Project: Eden's Garden

16 talented participants enter the game. Only 2 will walk out alive. · By Project: Eden's Garden, Shade, UndreamedPanic, Sozzay, Zetsis

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Mostly negative criticism of the first trail.[Spoilers of course]

A topic by tlittle created Dec 22, 2024 Views: 6,059 Replies: 15

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tlittle295 days ago(+11)

I'll get my positives out of the way before I get into my many negatives. The idea of the trial is good. The plan, the motive, the victim and blackened, all of that was great. Taking the characters where in Danganronpa would either be endgame deaths or survivors and making them the first deaths was great. It plays heavily with expectations. The ending of the chapter is also great and makes me wonder how the rest of the game will go.

However, the actual logic of the trial is all over the place.

First, let's talk about the elephant in the room. What happened to that entire hour? So Diana walks into the boiler room at 8:45, has a tussle with Wolfgang, and the generator blows up by way of lithium bomb at 9:35. Diana's explanation of the events looks as if, at most, only 5 minutes had passed.

The moment she called Wolfgang's name, he woke up. That's like a minute, maybe minute and a half .

He confusingly stumbles and mutters about his some vague stuff about his past. That seemed to only take around two minutes.

Wolfgang swipes at her. Thirty seconds at best.

Diana picks up the taser and points it at him. Again, thirty seconds at best.

Then Eva drops the lithium battery.

What happened to the remaining 45 or so minutes???

They even bring it up in trail, but then it's just brushed aside. Speaking about brushing aside, they never actually explained how Eva managed to steal the lithium battery and taser from their respective dorms. They explained how she knew about the existence of the lithium battery and taser...but, wait a second. Why would she assume that Desmond's blackmail quote meant he had weapons in his dorm? The motive was about secrets, not what was in their dorms. Not only that, but HOW DID SHE STEAL THE STUFF. The game just explains how she knew about the items, but not how she got them, and used her knowing about them as proof she took it.

I assumed they were going the route of because they all distrusted her that they stayed away from her long enough for her to take the things she needed without being noticed, but that just never happened. As far as the narrative is concerned, she has the items and how she got them doesn't matter, despite the fact her method of retrieval being a core element of pinning her as the blackened.

Also, one last thing, but this one is minor.

How did the boiler room door lock? So, Eva turned the lock around. How did she do that, they never explain. But, the lock was turned so it would lock from the outside, trapping whoever's inside. But who locked the door? Doors don't just automatically lock. Diana opening it meant that it wasn't locked so she could get inside, and Eva couldn't lock it cause she was at the game tournament. Did the door just lock itself?

Also, no one pointed out Wolfgang's portrait. Just thought that was weird.

The first half of the trail was alright, but once we get to the second half, it just turns into a mess of logical fallacies. The ideas are there for an amazing trail, but the actual logic isn't thought through. Hopefully they learn from this and the first trial is just a hiccup as it's the first real trial.

One last thing, that bullet hell minigame needs fixing. Just give it a small square hitbox like most bullet hell games and don't make the hitbox the size of the entire character and it'll fix so many issues with it.

Illidan1943294 days ago(+6)

Agree with the timeline criticisms, it just doesn't line up, they could probably fix it changing a few of Diana's lines saying that once trapped she tried to wake up Wolfgang for a long time before he finally did, as for the rest:

>How did she steal the stuff

I think it's fairly simple, she stole from rooms with nobody inside, and most likely didn't have someone on her at all times, Damon is also suspicious to the other students yet he was able to sneak by to the boiler room to talk to Tozu, considering Eva was planning the murder for a couple of days she likely had plenty of opportunities to be sneaky

>Eva turned the lock around. How did she do that

Yeah, this one has some problems, you'd need a screwdriver to do that, while I'm sure there's one in one of the rooms this is the kind of detail it'd be explained, maybe it's meant to be revealed early in chapter 2, maybe Tozu helped, while the games take from Danganronpa, to assume he tries to be as neutral as Monokuma is probably a mistake

>Doors don't just automatically lock

The one in the boiler room is a kind of lock that does that, it's called a storeroom lock and exists in real life

MagicLizardWizard263 days ago (2 edits) (+2)

> The one in the boiler room is a kind of lock that does that, it's called a storeroom lock and exists in real life.

Can absolutely second this. The doors in my house literally use these types of locks where if they're locked while open then they'll lock the door when it's closed. Hence why the door was left slightly ajar when Diana found it.

> ... considering Eva was planning the murder for a couple of days she likely had plenty of opportunities to be sneaky.

While it's extremely flimsy I do agree with this too since Damon was in the same boat. However, it would've been nice for the game to clarify it at the very least instead of leaving it up in the air.

Scorpionwasp282 days ago(-3)

You know, I'm not going to bother engaging with modern day Internet anymore. Wrote a detailed, thoughtful take, criticized a few things (respectfully), even ended with nothing but the highest praise for the game, which I feel is very deserved.
Reply doesn't show, I'm not given a reason, and that's that. At least it's not shadowbanning, I guess. Everywhere is like that these days.

Zelda9678263 days ago

Looks like it showed up. Maybe it just needed to be reviewed?

ForcefieldDown280 days ago(+2)

I agree with the criticism about the huge time gap. That plot hole immediately jumped up at me at first.

During the later parts of the trial, they heavily imply Eva needed to know the EXACT second Diana walked into the room so she can trigger the trap right after. It kind of makes me think whether there was some miscommunication among the writers surrounding the evidence.

It would make much more sense if the note Diana received told her to go there in the middle of the tournament. Or if the trap was triggered around 9:10-ish at the latest.

Scorpionwasp285 days ago(+2)

The main plot-hole for me is - indeed - the over one hour interval that is never accounted for. It's probably not too hard to fix by tweaking the timing a bit, making the tournament start earlier, say that it was dark and it took a while for Diana to even realize Wolfgang was there, etc.

There were a few instances in the plot that weren't plot-holes per se, just stuff that gave me this feeling of... "These characters have really weird thought processes". Like... the blackmails. Both Toshiko's and Cassidy's are laughable nothing-burgers, right. Tozu himself confesses he was having a hard time finding material and had to wing it. So, in that context, Damon looks at the cryptic one he received about Wolfgang - stuff that looks more like subjective opinion than fact either way - and goes "Oh my, this has got to be important, I should contact my psychopathic kidnapper and ask him to break the rules of his game and give me privileged information!" This might speak more to the sort of person Damon is, though.

Second one, when he's discussing Desmond's with Eva. Again, cryptic shit. Is this "one he trusts" they are talking about a person, an object? Assuming it's a person, is that person here, in Eden Garden? Because these are supposed to be about their lives outside of Eden's Garden, right? But no. Eva jumps to the conclusion Desmond has an entire armory in his dorm, from that vague statement. I don't think the statement supports that conclusion, but on that same token... are you telling me the ULTIMATE MARKSMAN who walks around with a QUIVER FULL OF ARROWS and brags about being proficient with multiple accuracy devices, and has a room themed around his talent here... HAS WEAPONS??? Shocking. But wait. You know what I have NEVER heard being used in target practice competitions? Tasers.

These are relatively minor issues though. 5 chapters of this level of quality, artwork, music, voice acting, scope, I'd be selling for $60 on Steam. I'm not exaggerating.

tlittle267 days ago(+4)(-1)

Yeah, the Desmond blackmail literally makes zero sense as of right now . I touched on it in my criticism, but the nature of his blackmail and the outcome of it makes no sense. The blackmail is meant to be a secret held by the holder about something in their past, so why would Eva assume the blackmail mean he had literal weapons on him as of right now? Not to mention it is one of the cryptic blackmails, meaning it could mean literally anything until you actively ask Desmond to explain it.

I will give some benefit of doubt and say they're planning on something later. In the trial, Desmond said he didn't even know his room had weapons, which has to be a lie considering the outcome of the trial, and, you know, logic. Maybe it'll come into more play later, but as of me writing this, it is a massive flaw in the writing.

Astrýl Linalool266 days ago(+3)

I honestly also have a bit of an issue with the trial asking me to remember one liners that happened outside of the investigation real time hours ago, personally. Plus some of the solutions to Non-Stop debates seem to just... derail the conversation to an unrelated topic someone happened to mention which felt a bit moon logic-y to me? But it may just be a skill issue tbh.

Also I 100% expected them to mention how similar Diana and Wolfgang's mom look and for it to be the reason for Wolfgang's hostile reaction (given the blackmail and Eva knowing about it and blah blah blah).

But hey, it's a first chapter and the rest of it is absolutely stunning, so I guess I can kinda let it slide...

MagicLizardWizard263 days ago(+4)

They also need the fix the Non-Stop Debates because a lot of gameplay aspects are just poorly designed.

Like the Truth Bullets. Why are they so disorganized? Why is the image of the "internal end" of the cable clearly WAY TOO LARGE to fit through the grate (and inconsistent with how its shown during the closing argument)? Why does the bullet never specify which end is the "internal end", a term that likely differs from region to region? Why are Wenona, Ulysses, Eloise and Desmond's alibis under the "Blackout" truth bullet?? Just MAKE IT ITS OWN BULLET. I don't remember the Storage Closets bullet ever being used so it's clear that not every single bullet has to be used during a class trial. They can just be purely informative.

Which comes to my second point. The trial relies way too much on the player's memory. I'm not gonna remember who initially suggested the time for the competition, or who didn't speak during a certain story segment 4 hours ago or that someone was holding this object during this point of the story which was actually a device to tune in to the cameras situated around the entire school (because obviously that's not a stretch to assume at all). A lot of segments during the game were literally just guessing trial and error because while I knew what information they were asking for, I simply didn't remember because details like that are easy to slip from the mind hours later, and there were no informative truth bullets to help. I'm not Makoto Naegi.

There are also some more minor creases I would've liked to have smoothed out. Such as clarifying when the culprit actually fired the Taser Gun (or clarifying that they even shot it at all) or explaining better how the cable managed to fall through the entire ventilation shaft when the intact end would've likely been heavier than the burnt end. Too many things just get glossed over during the trial (or worse, brought up then prompty ignored without resolution).

I still really liked this chapter, and want to like it more still. This is the most ambitious fan adaption of Danganronpa to date (and the only one that's actually been developed into a game as far as I know). The characters are enjoyable and diverse (and extend past the tired japanese tropes and stereotypes that Spike Chunsoft repeats in every single game), the actual storytelling and progression of the Class Trial is interesting and engaging (I certainly mentally ruled out everyone in the Videogame Tourney as a suspect right off the bat). They just need to fix the many holes in their logic because while a Class Trial is certainly a spectacle, it's also supposed to make sense.

parece.champignon205 days ago(-1)

I made an account just to reply to this text just because it was really... poorly thought out.

1. her recollection is of key moments, not solely what happened. Him being drugged, and her trying to stabilize him, lasted those 45 minutes.

2. The letters were an incentive to murder. Your point that the letters HAVE to be solely historical secrets relies on the belief Tozu is a neutral observer who doesn't twist the truth. He is not. Tozu's goal is to aid people in killing, and if that means twisting rules, making deals with the students, hiding key information, OR giving someone a heads up about where weapons are stashed... then he'll do it. Tozu is on the team of the blackened.

3. If we know that the drag racer has lithium batteries in his room, it then logically follows that the ultimate marksman has weapons. Not that far of a reach at all, and Desmond's letter seemed to confirm that when it stated "weapons in hand". We also don't see the picture on his letter, I believe, which may have shown where the weapons were.

4. The students literally make it a point that they don't exactly know when she accessed the items, but that it doesn't matter because she is the only one who had the information to even know to search his room anyways. There couldn't possibly be anyone else who had done it, so filling in the last gaps was not necessary. They overtly state this.

5. Doors can, in fact, lock themselves once closed. They are pretty common actually.

tlittle176 days ago (1 edit) (+1)

1: Her recollection of the moment specifically shows him rousing himself after just a few attempts. There wasn't any visual or said moment where time passed that long on her just trying to wake him up. And it just wouldn't make sense that she'd stay that long for that. After 5 minutes of being unsuccessful, any rational person would try an leave to get help, to find out the door was locked, and the entire flashback would have played out differently. Besides, if she did just stay in that room doing nothing but trying to rouse him, then she's just a moron which the story doesn't depict her as. And don't say she was panicked either cause that would imply further she'd try and go for help sooner.

2/3: Literally all of the letters are about past events. True, Tozu could have twisted the rules for that one letter, but the characters in the story wouldn't have known that. They would assume the pattern is the rule, and the pattern established is that the letters refer to past traumas. No one even knew the Racer had lithium batteries until the trial, except for Eva. Not even the Racer knew. There's no reason for the characters to assume foul play. Also, the picture thing doesn't work considering they never showed what the picture was. If the picture did indeed show where the weapons were in the room, why didn't the writers show that to the players? Don't make up fanfiction to excuse bad writing.

4: The fact they can't prove how and when she got the items means she could easily spin the narrative that someone else knew the information and got the items instead of her. Knowledge of an item doesn't mean she took it, especially without definitive proof she did. That's not how you win court cases, that's how you lose them. There needs to be definitive proof that she nabbed the items from the room, otherwise the logic feels faulty.

5: Yeah learned that myself from the comments, but that doesn't explain when or how she got the tools to turn the doorknob. Again, more faulty logic.

parece.champignon176 days ago(-1)

1. Wrong, it was already confirmed by the creators that is in fact what happened. Her memory shows him waking up after a few attempts because that is the recollection of important events... not because that is absolutely everything that happened.

2. Wrong, literally not all of the letters are past events. Tozu never said they were past events; he said they were secrets. If you want to be technical about the motive (despite the fact Tozu has already shown he is not), Desmond may have lied about not knowing the weapons were there, and it's even implied at one point by Damian. Not like it matters though, Tozu has shown to bend the truth and rules to aid the killing game. He literally said he doesn't lie then was promptly shown lying. Tozu is not a reliable narrator.

3. Wrong, courts do not require the prosecution to prove every single aspect of a case, but to prove BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT that only the defendant could have committed that crime. That's exactly the point made by Damian: We don't know how Eva got the weapons, but we do know that no one besides her could have done it. Even then, this isn't a court case, this is a class trial with 16 students.

4. Tools to turn the doorknob? You can turn a doorknob at home with any random thing you find. It's incredibly easy. No faulty logic by the game, just a lack of manual labor by yourself 😅

tlittle176 days ago(+1)

1: So you're just proving my point. They wrote it so poorly in the actual game, they have to confirm outside of the media what actually happened. In game, she literally called his name once, and she said it snapped Wolfgang out of his delirium. That's bad writing. If she did do other things to snap him out of it, why out of the entire half hour, did she not try and get help. Granted, she'd have failed considering the door was locked, but she never mentions the door being locked until AFTER he started attacking her. Any competent person would have tried to leave much sooner, but she didn't. Again, either poor writing, or they're writing the most insufferably dumb character imaginable.

2: Literally every single note shown in game was of a past event. That's the pattern shown, and even though we as spectators know to not trust literally everything, the actual characters in game don't have that sense of dramatic irony as they are the participants. Most people, when seeing a pattern, bases logic on said pattern. It would be strange for everyone to have their letters be of past secrets, but then this random letter for some reason doesn't. As of right now, it's bad writing, but if something does happen with Desmond in a later chapter, I'll happily rescind this critique, but it's a critique nonetheless.

3: Beyond a shadow of a doubt. Never heard that term before? If at any point you believe there is any suspicion that the defendant isn't guilty, the jury issues a not-guilty verdict as there isn't enough evidence to fully pin them at the scene of a crime. If Eva was smart, she could have easily pinned the blame on Diana or Damon since there's just as much evidence that Damon knows where every tool is, or Eva could say she had shown Diana Damon's letter as well. Heck, I thought they were gonna do this as everyone tries to pin the blame on others until you come up with the correct piece of evidence showing that Eva had physically taken the items from the room. Danganronpa does this all the time since in crime solving stories, a stone unturned is a plot point unfulfilled, and I felt pretty unfulfilled.

4: A screwdriver or screwdriver esque object. Most involve at least that, but on more complicated locks, sometimes a bit more. You'd need to find evidence not only of what Eva used to turn the knob, but also a general time of when she could have done so. It would have been so easy to just point out a screwdriver in one of the storage rooms, but then during the investigation you find it missing, then find it stashed somewhere. Without it, it's just a missing piece of the puzzle. It could have also led to having more evidence against Eva, but again, it's another stone unturned.

parece.champignon176 days ago(-1)

1. Nope, because you can reason it pretty easily in-game. Poor use of context clues is not a failure of writing. She said she stayed because she didn't want to leave him alone.

2. Except Tozu never said they were past events, he said they were secrets. The students also would not assume a pattern because the notes were never shared publicly. For all we know, and they know, half the notes are not about the past. And no, it wouldn't be strange, because it happened. It has already been established Tozu cares more about furthering the game than honesty. It is perfectly reasonable to think one note would be an advantage to kickstart the killing. I have said this multiple times already.

3. No, again. Jury's are not a hivemind. There are PLENTY of occasions of innocent people being given a verdict of guilty. This is just incorrect. No one else would be capable of causing those explosions besides Eva, and no one would be able to see besides Eva, so how she got the tools doesn't matter. Beyond a reasonable doubt.

4. It takes 5 minutes to change a doorknob. Not farfetched at all.

Fallenangel700135 days ago (2 edits) (+1)

I feel like I'm watching two Danganronpa characters argue. Y'all are right and wrong about various things and are getting kinda heated over it. I just finished Trail 1 last night and want to discuss it so I'll throw in my two cents.

1. I agree with Tlittle that the time scale of Diana the Cosmetologist being in the basement doesn't make sense. Her story could have only been about 5 or 6 minutes as it currently stands. She spends a little time waiting for her eyes to adjust to the darkness before calling out to Wolfgang the Lawyer. He responds, she tries to help, and he lashes out at her. He goes on a rant for a bit before the explosion. That's not a lot of things to happen, so it could not have been long and doesn't match with the timescale of the rest of the case.

This is made somewhat worse because the story does give an explanation for why Diana was down there for so long, it's just that the explanation doesn't make any sense. The explanation given by the story is that Diana was trying to pick the lock on the door so she could escape. She was doing it blind in the dark and had no experience with lockpicking so she just kept trying til she got lucky. The explanation doesn't make sense because that would require a lot of time after the explosion and not before it. I think was some miscommunication or oversight as the rest of the writing is generally very quality.

2. I agree with Parece here. The blackmail does seem random. I think we only hear 4. Toshiko the Matchmaker's was a load of nothing from her childhood. Cassidy the Pro Gamer's was about a fear of spiders I think? (Weird that she's the spider of the cast) Desmond the Marksman's was a vague reference to that he has weapons. Lastly, Wolfgang's was a vague reference to how he's a wolf is sheep's clothing (fitting that he's the sheep of the cast). The only common thread is that they reflect poorly on the person they are tied too, and that all of them are... kinda weak? This makes sense though. Tozu admits that he got the idea from something Eva the Liar said when the cast were looking at their student profiles. Tozu handed out the blackmail the next morning so he clearly didn't put a lot of time into it. Combine this with his admission that it was hard to find actual good dirt on the characters and it only stands to reason that the blackmail is random and weak. He was probably twisting words to make mountains from molehills because he only had molehills.

3. I agree with both of you here on different parts. Parece is right that the cast had Eva dead to rights at the end of the trial. She was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. She was the only one who could have possible dropped the battery and killed Wolfgang. Everything else is practically irrelevant at that point as it doesn't matter who stole what; Eva triggered the murder mechanism and is the killer. Nothing else truly needs to be answered.

Tlittle does have a good point in that a stone unturned is a plot point unfulfilled. Especially cause this plot point has a very easy explanation. She had access to the cameras because of the Traitor Perk. She could have just seen where everyone is, seen where the objects are in the rooms, and slipped in and out of the rooms in just a minute or two. Stealing the stuff would have been extremely easy for her.

4. This is just a repeat of 3. Does it actually need to be answered? Not really. There are plenty of places to hide a screwdriver and plenty of time to flip the lock over the several days especially with the aforementioned camera access. The details don't really matter. At the same time, including those details, even just educated guesses at them, would have been quite easy and satisfying to the player.

That's that. This was fun. Trail 1 has some flaws for sure and can be a bit unsatisfactory a times. I can't believe they killed Eva, one of the more interesting characters and the probable Eve of the Garden of Eden. However, it was over all very enjoyable and I'm very much looking forward to the rest of the game and specifically how it develops from this first chapter. Here's hoping Eden's Garden is successful and doesn't peter out into nothingness like so many other Fanganronpas.

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Project: Eden's Garden

Mostly negative criticism of the first trail.[Spoilers of course]