My quick thoughts midway through case 4
Danganronpa 1
Pros
Fantastic ost
Great premise and set up/motivation
Clever major twist (mastermind)
Cons
Braindead cases (guessed the killer and how they did it almost instantly)
Bad gameplay in the court cases between terrible mini games and drunk controls for "difficulty"
Garbage explaintion/twist for why this is happening
Main cast is weak and not well developed for me to care when they start offing each other
So far in danganronpa 2
Pros
The first two cases are better mysteries then any of the cases in dangan 1
Neutral
The cast as a collective is stronger, but the duds are much bigger issues this time around
The pet minigame justifies all the walking around instead of quick travel, but you have to check every 5 minutes for poop
Streamlined freetime system so the longer survivors don't need like 9 visits to complete and earlier deaths don't cap at 3, but because everyone has a flat 5 some feel like they end when they're just starting
Negative
Music isn't as good
Core gameplay is still terrible and somehow worse
Bad pacing
Case 3 and so far case 4 are back to predictable and uninteresting (in the middle of case 4 so subject to change)
The background plot of the truth of whats happening is still awful accented by the character who constantly brings it up
Overall I want to like the danganronpa games more then I do, I love murder mystery games and point and click adventure games, as yall know I'm also a big anime fan. But when all the elements are combined in these everything we can to make you like us approach the end result is a frustrating, boring, and unrewarding experience. The series has so many baffling design choices that it hurts my mind why so many of them are called defining features.