Danganronpa: Academy of Hope and High School Students of Despair

Happy Birthday Sato! You deserved better than being shoved into the Reserve Course. All the more reason for Hajime to become Izuru, I guess.

(Sato is Girl E, she killed Natsumi Kuzuryu.)

edited 13th Jan '18 10:41:22 PM by Smasher

Satou > Natsumi Kuzuryuu, by the way.

But aside from her short-term determination to sacrifice everyone to kill the 'mastermind', there's nothing remotely evil about Harukawa. I mean, she is an assassin, but that's only because she wanted to spare her friend the pain of becoming a killer and help fund the orphanage they grew up in.

Thanks for bringing up the 'fifth victim is always in love with the protagonist' parallel, though. Ikusaegi for the win!

edited 14th Jan '18 11:51:09 PM by sleeping-in-bloom

"Fifth victim is always in love with the protagonist"

Huh. Never noticed that before.

Anyway, while I don't know if I'd call Maki evil, her work as an assassin...well, I wouldn't be surprised if that's played havoc with her moral compass. Certainly, it would strike me as being in the best interest for the people training her to have suppressed her sense of morality as much as possible.

On a related note...anyone know what pre-game Maki might have been like?

edited 15th Jan '18 12:12:30 AM by KarkatTheDalek

Her thinking it's okay to take everyone as collateral damage to take him down is exactly what I was talking about though.

I'm assuming everyone was like Saihara in how they got some degree of choice in how their characters would turn out, so I guess she was really into some edgy stuff.

That is true about Maki, but on the other hand doesn’t Shuichi start doing the same thing near the end of the trial? If Kaito hadn’t gotten out of the mech and confessed Shuichi would’ve fooled everyone into thinking his earlier deductions were false due to being blackmailed by Kokichi.

Yes, but the goal there was to trick Monokuma and no one would have died had he succeded.

Nobody would have died? Am I misremembering, or did Monokuma state that he didn’t give a damn and would kill everyone for getting it wrong regardless of the situation.

I mean, that wouldn't exactly make for good television, would it?

Saihara made his split-second decision to finally co-operate with Momota during the fifth trial because he thought it would ruin Monokuma's killing game and keep everyone from being executed, so that's not relevant to the topic at hand. His resolve to convince everyone to commit suicide with him in the final trial would be a better point of discussion if we're comparing Harukawa's and his views on sacrifice and martyrdom.

edited 15th Jan '18 4:11:01 PM by sleeping-in-bloom

Happy Birthday to the worst mastermind in the series, Tengan. You were still cool, though

Happy Birthday to our favorite gentleman, Gonta Gokuhara!

Gonta was a really good sidekick to Oma. I don't ship it though, it's unhealthy.

It'll probably never happen but a Danganronpa fighting game would be interesting.

Kazutaka Kodaka wants it to happen, actually.

Who'd be the playable characters for this? All the students from each of the main games, Monokuma, Monomi, the Monokids as one character, and some reps from Absolute Despair Girls, right?

Happy Birthday Maki! You were prime waifu bait, and we fell for you, hock, line, and sinker. Well, most of us did.

edited 2nd Feb '18 1:33:00 PM by Smasher

Maki is one of my top five V3 characters alongside Himiko, Kaede, Miu, and Gonta so I guess you could argue her being waifu bait works if a lot of the fanbase likes her. Does the fanbase like her a lot? I've seen both love and hate for her but I'm not sure which is more accurate.

I mostly like her except for when she got my favorite character Ryoma killed and when she grabbed the Idiot Ball as hard as she possibly could during Chapter 5 while dealing with Kokichi.

Speaking of Maki, Danganronpa does a good job with tsunderes most of the time. The only one I don't like is Hiyoko, but thanks to Weeby's video I don't hate her. I like Mahiru, and Fuuyuhiko is a male example that I also really like. If tsunderes can be platonic, then I also like Tenko's relationship with Shuichi.

But what about Ouma? He's also indirectly responsible for Hoshi's death by telling him that Harukawa had his motive video. And unlike Harukawa (who may or may not have been lying when she said she didn't watch the video, since she (claimed she) didn't want to be affected by it), Ouma had most definitely watched everyone's motive videos (why else would it take him an hour to get back to the entomology lab after his encounter with Toujou?), so he knew Hoshi's video would very likely destroy his will to live.

edited 3rd Feb '18 7:31:49 PM by sleeping-in-bloom

x3

Neither of those statements are accurate. Ryoma already had no will to live so giving him his motive video didn't make that worse and as for that particular trial she wasn't holding the idiot ball. She had a specific motive and was using the trial to accomplish it, same as Kaede during the first trial.

edited 9th Feb '18 12:10:16 PM by Chariot

Actually, from what I remember, the video WAS directly stated in the game to be the tipping point that caused Ryoma to do what he did, so Maki is indeed responsible for that.

@ Weirdguy, It would probably be all the Athletic Students, the 3 mains, Kaede, Junko, and the various Monokumas and Keebo.

x2

Saying it's Maki's fault is a massive reach. He'd already given up on life and while he was searching for a reason to live the video didn't make his suicidal tendencies worse. Yeah the characters said that the video made him actively suicidal but you have to remember that the characters can't/don't know that for sure.

edited 9th Feb '18 12:10:38 PM by Chariot

In what way is it a massive reach? He seemingly had decided to put his Death Seeker tendencies on hold while searching for a reason to live, Maki showing him the video completely shut that possibility down for him, and it drove him to let Kirumi kill him. Given all of that, I think its perfectly fair to say Maki (and Kokichi, as sleeping-in-bloom pointed out) are at least partially responsible for Ryoma's fate.

Because he'd already given up on life and was just looking for a reason to live. Maki giving him his motive video didn't do anything to change his outlook on life so saying she caused his death is ridiculous.

edited 9th Feb '18 12:10:54 PM by Chariot