Danganronpa-Trigger Happy Havoc: Compare this to a Ferris wheel

Six chapters in, and I still don't have a clue about what's really happening in that game. That's just brilliant.

Well, saying that I don't have a clue is not totally fair. I actually do have tons of clues about what could, may or might be happening in this sky-forsaken school; however, I still lack absolute, rock-solid certainties. Is this all a sick real-TV game? A post-apocalyptic rescue attempt that turned terribly wrong? The crazy product of a psychopathic mind—doubled with a seemingly infinite bank account balance? All of that at once? Or something else entirely, something even more twisted and devious? I do NOT know, and I LOVE not knowing. I love stories that let you imagine anything while confirming nothing, and Danganronpa is one of the most glorious example of them I've ever encountered.

My mind is reeling just now, but I'm trying to keep it in check. I wouldn't want too think too deep and to uncover the actual truth about what's happening, ruining any plot twist to come in the process. Better concentrate on the gameplay and let the story properly blow me away, yes precious. I'm thus trying to bury my doubts about (spoilers) whether the masked body really belonged to Ikubasa Mukuro and may not have been the body of one of the already dead female students, conveniently kept in a cooler before being used in an elaborate setup. I mean, the face was unrecognizable, so it could have been anyone, right? And a tattoo is just so easy to fake. I'm trying to forget the uneasiness I feel regarding Kyoko, who seems just a little to helpful and knowledgeable to be completely honest. How can I be sure that she's not Ikubasa Mukuro herself, or the Mastermind—or both? After all, I didn't get to see what's really hiding under her precious gloves, did I? And how do I know that there are really sixteen students in the school, anyway? And... Oh dear, now I'm starting again.

Like I said, better concentrate on the gameplay. To my utter delight, there is a substantial amount of it—enough to make Danganronpa more akin to a Point and Click on rails than to a full-blown Visual Novel. There's a delicious amount of roaming around and clicking on suspicious and/or interesting areas, and it wasn't look before I felt like the whole school was my territory—as much as a prison can be considered territory, that is. The Class Trials are a vibrant potpourri of gameplay mechanics that are challenging enough to keep me on edge, especially since I set the logic level to "Mean" when I started the game. In retrospect, I should have set the action level to "Gentle", because the shooting parts often give me a hard time. I even royally failed the first Bullet Time Battle: to my utter shame, I totally panicked and ended up tripping on my own fingers and losing before I could say "ohshitshitshit that's a bloody rhythm minigame!!!" I fortunately got better at it with time, but Bullet Time Battles are still far from being my favourite parts of the game. Oh, well.

I really love the characters, and I deeply regret that so many are dead already. They are glorious clichés that zealously adhere to anime and manga tropes, that much is sure, but they do so in a clever and tongue-in-cheek way that makes them incredibly endearing. They cannot be deemed realistic or even complex characters, but that fits the style of the narrative perfectly. The unrealistic, slightly surreal premise of being stuck in a school and encouraged to kill your classmates by a creepy mastermind certainly wouldn't work as well with realistic characters—especially when the mastermind in question assumes the shape of a Teddy Bear with a lopsided grin.

Anyway, I'm now heading towards what I hope will be a mind-blowing ending. There's only one Class Trial left, and it will be the most intense of them all. Brace yourself, Monokuma! Whoever you may be, I'll shed light on your true identity! Until then, thanks for reading, and be my guest anytime!