How An NFL Joke Slips Into A Japanese Game

Danganronpa V3, like previous entries in the excellent humour-horror series, is full of pop culture references. But how did an NFL joke get stuck in there?

As a longtime New York Jets fan who has nothing but bile for the New England Patriots, I very much enjoyed seeing the above line, a non sequitur delivered by one of the game’s irritatingly charming Monokubs. Clearly GOTY material. It made me wonder, though — did the Japanese writers of Danganronpa V3 really intend to make a joke about American football? I reached out to publisher NIS America for an answer.

The original line, according to a NIS America representative, was:

湿っぽい事言わんとタイガースの応援や！

巨人を駆逐や！　駆逐したるで！

Their direct translation for that is:

Stop being so gloomy and cheer on the Tigers!

Destroy the Giants! We’re going to destroy them!

That’s a reference to the Japanese baseball team the Hanshin Tigers and their biggest rivals, the Yomiuri Giants. In Japan, those two teams have a huge rivalry, but the reference wouldn’t make sense to most English readers. (Danganronpa V3, like its predecessors, does dig into Japan and Japanese culture, but this reference would have likely been too left-field.)

Monosuke, the bear in question, has a heavy Brooklyn accent, so the Danganronpa V3 localisation team decided to replace the Tigers and Giants with an US east coast equivalent. “They were trying to decide what east coast sports teams would make sense to use,” said a NISA representative. “Then our editor decided on the Pats and Jets.”

And that’s how an NFL joke makes its way into a Japanese game.