Update One Hundred and Fifty-Two: 8 April 2018

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

Oh my god. Oh my god. It’s been nearly a month and I’m finally done the first half of Umineko.

A spiritual successor to Higurashi When they Cry, Umineko When They Cry takes the murder mystery, fantasy-or-reality, interpersonal drama that results in mass murder from the first series and amps it up to four hundred thousand. Ryukishi07’s writing is a tour de force, a maniacal balancing act of humor and drama and violence. It’s insanely long and hard to keep straight, but holds a human core that is strong enough to support all of the batshit crazy things that happen.

The story revolves around the illustrious Ushiromiya family in 1986. The head patriarch, Ushiromiya Kinzo, owns an island where the main family - his eldest son and his family - live. Once a year, the other three siblings and their families return to the island for a family conference. This year, Kinzo is near death, his inheritance is in question, and the young four siblings desperately need money, and a lot of it. The point of view character is largely Ushiromiya Battler, the oldest child of the third son. He and his three cousins prepare to endure their parents’ infighting and greedy scrabble for money. The island is swallowed up by a typhoon, and remains inaccessible for two days. When the typhoon passes… everyone on the island is dead.

How did it happen? Who did it? Why? Was it a human… or a witch?

Ryukishi07 LOVES mystery stories, and has a lot of knowledge about them. In each arc he sets up mystery after mystery, intricately woven and tied together to confuse not just Battler, but the player, too. Fantasy plays a big role in it, too - there’s a whole hierarchal system of witches that grows over the course of the games, with mythical weapons and creatures and complicated fights out of something like Fate/Stay Night.

But at the beating, gorey heart of it all lies the exquisite, aching human motivations that power and drive the plot, rendered in excruciating, genuine detail. Ryukishi07’s background as a social worker shows as he shows different parts of the human condition, particularly through abused children. No character is truly ‘just bad’ in this sprawling work, and everyone is sympathetic and unsympathetic by turns. Even outright antagonistic characters have depths that are explored, if not in these arcs then in the next ones. Not to mention how besides Battler and Kinzo, every single mover and shaker of the plot is a woman, from ancient 1000 year old witches to 9-year-olds. Beyond some eye-rolling sexist jokes here and there, Umineko does a lot of work in showing women as complex humans who fail and scream and commit acts of huge evil and suffer… and also persevere, protect, overcome, with fierce intelligence. Beatrice is a fascinating antagonist who I can be appalled by but root for at the same time.

That’s not to say this series doesn’t have some faults. It’s huge and bombastic… which can veer into the ridiculous. When these characters lose their shit, they lose their shit and babble and freak out and go nuts in a real genuine way. These characters don’t shut up, which is entertaining… until it isn’t. This game is LONG and a lot, and even I got fatigued near the end of this. This is a game where you should take as many breaks as you need to until you can face it again. I don’t like these mangagamer sprites, so I felt the PS3 graphics mod was required. It takes a little bit to set up.

But this is the Golden VN series, the Endless VN series, and it’s rightfully killed and slaughtered and magicked its way into the annals of VN history. Now that I’ve reread it to confirm it, I can finally officially add it to my Visual Novel Masterlist!

Next up: Oh, I need a reprieve from the gore and dark. I also have a SG win from a while back I should play. Two cats with one stroke!

See you soon!