Adrian Pilanga
If you’re new to Danganronpa and are only watching the anime adaptation instead of playing the games, you might be a little confused after finishing the first season of Danganronpa. Confused because you’ll be searching for a Danganronpa 2 anime… but there isn’t one.
Even weirder, there’s an anime series called Danganronpa 3.
For quite some time now Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak High School (2016) has been released for everyone to watch. Seemingly skipping over the entirety of the 2nd game.
Here’s what you need to know as to why there’s no sign of there ever being an anime season to cover the second killing game that happened between the two seasons.
Danganronpa’s Source Material
The Danganronpa anime has been adapted from the Danganronpa video game series developed by Spike Chunsoft. There are three main games plus a single spin-off game.
Spike Chunsoft is also responsible for the development of other anime-adapted games you may recognize like Steins;Gate and Re:Zero (although the Re:Zero game came after the light novel and anime).
You can check out their steam page if you wanna try out the games for yourself.
Why The Danganronpa 2 Anime Never Came To Be
Admittedly, there have never been any official statements by either Spike Chunsoft or Lerche (the studio in charge of the Danganronpa anime) on why the second game was never adapted. So, take whatever you read here with a grain of salt.
The main reason why the Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair didn’t get an anime adaptation is because of how the first adaptation was received by the audience. Many of the fans felt the anime felt rushed in comparison to the game.
If you’ve never played the games, they contained way more content than the anime ever did. They had a segment called “free time” where the player (as Makoto Naegi) could walk around the school and talk to the other characters and reveal information about their past and where you can learn more about their personalities, likes, and dislikes.
This greatly helped in fleshing out each character and making the stakes feel higher whenever a murder takes place. You’d feel way sadder and more desperate to find the killer when the person they’ve just killed is someone you’re attached to.
The anime didn’t have free time. This and a lot of other content from the game was cut from the anime making the characters feel like they didn’t have a proper foundation and the audience didn’t connect with them as well as they did in the games.
The producers of the show most likely figured out that animating the second game would result in similar issues and so decided against it.
Well, Why Couldn’t They Just Add More Episodes To Flesh The Characters Out More?
So, the first season felt like it needed more exposition and character development. Why not provide that in the second season by increasing the number of episodes? The biggest issue with this is the budget. Making any anime comes with a price, especially a high-quality one with good art, animation, writing, and voice acting.
In order to fully flesh out the show the way the game did, it could take dozens of episodes (yeah, that’s how much content was cut), possibly causing their required budget to double or even more!
So, they instead decided to go make their own Danganronpa story that would work better on-screen rather than relying on the stories already in the games. Thus: Danganronpa 3.
Wait, Danganronpa 3 Isn’t From The Games Either?
This is Danganronpa V3, completely different from Danganronpa 3 (the anime)
Yep, you read that right. The 3rd game, Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony is completely separate from the anime’s Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak High School. Similar to the missing 2nd season, it would have also been too tough to adapt the 3rd season due to the sheer amount of content they’d need to adapt.
They had to create a new story that would look better on screen.
Should You Just Go Ahead and Watch Danganronpa 3?
Well…. I guess it would depend on how invested you are in the series. Because be warned, you will be missing out on a lot of plot if you jump from the 1st season to the 3rd season. There will be characters there that have been introduced in the 2nd game and several plot points you would have no idea about if you haven’t played the 2nd game.
It’s honestly better for you to play the 2nd game to get the full story, it’s a highly rated game and it’s really fun, trust me!
But I also understand that it’ll be a bother for some people who just like watching anime, Unfortunately, that’s just the way Danganronpa is structured.
What’s The Correct Order Of The Anime and Games?
If you’ve decided to consume both the anime and the games, here’s the proper watch & play order so you can get started right away!
- Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc (game) and/or Dangangronpa (1st season of the anime)
- Damganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair (game)
- Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls (game)
- Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak High School – Future Arc (anime)
- Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak High School – Despair Arc (anime)
- Super Danganronpa 2.5: Kimaeda Nagito to Sekai no Hakaimono (anime OVA)
- Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak High School – Hope Arc (anime)
- Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony (game)
Curious about Kakegurui Season 3? Check out the release date, cast and much more here!
