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To paraphrase my gacha pal Sefal Re: Umineko EP3: beato at start of chapter 3 im going to do a this thing Me at the end of chapter 3: I did not see that thing coming Owns
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Dec 8, 2018 18:50
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Regarding the Umineko domestic abuse stuff discussed, as someone who has witnessed domestic abuse first hand growing up (albeit not directed towards me), I felt a lot of painfully resonant notes in Rosa's relationship with Maria, which you don't usually see in entertainment fiction. I definitely feel it was handled fairly well, at least compared to anything else I've read.
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Dec 8, 2018 19:10
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AFancyQuestionMark posted:Regarding the Umineko domestic abuse stuff discussed, as someone who has witnessed domestic abuse first hand growing up (albeit not directed towards me), I felt a lot of painfully resonant notes in Rosa's relationship with Maria, which you don't usually see in entertainment fiction. I definitely feel it was handled fairly well, at least compared to anything else I've read. Yeah I pretty much felt the same way.
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Dec 8, 2018 19:17
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(Umineko) Rosa is a textbook case of Borderline Personality Disorder, imo
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Dec 8, 2018 21:19
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From my personal experience at least, R07 knows what he's on about. Episode 4 was a really rough one for me, but also one of my favorites because of that.
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Dec 8, 2018 21:20
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Dessel posted:I might be too careful to praise how it's handled because people could take that the wrong way if they've had to deal with it themselves
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Dec 8, 2018 21:31
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london detective mysteria out on 12/18. they made it.
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Dec 9, 2018 01:24
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I feel like Episode 4 of Umineko was the worst of them all yet. It's still entertaining but I'm quite a bit disappointed. I get there's an unreliable narrator. Whatever shenanigans. I never expected logically to conclude anything from what's happening. But episode 4's 4th wall breaking and just utter anime bullshit got on to my nerves. The entire Krauss vs. Goat scene was basically just cheapening the experience - and so are a few of the characters like Chiesters. I could rant about this entire medium and annoying anime bullshit that cheapens experiences. Sometimes I wish I could read a VN that would kill few of its tropes like having enough text for an abstract of a dissertation and the logical conclusions of it happening inside someone's head in a split second. I don't mind that much. But this episode kind of abandoned its own internal consistencies. I don't mind some stereotypical anime bullshit like all-powerful loli witches as long as the fiction stays within its own narrative logic. I get a lot of my complaints can be explained away with bunch of clever "gotchas" of ridiculous complexity but it doesn't change the experience for the reader. I've now read all the tea rooms/???? and played through episode 1 through 4 but for whatever reason "Read EP1-4" achievement didn't unlock. Might have something to do with the fact I shut the game down improperly during ep4 last night, lost my latest save and skipped through a lot of poo poo from an older save. I've pretty much given up trying to figure anything out. I'll just be there for the ride. It could be something as dumb as the entire thing being some adolescent abused girl's delusional diary for all I care. Or family of extremely mentally sick people. Beatrice seemed to directly refute my expectation that Beatrice is just Battler's alter ego/split personality or something by saying "I am not you" in red (Though there could be loopholes around that I can easily see). I wonder if the money being sent around will have any meaning. If we entertain thoughts about witches and witch's "domain" it could be construed as somehow establishing borders by most north/east/west/south -most tips of Japan or something. Don't get me wrong, I still like the experience, but eh. The OST is definitely one of the points that keeps me reading. Even though no real instruments are used it's mixed surprisingly well in comparison to anything I remember from Higurashi (which I never finished because I couldn't deal with child protagonists and mind numbingly boring narrative anymore) and it's a joy to listen with both decent headphones and some decent studio monitors. In fact that's still one of my motivations for still buying and finishing the rest of the episodes: So that I can compile a fighting game playlist out of few of the songs without spoiling myself. I can't but help but wonder how some of the characters would sound with good? voice acting. Maybe I'll check the anime once I'm done just to hear that. Not sure if I regret the lack of VA in this VN or not. At least it's quicker to read without any regrets. edit: I'm almost expecting some sort of 4th wall breaking EVA-like ending that's aimed towards trolling the player in some way. I wouldn't actually really mind that. Just want to see the end, no matter how ridiculous it is. There are some narrative oddities like you and the weirdly shifting narrator in some cases where the "I" is being shifted between different characters | v edit: quote:I don't love everything about the voicework but it's generally very good, you should really check out the PS3 patches when you get the chance (I'm actually surprised you weren't already using them)  Dessel fucked around with this message at 21:54 on Dec 9, 2018 |
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Dec 9, 2018 20:56
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I don't love everything about the voicework but it's generally very good, you should really check out the PS3 patches when you get the chance (I'm actually surprised you weren't already using them). Also don't watch the anime, it is Quite Bad. As for the rest eh I guess we'll just never see eye-to-eye on a lot of it, I personally found much of you seemingly disliked (the Krauss part especially) to be hysterical and very much in the spirit of what they were going for. I'd argue that several characters in the second half are more or less direct stabs at the more logical/clinical interpretations of the narrative you seem to desire so there's probably a lot that is going to be at odds with what you want as it goes on.
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Dec 9, 2018 21:33
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Dessel, have you read Fata Morgana?
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Dec 9, 2018 22:07
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Yup edit: Judging from the beginning of Umineko episode 5 I don't regret not having played with the patches that much, Beatrice's VA is not as good as I hoped and character art is going for a flatter anime look which is a shame in a few cases. Backgrounds are definitely better. Yeah I realized you can restore the mangagamer/steam sprites. Dessel fucked around with this message at 22:49 on Dec 9, 2018 |
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Dec 9, 2018 22:12
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I'd be surprised if you end up liking Chiru (Eps. 5-8, I can't remember if the Steam release calls it something else or not off the top of my head) much, Dessel. I personally don't think Chiru works very well at all and largely consider it a failure, though I also seemed to like Episode 4 more than you did. Raxivace fucked around with this message at 03:00 on Dec 10, 2018 |
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Dec 10, 2018 01:59
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I will say that for all of its flaws though that Umineko did ultimately lead the internet to the creation of the greatest YouTube video ever. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddJHCUmIC8M You probably shouldn't watch it until you've finished Episode 8 though.
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Dec 10, 2018 02:16
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There are flaws in the execution of Chiru (especially in episode 8) but everything does click together once you've arrived at the solution to the series. If you just assume the answer will be something dumb and stop thinking about it your experience will be worse (this may in fact be a theme addressed within Umineko itself).
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Dec 10, 2018 02:27
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Chiru is also a section of the story that, at least IMO, the more removed you are from it and thus are able to see the full picture, the more it can be appreciated as a statement on the overall 'goal' of Umineko's narrative. I definitely felt "Oh, OK, I guess that was kind of neat?" when it first came out but as the days/weeks/months/years went on I looked back on it with an increased amount of reverence. Much of that initial reaction was probably mostly because of the nature of how I experienced the story at the time though, which was "a chapter every 6 months" or so. I don't know how it will necessarily come across now where you can just digest all of it at once.
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Dec 10, 2018 02:44
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Raxivace posted:I will say that for all of its flaws though that Umineko did ultimately lead the internet to the creation of the greatest YouTube video ever. Thank you. I thought Umineko didn't need a ninth chapter but this changed my mind. The new chapter they announced is going to be available standalone right? and not only as part of the remaster/bundle
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Dec 10, 2018 03:05
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Yeah man I'm just not really sure at this point what you're gonna get out of the rest of it Dessel cause I had just fundamentally different reactions. Although the series could have really used an editor to tighten things up there's very little I'd actually remove or do differently besides some of ep4 and 6... the comedy and fight scenes really break up the gloom and have a lot of interesting character moments... & to me Beatrice's VA is just absolutely phenomenal. It took a bit to adjust my internal voice for her but she's so perfect & I got to meet her at an autograph session for a different project once and she was so jazzed I liked Beatrice  e: eh i think everyone knows beatrice is a character at this point we post her sprites enough, who needs spoiler tags Yakiniku Teishoku fucked around with this message at 03:15 on Dec 10, 2018 |
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Dec 10, 2018 03:12
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Umineko 5: Aren't Beatrice's lines literally just "..." at that part?
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Dec 10, 2018 03:24
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Raxivace posted:I will say that for all of its flaws though that Umineko did ultimately lead the internet to the creation of the greatest YouTube video ever. This is the best thing. Holy poo poo.
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Dec 10, 2018 03:33
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Raxivace posted:I'd be surprised if you end up liking Chiru (Eps. 5-8, I can't remember if the Steam release calls it something else or not off the top of my head) much, Dessel. Episode 7 is the best episode in the series imo, and 5 isn’t too far behind. 6 is kind of a mess and 8 might be the weakest overall, but the actual ending is still beautiful chiru is good imo
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Dec 10, 2018 04:19
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Umineko EP7 is up there as one of the best When They Cry chapters ever IMO, I might only put Minagoroshi (Higurashi #7) and maybe Umineko EP3 or EP5 in the same conversation. Both the narrative itself and the narrative structure are extremely enthralling and engrossing, with one of the best overall selections of new music and impactful usage of said new music. It's a hell of a package.
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Dec 10, 2018 04:29
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Especially after the crushing disappointment EP6 was. Being sandwiched between the two best episodes is really unfortunate. Still the very end of EP6 is still memorable and loving awesome
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Dec 10, 2018 04:31
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I'm just hoping the Umineko kickstarter gets launched soon
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Dec 10, 2018 11:12
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John Lee posted:The author quit his job in Child Protective Services (well, the Japanese equivalent) to make VNs, and abuse is a major theme in both Umineko and Higurashi. I personally thought it was handled very well in both. Suddenly I understand why he made Higanbana. I know a lot of people bounced off that game after the (extremely brutal) first episode, but I always felt like the game was something he really -really- wanted to write and get off his chest, and this explains a lot of it, and why it's such a screed on bullying
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Dec 10, 2018 22:11
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Irony Be My Shield posted:Umineko 5: Aren't Beatrice's lines literally just "..." at that part? Just finished episode 5 and its aftermath. There's a flashback right in the beginning. That certainly was a ride which cost bunch of my sleep. Not going to bother with the rest of the episodes till holidays/lazy weekends because finishing/pausing at a fulfilling note is difficult and apparently episode 6 isn't that great. Maybe I'll post more thoughts later on but the "anime bs" didn't bother me nearly as much as the stuff in episode 4. yes Krauss vs. Goat was way worse than all low points in episode 5 together Also thanks to whoever got tired of staring at my terrible newbie AV, I guess?
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Dec 11, 2018 01:47
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I like 6 quite a bit so it's not a definite thing that you'll dislike it, but not playing it all at once also sounds like a good idea so you don't get burned out, the arcs get longer as it gets close to the end.
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Dec 11, 2018 02:19
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Sorry if there's a dedicated Zero Escape thread and I just missed it but I finally got around to finishing 999. That was pretty enjoyable, I hope VLR is just as good.
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Dec 11, 2018 04:36
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Ryuga Death posted:Sorry if there's a dedicated Zero Escape thread and I just missed it but I finally got around to finishing 999. That was pretty enjoyable, I hope VLR is just as good. I personally thought VLR was the better game.
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Dec 11, 2018 04:48
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999 benefits a lot from being standalone, esp. since VLR relies a lot on ZTD which was, kind of a mixed bag the good parts of VLR are still fantastic though, particularly the english voice acting siggyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy phidooooooo!
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Dec 11, 2018 04:53
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Raxivace posted:That's pretty appropriate, since today is the 9th anniversary of the original release of 999. Um, I did not intend for that to happen. Holy poo poo.  dmboogie posted:999 benefits a lot from being standalone, esp. since VLR relies a lot on ZTD which was, kind of a mixed bag Should I switch to the English track? I played 999 with the English track but I usually play vns with the Japanese audio. Also, sorry if I misunderstood your comment, but you said VLR relies on ZTD, but VLR is the second game and ZTD is the final entry, right?
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Dec 11, 2018 04:58
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Ryuga Death posted:Should I switch to the English track? I played 999 with the English track but I usually play vns with the Japanese audio. it's one of my favorite dubs of anything, ever, so I'd definitely recommend at least trying the English audio out! and what I meant was that a decent amount of stuff in VLR doesn't get resolved until ZTD, which sucked for the years we didn't think we were ever getting a sequel, and still sorta sucks in places
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Dec 11, 2018 05:02
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Despite cliffhangers and dropped plot threads VLR is definitely my favorite by far, though all of the games are at least decent
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Dec 11, 2018 09:36
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I liked 999's writing best out of the trilogy, but the original DS release was pretty rough to actually play, since you'd end up having to redo a lot of the puzzle rooms if you didn't read a guide to know the optimal route to take. I think the rereleases on other platforms fix that, but at the cost of some pretty cool storytelling gimmicks that relied on the DS screen layout.
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Dec 11, 2018 09:51
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Thuryl posted:I liked 999's writing best out of the trilogy, but the original DS release was pretty rough to actually play, since you'd end up having to redo a lot of the puzzle rooms if you didn't read a guide to know the optimal route to take. I think the rereleases on other platforms fix that, but at the cost of some pretty cool storytelling gimmicks that relied on the DS screen layout. What was changed for the re-releases?
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Dec 11, 2018 10:20
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Ryuga Death posted:What was changed for the re-releases? I think the iOS version removed the puzzles entirely, making the game into a pure VN, while the Steam version lets you skip parts that you've already played through.
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Dec 11, 2018 10:28
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So Umineko episode 5 and its significant aftermath (tea party + ???). Sorry for my increasingly ranty and incoherent posts, feel free to ignore. I'm warming up quite a bit to Beatrice's voice acting, but I did somehow picture it to be slightly higher pitched and a little haughtier. Stupid anime battles were entertaining. Though if you were to deliberately look for loopholes and impossible arguments because stuff kept circling in some weird argumentative/rule circlejerk you'd probably find them. I kind of wanted the piece Battler be afflicted with the burden of having Beatrice under his service and that possibly leading to some moral issues for him, perhaps even mirroring Eva and EVA-Beatrice in some way. Though it seems he might've been already responsible for some horrible poo poo during the episode. I understand that there's at least "the meta/rose garden" + "the game" layers. I know it's intentional but things get quite a bit confusing when you start wondering when/how exactly Battler originally "entered" the game "from the real world". One would easily think it was the original entry at episode 1, but the events have probably been taking place for far longer than episode 1 to 5 judging from the narrative. Battler just doesn't have memories of it. Maybe he "entered" the game when he originally entered the island and it was cordoned off by the typhoon. I understand "fragments" as they've been discussed being "episodes of the game". They're not necessarily one and the same, but "a playthrough" may give birth to one or several fragments. I'm still not sure how temporally and spacially limited/bordered fragments are and if fragments can be of various different spaces, eras and times. I would imagine so. However this VN so far seems to directly allude to fragments taking place during the two day period in Rokkenjima. Fragments seem to be tools to be used to arrive to some greater truth within the narrative. Which doesn't quite make sense from the standpoint of how Episode 5 seems to be about falsifying and coming to a false truth. Unless these fragments can somehow "supernaturally" affect the reality. There's some sort of philosophical question about what is the real truth, perception etc. lying here but I'm not even going to touch it. I'll just say that I'm aware of the nature of the question. Generally speaking it does seem that fragments are "helpful" in constructing "a full truth" by combining new pieces of information that is unique to one or few fragments but seemingly the undeniable truth (Like Battler's parentage or lack there-of). I'm still not convinced about Beatrice. The game is doing an effective job of "Stockholm syndroming" the reader (me) to like her character, and I don't mind that. Even with how episode 5 went, I feel Battler should be afraid and deeply mistrustful of her and of this "romantic" narrative the episode seemed to be going for. I say "romantic" because I'm not sure that's exactly what is meant by the inner "true" narrative of the episode/characters even if a player would want to comfortably assume such a thing. As for Battler's reactions, the guy should be basically horrified of her and probably afflicted by at least a few PTSDs due to the events in the previous games. Even if we assume the very best of Beatrice in human terms by saying that she has to run the games for some greater good or she is not fully in control of running them she still seems like an unrepentant, evil person. There doesn't seem to be any evidence of linking her with the gruesome effects within the games, though. But her reactions to events still show a very twisted nature. I'm assuming that even if "pieces" are somehow limited to the game they still are self-aware. In addition to this the overt torture of Battler in the "game room" by the stakes of purgatory seems something Beatrice is either directly or indirectly responsible for. I'm sure there are other gruesome events that from the observer's point of view assign direct blame to Beatrice. Perhaps it's all an allusion to emotional abuse in a relationship or something. Then there's the entire thing of the game warning about "Battler being too sympathetic", whatever that means. I do still want to see Beatrice bash some arrogant heads in in because geez the Erika character is sure well made to push the player's buttons. I try to be cognizant of the obvious emotional manipulation the game is going for, but I'm not going to lie, Beatrice's lines that were something akin to "Liar... Thank you.. I'm sorry" did have quite a bit of an emotional impact on me. The delivery on the "I'm sorry" was pretty phenomenal from the voice actor. Battler seems to be afflicted by some type of amnesia. He's apparently promised, said, or done something to Beatrice. And him forgetting this has Beatrice willingly embrace death. Episode 5 seems to imply this is some sort of romantic idea but that might be false. Then there's the promise/truth of Battler killing Beatrice. The events so far seem to almost imply this is some kind of promise of euthanasia to free Beatrice from suffering or immortal life. Some romantic could consider it to be a very roundabout way of professing love by sticking together with someone immortal who doesn't want to go through the suffering of loss again. The promise after all doesn't have a promise of time/when connected to it. Stories of immortality and seeing your family and everyone you know dying as you stay alive and young are not exactly unheard of. Ironically Battler denying witches and therefore Beatrice is assigning "good" towards her while simultaneously killing her. Maybe it's an allusion to letting go. The entire nature of magic in this narrative is... peculiar. If we assume it's real, it still seems often handled/limited in a way that nothing supernatural necessarily took place. Which seems to run counter wise to the entire idea of magic in the narrative (but not necessarily?...) All in all it's shrouded in this game of observations and truth which makes the magic approach the definition of "magic tricks" in the real world. The entire island of Rokkenjima with its typhoon that makes its events unobservable from the outside for the duration of two days seems like a macrocosm for each microcosm which are the manifestations of alleged magic that are connected to the murders. As for the Who/Why/How I'm not even going to try.  Maybe I indirectly answered a few of those questions in my post, though.
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Dec 11, 2018 15:24
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The concept of fragments/pieces are more clearly defined and established in Higurashi, though their usage in Umineko is in some ways a red herring or at least somewhat deliberate way of misleading readers if they are expecting the same implementation of them. This is not really something that is stated explicitly in the text so I wouldn't consider it something that is necessarily "lost" by not reading Higurashi first, but it becomes a very obvious conversation to have once one has finished both works.
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Dec 11, 2018 15:50
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Heaven Will Be Mine. the lesbian mecha pilots visual novel, is out on IOS. It received very strong reviews. RPS loved it
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Dec 11, 2018 17:45
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Talking about Umineko made me remember the anime. It was trash. It did give us 2 good things. #1: That fantastic opening https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtKBs3BbHGs #2: If you hadn't read the VN, it was nice early tickets onto the gently caress Rosa..and well most of the family train
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Dec 11, 2018 20:59
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| # ? Jun 4, 2024 06:44 |
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The ED was better.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQbbZVRW4A0
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Dec 12, 2018 04:07
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