[Game] Umineko - Spoilers, Theories, Interpretations

[AuraTwilight]

Because it's easier for people not in on the plan to realize things are sneaky through Shkanon. I mean, what if the cousins split up to check on the corpses? Yasu can't be in two places at once.

[Cao Ni Ma]

Originally Posted by LyricalAura

Yes, a corollary would be that "somebody besides Battler was still alive on the 5th", and that's probably unsupportable given Battler's investigation.

The mechanism could work in way like requiring 2 strikes of 12 o'clock to complete the circuit that triggers the explosion. It wouldn't be hard at all. But without any absolute confirmation on the matter, we cannot discard the possibility that its a single strike mechanism. In that case its probable that someone else started it up after noon.

[Jan-Poo]

Originally Posted by AuraTwilight

Because it's easier for people not in on the plan to realize things are sneaky through Shkanon. I mean, what if the cousins split up to check on the corpses? Yasu can't be in two places at once.

What would happen? "Oh shit! The corpses vanished!"
I think it did happen in a few episodes in fact.

[rogerpepitone]

How about this timeline for Episode 4?

October 4:
11:45 - 11:55 PM: Battler talks with "Beatrice" (Shannon) in front of the mansion.
11:57: Battler gets key from outside chapel. Shannon grabs the chapel key on her way out.

October 5:
12:02 AM: Battler returns to the mansion. Shannon makes her way to the garden shed.
12:07 AM: Battler finds first twilight victims. Shannon gets the key from Gohda.
12:09 AM: Battler still searching dining room. Shannon kills Gohda & Kumasawa.
12:15 AM: Battler searches mansion. Shannon goes to chapel.
12:20 AM: Battler still searching mansion. Shannon sets bomb.
12:30 AM: Battler still searching mansion. Shannon kills self by well.
6:00 AM: Battler leaves mansion. Finds bodies of Krauss, Nanjo, Shannon.

[Tazar]

But if Yasu did flip the switch then somehow Eva found out, and I'm not sure how that would happen without Yasu telling her. Plus there had to be some kind of individual killings going on, because Eva would not leave George and Hideyoshi behind unless she knew they were dead.

Well, in the Tea Party in EP7, we are shown that Eva & the other adults solve the Epitaph, and are met in the Golden Room by Beatrice. Immediatly, Beatrice explains the Bomb Mechanism on the clock, and tells them that it is currently on "off".

Eva doesn't believe her, and tries to change it's setting. If the other adults weren't there, Rokkenjima would have exploded that night.

Maybe Eva switched it (Thinking it was on "On", when it really was on "Off", which means that she accidentally activated it) and stayed to protect the clock (And left Hideyoshi and George)

And then at midnight the Bomb Exploded. This would mean that there's not really ONE culprit, and that the tragedy was just an accident.

Still, this has a lot of rough edges. What would Eva do with Beatrice? I don't think she would let this strange person wander about the island and let her do whathever she wants (Which would be dangerous)

And, is the room with the switch safe from the explosion? If it wasn't, it means that Eva might have panicked at the last second and left the room, leaving her family behind.

[Renall]

Originally Posted by rogerpepitone

How about this timeline for Episode 4?
...
October 5:
12:02 AM: Battler returns to the mansion. Shannon makes her way to the garden shed.
12:07 AM: Battler finds first twilight victims. Shannon gets the key from Gohda.
12:09 AM: Battler still searching dining room. Shannon kills Gohda & Kumasawa.
12:15 AM: Battler searches mansion. Shannon goes to chapel.
12:20 AM: Battler still searching mansion. Shannon sets bomb.
12:30 AM: Battler still searching mansion. Shannon kills self by well.
6:00 AM: Battler leaves mansion. Finds bodies of Krauss, Nanjo, Shannon.

The issue here, of course, is that the bomb setting has to work one of two ways:

• It responds to the clock striking 12. In this case, it should explode at noon or midnight, whichever comes first, and thus to go off at midnight it has to be set at or after 12:01 PM. Your timeline won't work this way, but neither would ep4's final scenario based on evidence (Battler sees Shannon's body sometime between 6 AM and noon).
• It responds to actually being 00:00 somehow. I don't know how it would do that, but it'd basically have to be electronic in some fashion as a mechanical clock does not distinguish between noon and midnight unless it specifically has a separate mechanism to display AM and PM (and we don't know, but this one might). However, based on the evidence of the ep4 timeline it seems reasonable to believe either of these mechanisms is in place, and thus it only goes off at 00:00.

Otherwise somebody has to be alive and set the bomb after 12:00 PM on October 5th. So it seems likely that the detonator somehow distinguishes AM/PM.

I've seen clocks (albeit not grandfather clocks) that have an AM/PM display that's mechanically controlled by just switching over when the clock strikes 12. So one would just assume the clock has this and that the detonator is only active if (1) the "detonator switch" is set ON, (2) the clock's hands are both at 12, and (3) the AM/PM setting is set to AM.

The way I see it is there might be a circuit. At 12 an electrical pulse is sent out. If the detonator switch isn't active or the AM/PM switch is set to PM, the circuit is not completed and the pulse never reaches the detonator. With the detonator switch set ON, at 12 AM a pulse is sent out to a completed circuit. This would require no electronics, only sufficient knowledge of electricity and a battery in the clock, all of which Kinzo would have the knowledge to construct as a military engineer.

[Wanderer]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

What would happen? "Oh shit! The corpses vanished!"
I think it did happen in a few episodes in fact.

Happened in EP2 and EP4. In EP1 it made Nanjo's and Hideyoshi's lie necessary (otherwise Yasu could just play dead as the 6th victim), and even Will called it a "risky game from the start" because of that. In EP3 it created another unnecessary complication since Yasu had to convince everyone that Kanon and Shannon were both dead at the same time in two different places.

From a killer's standpoint, it's a pointless liability.

Originally Posted by Tazar

Maybe Eva switched it (Thinking it was on "On", when it really was on "Off", which means that she accidentally activated it) and stayed to protect the clock (And left Hideyoshi and George)

And then at midnight the Bomb Exploded. This would mean that there's not really ONE culprit, and that the tragedy was just an accident.

I'm pretty certain the room isn't safe from the explosion, mainly for these two reasons:

• Kinzo's idea with the clock was supposedly that he would erase everything, including himself and his gold.
• The secret gold chamber does not seem too far from the mansion and the explosion from 900 tons of explosives is supposedly going to create a crater over a km in diameter.

Originally Posted by Tazar

And, is the room with the switch safe from the explosion? If it wasn't, it means that Eva might have panicked at the last second and left the room, leaving her family behind.

Technically possible, but completely inconsistent with Eva's characterization.

Originally Posted by Renall

The issue here, of course, is that the bomb setting has to work one of two ways...

From the EP7 Tea Party:
Beatrice: "......If 24:00 arrives when the switch is in this position, the bombs will explode."
Natsuhi: "B, but it's almost 24:00 now......"
Kyrie: "In other words, it won't explode X hours after you flip it. ......It's a time limit bomb that only explodes at midnight."
Beatrice: "Indeed."

[cronnoponno]

Originally Posted by Tazar

And, is the room with the switch safe from the explosion? If it wasn't, it means that Eva might have panicked at the last second and left the room, leaving her family behind.

No, otherwise there wouldn't have been a problem with Rosa and Eva's argument about blowing up the gold.

[Kylon99]

By the way, about the reveal to to the siblings about the Murder Game...

I think we did get a scene and example of this in EP2 when all the adults bowed down and acknowledged 'Beatrice.' So maybe she doesn't specifically reveal herself as Yasu, but 'Beatrice' instead? (And she assumes in her writing that her disguises are good enough to distinguish her from Yasu, Shannon or Kanon?)


Heh... I remember that scene now. I kept thinking it was some sort of production error; "How can Rosa and the other siblings be in the church, when Rosa acts like she was never in the church later?" Of course... should've just took the *simplest* answer... but I kept going.. "Noooo... can't be! Must be a messed up background, right?" 8)

[cronnoponno]

Something I just thought of....

Erika claims to have listened to Battler sleeping all until the discovery of the crime, correct? Doesn't she also believe that they were already dead at the time? The cousins...

So, naturally, she wouldn't hear their breathing.




Now, when Battler apparently makes his claim about him killing them after his scream, her natural response should have been ''Bullshit, I didn't hear their breathing!'', or did she actually hear them breathe?

I can't wrap my head around this, I might be missing something, but this sounds really odd...

[Kylon99]

I don't think she heard their breathing per se; just that nothing occurred other than normal sleeping breathing, I think. She was basically listening to ensure that no crime was committed and she assumed she would be able to hear a knife stab, shout or muffled scream or something.

At the time, I don't think she was ready to think all 6 would be killed, although she's role-playing as a detective would. She basically suspects (or she says her piece does) that a murder would occur and that it would've been Battler that would've been killed. That is rather natural considering that's how most detective novels start out.

[Jan-Poo]

Originally Posted by Renall

The issue here, of course, is that the bomb setting has to work one of two ways:

• It responds to the clock striking 12. In this case, it should explode at noon or midnight, whichever comes first, and thus to go off at midnight it has to be set at or after 12:01 PM. Your timeline won't work this way, but neither would ep4's final scenario based on evidence (Battler sees Shannon's body sometime between 6 AM and noon).
• It responds to actually being 00:00 somehow. I don't know how it would do that, but it'd basically have to be electronic in some fashion as a mechanical clock does not distinguish between noon and midnight unless it specifically has a separate mechanism to display AM and PM (and we don't know, but this one might). However, based on the evidence of the ep4 timeline it seems reasonable to believe either of these mechanisms is in place, and thus it only goes off at 00:00.

Otherwise somebody has to be alive and set the bomb after 12:00 PM on October 5th. So it seems likely that the detonator somehow distinguishes AM/PM.

I've seen clocks (albeit not grandfather clocks) that have an AM/PM display that's mechanically controlled by just switching over when the clock strikes 12. So one would just assume the clock has this and that the detonator is only active if (1) the "detonator switch" is set ON, (2) the clock's hands are both at 12, and (3) the AM/PM setting is set to AM.

The way I see it is there might be a circuit. At 12 an electrical pulse is sent out. If the detonator switch isn't active or the AM/PM switch is set to PM, the circuit is not completed and the pulse never reaches the detonator. With the detonator switch set ON, at 12 AM a pulse is sent out to a completed circuit. This would require no electronics, only sufficient knowledge of electricity and a battery in the clock, all of which Kinzo would have the knowledge to construct as a military engineer.

To be honest, I'm not really sure that Ryuukishi thought about that, but there are two facts that make it more reasonable for a more reliable device to exist.

The first is the issue that you explained. What I'm confident about is that in Ryuukishi's mind the bomb can only explode at midnight (whether he thought about the fact that for a grandfather clock noon and midnight are indistiguishable or not).

The second is that it is said that the bomb exploded at exactly midnight, not a minute less or more. Those old style clocks aren't that reliable.

It is not impossible, and it is actually more plausible, that the grandfather clock is just a facade for a more complex and reliable device. The mechanical clock arrows might be connected to that device rather than their original equally mechanical set of gears and weights.

So we might just pretend it's that.

Originally Posted by cronnoponno

Something I just thought of....

Erika claims to have listened to Battler sleeping all until the discovery of the crime, correct? Doesn't she also believe that they were already dead at the time? The cousins...

So, naturally, she wouldn't hear their breathing.

Now, when Battler apparently makes his claim about him killing them after his scream, her natural response should have been ''Bullshit, I didn't hear their breathing!'', or did she actually hear them breathe?

I can't wrap my head around this, I might be missing something, but this sounds really odd...

Nothing in Episode 5 makes sense. If there is a "truth" it's well hidden under several blankets of falsehoods. You can't even be sure that Erika was there at all. Considering how Ryuukishi dealt with the issue of people numbers in EP3 and EP6, the red truths aren't worth a dime in this case.

[ndqanh_vn]

One more question from me. I just re-read Bernskatel letter. As you remember, she mentioned about rule X, Y and Z just like the opening of Minagoroshi-hen in Higurashi.

But the rule X, Y, Z in Higurashi is rather literal and easy to understand. In Umineko case, for some reason Bern chooses to speak in a very cryptic way. As the main game is practically over, what is your possibly interpretation of the rule Ryukishi set to his game? (Again, I don't know whether this has been discussed before or not.

Lambda-Delta boasted that I will ‘absolutely’ not be able to win in this game board.
At that time, I paradoxically identified the rule X.
She’s really a stupid girl.
In other words, it’s like the story that always starts from June, 20th.
Probably, this is the core of the Witch Beatrice.

I well forgot what happened in the time June 20th (I'm really bad with word). Do anybody know what she;s talking about?

She opened up a world that I, that girl and you didn't know.
The rule Y that makes it into the source of the magic.
It seems Lambda-Delta touched it a bit but too, but she can't possibly reach her level

Really cannot make sense of this.

What on earth could such a maze with bad affinity with me be...?
There's only one thing I can think of.
In other words, ...... it is a maze where it's meaningless to write maps.
Would it be alright to say that, for example, it is a maze of indefinite shape that constantly changes the shape, flexibly?

It has been discussed before, I guess, but is rule Z refered to the multiple-cuprit theory? That everybody has the change to kill and everything that happened maybe just some accident? Or it just mentioned about the massive amount of speculation people could have on the truth in Rockenjima?

Sorry if I was asking basic thing, but even when I finished, I still don't understand Bern letter.

[UsagiTenpura]

For Y and Z I have some ideas.

Y is probably that "writing a mystery story but remove the part where the culprit is revealed turning it into a fantasy story". Ryuukishi said that arc 3 the Y rule failed or didn't apply or something along that line (forgot sorry) and it's the only question arc where a human culprit arise (Eva, even tho she's the wrong culprit, she's not a fantasy culprit at least) and is declared as such by the main character/detective.
(Side note: The more I think about that idea, the more I think that's probably Beatrice's goal and overall what makes the people in the story claim it's such a special story. Beatrice probably wanted to write a fantasy story, but instead of writing it directly as a fantasy story, she used that logic of writing a mystery story, leaving it unsolved, and "writing" the fantasy story over it. "A fantasy story weaved out of mystery". LD touching her level probably refers to Takano/Oyashiro-Sama)

Z sounds like the author has a level of liberty into altering the story based on readers' theories. Ryuukishi certainly did that. Land was removed and changed into Banquet, Alliance had Kinzo's death status unveiled (orriginally he planned to reveal it in arc 5 only) and I read that Virgilia was orriginally supposed to be more like Erika then the Virgilia we know.
I read also that Natsuhi was made the "wrong culprit" in arc 5 because she's the one the japanese fanbase most suspected of being the culprit.
It also seems like Ryuukishi wasn't sure at all how many arcs would be in all of Umineko until pretty late (was it around arc 6's release that he said it could be 7 arcs long, or 8 or even 9?).
So yeah, in any case, he treated his story in a very flexible way.
Even within the story they make such references with Battler's ideas being later used by Beatrice (goats and Goldsmith).

At least to me it makes sense that the "Y" rule I explained is the source of magic and that the "Z" causes that flexibility maze thing.

For X I'm more lost. Since LD says "absolutely" not be able to win that game, well in Higurashi figuring out the truth wasn't enough for Rika to win, she had to still survive.
It probably refers to everyone dying at midnight of the second day no matter what (outside of rare exceptions) or else to the epitaph murders, but I'm not very confident in that. It could also be the entire serie of events that "has to happen in any given arc for it to fulfil what Beatrice wanted the arcs to be". It'd include things like Maria meeting Beatrice in the garden (or something similar to that).

[Wanderer]

Originally Posted by ndqanh_vn

One more question from me. I just re-read Bernskatel letter. As you remember, she mentioned about rule X, Y and Z just like the opening of Minagoroshi-hen in Higurashi.

Where did this letter appear? This is the first time I remember seeing it.

Anyway, it's very interesting. Here's what I read into it:

X- feels like a reference to Higurashi with the June 20th part. I think that Bernkastel has judged Lambda to have set up a game board which has a "certain" Bad End, similar to Higurashi.

Y- It's about the cat-box of infinite possibilities; it's about how there is no way to know for sure what the truth of Rokkenjima is. It makes magic possible.

Spoiler for Higurashi:

I think the part about "Lambda-Delta" touching it is a reference to Higurashi and the cat-box that Takano tried to create.

Z- Bernkastel's ability is to always find a way to succeed as long as it's possible to do so, so "A maze of bad affinity with her" would have to be a maze with no way out, right? Of course there is a way out in Umineko, but it's the fantasy route. Apparently, Bernkastel doesn't have good affinity with fantasy? Basically, Beatrice made a "maze" where the only way out is to imagine it. Lambda (Willpower) can do that, but Bernkastel (Probability) can't.

[ndqanh_vn]

Originally Posted by Wanderer

Where did this letter appear? This is the first time I remember seeing it.

.

The full letter is here. It is a seperate TIPS released from a long time ago. I don't remember when but certainly before the time we know that Bern is a bitch.

http://umineko.wikia.com/wiki/TIPS/B...tel%27s_Letter

http://umineko.wikia.com/wiki/TIPS/B...tel%27s_Letter





Well, I checked and the only thing X could refered to is Higurashi, Hinamizawa disaster is caused on 22 June

Spoiler for Higurashi:

Rika must be dead around 20 June

But it made no sense to have a Higurashi reference here...

Originally Posted by UsagiTenpura

At least to me it makes sense that the "Y" rule I explained is the source of magic and that the "Z" causes that flexibility maze thing.

F

Um, I guess it basically what he means. So the first is the inevitable bad end, the second is the nature of her so called endless magic, and the third is...whatever it is...

I think I understand it a bit clearer now, but still very blur...

[UsagiTenpura]

If I remember well Bern's letter/LD's letter and the anti-mystery vs anti-fantasy letter all came out soon after arc 3's release.

[Renall]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

To be honest, I'm not really sure that Ryuukishi thought about that, but there are two facts that make it more reasonable for a more reliable device to exist.

The first is the issue that you explained. What I'm confident about is that in Ryuukishi's mind the bomb can only explode at midnight (whether he thought about the fact that for a grandfather clock noon and midnight are indistiguishable or not).

The second is that it is said that the bomb exploded at exactly midnight, not a minute less or more. Those old style clocks aren't that reliable.

It is not impossible, and it is actually more plausible, that the grandfather clock is just a facade for a more complex and reliable device. The mechanical clock arrows might be connected to that device rather than their original equally mechanical set of gears and weights.

So we might just pretend it's that.

The problem with that is that Kinzo's apparently had this thing for a while. Unless he goes in and reconfigures it every 10-15 years he's not going to have access to accurate modern timekeeping devices like electronic digital timers. The circuit I described making use of a mechanical clock's moving pieces was proposed specifically because Kinzo would have definite access to all necessary pieces and the clock itself (and thus the mechanism) would be relatively low-power and thus possible to activate, probably even if the clock itself wasn't wound properly. One presumes you could actually detonate the clock at any time by just pushing the hands until they're reading 00:00. If there's a more complex failsafe than that, Kinzo would've had to have added it in the 60s or 70s.

I agree with you that Ryukishi probably didn't think about how this could work. But I actually do think it could work, not just using only 1940s technology, but using only 1940s technology Kinzo probably already had. All he'd need to do is add a few things to the interior mechanisms of the clock.

As to it not being accurately 00:00... well, so what? It's pretty much never exactly, indisputibly 00:00 in mutiple places at the same time. Clocks vary constantly and unless Kinzo had wired the thing up to an incredibly accurate atomic clock (which he wouldn't do even if he could), "when this clock hits midnight" is close enough to "midnight" for me. Besides, Genji probably wound all the clocks in the house, so they were all probably set to as similar a time as he could manage.

[Jan-Poo]

Well first it was at least 1950 technology since the Mansion was built a few years after that (and I presume the secret rooms in the tunnels near it as well). I'm not sure how much advanced technology was at that point, but realistically speaking unless the bomb device was the first thing he made (and not the last) it should be close to 1955 if not later. The actual date of the ending of the Mansion's construction was never stated accurately. We only know that Genji said "about 30 years before", so around 1956. It's probably a bit earlier than that, but how much isn't known.

The second thing is that you misundertsood me. the bomb exploded exactly at 0:00 according to the story. Again, I'm not sure that Ryuukishi thought it through enough, but this is, again, how it is in his mind. So this scenario makes more sense if we imagine a very accurate clock.

[jjblue1]

Originally Posted by Renall

I've seen clocks (albeit not grandfather clocks) that have an AM/PM display that's mechanically controlled by just switching over when the clock strikes 12. So one would just assume the clock has this and that the detonator is only active if (1) the "detonator switch" is set ON, (2) the clock's hands are both at 12, and (3) the AM/PM setting is set to AM.

The way I see it is there might be a circuit. At 12 an electrical pulse is sent out. If the detonator switch isn't active or the AM/PM switch is set to PM, the circuit is not completed and the pulse never reaches the detonator. With the detonator switch set ON, at 12 AM a pulse is sent out to a completed circuit. This would require no electronics, only sufficient knowledge of electricity and a battery in the clock, all of which Kinzo would have the knowledge to construct as a military engineer.

I know of clocks that also sign the day and not just the hour and therefore in their own way are capable to 'realize' when it's midnight and when it's not. This doesn't seem to be the case of the clock as it's shown in Umineko, unless the part showing the day is simply not showed.

I personally think/hope that the clock was an 'artistic licence' from Bern and that the bomb worked in a different and more realistic and reliable way (Kinzo apparently built everything with the idea of the epitaph in mind, meaning he planned to challenge someone to solve the epitaph. What if a person where to solve it around midnight, notice the switch, turn in on merely out of curiousity because he can't assume a clock will be dangerous and blow everything up?).

However Ryukishi might have not cared about it.

I still find unbelievable how Kinzo can keep so much explosive and have a self destruction mechanism built for his house.
It sounds more fitting for an anime mad scientist's lab that for magic obsessed Kinzo.