Roleplay / Roulette Rampage

Roulette Rampage is a Tumblr Play-by-Post roleplay set in the Danganronpa universe. As with its inspiration, sixteen students preparing to enter Hope's Peak find themselves waking up in a grim prison with no memories of how or why they got there. Upon awakening, they discover that their predicament is caused by Monobear, the supposed warden of the prison, who then tells them to kill each other to leave. The group is given motives each chapter, and then made to investigate the crimes in order to determine the culprit.

The first roleplay began on May 5th 2014, and was successfully concluded on December 10th, 2014 after 5 Chapters.The second RP, Roulette Rampage: Reloaded, began later that year, and finished December 15, 2015, wrapping up the storyline with the Remnants of Despair and bringing closure to some of the plot threads left in the first session. After a hiatus, the mods decided to begin a third installment, Roulette Rampage Rewind, which covers a different set of Hope's Peak students and began on October 9, 2016, with the roster revealed on October 5th. However, Rewind has been on unofficial hiatus since the beginning of Chapter 2, with no apparent plans to restart it.

Tropes featured in all of the Roleplays include:

• Alliterative Name: In all sessions, but even more so in the sequel Roleplay Reloaded and again with the third roleplay Rewind. Someone even asked why the mods didn't up the ante and increase the "R" words with each installment.
• A Student Body Divided
• Amateur Sleuth: The students are required to investigate each murder. Justified, however; keep in mind, they are still teenagers, and many of the inmates don't have a profession that involves crime research or heavy investigation.
• Anyone Can Die: Even the GMPCs aren't exempt from this. They had some immunity back in the original session and even survived to the end of the game, but in Reloaded, one of the two GMPCs (Aiko) was caught and executed around mid-game.
• Artificial Intelligence: It's revealed sometime after Chapter 2 of the first session that the dead inmates can still be talked to... but they're only limited to the tablet stuck in their cells. They all retain their memories up until their death, and they can talk to one another too. However, if they're broken, they're gone for good.
• Bears Are Bad News: Monobear, as per usual.
• Connected All Along: What Reloaded turns out to be. This session and the first session were happening simultaneously, and even adjacent to each other (albeit separated by a wall), but neither party was able to figure this out until the very end.
• Creator Cameo: In all of the games, the moderators of the sessions appear as students. Two of the artists for the first Roleplay also appear as students (Nana Yasuda and Eiji Iseri) in Reloaded.
• Cruel and Unusual Death:
  • Death by Irony: Executions are specifically tailored to their victims, so they're usually based on the character's talent, personality or interests.
• Deadly Game
  • Deadly Graduation
  • Involuntary Battle to the Death
• Developing Doomed Characters: The task of the roleplayers.
• Famed In-Story: This is par for the course for each and every non-Reserve Course student coming into Hope's Peak. Since they have to have some level of notoriety for the Board to even consider them coming into the school, it's basically a requirement.
• Friendless Background: A common theme between sessions. Oten Kouei, Boa Hoa, Banri Bunko, Misaki Asaihara, Kouya Itoutani, and supposedly Estuko Reiki qualified for this in the first session, and Irino and Terumi counted for this in Reloaded.
• GMPC: Kaori and Miwa in the first session, Aiko and Miya in the second, and Kohaku and Kaneto in Rewind. Rewind marks the first time that one of the GMPCs is male, though.
• Hanging Judge: Monobear, of course.
• Here We Go Again!: The first session reveals that the Future Foundation ended up reopening Hope's Peak after the worst of the Tragedy passed. Rewind's session includes the addition of an 86th class, which implies that the new school has been running for a while.
• Incredibly Lame Pun: Every single one of the execution names, in true Danganronpa fashion, makes light of its subject matter and the executed.
• I Warned You:
  • In a humorous case, in one omake Oten is greeted by Banri in the afterlife with this after he warned Oten that he's just as susceptible to death as he and everyone else was.
  • Less humorous case usually being when the ground rules are broken, even if you did them unknowingly. Monobear gunned down Ryouta after he forgot to pay for a snack from the Monoshoppe, and he repeatedly warns the inmates to not assault him, which Kyo does anyway when he's not in his right mind.
• Love Hurts: Wouldn't be a Killing Game if they didn't have this:
  • Banri had a crush on Boa Hoa that mostly went reciprocated, but he was forced to kill her after she caught him murdering Nagisa in a fit of madness, and her death haunted him all the way up to the trial.
  • Oten seemed to admire Banri and noted that he did enjoy kissing him, even if by accident, but that goes swirling down the drain with the aforementioned murders, and due to his Knight Templar tendencies he can't reconcile the ideas of his sympathetic friends committing such heinous acts at all and loathes Banri (real and AI) from that point forwards.
  • Nana and Tetsuo had some history together as she was usually the one he'd have to arrest when there was trouble, but she harbored some feelings for him. Cue his death in Chapter 2, and his Lost Lenore status to her from then on.
    • To add insult to injury, Kyo is quite smitten with Nana, but she doesn't reciprocate and sees them as Just Friends.
  • Harper and Ozu had never been quite able to get over Antoinette's death.
• Once a Season: There will always be a double murder, and there will only be one of them in the story. The original had its double in Chapter 2, with Reloaded's in Chapter 3.
• One-Steve Limit: Generally goes out of its way to play this straight, but some cases still slip through. Tetsuo Shingen from Reloaded and Gyo Shingen from Rewind are the biggest examples, though. No longer, as Tatsuya and Yuuna Mikami are both in Rewind.
• Ontological Mystery
• Public Execution: All of the students who happen to be alive are forced to watch the executions of the murderers.
• invokedReal Life Writes the Plot: Roleplayers can send in murder applications if they want their character to be a culprit. The victim does not know whether or not their character has died until a day before the body discovery. In addition, any player who has not RP'd in two weeks (the (Ab)Normal week and the Abnormal week) without notification will be executed by Monobear in what is called a "Monodeath". Ryouta of the First Session and Kyo and Terumi of Reloaded have been victims of this fate.
• Sadistic Choice:
  • The first session's Chapter 4 motive presents the eight remaining inmates with this. Either they try not to kill anyone and remain in a prison encased in a barrier with no one in sight, or they kill one of their own to let the other 7 inmates go free— and at this point, almost no one is willing to do so. The point was moot anyway since Monobear counted the Mastermind as a living student as well.
  • Reloaded had the Mastermind make the students choose between killing her and getting rid of the cure for mankind's disease or letting her live despite her atrocities. Of course, the inmates picked the first option, but they agreed on trying to find a way around it.
• Transplant: Oten of the first session and Kohaku of Rewind are permanently stuck in this roleplay after appearing in Ultimate Bullet Time 3.
• Two Guys and a Girl: Inverted, more often than not in the completed sessions. The first session had the trio of Kaori, Misaki, and Atlas, while the second has Kaori, Misaki and Junpei.
• Waking Up Elsewhere: All three games start up like this, as the narration explains that they were about to set foot in Hope's Peak before suddenly waking up in a different facility (a prison, an underwater base, and a hotel, specifically). Turns out not to have been the case, as they were simply given amnesia and had the last three years of their memories taken away.
• Win Your Freedom
• You All Share My Story: Not only did Everyone Go to School Together, the second cast became Future Foundation members after the tragedy hit and started treating the first session's cast since they were Remnants of Despair. The company Sumiko worked for helped cultivate the antidote for Despair Disease.
• You Wake Up in a Room: Each game pretty much starts with such, as all participants have had their memories wiped before the game starts.

Tropes found in individual Roleplays include:

Roulette Rampage 1

• Alpha Bitch: Ai, at least at first. As she starts to cooperate with the others and makes allies, she's sort of becoming a Lovable Alpha Bitch. She goes straight back into Alpha Bitch after the Chapter 3 trial.
• And I Must Scream: Nagisa Iwase's murder in Chapter 2. She had her back smashed in with a sewing machine, then was Bound and Gagged and eventually injected with a lethal dose of potassium, writhing helplessly and futilely as she felt her heart stop.
• Armor-Piercing Response: More like Armor-Piercing Statement, but as Banri was being chewed out by Senzaki, he suddenly switched gears and stated that she was probably the most frightened out of the whole bunch but hiding it under a Jerkass front— "like a cornered animal ready to swipe", as he put it. What pissed her off was that he was absolutely right.
  • A straighter example would be during the Chapter 3 Trial, when Misaki mentions to Ai that Etsuko's spare habit (nun robes) had blood on it, and that if Ai cleaned the robe, she must have seen it.
• Big Damn Heroes: The A.I.s make a big return in the final trial, usurping the technology around the trial room and revealing the identity of the Mastermind, all with a final triumphant grin on their faces.
• Big "SHUT UP!": Banri in Chapter 2 when Monobear revealed his Delusional Parasitosis to the court.
  Banri: NO ONE WAS SUPPOSED TO KNOW THAT!
• Break the Cutie: Increasingly common as the RP goes on. Junpei, Kaori, and Etsuko (albeit very subtly) have been hit the worst. Subverted for Etsuko. She wasn't broken at all.
• Chekhov's Gun: The picture from Chapter 3. Nabiki eventually uses it as a lead for who sent them all to prison in the first place. Jinta, one of the two remaining kids in the photo, was the first person she talked to in order to get the truth.
• Closed Circle: Monobear made sure that no one could enter or exit the prison's boundaries. Not only that, but the prison itself is in a literal circle, for a barrier surrounds the prison.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: The characters aren't seen with full body sprites in most (if not all) of the blog posts; instead, each character is represented with their head and expressions against a colored background. The color coding goes as follows:
  • Ryouta: Sky Blue
  • Oten: Green
  • Junpei: Pale Yellow
  • Kouya: Light Green
  • Banri: Salmon
  • Jinta: Light Gray
  • Atlas: Navy Blue
  • Masato: Periwinkle
  • Miwa: Light Blue
  • Kaori: Peach
  • Boa: Light Red
  • Misaki: Indigo
  • Nagisa: Pink
  • Ai: Mint Green
  • Nabiki: Gold
  • Etsuko: Purple
• Comically Missing the Point: During the Chapter 2 trial, certain folk were giving Junpei dirty looks for finding a crucial clue in the girl's bathroom, as if that fact was the most important part of that statement.
• Dark Secret: Chapter 2's motive involved Monobear threatening to reveal their most embarrassing and darkest secrets to the public if someone had not killed in 24 hours. In addition, each inmate was given someone else's secret, either to return it or figure it out for themselves. However, since it was taking far too long for the students to reveal their secrets to each other, Monobear happily does it for them during Chapter 2's trial:
  • Atlas, Junpei, and Miwa's revealed that they have all resorted to foul practice in their sports (Atlas with performance enhancers,Junpei by cheating, and Miwa by sabotage; Misaki's revealed that she had created a formula that enhanced plant life, but ended up being toxic to humans; Kaori's revealed that she was supposedly the reason that her boyfriend died years back; Both Ai and Nagisa's revealed that they have had long histories of picking fights with others, with Ai reportedly being a deliquent; Jinta's revealed that he dated two girls simultaneously; Ryouta's revealed that he's never dated, let alone kissed anyone; Oten's revealed that he dresses like a superhero to build up self confidence; Etsuko's revealed that she wears red lingerie to feel sexy when she's alone. Boa's revealed that her parents bank off her achievements while she does the work; and finally, Banri's revealed that he has Delusional Parasitosis, which makes him hallucinate that there are insects crawling in his body. This secret is the reason for Nagisa's murder. Boa's is another matter entirely.
• Didn't See That Coming: Ryouta Akagi's death in Chapter 3. They may have been the most naive out of the cast, and they seemed to trust everyone too easily, but they didn't seem like the type to kill anyone and no one expressed any reason to kill them or considered them a target. Even resident Manipulative Bitch Ai didn't think of them as much of a target. But still, She found him shot to pieces at the foot of the entrance to prison store, and she along with a good number of the other survivors were visibly shocked.
• Easy Amnesia: When the characters wake up in the prison, they don't remember anything after arriving at Hope's Peak.
• Exact Words: In Chapter 4, Monobear presented the inmates with an interesting motive- to kill one of their own so the other seven could leave. However, after the murder occurred, he revealed that this included himself, so, technically, that would still mean there were eight people. They still need to find the culprit.
  • I Gave My Word: He wasn't exactly wrong, though. After the culprit of Chapter 4 had been found— thereby leaving seven people in the prison left— Monobear then decides to call off any further motives and allows the inmates to discover the truth about their situation.
• Faint in Shock: In Chapter 3, Etsuko Reiki faints when she opens the bag with the very much dead Oten Kouei inside that she was supposed to bring into the Cathedral.
• Frame-Up: Done to Kaori, Etsuko, and Junpei in Chapter 3. See Mysterious Note below.
• Game-Breaking Injury: In Miwa's case, it's a subversion. She had developed arthritis in her wrists, which normally would put a damper on her bowling career, but she had tried to keep it hidden in order to keep doing what she loves. It's only gotten worse as time went on.
• Kill the Ones You Love: Banri ended up doing this in Chapter 2 once he discovered that Boa Hoa, his crush, walked in on him just as he was done with his murder of Nagisa Iwase.
• Knight Templar:
  • Oten. If someone doesn't completely match up with his Black-and-White Morality, he'll immediately assume them to be a dishonorable enemy and will consider them a target.
  • Etsuko turns out to be this as well, as revealed in the final trial. As a member of the Future Foundation, she oversaw the rehabilitation process of the collected remnants of SHSL Despair. However, after seeing that a certain group of kids were deemed "At-Risk" of turning again, she started the new Despair game in the hopes that only the purest, most good out of the inmates would be able to survive and resist the temptations of the motives. Once they figured out all of this, she chews them all out, screaming that they should be thankful for all that she's done for them.
• Let Us Never Speak of This Again: Early Chapter 2, Oten and Banri shared an Accidental Kiss after he tripped and pulled off Banri's gas mask, but by instinct Banri decided to kiss back, and both noted to themselves that they kind of liked it. Regardless, both boys try to pass off the incident as something that never happened.
• My God, What Have I Done?: In Chapter 2, Banri kills Nagisa Iwase on the pretense that he saw bugs crawling out of her body, and deals with the problem as if doing his regular exterminating job. His Only Friend and crush Boa Hoa just happens to be there at the time he finishes, and thus he kills her as well to preserve the secret. Overcome with guilt, he tries to scrub his hands of these filthy deeds until his skin rubs raw. He shows remorse for his actions throughout the trial, but it's mostly for killing Boa.
• Mysterious Note: Not just one, but three in Chapter 3. Junpei received a note from his "Guardian Angel", saying that Oten was planning on killing Miwa in solitary confinement, and that he could prevent it if he did something about it. Atlas received a note from his "Number One Sidekick", about a fake party for Oten. Finally, Etsuko received a note saying that she should bring a bag (which has Oten in it) up to the Cathedral from solitary. Those letters were written by The Chapter 3 culprit, Ai Senzaki.
  • Another one of these turns up in Chapter 4, given to Jinta by 'A friend'. This person turns out to be Nabiki Kaname.
• Never Suicide: One of Chapter 2's victims was found hung on the giant burger in the cafeteria . Of course, it's revealed that She died far, far before her body was strung up. The other inmates were able to figure out that she was strangled by Banri after she walked in on him, just as he was finished killing Nagisa Iwase.
• Older Than They Look: Everyone, since it was revealed in Chapter 5 that their memories of the last 3 years had been taken away.
• Out of Focus: A few of the inmates take a backseat to whatever's going on per chapter, and as such they don't get as much development.
• Sadistic Choice: In Chapter 1, Monobear gives the inmates two choices; either kill one of their fellows, or be subjected to starvation.
• Shirtless Scene: Happens in Chapter 2's trial. Jinta, Banri, and Altas are suspected of being the culprit, so they're asked to take off their shirts to prove that they have no scars on their chests as signs of a struggle. In addition to the view the girls got, the outcome determined that the suspects didn't have the marks on their chests. However, that doesn't mean Banri's not entirely devoid of scars...
• Ship Sinking / Ship Tease: All over the place.
  • Around Chapter 2, Banri starts developing feelings for Boa Hoa and hangs out with her a couple of nights before the next murder. He also tries to calm down Oten after the first trial and ends up Accidentally Kissing him (and he notes that he liked it). Both of these ships come crashing down after the events of Chapter 2, as he kills Boa for walking in on his murder of Nagisa, and Oten now hates Banri for his violent actions. Not to mention that Banri's dead, anyway.
  • Ai Senzaki makes it clear in Chapter 3 that she actually enjoyed her time with some of the other inmates, and makes a particular note of Nabiki (combined with her elated nature around her and the beach daydream, it's not all that surprising). This is also the same scene which outed her as the culprit, so they're not going to hook up anytime soon.
  • Kaori gets a little more of this than usual. She gets some with Atlas in the earlier chapters, which was further Teased in Chapter 3's (Ab)Normal Days when the two run into each other near the Monoshoppe and awkwardly muse about watching a movie, but seems to be put on hold due to Atlas' increasing Out of Focus moments. She also has her close friendship with Misaki, which has held up since Chapter 2 and more importantly has gotten a possible Relationship Upgrade when she confesses to her in Chapter and even that's sunk when the RPer revealed the confession to be platonic, sending the two girls right back into Heterosexual Life-Partners.
• Shoo Out the Clowns: Monobear and his prison games aren't very kind to the most optimistic and energetic inmates. Oten was certain that most of the people he looked up to and admired were now dishonorable (even if he didn't want to admit it), Kaori and Junpei slowly break over the course of the RP to the point of tears, and Ryouta, perhaps the most childish out of the group, is killed by Monobear himself in Chapter 3.
• Shout-Out: Of course, Roulette Rampage owes a lot of its foundation to Danganronpa, so expect there to be a lot of references to it in this RP.
  • Chapter 2's motive seems to be inspired by the motive of Chapter 2 in the first game, since it involves secrets. However, instead of the secrets of all those important coming up in trial, Monobear decides to shout out everyone's deep, dark secret.
  • Senzaki's execution, like Celestia's, ends with a vehicle crashing into her combined with a fiery demise. Bonus points for both occurring in their respective third Chapters.
  • During the Chapter 4 trial, when the inmates discover that the victim was hit over the head with a bottle of tesmic (turmeric) and loosely connected this incident to a prank book, Nabiki quips that it's sort of like getting hit on the head with an over sized hammer- seemingly a reference to the fates of Hifumi Yamada and Kiyotaka Ishimaru from Chapter 3 of the first DR game.
  • The series Catchphrase (or rather, Something Awful's translation of it) "You've got that wrong!" makes an appearance during the final Trial.
  • On another note, Nabiki's execution takes some inspiration from the 1912 sinking of the Titanic.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: Kaori gives a big one to the Mastermind after telling them that they need to stay in the prison after all they've done as SHSL despair. Topping it all of with a "You've got that wrong!"
• Shut Up, Kirk!: Conversely, in Chapter 3, Oten refuses to listen to the warnings of the Banri Alter Ego and tells it off because he doesn't trust its real self after everything that transpired in Chapter 2.
• Sympathetic Murderer:
  • Chapter 2's Banri Bunko. Even though he tried to cover his tracks and clam up about his two murders, the fact that he was suffering a bout of Delusional Parasitosis and the fact that he killed his crush Boa and felt extreme guilt makes the entire courtroom empathic to his downfall. Well, almost everyone.
  • To an extent, even Ai Senzaki is susceptible to this trope. Though she wasn't the most pleasant person to many of the other inmates, she still befriended (and even fell in love with) some of them, and her Xanatos Gambit was basically to get out either by surviving the trial or death. Post-mortem, she states that she didn't think she was worthy of getting out anyway and thinks the survivors are more fit to move on.
  • Chapter 4's Nabiki Kaname is this trope as well. Unlike the previous culprits, she really had no reason or rhyme to kill. All she did was try to get Jinta Katsuragi to confess to her if he was involved with locking them all up in the prison, based off of that picture Junpei found way back in the beginning of the chapter. The only real suspicious thing she did to him was pull a prank on him- pour turmeric on him and act like she was going to light him on fire if he didn't confess- but even that didn't work, and she ended up killing him on accident by throwing a bottle at his head.
• Talking the Monster to Death: An extended one to Etsuko Reiki after figuring out how and why they were sent to prison in the first place.
• Tap on the Head: The Chapter 3 trial shows that Oten and Etsuko both suffered from this. Junpei, on his part, ended up knocking out Oten with a baseball bat after getting some misinformation.
• That Came Out Wrong: During Chapter 5's scavenger hunt, the remaining inmates are given a clue involving "laying down", and one of them naturally assumes it relates to a bed. Kaori inquires that one could do "a lot on a bed of you try hard enough" in all innocence.
• The End... Or Is It?: Hit almost immediately with this after the final trial, setting up the Sequel Hook for Reloaded.
• Wham Episode: Chapter 4. After the Chapter 3 trial, Monobear unlocks a watchtower for the inmates to use, which reveals that the prison is encased in a barrier, and the rest of the surrounding area is barren and destroyed.
  • Later on, while looking around the warden's office with Junpei, Misaki discovers a photo of Jinta, Boa and herself standing around in Hope's Peak. The document with the photo also announces the admittance of fifteen students into the school... after they decided to re-open in the wake of the Despairing Incident. A little afterwards, all of the Alter Egos are shut down by a mysterious force.
  • Chapter 5 is just full of these. After Monobear unlocks the rest of the prison for the inmates, he them tells them to go on a clue gathering hunt, revealing much about their situation in the process. At first they find a notebook that belonged to the now deceased Banri Bunko, and discovering that they all had known each other at some point. They then come across documents about the Future Foundation, and discover that they've all been taken to Novoselic.
  • The final trial reveals that everyone save Etsuko was a part of the SHSL Despair group, and that they had all their memories taken away from the past three years as part of the rehabilitation process. After a time the Foundation found that the inmates were starting to relapse into their old ways and considered them "At-Risk". Etsuko, a member of the Foundation, wanted to prove that at least some of them could be redeemed, but her idea was to weed out the troublemakers—and thus, a new Despair game was born.
• Wham Line:
  Monobear: Would you believe it? We've removed three years worth of memory!

Reloaded

• A Death in the Limelight: Tetsuo had a surprising amount of focus and interactions in Chapter 2 before he was murdered.
• Apologetic Attacker: During the Mastermind's execution, in stark contrast to the other Monobears running around, one wearing a white habit took them by the hand and recited a prayer before injecting them.
• Beach Episode: Monobear unlocks an indoor beach in the beginning of Chapter 2. Of course, some of the inmates get to check it out before the motive gets out.
• Big Damn Heroes: Invoked during Aiko's execution. A group of pink and white Monobears dressed as sukebans protect her from police-Monobears, and try to fend them off while she makes her escape...only for them to turn on her the instant they hear about a "reward" for capturing her.
• Bilingual Bonus: If one wanders into Kyo's room, they'd be able to find one letter among millions that is able to be read. It's left untranslated though.^note It reads: "Otonomiya-sama~You're my prince! Kyaa! I can't believe I just said that! I love you<3" -Miyamoto Umeko
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: As with the previous session, each of the characters' icons are set against a solid background colour. The colour coding is as follows:
  • Antoinette: Lavender Pink
  • Sumiko: Hot Pink
  • Kiyoyuki: China Pink
  • Eiji: Periwinkle
  • Kemono: Greyish Purple
  • Miya: Yellow
  • Kaitaro: Powder Blue
  • The Gingerbread Man: Lime
  • Harper: Orange
  • Terumi: Olive
  • Aiko: Mint
  • Kyo: Gold
  • Akihito: Red
  • Jiang-li: Mocha
  • Tetsuo: Grey
  • Nana: Salmon
• Darker and Edgier: Between the deadlier executions, the traps, and Monobear's sadism increase, this game is already bleaker than the other one.
• Distracted by the Sexy: Kiyoyuki tries so hard not to look into Nana's bust after she asks him to sign her bra. Poor boy was having a minor meltdown internally.
• Faking the Dead: Sumiko Ikuhara, the second victim all the way back in Chapter 3, turns out to have done this as the Mastermind of this session. Aiko was her accomplice in that endeavor.
• Foregone Conclusion: The fact that the inmates hear Kaori and Misaki during their Chapter 4 means that they're going to have to go through a couple of more hardships before either group is set free from the prison.
• Foreshadowing:
  • When Kiyoyuki is monologuing to himself about his mannerisms, the narration reads: "Wait, he was a teenager too, right? He hadn’t just aged up to being twenty without realising it, had he? Or was he younger?" Late game revelations show that this is indeed the case.
  • Chapter 3's picture of the dead showed Kaitaro looking away while Sumiko looks directly at the viewer. It turns out Sumiko's death was faked, and she's very much alive by the last Chapter.
  • Reading up on Jiang-li's Relationships page after her execution, she has final words for everyone except herself and Sumiko. For her, it would be understandable, but for Sumiko? An error message pops up and says "ACCESS DENIED".
  • The inmates' personalities and occupations are, for the most part, nurturing and very protective. That's the perfect mindset to have if they ever were in charge of rehabilitation.
• Giant Spider: Monobear dresses up as one for Jang-li's execution, complete with hair webs!
• History Repeats: Mastermind fakes their death long before the endgame? Now why does that sound familiar?
• Hope Spot: After Ihara presents the surviving inmates with the ultimatum of letting her live for the antidote or killing her, Usami suddenly presents the inmates with information concerning the antidote's location. Ihara promptly blows up Usami before she can say anything, but the possibility still holds for the survivors to find the antidote's location in the ruins of the world without guidance, if they can even manage that.
• Important Haircut: After Tetsuo Shingen's death in Chapter 2, Irino cuts his long, black hair short to symbolize his desire to stop relying on others.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Due to the inactivity of the roleplay in June through August, Chapter 4 and its Investigation period had taken up two months. In universe, it's only been a day or so. When the investigation period finally ends, the narration reads "The investigation felt like it had taken weeks, but when the familiar chime of the trial announcement rang through the facility, the students wished that it actually had".
• Loophole Abuse: The rules strictly say that no one character can have the same talent as another from a previous session. Antoinette, however, could pass through and join the roster because the previous Nun was a fake.
• Love Triangle: One between Nana, Kyo, and Tetsuo. Kyo very much likes Nana, but she doesn't feel the same way and likes Tetsuo instead. It doesn't help that Nana and Tetsuo have a bit of "history" together and display some Unresolved Sexual Tension towards each other at times. This particular triangle ends tragically though, since both Kyo and Tetsuo die before Nana could get with one or the other.
• The Mole: Suspected, but then later on confirmed in Chapter 3 when it was revealed that Aiko had been working with the Mastermind the entire time, and had pressed the button that started the whole killing game in the first place.
  • Sumiko notes that the gang had two: Aiko, as previously mentioned, and Etsuko, as they were all Future Foundation members trying to treat the "At-Risk" Remnants of Despair from the first game.
• Morton's Fork: Antoinette's execution, "Worship-Wrecked", has one. At in the beginning of it, she would have had a painful death by asphyxiation if she didn't try kicking at the casket top. But her execution involves a traditional St. Olaf funeral, which includes sending her out to sea; all her kicking did was make enough cracks in the casket to allow for water to get into it, sentencing her to death by asphyxiation anyway.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Monobear of all people decides to do this when Kyo lunges at him and prepares to fight him. Instead, Monobear brings in more and more of his spare robots in order to overwhelm Kyo, and they reduce him to a bloody pulp on the ground.
• Previous Player-Character Cameo: Kaori, Miwa, and Junpei show up after the last trial in order to get the inmates. Misaki makes a small vocal appearance during Chapter 4.
• "Ray of Hope" Ending: Humanity's been diagnosed with Despair Disease, and the inmates have been slowly taking it in throughout the whole game. Following their release, they're going to go into that world without a cure, or even a location, because both have been left up in the air by Ihara following her death. But that doesn't mean that it's not gone entirely, and they now have the first session's survivors to help them look and survive.
• Shout-Out:
  • It's not all that hard to find out what Eternal Fantasia is supposed to be a stand-in for.
  • The narration for Tetsuo running off after his initial meeting with Kiyoyuki reads "See you space cowboy".
  • Eiji's Body Discovery is given the title "Spirited Away".
  • Ozu refers to Antoinette's ability to speak with animals as a "Doctor Dolittle routine".
  • Ito's execution is described as taking place on a shooting range, but the scenery is static and pixellated ala Duck Hunt.
  • The title for Tetsuo's Body Discovery is the delightfully punny "But I Didn't Shoot the Deputy".
  • During the second execution, the murderer is put in a glass casket filled with beautiful flowers, and left in the middle of a forest, echoing a similar setup in Snow White.
• Show Within a Show: Everything that the inmates know Kiyoyuki from (and that's a lot of shows), mentioned by virtue of him being a SHSL Seiyuu.
• Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism: As the last chapter rolls around, the group has experienced the death of their moral compass, discovered a traitor among their ranks, found out that the cast of First Session is experiencing the same hell they are at the present time, and recently found out that Ihara faked her own death and helped spread Despair Disease around Japan, and that by killing her, the coordinates to location of the antidote dies with her. Despite this the characters find some strength in themselves to pull through and win against despair, even saying that they can find the location if they can try hard enough.
• This Is Reality: Monobear responds like this after Kiyoyuki likens the first trial to a twisted gameshow (Oddly, Terumi doesn't make the same comment).
• Trap Door: The second motive had everyone spin a wheel in order to get the chance to either find out someone's secret or "leave" the prison. As Terumi later found out, the "Leave" option led to a spiked pit. She only survives due to sheer luck.
• Underwater Base: Monobear shows the students that they're in one of these this turn around, and the walls are almost constantly portrayed as having aquatic life in them.
• invokedUnexpected Character: The survivors of the first session's cast, given that the idea that they were all suffering the same game as their Reloaded counterparts at the same time was pretty farfetched.
• The Virus: Despair Disease, actually. the world outside is still currently suffering from it, and Parasol Pharmaceuticals (which Ihara is a part of) was looking into an antidote for it. This is also the cause of the inmates' actions in this session, as Ihara made sure that the air they're breathing in the base had some DD particles dispersed throughout. In the end, the secret to the location of the antidote is destroyed along with Ihara and Monomi.
• Wham Episode:
  • Tetsuo Shingen's death in Chapter 2. It's a given that authority figures don't quite live long in this type of game, but most of the long-term players of the game found themselves affected for better or for worse by the victim's death.
  • In Chapter 4, Mike and Miya start wandering around the furthest section of the base. They start hearing sounds near a door marked "prohibited", which they then become suspicious towards. Upon closer inspection, they notice that an argument is going on on the other side of the door. Specifically, the argument Misaki Asaihara and Kaori Natsume of the first RP have in their Chapter 4. One that takes place in the watchtower. That's right: two Killing Games are happening at the exact same time.
  • The Chapter 5 trial revealed that Sumiko was still alive.
• Wham Line: "JUST LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE, MISAKI!"
  Kaori Natsume, one of the survivors of the first Prison Life of Mutual Killing
• Withholding the Cure: Chapter 3 presented the kids with a strange illness floating around the prison. Monobear would only give them the antidote if they either killed someone or found the antidotes hidden within the prison.
• You Said You Would Let Them Go: The Mole ended up conspiring with Monobear and the Mastermind for this reason, except they were barganing for their own freedom. However, Monobear claims to have nothing to do with it, and drags them off to their execution.

Rewind

• City of Adventure: The new location, it seems. This time around, the areas are blocked off by sections spread around the place, instead of locked by floor.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: As with the past 2 games, the characters' icons are set against differently colored backgrounds.
  • Kohaku: Desaturated Pink
  • Nobu: Light Tan
  • Yuuna: Dark Blue-Gray
  • Blackfin: Forest Green
  • Bunji: Bright Red
  • Kayo: Light Violet
  • Kaneto: Dark Blue
  • Ururu: Soft Orange
  • Minako: Mint Green
  • Tatsuya: Dusty Rose
  • Misaki: Pastel Pink
  • Tsukasa: Grayish Blue
  • Kazuma: Purple
  • Mina: Dark Cyan
  • Nagisa: Desaturated Red
  • Gyo: Light Green
• Uncancelled: By invokedWord of God, the roleplay group was supposed to end with Reloaded out of a lack of interest for continuing it. They started up again with Rewind, but swiftly turned itself into an Orphaned Series by the time Chapter 1 ended, halting just as Chapter 2 reveals its new areas to explore.