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The translation plays a big role indeed. When I played Higurashi it was the french version, which is super high quality compared to Umineko's english translation, and that makes a difference. For that bit in your spoiler it's one of the super interesting aspects, it assumes a specific kind of literacy and if you have it you can probably already understand how to approach those bits, but if not you're gonna be taught how to eventually. Let's just say episode 2 was highly controversial back in the day so bringing everyone up to speed concerning how to reason about that was necessary in episode 3. Chev fucked around with this message at 00:36 on Aug 15, 2020 |
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Aug 15, 2020 00:12
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Stefan Prodan posted:I literally don't think I"ve ever read a steam description for anything I've ever played lol in my experience you're not rare but that's also really bloody frustrating because of the number of negative reviews I see left for games complaining about things that were extremely blatantly listed in the description and tags. The most common, of course, being people complaining about how they'd been forced to read for thirty minutes and hadn't found any gameplay yet. In a visual novel.
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Aug 15, 2020 02:33
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gegi posted:in my experience you're not rare but that's also really bloody frustrating because of the number of negative reviews I see left for games complaining about things that were extremely blatantly listed in the description and tags. well sure but that doesn't really quite seem like the same thing as what I'm saying
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Aug 15, 2020 02:40
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Oh, I'm not saying you're doing anything like that, I'm just showing that yeah many people don't read the steam pages.
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Aug 15, 2020 03:13
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Stefan Prodan posted:well sure but that doesn't really quite seem like the same thing as what I'm saying The thing is that Umineko tends to provoke a lot of discussion and analysis and such for long-time fans, but it's just not that relevant for people who are just starting the read. The game ends up speaking for itself. There's not a secretly wrong way to read it or anything.
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Aug 15, 2020 03:13
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Ryukishi's prose in Umineko is just unnecessarily repetitive and over explanarory. For someone who's willing to trust the reader to figure out some pretty out there mysteries, it's weird that he doesn't extend that trust to grasping some basic character interactions and the meaning behind mundane scenes. I don't think there's a single bit of dialogue in the entire VN not directly followed by the narration explaining what you were supposed to get out of it. There are also a lot of overused turns of phrase. In other words, Umineko collapses like a puppet with its strings cut. I am glad that his prose in Ciconia seems to be much better so far.
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Aug 15, 2020 05:49
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AFancyQuestionMark posted:Ryukishi's prose in Umineko is just unnecessarily repetitive and over explanarory. For someone who's willing to trust the reader to figure out some pretty out there mysteries, it's weird that he doesn't extend that trust to grasping some basic character interactions and the meaning behind mundane scenes. I don't think there's a single bit of dialogue in the entire VN not directly followed by the narration explaining what you were supposed to get out of it. Let's spin the chessboard around and see why he'd use repetitive phrasing, and an overabundance of stock phrases
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Aug 15, 2020 05:51
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Gaius Marius posted:Let's spin the chessboard around and see why he'd use repetitive phrasing, and an overabundance of stock phrases Taking this non-sarcastically, yeah, I can see why people would be bugged by it, but it's very much a deliberate choice.
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Aug 15, 2020 05:58
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:I did know that was the premise, but not because the game mentioned it, because it doesn't. I guess that's kind of why I'm surprised it's so slow - if you're front-loading the cool premise so much it's delivered before the game has even started, it just feels odd to then string the reader along for multiple hours of what feels right now like pointless minutiae (yes, I get it, they might actually be clues to the future but it sure doesn't engage me in the moment), when I'm just wondering when the murder mystery is going to start. There was at least one Agatha Christie book that did the same (I think it was Endless Night, or possibly Death on the Nile? Took nearly half the book for death to occur), so I can definitely understand how you feel. That said, sometimes mysteries do need a bit of time to set up.
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Aug 15, 2020 07:35
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One of the strongest traditions of the mystery genre, at least in the west, is eventually learning exactly how much canned beef tongue the mansion had in stock.
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Aug 15, 2020 13:20
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Yeah, there's some Christie novels where the apparent murder (saying apparent because in some cases murders may have already taken place, you as a reader just didn't realize it) doesn't occur and/or the lead detective doesn't appear until like the last quarter. Mysteries are fundamentally about the reader not having all the data on hand and/or not knowing how to assemble it because of a very limited outlook on the situation due to being limited to the subjective and unreliable point of view of the narrator and witnesses, so there's lots of room to play with. Some mystery writers took it really far in some of their novels, and Umineko very much takes after those.
Chev fucked around with this message at 14:01 on Aug 15, 2020 |
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Aug 15, 2020 13:48
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IMO the best things for teaching you how to read the earlier chapters of Umineko are the later chapters of Umineko
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Aug 15, 2020 15:06
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Yeah, I think it's fair to say that the Question Arcs set up the Answer Arcs which set up the Question Arcs.
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Aug 15, 2020 15:24
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This whole discussion is making me wish I wasn’t in too much of a funk to read Hig 8 or Umineko 4. 
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Aug 15, 2020 16:59
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I'm still waiting for my Japanese to get smooth enough to be able to read them without as many interruptions, then one day I too will unlock all the spoiler bars.
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Aug 15, 2020 17:20
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Well, I finished the first chapter, including the tea party and ????. Happily, the game absolutely delivered once the action got going and I'm looking forward to continuing. There are so many mysteries to tease apart, although the presence of Frederica in the ???? segment at least confirms one thing I'd been suspecting from the start.
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Aug 15, 2020 22:26
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Stefan Prodan posted:I'm towards the end of chapter 2 and I guess I still don't get what the mystery is lol When I finished chapter 1 (plus bonus scenes), I found myself, ironically, with zero 'questions' that needed answering. It explained itself quite thoroughly and in no uncertain terms, so that the only question left was 'well, does something else happen then?'. I dropped it when, over the course of chapter 2, no new mysteries have been presented, but a ton of time was spent on characters trying to CSI the crimes that we'd just seen unfold in full detail. Complete with tortured ghosts of the victims standing right next to them screaming 'how can you be so blind!', lol
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Aug 18, 2020 08:34
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I feel like if you fail to notice any mysteries after the VN literally has a character that exists in an abstract reasoning space explicitly outside the regular narrative point each and every one of them out and challenges the protagonist to come up with a non-magical solution for each then that's entirely on you. Like idk what the novel could do to be more explicit in communicating the mysteries the reader could solve if literally listing them out is not enough.
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Aug 18, 2020 09:50
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Yeah, I have plenty of issues with the writing in Umineko, but when the central question is presented as "is magic real or not", taking the explicitly supernatural scenes at face value as literal truth seems baffling to me.
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Aug 18, 2020 10:41
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I mean to me it seems like it's being presented as magic is real because otherwise how are characters doing the thing the previous spoiler just said, the question is whether the character can keep reasoning out like a way for it to maybe not be real and form a convincing defense or something? I dunno, I just finished chapter 2 and it's okay I guess but I'll keep going, it's just kinda confusing what it's going for still and definitely has more words than necessary But yeah still to me after 2 chapters there's no aspect of it that to me leaves any room for there to not be some supernatural element, I have no idea how else to make the things that are being shown make any sense short of everyone being on drugs like that episode of the x files where Scully has an alien in her apartment
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Aug 18, 2020 11:07
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:Well, I finished the first chapter, including the tea party and ????. Happily, the game absolutely delivered once the action got going and I'm looking forward to continuing. There are so many mysteries to tease apart, although the presence of Frederica in the ???? segment at least confirms one thing I'd been suspecting from the start. Hmm maybe I missed a segment I did chapter one and the tea party but I don't remember doing the other thing and I manually unlocked chapter 2 after I lost my saves so maybe I gotta look up the other in between thing you mentioned on YouTube or something
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Aug 18, 2020 11:14
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I believe manually unlocking the second episode should give you access to the ep 1 ????.
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Aug 18, 2020 11:21
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Ok I'll go look I may not clicked and just assumed it was the tea party
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Aug 18, 2020 11:22
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Stefan Prodan posted:I mean to me it seems like it's being presented as magic is real because otherwise how are characters doing the thing the previous spoiler just said
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Aug 18, 2020 12:26
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I've read partway into chapter 2 now (murder is back on the menu, boys) and, like, in terms of mysteries there are a shitload I can think of, mostly from episode 1: - What is Beatrice? Human? Witch? Something else entirely? - Why is Beatrice only visible to certain people (in episode 1)? - Why is Beatrice visible to everyone (in episode 2)? - Why is Beatrice doing any of this? - Why do people seem constantly unsure whether they've actually seen Beatrice or not? - Why does Beatrice seem to behave completely differently depending on who she's interacting with? - Who killed the first six people, and how did they do it? - Why were those specific people killed? - Why was anyone killed in the first place? - How were the people killed? - When did Kinzo die in chapter 1? Who killed him, and how? - Why is Maria like this? - Who positioned the bodies where they did? For what purpose? - What is the purpose of the magic circles everywhere? Who drew them? - What is the meaning of the claw marks on Natsuhi's door? - What is the purpose of the epitaph? - Why is the meaning behind the words in the epitaph? Clearly it's not meant literally. - What is the nature of Purgatory? - Why is Frederica Bernkastel here, if it is her in the first place and not misdirection? - Who is Lambdadelta? Are their motives... complex? - What is the purpose of the mirror Shannon broke? - Why is Kanon so hellbent on the whole furniture business? - Why is Beatrice here? - Is Beatrice here? - Why are the stakes of purgatory anime waifus now? You might say, well, the game told you the answers to some of those already. No. I don't trust anything the game is going to tell me upfront, especially if Beatrice is the one telling me. I've read too many weird mystery novels for that; anything you're told on early on in media like this is 95% obfuscation and 5% truth, and you can't easily tease them apart. On the other hand, maybe Ryukishi07 is banking on that and is just waiting to do some kind of mystery-fiction judo move and use my own suspicion against me. I guess I'll find out. Rampant speculation, most of which is probably dead wrong: One thing that's sticking out like a sore thumb, especially in chapter 2, is how wildly inconsistent everyone's encounters with Beatrice are. In particular, she acts the way people expect her to, or want her to. When she talks to Maria, she's the kindly witch that teaches magic and hands out candy. When she talks to Shannon early on, she's a terrifying yet potent force that you can appeal to for a magical boon (in this case, love) in exchange for a price. When Kanon talks to her, she's a malevolent, hateful being that only wants to inflict suffering on others. And afterwards, her encounters with Shannon veer in this same direction. Sure, part of this is consistent with the idea that she was planning to gently caress everyone over from the start and helping Shannon was just a part of that scheme... but I don't think that's actually true. I think the reason she acts that way is because that's what Kanon expects. He doesn't like the idea that "furniture" can become human, so Beatrice's apparent kindness must be a trick. And so it becomes a trick. And because he's a young boy, him standing up to Beatrice takes the form of a ridiculous anime fight because that's what he expects fighting a witch is like. I'm also suspicious about the rampant quotation marks around the word "exists" when Maria's talking about Beatrice. The Japanese word used in the VO is いる, iru, which does mean "to exist". But 要る, also pronounced iru, means "to be wanted or needed". Maybe I'm overthinking this poo poo, but I'm getting this weird idea that Beatrice exists because people want her or need her to. Does this tie in with Battler's need to disprove that witches even exist? Is that why Purgatory exists - because Battler needs to believe there are no witches, so Beatrice ironically becomes the opportunity he needs to do that? Uh, I guess I'll read on. Brain is full of gently caress. Game is great. Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 14:22 on Aug 18, 2020 |
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Aug 18, 2020 14:19
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:- Who is Lambdadelta? Are their motives... complex?
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Aug 18, 2020 14:54
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Λ Δ
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Aug 18, 2020 14:59
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The only related thing that comes to mind is Higurashi's Plan 34, so, uh... 
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Aug 18, 2020 15:12
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Congratulations, your question is now more complex 
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Aug 18, 2020 15:31
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Wait is berkenstal from higurashi. I was not aware. What'd she do in that game?
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Aug 18, 2020 16:16
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Gaius Marius posted:Wait is berkenstal from higurashi. I was not aware. What'd she do in that game? It's spoilers for Higurashi's late-game plot, so uh, you'll get spoiler answers. But also she didn't do much, it's kind of more of a wink/nod to that game.
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Aug 18, 2020 16:25
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Gaius Marius posted:Wait is berkenstal from higurashi. I was not aware. What'd she do in that game?
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Aug 18, 2020 16:27
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For practical purposes Higurashi isn't required reading. However, Umineko is, beyond its intrinsic attributes, a huge meta-commentary on Higurashi, so you'll get extra value if you've read Higurashi before (or even after like I did), including things designed to drive you mad because you think you're clever having read Higurashi.
Chev fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Aug 18, 2020 |
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Aug 18, 2020 16:54
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Nate RFB posted:Umineko up to ep.2 stuff> Because Beatrice is the storyteller, it's "her version" of the events.
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Aug 18, 2020 17:36
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The third game goes into this explicitly
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Aug 18, 2020 17:42
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woodenchicken posted:Well I guess that flew over my head, when was that established? Cause it didn't... feel that way to me. It's first-person, we are shown people's thoughts, motivations, childhood memories... Looked like good ol' reliable narration.
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Aug 18, 2020 17:47
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No Wave posted:You're not the only one. Players were so misled that Ryukiji ended up dramatically changing the planned narrative of episodes 3 and 4 because of it. Oh neat, is that why Land of the Golden Witch was scrapped?
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Aug 18, 2020 17:50
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Yeah Land would've been the third episode instead of Banquet. Some elements of it were used in later episodes.
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Aug 18, 2020 17:51
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woodenchicken posted:Looked like good ol' reliable narration. Honey
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Aug 18, 2020 18:23
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I think I've said it in this thread before but as a WTC diehard, the general thing I tell people is "all of them are standalone and you can read them in any order and be fine, but if you know you're interested in all three you'll get something out of reading them in order." Ryukishi really likes to comment on and question the ideas of his previous works, beyond just lore nods. That said, enough of the western WTC fandom read Umineko before Higurashi (whether due to Umineko's slightly better reputation in some circles or because of the Steam release schedule) that I think pretending you have to read Higurashi before Umineko would be kind of disingenuous.
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Aug 18, 2020 18:48
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