The PS Vita has very little going for it these days, after not onlyhaving very few worthwhile games being released for it in itsrelatively short lifespan, but now Sony has confirmed that they willno longer be supporting the Vita and instead focus all their effortstowards the PS4 and beyond.
But don't despair (see what I did there), for one of the best reasonsto own a Vita is back for its latest outing into a twisted world ofhope, despair and murderous robotic bear dolls. A description likethat can only mean one thing, Danganronpa is back...but it looks alittle different this time round.
Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc and Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despairare two of the Vita's finest games. Part Japanese anime, partdetective game, part high school sim; the Danganronpa series has sofar been a reason to own a Vita standing alongside games such asPersona 4 Golden and Tearaway, proving that the neglected systemstill has some knockout titles.
This time though, Danganronpa is adopting a completely differentlook, a third person shooter. As a fan of the series I have to say Iwas a little surprised when I first saw the reveal trailer andwondered how on earth Danganronpa could ever be something other thana detective/high school sim. But once I started playing Ultra despairGirls I realised something crucial, Danganronpa is one of the fewgames I would say is not restricted to genre, instead it couldprobably tackle just about any genre it wanted due to the sheerinsanity, unpredictability and outlandish style of it's story.
This time round we are thrust into the shoes of Komaru Naegi. Soundfamiliar right? No, she is not an ultimate, she does not attendHope's Peak Academy, she was not on Jabberwock Island...so why sofamiliar for just an average, normal girl? Well she is the sister ofthe Ultimate Lucky Student/Ultimate Hope Makoto Naegi from TriggerHappy Havoc. Taking place shortly after the events of Trigger HappyHavoc, Komaru has been living in captivity for the last year and ahalf with no contact with any other human beings and no way to knowwhat is going on in the outside world. That is until a Monokumabreaks into her room and she is saved by the Ultimate AffluentProgeny, Byakuya Togomi. After helping her escape and arming her witha hacking gun that can disable Monokuma's she runs into UltimateWriting Prodigy, Toko Fukawa and her serial killer alter ego GenocideJack.
Together the duo must regroup with Byakuya and escape the city,easier said than done however due to Monokuma's targeting and killingall adults, an army of children wearing Monokuma helmets who hinderyour progress and a small band of children who call themselves theWarriors of Hope who claim to be behind the attacks on the city.
Will they find Byakuya, will Future Foundation step in to stop theattacks on the city, who are the Warriors of Hope, why are thereMonokuma's everywhere and most importantly, will Komaru and Toko everget along? Just a normal day in the world of Danganronpa.
Ultra Despair Girls' story is devilishly clever, as expected from aDanganronpa game. The most important thing to realise is that itgives us an idea of what is happening outside of Hope's Peak, outsideof the killing games conducted by Junko Enoshima and the Remnants ofDespair and an insight into a world being torn apart by despair, setinto motion by the events of Trigger Happy Havoc. We have previouslyonly heard about what's happening outside through small snippets ofdialogue in the late stages of Trigger Happy Havoc and GoodbyeDespair, but now we are able to see for ourselves exactly what ishappening to the world that is killing itself.
It also presents the player with a unique concept involving a warbetween adults and children. Producing interesting and incrediblydisturbing truths about what each would to to defend themselvesagainst the other. Ultra Despair Girls has the most unsettling andmature narrative in a Danagnronpa game to date, dealing with topicssuch as child abuse, genocide, attitudes towards sex andrelationships between both adults and children as well as theinnocence of war through the eyes of a child. Regularly I foundmyself questioning PEGI's 16+ rating due to the maturity and taboonature of some of the subjects Ultra Despair Girls. But we aren'texactly talking about the next Last of Us here, the maturity is oftenspoiled by some extremely out of place and awkward humour; after allDanganronpa is a light hearted approach to the total annihilation ofthe human race is it not?
