Board 8 > Umineko Playthrough Topic Final Part

(+) Yeah! (+)

I have now finished Umineko.

That was a really beautiful ending.

Not only did it satisfy what I wanted as a mystery story(i.e. it returned to the "mystery" of the amnesiac segment and gave me a surprising, but fitting answer) and therefore it tied its emotional beat into a twist, enriching the effect of both of them...

But it was just a very sweet scene. Battler escaped the island after all. But he also died. Fitting for this cat box themed game... He both is Battler, and is not Battler. This awkward, sad meeting between Ange and Battler in a coffee shop, decades later, with his white hair... It's incredibly bittersweet. There's no magical fantasy here, no overexagerated monologues about feelings. It's just awkward and sad.

And then the final segment with the renovated Fukuin House turned into the Dining Room, the that classic, familiar portrait of Beatrice one last time. Like I said earlier, I am a sucker for endings that bring back every character for a final goodbye - and even though episode 8 literally did this multiple times, giving every character a defining moment at the puzzle party, then another final moment in their final battle vs Erika, then another final moment as they said goodbye to Ange by the door... Well, after spending 7 months with characters (And for some, it would've been... what did you say, 4 years?), goodbyes are hard, and they take time, so I don't mind repeating them a few times anyway.

And so we get one final goodbye, as Battler's memories return (or don't - the viewer can decide what happens here) and we scroll through everyone one last time, with some more beautiful new art and each character getting one final line... truly a celebration of everything that Umineko was ultimately about. And then, as it ends, a great white space, followed by what we were all waiting for... one final picture of our beloved heroine, Beatrice. She really is one of the most beautiful characters of all time, huh?

And as her image leaves the screen and is replaced with the line of dialogue she is about to speak, you can already hear her say it in your head - because her voice has been engraved in your mind after this much time. And, just as you'd expect, she says "Battooooorrraaaaaa" in that voice, the one she always has when she does those ridiculous evil grins which were once terrifying and creepy, and then somehow became endearing and sweet in what can only be described as masterfully paradoxical writing. And the moment the words left her lips, I just completely broke down in tears, as the moment hit me and I realized that this truly was Beatrice's final goodbye... The culmination of that wonderfully written arc where we (and Battler) somehow fell in love with her despite her spending 4 chapters being nothing but over-the-top cruel and evil, making it seem natural (and not surprising at all) when they fell in love. What a ridiculous romance plot, haha. But I think just the overwhelming power of how her entire character can be summed up in that one vocal delivery is what made it such a strong moment.

Of course, Beatrice doesn't exist, and she may or may not have murdered 15 people. But that's not the point, is it?

Anyway...

Now I've unlocked the Music Box.

Thank you for following along with me for the entire first half of 2019, and let's dive in to postgame, because, well, the game's not really over until I let the internet fandom fill me in on the parts that weren't actually in the game.

This was a link given to me after I completed the game (don't know if it was from here or elsewhere). This is side story in the manga that delves more deeply into Yasu and their motivations (I think there's three chapters):

https://mangakakalot.com/chapter/umineko_no_naku_koro_ni_chiru_episode_8_twilight_of_the_golden_witch/chapter_24.15
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Regardless of any of my feelings about the games flaws, it's impossible to deny that Umineko certainly makes an impression and isn't a story I will ever forget. I can certainly imagine reading along with playthrough topics 10 years from now.

The first thing on the agenda will be to go through my past topics and note how many things I got right, how many things I got wrong, and just in general any posts I made which are funny to look back it.

I'll go through the theatregoing topic alongside this. Finally I can open that Cat Box... =P

Beyond that, please feel free @Eerieka to post your notes from episodes 2 to 4, I'll take a look at them and then I'll read the answers online to anything I don't know... I assume there's probably a webpage somewhere that walks you through the truth...?

BTW any plans to start Higurashi any time soon?
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Team Rocket Elite posted...

BTW any plans to start Higurashi any time soon?

definitely not

topic 1, page 1:
"First Impressions: George is a smug, condescending know-it-all asshole. "

well. that never changed. =P but he was ultimately not a killer. i mean, look, i'm not terribly surprised that he was ultimately innocent.

so, i think i said this before during episode 4 or so, but i'll say it again

there was a lot of talk from me during the beginning of episode 1 about "surely maria is a psychopath" "she must actually be a child genius" "there's no room in a story of this kind for just a normal 9 year old girl"

and, it's so interesting that i was wrong here, because

that was the point, in the end.

maria was just an ordinary 9 year old girl!

yes, she was really into the occult, and she was a little bit developmentally late

but she wasn't a psycho. and she wasn't a genius. she was just normal.

and all her "quirks" were just things she did to try to get over the fact that her life sucked because her mom hated her

(plus she was manipulated by yasu, it seems)

And I think that's really great. Just like the "magic isn't real!" -> "well, actually, maybe magic is real" development, Maria's sort of goes "Aha! Maria's a psycopath!" -> "well, actually, wait, no, she's totally normal", and I think that's really cool

And in fact, despite being "just a 9 year old girl", Maria ends up being one of the most important characters in the game, as her plot basically serves as a huge source of understanding the game's themes (and the villain's motives/world)

first impressions, continued:
"That said, I'm pretty sure Kumasawa is not going to be this game's killer or main villain.

She's already built up as being crafty and I think her plot role will be that she knows lots of secrets about the household which she will let us know at critical moments"

i mean, yes, basically, but with a lot more irrelevance, and really barely revealing that many secrets, though she definitely knew most of them

so basically, during episode 1, i started writing about the game's themes

because i thought, hey, you've all read this game a dozen times, you know what's gonna happen, i don't need to summarize events for you

but maybe i can provide my unique PoV on the themes, and you might get something new out of this readthrough

so i was like "guys, it's subtle, but there's a bit of a theme about choosing your own happiness" "okay, there was a little part that makes me think a theme of this game might be how you can appreciate a part of your life even if its in the past"

now, I was right, so, go me, but also, little did I know the game was literally going to beat you over the head with these themes for 8 episodes and i was most certainly not telling you anything you didn't already know

kanon first impression:
"Likely he has some sort of connection to another main character (someone's illegitimate son?) which won't be revealed until later."

well that's certainly true in a way

episode 1:
"george snuck off to ask kuma a question.

when asked why, he gets all tinted-glasses and says it was nothing"

what was up with this...? did we ever learn what that was about...? was it just, like, "hey, can you tell shannon i'll see her later"...?

episode 1:
" i feel like the last two adults are clearly gonna be very important pieces of the puzzle, since from what i gather they actually live here. kraus or whatever his name is is probably gonna be one of the most important characters"

i mean, krauss isn't, like... unimportant, but tbh, he is not one of the most important characters =P

"Eva's dying early. Her character has no depth beyond being sort of catty and sarcastic, and seemingly no room for growth."

well, can't get them all.

"I guess I have to give a first impression of Shannon.

Um.

She's nice, I guess? We're meant to feel bad for her 'cause she got bullied over tea stuff which wasn't her fault.

Seems sweet.

Not a killer.

Likely gonna have a growth/self-confidence arc or something?

But she will be killed right as she is on the verge of a personal breakthrough, and her death will be the one I predicted earlier that snaps Kanon out of his funk and makes him go through his own growth."

Well.

...Can't get 'em all!

But I make up for this wrongness later! =P

Though, mistakes aside, my actual feelings about Shannon never change from "She's nice, I guess", represented by her constant middling spots in the rankings

The prediction for her purpose in the plot is 100% correct for episode 1, but of course, that doesn't mean much.

ep1 battler: "All my memories of Aunt Natushi involve her talking to the adults about complicated things, with a scary look on her face."

I love it when a character's introduction consistently tells you what their role in the sotry is going to be

because that's exactly what natsuhi does for 8 episodes!

anyways, now that you're done, check your PMs

https://snag.gy/QdE4O0.jpg

i mean, i have nothing to say other than that i was on point and those are both themes that were very relevant to most of the story

Okay, so, the initial mastermind rankings:
http://zyxyzarchive.x10host.com/delsumi_t1p4.html

2) Shannon: I don't know how Shannon got this high. There's just nothing explicitly ruling her out like the others. It's not impossible that she's just pretending to be a sweet naive clumsy girl, and she actually has some evil plan to infiltrate the manor and steal the inheritance money. Tbh, I don't think any servant has as much of a motive as family members. Maybe she should be lower. Oh well.

Now, look. I'm not going to take credit here and say "Look how on point I was, I correctly identified the mastermind as me #2 pick!" (behind George, of course)

The post even says that I think George is the only likely mastermind and that even the people ranked in the top 10 besides him are people who I don't think are that likely.

And I don't have any credible reason for her being the mastermind. After all, I suggest she might just be pretending to be sweet and clumsy (she's not, really - it's a real personality), or that she wants the money (nope, she has it already).

But I will take credit for the process of elimination that led to her being number 2, because, well, I was right. When I looked at every other character, I felt like I could already see what their possible development arcs were, and I didn't think any of them made sense as a mastermind.

And I was right. And so I correctly placed the mastermind at #2 because she was the only one (along with, like, Hideyoshi and Rosa, because they hadn't done anything yet) who I couldn't rule out.

So I'll take some credit for that.

We'll continue my Shannon-mastermind journey as we keep moving along, there's just a lot to uncover here in the "first impressions" section of topic 1.

Before you go delving into too much more, odds are good you should read Confession or consider answering the next set of questions.

Because let's just say there's a major factor of Yasu that I'm pretty sure you've completely missed.

Questions for thought regarding Yasu:
Why would falling off a cliff as a baby make Yasu "incapable of love"?
What would "incapable of love" mean in relation to George, and what he said about the future?
How does ShKanon work, in a completely physical sense?
What would Yasu's situation have been like if Battler had returned one year later? One year earlier?

One of the funny things about Shannon being the mastermind is that the game (properly) doesn't shy away from characters suspecting her.

i.e.

When Maria first says she got a letter from Beatrice, characters say "Well maybe Shannon just dressed up as Beatrice and gave it to Maria and said to tell everyone it's from Beatrice"

and you're like "nah i'm sure the answer will be more clever and shocking than that"

but, like, nope.

and that's a good thing. you want the actual killer to get suspected sometimes. you don't want a player to be able to just write off every early suspicion as being wrong.

danganronpa series spoilers for example, V3-2, when Kirumi is the first person suspected in the trial, you go "yeah, whatever, since she's the first person being suspected, she's obviously not the killer", because that's usually true - but then she is later, for a totally different reason admittedly, and it's satisfying because it subverts expectations

(i can't remember if i've written this already or if i just thought about it and said "i'll talk about this later when i'm reviewing post-game, so, sorry if i already posted this thought)

Cyouni posted...

Before you go delving into too much more, odds are good you should read Confession or consider answering the next set of questions.

Because let's just say there's a major factor of Yasu that I'm pretty sure you've completely missed.

Questions for thought regarding Yasu:
Why would falling off a cliff as a baby make Yasu "incapable of love"?
What would "incapable of love" mean in relation to George, and what he said about the future?
How does ShKanon work, in a completely physical sense?
What would Yasu's situation have been like if Battler had returned one year later? One year earlier?

I mean, it's not so much that I've missed it. Yes, I've had those exact same questions. I have no idea how the Yasu situation works. That's why I've kept wondering about it. But the game never explained, and I haven't thought about it too deeply because I just have no clue.

I assumed that falling off the cliff would leave some handicapped! i.e. maybe in a wheelchair. Incapable of love, literally, the bottom half of their body doesn't work. But Yasu couldn't be in a wheelchair and work as a maid/servant...? Unless they really were in a wheelchair the whole time and we didn't see it.

"Incapable of love"... in relation to George...? And what he said about the future? What did George say about the future? I don't remember. He'd oppose his parents, take Shannon away, and start a new life... Didn't he say they'd have children? I don't remember.

I have absolutely no clue how ShKanon works in a physical sense, that's what makes it so baffling.

As for the one year later or earlier thing, the only thing I thought of is because this was the year of the proposal. Is it something else?

I can read the Confession manga now before I keep rereading my past topics, or later. I don't have any particular planned order.

man, everyone in the theatregoing topic during episode 1 is like "can't wait till he finds out kyrie's actually an asshole"

and its like

well, sure, on one hand, sort of

but bern even admitted that the ep7 tea party might not be true, and that ep8 puzzle certainly isn't either

ultimately, i can decide what the truth is, and which fragments are "real"

by that logic, virgilia is also an evil asshole! but she isn't, right? different fragments, different people. my eps 1 to 6 kyrie is still an awesome badass genius <3

(granted, an awesome badass genius who says she'd kill asumu, but hey, without love it can't be seen, am i right?)

It is my understanding that the events shown in the Episode 7 tea party are what actually happened.
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GANON1025 posted...

It is my understanding that the events shown in the Episode 7 tea party are what actually happened.

Yeah, I believe the Manga confirms that's the truth.
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https://snag.gy/nCkitW.jpg

i mean, i feel pretty good about the fact that i zoned in the game's core themes so quickly (and of course, later used them to figure out the mastermind)

I mean, this is exactly it. This theme I write about in episode 1 is what episode 8 was about: Ange choosing to remember the beauty of her family from her childhood and accepting that it's gone while being able to hold on to what it was

The mastermind's motive was in large part because of the way society treated her - and also a result of the fact that she did not have a parental relationship - the person who was "supposed to be" her mother rejected her, and her real parents were a rapist/dead

GANON1025 posted...

It is my understanding that the events shown in the Episode 7 tea party are what actually happened.

I reject your truth!

But, I mean, yeah, after episode 7 I said that I was okay accepting that as the truth.

Then in ep 8 Bern said it may not be and she apparently really wanted to open a book containing another truth, so, idk.

Anyway, I don't have any massive level of denial here, I'm fine with the ep7 tea party being the truth.

topic 1:
"they are essentially talking about code-switching, i think? how your personality changes depending on who you are around. it's a real thing. what i'm wondering is how it'll be relevant to the game. "

this is right after that very early segment of episode 1 where george talks about how maria has different personality modes.

I totally forgot about this, but oh boy the foreshadowing! Not that I fully "get" Yasu's situation yet, but it does seem to be a person who adopts different personalities, that's for sure.

I think my summary is that the things made explicit in Confession are a massive portion of the subtext of episode 2.

hm. why was there blood on natsuhi's door in episode 1...?

Cyouni posted...

I think my summary is that the things made explicit in Confession are a massive portion of the subtext of episode 2.

I see. I think it's really interesting how I actually vaguely felt that after finishing episode 2, even though I didn't quite realize what I was feeling. We'll get to this...

topic 1:
"The game is doing an interest thing with the narrative right now. Eva is accusing Natsuhi of lying about meeting Kinzo. But since we saw it happen, we know it was real. If we hadn't seen that, it'd make a lot of sense to assume Natsuhi was lying."

lol

man, kinzo having 6 toes really was a red herring thing. it wasn't ever relevant for anything other than confirming his body. no one else has 6 toes.

topic 1:
"kyrie's role in the story was to make battler never stop talking about chess metaphors"

this isn't even untrue, tbh

https://snag.gy/tYigSs.jpg

score another point for me!

I mean, I still don't even know what Yasu's motive was. lol. I guess I'll read the confession manga before going ahead much further.

Hell, I still don't really have an answer for why the killer followed the epitaph. If everyone was going to blow up after 48 hours, why does it matter? Why kill them one by one? (Or rather, six by one) I presume something about getting back at Battler by having him deal with the pain of it. And then you did it along with the epitaph just to cover up that motive?

https://snag.gy/gDPUOQ.jpg

woohooooo

You guys have some strange reactions in the theatregoing topic during episode 2 where it feels like you're sort of projecting your own thoughts onto mine.

Like in episode 2 there's posts like "oh no dels why are you accepting the magic and stopping thinking about the mystery, you need virgilia to explain to you how they can both happen"

but like

didn't i immediately deny the existence of the goats and say the magic wasn't real? and continue to post as if there was a real explanation...?

hell i even explained virgilia's thing before she did, as far as i recall.seems like people jumped to conclusions and thought that just because i was reacting to the magic (how could i not? it was ridiculous) that also meant i believed it?

Reg posted...

JeffreyRaze posted...

Dels needs to start doubting the veracity of the non-magic scenes at some point >_>. Eva having fever dreams isn't magic, therefor it must have happened! Bleah.

The end of the episode will teach him to.

And if it doesn't, he literally never will until he's told <_<

i mean, yeah.

as episode 2 went on, i developed what i thought was the rule, which was: "if, at any time, something magical is shown on screen, you know that that scene is not real and should not be counted. if no magic is in a scene, then the scene is real"

that was, of course, wrong, but that's what i thought. i think that'd be a lot more consistent than whatever the hell the rule actually is, which seems like "anything on screen is fake if a character wants to believe it"

So, in episode 2, whenever the schoolgirl-outfit Beatrice appears, is that actually Yasu? And she never appears on screen at the same time as Shannon or Kanon if someone else is together with them?

https://snag.gy/EbMj2h.jpg

...yep

oh yeah, what's up with the portrait...? why is it that when some people talked about it, it showed a picture of schoolgirl beatrice, and when others talked about it, it showed the proper golden dress?

Dels posted...

So, in episode 2, whenever the schoolgirl-outfit Beatrice appears, is that actually Yasu? And she never appears on screen at the same time as Shannon or Kanon if someone else is together with them?

Strictly speaking, the only person who wasn't allowed to see Shannon/Kanon(/Beatrice) together was Battler.

Oh really? Huh.

I guess that'll be explained when I read the manga chapter.

https://snag.gy/u87Mg1.jpg

nailed it.

Dels posted...

Oh really? Huh.

I guess that'll be explained when I read the manga chapter.

Yes, because Battler's perspective was objective in Eps 1-4 on account of him being the "Detective". Same as Erika in Ep 5.

That said, anybody who claimed to see two of those characters together (or had a PoV scene where they saw both together) was lying about it - they had to be. On the other hand, just because they are physically capable of lying about it doesn't mean they will lie about it.