According to producer Shohei Sakakibara in an interview with Famitsu, the team had originally considered a remake or reboot of the first game, Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc. They had planned to change the story without changing the world or characters, but realized that because the plot of the first game was the "root" of all the future games, changing it would have too great of an impact on the series as a whole. As a result, they decided to remake the second game instead, as it allowed them to create a new Danganronpa game without "destroying the game world".