittedly that is a limited selection), with 5 in particular earning every bit of praise and raw vitriol that it gets. Fave characters: Mahiru, Gundam Least Faves: Teruteru, Akane Ultra Despair Girls - I...kinda don't have much to say about this one tbh. Other than I think Komaru and Toko have the single best relationship in the franchise, possibly? The kids were effective villains I guess, Monaca I actually prefer as a villain in some respects than even Junko, but I think some of their trauma felt a bit too heavy-handed? Not that Danganronpa is known for subtlety, but it just felt stretched here a bit? Hard to really explain. Komaru is probably my favorite protag in the series. I love her development, and I love that her development in itself plays into the mastermind's plot, which isn't really a kind of ploy you see a villain often make? Kinda genius. Fave Characters: Komaru, Monaca Least faves: Haiji, Kurokuma Danganronpa 3 - So much wasted potential that I can't muster anything for this series other than utter contempt. A seemingly cool new cast of characters that either lack any sort of actual character whatsoever (half of them), end their "arcs" on a total wet fart (Mitarai, Munakata), or have their arcs just totally cut down (still mad about Andou's death). An ugly and drab color palette in Future Arc. Insulting retcon after insulting retcon in Despair Arc. The DR2 characters being reduced to one-note caricatures and being brushed to the side in favor of The Junko Show Guest Starring Mukuro and Mitarai. Every second of the last two episodes. I've ranted about this trashfire for months now and not an ounce of my disgust for it has waned even slightly, that's how much I hate it, so I'll leave it all there. Favorite Characters: Andou Least Fave: I'll be honest I can't bring myself to care about most of them, but the ones I flat-out hate are Tengan and Mitarai Danganronpa V3 - I'm...still gathering my thoughts on this tbh so for fear of sounding jumbled and messy I won't go into this like the others, but I will say this definitely has my favorite set of characters. While they're certainly more outlandish compared to prior characters, for good reason, I still feel a number of them have this very human center to them? Not as consistently as maybe 1 or especially 2, but I feel a good half of them if you dig a little deep there's certainly more underneath there than their eccentricities would indicate. Kokichi is most obvious case of this, but I think even Gonta, Angie, Himiko (I don't think she's even half as chuuni as the likes of Gundam), even Korekiyo(he's definitely a psychopath but he's an interesting psychopath) are further examples, in spite of how incredibly...incredible...they are. The individual mysteries are mostly solid, I think 2 and 4 spend a little too much time on things that should be a little obvious, but I love that 3 makes you think it's gonna throw a curve ball at you several times, but it ends up being exactly what you would expect? Until the motive anyway. Definitely one of the stranger chapters in the series. In regards to the protag fake-out, while Kaede was an engaging character, I do think Shuichi was just a far better fit for the story V3 turned out to be. With Kaede, you'd...kind of have to change it significantly. Fave Characters: Himiko, Kokichi Least Fave: Kirumi, Rantaro (I actually like him but I really couldn't think of anyone else lol) V3's ending - Yes there needs to be a separate section for this but this will be very disorganized lol. I think this ending does largely succeed at landing the impact that it obviously wanted to, and I love that Kodaka seemingly predicted every single major complaint people may have had on the game with that final Argument Armament. The criticisms that it acknowledging that it's fiction somehow invalidates not only the game but the series as a whole ring hollow when not only does the game call attention to this point, if anything it argues the opposite. I love how the epilogue also calls into question the validity of nearly everything that was revealed over the past few hours, which I just think is another extension of the overarching dichotomy of truth/reality and lies/fiction presented throughout the game. There's certainly a clusterfuck of evidence throughout the game that could support either conclusion which I think is a bit of a brilliant move on Kodaka's part but could easily go very, very wrong if there's ever any kind of follow-up to this. If I wanted to see any more from this universe, I will admit my curiosity in regards to Danganronpa 52 and how that played out? But we also kinda more or less know it ended, so that's the only problem with that. |
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championferret
 Posts: 765 |
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The episode wont play for me in a browser, and when I try to use it via my phones podcast feature it says its 'currently unavailable'?
EDIT: Never mind, it's working again. It was a good episode! I always like hearing Oren's opinions and insight on things. I was also one of the people who got into it from his LP (although I only discovered it when he had just started the second game.) I was living in Japan at the time and heard about the LP, and I read a little bit of it and went straight out to buy it. My Japanese wasnt as strong back then so I was actually using the LP as a translation guide - playing ahead with the game and then checking the LP to check the parts I wasn't sure about. Since the second LP never finished and I absoluted hated this one other fan translation floating around tumblr, I decided to see if I could play the whole game with only my dictionary helping me occasionally - which was the first time I'd done that with a Japanese game. I feel somewhat indebted to Dangan Ronpa for helping me with my Japanese reading comprehension. I was able to play all of Ultra Despair Girls and V3 with no help at all. I'll always be thankful to Oren for introducing me to all this and for playing a role in kicking me into playing Japanese games on my own without the training wheels. Last edited by championferret on Mon Oct 23, 2017 7:58 am; edited 2 times in total |
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GhostStalkerSA
Posts: 425 Location: NYC |
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Whoops, my bad. And yeah, you guys really did put in a ton of work on that thing. Also hey orenronen, nice to see you here. And I might look up the VNBC thing with slowbeef, thanks for bringing it to my attention. |
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AuraShadow
 Posts: 242 Location: Texas |
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I "finished" the game about two weeks after release (I got to last rhythm section and at that point it was 2am and I was too exhausted and shocked from the truth to keep playing) So I watched the last 30 mins or so of the game on youtube, ranted to a series of fans and non fans in my life to absorb everything and last night I FINALLY worked up the mental energy to finish.
I 100% agree with the assessment of this ending being emotional layers you have to work through and that being a mark of strong story telling. It also frustrates me how many people (especially on reddit) are talking about what could happen in a hypothetical next game. Kodaka more or less made it very clear that this is it. Honestly where from here could the story go if the very nature of the story has been left with a giant question mark? Others have shown me interviews where Kodaka said this isn't true to refute my view but I still firmly believe that we are the audience of the game that is revealed and we are the ones being told to no longer desire this battle between hope and despair and want more of these killing games. In my view he has shown us, the player, a mirror, to look at ourselves, as well as himself as the creator feeding our need; literally breaking of the 4th wall for us to see this point. No one likes to be told a truth about themselves and the fandom has responded in a way that shows to me that the point was completely missed. It's ok to admit, as long time fans, that we are all a little messed up in the head for liking something like this. It is also ok to accept that we enjoyed and but understand that at some point it has to end. I would be MORE than ok with this being the end of Danganropna as a franchise but that DOESN'T mean the end of Kodaka. I REALLY hope (no pun intended) he is creating a new series. He is one of the most talented writers out there and if he puts his skills into another project I'm sure it would shine. We, as fans, should want more from him regardless if it has a Monokuma in it or not. He took us on a HELL of a ride and I'm more than happy to see what new one he constructs next. |
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Covnam
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I'm not caught up, so I won't be listening for quite a while, but I'm saving this episode now for future enjoyment
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cloud8100
Posts: 550 |
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The thing with the ending is that it's completely open to interpretation. I highly disagree with it being the end. The ending does not represent us as a fandom in any way because there's a distinct difference between the viewers on the game and us. That being, the players of the game had been real people. How people even associate that kind of viewership with themselves and believe it's talking about them is beyond me. I believe it was something of a lesson to not go too far into that kind of world but that's all. The ending is very open so I believe there is plenty of room for a sequel the same way the first game was open ended and gave us Danganronpa 2 which turned out to be tonnes better then the first. That's why I believe there is potential for another game that may even be better then V3 as well if done right. On another note, I especially love the way chapter 6 was done in terms of going against hope and despair. All the unanswered questions put me off somewhat but seeing all the discussions have been pretty interesting. I believe this one had the strongest characters so far in the series and Shuichi had the best development of the protagonists. |
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