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The set was very simple - an empty stage with a balcony for the most part. A large video monitor used for all sorts of stuff in the middle, some school desks to the right, and a couple of doors leading off stage to the left (usually representing the dorm rooms). For the trial scenes, they wheeled in the circle trial stand thingy which they than split in half and straightened so all actors can face the audience.

- I went to a Saturday noon show. About 80% of the audience was female, and I don't think there was a single non-fan in there (which is a good thing - the show won't make much sense if you don't already know the story). The girl in front of me (who looked about 16) took out her Vita while we were waiting for the show to begin and talked her friend through literally hundreds of screenshots she took from Zettai Zetsubou Shojo. It looked like she just liberally used the Vita's screenshot functionality as she played through the game and took a shot of every dialog box during her favourite scenes. There was a lot of Shojo Manga SM Togami shots in her library, but also a surprising amount of the problem scenes people keep talking about.

- The costumes were gorgeous. The acting was all over the map. Naegi himself was so-so. Fukawa was a spot-on impersonation of Miyuki Sawashiro's original performance. Yamada and Hagakure are played by comedians, which showed (they also got the best lines).

- The first act is a super-speedy reenactment of DR's first two chapters. *Real* speedy. Trials are done in about 5 minutes and whole bits are skipped and ignored (including elaborate executions, though that's probably for the best). Then we get to the end of the first act and things start changing from the way they went in the game (for the sake of speed, mostly). Kirigiri's role is greatly reduced. The game's third chapter is skipped entirely, and the fourth is altered a whole lot (and I *mean* a whole lot) to make sure the final cast is the same as in the game. The fifth chapter also isn't really there and we jump straight from Oogami's trial to Junko shenanigans. Junko herself is probably the largest bit of dialogue taken verbatim from the game, and the actress does a pretty good job with the role and the acting switches it requires.

- Then there's the ending and the biggest change the play makes to the basic plot of the game (also the only one that probably isn't attributed to length). Actual spoilers after the break.

I've been meaning to write a longish thought piece on ZZS after I finished it a couple of weeks ago, but as with many things I plan lately I just couldn't find the time. I still want to, though.

Here’s the original line, along with a literal translation:

他には、江ノ島の子孫を作ろうとして、 死んだ彼女の体から… Other than that, (some people) attempting to create Enoshima’s offsprings (took) from her dead body…

So, yes, it’s implied that they took something rather than attempted to have sex with a corpse. Creepy either way, but there.

I got a few responses clarifying how the translation went. "My beloved" is great and probably better than what I would've done. Any use of "they", however, isn't.

To be fair - they seem to have translated the line pretty straight. Since I like to write obsessively about translation and translation choices, here's the relevant exchange. First line is the original, second is a straight, mostly literal translation. Third is what Fedule and me ended up with. I believe "forty" was mine, but much of the final phrasing is thanks to Fedule and would be much. much worse without him.

Souda:まさかとは思うけどよォ… あいつら男女の関係になってんじゃねーだろな。 I think it's impossible but... I wonder if their relationship became a male-female one. (The word for male-female used here isn't one a typical teenager will use)I can't believe I'm sayin’ this, but... could those two have an illicit relationship goin’ on?

Hinata:男女の仲って…十代の表現じゃないぞ。 A male female relationship... That's not an expression a teenager would use.An illicit relationship? What are you, forty?

Souda:けど、聞いたろ？ 弐大を追いかける終里のすがるような声をよォ… But, you must have heard it? Owari's clinging voice as she was chasing Nidai...You heard how Owari's voice got when she was chasin’ after Nidai, right?

Souda:すっかり…女の声になってたぜ…！ Her voice became... just like a woman's!It was just like... she suddenly became a proper woman!

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From Weekly Famitsu 2014/8/21-28 (Published 2014/8/7)

Total Despair Kodaka #1

Hi. My name's Kazutaka Kodaka, and I'm the person in charge of the Dangan Ronpa series story and design. It's an honor being asked to write a column for the legendary Famitsu magazine! Thank you very much! It's already one of the high points of my life! I'm sure that in a few dozen years I will turn back to these columns repeatedly, soaking in memories as I sit there in the local park, a bottle of sake that I picked up from a garbage can in my hand.

--

Well, then. That may be where my life is heading, but it's a life that's been greatly influenced by video games. In today's column I would like to introduce myself by looking back on my life and the games that influenced it.

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The first game that changed my life was the Sega Megadrive (Genesis to you silly Americans --OR), which I encountered when I was in junior high. At the time my life was driven by a great sense of solidarity and was consumed by the Famicom craze that swept Japan, and so I was buying only the big hits that everyone else was also playing. An unsophisticated lad, I was. It was my cousin who introduced me to the existence of the enthusiast machine that was the Megadrive. He was the subject of my admiration at the time: a stylish guy with all sorts of electricity discharging artful objects decorating his room. That machine he showed me, a pitch-black body with the letters "16 BIT" engraved on it in gold, was burned into my mind as the unparalleled cool thing of the generation. From that moment my path in life was utterly changed into that of an outlaw Megadriver, to the tune of "This is so much better than a Super Famicom!". (Later, I shamelessly bought a Super Famicom when Street Fighter 2 was released). And thus, my sense of what's important was turned around by the Megadrive. Now I was sure that "Cool" was that which most people didn't do, and even my taste in music and manga turned to the obscure enthusiast stuff.

--

Moving on to my high school years. Next-gen machines were being released in succession, starting with the Playstation. The games of the era were brimming with a sophisticated cultural sense. The Virtual Boy was sold in fashion shops, game soundtracks were sold in trendy Shibuya record stores, and game creators like Kenji Eno were picked up by all kinds of media outlets. (Incidentally, the first next-gen game I ever bought was Tomb Raider, with the original Lara Croft panting and breathing loudly throughout. Years later I heard from Megumi Ogata, Dangan Ronpa's Makoto Naegi, that she was the actress voicing Lara at the time. I was astounded (in a good way)). At the time, it never even crossed my mind that I would once enter the game industry. I was into movies and studied film at college, planning to become a director. Still, since I was much too fervent in my studies and never once tried looking for a job, I was stuck without one after graduation. Then, when I went crying to one of my professors, he introduced me to a certain game company who was looking for people knowledgable in both film and games. The company was called Flagship, and was a subsidiary of Capcom. (Most Capcom employees make a weird face when I tell them about my past at Flagship. If you want to know the reason, go ask your local Capcom employee).

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The first game I was involved with at Flagship was Clock Tower 3. The game was attracting attention because of the involvement of legendary film director Kinji Fukasaku with its cut scenes. Mr. Fukasaku didn't care that it was a game he was working on, and stuck to his regular methods. Even scenes that were planned to end up as CGI got most of the same treatment as any film: he built humongous sets, made real actors perform on them, and filmed them with a real camera. I was employed on the set as an assistant director (that is, an errand boy), but... Fukasaku's company was known throughout the entertainment business as being extremely rigorous, to the point of making fun of the kanji that make up his name, "Deep" and "Work": "The company that makes you Work Deep into the night", they called it. After a few months of filming I was completely exhausted, grew weary of both the game and film businesses, and fled the company. After that I kept to a single mantra - "I want to create my own work!", and went on filming my own independent films while working part time. I spent many unhappy days working on game script jobs introduced to me by industry friends.

--

It was at that time that I encountered the two games that changed my view on what video games can do. The games were Illbleed and Conker: Live & Reloaded. The thing that surprised me when I played them was the amount of freedom they displayed. To be honest, both have many shortcomings as games. Still, I felt that their originality was sublime. Inspired by the freedom I started feeling video games allowed, I got it into my head that if I want to make something original it had to be a game. And so, I started a job hunt at game companies. My goal was to make my own game, and by a stroke of good luck I sneaked my way not into a large company, but into the middle-sized, shoddy-looking Spike (That's just what I thought back then! It really isn't a shoddy company at all!). A few years later, I encountered the game that -- and that's not an exaggeration -- changed my life the most... That would be Dangan Ronpa, of course. How did Dangan Ronpa affect my life? There's not enough space left for that story, so we'll leave it for another time.

Instead, a little about the future.