In the same way that the title of Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair appears to be a hodgepodge of words, the game is a hodgepodge of mechanics and themes. Part visual novel, part dating sim, and part something else entirely, Danganronpa 2 revels in every odd nook and cranny it can. That also means it relies heavily on tropes, both those that are subverted and some that are played straight.
The premise of the game is that you, a young student, have been accepted to Hope’s Peak Academy—a prestigious school for the elite with “Ultimate” talents—when suddenly your entire class is somehow transported to a seemingly deserted island. A creature named Usami apparently brought the group of 16 students out to the island, and she informs everyone that the only way off is to gather “Hope Fragments”—by spending time with and learning about each other. This is given a particularly goofy sense of camaraderie by the fact that Usami looks like a giant walking, talking stuffed rabbit that is also a magical girl. Welcome to Danganronpa 2.
Half of the game is talking with the various students stuck on the island with your character, all of whom have their own special talents, personalities and tropes. You can even give them special presents after spending “Free Time” with them, and they’ll enjoy some of them more than others. The Ultimate Princess, for example, enjoys the occult, so things like crystal balls go over well with her. “Hope Fragments” gathered this way can be spent on skills for a later portion of the game, though that’s not explained well immediately.
And then Monokuma shows up, who is something like a bear or tanooki or stuffed creature, and things get deadly serious. He says that the only way off the island is to kill another student, and then if the rest of the students fail to determine that the killer was the one that did it, everyone but the killer will also be killed—and said killer is free to leave.
Of course this means that someone decides the only way to get off the island is to kill someone, so they do. This leads into the inevitable investigation where you, the player, gather clues to try and piece together what happened. It feels genuinely puzzling to scour through the clues to try and figure out what happened, and the solution isn’t completely transparent. The first case is especially convoluted. After all the evidence is gathered, the trial commences.
