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catboyebooks · 10 months

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so there's a classroom on this floor we can enter and there's another manga in here. "manga for morons! the tragedy of hope's peak academy." again, great! & i'll give the tl;dr:

this manga names kamukura as the perpetrator of the incident in question. it doesn't give a full background on kamukura but says he was allegedly a multitalented genius, referred to as "shsl hope" by the academy, who expended tons of resources on developing his talents and kept him a secret from the rest of the student body to protect their investment. anyway, according to this, kamukura murdered the thirteen members of hope's peak's student council, hope's peak tried to cover it up, and a "certain student" (junko, obviously) blew the whistle. the resulting scandal forced the school to close and incited an uprising among the reserve course students, and from there the situation grew out of control and the despair apocalypse happened etc.

i don't wanna jump way ahead here but i have to point out that we see the incident in question in dr3 and kamukura was in fact not the instigator. junko used him as a fall guy. since dr3 did retcon some stuff (nanami having been a real person they used to go to school with is a retcon, komaeda and kamukura meeting back when they were still in high school is a retcon, etc.) i don't know whether this is also a retcon or whether monokuma is just lying here, but i'm kinda leaning towards the latter. junko always denies personal responsibility for murders she didn't directly commit, and she didn't directly kill the student council, so when she speaks about her own involvement here as though all she did was leak the story i think in her mind that counts as not lying. and of course she wouldn't admit to having set kamukura up, she's clearly trying to portray kamukura as a monster so that she can break hinata by revealing that he's kamukura (i would bet that's why this manga omits the fact that kamukura was locked in an underground lab for like a year and change while his high school performed experimental brain surgeries on him. i mean, that makes him sound like the victim here, and, even though he is, we can't have that!). i guess we'll see, though, depending on how the kamukura stuff gets talked about in the rest of this chapter and depending on whether or not monokuma turns out to be lying about anything else. i'm not positive yet to what extent we're supposed to accept this info on face value

also the manga cites danganronpa zero as a source lol. i should probably reread that at some point too huh

#kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 9 months

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about kamukura. i've been holding off on talking about this for a while now because i couldn't really remember how the whole thing was talked about in sdr2, and it seems the fandom at large had a different read of the situation than i did, which made me question myself here. i keep seeing people interpret the situation as "the experiment was successful in that kamukura was given every talent ever, but it was bad because it robbed hinata of his memories and personality" and i've been over here like, that Can't be the intended takeaway, right? the broader points being made here are that hope's peak's view of how talent works is wrong, and that what was done to hinata was wholly unnecessary and tragic because nothing was wrong with the guy in the first place. wouldn't it detract from the intended takeaways if their experiment was successful? if you really can operate on a Normal Guy's brain to make him superhumanly talented, doesn't that mean that hope's peak is right about how talent works?

but i'm glad i waited to talk about it because i think i have basically been proven correct here. when junko explained the kamukura project to hinata a bit earlier in this trial, she does not say that the brain surgery was intended to give him every talent ever, but instead that the goal was to retool his brain so that it is solely devoted to the acquisition of talent. they wanted to create a guy who could learn any skill, because hope's peak is so fucking nuts they think the only way you could learn a skill you don't have an innate aptitude for is if they do mad science to your brain first. their goal in tampering with hinata's brain was to reshape him into the most talented man alive, yes, but the surgery was just intended to lay the groundwork for that.

we don't know what exactly was done to hinata/kamukura beyond the brain surgery, but i do have some guesses. again, not to jump ahead and talk about dr3 too much, but i always figured kimura's weird concoctions that all seem to have uncontrollable hair growth as a side effect were used on him in order to enhance his abilities. i also assume that they tried to fill his brain with as much talent-related information as they could, probably pulling data from shsl students and "uploading" it to hinata's brain somehow so that In Theory he'd know everything he needs to know to Be Very Good At Things. but kimura's drugs wear off and knowledge alone only gets you so far. there's a difference between talent and raw ability.

as a general rule, when someone is incredibly good at a particular skill, it's because they like it, they're passionate about it, they've practiced it endlessly, they've devoted their lives to it. this holds mostly true for the shsl students (notable exceptions being leon who is great at baseball but doesn't like it and would rather become a musician, owari who has no formal gymnastics training nor any real interest in the subject but got really good at it anyway because she grew up in a rough environment and learned to be fast and nimble to keep herself safe, and also the people literally born into their "talents" like togami, kuzuryuu, sonia, etc. — not everyone has the freedom to pursue what they want, another point danganronpa makes about how being recognized as talented can be restrictive), but it cannot possibly be true of kamukura, who is a guy utterly devoid of any passions whatsoever. while hinata's problem is that he's afraid to try things because he thinks he'll be bad at them due to being "untalented," kamukura gets told he's the genius of mankind and can succeed at anything he tries his hand at but (especially since this also came at the cost of his memories and personality) he no longer has any interests or passions, so what does it matter? like, for example, maybe he could beat asahina in a swimming contest, but she's the one who actually enjoys swimming and will actively work to continue honing that skill, whereas kamukura wouldn't even be interested in entering the contest in the first place. you could say that both of them are the "shsl swimmer" but i'd argue that it's not the same thing at all.

this is another place where hope's peak's ideology falls apart, because it's not that talent itself inspires hope, it's that young people who are very passionate about their skills and want to continue pursuing them and take it to the next level are obviously hopeful about their futures — but you can hold out hope for the future without being the best at something, and you can be skilled at something without wanting to dedicate your life to it. this is, imo, the narrative point of the kamukura project; it lampshades this distinction, illuminating how harmful this way of conceptualizing talent can be to young people like hinata who deeply internalize this message.

#i've quite literally been waiting years to make this post. just needed a little more proof i wasn't nuts. and i got it #kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 9 months

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there's some more back-and-forth between junko and naegi, basically the two of them having a hope vs. despair argument (it kinda sounds like they're picking up where they left off in 1-6). naegi is adamant that junko can't be allowed to escape and junko says that preventing her from escaping means preventing the sdr2 survivors from escaping, too. the group realizes that if everything junko's saying about how she modified the simulation is true, they can't choose to "graduate" without causing the dead people's minds to get overwritten with junko's. of course this is cause for alarm. junko agrees with the group that it's fucked up, but says that for the future foundation, it must be awfully convenient. this is a way for them to keep all of shsl despair trapped in VR forever. naegi protests, but he doesn't have a real argument here, presumably because he has already committed treason against the future foundation by trying to protect the sdr2 cast and he knows the foundation as a whole would probably prefer they all stay trapped in VR.

junko makes a rather big deal about how ironic it is that they came all this way only to realize that leaving VR was the wrong choice, and isn't that soooo despair-inducing? (this time when she says zetsubouteki they translated it as "fuckin' tragic." idk what we're even doing anymore.) this effectively gets under hinata's skin, at least, and he starts agonizing over the possibility that everything they've worked for has been in vain and the lives lost were lost for nothing. he seems to be heading rapidly towards a complete breakdown, but luckily (lol) naegi interrupts to snap him out of it.

naegi says there is actually a way they can leave without letting junko escape. junko's immediate reaction is to dismiss this, but a second later she changes tune and asks if that's really true because it's the first she's heard of that. we did actually hear about this earlier, naegi mentioned a shutdown sequence, and this time he elaborates saying it's a safeguard he included in case of rogue AI, hence junko can't stop them from activating it. at this point junko reveals that she does know about this safeguard and they won't be able to use it, because in order to activate the shutdown sequence more than half the group needs to press both "graduate" and "repeat" simultaneously on their podiums. with two-thirds of the group dead, this just isn't possible. even if naegi participates too that won't be enough, and the actual number of people present matters to the VR program, not just whether the buttons are pressed or no (so they can't just hit the buttons on the empty podiums to accomplish this). i presume this is where we bring in the rest of the dr1 survivors? or at least the rest of the main trio? at least kirigiri? i miss her

#kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 9 months

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ok is everybody ready

#kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 9 months

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ok continuing. of course everyone is very upset about, well, everything, but naegi tells them they don't need to worry, he's here to provide them hope. essentially, he explains, the whole purpose of putting them in VR was to remove and overwrite their memories of becoming shsl despair. even though things didn't exactly go to plan, with most of the group dying in the VR program, those of them who made it through to the end are now free to "graduate" which they can do by selecting that option on their podiums. monokuma adds that this means they won't get their missing memories back, and naegi confirms — if they choose to graduate, their VR avatar selves will be "uploaded" back into their real bodies, effectively erasing their past selves. they'll remember everything that happened in VR, but won't ever get those years of missing memories back. the people who died in VR unfortunately will still be dead (well, braindead) in real life.

at this point it seems like graduating has lost some of its appeal, because sonia asks about the alternative and naegi says they can remain in VR and continue the "beach vacation" if they want. the group starts arguing about what to do. irl the world is destroyed, their families and friends are dead, their bodies aren't what they remember, and returning to that world won't bring their "dead" friends back... but they struggled through so much to get to leave, are they really just going to give up on the idea now?

hinata doesn't participate in the discussion/argument himself, but he clearly feels conflicted; he still thinks leaving is what they ought to do, but it's clear he doesn't really want to anymore. he also, to his credit, realizes something is off here. why isn't monokuma trying to stop them? if they really just get to leave, what was the point of the killing game? can naegi actually be trusted?

i probably don't have to say it, but it is once again insanely suspicious that naegi and monokuma have been giving the exact same story here, consistently agreeing with each other and backing up what the other says. even without having met naegi before, it must stand out as suspicious to hinata that a survivor of the previous killing game run by monokuma, who now works for the future foundation, would be appearing here basically as monokuma's special guest and agreeing with everything he says.

#kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 1 year

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i’ve still got more chapter 5 stuff to talk about. is anybody surprised? since the last two posts were more character-focused, let’s talk about The Plot. specifically the events of this chapter. specifically the ways in which the events of this chapter bear (heh) similarities to the events of dr1. this one isn't going under the cut either, fair warning.

not saying anything groundbreaking here, but the sdr2 killing game very closely parallels the dr1 killing game. without even being exhaustive about it, let me point out some of the similarities in the murder cases:

in chapter 1 of both games the motive relates to the memory wipe, the murder takes place at night, the victim is killed by being stabbed repeatedly, the murder is instigated by someone who is not the killer (in both cases, also, the instigator is someone close to the protagonist), and the killer is collared around the neck and strapped to a pole as part of their execution

in chapter 2 of both games the motive relates to the past / secrets. the murder takes place near the water / in an area where people might get ready to go swimming, and the victim is killed with a single blunt-force head injury by someone who acted impulsively rather than out of actual animosity towards them. there’s an attempt made to frame another student for the murder as well as confusion over whether a famous serial killer might have done it. familial relationships, specifically sibling relationships, factor heavily into the motive. while the protagonist and deuteragonist conducted the bulk of the investigation together in chapter 1, this time it’s mainly the protagonist and tritagonist who do so, with less direct input from the deuteragonist

in chapter 3 of both games the crime that takes place is a premeditated and particularly cold double murder. the motive is something unexpected and difficult for the others to understand or relate to. a major point of confusion during the trial is the sequence of events during the killings, and misleading photo/video evidence is staged by the killer in order to further this confusion

in chapter 4 of both games the characters start to become preoccupied with who the traitor might be. a robot/AI “dies” this chapter. the person to die is the most physically powerful member of the group by far, raising doubts as to who could have killed them; in fact, the “murder” is actually a suicide / suicide pact done to ensure the rest of the group’s survival, and in the aftermath of the trial the survivors feel inspired to work together and try and end the killing game. one member of the main trio, who has had a particular approach to the killing game since the outset, changes strategies during this chapter’s trial and no longer believes the killing game ought to be won. this same character shows off during the investigation/trial by doing something that looks like it should be fatal

now, in chapter 4 of sdr2, the characters learn about the previous killing game and komaeda is quick to point out the parallels. most of what happens in chapter 5 is masterminded by him, so i think we can infer that the parallels between 1-5 and 2-5 are intentional on not just AI!junko’s part (obviously some of the similarities, like similar motives, are things she has direct control over), but on komaeda’s part as well.

there’s an interesting dynamic that plays out between komaeda and monokuma this chapter. for the sake of brevity (haha! that worked out well) i didn’t get into this in the previous longpost about komaeda, but i do think i have to talk about it here.

(as i’ve been over repeatedly) monokuma handed komaeda the information about shsl despair clearly intending for him to react by doing something batshit insane. that’s why he’s happy to go along with it when komaeda takes the reins this chapter — i mean, komaeda basically says “you don’t need to give us a motive this chapter, i want to know who the traitor is and if i don’t get a confession i am going to blow up this entire island” and monokuma not only has zero objections, he seems to be in a great mood most of chapter 5. of course, monokuma would have known all along that the “bomb threat” was just a bluff intended to keep everyone else distracted, but i don’t think he realized that he counted as part of Everyone Else here.

the bomb threat serves to accomplish a few things — it keeps the other survivors preoccupied while komaeda sets up his own murder, and it ensures nobody has an alibi for his murder because they all split up to investigate. however, komaeda’s unhinged villain act in 2-5 isn’t just to convince the others that the bomb threat is real, it’s also to convince monokuma that komaeda has indeed snapped and is now acting with malicious intent towards the others. and it works. during the trial monokuma actually praises komaeda’s plan and makes it very clear that he admires it, but he’s misinterpreted the takeaway — he thinks komaeda’s goal was to show the others True Despair by trapping them in an unwinnable stuation.

back to the parallels with the previous killing game, i think another big reason why monokuma is all too happy to let komaeda take charge here is because chapter 5 of the last killing game is when junko really started losing control of the situation. after sakura’s suicide in 1-4, the survivors resolved to work together to solve the mystery and end the killing game, leading junko to become increasingly desperate in her attempts to keep the murders going. she tried killing naegi herself, and when that didn’t work she reused her sister’s corpse to set up a fake murder so that she’d have an excuse to execute kirigiri or naegi. i’ve talked about this a bit before but it does feel like AI!junko is playing her side of the game more aggressively this time, particularly starting in 2-4 with the funhouse motive (never before has she imposed a time limit for committing murder). this is, i’m sure, why she chose to give komaeda the info on shsl despair. monokuma doesn’t seem to feel Threatened by komaeda in the same way that he did with naegi and kirigiri (figures, since komaeda has actually been in favor of the killing game and does not announce his intent to stop the killing game / take down the mastermind the way naegi and kirigiri do), but the rest of the group has been relying very heavily on komaeda to solve the mysteries, and it certainly makes the situation more difficult for everyone else if they don’t have komaeda as an “ally” of sorts. last time, it was the survivors working together as a team — in particular, the main trio working together — that ultimately derailed the killing game, and this time monokuma is trying to ensure that Does Not Happen. so it’s no wonder that he’s in such a good mood this chapter, it looks like komaeda is doing exactly what monokuma hoped that he would!

however, it also appears to be slowly dawning on monokuma throughout the course of this chapter that komaeda has figured out way more than he anticipated about the situation, and that this might be A Problem. at several points beginning during 2-4’s trial and continuing into 2-5, komaeda makes comments hinting that he knows they’re in VR and that he knows the mastermind is planning something much bigger after the killing game ends; he’s vague about it so it’s not clear exactly how much he knows, but it’s enough to get monokuma agitated. during the scene where komaeda confronts monokuma alone at the end of 2-4, monokuma initially seems quite confident and pleased that his plan is working but gets shaken towards the end when komaeda implies he knows what the mastermind is planning to do when the killing game ends, so this is definitely a worry monokuma has before 2-5 even starts, but the rest of komaeda’s actions appear to lull him into a false sense of security.

one thing komaeda does this chapter feels particularly pointed, though. and yes, pun intended, i’m talking about the impalement. the way junko staged mukuro’s body in 1-5, she was lying flat on her back with a knife in her stomach. komaeda stages his own death so that he’s discovered in a similar position, but rather than stabbing himself in the stomach with a knife, he uses a spear, just as was actually used to kill mukuro. lemme point out again that the spear was a totally unnecessary element of his murder, it was 100% for show as the poison would have killed him anyway. i don’t think AI!junko, observing the setup for this, would have noticed the similarities to the way she staged her sister’s body at first — most of the setup would have involved komaeda tying himself up and stabbing himself and i’m sure that kept her distracted. but when hinata’s investigating komaeda’s body (hehe) monokuma comments on the spear, calling it “the spear of gugnir” without explaining the reference. he seems a bit shaken by this. komaeda going to such lengths to imitate mukuro’s chapter 5 body discovery, including throwing in a reference to her actual cause of death, feels very much like he’s telling junko that he knows who she is — and since they all know the mastermind of the previous killing game is dead, if he knows they’re still dealing with junko, that must mean he also knows it’s VR.

regarding komaeda’s final video message, which monokuma redacts parts of — the mastermind of course would have witnessed komaeda recording this video, and presumably didn’t worry too much about whatever he said at the time because at that point komaeda was already setting up his own murder, and the rest of the group might not even live through the trial to view the video. while ofc i have to take a guess at exactly what was redacted, it sure looks like monokuma removed some references to everyone being former shsl despair and at least one reference (which could very well have been vague, but i think monokuma is generally displeased that komaeda figured this out and would have redacted it anyway) to the killing game happening in VR, but he didn’t redact the instructions on how to enter the ruins. he must still think it’s possible to turn the situation around in his favor, especially with both future foundation agents out of the picture, no more main trio, and only five people left alive. i think this means that junko still doesn’t understand what komaeda was actually trying to do in chapter 5 — like i said before, i think his actual end goal was for the group to survive and make it into the ruins, hence why he left instructions, but none of the characters seem to have realized this. (hinata actually got the closest. there’s a moment during 2-5 trial where he thinks that maybe the only reason komaeda put them in such a despair-inducing situation was to force them to overcome it together with the combined power of their hope, or something.)

there’s other 1-5/2-5 parallels beyond the way the body is discovered this chapter, of course. both trials, it feels like the group is being rushed along and there’s a(n entirely justified) sense that they’re headed towards a trap. both trials also involve a metaphorical trust fall — in 1-5 naegi has to trust kirigiri and allow suspicion to be directed onto himself (the alternative is a bad end), and in 2-5 the entire group has to trust in nanami’s assertion that the only way for them to live is to vote her guilty. in both of these scenarios, also, the person being executed is particularly friendly/kind/optimistic, and they’re set to be executed via crushing. neither of the executions are “real” either in that naegi survives and nanami wasn’t alive to begin with.

i’m sure i’m gonna keep talking about parallels between the cases in this liveblog, as well as when i end up eventually talking about ultra despair girls and dr3 and ndrv3 on here, but i did want to talk about the way komaeda sets up his murder in particular because imo he 100% did that shit on purpose. anyway that’s the post

#im gearing up to continue the damn game i promise. i promise #its just that im fucking insane. sorry #kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 10 months

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we also get to enter one of the classrooms on the second floor, but it's been converted to a laundry room. apart from the glitching, it looks like it did in dr1, still with the same laundry hanging on the clotheslines even. there's a tablet computer lying on the table and hinata goes to have a look at it. when the screen boots it reads "neo world program" and then displays some sort of charts/graphs along with a message about how this VR program is designed with the most advanced psychotherapy technology, in collaboration between people such as the shsl programmer, neurologist, and therapist. it further explains that because the simulation can be used to overwrite memories of the real world with new information and experiences in the virtual world, it can "undo trauma." also this program is to be used for psychotherapeutic purposes only and any other use is expressly forbidden. when used improperly it could cause "total personality destruction."

this is when it appears to finally hit hinata that he's in VR.

the screen fades to black. hinata thinks that suddenly everything is beginning to feel meaningless. the world around him seems empty and tainted and about to collapse around him. all he can feel is despair. naturally, he screams. the room pops back into reality around him and monokuma appears to tell him he can't give up now, he's not done completing monokuma's "character route" and more despair awaits him!

hinata, still in existential crisis mode, thinks that if everything around him is apparently not real then what about him? is he also not real?

#kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 10 months

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leaving the room takes us immediately to the second floor, which is upside fucking down. also the music is an 8-bit glitchy remix and it whips. owari's here again and the glitch effects here make her sprite look almost completely garbled before we start talking to her. she says she's still got that gut feeling about somebody approaching them, and hinata asks her if she feels like it's an ally or an enemy. she thinks about it for a bit, but before she can answer the little mini nidai bot souda built yells "IT'S BOTH!" and she agrees, it's both. hinata asks what that means and she's again unable to clarify.

when we enter the library (everywhere else seems to be off limits) it's right-side up, but the carpet is glitching and the books on the shelves are also glitching. there's another email.

this email's addressed to the 14th division of the future foundation, apparently led by one makoto naegi (new world order starts playing when we read it — fucking figures). the writer of this email asks naegi / the dr1 cast if they understand that what they're doing is a serious act of treason. why are they protecting the remnants of despair, when it should be all too clear to them how dangerous these people are? they're being lied to and they need to think carefully about their ideals, and the ideals of the foundation. there's an implied threat in here that they'll be kicked out of the foundation or worse if they don't comply, and the email writer brings up how the future foundation aided the six dr1 survivors and restored their memories for them. the conclusion of the email stresses again that the remnants of despair must be eliminated. the worst most despair-inducing event in the history of mankind will never end if they're allowed to live.

hinata finds this one confusing. why would naegi, who he knows is now part of the future foundation, work against them to protect the remnants of despair? did he betray them?

sidenote, as is maybe apparent, i don't remember this chapter well at all (in fairness to me it's been like nine years?) but it sure seems like we're being misled into assuming naegi might have turned evil between games. i feel like kodaka had to have been aware of how many people liked the idea of Despair Naegi because, like, this kinda keeps happening

#for clarity i was absolutely a despair naegi enthusiast i used to have the url mastermindnaegi back when people had .co.vu redirects #i guess it's a popular concept in the fandom bc something something corruption of a seemingly unbreakably kind character etc.#personally i just wanted to hear megumi ogata say evil things #kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 1 year

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before actually entering the warehouse we get to talk to the others but imo the only really interesting conversation here is between hinata and nanami. they talk about whether komaeda's still inside the warehouse; nanami points out there's only one entrance/exit, hinata points out komaeda could have left while they were getting the fire grenades or before they even arrived at the warehouse in the first place, but it's clear both of them are anxious about komaeda. the others don't seem to share the same concern, they're more curious about what caused the fire or (in owari's case) still vowing to beat komaeda up.

they head in. there's a lot of remarking on the strong smell in here, likely from the fire and the chemicals. the ominous hymnals are still playing. now that the lights are on they observe that the warehouse extends further back than they originally thought — the curtain that they thought was against the back wall has burned away, revealing a back half to the warehouse that they hadn't noticed before. hinata gets closer and that's when he sees... This:

#keep thotting it up in heaven king i miss you everyday.png #kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 2 years

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hm. we have more free time and i was gonna hang out with saionji next but i have no idea what gifts she'd like. might just look this up

#kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 1 year

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alright, i really don't wanna go in too deep on the kamukura stuff for now as that seems premature, but since it came up this chapter — let's talk about kanji name meanings for a second here. and please bear in mind that i am a fucking novice when it comes to kanji so i am supplementing my small bit of knowledge with stuff like Looking It Up or Just Plain Guessing:

i mentioned previously that when hinata sees the portrait of hope's peak's founder he remarks on the name being difficult to pronounce, and i think in the original japanese he says something like "i don't even know how to read that." my knowledge of kanji is quite limited but i do not blame him; "kamukura izuru" is written 神座出流, and while i recognize (most of) those characters i would not know how to read them in this context. given these kanji i think you'd read the name "kamukura" as like "a place for a god" and "izuru" as "out of the current," but i'm guessing, and also double-checking using the fan wiki, which might also be guessing.

but looking into this got me curious about hinata's name too. both his first and last name are, well, ordinary, and i hadn't given it a lot of thought prior. hinata's surname means "a sunny place" or "to face the sun" and his first name, hajime, typically means "beginning" — except that there are a lot of different ways to write his first name and i noticed he doesn't use the character i would have expected (始, "beginning") and instead uses a different character (創, which i think can be read as either "flaw" or "creation"). this creates an interesting thing with his name where i think most people upon hearing it would interpret the meaning as like "facing a new day," but if you saw it written down you'd think more "facing a flawed day" or "creating a sunny day" or something along those lines, which... is apt.

and let's also take a look at this tweet from kodaka:

hinata's full name, 日向創, could potentially be read in an alternate way, since kanji have multiple possible readings:

日 can be read as "ka"

向 can be read as "muku"

創 can be read as "kura"

the replies to this tweet have enough people going "holy shit i never realized" that i feel confident that many/most japanese speakers wouldn't have gotten this without him pointing it out, but you Could, Potentially, read hinata's full name as "kamukura." and that's too juicy of a clue for me to avoid posting about, quite frankly

#i was so delighted when i saw this tweet i was like Oh You Motherfucker (complimentary)#this is a recent-ish one btw. he waited till 2020 to post this #kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 1 year

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another angle on the "nidai is a robot this chapter" thing that i want to talk about, although it goes well beyond just what's going on with nidai: let's talk about the wizard of oz references in this game.

in chapter 3, we all had to sit through a dreadful little wizard of oz parody film that monokuma created. if you'll recall, monokuma kills 3 people in this movie, all of whom are different versions of monomi based upon wizard of oz characters. the first two of these deaths (scarecrow and lion) were imitated by the deaths of ibuki and saionji. it's pointed out at the time this happens that it's odd that there wasn't a third death to make the reference complete, except that there fucking is and we just had to wait until this chapter to get it. nidai, after being turned into a robot (similar to how the tin woodsman in the wizard of oz was once a regular human guy before being turned into tin), is killed in a way that leaves him dismembered, similar to tin monomi's death in the film where she's smashed into pieces. i think this is especially notable because the sequence of events differs from the wizard of oz itself, where dorothy meets the scarecrow and the tin woodsman before meeting the cowardly lion; changing the order makes it clear that this is a purposeful reference.

(to further continue this reference — monokuma then meets wizard monomi and "beats the stuffing" out of her, similar to how our AI moderator nanami is going to wind up executed next chapter. remember also that the wizard in the wizard of oz was hiding his true identity behind a lot of fakery and magic tricks, and in a similar way i think monomi's AI and the "magic" she's able to do turns out to be dependent on the presence of nanami within the simulation, and on the fact that it's a simulation in the first place. but we'll get to that.)

the bigger question here is "why is this reference in the game at all?" but i think i know the answer. it's similar to the other classic western fantasy reference this game makes (to alice in wonderland / through the looking glass); it's meant to foreshadow later events. the alice in wonderland references are there to set up and foreshadow the VR twist, and the wizard of oz references are in here to help clarify the thematic point the game is ultimately trying to make.

the wizard of oz is a story about a group of people who go looking for something they had the entire time. the scarecrow lacks a brain, but he's the smartest guy in the group. the tin woodsman lacks a heart, but he's the compassionate one. the lion lacks courage, but always demonstrates bravery when push comes to shove despite the fact that he's scared (and i wanna point out that this theme has explicitly come up in sdr2 — in one of komaeda's free time events this chapter he points out that it shows true courage for hinata to want to hang out with him despite being scared of him). dorothy just wants to go home, but she had the power to do so the entire time via the slippers she was wearing, she just didn't know. when the wizard "cures" dorothy's companions of their issues, it's heavily implied if not outright stated that he's just giving them placebos. the guy can't actually do magic at this point in the series.

With That In Mind, let's have a look at the issue of hinata's talent, or lack thereof, because i think this is making A Point about how you're meant to read the kamukura thing. and i don't want to get way ahead of myself here because we're still waiting on the actual reveal, so for now i'll just touch on it briefly. the point of the "talent" stuff as it's discussed in this game is that talent does not work in the way hope's peak thinks it does, talent doesn't equal hope, it's not innate, people who "lack talent" aren't lesser or broken or missing something essential. you're not meant to read what happened with hinata as like "hinata was lacking in some vital innate quality, but hope's peak fixed him, but this also made him evil, but now he's all better" (a read i could see someone having if they took the talent stuff at face value). the point is that hinata was capable of achieving greatness all along and simply held back by his own self-doubt and self-hatred, and that hope's peak's attempt at surgically fixing him enabled him to do extraordinary things but at the cost of his entire sense of personhood, and now he has the chance to recover from that. that is what his character arc is about. the same core theme of "the power you are seeking was within you all along" from the wizard of oz is also core to this story, hence the references. we'll come back to this.

#i've got one more thing to say about the kamukura situation but then we'll put a lid on that for now. save it for chapter 6 or whenever #kes plays sdr2

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catboyebooks · 1 year

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so here's an angle i wanna take this from: let's talk about asimov's 3 laws of robotics and their relevance to the events of this chapter. i may have already repeatedly mentioned that chapter 4 is basically a whole-chapter zero escape reference, and that zero escape characters have a habit of delivering infodumps on seemingly random and esoteric topics, like the symbolism of four-leafed clovers or morphic resonance theory or the very sexy mummy that was aboard the titanic when it sank. of course, as you continue playing it becomes clear that this is all relevant information for understanding the game's themes and story. sonia's little infodump about the 3 laws of robotics midway through this chapter deserves to be examined more closely, i think, given this context.

to explain the 3 laws really quick in case anyone isn't familiar, they're 1) a robot cannot injure a human or through inaction allow a human to be harmed, 2) a robot must obey an order from a human unless it conflicts with the 1st law, 3) a robot must protect itself unless this conflicts with laws 1 or 2. there's also a less-often-cited "0th law" which takes precedence over the other three and states that a robot must not harm humanity nor allow humanity to come to harm through inaction. i don't recall sonia mentioning the 0th law specifically (i regret not taking screenshots of this part!) but i think that's worth considering here as well.

now uh... nidai's obviously not the first robot/AI character in danganronpa and there's never been a hint prior that robots and artificial intelligences in this universe are 3 laws compliant. i'm not saying that i think nidai is literally bound by these laws, because i don't think it matters whether or not he is — these are the principles you'd kind of expect nidai to be abiding by anyway. this is the guy who only got turned into a robot in the first place because he used himself as a human shield between monokuma and owari, and as soon as he returned to the group in robot form he fucking did it again. nidai has already made it clear he would rather put himself in harm's way than let someone else in the group die. i don't recall specifically if gundam overheard sonia talking about the 3 laws (i think he did, but i'm not certain), but either way nidai's kind of the only person he could have picked for his plan. not only did his robotic attributes like the built-in clock and the sleep mode button allow for gundam to trap him in a way he couldn't have done with another person, nidai's personal principles &/or the 3 laws ensured that he would have agreed to enter into a suicide pact here for the good of the group. his fate was sealed the moment he encountered gundam at the tower. to make this clear let's consider the alternate ways this might have played out:

if nidai prioritized his own survival here, he could have overpowered gundam easily. however, killing gundam would have resulted in a very difficult murder case to solve, and if nidai got away with it the rest of the group would die, which is obviously something nidai does not want (also not 3 laws compliant). if nidai killed gundam and then simply confessed, it would have had the same end result (both of them dying, the rest living) as agreeing to go along with the suicide pact. an actual physical fight between the two of them wouldn't have been a fair fight and i don't think nidai would see any honor in winning a fight like that.

alternately, if nidai simply left (or incapacitated gundam without killing him, though this would not have been compliant with the 1st law) and then warned the others, there wouldn't have been enough time for someone else to plan and commit a murder. remember everyone but nidai was on the verge of total collapse from starvation at this point, and nidai himself would have run out of power eventually. this was really their one chance at ensuring everyone else could survive. neither letting the others starve nor letting himself succumb to power failure would have been 3 laws compliant, and it wouldn't jive with nidai's principles either.

when nidai awoke to find himself suspended in midair, he could have simply had a panic reaction and struggled causing the wire to slip free of the door handle. he instead exerted so much force that he tore the handle free, leaving crucial evidence for the others that allowed the case to be solved. it would have been very difficult to prove how the trap worked if the wire loop had simply slipped off of the door handle. of course, either way nidai would have died, but there was an action he took here (and we know it was a purposeful action because of the sheer amount of force it would have taken to get those handles to budge) in order to try and ensure the case was solvable and the others could live. this is again 3 laws compliant. protecting himself (3rd law) was out of the question, but he could still protect the group (1st/0th law).

i should be clear that at no point is it directly, explicitly confirmed that this was a suicide pact. that's something that has to be inferred here based upon what played out. the 3 laws being invoked is part of what makes this clear. the other main factor that makes this obvious is that this is a parallel with 1-4, where sakura killed herself to save the rest of the group — this is the same chapter where komaeda points out that the killing game they're in is mirroring a previous killing game, and there's a statue of sakura in the funhouse, so it's obviously something we're meant to be thinking about.

#not that i really have to prove what happened in this case was a suicide pact. it's quite clear despite being technically left ambiguous #i just like how we got a zero escape reference to lay the groundwork. and nidai being a robot has further relevance i'll get into #next post.#kes plays sdr2

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