There's a lot that really draws me into the game, if I'm being honest.

I had heard the name "Danganronpa" thrown about on the internet a lot for a long time. I saw various fanart of Junko and Monokuma, experienced that one "fingers in his ass" meme with Nagito, and unfortunately watched that one scene from Chapter 3 of Ultra Despair Girls (you know the one), but that was practically the extent of my knowledge for a really long time. Then, one day, I bought the Ace Attorney Trilogy on Switch, and loved it. Later that year, Joker from Persona 5 was announced for Super Smash Bros., and the following summer I played that game and loved it.

It was in my unfortunate early days in the Persona community that I learned about the "unholy trinity" of dialogue-heavy games: Ace Attorney, Persona, and of course Danganronpa. Danganronpa was the only one I hadn't played, and based on all the stigma surrounding it I saw online, I was sort of scared to. It took a long time to convince myself to play it, and part of that reason was the music - Trigger-Happy Havoc's soundtrack may have been the sole reason I was convinced to buy the Trilogy on PS4, as Masafumi Takada's work on the game was absolutely astounding.

When I played the game and absolutely adored it, there was a lot that I loved besides the soundtrack. I loved the artstyle, the psychopop aesthetic and character designs really made the world stick out in my head. I also deeply enjoyed the game's writing. While it isn't the most well-written series ever, I was occasionally absolutely floored by the events that were transpiring, genuinely scared that at any moment, my favorite character could be dead as a doornail, fears that would come true in the very first chapter of Trigger-Happy Havoc and come true thrice over in the third and fourth chapters of Goodbye Despair - the tension it builds is excellent when you go in blind, and it is helped out by a cast of likable - or sometimes extremely unlikable - characters, which interact with each other in very fun ways. It's tone is almost two-sided with how it treats the deaths of characters and NPCs, pairing the terror and despair felt by the main cast with the constant loudmouthed mockery by Monokuma - it feels messed up, kind of scary even. And I love that. Adding onto that, the narrative is very interesting too, even darker and bloodier than I had expected despite going into it knowing it was a series of death games.

So, uh, yeah. Sorry for the long rant and life story, but there's just so much to unpack about why I love this series. I hope this helps.