Doki Doki Literature Club

Sony and Nintendo have oddly more or less swapped places as far as censorship goes in recent years.

Is there a reason why some people act as if the MC is more important that what he actually is?

For some reason in the subreddit and other places you have people getting really defensive when someone states that the MC is not meant to be a "real" character in-universe and the real world, with Dan even calling him that

Specially in Plus where he is stated to not be an actual character who may be created by Monika

People are defensive of the player insert they are meant to project themselves into.

Maybe for a couple of things:

-Early in the game the chararter seen to have a personality, sure is very jerkish and somewhat dense of sayuri but it exit only to dan saying he is a meat puppet, which it was off for many, specially is reaction to sayuki hanging herself.

-This game is very minimalist, there like four chararter and a couple of escenarios meaning anything will be notable, MC feel like a chararter then suddenly he dont.

-There is a lot to said about MC if you take as chararter: being override your will so you experience your friend hang herself, how other act strange way just for the sake of a living glich? that is good material right there.

-It can also tie a lot to how the game kinda let monika get a little to easy in that regard since the trauma of the MC seeing sayuri matter not because he isnt a real chararter.

And finally people often dosent take well games calling the player in a way.

Nendoroid! Now with 100% more Monika!

Yeah, anyone know those chibi anime toys from Good Smile Company? One for Monika is up for pre-order. Comes with a desk and chair, cut-out text boxes, and even faces to recreate her signature "Just Monika" scene. So if anyone wanted to set her up with that sinister smile or even, God forbid, that pants-shitting, blood-curdling horror face in real life, you can do that! (*curls up in corner and assumes troubled fetal position*)

(Also has a poem made explicitly for the Nendoroid! *whimper*)

Edited by TargetmasterJoe on Feb 15th 2022 at 7:07:51 AM

Just got done with the Trust side story. I had noticed that ever since Plus came out there's been a massive increase in Moni Sayo fanart, and now I can very much see why. That aside it was interesting and sometimes a bit funny, but also sad near the end. It is fun to see these characters written in a scenario where all the Meta stuff is gone, particularly since now Monika isn't a terrible person. I'll look into the other side stories probably sometime soon.

Edited by marston on Sep 7th 2023 at 8:35:39 AM

Not only is MC just as much of a Doki as everyone else is and deserves to be seen as such, he's also arguably more of a tortured soul than Monika is. Monika realizes she is all alone in a world she shouldn't be in, one that's fake. She created MC (presumably alongside Ive Laster using beta elements) to help her communicate with the world she longs for. But MC? He was effectively born to be a tool. Literally, you could apply so much genuinely harmful rhetoric to MC because he really does fulfill it. He has a personality, goals, ambitions, his own level of intellect, and yet he's nothing more than a puppet. A puppet, which, mind you, has really done nothing wrong and yet can never be allowed to be happy. Pursue Monika? Even if he doesn't know it, that's >!incest!<. Pursue anyone else? Too bad, Monika needs him to fulfill her desires. Because she created sentient life only to use him like an object.

Oh! And people wanna say that he damaged the club like he even had a choice to join. Sayori blackmails him into joining initially, and the girls all guilt trip him into staying as a member. He came so close, so agonizingly close to actual happiness. He went from a bitter NEET in the making to a genuinely supportive member of the club with new ambitions and a new hobby. He was going to better himself for these girls and not live the life of isolated misery that Monika programmed him to have (or at least didn't bother to improve in any way). But DDLC Plus and Acts 2+3 both confirm in their own way that MC was never allowed to be happy.

Acts 2+3 basically show that Monika only ever saw MC as a means to an end. She lobotomized a living being in her world and used it to flirt with someone she doesn't even know. If that was it, well, okay, all the other girls are actually dead, so at least they all get somewhat equal treatment. But this only gets worse in DDLC+. Monika and everyone else got their happy ending in the Side Stories world. They all had a chance to be happy. But MC? It's implied he's in the anime club, but let's be real, he's doomed. He's doomed to just become a NEET, forever isolated in his home, to die alone and without friends. Those girls really matter to MC, and the poor guy is just never going to be happy without someone like them to encourage him to break out of his shell.

MC got done so incredibly dirty. He deserves better, both from the game and from the fans. He's just a reclusive 18 year old boy who tries his best when given a chance. He was forced to join a situation that benefited everybody involved and had it all taken away from him by Monika's whims. He may not always say the right thing or do the best option, but he's really not a malicious soul. Justice for this man. He deserves to be on par with everybody else.

Edited by Dokimang on Dec 15th 2023 at 6:45:52 AM

If you ever wanna watch some funny DDLC videos, youtuber Querxes has a series of voice acted videos that's basically a Rule of Funny thing where the Doki's get into shenanigans like going trick or treating, saving Christmas, robbing a bank, etc. Pretty entertaining videos imo.

Here's a link to the Playlist of them. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFHOM4xE6NRQ1YZF5DslEWvJWW4cdOMgQ&si=xG7RFTyIKi16h_O2

Oh yeah, I also finished the Side Stories too. I loved all of them, but especially the Monika/Natsuki focused one and the Yuri/Natsuki one. It's great seeing these characters interact without the meta narrative around.

Edited by marston on Dec 30th 2023 at 10:56:04 AM

That and i realized ddlc's 3 years away from turning 10, along with undertale turning 10 next year and fnaf will be 10 in a few months. Fuck I miss the 2010's. Oh and sorry for earlier

And in all honesty, looking back, DDLC's satire of Dating sims kinda flass flat for me.

One, most of the shallower Dating Sims out there are usually fan made or already Satires (Like Huniepop or Hatoful Boyfriend). Hell, even the 4th wall breaking Horror elements were already done better in stuff like Zero Escape or Dangan Ronpa (Which to be fair, Dan Salvato did list as influences)

Even the idea that the girls of the game aren't shallow character cut outs was something that the most popular visual novels generally avoid in general (Key Visual arts's stuff, Ryukishi 07's stuff, most things by Type Moon, and the aforementined Zero Escape and Dangan Ronpa, for instance) and feels more like Dan Salvato just wanted to be petty at points.

The irony is that his game probably helped make Anime, Manga, and Visual Novels more popular with people in general despite his own complicated feelings about the medium.

I thought it was already established the VN wasn’t really a deconstruction of the Dating Sim genre?

I missed some words.

Edited by The_Dag on Jan 6th 2024 at 10:42:00 AM

Dating Sims are mostly visuals novels, but Most Visual Novels aren't Dating Sims, basically.

Dan has a love hate relationship with anime. Hell he even said Sayori was inspired by one of the characters from k-on. Than again the way he did mc always felt like a shallow parody considering he personally interprets these type of characters the way he wrote him, but never state which one specifically. idk i never got the feeling he hates anime like some people suggest. The side stories showed that ddlc can work as a regular visual novel.

He also once said that Love Live is a guilty pleasure of his, which got some people speculating that Nico Yazawa was at least one of the inspirations for Natsuki (which Dan never confirmed or denied).

"It is fun to see these characters written in a scenario where all the Meta stuff is gone"

I have to admit I kinda baffle about this because without the meta aspect the game is just...a regular ass dating sim or just a typical slice of life with four chararters at best.

the MC feel more like a parody of harem series(which kinda overlap with dating sim and visual novels of course) protagonist which is why his personality range from "utterly pasive" to "kinda annoying".

Granted if you take him as face value(that means a personality and actually exist a not being a meat puppet) then his existent is fuck up beyond mesure: he went from maybe having a date and friends along the way to see her childhood friend hand herself(which if he confess to her make things even better) to see reallty rewritte itself in front of him then start see what can be describe a reallity faliures(like imagine taking to a girl and suddenly they speak super fast to get, her face disapear and god-know-what-else) until to culimating with Yuri killing herself in front of you(and if you start dating her it become even special as hell) and you just stay there......frozen, seeing her decompose and rot until Monika just drop any pretention she care and start taking with the outer dimensional being on which you his vehicle.

Like take literatly it sound it goes right from realistic horror(my friend kill herself and I cant do anything about it) to pseudo cosmic horror right away.

In a way while I dont like it I can see why he took this choice: It streamline the process, it allow monika to be good easier and kinda allow it to get into what people want(the doki themselves).

I've always taken it as the MC does exist what with all the narration that initially exists and slowly ceases to.

to be fair, he isn't much of a good parody imo because most of it is how Dan personally interprets such characters while the game simultaneously feels like there's more to him than its prepared to explore. Especially when he's literally the only one that never dies or get deleted. Like i said, he was dine incredibly dirty. It's a stretch, but it feels that way half the time.

DDLC isn't much of a parody at all besides maybe Natsuki's Tsundere tendencies.

I guess people mistake the whole bit with Monika becoming self aware as a parody of dating sims?

...what else was it supposed to be?

Well even if there is an element of parody there are enough sincere elements that people do grow to enjoy the characters legitimately. Which is good, because the dark elements wouldn't hit as hard otherwise.

Edited by Moth13 on Jan 7th 2024 at 11:21:04 AM

that and it shows ddlc can work without the meta ness since the characters feel like real people

I say that entirely because of the characters. Seeing them interact and bond in the Side Stories without the looming meta horror in the background was neat, and stories based around character interaction appeal a lot to me. Without the Meta stuff I don't care for the Dating Sim part, and the Side Stories show these characters can still work without that.