Bopper: “You know this really does question my culpability in this.”
Vivian: “You trying to say we’re some kind of suicide note?”
Bopper: “Well from the beginning I predicted this, that this would be the outcome. And think about- I have to reflect back on what I predicted. And what I wanted. I wanted to be right. You know. In essence, what was I wanting? I was wanting self vindication over, not only someone’s death, but I wanted self vindication in seeing a second person die.
And so when we sit here and we make predictions - and I make predictions and I make guesses - in some way breaking down that barrier of separation between myself and the game I lose the metagaming and I become part of it. Like invested in the diegesis of it.
Maybe that’s what Monokuma wants. To become a monster, to make death a commodity for catharsis. To make it be something that you buy and spend and trade for ‘am I right? am I wrong?’ instead of reflecting on the situation itself. Perhaps the game itself is what pumped the poison into my veins and revealed the darker side that I didn’t want that.”
Vivian: “Maybe.”
Bopper: “You know in some ways this game is just like Spec Ops: the Line if it were more clever. Ultimately the frustration- I’ve gotten 50,000 views and dozens of frustrated comments on my Spec Ops video, and it’s a lot of people upset that there’s a game that forces them to confront that they want to see death and violence, and they want to see it as entertainment.
And I think Danganronpa- Spec Ops couches itself in a hyper realistic setting, it’s obviously extremely over the top in terms of the sheer scope and volume of it. It is video game coded with a realistic aesthetic, with a realistic coat of paint. This, by hyperstylising everything, I think plunges you into a different level of abstraction.
How much can you abstract violence, chaos, suffering, and pain, before you actively root for it and can completely dissociate yourself from it? I wonder.”
From a conversation between Professor Bopper and Vivian on ‘Real High School Teacher Plays Danganropa: Trigger Happy Havoc (I Know Nothing About It) Part 9’