The Illusion of Choice in Doki Doki Literature Club

Preface: If you have not yet played Doki Doki Literature Club, I would strongly recommend that you do so. My essay will go into great detail and will spoil the whole game. It is an excellent, free game which can be found on Steam. If you do decide to play it, I would definitely do so without doing any research on it whatsoever, as it is a game which must be experienced by yourself.

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Doki Doki Literature Club is a visual novel game, released in 2017. It follows the eponymous literature club at a high school. The player plays as a player-named character, henceforth referred to as ‘MC’, who is convinced to join the literature club by his childhood friend Sayori. There, he meets the distant tsundere, Natsuki, the shy, nerdy Yuri, and the club’s president, the smart, athletic, popular Monika. It purports to be a typical visual novel, specifically a dating sim. However, it falls into the category of psychological horror, and explores topics such as depression, self-harm, malnutrition, implied child neglect, suicide, and obsession. In this essay, I am going to discuss what I believe to be the major underlying theme of the game, which is the illusion of choice.

As I previously stated, the game begins as a standard visual novel. We start by being introduced to MC and his childhood friend, Sayori. We are introduced to their relationship, with MC describing her as ‘the kind of friend you’d never see yourself making today’. In this scene, MC appears embarrassed by her, and she is shown to be upbeat, cheerful and happy-go-lucky. It is also mentioned that MC has not yet joined an after-school club, which he then promises to do so.

We then see him introduced to the Literature Club, and it is mentioned that both Yuri and Natsuki have been writing poems in their spare time. The club, which MC is now a member of, decides to write poems that night and share them with each other the next day.

Here is where the first element of ‘choice’ comes in. The player is given ten words to choose from, and the stickers of the three ‘available’ girls, Sayori, Natsuki, and Yuri, are on the right. Each girl has a list of words that they prefer, and the poem is written for the girl whose preferred words were chosen the most. As is usual in dating sims, the player chooses the girl whose route they wish to go down, and so chooses words they think that girl will like. However, as we will see later, whoever’s route the player goes down has no bearing on the outcome of events.

The next day comes, and, depending on who the player wrote the poem for the previous night, they will get one of three scenes, in which MC bonds with one of the girls. Then, the club shares the poems, which goes well until Yuri and Natsuki get into an argument over whose writing style is better. The player is given three choices: side with Yuri, side with Natsuki, or ask Sayori for help. No matter what the player chooses, the conflict is resolved, and everyone heads home to write another poem, using the same rules as above.

The next day is similar in structure to the last: the player gets one of three scenes, where MC bonds with a girl. Then, poems are shared. Monika mentions that the club will be taking part in a festival at the weekend.

The poem game happens as normal, and the next day begins. Today, however, something is different: Sayori keeps ‘zoning out’, and seems quieter than usual. Monika tells MC not to worry, and talks to Sayori. While this is happening, another scene plays out with the girl who has the highest ‘affection’, not including Sayori. Then, poems are shared. At the end of the session, the player chooses which one of the girls they would like to help out with the festival. However, although all four girls are given as options, choosing to help Monika or Sayori will elicit a negative response, and so the only real choice is between Natsuki and Yuri, perfectly displaying the theme of the illusion of choice in this game. Everyone goes home, but there is no poem minigame that night.

The next morning, MC wakes up, excited for the day he will spend with the girl of his choice. He does, however, decide to visit Sayori first, in order to see how she felt after the previous day.

It is there where we get our first genre subversion; Sayori, the cheerful, happy-go-lucky girl, reveals that she has had severe depression for most of her life. MC offers to cancel his day with the girl of the player’s choice in order to spend it with Sayori, but she refuses vehemently. And so MC returns to his house, in anticipation of the coming girl.

After a day well spent, with some romantic moments, MC and the other girl exit his house and, just as they are about to kiss, are discovered by Sayori. The other girl quickly leaves, leaving you alone with Sayori. She confesses her love for you, and the player is given a choice between ‘I love you’ and ‘You’ll always be my dearest friend’. This choice may seem important but, like all other choices here, it is ultimately meaningless.

The day of the festival comes, and MC heads over to school. Only Monika is there and, after a quick conversation, MC heads to Sayori’s house. There he finds that she hung herself, no matter what the player’s choices were leading up to that point. No matter if they told her they loved her, or if they went her route, she will still hang herself.

This is one of the starkest examples of the illusion of choice in DDLC. It may be a shocking moment, but that is the beauty of it. Without true, meaningful choice, we become helpless to stop events from happening.

In any case, this is not meant to happen in the ‘actual game’, and so the game ‘crashes’, before restarting to the home screen again. All the player’s previous save files are deleted, and so the only option is to start a new game. The game attempts to continue as usual, but wherever Sayori would be present, the game cannot function. So, instead, the game continues without Sayori, with MC mentioning that he has always walked to school by himself, and the introduction to the literature club instead being given by Monika.

The game otherwise appears to continue as normal. There are, however, a number of glitches that can happen. The poem minigame appears to remain largely the same, although Sayori is removed and all her words are assigned to either Natsuki or Yuri. The player is able to write two poems to either girl, one per night as before. If the player writes them both to Natsuki, they get a special ‘ending’. However, for the other poems written, the game will act as if they were written for Yuri, regardless of the player’s actual choice. Yet another example of the illusion of choice in this game.

The game otherwise remains unchanged, with many repeated scenes. However, during Yuri and Natsuki’s argument, when given the choice to choose between the girls, no matter which button is clicked, the screen will zoom into Natsuki’s button. After clicking nine times, Monika’s face will pop up in front of the buttons, and she will take MC outside of the classroom. Again, this quite clearly shows that the player’s choices do not matter, as Monika will still take MC outside, no matter what button the player clicks. Natsuki comes running out of the classroom, and Yuri is apologetic, although it is never stated exactly what she said to cause such a reaction. The day abruptly ends without its usual transition.

Skipping through to the next major ‘choice’, it is noted that Yuri appears to be getting more and more possessive and unstable, especially by Natsuki. What is also interesting to note is that MC starts having less and less dialogue and, at the point I am about to discuss, has no dialogue whatsoever. I shall expand upon this further later.

The next major choice should feel very familiar to the player: Yuri confesses her love, and the player is presented with two options: ‘Yes’ and ‘No’. As should be expected by now, neither option truly matters: Yuri will begin to laugh maniacally, and will pull out a knife and stab herself, twice in the stomach, and once in the chest.

The player is left in the clubroom with Yuri’s decomposing corpse for the weekend, until Natsuki walks in, vomits and runs out. Then, Monika walks in and reveals that she is responsible for everything. It turns out that she is self-aware, and knows that she is in a game. She then reveals that the base game did not give her a route, and so instead she decided to manipulate the game into being the most desirable girl. She tells the player how she deleted Sayori’s character file, and then proceeds to do the same to Natsuki and Yuri. The player is then taken to a different classroom, one that appears to be floating in space, with Monika facing across the table from them, staring into each other's eyes.

As I have previously stated, MC has no dialogue from this point, almost to the end of the game. This is interesting to note, especially when taken into consideration with the fact that the game is meant to be a parody of traditional visual novel tropes. In a traditional visual novel, the player chooses which character to go after romantically, and the character has no choice in the matter. In DDLC, however, the player is presented with a façade of choice, making them think that they choose which girl they romance. In actuality, the player plays the romanced, helpless to stop while a character relentlessly chases after them. Again, reflecting the illusion of choice in this game.

Monika then talks without end on a range of topics, and here is where there is a sort of choice: the player can either choose to sit there and listen to her rambling for eternity, or they can delete her character file, just like she did with the other girls. Not a true choice by any stretch of the imagination, but some of the best the player can get in this game. However, considering that, in order to ‘complete’ the game, the player must delete her, it falls short of being an actual choice.

Once the player deletes her, Monika is, at first, angry, but then realises what she has done, and resigns herself to this fate. The game restarts once more, and all appears to be well: Monika is no more, and Sayori is now the president of the literature club. The first day continues as normal, without Monika, until the end of the day, when Sayori reveals that she has actually become self-aware, most likely from being the president, and knows what Monika did. She tries to do the same, but it stopped by what remains of Monika. The credits roll, and Monika deletes the club, saying that no happiness can come from it.

But this is not the end, for there is one choice that does have an impact: should the player decide to use saves to get every scene for every girl, once Monika is deleted, instead of repeating the past, Sayori thanks the player for trying to spend as much time as possible with every girl and, once the credits roll, the player gets a note from the creator of the game, Dan Salvato, also thanking them for playing.