Danganronpa

The series revolves around an exclusive, government-funded high school called Hope’s Peak Academy, which, every year, selects “Ultimate” students, Super High School Level) who are at the top of their field, and one average “Ultimate Lucky Student” who is chosen by lottery. However, when average student Makoto Naegi arrives at the school, he loses consciousness, and when he wakes up discovers that he and his 14 classmates have been trapped within the school. Headmaster Monokuma, a sadistic robot bear, informs the students that they will be forced to live within the school forever, with only one way to leave: murdering another student and getting away with it.

When a crime scene is discovered, a Class Trial is held, in which the remaining students must decide amongst themselves who the murderer is. If the students successfully discover the murderer, the culprit will be executed, and the killing game continues. However, if they guess incorrectly, the culprit will be able to leave the school, but the other students will be executed.

Hope’s Peak Academy was a government-sanctioned private city-center high school with boarding facilities founded several decades ago. The school was founded by Izuru Kamukura in order to develop and research the talents of exceptional high school age children known as Ultimates (Super High School Level in Japanese). Unlike a typical high school, the students did not have to participate in entrance exams, but instead were scouted by the school itself as Ultimate experts in their field, with the exception of the Ultimate Lucky Student whose talent was determined by winning a lottery draw.

Prior to being scouted, the students had to have already been attending another high school by requirement, meaning they were at minimum 16 years old. Rather than typical school studies, students of Hope’s Peak Academy were encouraged to develop their talents, with a practical exam in September halfway through each school year, where they would be required to demonstrate their ability. These practical exams were judged by dignitaries and experts and widely reported by the media in order to give Hope in the future to the nation, and failure could mean expulsion. Ultimate students who successfully graduated Hope’s Peak Academy had the reputation of being guaranteed success in life, with many Hope’s Peak graduates holding high positions in every field of the professional world.

Originally exclusive to those with Ultimate abilities, the school later developed a preparatory school style second facility upon the school grounds known as the Reserve Course in order to fund the school’s research. Reserve Course students were not scouted, and instead took an entrance exam in order to attend. Successful applicants had to pay a high tuition fee, which would in turn fund the education of the Ultimates. Although the Reserve Course technically functioned as a normal - if exclusive - high school, the opportunity to attend was highly competitive due to the brand recognition of the school and the Main Course’s reputation for producing future pioneers. It was said that an exceptional student from the Reserve Course may one day be transferred to the Main Course, although no Reserve Course student ever achieved this feat.

Ultimate Students and Reserve Course students wear different uniforms to tell them apart.

The Main Course (the Ultimate Students) wear standard brown suits. Females wear a brown skirt and jacket, a white dress shirt, and a red tie. Males wear a brown suit, a white dress shirt, and a tie. They are free to accessorize their uniforms or in some cases, don’t wear the uniform if their talent involves having to wear something else, like a kimono or a jumpsuit.

The Reserve Course students wear black versions. The female uniform is a long-sleeved dress shirt, a red necktie, a black-pleated skirt, and brown shoes with matching socks. The male uniform is a black suit with three white buttons, a black tie and a white dress shirt inside. Unlike Ultimate students, they can’t accessorize their uniform.

After building a several hundred years long reputation of producing exemplary Ultimate graduates who go on to be experts in their profession throughout the professional world, the school built a second school building upon its campus and opened it to non-Ultimate Reserve Course students who paid a fee to attend. The tuition fees from these non-Ultimate students then funded the continued education and research of the Ultimate students.

During Class 77th’s first year the Twilight Syndrome Murder Case occurred, and The Kamukura Project proceeded. Soon after Class 78th was admitted, the Main Course was moved to the new school building on the main campus. An additional Overseas Campus also began construction during this year being managed by alumni and Former Student Council President Kyosuke Munakata.

The Tragedy of Hope’s Peak Academy, also known as the First Mutual Killing game, took place between the members of the Student Council. All of the members were killed, except for the Student Council President, Sōshun Murasame. Despite attempts at a cover up by The Steering Committee, a video of the debacle prepared by Junko Enoshima was sent to the students of the Reserve Course. This caused demonstrations and protests for several months by Reserve Course Students called “The Parade” by the Steering Committee instead of riots to avoid controversy.

Due to further meddling from the brainwashing videos given to the Reserve Course Students by Junko Enoshima, the Reserve Course Students eventually stormed the school building, destroying much of it, and killed all of the remaining Main Course students except for Class 78th (and unbeknownst to anyone else Class 77-B who faked their deaths with an explosion). Soon after, Junko Enoshima sent all of the protesting students a brainwashing video, causing them to all commit suicide simultaneously. This then lead to The Tragedy, the shutdown of Hope’s Peak, and the cancellation of the Overseas Campus project - the Overseas Campus eventually became the defacto secret headquarters of the Future Foundation. Headmaster Jin Kirigiri and Class 78th converted the old school building into a shelter, and lived there peacefully for a year until Junko forced Class 78th to participate in the Killing School Life killing game.

The main campus of Hope’s Peak Academy was diamond-shaped and approximately the size of four regular high-schools. It was divided into quarters, with the East side containing the facilities and classrooms for Ultimate students, the North side containing the old school building, and the West side containing the Reserve Course buildings. The South side housed the Main Course’s dormitories, as well as their living necessities, such as a convenience store, a bookstore, and other shops. The central plaza acted as a common area.

The Old School Building, located in the North Quarter, was the location of both The Tragedy of Hope’s Peak Academy and the Killing School Life killing games. It was essentially a self-contained unit containing all the facilities needed for a high-end live-in school: several classrooms over 5 floors, dormitories, a gymnasium, a large catering kitchen and dining room, a library, swimming pool, several restrooms, a laboratory housing an air purifier, a small school store, a trash room with an incinerator, a greenhouse, and a bathhouse with a sauna. After it was decided that the Old Building would become a shelter for Class 78th, the students and Jin Kirigiri bolted the windows closed with thick metal plating.

Before the Killing School Life began, Junko Enoshima covered the classrooms in gaudy and colorful animal-print wallpapers, vandalized most of the classroom blackboards, and added colored lights. She also added surveillance cameras and monitors all throughout the school, and converted the Data Center into a monitor room in which to view the surveillance footage.

First Floor

The ground floor is separated into two major parts; the dormitory and living quarters - called “Hotel Despair” during the Killing School Life - and the school area.

The living area contained 15 dorm rooms, a trash room and incinerator, restrooms, a substantial storage room, laundry facilities, a communal bath house, swimming pool and sauna, and a large dining room attached to a catering kitchen. During the Killing School Life the living quarters acted as a hub area, with breakfast meetings taking place each morning in the dining area, and secret meetings taking place in the bathhouse which was the only part of the school building which was not monitored by surveillance cameras.

The school area on the ground floor housed two classrooms (1A and 1B), an A/V room, the school store (containing the MonoMono Machine), a nurse’s office, restrooms, the entrance to the building (sealed with a large vault door) and the gymnasium. The elevator which led to the class trial courtroom in the basement could be accessed from this floor. The gymnasium on this floor was also a key location in the building, used repeatedly by Monokuma to gather the surviving students and give them their latest motive.

Dorm Rooms

The dorm rooms, which were situated in the living quarters, each had one room that served as both a sitting room and bedroom with simple wooden furniture, and a private ensuite bathroom. During the Killing School Life, as with most rooms in Hope’s Peak Academy, they were monitored by security cameras, and had a monitor mounted on the wall from which Monokuma gave wake-up calls, night-time alerts, and other school announcements. The default design of the room featured colour-coded bedding based on the gender of the occupant - pink of girls and blue for boys. Even during the Killing Game the students were able to decorate their dorm rooms however they chose according to their own tastes and personality.

Second Floor

The Library and Archives, the swimming pool, and classrooms 2-A and 2-B are located on the second floor. Leading to the pool area are boy and girl changing rooms. Within the men’s restroom on this floor is a secret room, containing secret documents and files about Hope’s Peak Academy.

Third Floor

The Rec room is directly across from the stairs leading to the second floor. To the left is the Art Room and a storage room. To the right is the Physics Lab, which contains an air purifier and another storage room. Classrooms 3-A and 3-B are also on this floor.

Fourth Floor

This floor contains the Music Room, the Staff Room, the Headmaster’s Office, the Chemistry Lab, and Classrooms 4-A and 4-B. The Data Processing Room is also on this floor and is kept locked; it connects to the Monokuma Control Room.

Fifth Floor

The fifth and top floor contains a dojo, along with the Biology Lab, which doubles as a morgue. The Greenhouse is found here, however, when the school was converted into a shelter, the windows were covered and painted sky blue, and artificial sun lamps were installed. Classrooms 5-A and 5-B are next to each other, and classroom 5-C is near the Biology Lab. Classroom 5-C is covered in blood and body chalk lines, likely a result of The Tragedy of Hope’s Peak Academy.

Basement

Before The Tragedy, this basement was used for The Izuru Kamukura Project, and Izuru Kamukura lived there for an amount of time. For the Second Killing Game it was converted into a grand room for the Class Trials. Separately is a trash dump. Makoto Naegi ends up there after Alter Ego saves him from execution. To exit the dump, there is a long ladder to a hatch that leads to the trash room.

Ultimate, is a title given to talented people described as being the very best at what they do. They often specialize in one subject.

Monokuma is a stuffed robotic bear and the self-proclaimed Headmaster of Hope’s Peak Academy who instigates the Killing School Life.

Monokuma is a bear whose whole face and body are divided by the center into two parts. It resembles the Yin-Yang symbol, of which there is a balance between two opposites in a way similar to a “flow”. Its right side is white and has the classic expression of teddy bear; While its left side shows a more sinister appearance. It is black, has a red, horizontal, jagged eye that resembles the Hope’s Peak Academy logo and an evil smile.

Although it is completely divided into two opposite sides, the only parts of Monokuma that are not affected by the division in its area are the snout and the belly, since both remain white. He also has a large, obvious belly button on the underside of his belly. His protruding navel has an “X” shaped mark on it. Inside him, he has a lot of wires due to him being a robot and a bomb.

Monokuma is often described as easygoing and cheerful at first glance, but with a very sinister undertone. However, he always rather quickly reveals his evil nature by describing killing games and his desire for despair, and he is very well known for his habit to say and do whatever he wants to. He loves hysteria, violence, and chaos, summarized in one of his catchphrases “thrills, chills, kills!”. He also has his own signature laughs, a sadistic “puhuhu” and a mocking “ah-hahahaha”.

In many ways, Monokuma represents duality both in design and personality, with his white good side and black evil side. He can sometimes act polite or cute and innocent, even patronizing, and during rare moments he even seems to give genuine positive and wise advice. However, he is mostly known for his malicious and cruel side, possessing a twisted sense of humor and a tendency to torment others and do anything for the sake of despair. He can switch between these traits at the drop of a hat, making him unpredictable for his students to deal with. He usually gets excited about the Class Trials and does everything he can in order to make them entertaining for himself.

Monokuma enjoys the suffering of others, which makes him madly excited. And in turn, he gets bored and disappointed if the situation doesn’t have as much despair as he hoped. Occasionally, he is so bummed out by the lack of despair that he seems to lose some of his energy and withdraws to make new plans. It’s been shown that he can also get hypocritical about his ideology of despair, as he is very much willing to lie and cheat if he gets desperate enough. Still, even he seems to have some standards, as some people are so vile that they disgust even Monokuma.

Monokuma is immature and childish, often acting sarcastic and mocking towards the students, and occasionally dramatically pretending to be offended when rightfully accused. In general, he cracks a lot of jokes (especially bear puns) and breaks the fourth wall often.

Monokuma doesn’t seem to take the students’ situation seriously, though he claims that despair is a very serious matter to him. He seizes every opportunity to belittle the students, dodging the blame and claiming that they are the ones responsible for everything bad that happens in the school. He also tends to ignore the students or act like he doesn’t understand what they’re talking about whenever they expose him with correct evidence.

Monokuma can be quite impatient and might attack people with his claws, his self-destruct function, threats of execution, or any other means if he is annoyed or threatened enough. However, most of the time he holds himself back, under the claim that he cannot hurt his “beloved students”. His bullying and abusive nature is especially clear in the way he treats Monomi, as he gets physically and verbally abusive towards her even if he is just slightly annoyed or seemingly for no reason at all. Similarly, he is seen acting very violent towards his children if they annoy him, though originally in a very cartoony way that didn’t seem to bother them. However, he turns increasingly more cruel towards his children as the game progresses, and they are shown to be quite saddened by this as they mention that Monokuma used to be much more loving towards them in the past. He also likes to make fun of K1-B0 for being a robot, even though he is also one. In the case of the students, Monokuma generally dislikes those who don’t obey him or have such optimism or intelligence that they are harder for him to manipulate, and he tends to describe these people as “annoying”.

Monokuma is also very arrogant and tends to treat others in a rude manner, with Junko being the only one he refers to respectfully as “Lady Junko”. Fitting his arrogance, he has multiple fake stories about his past, many of them nonsensical and with a silly, dark or even thoughtful message in the end. Strangely, he seems to take great pride in his supposed role as the headmaster, demanding respect for the rules and getting angry if he is called a teddy bear instead of headmaster.

Notably, he seems to be strongly against any shameful acts that could taint his respectful school, yet he himself often incorrectly accuses the students of having dirty motives and goes into way too much detail about his suspicions. Even though he acts like he is above all that, he can aim perverted comments at his students, boys and girls alike (especially for being teens).

Prior to the Tragedy

During the refinement in preparation for the Killing School Life, Junko determined that a mascot is necessary as well - not even a host dressed in a sort of a cartoon character outfit would do. Therefore, during the prototype execution featuring Chiaki Nanami, she hosted the broadcast to the Class 77-B with a non-robotic stuffed bear version of Monokuma. At around the same time, she contacted Monaca, the Head of Towa Group’s robotics division, to create the robotic version to be used for the Killing School Life, as well as additional units to serve as Junko’s army. In order to hide the true nature of the robot, Monaca claimed that she wanted to develop a series of robots that could assist in rescue operations and other scenarios that would be dangerous for humans. The Monokuma units were then secretly distributed to the various branches of Ultimate Despair, with Junko taking several for her plot at Hope’s Peak Academy. Junko also creates a personality for Monokuma in the Killing Game while she controls him.

Daily Life is one of the two major components in each chapter featured in the main Danganronpa series. The protagonist of each game can decide how to spend their time during the day and night during the events of the Killing Game. Some events may take place during a specific time of day as you progress. During this section of the chapter, the students are given Motives and new areas to explore inside Hope’s Peak Academy, Jabberwock Island and the Ultimate Academy for Gifted Juveniles respectively.

Class Trials are the final act of each chapter of the main Danganronpa games. The students debate amongst themselves, using evidence collected during the investigation phase, to determine the culprit in each chapter. The debate takes place in a courtroom setting, and consists of several debate phases and minigames. The trial ends when the culprit - known as the “Blackened” - is uncovered, and ultimately executed, or if the culprit isn’t identified, the jury is executed, ultimately ending the killing game and allowing the culprit to graduate.

The goal of Class Trials is for the students to uncover the “Blackened”, the student who has, either voluntarily or involuntarily, murdered another student as part of the mutual Killing Game. During the Class Trial, they oppose all the other students, who are known as the “Spotless”. The students determine who they believe is guilty by participating in a vote at the end of the trial. If the Blackened is found guilty, they will be executed by Monokuma and the Killing Game will continue, but if the students find the wrong student guilty then every student except the Blackened will be executed and the Blackened will be allowed to leave. Participating in Class Trials is mandatory for all students alive at the time. Students who have been murdered or executed prior to the trial are represented in the courtroom in portraits displayed on stands at the student’s former podium.

After the students have voted for who they believe is the Blackened, the Blackened is then Executed by Monokuma, also known as “Punishment Time”. The style of execution typically relate to the character’s Ultimate ability, their major interests, or their personality in general, for example Leon Kuwata, the Ultimate Baseball Star, is executed by being pummeled by baseballs fired from a pitching machine.

During School Life, the player explores the school grounds, builds relationships with students, and investigates the mystery of the students’ captivity. Monocoins collected throughout this free-roam mode can be spent on presents at the MonoMono Machine, which can be given to other students to increase their friendship with the protagonist. Becoming friends with another student will grant the protagonist special skills, which can be used during the Class Trial mode.

During Investigation, the player searches for evidence relating to a murder.

During Class Trial, the students try to solve the murder by discussing the evidence they have. The player plays several mini-games to progress the trial. The most common mini-game, Nonstop Debate, involves the player trying to refute the students’ statements using Truth Bullets based on the evidence they collected during the Investigation mode.

Junko appears to be a young high school-aged teenager, but due to her causing her classmates memory loss, she is two years older than they all believed her and themselves to be. She has a tall, dramatic hourglass figure, light blue eyes, and long, thick, bleached strawberry-blonde hair tied in two twin pigtails. Due to her fake talent, she wears heavy make-up along with fake long red nails.

Due to being related, Junko and her older twin sister Mukuro Ikusaba share several physical characteristics. However, Junko has a considerably larger chest than Mukuro and weighs two pounds more than her. Junko’s eyes are more round and larger and are blue with her contacts or naturally red compared to Mukuro’s light purple eyes. Junko also lacks freckles.

Junko’s usual outfit includes a black cardigan over a white dress shirt, with both left open to the third button to expose the top of her black-and-red bra, a red pleated miniskirt that is cut extremely short, and mid-sized black boots with platform heels and red laces. Her cardigan is accented with white symbols of her Former High School.

Her most notable accessory is her signature twin bear hair clips that are based on Monokuma’s two sides. The right clip is a completely white bear with dot eyes and a neutral expression, while the left is a black bear with a white muzzle, jagged red eyes, and a wicked smile.

Due to her constantly-shifting personalities, Junko’s appearance shifts slightly with her mood. Junko’s “moods” included (but were not limited to) her Monokuma persona, sickening cuteness, severe depression, clinical sophistication, boisterous vulgarity, eerie stoicism, and haughty superiority. Her “haughty superiority” personality dons a small gold and red crown with encrusted jewels. Her “clinical sophistication” personality wears glasses and styles her hair in a ponytail, carrying a pen and board. Her “severe depression” personality sports a few multicolored mushrooms on top of her head with a blueish forehead with no pupils. Additionally, her right hair clip has a sad face. Her “sickening cuteness” personality simplifies her entire appearance to appear more cartoonish, including smoother pigtails, large, bright eyes, and a small smile. Her “boisterous vulgarity” personality is similar to Genocide Jack, as she has a reddish forehead and she talks with her tongue out, along with having messier pigtails and doing the hand-horn gesture. Her “eerie stoicism” personality involves her doing a pose that turns her body away slightly to the left with one arm around her torso and one covering part of her face with a constant serious expression. Lastly, her Monokuma personality involves her having Monokuma in front of her.

As a young fashionista, Junko Enoshima is described as simply “not fake”, charismatic and eager to try new things. During her first appearances, she comes across slightly air-headed and hot-tempered. In the official artbook, she is described as a person who “drips with dissatisfaction the moment she opens her mouth” and tends to be in trouble with her classmates. She is also mentioned to be a bit too talkative with an overly carefree attitude.

However, Junko’s real personality, revealed at the conclusion of the Killing School Life, is notably different: very apathetic and easily bored to an unhealthy and abnormal degree. Because of this, her behavior and mannerisms tended to be extremely erratic and unstable by her own autonomous design; keeping up one “appearance” for too long bores her, which causes her to often switch between her aforementioned different personas. She switched between these personas regularly, often imitating other students’ expressions, which made for a highly unsettling conversation with the survivors. Her voice will either have a different tone or accent within the switches, such as “haughty superiority” giving her a voice similar to a stereotypical British monarch, her “sickening cuteness” giving her a higher pitched voice, her “clinical sophistication” giving her a more mature or deeper voice, making her speak as if she was, as her appearance suggests, a teacher/professor, her “severe depression” giving her a more sad voice, as if she was on the verge of crying, her “eerie stoicism” giving her a monotone voice, her “boisterous vulgarity” sounding similar to a stereotypical rockstar, and her Monokuma one mimicking his voice. While entering the Hope’s Peak Academy as one of Class 78’s students, she often talked as if narrating a story, writing down her thoughts in a notebook.

Above all, Junko was deeply obsessed with despair, having found despair to be the most (and possibly the only) enjoyable emotion for her, whether it be inflicting despair unto others, or suffering from despair wholeheartedly. This made her extremely dangerous, as she wished to make the whole world feel absolute despair. However, this also often proved to be her biggest weakness, as she gave her opponents a “fair” chance to defeat her in order to make their despair all the greater if they fail, and happily welcomed her own despair if her plans failed.