For those that might be unaware, I am a huge fan of mystery games. This includes series like Zero Escape, Ace Attorney, and of course the subject of today’s post, Danganronpa. At its best, mystery games hook you with questions about the situation that you desperately want answers to and lets you slowly find answers, building and building until it all comes together in a satisfying reveal. And for the mystery games with an overarching mastermind, figuring out who is the mastermind, how “they did it”, and most importantly why, that is a huge component of making the climax effective.

But from the title, you can probably guess that despite me being very much a fan of Danganronpa, I do find its masterminds to be generally weak. The aspects of Danganronpa that really work for me are generally the setup, the environment, the character interactions, the individual cases, the buildup, and honestly, the entire concept of the killing game itself. Which is really a shame because I do think the ending is generally where Danganronpa struggles, and a big part of that is the mastermind.

So, I’m going to take this opportunity to talk about masterminds, what I think makes them effective, and why Danganronpa’s masterminds are not as good. And to help with this, I’m going to compare the masterminds of Danganronpa to another game’s mastermind which I do think was really effective. Funnily enough, this one is from a game also written by Kodaka: Master Detective Archives: Rain Code. Yes, I think Kodaka, the writer of Danganronpa and Rain Code, very much improved on how he writes the mastermind to one that I think works really well. The mastermind in Rain Code feels like it took all the learnings of the struggles of Danganronpa’s masterminds point by point and addressed them, culminating in a compelling and effective mastermind.

When discussing what components make masterminds work, it’s important to note that it isn’t necessary to have every single one I’m going to talk about. Obviously what matters is the execution. However, there are trends in my mind that I notice the masterminds which I find compelling do have. While there are a bunch of components, I’m going to mainly be focusing on three that I think are the most important and I think are the most illustrative in showcasing the differences between Danganronpa’s and Rain Code’s masterminds. These are having a connection with the protagonists, enhancing the themes, and motivation.

So yeah, let’s get into it! And if you haven’t already guessed, there will be HUGE SPOILERS for the entirety of the Danganronpa series and Master Detective Archives: Rain Code. Oh, and there will be spoilers for the first Ace Attorney game as well since I do also want to make comparisons with that game’s mastermind. So, this is your final warning to leave if you don’t want to get spoiled. This blogpost might be hard to follow if you haven’t played those games as well, so be warned. With that out of the way, let’s begin!

Connection With the Protagonist

A personal connection generally means that some sort of interaction or impact occurred between the two. This can either be a connection that is developed throughout the game itself and/or it can be a prior connection that may be hidden in the mystery. The narrative benefits are obvious. It adds more emotional and personal stakes to the mystery at large. Instead of the mastermind being someone that the protagonist doesn’t know or have any relation towards, the fact that there is this personal connection makes the reveal and the confrontation more dramatic and compelling. This personal connection doesn’t have to be direct. For instance, the mastermind in first Ace Attorney game, Manfred Von Karma, doesn’t really have a connection with Phoenix directly. However, he is very much connected to Miles Edgeworth as he’s his mentor and the reason why Edgeworth is the way he is. And this connects back to Phoenix as Phoenix’s reason for being a lawyer is due to Edgeworth. Despite having no relations with Von Karma, we still feel the impact he had on Phoenix’s life.

When it comes to the first Danganronpa game, the mastermind Junko isn’t really that connected to the protagonist Makoto, or the rest of the cast. The extent of their relationships is that they were classmates. There is very little interaction between Junko and Makoto that we see, either prior to the game or during it. Junko is basically off screen the entire time until the very end with the reveal and thus doesn’t really form a dynamic with the cast or protagonist. The furthest you can stretch is Monokuma, but Monokuma feels separate from Junko. Thus, when the reveal happens, Junko is essentially an empty character for the player. Because of this, the reveal doesn’t have the same impact as if she was among them or had a prior connection that was shown. And therefore, the dynamic between Makoto and Junko, that conflict, is emotionally pretty shallow. There’s no buildup, it just happens. The extent of their relationship is as protagonist and mastermind, nothing beyond that.

In Danganronpa 2, the mastermind is still Junko, but I think in this game Junko works a lot better. In this case, she does have the advantage of being in a sequel game and thus the player has prior knowledge about Junko, so it doesn’t feel out of place. Rather, it feels more like a continuation with the previous game. However, that isn’t all that makes Junko better here. What makes Junko better here is that the rest of the cast have a huge personal connection to Junko. All of them, besides Hajime (the protagonist), are part of her group of Ultimate Despairs and she was the one that led them to become Ultimate Despair. The reason why they are in this game is because the Future Foundation captured these Ultimate Despairs and brought them into the simulation to rehabilitate them, but Junko infected the program, turning it into a killing game to revive herself. This makes the conflict of the game have so much more weight when the cast struggles with the decisions they are faced with at the end of the game. When they have to make a sadistic choice between either “Graduating”, returning to the real world with their current memories intact while letting Junko possess all the bodies of those who had died, or “Shutdown”, preventing Junko from doing that but reverting their memories back to what they were originally as Ultimate Despair, you feel more effectively the struggle and dilemma they are facing, and it makes it more compelling. The stakes include this huge personal component of once again being led by Junko to become Ultimate Despair. As for Hajime, there is a huge personal connection with Junko as well in that he is basically the co-conspirator of the game’s plot with Junko, and thus you have this same dynamic as the rest of cast along with the same dilemma of taking down Junko but reverting back to what he was or keeping his current memories but letting Junko get what she wants. Even though Junko herself once again doesn’t appear until the end of the game, which still causes a lack of buildup or dynamic that we actually see, this past personal connection she has with the entire cast in the past and how she was the one responsible for what they had become just makes the confrontation all the more compelling, and it makes it all the more satisfying when the protagonists pulls through. It still has its issues with the lack of a dynamic and buildup of a connection in game, but it is better than the first Danganronpa.

Now let’s talk about Rain Code. Whereas the first Danganronpa had very little connection between mastermind and cast, and whereas the second had it only in backstory, Rain Code has its mastermind have a connection with the protagonist both in backstory and during the game. The protagonist and mastermind, Yuma and Makoto (no relation to Danganronpa) respectively, are connected in the sense that Makoto is the homunculus of Yuma, the result of a project to essentially make a superhuman of the world’s greatest detective. I get into this more in the later section, but Makoto is basically a more extreme version of Yuma if Yuma didn’t have his character arc. Not only that, but Makoto is well aware that Yuma is the number one detective and heads the World Detective Agency, and since Makoto wants to keep hiding the truth about the ward, Makoto sees him as an antagonist and threat. This backstory, even with Yuma having no knowledge of Makoto up until this point, gives the mastermind this past connection that serves to explain why Makoto is opposed to Yuma. Not only that, but Makoto frequently appears throughout the game and interacts with Yuma in that mysterious “this person may or may not be sus, what is their deal” way. Sometimes he helps Yuma out. Sometimes he does something pretty suspicious. Through this, they are able to develop a dynamic that builds and builds until the reveal. We see these interactions grow and in retrospect we can see how Makoto has been trying to secretly forward his plans through these interactions. Thus, when the reveal does happen, all those previous interactions make it more meaningful and have more weight. That buildup of tension gets released in a cathartic way.

I will admit, Danganronpa 2 has a much more compelling past connection between the cast and mastermind than Rain Code. And given Junko’s benefit of being in a sequel, I do think the personal connection is really effective for Danganronpa 2. However, Rain Code having an actual in-game dynamic with a competent past connection more than makes up for that. Having this buildup in game in combination with a past connection makes the mastermind more emotionally resonant and dramatic. I don’t think that comes as a surprise. I do realize that the examples in this section mainly have the personal connection be one where the mastermind has had some impact on the protagonist, but it could be the other way around as well. Many compelling masterminds that I’ve encountered had a personal connection where the protagonist impacted the mastermind in some way. But I don’t want to spoil too many games. The idea is the same though. You get it.

Emphasize the Themes

The second trend that I’ve seen in effective masterminds is that they enhance or serve as representations (or anti-representations) of the themes of the story as a whole. Most often it is done in the form of a thematic throughline between the protagonist and the mastermind. One way this manifest is with them being foils of each other, representing opposite sides of a thematic question and being juxtaposed against each other at the end. Other common scenarios include the mastermind being a dark reflection of what the protagonist could have become if the protagonist didn’t go through a thematic character arc or something like that. Going back to the first Ace Attorney game, the themes of what the legal system should be like and the roles the lawyers play in to that goes hand in hand with Manfred Von Karma. As a satire of the Japanese legal system, the legal system in Ace Attorney has lawyers only concerned about winning and doing anything to win. This is exemplified by Manfred Von Karma who has a perfect winning record and obsesses with being perfect. He shows what such a legal system would lead to and perfectly exemplifies what would become of the system if pushed even further. Thematically, this is the perfect antagonist to Pheonix Wright and the main thrust of Ace Attorney, that being it should be about finding the truth. This juxtaposition emphasizes the thematic conflict and allows the resolution to strengthen those themes and allow it to resonate more when the protagonist wins.

Danganronpa’s most prevalent theme is the issue of Hope vs. Despair. This is materialized in Makoto and Junko being foils of each other, Makoto representing hope and Junko representing despair. This is a pretty good setup, especially in the context of a killing game where the game itself would cause its participants to despair that can only be weathered by having hope. However, I don’t think the first Danganronpa game really executed on this. At the end of the last chapter, Junko tells them that the world outside has basically gone to the apocalypse due to “The Biggest, Most Awful, Most Tragic Event in Human History” and the class was sheltered in Hopes Peak for their own protection. Junko has the remaining cast face a decision of either remaining trapped in Hopes Peak, safe but presumably there forever, or risk opening the door and going outside free from being trapped but potentially putting themselves in great danger with no assurance of what happened out there. This would be a good thematic question, with the former option representing the despair of the situation and choosing the trapped safety and the latter option representing having hope to go outside. However, in the game this is all very surface level, and the game doesn’t really go that far in depth of the dilemma and inner conflict. Furthermore, and more importantly for our case, Junko herself doesn’t really factor in all that much to that question. Yes, she is the Ultimate Despair that caused the tragedy in the first place. But in terms of the question, the extent she pushes the themes is basically just telling the cast how awful the outside world is. She herself doesn’t represent the despair of the situation, or a reflection of what a person becomes if they succumb to despair. She just causes despair. Honestly, she’s having a blast and is definitely not despairing, unlike Nagi who does have hope and helps keep the hope among the cast. This makes for a relatively weak thematic link for Junko, not helped by the fact that the despair she tries to cause is dealt with pretty simply in the first game.

The second game has this problem too where Junko is just the cause of despair, but I feel the second game does a lot better job at how she causes despair and goes a lot more in-depth with that. We actually see how Junko breaks down the cast, having them fall to despair, having them lose hope and give up. She tells the cast that they don’t need to sacrifice themselves for the world, that it is unfair that the Future Foundation wants them to effectively be erased to contain Junko on the hope that this will make the world better. We see how she causes despair, rather than just being told about it. While that doesn’t make herself a good reflection of the themes, it does better enhance the theme of hope vs despair, which again is why I think Junko was a lot more effective in the second game. It still has similar problems, but overall, it is a stronger execution on having the mastermind connect to the game’s themes.

When it comes to Rain Code, the main theme of the game is about the importance of accepting the help of others and that you can’t solve everything just by yourself. This theme is built into the concept of the entire game where each chapter has the protagonist Yuma team up with a different detective to use their unique power to help solve the current case. And it is through these cases that Yuma learns that everyone brings their own unique strengths, and it would be impossible to solve these cases just by himself. In fact, as revealed in the end, Yuma is Number One, the world’s greatest detective and leader of the World Detective Agency, but he had made a deal with Shinigami to, in part, give himself amnesia so he would be able to enter the Ward under the radar, rely on others, and not try to do everything himself. When the deal ends, Yuma carries those lessons and heads off to solve other mysteries with that in mind. In contrast, Makoto, who is the homunculus of Yuma, is the perfect reflection of who Yuma would be without that development. He is the antithesis of the main theme of the game in that the entire reason why he did what he did ultimately boils down to the fact that he tries to do everything by himself. The fact that he has to keep the fact that the Ward’s residents are all homunculi a secret is because he doesn’t trust the residents to help, looking down on their ability to find a solution themselves, and instead does everything by himself. This leads to him having to make the city drown in constant rain, having to secretly feed human meat in those meat buns to feed the homunculi, etc. In this case, Makoto shows what trying to do everything yourself ultimately leads to. The perfect antithesis. We are shown how the horrific things he has done are ultimately due to not relying on others. Even though he wants to save the residents, the fact that he does everything himself, keeping the residents in the dark, means he goes down that spiral. It is the perfect contrast to the character arc Yuma has and the themes that arc portrays. In fact, it is further exemplified at the epilogue where, after Makoto reveals the truth and the residents worked things out, it turned out having to feed the homunculi residents human meat was totally unnecessary as a talented cook managed to figure out a way to get the necessary nutrients that the homunculi needed in food without needing to use human meat. The fact that that was solved relatively simply just perfectly demonstrates how wrong Makoto was in trying to do everything himself. From a story perspective, the mastermind pushes forward and enhances the game’s themes, adding another layer of narrative depth and connecting the mastermind closer to the story rather than being any other person.

Having the mastermind have some sort of thematic connection is important because most mysteries, at least ontological mysteries, have a theme that is very important to the mystery and the story. Ontological mysteries, where the cast is trapped in a restricted setting with no idea how they got there, why they’re there, who’s responsible, or how to get out, these types of mysteries lend very well to greater thematic questions on a variety of topics. Danganronpa chooses the thematic question of Hope vs. Despair in such a setting, which is appropriate and conceptually works really well. However, as explained above, the execution of that theme, at least by the mastermind, is fairly lacking and in my opinion pretty shallow. Rain Code’s mastermind on the other hand is a lot more effective in driving its themes forward, and the development of the mastermind is very thematically impactful. And thus, when it comes to a thematic perspective, Rain Code’s mastermind resonates more and leaves a bigger impact.

Motivation

The last trend, but certainly not the least, is probably the single most important aspect of what I feel makes an effective mastermind. This aspect probably doesn’t come as a surprise. It is motivation. An engaging mastermind has to be one that is motivated. After all, they are the cause and driving force of the mystery. The reason the mastermind has for orchestrating the story needs to be compelling. This is called the “why” and it is often the case that finding out “why” is more important than finding out “who” or “how”. It is often the “why” that drives the mystery. Thus, when we get to the reveal, the reveal of the motivation is often the most important part. It is not engaging for the player if they find the mastermind’s motivation to be uninteresting. However, if a mastermind’s motivation is compelling to the player, it can be the case that it sticks with them for a long time. This doesn’t mean the motivation needs to be deep or sympathetic. Going back to the first Ace Attorney game, Manfred Von Karma’s motivation is downright simple and petty. The entire reason why he did the things he does is because Edgeworth’s father gave him his first penalty, breaking that perfect record. And in response to that penalty which didn’t materially affect things, Manfred killed Edgeworth’s father and raised Edgeworth to be his father’s antithesis, all for the most petty revenge. If we take a step back, the motivation here, the breaking of his perfect record, is not sympathetic or deep at all. And yet despite that, it is still very compelling. The drive and obsession Manfred shows in the game sells this motivation and the obsession with perfection fits with the themes of the story.

When it comes to Junko’s motivation, well suffice to say the real question is “what motivation”. In the first Danganronpa game, Junko is more like a force for despair. The reason why she traps the cast into a killing game is to broadcast this to the rest of the world so that seeing the hope of the world devolve in the killing game would bring the world further into despair. She brings about “The Biggest, Most Awful, Most Tragic Event in Human History” to bring the world to despair in the first place. Okay, that is fine so far. But like, why does she want to spread despair? Who knows! She herself says that she doesn’t really have a reason to do the things she does other than despair itself. She is the Ultimate Despair in every sense of the word. While in concept there are ways I feel that can work, in Danganronpa, it kind of just comes across as lacking. There is no “why”, literally. This aspect does not improve in Danganronpa 2 where ultimately her plans to revive herself are towards the goal of causing more despair, which still has no reasoning behind it given. Again, Danganronpa 2 does have the advantage of being a sequel so by this point the player already knows and accepts Junko’s deal and the aspect of her wanting to revive herself to spread despair takes center stage and is actually pretty intriguing. But as before it doesn’t really go beyond that. It doesn’t help that Junko herself does not seem to be that driven to complete her goals. In the first Danganronpa game, after the cast successfully unanimously voted to leave, Junko seems almost happy in despair that her plans have failed, feeling that despair herself. While masterminds being graceful in defeat does work, in this case, combined with the lack of a why in the first place, this aspect feels very hollow. This to me is the biggest issue with Danganronpa’s mastermind. The fact there is literally no motive, no “why”, to why she wants to spread despair makes me pretty unengaged towards Junko. This is not a mastermind that leaves an impact on me, or one that I think of a lot after I’ve finished the game.

In contrast, Rain Code’s mastermind, Makoto, is very motivated and desperate. The reason why he does the things he does in the game is very compelling. Makoto does some very horrific things that are revealed during the game that I’ve somewhat covered in the previous section. But crucially, and unlike in Daganronpa, there is meaning and motive behind it. Everything he does is to protect the residents of the Ward. Everything is for the homunculi, and he will go to great lengths to ensure their survival, by any means necessary. He genuinely loves the homunculi and the Ward. But, as mentioned in the previous section, this love for the homunculi does not translate to trust as he doesn’t trust them with the truth. It is pretty condescending actually, the way he pities them. And this is what drives him to extremes. The obsessive compulsion to handle everything by himself combined with his genuine love for the homunculi populace leads him to cross multiple lines. It is to the point where the stress and mental load of all this is breaking him down, to the point where at the final confrontation debate, part of the reason behind the showdown was him being desperate for anyone to show him that there was another solution. This “why” is immensely interesting and compelling. Despite it being sympathetic, it doesn’t absolve him of his actions. However, it does make him a fascinating mastermind and character to engage with. Having such a deep motivation makes his character feel actualized, which in turn makes him leave a bigger impact on the audience. And Makoto certainly leaves that impact, at least to me.

It is this aspect that I feel is the most important for masterminds, and the one where I think Rain Code completely improves over Danganronpa. In these mystery games, I feel the “why” is the most important aspect. The biggest question generally is why would someone do the thing. What purpose is there for say putting on a killing game? What reason is there to do something like that? What is their goal? Daganronpa’s mastermind fails at delivering a satisfying motivation, if one at all. The answers to the questions above feel hollow and uncompelling. There is very little to engage with regarding the mastermind. Rain Code is a huge improvement in the mastermind’s motivation which makes it so much more satisfying to think about and engage with. It makes it so much more satisfying and impactful when the mastermind reveal happens. It is compelling, it is cathartic, and to put it simply it is a lot more interesting.

Conclusion

So, in conclusion, I am a fan of Danganronpa even if at times it drives me mad. Its masterminds though I feel are, from a narrative perspective, its weakest part. They generally don’t have any in-game dynamic with the cast until the reveal, the enhancements of the themes they provide can be lacking, and most critically the motivation is just not there. Rain Code somehow improves every single one of these components and I personally find Rain Code’s mastermind to be a lot more compelling. That’s not to say of course that Rain Code is perfect. I do have various issues with it. But its mastermind is not one of them and I think that aspect of Rain Code is really strong. And honestly, that is probably the most important aspect, so it is good they got it right there.

Hopefully you enjoyed reading this blogpost. It’s nice to be able to put my thoughts on various mystery games again, as I am a huge fan of them. There are definitely a lot more that I have in my head that I would love to share, but it will take time to write it all up. But hopefully they will be out soon, or at least a lot sooner than this one. I am so sorry, I did not mean for this time lag to have happened. Anyways, thank you so much for reading and see you at the next blogpost!