E3 2015 – Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls Preview

As someone who didn’t really get much into the original two Danganronpa games, I was eager to see the change in genre that Another Episode takes on. Switching gears from a murder mystery game and becoming more of an action game, Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls pits you against the Monokumas in a fight for survival.

In the game, you take control of Komaru Naegi and Toko Fukawa as you try to survive hundreds of Monokumas and the Warriors of Hope (a group of children that have taken over the city). This group declares that the world will be a paradise for kids and plans to take out all the adults. Now, somehow Komaru is thrown into the middle of all this and with the help of Toko, must make it out alive. Another Episode takes place between the events of Trigger Happy Havoc and Goodbye Despair.

School is in Session

The demo I played had you trying to escape what looked like a school. I started by controlling Komaru, who uses a megaphone to fire various different kinds of bullets at enemies you face. It’s not just for fighting though, as I had to switch bullets to the Move Bullet in order to solve different puzzles in the demo. For instance, I had to shoot the bullet at a power button to turn on a door so I could move on in the level. 

If you do need to get in close with any enemies, you can switch to Toko, who turns into her psychotic other self, Genocide Jack. However, you can’t keep her out forever, as your battery life for her depletes as she stays, forcing you to change back to Komaru once it is all out. It’s a really effective one-two punch between the ranged Komaru and the in-your-face Genocide Jack.

 Mixing Things Up

Outside of just roaming the hallways, taking out the Monokumas, and solving puzzles to proceed, I also got to try out a Pac-Man-style mini game. In this mini game, I was tasked with trying to sneak past Monokumas in a small room without being caught. It wasn’t anything amazing, but it was however a nice way to break up the action of the game, giving you a different way to make it through certain areas of the world.

I could easily see fans of the first two games being a little thrown off with Another Episode, as it really is such a different game from the first two. That being said, the game retains a lot of the same charms of the past games, all with the same quirky characters. Make sure to check this game out when it releases on the PlayStation Vita on September 1 later this year.