Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls is the third game in the Danganronpa series exclusive for the PlayStation Vita. It is a spin-off and set between Trigger Happy Havoc and Goodbye Despair. It follows Makoto's sister, Komaru Naegi, as she tries to escape Towa City. Another Episode is a drastically different game compared to the previous two games. Instead of a visual novel with investigation and trials elements, it is now a third person shooter. Towa City is overrun with murderous Monokumas (robotic bears that are your enemy) and Komaru is equipped with a hacking gun that can disable them. Don't think Call of Duty style of third-person shooter, Another Episode is much slower paced, requiring you to patiently tread forward, and aiming carefully to score a good shot.
The slight twist in gameplay here are the different types of bullets. You will get eight different types of bullets, slowly earned during the course of the story. These are effectively for different things and also against different Monokumas. You'll get bullets that activate machinery, a fast shooting bullet and bullets that allow you to take over the Monokuma and control them at will. Naturally, this means there are different types of Monokumas as well. The most abundant is the standard black and white bear design that we are familiar with. They will dash towards Komaru and pounce, attacking with their claws.
Other Monokumas include the Bomber variety which throws bombs, a Siren Monokuma which calls for reinforcements and more grotesque versions such as the Junk Monokuma which look like a Frankenstein mishmash and the Beast Monokuma which acts more feral than others. This keeps the gameplay engaging and refreshing while not being overwhelming. Another Episode has a slight horror survival theme. You'll be traversing through dark areas, where the next step might be the one that has Monokumas bursting out of nowhere and startling you. There is even a section where it was pitch black and when they jump out at you, those Monokuma designs will start to seem freaky.
Monokumas have a weak spot, which is the red eye. Aiming for the eye will normally result in one-hit kills, except for the more powerful Junk and Ball Monokumas. Eventually, the Monokumas end up being quite the bullet sponge. With the rate of fire being this slow, and you ending up being crowded by numerous enemies, it can be quite frustrating as they start to stun lock you and you can't aim properly. The game is now in 3D, with a slow camera rotation speed, which you will get used to eventually. The graphics aren't exactly poor but they're not cutting edge either. At least the environments and character models are sharp and crisp, although environments are a bit too block looking.
The aesthetics of the game help mask the lack of detail but it translate the 2D portrait designs of the characters nicely into 3D character models. The shooting mechanics are clunky so you have to take the game slow. This slower pace actually creates a nice atmosphere. The way you switch to different bullets is very awkward though, and you cannot do it quickly in the spur of the moment. There is a levelling up system. Komaru will level up as she defeats Monokuma and as she levels up, she gets more Skill Points. Skill Points are required to equip skills which improves her and Toko's abilities.
Skills can have effects such as increasing Komaru's health, aiming speed and the rate of experience gain. You get Monocoins from defeated enemies which are used to purchase upgrades to equip to specific bullets that can increase the rate of fire, power and ammo capacity. A get-out-of-jail-free card comes from Toko. You can switch at anytime to Toko's Genocide Jack persona, who does not take damage. However, you can only use Genocide Jack for a limited time. Generally in big fights, you get free recharges to the time allowed anyway, so it's an easy way to get past some fights. Genocide Jack uses melee based combos and special moves, but you can just button mash.
There are frequent puzzle rooms in which it requires you to kill all the enemies in one go. You will have to use your understanding of the bullets and the nature of the different types of Monokumas in order to get through them. They're not that hard to be fair, and are enjoyable. Unfortunately, there will be times where the game will throw waves upon waves of enemies at you, which isn't htat good when the shooting mechanics don't support this type of gameplay. Most of the time, there might be tricks to defeat a bunch together so you need to keep an eye out and not mindlessly start to shoot at everything.
Another Episode doesn't allow you to save anywhere; you have to use Save Points for that. They're usually spaced every 10 to 30 minutes. Each Chapter is also graded, if you want a good grade you will need to retry some of the puzzles through reloading saves, which can get annoying especially when you know what to do but somehow the game made the enemies notice you even though you were not in their line of sight. As mentioned the story takes place soon after Trigger Happy Havoc. Komaru was abducted for the purposes of the first game in encouraging the characters to start killing each other. She was held captive inside an apartment for the whole time and cut off from the outside world.
So it turns out Komaru was held in Towa City, and now that the killing game within Hope's Peak Academy has ended, numerous Monokumas were unleashed in the City, killing all the adults, leaving only the children to create their paradise. Komaru might fight and find a way to escape this nightmare and she meets Toko along the way. Teaming up with her as their goals are the same (Komaru to escape, Toko to rescue Byakuya), eventually they come to stopping the masterminds behind this scheme, five children who each have a very good reason to hate adults. You'll meet familiar characters from the first game, as well as siblings of the first game's characters.
The game is long, clocking in at around 14 hours due to the frequent and long cutscenes. Stylistic choices from the previous games continue, such as the pink blood. Another Episode is actually more cruel and gory with a lot of scenes showing actual killing rather than just inferring. The story is told via various different forms. There'll be traditional 2D animation, 3D in-game rendered cutscenes, 3D pre-rendered cutscenes and pre-rendered cel-shaded animations that's more in style with the "execution" cutscenes of the previous two games. While the story is long and not as focused as the other two Danganronpa games, it is still very decent.
The story starts to ramp up from Chapter 4 and the finale in Chapter 5 was absolutely fantastic. It presents tough choices and you can see how much each character has grown. There will be odd moments from time to time such as Toko's fantasies or the frequent sexual related humor. It can be strange and at times, uncomfortable... That being said, 90% of the humor works and the story can be very funny. While travelling during the game, you will encounter frequent loading screens as you go from one section to the next. It's long enough to break the immersion and can be annoying when you're itching to get to the next part.
The music of the game will be familiar to most but it does have a few new tracks. This is not a lazy spin-off, the developers have put in a lot of effort and resources into it, and you can tell. There are an abundance of collectibles in the game. Spread out over all the chapters, it's near impossible to find them all without a guide. There's just too many of them to be fun at trying to find them all, however, they add some nice context and backstory. Once you complete the game, it unlocks a bonus spin-off novel called Ultra Despair Hagakure. This takes place at the same time as the first two chapters of the game, and gives background to both Hagakure and Leon from the first game.
Overall, Danganronpa Another Episode; Ultra Despair Girls is a very different game in the series. Spike Chunsoft has taken a fairly big risk to make such a big change but it works. It retains the good storytelling the series is known for, and the third-person shooter mechanics works well once you understand and get used to it. It is an enjoyable game that's surprisingly fun to play once it gets going. Another Episode is highly recommended for fans of the series but you have to have played the first two games in order to get all the references and spoilers.
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