WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
Sometimes a final battle doesn’t need cool explosions. Sometimes a final battle doesn’t need a clashing of blades. Sometimes a final battle doesn’t even need any sort of violence. Sometimes, a final battle can be not one of weaponry or strength, but one of words. Case in the point – the ending of the final class trial in the first Danganronpa game. Continue reading
Before you ask, yes, the song title in the video is different but I’m calling the song by its name listed on the iTunes release. Now that I’ve got that out of the way, let me quickly explain why Monokuma, the mascot of the Danganronpa series (which I wrote a personal retrospective about here), is an asshole. Continue reading
WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for the entire Danganronpa series
Where do I even begin describing something like Danganronpa? What even is a Danganronpa? It almost sounds like a word a one year old would make up (real talk, though, it’s actually a portmanteau of the Japanese words ‘dangan’ and ‘ronpa,’ which mean ‘bullet’ and ‘refute’ respectively. It’ll make sense later).
Bizarre names aside, though, this strange series has really made a name for itself since the first game’s initial release in 2010. Back then, it was a Japan-only PSP title that only a small handful of Western fans soon learned about. Cut to 2014 and someone, somewhere, decided that the rest of the world should be made privy to the lives of the Super High-School Level Students of Hope’s Peak Academy. And it paid off in a big way.
Following the first game’s re-release on the Vita, Danganronpa has slowly but surely become notably more well-known. While by no means a household name, it still developed a surge in popularity. Originally just two games on the PSP (a console most people don’t even acknowledge anymore), the series now consists of seven games, several re-releases, two anime series, novels and a tonne of manga (seriously, there is a lot of it).
I found myself checking the first game out almost on a whim, and ended up falling in love with it and desperate for more. It’s since quickly become possibly one of my favourite series, so (with the next game in the series arriving later this month) I’ve decided to write up a personal retrospective about my experiences with it and why I love this franchise all about the ongoing struggle between hope and despair. Continue reading
Oh, Marvel vs Capcom, I can’t play you to save my life but I love you as a concept. And while I’m aware some people had issues with the third installment in this crazy crossover series, it still looked like a pretty solid and enjoyable game to me. Though I can’t personally critique it’s gameplay, however, I can at least compliment its music, like this piece. Continue reading
I know many were incredibly disappointed with how Street Fighter X Tekken ultimately turned out, but there were still a few elements that I still enjoy even now. For instance, the rival fights. If you play through the Arcade Mode with a “canon” team, like Ryu and Ken or Kazuya and Nina, you’ll get into a rival fight, prefaced by a short cutscene of the two teams confronting each other.
Granted, these scenes weren’t anything particularly special but were mildly entertaining at the very least. But my favourite part was the music that played. If you were playing as a Street Fighter duo, you’d fight your rival to a Tekken remix and vice versa. And for my money, the first variant of the Street Fighter rival theme is easily my favourite. Continue reading
Persona 4 is, without a doubt, one of the best JRPGs ever made. Anybody who’s played it will tell you that, which is probably why some people got a bit mad when Atlus started milking the crap out of it. Two fighting games, two different anime series, a crossover with Persona 3 and, today’s subject, a rhythm-action game.
Personally, while I understand some people’s frustration, I had no issues with these because 1. any opportunity to spend more time with these characters was a welcome one for me, 2. the money made from these would help fund other projects (coughPersona5cough) and 3. they were fun to play anyway. And for me, it was, bizarrely, the rhythm-action game that had me most excited.
At the time, I had only recently found myself becoming a fan of the genre thanks to the likes of Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy and the Project Diva games, so having a game like that but with Persona 4 music was a welcome one. But did the game live up to my admittedly lofty expectations? Can someone who isn’t a fan of the series enjoy it? Or does it alienate even the Persona 4 fans? Well, that’s what this review is all about. Continue reading
Last week, I wrote a review on the visual novel Steins;Gate, but I realised after the fact that I didn’t go into it’s music at all. To be fair, I wouldn’t call the soundtrack the greatest. It’s not a bad one; just one that I don’t really remember all that well. It serves its purpose well and creates atmosphere, but there were a few tracks that stood out to me. Especially this one. Continue reading
Opinions are a funny thing, aren’t they? We all have them, we love to share them and, for some reason, we can’t fathom the idea of somebody else having one different to ours. But possibly the most bizarre thing about them is how they can change. We can go from liking something to hating it and vice versa. It’s all very weird. Why am I bringing this up? Because of my experience with today’s subject, Steins;Gate.
Now, Steins;Gate isn’t an old game that I played as a child and am now looking at to see if it holds up or anything. It only came out in Europe last summer (though it originally came out in Japan in 2009), but it sticks out as possibly being the only game I’ve played where my opinion of it radically changed whilst I was playing it. Such an oddity deserves to be documented and shared with others. I guess you could say this is the will of Steins Gate itself. Let’s get started, shall we? Continue reading
In the first episode of the new, rebooted Entertainment Dome, James and I have a brief Danganronpa discussion, talk about Square Enix’s terrible business practice of cutting their games up and begin what will no doubt be a recurring trend of going on unrelated tangents.
Since I wrote a review of Zero Escape: Virtue’s Last Reward last week, I figured I should share a sample of its soundtrack with you, specifically a track I mentioned by name: Sublimity. Continue reading
Too Long for Twitter 