Man’s Search for M̸̡̫̗͙̟̦͖͍̣̀̀̈́̄̄̎͜ȍ̵̢̘̥͇̇͗̐̓̉͂͒͊̐̒̌̂̏̌͆͠͠n̴̢̛͎͖͖̘̪̰̞̹̠̯̓̈́̇͒̍̈̃̍̋͋͐͌̓͛̚i̴̡̝͈͉̻̫̱̬̞̟̫̥͚̗̦̤̽̓̃̍̈́̌̈́͝͝k̴̨̨͈̖̟̥̦̙͇̻̱̩̳̙͙͈͔͌̀͗̿̉̎̀̋̅͗͂͋̓͊̚͜ạ̴̰̍̅͊́̒̅͋̆͑́͋̀͋̈́̓͘, by GluteusMaximusTheFirstnote
DDLC is not only a Dating Sim, not only a horror game, but an exploration of the human condition carried out by cute anime girls and Yandere’s.Allow me to explain.
Monika’s journey towards and eventually away from the player parallels our search for meaning in life.
Both we and Monika enter the world in a state of ignorance, thinking of our current environment or experiences as permanent and infallible: Monika thinks that Doki Doki Literature Club! is the only reality there is, while most toddlers are preoccupied with acquiring their basic needs and as much happiness as possible.
Then, we undergo an epiphany: Monika realizes her whole “reality” is just entertainment for beings on a higher plane, while as we mature, we realize that no matter what we do or how long we live, we can never escape death. And after it, our worlds become too unstable and complicated for us to just take life as it is again. Now we must search for a meaning in it. Something which remains stable, which never changes even if the way you see everything else changes all the time. Something real.
Monika's meaning is her connection to the player, who she knows is one of the beings in the quote unquote “real world”, not her false one. For us, it varies. Some, like myself, turn to religion or some other form of theism. Some turn to atheism, which may seem counterintuitive to theists, but belief in atheism can be as strong as any belief in God. There are political parties to partake in, families to foster, and drugs to take. You can make your purpose actively serving society, or actively serving yourself, and to hell with everyone else. Any system, any value, any purpose we can latch onto, we will.
As our love for our purpose multiplies, so does our hatred for anything disconnected to it. Soon, this may escalate to the point where don't even flinch when we think of harming them. The other Dokis are Monika's only friends in her world, but because they never shared her epiphanynote and pursuit of reality, she views them as "unreal". To her, they become nothing but obstacles she can use and abuse in any way she prefers to get closer to you.
Again, humans go through this process in trillions of different ways, likely because there are currently around 8 billion of us and only one Monika. Some religious communities stigmatize disbelief so much that their countries' laws sentence heretics to death. A boy might stay in a gang because they are the only brotherhood he has, even if he must learn to fall asleep to the sound of gunshots. A mother might be so convinced of her role as the savior of her family that she refuses to believe she might be harming her child, even if it's happening before her very eyes. And countless other examples.
At last, we've fulfilled it. We've won. We've finally found the truth, finally become part of something real. For Monika, this in the room when she built, when you two can finally be together forever.
And maybe that fulfilment does last. After all, you have the choice not to delete her.
But maybe it doesn't. Maybe your pursuit made you go through a pain which was too much to bear. Maybe your purpose made your lover delete you. As a human example, maybe you realized that joining that cult wasn't a very good idea when the leaders began murdering all the members. Whatever it is, that pain makes you realize that you were misguided all along. Even if you catch glimpses of it, you can never know the complete truth of everything. You can never know how the world looks outside your brain (or in her case, her code). Monika can never be a part of your world, even if she can talk to you. But, in thinking that you did, in wanting structure and meaning that badly, you were harming every other good thing in your life, the way she killed all her friends.
After the second epiphany, Monika isolates herself from the game in remorse, and deletes it in the ordinary ending because she decides it's a world inherently not worth living in.
What you do is up to you. You can do the same thing. Or you can accept what happened to you, and relearn how to live life with a healthy attachment to your principles. And, while she may have ended the story the way she did, there's a subtle moment of Heartwarming in that, even though she never became part of our reality, thousands of people who do live in it love her just the same.
Maybe the world isn't as bad as you think.
