A major event occurs in the story right there in Chapter 1, something that came as an emotional gut-punch since I didn’t know it was coming.
These set us down a path during the game’s prologue and first chapter that feels like what you might expect from the third outing for a series like this: similar to what we’ve had before but with a few natural tweaks. We also meet Monokuma’s “children,” the Monokubs, a quintet of brightly-colored bears each with their own very distinct personalities. One is the game’s protagonists, Kaede Akamatsu-who exists as the series’ first female protagonist outside of the side project Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls. In Danganronpa V3, however, we get a few twists on that familiarity right from the start. Our latest group initially tries to come together as one cohesive unit, that unity slowly gets chipped away, and finally a body turns up to kick things off proper. The familiar elements of past Danganronpas begins to play out here.
Every time someone is killed, the other students set out to investigate and hold a class trial, and if you’re found out as the murderer, then you’ll be executed as well.
To basically spoil my review-since I’m going to try hard not to spoil the story itself-this is a game that’s both a heartfelt attempt to breathe new life into the Danganronpa franchise, and a third entry that I think really needs to be the last.Īs we’ve learned from two previous chapters, a side project game, and a TV anime series, Danganronpa revolves around a killing game where sixteen students are given an ultimatum by a bizarre half-black half-white bear named Monokuma: the only way to regain your freedom is to kill one of your fellow captives and get away with it. So, Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony is a bittersweet release for me.
I’d first heard about it from its PlayStation Portable release years before, and found that not only had the begging and pleading for the game to be localized been worth it, but that it took the top spot on my list of favorite games for the year. Three and a half years ago, I fell in love with Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc, a quirky Japanese Vita game about students being forced to kill one another.