In the official English localisation of Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc, a few of the characters go by nicknames. I like 'Hina' for Asahina; it's cute, and she's very casual and friendly, so it makes sense that she'd immediately invite everyone to call her by a nickname. 'Hiro' for Yasuhiro makes perfect sense as well; he's definitely the sort of person who'd go by a shortening of his name.

I don't think 'Taka' quite works for Kiyotaka.

This is for a couple of reasons. Firstly: I cannot imagine formal, traditional, takes-himself-incredibly-seriously, rule-obsessed Kiyotaka ever going in for name-shortening. Secondly: you don't tend to get a nickname like that unless you have friends. Canonically, Kiyotaka has never had friends. (Sorry, Kiyotaka.)

I'll still call him Taka on this website, for the sake of being understood, because that's what he's called in the game! But I'm going to pretend it's a nickname Mondo gave him, rather than the name Taka used to introduce himself.

That would be really cute, actually. NISA, if you're listening, you should do a rerelease of Trigger Happy Havoc in which everything else is the same, but Mondo is the one who gives Taka his nickname after they bond.

I'm very fond of Taka; he's such a good kid. Absolutely tactless, but he's so passionate and genuine in his desire to prevent murders. His 'let's build bonds with each other by eating together every morning' idea was an excellent one, and his suggestion to reveal all their secrets to each other really could have prevented the second murder if people had gone along with it.

back