[In a continuing series of game narrative reviews, Jaddua Ross, a student at The Guildhall at SMU, picks apart the silly, convoluted, and occasionally ludicrous story of Nippon Ichi's Disgaea 3.]

Overview

This story, like the others in the Disgaea series, takes place in the Netherworld, a place run by demons and ruled by an Overlord. This installment, however, revolves around the Netherworld Evil Academy, a school for demons that turns the human scholastic system upside down. Honor students never attend class or complete homework, only delinquents do.

Within this setting, the "hero" of the game, Mao, the number one honor student, sets out to take revenge on his father, the Overlord, for stepping on Mao's video game console and destroying 20,000 hours of work in saved games. While reading his manga, he decides he must become a hero to defeat his father. So he decides to capture a hero and study him. His childhood friend, Raspberyl, the number one delinquent, learns of his plan and fears she may lose her standing as number one delinquent, so tries to dissuade him.

A convoluted plot follows that includes exploring the depth of Mao's subconscious, and a surprise betrayal by his trusted butler, Geoffrey, who turns out to be a Super Hero. Ultimately, because of the friends he made, Mao does not release the evil inside him, which would completely destroy his personality and make him an ultimate evil. He defeats the Super Hero, taking his father's place as Overlord.

Characters

Mao

The main character, evil genius, number one honor student, and son of the Overlord, Mao has a 1,800,000 EQ (Evility Quotient). Mao has a nerdy, mad scientist flavor, and is utterly ruthless in pursuit of his goals. He reluctantly accepts the friendship of the characters in his party, but rationalizes why he keeps them around, making them underlings or taking them prisoner. Early in the story revenge drives him, but he discovers his own culpability in the death of his father, and guilt drives him for a time. Finally, on discovering the betrayal at Geoffrey's hands, revenge drives him again, but the words of his friends keep him from releasing the ultimate evil.

Raspberyl

Number One delinquent and childhood friend of Mao; she prides herself on her scholastic ability and constantly pursues perfection, although perversely as in this world standards are reversed. Although she appears kind and compassionate, there is a note of insincerity, as she dons kindness and compassion only for the sake of becoming the Legendary Delinquent, rather than from any actual empathy.

Almaz

A wannabe hero on a quest to defeat the overlord. He has a crush on the Princess Sapphire from when he served as a palace guard. Out of his league in the underworld, Mao defeats him early on and steals his hero title, giving him a demon title instead. Almaz slowly begins to turn into an actual demon, and Mao forces Almaz to become his servant, which Almaz does in hopes that Mao will return the title before he turns fully into a demon.

Sapphire

A princess from the human world. After watching hundreds of heroes die to protect her, she vowed to become so tough that nobody will have to die for her again. She lost the ability to cry, presumably from some trauma in her youth. The fact that she was not able to cry at the death of her mother tortures her. Although quite feminine, demonstrated by her inability to resist anything cute, she is also a cold, bloodthirsty killing machine.

Geoffrey/Aurum

At the beginning of the game, Geoffrey appears to be Mao's loyal butler. As the game progresses, however, his behavior becomes more and more suspect. Toward the end of the game, he reveals he is actually the Super Hero Aurum in disguise, who defeated the Overlord 200 years ago and has been training Mao ever since to be the ultimate Overlord, so that Aurum could finally be defeated and rest. He further reveals that he orchestrated most of the events in the main story.