At first, I resented Shuichi a little for taking the position of protagonist from Kaede, who I liked a lot. My exact words, I believe, were 'are you seriously going to make me play as boring Shuichi?'

(I love that Shuichi was wearing a hat so we wouldn't see his ahoge and realise he was the real protagonist. Absolutely incredible.)

I ended up warming up a lot to Shuichi, though! Continuing my trend of getting very attached to Danganronpa protagonists, he's my favourite character in V3. Smart and analytical, anxious and insecure, cautious, reserved without being cold. It's good to see how his determination builds over the course of the game.

I also like how strongly Shuichi ends up bonding with some of his fellow captives. It's pretty cute that he's always sticking close to Kaede at the start; he's nervous, and she's the only person here he feels halfway comfortable around.

The fact that Shuichi forms strong friendships among the cast allows for some interesting emotional moments. Makoto and Hajime react more strongly to some deaths than others (Hajime in particular has an extremely rough time in chapter five), but I think Shuichi's absolute devastation at the prospect of Kaito's death might be the strongest protagonist reaction we see in the series. When he discovers what appears to be Kaito's body in the hydraulic press, the poor kid can barely process it.

Shuichi is very recognisably from the same mould as other Danganronpa protagonists, but he has enough distinguishing features to set him apart, rather than feeling like a carbon copy of his predecessors. The Danganronpa series in general is very good at this; Makoto, Hajime, Kaede and Shuichi share common features that help them work well as the protagonist, but each one is recognisably their own character.

As a final note, I really enjoy the bit where Miu goes 'let's make the masochist go and get the sign' and Shuichi asks 'wait, who's the masochist?' and everyone else goes 'Shuichi, you're the masochist.' They're not wrong!