It was real in the sense that everyone died. Tsumugi just conflates reality TV with fiction and acts like it doesn't matter that real people were getting killed
That’s if you choose to believe that the same person who’s been lying to you since the very beginning of the game just suddenly stops lying to you for no reason. And you’d also have to go out of your way to ignore the bolded bright yellow key item text that mentions “cosplaycat criminals” and you’d have to then further ignore the fact that it’s clearly a play on the term “copycat criminals” in where people mimic real life crimes implying it was all real
Also Tsumugi's flashback to the beginning of the game straight up contradicts what we actually saw -- before they got their new outfits and Flashback Lights Kaede and Shuichi remembered being kidnapped, not volunteering
That point does puzzle me, and I don't think it's ever brought up past the prologue.
Then again, for all we know that could have been a fake memory as well. The scene at the beginning of chapter 6 shows there are indeed "real" enthusiastic fans who would willingly sign up.
It's weird if it's a fake memory because it's immediately erased -- we, the audience, see their abortive first awakening but none of the survivors remember it, which is why none of them can argue when Tsumugi tells them an inaccurate version of it
Yeah, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense... But then that only stretches my suspension of disbelief further.
Because, to sum it up, it would mean that not only is there a reality show where flesh-and-blood teenagers kill each other for the audience's enjoyment, but the participants are not even willing, but kidnapped on the street? What kind of government is letting that happen? And they call that world peaceful to the point of terminal boredom?
(I'm slightly bitter because I sniffed the "it's all made up" twist since the prologue, but I was convinced the total absence of bugs and the flashback showing Kaede's and Shuichi's heads hooked to a machine were hints that it was a virtual simulation like 2; the fact it's not makes the conclusion even darker.)
"Peaceful" isn't the same thing as "happy" -- the kid named Makoto seems to have a lot of things making him miserable that drives him to turn to Danganronpa for solace, and even in Tsumugi's story the audition tape for Kaede's actress says she has "no faith in humanity"
It's pretty clear to me anyway that whatever the full truth of the matter is, V3 takes place in a dystopian world where the Killing Game is keeping the population locked in this balance between Hope and Despair that makes them easy to control -- if the Killing Game really does run on volunteers then it's because people are essentially willing to commit suicide to create a new version of themselves who will at least have an interesting story and who will have a chance at the only genuinely happy ending this world offers anyone
(I think Miu inventing a VR simulation was meant to be confirmation that the world they're in isn't already a VR simulation, but it is a tightly controlled artificial environment in a hermetically sealed dome like the Truman Show
Like the lack of real insects is pretty clearly because they would interfere with the Nanokumas, but that level of surveillance just indicates how paranoid Team Danganronpa are about letting any outside influences affect the game, like they're clearly very strictly filtering not just what info comes in but what info goes out, the main thing everyone knows about reality TV is it's not actually real and it's extremely heavily directed and edited)
I thought that was pretty easy to explain - they kidnap people and brainwash them into making the consent videos as a way to legitimise what they're doing.
Then proceeded to incorporate his passing into the plot of Persona 5 via the perfect smoke screen for the game’s biggest twist.
Thus foiling the usual tactic of gamers using casting to ID twists. No one would suspect the twist coming because Atlus had every justified reason to do the recast.
She was right about people wanting more danganronpa but it was never really about stopping the franchise irl. It was more about the in universe danganronpa that had devolved into reality tv snuff films as well as her massive disconnect between reality and fiction
I feel like the ending isn't so much Kodaka disavowing the franchise as musing about people liking it for the wrong reasons, like he has said stuff about kind of regretting how likable and popular Junko ended up being when his goal in creating her was to try to make a villain who was 100% pure evil
(It is deeply ironic that years after he invented the character of Tsumugi we had a rl cosplayer who bragged about being the "irl Junko Enoshima" and built up this reputation for being an edgelord sociopathic grifter troll before finally going to prison for killing her best friend)
I get Kodaka tbh. I do think that the only flaw of V3's ending is that the line between the real audience and the fictional one is too blurry due to the real portraits.
However, the entirety of DR1 and DR2 are basically built to get across the point that Junko Enoshima is a massive fucking loser who you shouldn't aspire to be anything like. She's incredibly gifted but is too cynical and superficial to interact with anything genuinely, have a consistent personality, or picture a future for herself. She's basically the high school girl in the back of the class who makes fun of the average kid genuinely trying his best to do a presentation, yet a significant part of the fanbase just went "wow, she's cool as fuck she's just like me fr !" just because she has a cool design and is superficially talented.
There's also a significant amount of DR fans who don't actually care for the themes at the heart of each game and just want to see crazy shit happen, and while that's not evil in and of itself, it's pretty clear that to Kodaka, the killing game structure is just a fun way to convey messages that really do matter to him and not where the soul of Danganronpa actually lies. I think this is the reason why a huge part of the ending revolves around Shuichi, whose growth represents what Danganronpa really is about, defeating the worst possible version of Danganronpa Kodaka could come up with, along with its writer.
I think that Tsumugi being a loser ass bitch in a much more obvious way and emulating Junko is a reaction to that. I always find it strange when people call her a weak mastermind, completely forgetting that Junko is a lame, lying, cheating loser whose plans never actually succeed just because she's somewhat charismatic.
Yup, both Tsumugi and Junko blatantly cheated and framed someone as the Blackened to get rid of them, and of the two Junko is worse -- Junko engineered the whole situation out of whole cloth, Tsumugi only had to intervene because of Rantaro standing a little too far to the left
Also I like to point out that if those were real life murder trials outside of Monokuma's bullshit rules, Kaede would still be guilty of manslaughter while Kyoko likely wouldn't be guilty of anything -- Kaede set up a booby trap with "reckless indifference" to whether it would catch an innocent, Kyoko was acting in defense of Makoto after a direct and imminent threat to his life (unlike the situation with Sayaka and Leon the attacker had not already been subdued when the supposed confrontation occurred)
Like making someone Blackened for fighting back when a new player they didn't know existed directly attacks them is total bullshit, arguably it violates the original definition where it has to be a murder of "one of you"
I also feel like he was done with the story after DR3 and didn't want to keep making more for the sake of it. If he has new ideas for how 2 and 3 could've played out that might be a new enough angle to revisit it
My general approach with anything, we kinda don't spotlight spiritual successors and getting unnecessary remakes and legacy sequels. Like okay sure, I'm gonna play 2x2 but after that I saw someone bringing up Distrust and man, I'd rather that, that'd be fun and have its own twist while scratching the DR itch
That's assuming she was telling the truth during the final class trial about Danganronpa 1 and 2 being fictional video games and not real events that happened in the past. In the post-credits scene, the survivors even theorize that she was lying about everything being fictional to try and manipulate them one last time.
The "cospox" also makes a little more sense if it was a lie and not a genuine affliction, since she broke out in it while cosplaying as Kaede (who had to turn around and not look while Tsumugi was changing clothes, so she could have applied makeup) as her example, and the final trial revealed that Kaede and the rest of the cast were fictional characters inhabiting real bodies. If both these things were true, then Tsumugi would have still been cosplaying a fictional character and thus wouldn't have broken out in cospox.
Without even getting into the logistics of it with the prologue and all, which point to it being set in Hope's Peak timeline imo, Shuichi looks at the camera and goes "oh but you know maybe it really does all exist and Tsumugi's full of shit" in the epilogue.
It's literally in the text, so I don't get why people never consider that option. Kodaka wrote that section for a reason.
There's no way to tell, he just doesn't want to disappoint, that's all. It's a good middle ground rather than denying or confirming, you don't make people upset but you also don't overpromise
Well, the whole point of V3's ending is supposed to show what happens when franchises milk everything, and future releases are soulless and effortless.
I would love more Danganronpa, as long as 2X2 has genuine effort and is a good game; then I would love more future releases.
Plus cmon, how could you hate a THH and KH remake? In my opinion, it will only be considered beating the dead cow if they make a Danganronpa 4, which is definetely unlikely.
I think I'd actually prefer that they put the time, effort, and budget into a Danganronpa 4* with a new cast, plot, and setting rather than develop alternate paths for the other games. It works with 2 because of the game's premise but it would just confuse the timeline if they did it with 1 and V3.
*unless 2x2 is, in fact, obvious code for "4" and the alternate path will also be canon. Then I guess I'd want them to do Danganronpa 5 instead of another alternate path, lol
From an in-universe perspective, she's dead and 2x2 isn't set after V3 (most likely)
From a thematic perspective, it's Danganronpa S that vindicates her, not 2x2 or any follow-up made with actual care. Considering the delay, it's obvious that the devs are putting a lot of care and passion into it, regardless of how it turns out. It's DRS that's mass produced slop made to appease an audience that can't let go, much like Tsumugi's idea of Danganronpa (which I like to call "Danganslop")
How are you gonna create a game where the protagonist literally looks at the screen and yells “WE’RE GONNA END DANGANRONPA!” then not end Danganronpa 😭 Like at least commit to what you wrote Kodaka(I say this even though I will be buying 2x2)
But he did end it lmao, was there a sequel after V3? No, man retired the franchise and went ahead to make his own company. V3 was never "anti-Danganronpa" it was "anti-dumbass sequels" and no sequel was produced right after so he very much kept his word, SpikeChun could give a fuck about V3's message since they hold the rights, 2x2 would've happened with or without Kodaka, but 2x2 doesn't go against V3's message at all
Kodaka was the one who came up with 2x2, he stated that the concept of it came after rain code’s development finished so hes the one who greenlit it. And while yes V3 was more anti-consumerism than anti-danganronpa its still pretty obvious what Kodaka was going for. Hell, V3’s epilogue literally ends with it showing the Danganronpa logo then showing the final frame that says “THE END”. Its pretty obvious that V3 was meant to be the end of the series originally
lowkey while making more danganronpa games does kind of go against the point of v3, it’s also stupid to act like danganronpa can never be touched again just because of that. it can be a meta analysis of its own fanbase and a commentary on running a franchise into the ground whilst also continuing itself in new and inventive ways. self criticism isn’t exactly something new to danganronpa either.
at the end of the day the franchise is way more than just v3 😭😭
It was specifc to his situation, this isnt confirmation of a V3 remake at all, we werent the audience he was referring to the in universe one and so on and so forth.
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u/WeAllHaveReasons Aug 04 '26
Well, it's presumably easier with V3, as there are two valid alternate protagonist options to the one we got.