What Is It?
Don’t let the anime aesthetic turn you away. Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc is one of the trippiest games you’ll play on Steam this year, if you haven’t already experienced it on the PSP or PS Vita.
Gameplay-wise, Danganronpa is part murder mystery, part social simulator, and part visual novel. You’ll take control of protagonist Makoto Naegi, also known as the Ultimate Lucky Student, as you spend time with your fellow elite classmates and solve deadly class trials whenever a beloved classmate murders one of your own.
I also like to describe Danganronpa as Ace Attorney on acid, with the occasional splash of trance music. Each time one of your classmates is found dead, you’ll have a short amount of time to scour the school for evidence that might point you to the culprit. After some time, the evil headmaster Monokuma will bring all of you to the courtroom, where one of you will be identified as the culprit. These courtroom sequences are presented with extreme rotating camera angles, loud pulsing music, and even the occasional rhythm game, because what better way to keep you on the edge of your seat as you look for the truth?
Lastly, in Danganronpa, you must accept your fate and bow down to the almighty Monokuma. He is your master now, and there is no other way.
The Story
Hope’s Peak Academy is a school for elite students, the cream of the crop, the best of the best. You play as Makoto Naegi, the one odd student who got enrolled purely by virtue of having his name picked from a lucky draw. Your ‘elite’ ability is your incredible luck, and you’re thus known as the Ultimate Lucky Student.
Makoto is enrolled alongside several other ‘elite’ students as well, including the Ultimate Fashionista, the Ultimate Fanfic Writer, the Ultimate Clairvoyant, and a ton of other crazy personalities. The story kicks off on your first day of school, as you and your other elite friends step into Hope’s Peak Academy. However, the story takes a turn for the dark when Monokuma shows up, and tells you that you’ll never see the sunlight again.
The only way to ‘graduate’ and leave Hope’s Peak Academy is to murder one of your classmates and get away with it. If you’re able to pull off a successful murder without anyone figuring out that you’re the culprit, you’ll get to leave, but everyone else will be executed. If the culprit is identified, only he or she will pay the price of death.
These class trials become a grave matter of life and death where one wrong move could spell mass execution for all innocent parties.
How Long Is It?
Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc contains six chapters, with each chapter ending in a deadly class trial. The main campaign is rather lengthy, though it is a linear story without a lot of room for divergence. The main story alone should take you around 18 to 20 hours to complete, especially if you choose to examine every nook and cranny of Hope’s Peak, or try your luck at Monokuma’s gift vending machine.
Outside of the main story mode, there is an extra School Mode that you can play through. This is essentially a micro-management mini game where Monokuma will give you special projects to build, and you’ll have to assign your elite students to mine for materials at various parts of the school. The School Mode is primarily meant for players who want to max out their bond levels with every classmate – something that is rather difficult to achieve in the main story because, y’know…people die.
If you spend the time to check out every bit of content that Danganronpa has to offer, you could easily spend up to 30 hours on this game.
When Is It Out?
It’s already available on the PS Vita, along with its awesome sequel Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair. However, if you don’t own a Vita, you’ll be able to play it on PC via Steam on February 18.
So. Are you ready to commit yourself to Monokuma, the amazing bear of an entity that cannot be comprehended by our limited brain capacity? Let us know in the comments down below if you’ll be checking this one out!
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