Critical Play: Danganronpa
For this Critical Play, I will talk about my favorite mystery game series Danganronpa! There are three Danganronpa games and each play very similarly, where you play as a high school student who is forced into a killing game. The main gameplay in these games occur through reading the story segments and hanging out with the other students during free time. However, once a student dies, you then investigate the murder scene and go to a class trial to try and find out who‘s the murderer. This process typically continues for 5–6 trials where each trial becomes more difficult and elaborate.
Narrative is woven into the mystery really well in these games because there is an overall mystery the player is trying to solve, specifically why the killing game is taking place and how to get out of it, which is matched very well with a smaller more pressing mystery given in doses through the trials of discovering the murderers for the different killings.
Another aspect that makes the mystery element very engaging in these games is that the player has to play through lengthy trial sessions which incorporate a variety of mini games to attempt to find the culprit. These segments make the player engage with the mystery and guide the player to solve the mystery on their own, rather than other forms of media where there is not much player agency in solving the mystery.
