#kohei matsudaira

[shockersalvage]

Kohei Matsudaira - Salvage Smallcase

Finally we reach the end of Kirigiriso's participation in these Showcases! It's time to tackle our hero for this story...and his unique situation!! It's Kohei Matsudaira!!

Summary

For the basics of Kohei, no matter the route, his entanglement to the plot starts the same way. Kohei is driving one night from college and takes a short cut he never took before. During his drive, he winds up meeting Kyoko Kirigiri, who ends in a ride with him towards her destination. Ultimately, though, his car is totalled and he's forced to accompany her on foot to the sight of her latest case: a mansion in the woods.

Kohei is a witness to Kirigiriso's three routes + alternate ending to canon:

The canon route - the Plant Girl Route - has him trying to survive a man eating mansion filled with carnivorous plant/human hybrids, cared for by the most successful experiment: Kyoka a bioenginerred plant/human hybrid clone of Kyoko Kirigiri that sought to sacrifice Kyoko and Kohei to her plants as 'nourishment'. In the canon ending, it's Kohei appealing to Kyoka in an attempt to turn her life around that has her give up her antagonism towards the lured in duo...but, killing herself and the Hybrids by setting the mansion on fire. Six months later, Kohei returns to the mansion to see the gravesite of Kyoka filled with white flowers and one huge one that he mistake for Kyoka.

Alternative route - Earth Defense Force Route - has him be a member of the Earth Defense Force with Kyoko, Kyoka and lead by their captain: Santa Shikiba. They fight against aliens: the Rhinogradentia, and its during this plot where it's revealed their ally - Kyoka - was an alien herself, but its thanks to Santa's actions does she reform and call off the invasion.

Joke route - Extra Scenario - A dream Kohei has after crashing his car. Kohei dreams of Kyoka and Kyoko being related, with him being called by the former to wake up the latter with a kiss. He's instead woken up by actual mouth to mouth by Santa.

Another End - an alt ending route to Plant Girl - Kyoka survives and becomes the adopted sister to Kyoko, while becoming good friends with her and Kohei.

Kohei's personality is that of a typical everyman sort, whose traits depend on what choices the player chooses. For example, he could be pervy towards Kyoko, cowardly enought to abandon Kyoko, easily timid or misled by Kyoka. From what canon route show of him the most, he is at least empathetic enough to try to connect with even a serial killer like Kyoka given his knowledge of her origins and is more than willing to give her at least a shot at turning over a new leaf.

Personal Thoughts/Rundown

Now, Kohei is difficult to properly analyze or discuss. At his core - he is a CYOA protagonist without much in the way of his personality or desires outside of being the typical average joe to Kyoko being a not-so average extraordinary detective. He's the Kirigiriso equivalent to Makoto and Yui, but lacks their core traits of being overly hopeful and justice seeking. He's basically even more of an audience surrogate than those two. As such, he can't really be gleamed for deeper meaning without it being a stretch? I mean, at best, I can consider Kohei in the canon route as being like a message that running away from the truth or not delving in to the heart of the matter as being detrimental? But, again, it feels like a stretch.

That's not to say Kohei is bad by any means. For an audience surrogate, he offers a serviceable look to Kirigiriso as the straightman/butt monkey to a lot of its oddities, which is appropriate given this is the game that has Kyoko deal with evil plant clones and aliens. He does his job well!

He's also interesting in that he's actually a guest star from another series, Otogirisu. I don't know the exact specifics of Otogirisu, aside from Kirigiriso being sort of like a sequel to it. So pretty neat origins on his part.

But, yeah, not much else to go off of beyond that. As it stands, this ends the Kirigiriso side of the misc. spin-offs - and in turn, for the next time I get back to them, I'll discuss two characters hailing from the short story - Makoto Naegi's Worst Day Ever!

[issantashikibaindr3orndrv3yet]

I can't take it anymore, I must share my hot takes

Santa Shikiba is the worst DR in the whole franchise. His stupid existence makes everything worse and Trigger Happy Havoc is the best game for making him dead so we don't have to see him again. Unfortunately he appears in Kirigiriso, which makes it the worst thing in the franchise. And what makes it worse is HE DOESN'T DIE! This game loves to torment me, making me think he's finally gone only for him to pop his ugly face up to remind me that he's a cockroach, except I have more respect for cockroaches because they don't have that shity horned design Satan gave himself.

Kyoka is the second worst character because she was created by Santa. She is a lame OC that rips off a better character. Kirigiriso's only good point was showing her die twice, and in one of those she kills herself. Even she knows she sucks.

The Rhinogeadentia are the worst designs for aliens I've ever seen. RATS WITH TENTICLES??? WHAT WERE THEY THINKING??? And yet it took at least a year for Santa to kill them? I would have killed them in a day with rat poison.

Speaking of Kirigiriso, you don't even know what the protagonist looks like. WHY? This is a VISUAL novel! We saw what the other protags look like in other games, why is this different? Is it because he has 10 bags under his eyes from being a college student? And why is he horny over Kirigiri? Doesn't he already have a girlfriend in another game? Does this game think cheating is funny? And despite this, we don't even get any fan service scenes like the other games. They were the best parts of those games, so I'm very disappointed this game had none. And that's why Kirigiriso should be called Kirigirishit.

[drmedicsgamesurgery]

If you don't mind, I want to see your own rankings of the protagonists, including the spinoff.

Spoilers obviously:

For ease im just going to be ranking the protagonists with the most screen time in their respective plot. This will also encompass their character portrayed via the entire sewries as well as not just the book they have a protag role in.

So sorry kaede and misaki, you were both good but you were overtaken. or Rantaro from V2, since we have no real idea if he was the protagonist.

1. Yui Samidare (DRK)

2. Blue Ink (DRT)

3. Mukuro Ikusaba (DRIF)

4.Hajime Hinata (DR2)

5. Kanon Nakajima (UDH)

6. Komaru Naegi (UDG)

7. Chisa Yukizome (DR3:DA)

8. Koichi Kizakura (DR3 Drama)

9. Ryoko Otonashi (DR0)

10. Makoto Naegi (Like everything lmao)

11. Takumi Hijirihara (DRGKK)

12. Kohei Matsudaira (KGS)

13. Nagito Komaeda (DR2.5)

14. Shuichi Saihara (V3)

[leenaevilin]

[Pics] 舞台「剣が君-残桜の舞-」(butai ken ga kimi -zanka no mai-)

visuals update under the cut^^

Cast:

Tanaka Reina as Kazo (香夜)

Yabe Masaki as Tsuzuramaru (九十九丸)

Sorihashi Souichirou as Kei (螢)

Akisawa Kentarou as Kuroba Saneaki (黒羽実彰)

Tani Yoshiki as Enishi (縁)

Sugie Taishi as Suzukake (鈴懸)

Tanaka Toshihiko as Sagihara Sakyou (鷺原左京) 

Washio Shuuto as Matsudaira Tatsukage (松平辰影) 

Hotta Reo as Yagyuu Mitsuyoshi (柳生三厳) 

Jounishi Kei as Hattori Hanzou (服部半蔵) 

Tokuyama Hidenori as Tokugawa Iemitsu (徳川家光)  

Doi Kazumi as Zantetsu (斬鉄)

KOHEY as(シグラギ)

Satake Uki as Habakitsuki (ハバキ憑き) 

Yagura Fuuko as Madara (マダラ) 

Shitara Ginga as Hachimoku (ハチモク)  

Suzuki Yuuta as Tsuzumi Hougen (鼓法眼)　

Hinagata Ui as Nanae (七重) 

Asakura Nobumasa as Kawana Kousuke (川名浩介)

homepage twitter natalie

[shockersalvage]

Salvage Showcase - Santa Shikiba

And now from a character to a controversial entry to one from one of the various short, yet sweetish, forgotten entries that make up the League of Obscure (in a MHA mood while writing this): Santa Shikiba!

Santa might just be the Danganronpa poster boy for obscure, underappreciated characters in the entire series so its only fitting that he goes first for the League in terms of these Showcases!

Summary

Santa Shikiba is actually one of the oldest obscure characters in Danganronpa history, dating back to his mention in DR1 as the Ultimate Botanist, a member of the 77th batch of Hope’s Peak students. On the fifth floor of the old school building, when Makoto is looking at a giant flower in the school garden, Monokuma explains that the flower is what he calls the Monokuma Flower - a plant capable of digesting anything...even people. He also claims that the Botanist responsible for it died in the Tragedy.

Santa would go on to be a central character in Kirigiriso, which was written by Danganronpa Kirigiri’s author: Takekuni Kitayama. Kirigiriso has three routes: the canon Plant Girl route and the non-canon routes: Earth Defense Force and Extra Scenario routes.

In the Plant Girl Route, while he actually doesn’t make an appearance, he is responsible for making the plant/human hybrids that attack Kyoko and Kohei (the main protag) during their time at the ‘man-eating’ mansion. One of these creations is Kyoka - the plant/human clone of Kyoko. He made her off of DNA of Kyoko that he got on the black market, since DNA of the talented increases the survivability of the experiments (just going to brush past that one) and combined that with DNA from an newly found organism with both plant and animal properties. In addition, he owns the mansion itself. The hybrids attack our heroes because in order for them to be complete like Kyoka they need proper ‘nutrition’ aka other people to eat. 

He does appear in the EDF and ES routes. For the former, he serves as leader of a task force meant to combat space aliens, the Rhinogradentia, from invading the Earth. He fights them by using his own talent to make bioengineered plant weapons to use to repel them. Ultimately, it's his love for nature, bond with Kyoka, an alien double agent for the Rhinogradentia, and showing proof of his love by tanking an entire goddamn laser beam that gets the aliens to stop the invasion. In the ES route, he appears in the ending, having given CPR to Kohei following an accident that has the guy dreaming the events of that route. It’s that route that also reinforces that, yes, Santa does own the mansion.

Santa has his personality mostly fleshed out in the non-canon routes. In these routes, Santa has show to be quite the nature lover and a fierce desire to protect it. Well, protect it and his friends, since throughout the EDF route, he’s shown that he’s willing to sacrifice himself to keep them/the Earth/nature safe - fully prepared to die (even though the universe of that route seems keen on the opposite, but the intent is there). Yet, its also this heroic attitude that has been implied from him being an action movie geek. On top of just being a regular botanical geek.

That’s not to say the PG route is devoid of depth to him - it actually gives the darkest aspect of his character. By his research notes to his own hybrids, it shows Santa as, while intelligent, someone who holds little in the way of ethics when it comes to his own experimentation, from buying evidence off the black market, to the sheer fact that he ended up creating a new form of life without any regards to consent from those whose DNA he stole. Given that Kyoka had been killing people for at least a year now, and Santa is nowhere to be found during the canon route, it also implies that he is, at the very least, hands off enough to what goes on with his creations that allow them to murder people for their own ends.

The Rundown

Santa’s theme in Kirigiriso, which I find to be apart of the theme of ‘Choice’ (not just because its a choose your adventure), is what I believe to be the ‘Choice’ of selflessness or selfishness.

It seems strange, especially given his role in the EDF route, but when comparing both I find it to be fitting. The non-canon routes are us seeing a Santa at his best: when there’s something or someone else in danger that needs to be protected. He pulls out all the stops, from making plants to go against alien rodents or even burning down his own mansion with homemade pinecone bombs. Why? Because he loves nature, he loves his friends, he loves them that much that he doesn’t mind dying or being hurt just so they can be safe. What we see from him is the ideal version when there are people for him to put it all on the line for.

So...what happens when we have a Santa that doesn’t have those people in danger or isn’t in a situation where he needs to protect something? In that case, you have the canon route Santa, who I believe is what happens when you have a genius botanist who only has just his work to give his all for. Someone to take that extreme lengths into just his research – by any means necessary and no matter the cost. His intense devotion outweighs the law or ethics in this case That isn’t to say he’s devoid of emotions or evil or  unfeeling to others or his creations, heck the diary for Kyoka shows he did care for her (rational) needs, but the route makes it clear that his standards aren’t really on the up and up.

If anything, Santa can be described as a different type of awful scientist: irresponsible. He makes sentient life without being able to fully handle his hybrids needs (be it physical or emotional). If his absent status is to be considered, he’s negligent in their care that they’ve settled into a routine of killing people for food to complete themselves for a year without anything to hinder them or morals to consider otherwise. Who knows how many people from the Detective Library were killed in order to be nutrition, and Kyoko and Kohei might have been next if things hadn’t gone their way. If the non-canon routes are him at his best, the canon route is him at his worst: a guy who, at his very least, own ambition for his research unintentionally created one of Danganronpa’s own, if seldom talked about, tragedies...

And he doesn’t get punished for it. Sure, he dies canonically with most of the Main Course not affiliated with Ultimate Despair or a member of the 78th class, but this incident is one he escapes from scot-free. In general, with knowledge of Santa’s role in the Plant Girl, there’s an eeriness to his absence. We see his research notes, Kyoka’s entry concerning him (and his pal), and certainly the consequences of his actions in the form of the hostile hybrids or Kyoka’s sad end. But never himself. Utterly away to the problem, he gave to others and still away when outsiders barely managed to get to a point where the problem is resolved permanently. He’s not in the thick of things as a hero helping others, he’s in the background, quietly and likely unintentionally spawning hidden villains that need to be stopped.

Personal Thoughts

Prior to Kirigiriso, given Santa’s lack of character beyond his design, I was rather neutral on the guy. He just...kind of existed? I found it neat that the DR team made a design for a mentioned character, alongside Kenshiro too, but unlike Kenshiro’s connection with Sakura, Santa had nothing else to him.

Post Kirigiriso? I fairly enjoyed his comedic, yet noble nature in the non-canon routes. He really feels like a character you could see in an average DR game, not quite a survivor. At best, I can see him last up until the midway point. His main route actions I also really like, as it gives a surprisingly dark factor to someone with a rather cartoonish design, and serves as a great contrast to his on-screen appearances.

There’s something apt about how one of the most forgotten/underutilized characters in Danganronpa gets to start in a game about his work, but he himself is never around to witness the final fallout from it. Goes back to his DR1 roots!~

Well, with him down we’re going back to Danganronpa Zero for the next Showcase! Hope you enjoyed this one!

[shockersalvage]

Salvage Showcase - Kyoka

This has been a longtime coming, but here is the next Showcase on the misc Danganronpa entry front. She's lean, mean and made of green in the literal sense. The main antagonist for Kirigiriso - Kyoka!

Summary

In the true route, the Plant Girl route, Kyoka was created by the efforts of Santa Shikiba and another unknown creator with DNA off of Kyoko from a case 10 years ago mixed with DNA from an unknown lifeform that was recently discovered to contain plant and animal DNA. As a clone of Kyoko, she grew up quickly, raised in Santa's mansion, though was also quite lonely, wanting to see the outside for herself. Unfortunately, her biology had her highly allergic to the outside, meaning if she would leave, it would kill her.

During this time, other Hybrids would be created, but since they lacked proper 'nourishment' (AKA human flesh), they could not be as perfected as her. In order to help them out, Kyoka began making false requests to the Detective Library, luring in detectives before feeding them to her family in efforts to make them the same as her.

Her most recent false report, would be to lure in Kyoko Kirigiri who would arrive with a civilian named Kohei Matsudaira. Of the true route to the game, both would become aware of the history behind the mansion, avoiding being consumed by these plants there and Kohei finding her diary, would encourage him to reach out Kyoka. That all three of them can go outside together.

But, knowing she couldn't live a life knowing she killed countless to feed her family, she instead sets the house on fire while the two escape. The hybrids manage to get her body outside, before they die, but she's already dead by that point. Kyoko and Kohei bury the family before leaving.

Six months later, Kohei returns to the scene and spots a giant white flower where they buried Kyoka. A flower he mistakes for her.

In the Earth Defense Force route, a non-canon story of Kirigiriso, Kyoka is a member of Santa Shikiba's Earth Defense team against the Rhinogradentia, aliens from outer space that seek to conquer the world. When Kohei and Kyoko arrive at the mansion, they join the team and the quartet are attacked by the aliens. Ultimately, Santa sacrifices himself to burn down the mansion with the invaders in it. However, Kyoko is able to deduce soon after that Kyoka is also an alien working with the Rhinogradentia. As the True Super Galaxy Level Invader, she claims her forces are trying to save the Earth from humans. She orders her mothership to send a laser right at their location, but when Santa (who is pretty much unkillable in this route) tankts the hit since it would destroy Kyoka's sakura tree, she weeps for her Captain who she thinks is dead (he is not, again unkillable) and calls off the invasion. When Santa is revealed to be alive, she happily agrees to make him sakura tea again.

There's the non-canon joke route, Extra Scenario. ES has Kyoka as the younger adopted sister of Kyoko, looking after her sister whose been asleep many years. Kyoka urges Kohei, whose been lured in by illusions by a sleeping Kyoko, to kiss Kyoko to wake her up. This is just a dream from Kohei whose been in a car wreck.

In a non-canon alternative ending to Plant Girl, Another End, when given the chance to escape from the mansion, she takes it and becomes close to Kyoko and Kohei, living like a regular friendly girl to her new friends.

Kyoka is Kyoko's polar opposite in many ways. While Kyoko is stoic, calm, and very close off Kyoka differs by mainly being warm, highly expressive and very open to others. However, this is just surface level. Kyoka is characterized as being very callous to harboring dislike against human lives. In the Plant Girl route, she's a serial killer that feeds humans to her kind as a means to an end, wanting her kin to be just like her. For EDF, she's a spy that hates humans for their crimes against nature. Regardless of both, she's an expert manipulator and skilled in deception, able to hide her true intentions up until its either too late for her victims or when someone has the means to call her out. When exposed or in control, she's rather ruthless and has her forces attack her enemies, usually without mercy.

She isn't completely devoid of empathy to humans. In the true route, she's incredibly lonely and desires to see the world, hindered by her body preventing her from going out. When Kohei offers her to escape, she's genuinely touched, but refuses out of knowledge that she can't live normally due to her crimes. In EDF, she genuinely forms a bond with Santa and once she sees his selflessnes, is willing to call off the attack to Earth. Both routes, and Another End, show she is someone who holds potential to reform when faced with true kindness.

Rundown

Like her creator, Kyoka emobides the Kirigiriso theme of Choice - Selflessness and Selfishness.

From Kyoka's point of view, her actions are selfless. She is helping her own kind reach a state of perfection that she was only able to get because she was made from an Ultimate's DNA (...not getting into that can of worms) and just wants to see them perfected as well. This also goes for her actions in the EDF route: to her, and likely the other Rhinogradentia, she's being selfless by saving the Earth from humans who harmed it. Even in the ES joke route, she's trying to be selfless by guiding Kohei into waking up her sleeping sister.

But, in truth, her actions are dripping with Selfishness when looking outwards from a human or even morally right perspective. Kyoka is heavily prejudiced to favoring her own kin and nature, her idea of 'caring' for them involves destruction of another race entirely. Be it as a food source, or straight up genocide. She embodies love for the environment and family, but it shows that without even basic love for people as a whole it could lead someone to become a monster.

She also serves a literal inverse of Kyoko. Everything about her is designed to be the sheer opposite of her. Kyoko prefers to wear darker clothing, Kyoka is in a white dress. Kyoko is serious and brooding, Kyoka is bubbly and openly chummy with others. But its not a simple case of 'twin 'sister(?)' being peppy and the other not. It boils down to their inner character. Kyoko has shown throughout the series that she feels emotions just as much as everyone else, that she can be hurt, love, be remorseful, be sacrificial, have a strong sense of justice and struggles with balancing the expectations of being a Kirigiri with her own feelings concerning her past and the legitimate bonds she made with her friends or humanity as a whole. While she's known for her stone faced, cold front, and that's very much a part of her, its also a front for a much deeper picture.

So what happens when you have a Kyoko that's meant to be her counter? Well, that bubbly, comedic, openly emotional nature of Kyoka's is her 'front' as it were. It covers for her loneliness, her desire to explore, her want to connect, but also her deceptiveness, self-centeredness, and her twistedness from her own circumstances. A girl that is colder in life than Kyoko ever could or would be.

One front could alienate people, yet ultimately her actions are beneficial to humanity. The other brings people in, yet ultimately her actions can bring humanity's doom.

She also answers another what-if scenario about Kyoko: what happens if she never had someone to connect with while in her profession? While Kyoko was able to meet Yui and grow due to her bond with her and later meets the 78th Class who she befriends, Kyoka was quickly forced to grow up quickly without a chance to meet someone outside of her nature based kin or creators (who, more than likely, aren't the most attentive to her 'activities'). She hyperfocuses on it, to the point of going to the extremes if it meant she can benefit, at the cost of other's lives. Imagine a Kyoko who would do anything if it meant she could rank up quickly in the Detective Library, and didn't have someone to anchor her morally? It's easy to imagine her falling into letting people die if it meant gaining something from it or potentially framing someone to gain easy fame. It's something she avoids, but Kyoka presents a tragic outcome without that grounding.

Personal Thoughts

Kyoka to me is one of Danganronpa's unique and better Masterminds. While some may be...just baffled by the thought of a Kyoko clone running about (don't blame them as the concept is out there even by this series standards), I feel Kyoka works well as the game's villain. She's a tragic victim turned monster out of loneliness and no real path to take outside the mansion (Santa isn't winning best Dad awards any time soon) and, even when she's an alien in the EDF route, it works well in playing off the true route's showing of her: an extremist that would do anything for nature, even it costs people their lives.

The game does well in explaining her origins under a scientific manner than supernatural, which helps soften the blow of her nature as a clone. Furthermore, I also just think that Kirigiriso really does the 'Evil Kyoko' concept brilliantly. From how she dresses to how she acts and what she's truly up to - it was just pulled off extremely well in my eyes. She's, technically, an anti-villain since her motives are benevolent to a few, but unlike someone like Tengan (who is supposed to be that.......but fails. Miserably in the execution department), her methods of going about her goals are straightforward and why she does it like that is understandable. She's stuck in a mansion she can't really leave, luring people in with fake requests and later her friendly act is the best she can do. Her kin needs human meat as food, so of course she has to kill people and deceive them to do it. She has no way else to help them or help herself.

She's someone boxed in to really only picking the worst options in life, and its a tragedy like that and the what-if she holds, that has me really loving her. Also, I really like her more comedic, yet still just as threatening, portrayals in the EDF route (with her connection to Santa) and the ES route got some laughs from me. Kyoka's just a character that I think people should at least give a chance to read about and really makes Kirigiriso work.

[shockersalvage]

And everything was resolved!~

Kohei: Well...all’s well that end’s well?

Kyoko: My client and her mansion has been burned to a crisp...well, time to head back to Hope’s Peak.

(Not even five minutes later after they leave) Santa (dropping his organic vegetables): MY MANSION!!! MY LIFESWORK! MY DAUGHTER!!! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!

[issantashikibaindr3orndrv3yet]

[drmedicsgamesurgery]

Can confirm the protagonists full name is Kohei Matsudaira (松平公平) in Kirigiri Sou

@issantashikibaindr3orndrv3yet

was playing around in kirigirisous trying to unlock the files (which currently is not looking like ill be able to mine it) but i can confirm that the protagonist uses the