The Tragic Reality of Sayori’s Character: Why Did She Hang Herself?
Sayori’s poems chronicle a person trying to maintain a brave face whilst falling into despair. I became increasingly unsettled as the bright visuals and cheery music contradicted the often dark subject matters. However, Sayori’s poems began to affect me most because I recognised the behaviour: I had been that person, wanting to pretend everything was okay whilst inside I vacillated between numbness and the deepest despair.
Finally, in one scene, Sayori confessed that she was experiencing depression. Didn’t I, the player, realise that was the reason she was never on time? It was because the weight of her depression meant she had difficulty getting herself out of bed in the morning. Shortly afterwards, there is a moment where Sayori confesses her love to the player, but tells them that she doesn’t deserve love, that she, who is so worthless, should only exist to make others happy because that was all she was good for.
Sayori hangs herself motivated by her depression, and the game has an exceptionally advanced view of the condition. With the general comprehension being that depression is a form of sadness, Sayori is the last character we might expect to have it: she is bubbly and positive, ready to leap out of her seat to cheer her friends on at a moment’s notice. However, some sufferers of depression use such unrelenting positivity as a way to try and escape the debilitating negativity of their illness or because they feel like a burden and don’t want to concern others with their negativity. Both are the case for Sayori.
The suicide also suggests that you can’t just cheer a person out of their depression as conventional wisdom suggests you can. Once you’re aware of Sayori’s depression, it becomes hard to enjoy her sparkly demeanour in the same way. That is not to say that she or any real people with depression are less likeable than neurotypical people, but dating sims usually design the personalities of characters to an attractive ideal.
In DDLC, the heart-to-heart between Sayori and the protagonist is when she opens up about her depression to him, and at that point, the protagonist and possibly audience may expect the plot to utilise those standard romance story tropes. However, it does not and urges you to think about how the expectation for it to do so is unrealistic.
Unfortunately, there is no way to stop Sayori’s suicide. It happens no matter what you do or choose. The game prevents you from ‘saving’ Sayori, no matter what dialogue option you pick with her, and this gets it out of multiple jams. Her death needs to be inescapable because the game needs to turn over its ‘horror’ card and you not being able to prevent her suicide makes the horrific force feel insurmountable.
Sayori was hanging from the ceiling, dead, her eyes staring blankly at nothing. The screen glitched, the music warped, and the player character began to ramble in shock, asking with increasing panic what was going on. I began to feel the edges of a panic attack creeping into my mind. I grounded myself, breathing in and out deeply until my vision focused again. Then I uninstalled the game faster than I had ever done anything in my life.
Witnessing Sayori’s spiraling behaviour allowed me to do something for the first time in my life: accept that what had happened to me was not my fault. I have talked about my depression and anxiety with others before, but I’ve never truly felt I was ‘entitled’ to feel that way. Seeing Sayori harshly judge herself, denigrating her very existence, made me realise I had been punishing myself for a long time.
Sayori’s depressive thoughts are built on the idea that “the world is punishing [her] for being selfish.” She believes that because she is selfish, the world punished her by giving her all these sad and depressive thoughts and feelings, which makes it hard for her to cope with life.
Exploring Sayori’s Depression: Signs and Symptoms Revealed
Sayori’s struggle with depression is one of the most poignant elements of the game. Her behavior aligns closely with the symptoms of Major Depressive Disorder as outlined in the DSM-5: persistent sadness, feelings of worthlessness, and a loss of interest in previously enjoyed activities. As the player progresses through the game, they discover that Sayori suffers from depression, exhibiting symptoms like forced positivity, overeating, oversleeping, forgetfulness, difficulty getting out of bed, and suicidal thoughts.
Despite her lighthearted façade, it is later revealed that she is a tragic individual who suffers from chronic depression. Sayori’s depressive thoughts are built on the idea that the world is punishing her for being selfish. She believes that because she is selfish, the world punished her by giving her all these sad and depressive thoughts and feelings, which makes it hard for her to cope with life.
Psychologically, Sayori embodies the concept of smiling depression, where individuals mask their struggles to avoid burdening others. Her desire to protect the protagonist from her darkness ultimately leads to her tragic decision to end her life. Furthermore, Sayori’s depression makes her disorganized, and she often cannot find a circumstantial reason to get out of bed in the morning when she tries to awaken herself. The things that make Sayori seem klutzy, sloppy, and lazy are all actually serious symptoms of chronic depression, including low appetite, hypersomnia (excessive sleeping), and restlessness.
Each character in DDLC represents a different facet of human psychology and serves as a vehicle for exploring larger themes. Sayori embodies the hidden struggles of mental illness, Yuri illustrates the dangers of unchecked obsession, Natsuki reflects the resilience of the human spirit in adversity, and Monika symbolizes the existential yearning for agency and meaning.
Thus, Sayori’s arc illustrates the importance of addressing mental health openly, as her tragedy arises from the stigma and silence surrounding her condition.
The Role of Monika: Did She Influence Sayori’s Suicide?
Sayori’s poem ‘Bottles’ highlights her struggle with depression. It illustrates how she feels the need to collect ‘happy thoughts’ for her friends while being unable to express her own sadness. This poem reflects how Sayori’s friends expect her to always be happy, leading to a deepened sense of isolation and despair.
Additionally, the poem ‘%’, which appears before Sayori’s tragic fate, demonstrates her growing awareness of Monika’s influence on her emotions. The repeated line ‘Get out of my head’ indicates Sayori’s internal battle against the manipulative presence of Monika. This suggests that Monika’s actions contribute significantly to her despair and eventual suicide.
Natsuki’s message regarding Yuri’s behavior reveals her concern and acknowledges the troubling influence Monika has. Natsuki notes that Monika has been ‘really dismissive about this,’ indicating that Monika’s control over the situation is impacting the dynamics between the characters. This further complicates Sayori’s emotional struggles.
Moreover, it is clearly a reference to Monika’s meddling in Sayori’s emotions to make her more depressed. Sayori seems to have become somewhat aware of Monika’s presence. Monika herself explains that Sayori’s hands are bloody because, due to her using a chair, she lacked the gravity to have her neck snap.
Sayori chose to hang herself because most visual novels don’t deal with such themes. In a story sense, since DDLC is a romance-based game, it wouldn’t be able to handle Sayori’s suicide. Monika eventually deletes Yuri and Natsuki, revealing her obsessive love for the player as opposed to the character they controlled. She also reveals that she went into the game’s code to modify the parameters of the characters, causing Sayori’s depression trait to increase.
Ultimately, Sayori was driven to suicide because Monika tampered with her depression. If this manipulation hadn’t occurred, Sayori’s fate would probably have been different. Thus, Monika is certainly the core cause of Sayori’s suicide, while the events of the game and the protagonist act as assisting factors.
Understanding the Impact of Sayori’s Death on the Game’s Narrative
Sayori’s death significantly impacts the game’s narrative in multiple ways:
- Initially, Sayori had been deceiving the player throughout the story. In order for this deception to be effective, she needed Monika to be removed from the game.
- This is evidenced by the fact that, after the player deletes Monika in Act 3, Sayori inherits her role as president.
- To further complicate the narrative, Sayori utilizes Yuri as a vessel. After her death, she transfers her essence to Yuri’s body, allowing her to continue to appear and influence the game world.
- Feeling remorse for her actions, Monika uses her remaining presidential power to restart the game in Act 4, effectively removing herself from the narrative.
- This strategic move enables Sayori to seize the opportunity and claim what she has been striving for all along.
- Moreover, Sayori’s decision to hang herself is a stark reflection of the game’s unique approach; most visual novels shy away from such grim themes.
- Given that DDLC is a romance-centered game, it struggles to address the weight of Sayori’s suicide effectively. Monika’s inability to rectify the situation leads to Sayori inheriting the role, marking the conclusion of Act 1.
- As players navigate through the game, they come to realize Sayori’s struggle with depression. Symptoms include forced positivity, overeating, oversleeping, forgetfulness, difficulty getting out of bed, and suicidal ideation.
- This unsettling awareness begins to surface several days prior to her suicide.
- Ultimately, Sayori’s death initiates a cascade of events that alters the game’s trajectory, transforming it from a light-hearted story into one with a bleak and shocking conclusion, particularly highlighted by her tragic end.
Sayori’s Internal Struggle: Was Her Cheerfulness Just a Facade?
Sayori suffers from depression. She clearly states this herself when you confront her in her room. There’s a very good reason why the portrayal in this game was lauded as one of the most accurate portrayals in video games. According to an article I found on medicalnewstoday.com, depression can be seen with the following symptoms:
- Depressed Mood: In the 3rd segment of the first act, Sayori enters the classroom, not with her usual infectious, joyous self, but as a very sad girl, downcast and quiet. She refuses to discuss the problem and ultimately decides against showing a poem or reading anybody else’s work, opting to go home early instead.
- Reduced Interest or Pleasure: Sayori tells us herself in her monologue that oftentimes she asks herself why she bothers eating and waking up in the morning.
- Fatigue and Loss of Energy: This question leads to another symptom, fatigue and loss of energy.
- Restlessness and a Hyper-Energetic Facade: The restlessness is evident when she tries to make everyone happy. She states outright in her monologue that she feels worthless and guilty when people waste time trying to cheer her up.
- Confusion and Hopelessness: Near the end of the first act, we start seeing her descent into hopelessness, with Sayori telling the main character that she’s confused by her own feelings. These feelings eventually lead to recurrent thoughts of death or suicide.
Even before these moments, it was already hinted at in several scenes that she frequently thinks about death. Her relationship with the main character (MC) is clearly a difficult one. In the first act, she is always fidgety and nervous around the MC, more than a normal person should be. In the second act, she becomes obsessed with the MC, often keeping him to herself throughout most of the act, regardless of whether you picked Natsuki or her.
Combining all these factors—her obsession, violent and impulsive behavior, mood swings, and low self-esteem tied entirely to the MC—we see the culmination in a very broken, confused, and dangerous girl. This chaotic mix leads to a tragic turn when Sayori commits suicide and is deleted from the game by the antagonist, Monika.
However, beneath Sayori’s happy facade lies a struggle with depression, making her character both relatable and deeply impactful. A tragic incident forces Sayori to confront her innermost demons and find hope in the darkest of places. When Sayori reveals that she has depression, it evokes feelings of selfishness and inconsideration, leaving the player wishing they could go back and do everything possible to her.
Suicide in Video Games: How It Affects Players and Communities
Sometimes, a game subverts your expectations. Team Salvato’s psychological horror video game, Doki Doki Literature Club Plus, is an expansion on their 2017 Doki Doki Literature Club, and it addresses the issues of mental health, depression, and suicide in an unsettlingly but realistic way.
The game’s central mechanic has the player choose words for poems to try and appeal to the different girls, which seems harmless enough. In a first playthrough, it can be easy to miss some darker words like ‘suicide,’ ‘cage,’ or ‘trap,’ and that these words interest characters you wouldn’t expect.
The horrible part is that after this, the game acts as if Sayori never even existed. The game is at its best when it explores the mental state of the different characters. Sayori’s depression is a bit of a surprise at first because she is always upbeat, trying to help other characters have fun, especially the protagonist. However, people with depression, especially those who have lived with it for many years, can often hide it well, especially from people unaware of its symptoms.
Sayori chose to act cheerful in spite of her depression so that she wouldn’t be a burden to others around her. She also wanted to avoid the harsh judgment or repercussions that can go along with letting others know about her psychological state. These reactions are common enough for people hiding their depression. Team Salvato is brave in its attempt to deal unflinchingly with the complex realities of suicidal depression.
The aftermath of Sayori’s death sets the tone for the rest of the game. Her hands are covered in blood, serving as a gruesome reminder of her slow and agonizing demise. Later, you’ll learn that she didn’t actually die immediately and that her fingers were smeared with blood as she tried to free herself from her noose.
Regardless of whether the player dates Sayori or considers her a friend, she’ll hang herself on the morning of the festival. On the surface, the game makes a point to show that she is not in her right mind.
Analyzing Fan Theories: What Really Happened to Sayori?
In analyzing fan theories surrounding Sayori’s fate in Doki Doki Literature Club, we begin with a description of the tragic event:
It was sunrise while Sayori was sleeping. She had a horrible nightmare that abruptly woke her up before 6 AM. After that, she felt extremely depressed, a depression so strong that urged her to even commit suicide. She got a rope, and a chair to hang herself. But she used a chair, leading her to slowly asphyxiate. She tied the noose so carefully, so that she can die a slow, painless death. And then she hung herself, even though she messed up the hanging process.
A little later, Sayori’s survival instincts kicked in. She wouldn’t kill herself because of a scary dream! She thought. As a result, she started clawing at the rope, but it was too late. She already did the damage. And then the grim reaper got her soul…
Moreover, another theory suggests that Sayori had simply been deceiving everyone the whole time. On Friday, Sayori leaves the club early, and her absence notably disrupts the atmosphere. The other girls become disturbed and even start to turn on Monika a little, but this is only the start. The weekend rolls around, and Sayori reveals her happy-go-lucky attitude was simply a mask for a serious case of depression. This metaphorical mask can hide not only depression but potentially villainy as well.
Additionally, another perspective proposes that Sayori’s main method of acting in the game world is through the use of Yuri as a vessel. After her death, she ed on to Yuri’s body so she could still physically appear and act in the game world, which gave her more options in what to do.
Following Sayori’s death, it is notable that not only does Yuri inherit the role of vice-president, but at the end of Act 2, she is involved with her own suicide scene, which we know now is directly tied to Sayori’s narrative.
Meanwhile, Monika sat alone in the clubroom, staring at a blank sheet of paper and thinking. She knew Sayori was dead, and nobody knew. Nobody could mourn the chipper girl who cheered everyone up. Monika sighed; she knew Sayori wasn’t just a character but had deeper struggles.
Ultimately, the game concludes with the devastating reality that Sayori has hanged herself, and she is dead. As the protagonist agonizes over what he could have done to prevent this, the game ends.
Preventable or Inevitable? The Nature of Sayori’s Suicide in DDLC
Over the course of the game, Sayori’s cheerful personality is shown to be forced, with symptoms of depression becoming more evident. This culminates in Sayori committing suicide and being deleted from the game by the game’s antagonist, Monika. Some critics saw themselves in Sayori, with commentary about how Sayori’s depression was not something that could be fixed by the player.
Fanbyte writer Kara Dennison discussed Sayori’s depression, commenting that her aversion to being helped reflected her feeling that it’s wasted on her rather than believing she’s undeserving of love. She discussed how this is a real struggle that she herself suffered through, finding her story and characters valuable for both sufferers and those around them.
Sayori’s poetry progressively reveals darker feelings of depression. She eventually confides in the protagonist, telling him about her depression, and later confessing her love, which he can either accept or reject.
Regardless of the response, she commits suicide by hanging, causing the game to restart after the protagonist finds her corpse. Kotaku writer Gita Jackson grew attached to Sayori, seeing ‘a little of my confused, sad teenage self in her’. They discussed one of her poems, Bottles, which they felt spoke of Sayori’s desire to make others happy, only for her efforts to be rejected, leaving her with no happiness for herself.
IGN Japan writer Shohei Fujita felt that the way the confession and suicide were handled was more ethical than how it could be. He suggested that being able to save Sayori by staying by her side would be objectifying. Writer Sky LaRell Anderson, while feeling that the portrayal of her mental illnesses was accurate, begrudged that the game did not take advantage of the interactivity of its medium in depicting them. She represents the strongest case of real-world inspiration, directly reflecting those around Salvato with depression.
Sayori’s ending occurs at the end of Act 1. Regardless of the protagonist’s choices related to Sayori or not, earlier in the game, what the player sees will be the same: Sayori will be hanging by a noose from her neck upon entry. The protagonist thinks to himself that this is his fault, that she is gone forever and that choosing the other option when hearing Sayori’s confession would have prevented this.
Monika will later state in Act 3 during her conversation with the player that Sayori’s hands were bloody because her hanging did not kill her instantly by snapping her neck. She stepped from a chair instead of a higher place, which would have made her death quick and painless. Instead, she slowly asphyxiated (choked), and during this time tried to scratch at the rope in a vain attempt to free herself, bloodying her hands in the process. Monika believes that this is because of Sayori either changing her mind a few seconds too late, or maybe it was just her survival instincts kicking in.
This suggests that Sayori hanged herself very early on Day 5, which has been confirmed by Dan Salvato on his Twitter. The shirt is believed to be part of Sayori’s school uniform. Natsuki’s Ending, Yuri’s Ending, and Monika’s Ending are also described as events that are unavoidable, showcasing the theme of inevitability in the game’s narrative.
Sayori’s suicide seems to occur regardless of player choices because Monika amplifies her depression at a critical point, culminating in her tragic decision. After a distressing nightmare, Sayori wakes feeling an overwhelming sense of despair, which becomes a powerful urge to end her life. The moment is horrifying and unsettling, especially for the protagonist who must confront the reality of her death.
While Sayori’s suicide is a shocking revelation in Doki Doki Literature Club, it serves as a pivotal moment that highlights the severity of mental health issues within the narrative. The protagonist’s feelings of helplessness and regret after her death reflect a broader commentary on the impacts of depression and the struggles of those left behind.
