Subarashii
Forget the Golden Witch discussion and notes plurk. Idk about how long it is, but given it took a small amount of time comparitively to get to the first twilight, I feel I might be able to get the story being told done tonight.
lily!
It took me a few hours with EXHAUSTIVE note-taking and speculating to get to the point where the game asks you for answers.
lily!
The problem is that I'm still stuck on one problem there, ha.
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TheDoomkitten: also doom, remind me to link you to R3 one of these days, since that was essentually me doing an umineko fanwork as a murdergame mod
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(with help from maple, who was v good)
lily!
oooh yeah I am quite curious about that
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it was a tiring one because I wrote a fantasy story for EVERY SINGLE MURDER since the mechanic of the round was that characters had to prove via blue truths a 'truth' the witch would accept
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i.e. 'Was this Murder a Mystery, or a Fantasy?'
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ANYWAY THOUGH BACK TO THIS FANWORK
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one last thign is I am lowkey pissed the dw code push completely borked the code I used for the game because I took HOURS getting everything right and it looked like the ui the game had
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ANYWAY
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FIRST OFF: The rules of the game
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- There is only one Culprit.
- The Culprit is defined as 'The one who kills.'
- Everyone else is innocent.
- Innocent Characters may not hide important information or intentionally mislead other characters. This means they are allowed to be mistaken.
- Statements in Purple are absolute truth UNLESS spoken by the Culprit, who is allowed to lie.
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- The Culprit is someone involved in the story.
- The Culprit is a Human Being.
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SO! first off, these rules give a SHITTON of wiggle room
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While also giving supporting information
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As someone in the higher meta mentions, This doesn't exclude supernatural shit happening. The game page and the name of the game itself may tell us to forget the witch, but I'm onto you author
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Secondly, no accomplices, AND we get told a single person is the murderer.
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Also, no 'turns out it was old man mcsteve who we've never mentioned lol'
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anyway, onto the contradictions.
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Something I've noticed in retrospect after re-reading to get the rules is that battler mentions 'I've spent the last 6 years in my grandma's kitchen eating her mashed potatoes'
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Asumu, from the first twilight, is apparently alive.
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or well, apparently is UNTIL the first twilight
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In canon, at least, Battler only goes to his grandparents due to a fight he has over rudolf and his relationship with kyrie
lily!
In canon, Ushiromiya Beatrice doesn't exist.
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I was getting that
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it's less contradictions and more 'okay, shit to note until later'
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more specifically, the implication beatrice's mom still died is. hm
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and kinzo confirms he hasn't seen battler for 6 years. interesting.
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lol nanjo trying to change the subject repeatedly
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the more things change...
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'the portrait in the hall, though....why has her face been ripped off?'
'because her face doesn't matter.'
A H.
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this, coupled with 'the golden witch will be revived.....yes, yes, I see what you're going for, author'
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the mention of asumu never panicking is interesting
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innnnteresting
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'with the way things are going, this could be our last conversation, you know.' jiiii
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noting the letters were still being written, though.
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AND TO THE HIGHER META
lily!
I was nodding along and going "okay, so this is an AU where Sayo was kept at Kuwadorian for a while or something then, alright-" and then Shannon showed up and that's when I decided to throw all of my assumptions out the window
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I mean, that's pretty evident from a certain man being alive (kinzo)
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kinzo in canon is ALWAYS DEAD when battler returns from 6 years away
lily!
Fair, ha. But the existence of "Ushiromiya Beatrice" as a discrete, new character really hammered in home that trying to extrapolate the situation or assume XYZ is true because it was true in canon was really useless.
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'we preferred not having mystery scenes' HOW BARE
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dare*
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the thing is, it's a bad idea to throw away ALL canon assertations.
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after all, the game is made for those who've read the series to the end
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I'm noting the differences because that's how you figure out the 'AU' being played out here
lily!
True, but during my own playthrough I found it more broadly useful to assume that nothing is like I remember it unless it's implied to be the same.
lily!
Like, for example, the letters continuing to flow back and forth is evidence that there's some kind of preexisting relationship between Battler and Shannon, but also that it was massively different and obviously those differences changed the course of things here.
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well, yeah. I just think at least for me, I can keep the au of this story seperate from canon while also being able to compare and contrast, especially given the whole conciet of the story is couched in
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'this was written by a dead umineko fan on a forum'
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ANYWAY though something I do note is the strange panic of the narrator in the higher meta portion, and the repeated mention of 'I'm not a bad person' in regard to his friend who apparently died of suicide
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anxiety over not being able to tell the other people of the forum the truth? Or is this layer where the real 'fantasy' of the piece resides?
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I'm suspecting that might be the case, but it's still early. onwards to the first twilight.
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OH ACTUALLY
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https://images.plurk.com/7FbFB1t0ZSyUATaeNQf3Vx.png wow I can't believe they'd bully featherine like this
TC
lmao
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the author being tohya, the other people being Vergil, BBag, and ang3l
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with the narrator's handle being NILE
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an almost perfect note from this dead friend, who they are SO SURE they knew committed suicide but never met in person
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and 'tohya' mentioning the story will 'answer all the questions' and that '[NILE] will tell them [I'm dead] when the time is right'
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with NILE panicking about the people on the forum reading the story but then deciding it was okay, with the repeated refrain 'I'm not a bad person'
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from the game page:
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You need not hunt for a witch. For there is no witch to find.

Forget her.

Forget all of it.

There are only people. And the monsters that wear human faces hiding among them.
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the higher meta, after all, is still robed in purple.
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just little thoughts, nothing gamebreaking. but it'd be nice if the actual fantasy lies there, instead of the game we're all so familiar with.
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okay, first twilight:
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- all of the parents are dead! most of the servants are unnacounted for, along with george, jessica, and maria.
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AH THERES OUR FIRST PURPLE
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okay so one of the things I noticed: there's no purple BEFORE the first twilight. so no statements before this can be taken as absolute truth.'
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https://images.plurk.com/12YdUCZmNMttOZTossKIEz.png explicitly not showing us the expressions, huh....
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'The golden witch will be revived!'
'Why is there no face on the portrait?'
'The face doesn't matter.'
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....hm. hm hm hm. battler, you feelin alright, bud?
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ANNNND more death! not doing the twilight stuff, eh? I guess that fits a purple tale.
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anyway, all of the Older Servants are dead. Shannon is still alive, and kanon...hasn't been mentioned. For now, he's Sir-Not-Appearing-In-This-Story.'
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aaah, this is a modified version of that one trick
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probably with a different trick, I think
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and there's finally the key. A three room connected trick, huh?
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parents were very clearly stated to be dead in purple, none of the other bodies were. /jots that down
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phones not out, but a six hour time limit. Hm hm hm
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something else inherently interesting is a detective was never declared in the rules, meaning EVERYONE is a suspect.
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then again, I guess that's the whole thing of the purple.
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https://images.plurk.com/FHWhAy6gj4SnNQ1poBaWH.png mmmwelp.
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https://images.plurk.com/2jg7qnPSlrqlcZA4ssRp1q.png MMMWELP
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https://images.plurk.com/6Lj68UzuTT9swvW99xExSj.png aight, theres the purple regarding them
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ah, i see. the higher meta is being treated as a prelim thinking chamber, huh?
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easy way to trip up your readers, at least.
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ah. now it's claiming there's someone using the account within tohya's wishes?
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CONFIRMATION TOHYA WAS MURDERED I FUCKING KNEW IT
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https://images.plurk.com/6NbGEnSQ9ymPK0Aro7qCKT.png did I really guess the twist from the fucking start based on SH2 vibes
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https://images.plurk.com/6sbMmiUrqiJGvApFVdIYoo.png looks at nile's first extreme panic about the story
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sips tea
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I'm more surprised for umineko fans none of them are explicitly going 'hey, I remember this!'
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because that was my first thought after reading it
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'Don't tell me...this is exciting for you?'
'They weren't my family, Battler.' DAMN, SHANNON
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ICE COLD
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head ring stolen, huh.
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'the fact that I'm even alive shows you had no respect for her as a human being'
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.........ah. did, uh. did the incest still happen
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aaaand nanjo's down
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........wait, has shanon been seen interacting alone with anyone OTHER than battler? probably tbh
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huh. battler's acting a little more in character now.
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??? wait, erika was with shanon and battler? even though before this, we'd only seen erika with nanjo and battler with shanon?
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ah, beato gonna beato
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so there was apparently a killer who killed their family and looked like a sole survivor, and tohya got called by said killer who tracked him down and threatened him
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aaaand kinzo got everyone still alive off the island
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hm. so this is saying asumu knew about the cheating and was fine wi....
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....
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battlers not screaming on the boat
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'she wanted me to meet someone'
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also the talk with shannon and beato...hm....
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'WHO STABBED SHANON'
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me: I. is it not obvious??
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and yep, kinzo blew up the island
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ok, doneso. time to try and solve, then.
lily!
please give me your thought process on the first locked room
lily!
i am STILL grappling with it, it's an intense bitch
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I will admit I'm reading the first hint just to get a bit more clear definitions and insight into how the author works
lily!
i did that too
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gonna admit I'm not a real fan of the author stating the fantasy scenes only had a point of confusing the reader and characters
lily!
I think the intent was "fantasy scenes in works that are not Umineko's main canon"
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I'm just sitting here like 'idk how you missed one of the MAJOR POINTS OF UMINEKO but okay I guess'
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I mean, I feel they appeal to certain people. like, uh, me, because god do I ever love analyizing shit
lily!
oh yeah absolutely same
lily!
i do agree with you
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but I also get why some people wou;dn't like them, but i'm just
lily!
also i AM you, gestures at how often i rambled about the ridiculous fantasy scenes in umi as a whole lmao
lily!
i do think forget is a story that works better without the fantasy scenes tho
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oh yeah, that's because it's SUPER traditional mystery story
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I will admit atm I am working on shanon being the culprit, not because of metalore, but just because she's the one often most not supported by purple. I'll have to run through statements like I do in order to see if it's viable or not.
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because....and this is something this person probably realized - is purple games have a massive flaw
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specifically speaking, you can determine a culprit simply by doing a VERY CLASSIC logic puzzle
lily!
How so?
lily!
(Shannon is very much not my guess but I'm curious about your logic here.)
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simple. Take everyone's statements into account. whichever statment directly contradicts another statement when taking what the 'goal' is of what they're talking about into account.
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the puzzle of 'there's a situation that three people saw, one person did it. two are telling the truth, and one is lying. the person that is lying is the culprit.'
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you can LITERALLY use this to solve the puzzle in ep 8. It's what I did
lily!
Huh, interesting.
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a purple tale is just a much more complex version of that puzzle, but the author themselves state that anyone who isn't the culprit isn't purposefully hiding things back.
lily!
I discounted Shannon out of hand largely because if she's the culprit, the mystery is no longer interesting and there's not really a game to engage with anymore, since a lot of her purples are foundational to setting up the rules of the game and mystery.
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the thing is
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that's extremely Trad
lily!
Plus, I agree that it'd be... really hard to "take herself by surprise" in the final murder.
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I think, though.
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as was pointed out in the text.
lily!
...fair.
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remember, they can't lie. but they can supposition or be mistaken.
lily!
Tohya's writing style does tend to do out of left field things.
lily!
And that's true with the white text, but NOT the purple text.
lily!
Purple text is still as good as red truth as long as an innocent says it.
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https://images.plurk.com/77R87QYiQVQPre713AZVFX.png
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again, it's about wording.
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it's NOT ALWAYS the truth. hell, though this author clearly subscribes to the red being absolute, it really....isn't? it's more like a subjective truth. The most 'absolute' truth in the umineko series is the Gold Truth.
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anyway, semantics.
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(I was mostly like CAN I GET A DECRIPTION OF THE GRIP ON THE KNIFE THEY ARE RIGHT THERE)
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(since you actually can tell if a wound was self inflicted vs inflicted on with knives due to grip position)
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an 'I think' in that part isn't good enough confirmation, at least for me. ANYWAY, I'll go back and look at the first murder again.
lily!
The thing that honestly most convinces me that Shannon isn't the murderer are two tiny details about her death:
lily!
The diegetic sound effect of something metallic dropping, and the detail of her having a 50-yen coin.
lily!
I'm pretty sure she was trying to tell the others something right before she died.
lily!
I'll keep my theories out of your plurk, though.
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that is true, but reading the author's thoughts on the purple just is like 'ah. this is exactly the kind of dude ryu railed against before giving up and writing ep 3, huh'
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'I came up with the crimes and then wove the purples around them' I. okay, as someone who actually used red/blue, this feels OBSCENELY insulting
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sorry this is turning into 'eski rants about mystery' but like
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I will say one of the things about having the fantasy is that it genuinely gives more life to the whole thing
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done well, and considering who's telling the fantasy, the stuff in it can actually be clues and tell you more about the characters involved
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like, if this ISN'T wordplay or logic based, then why have it be a purple story to begin with?
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because with that in mind, you can just FUCKING REMOVE THEM and use ACTUAL MYSTERY NOVEL LOGIC in order to solve!
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UGHHHHHHHHHHHH
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in which case: Battler did it.
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okay yeah, I'm sorry, but a lot of the author comments are genuinely souring me on the work.
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at this point I don't care enough to actually try solving it when the author is basically shitting on everything I loved about umineko, no offense.
It's Nick
What sort of comments?
lily!
i really think you're attributing malice that isn't there
lily!
the author clearly respects what umineko did and how it told its story
lily!
but this is a story about umineko and they want to do it differently to accommodate that
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I mean it's more that saying 'wordplay bad' is, honestly, kind of going to sour me, as well as saying fantasy is basically only confusing and exists only to get the player and characters upset
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and while yeah, I do get that they might respect it, but they didn't....actually seem to get the heart of the actual story
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it's more me saying 'sorry chief this isn't for me' and bouncing, especially when I'd been all for it rrrrright up until I read the first two hints and got That
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like I get it! but...idk how to even mention this.
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I appreciate what the author tried to do, and honestly stuff like this takes a lot of work.
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but I'm just finding myself going....if you basically wrote this like just a mystery novel but with explicitly stated rules....why have it be purple at all?
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why not just say 'here's my au forgey guys' and not have the purple conceit at all? like an actual mystery novel?
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like, okay, I had this as an example when I ran r3
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Doom, you know the steamed hams clip?
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lily!
oh yeah
lily!
i've also seen "steamed hams but it's a fully playable episode of umineko no naku koro ni"
lily!
it's good
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yeah
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that's what I mean by like, someone going
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'fantasy is only there to confuse the readers/the characters'
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good fantasy always has an inherent logic to it that also by definition gives more depth to the person 'running' the fantasy
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chalmers even using the red to state 'professor skinner's mother was not in the building' is the exact kind of wordplay ACTIVELY USED IN UMINEKO, that the author clearly doesn't like
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(because professor chalmers in the simpson isn't ACTUALLY chalmers, he's his war buddy who took over his life when the real chalmers died)
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but the author here would argue things like that are nice but in the long run just bog things down
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okay, i'm just kind of meh about it now, but fine. if the author wants their story done like just a 'howdunnit', then let's go.
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alright. when logically thinking about it, nanjo's death is only capable by either battler, shannon, or erika.
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...ah. yep, battler stole the ring. he was the only one in the story to enter the study.
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he's also the one to knock on the door, when erika admonishes him because 'we don't know who's in there'
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small calber, i.e 'something small enough to hide on your person.'
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gunshot means it's either an actual pistol, or something that uses gunpowder as a firing mechanism. either is easy to conceal and use at close range, and would be easy to slam a door shut after.
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honestly, i'm getting frustrated because for a lot of these you have to take a logical leap
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because there's not enough concrete evidence
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OKAY NO, THE ACTUAL ANSWER IS ABSOLUTE GARBAGE.
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if you're going to change the setting that much, then DON'T FUCKING CALL IT A FANGAME.
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not when shit has been changed SO MUCH that it's basically ocs with umineko trappings
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like, I am genuinely upset at this, not to mention it's just 'the person you think would be the most obvious culprit is the most obvious culprit'
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'just for different, MUCH more contrived reasons'
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also: if this is true, battler had zero fucking reason to not act like ACTUAL GODDAMN BATTLER
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throws hat on the ground
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FUCK THIS SHIT
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the answer is 'guess what, there's nothing clever! it's just the person who's always the culprit in this shit'
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also you can tell in retrospect they made the COOL MURDURZ first and made the plot second
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UGH
yukkie。
oh man is it really that bad
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LEN ARE YOU ON DISCORD LET ME RANT AT YOU
It's Nick
Golly, now I'm curious what it is
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