[RECENTLY UPDATED, AGAIN] Upcoming contents about Disaster Report 5 + my honest criticism about THAT incident in DR4

[Minorica]

So, I've watched all of Granzella's livestreams that are related to the upcoming Disaster Report 5. Here are the summaries about settings and contents of DR5 by Kazuma Kujo (including that one Easter Egg from the Epilogue DLC of DR4):

• The story is confirmed to take place after 1 (original Disaster Report) but before 2 (Raw Danger!), around year 2008-2009 a.k.a. an interquel of 1 and 2.
  
• The disaster takes place near Stiver Island/Shuto Island (the location of the disaster in 1)
  
• Natsumi Higa (Kelly Austin) is (probably) confirmed to be in 5, with a setting of her being a university student, has the main story about her brother Haruhiko waiting for her to pick him up. Plus, Kujo said that in the previous installment, she was 22-23, so yeah, it's gotta be her.
  A rather long thoughts about her in 4. But first, let's focus on my summarizations.
  
• Masayuki Sudo/Keith Helm's (the protagonist of 1 + hidden protagonist of 2 + cameo in 4's Epilogue DLC) formation process from 1 to 2, and the cause of his leg injury/broken leg will be shown in 5. It should be noted that in 1, Sudo gets shot in the arm at the endgame of 1.
  
• Characters from previous games (DR1-4?) will reappear (only Natsumi Higa and Masayuki Sudo are confirmed for now) in DR5.
  
• According to the question directly asked by one of DR fans, Kujo answered that there will be various action parts. Plus, he and his team will add how to counter the mobs during disasters in DR5 (like in DR3).

That's all.

Now, my thoughts about her incident, SPOILER ALERT, of course:
Considering what happened in 4, I wish there's a dialogue choice in DR5 that literally undoes Higa's unavoidable death in 4, or having an update patch of adding Higa's survival route or allowing the protagonist to save her via dialogue choice, like in DR3: Fading City and Her Song.
It's jarring when DR4 kills her off for any reasons, considering Granzella officially called her a "perfect attendance award" (one of the terms for a regular character in Japanese media) besides the fans of the series. Fans, imagine that Kana Nishizaki's, (Paige Meyer in Raw Danger!) rescue missions in 2, Kosaka and Makimura's choice of saving Higa in 3 becoming meaningless in 7 months and 4 months later, respectively. This will hurt more for the protagonists in 3, because they can choose either:

1. Save her and let the food box be destroyed by the pillars inside the burning storage building, or
   
2. Take the food box and let her die from getting crushed by the pillars.

Plus, Higa has been involved in 3 disasters (excluding the first one) in 7 months! She worked as a teacher (her dream job), in 4 months! (excluding her internship in Raw Danger! Both are less than a year!!!

It certainly doesn't help that according to one of Granzella livestreams, the decision of killing Higa off in the scenario has been made by Kazuma Kujo during the development of DR4 for PS3 before the Great Tohoku Earthquake, but the reason why is completely unknown. There is one of speculations for the reason: it was realistically impossible to have her to completely survive all the time. However, it's already unrealistic in the first place where she has survived the disaster three times (or four, if you count the non-canon crossover "City Shrouded in Shadows"/"Kyoei Toshi"). If Kujo want to kill Higa off, he should have do it in the first game she debuted. Therefore, that speculation can't be defended. Oh, Kujo did say that he wanted to continue the cancelled project of Disaster Report 4 instead of starting from scratch after leaving Irem...

According to Kazuma Kujo's words, he wanted to depict the frustration during disasters (thus there are some heart-wrenching events throughout the series) in his works. However, the epilogue DLC in DR4 was created because Kujo, ironically, felt that the main story he directed is too dark and depressing. However, this doesn't fix some of the problematic subplots, addressing fans' complaints and the follow-up stories still comes up as half-baked and cheap, especially Higa remains dead instead of ret-conning or adding a survival route to save (both Hiroko and) Higa followed by the truth behind Eri's bullying towards Hiroko and a happy reunion between Higa and the characters (from previous works) whom Higa encountered and had been saved by; the thugs who sexually assaulted Yayoi can only be fought off by the protagonist instead of having the protagonist to prevent the sexual assault in the main story.

It also certainly doesn't help by the fact that Natsumi Higa is the only named regular character whose death is the most unambiguous by some evidences (the radio news about her dead body and Epilogue DLC's the protagonist offering flowers and praying at the location of her death, and Masayuki Sudo, the protagonist of the 1st game and the hidden protagonist of the 2nd game, also visits that location and then lament about her death).

No wonder such episodic[manga-yomeru.com] fix[manga-yomeru.com] fics[manga-yomeru.com] related to this issue exists (made by Manga Ka Keru, a Manga Maker created by Granzella). I really really wish that DR4 is a parallel world or non canon (or at least said problematic plot twists, including Natsumi Higa one).

[SilentWraith]

This is a very thorough description of what we know of Disaster Report 5 so far, I am also interested in the fact they said it will be open world too.

I am impressed with all the information you have said about the other games as well, solidifying that Natsumi Higa was such an integral part of the series, and in the way, you could have seen her as the 'series protagonist' as she is the only one that appears in all 4 games, close second is both Keith Helm and Sophia Briggs (Keith being in the first, second, and Fourth game) and Sophia being in the (Second, Third, and Fourth game) I am hoping to see more about past characters coming into the 5th game though.

Thank you for having all this information in one place!