I Unfairly Pulverise The Competition In Asshole Pageants.

[rionaleonhart]

My laptop was on its last legs, so, alas, I've had to replace it. My new laptop is tiny and silver and pissed me off in numerous different ways the moment we met, so I've named it Joshua after the unbearable Joshua Kiryu of The World Ends with You.

This naming was actually a great decision. I love Joshua Kiryu, even though he's the worst, so my laptop now inspires a sort of fondness when it displays the obnoxiousness of its namesake, rather than just rage.

Speaking of The World Ends with You: a sequel's been announced! I'm so excited! It's been thirteen years since the original; I'd given up hope! The original is still one of my all-time favourite games; it's fun, it's stylish and it's got some fascinating character dynamics. I'm looking forward to returning to Shibuya.


In my search for something to follow up Persona 5, I wandered into replaying the first Danganronpa game. It's interesting to revisit it!

I've just finished replaying the second case; there are spoilers up to that point below the cut.



The 11037 clue may be too easy, and Kirigiri holds our hand too much at points, but I still think the first case is a very strong case. Poor Naegi, slowly realising that the victim he cared so much about was planning to commit murder and frame him for it.

I really like that Kirigiri tells Naegi he can move past this after the first trial, and Naegi refuses. He's going to survive these deaths, but he's not going to move past them; they're a part of him now.

I still love Mondo. He's got some very serious faults, but he cares about other people. My weakness for angry, surprisingly softhearted characters who make relentlessly terrible decisions rears its head once again. (See also: Karkat, Kuzuryuu, Dr Cox, Lightning, Tariq.)

I keep finding Mondo and Chihiro hanging out together in free time and going 'aww, that's cute' and then remembering one of them is going to murder the other. These poor doomed kids.

(I notice I've written Naegi and Kirigiri, but Mondo and Chihiro. I'm very inconsistent in whether I refer to the first game's characters by given name or family name.)

You know, across the entire Danganronpa trilogy, I only ship two victims with their killers, and I'm mildly surprised by this.

Ishimaru's such a good kid. Absolutely tactless, but he's so passionate and genuine in his desire to prevent murders. His 'let's build bonds with each other by eating together every morning' idea was an excellent one, and his suggestion to reveal all their secrets to each other really could have prevented the second murder if people had gone along with it.

Mondo reacts with extreme shock on seeing Chihiro's body, which, you know, makes a lot of sense. He's the one who killed Chihiro, but he's just discovered that someone else came along afterwards, discovered the body and went 'lol, I'm going to crucify this corpse and write a message in blood on the wall, what fun'.

I've never been sure of how much I like Togami, but I think I've warmed up to what a colossal arrogant arsehole he is. It possibly helps that he reminds me a tiny bit of Light Yagami, although Light's better at putting on a socially acceptable façade.

I've also never been particularly into Naegi/Togami, but I'll admit that Togami's 'If you get down on your knees and beg, I might even show you myself' line does make some of the appeal apparent. He takes a real interest in Naegi, too, as soon as he registers 'this one made some strong deductions in the trial and is also easily led; he may be useful'.

The official translation of the Hangman's Gambit in the second trial is so bad. Schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder are completely different things!

Yeah, I'm enjoying Togami a lot this time around. He's just so arrogant and ridiculous. I love the way he's just toying with everyone in the second case for no good reason, potentially risking death for everyone, including himself.

Chihiro's story is such an odd one. It's essentially a trans guy's storyline - he's living as a girl, trying to work up the courage to start presenting as male - but in fact he's a cis guy. Trans female Chihiro is a popular interpretation within the fandom, but trans male Chihiro makes a lot more sense to me.

'Chihiro must have trusted whoever he was meeting with very much' noooooooooo

I still have a lot of emotions about this case. The idea of killing someone in a terrible, unthinking moment and instantly regretting it and trying to make it up to them in whatever tiny, inadequate ways are left to you is just so painful.

Mondo didn't try to dispose of the murder weapon. He just moved it, with the rest of the crime scene. He didn't try to remove evidence of his crime; his focus was on removing evidence of Chihiro's secret.

Of course, Mondo didn't confess. But I think, if the trial had started to draw to a close and it was clear he was going to get away with it, if it really sank in that he was going to have the deaths of everyone else on his conscience as well, he might have.

I'm not trying to claim that Mondo's actions weren't wrong. It's bad that he killed Chihiro! Obviously it's bad! It's terrible! But Mondo fascinates me because he does this awful thing and he didn't mean to. I don't think you can call it an accident, exactly, but it's a mistake, and he's in agony over it. I've got such a weakness for characters who make terrible mistakes and are overwhelmed by guilt.



It's sort of hilarious that, in the original Danganronpa, you're not playing the detective character. The detective character's already worked everything out, but she can't be bothered to spell it out for everyone, so that task falls to you. Poor Naegi.

Comments

[graveexcitement]

i've been watching a friend play DR1 for the first time, and it's been interesting! it's also been my first time fully experiencing the DR1 localization, because i read orenronen's translation on SomethingAwful back in like 2013, and when i got back into the series i skipped straight to playing DR2. so i never actually played the localization of DR1 past like, the prologue, lmao.

the 11037 clue might have been a tad harder for a japanese audience, both because it forms romanized letters and because addressing people by last name is more typical? i'm not sure how much difference it made tbh, it was still probably meant to be an easy clue because it's the Tutorial Trial, but it might not have been *quite* as easy originally?

(I notice I've written Naegi and Kirigiri, but Mondo and Chihiro. I'm very inconsistent in whether I refer to the first game's characters by given name or family name.)
same! and my name choices line up with yours for those 4 (naegi, kirigiri, mondo, chihiro), lol. the localization's nicknames def annoy me tho. and so does togami being called "byakuya." though nothing throws me off quite like komaeda being "nagito."

(tho i did write a komaeda fic recently where i used first names, including nagito, because it was for an exchange and that's what the recipient wanted.)

He takes a real interest in Naegi, too, as soon as he registers 'this one made some strong deductions in the trial and is also easily led; he may be useful'.
yes, this is part of what interests me about Togami and Naegi's interactions! god togami is such a dick, but i greatly enjoy him.

also god yeah the "Schizophrenia" hangman's gambit is terrible. it's not DID! it's completely different!

the Chihiro thing is interesting. the friend of mine who is playing DR for the first time is a trans woman, and she definitely read Chihiro as a trans girl? her main point was that "cis people don't usually see 'present as the other binary gender' as an appealing solution to their life problems" and tbh, she's not wrong about that. on the other hand, Alter Ego refers to Chihiro with male pronouns, which to me seems indicative of a preference, sooo...

yeah. it doesn't seem like a Cis Thing To Do (which i guess may be why i've also seen nonbinary Chihiro headcanons floating around), but chihiro seemed to indicate wanting to present male again and alter ego used male pronouns for chihiro... yeah. idk.

that said tho, the *way* chihiro's gender was revealed in chapter 2? super gross. instead of just explaining it, Kirigiri hints that they should check Chihiro's corpse, and Sakura inspects the body closely and then reacts with her most extremely shocked/horrified face. big, big yikes. i didn't remember how bad it was before now (prob bc in 2013 i didn't yet realize i was trans.)

Of course, Mondo didn't confess. But I think, if the trial had started to draw to a close and it was clear he was going to get away with it, if it really sank in that he was going to have the deaths of everyone else on his conscience as well, he might have.
interesting! yeah, if it had come down to it, i think he might have.

[rionaleonhart]

I've also wondered how easy the 11037 clue would be for a Japanese audience! It's an interesting question. The fact that Kirigiri outright says 'rotate it 180 degrees' does make me think it was expected to be harder than it is for an English-speaking audience, but, yes, perhaps that's just Tutorial Trial handholding.

In my head, the Danganronpa 2 characters are referred to almost entirely by surname, the Danganronpa V3 characters are referred to entirely by first name, and the first game's characters are a terrible mix of the two. It's very messy and means it can be hard to remember which names to use when writing fanfiction (particularly as I use orenronen's conventions when writing for the first two games and the official localisation's conventions when writing for V3).

god togami is such a dick, but i greatly enjoy him.

He's so much more fun than I remembered! This replay is also reminding me of my fondness for the 'tell them, Naegi' meme. Goddammit, Togami.

The way Chihiro is handled by the game is definitely a bit of a disaster. My interpretation of Chihiro is basically 'a cis male character who very strongly invites AUs in which he's a trans male character', but I can understand why people interpret him as a trans girl or as nonbinary.

[graveexcitement]

thinking about the names thing made me remember that the ship name for Ishimaru Kiyotaka/Oowada Mondo is “Ishimondo,” thus mashing up ishimaru’s family name and mondo’s first name — probably because those are the names a lot of the older fans use for them! and adding chihiro makes it “chishimondo,” which again uses chihiro’s first name

my own personal name usage falls along these lines:

First names: Chihiro, Mondo, Sakura, Celeste, Mukuro, Junko, Leon, Hifumi*, Sayaka*
Last names: Kirigiri, Togami, Naegi, Asahina, Ishimaru, Hagakure, Fukawa

*I think I used to use their last names more, but (possibly as a result of exposure to the localization) I’ve started thinking of these two more by first names. I also sometimes think of Naegi as Makoto, I think.

(Side note: I almost forgot Fukawa existed when making the above list.)

For SDR2 I did get used to a lot of the first names, except Komaeda. He is always Komaeda. For V3 I’m familiar with both sets of names. I do usually write with last names these days (tho if you look in my fic history, there’s a variety of different approaches. I at least keep it consistent within each fic, lol.)

[rionaleonhart]

This list is very similar to mine; the only ones we differ on are actually Yamada and Maizono, the ones you used to refer to by surname. (I also go back and forth between Mukuro and Ikusaba.)

I notice that both of us refer to all the survivors by surname! Possibly because they were around for longer and we were therefore exposed to their surnames more in orenronen's Let's Play.

I also sometimes think of Naegi as Makoto, I think.

I've always very much thought of him as Naegi, and then earlier today I was working on a fic and accidentally wrote 'Makoto's room' and was SHOCKED by myself. He's still Naegi to me, but apparently the official localisation's managed to creep into my brain a little!

[fishguts]

For SDR2 I did get used to a lot of the first names, except Komaeda. He is always Komaeda.

This is so interesting! For me, it’s Nagito and it’s always Nagito - unless we're not talking about the character, but the 'tumblr sexyman' meme of sorts he somehow turned into, in which case, yes, it's absolutely Komaeda. I can't use the two names interchangeably, since I find they evoke wildly different concepts.

[graveexcitement]

meme Komaeda might have influenced my thought patterns, but in the opposite direction -- it only cemented how Komaeda is never Nagito to me.