[Game] Umineko no Naku Koro ni - Overall Game Impressions

[naikou]

Originally Posted by Chron

All conclusions. I'm talking about every single conclusion in the narrative. We can't even be sure that there was an explosion to begin with, the only time Ange is shown visiting the island is in 2nd-level fiction.

How is Ange's story "the narrative"?

Ange's story does not represent reality. It's just one of many stories about Rokkenjima. We aren't told the details of that story because no one knows them (except Eva, and she dies).

Look at it this way: every story is explained, except for one. Don't get caught up on that one story.

Originally Posted by Chron

Think the situation over and put it in chronological order. You're overlooking something very obvious to me.

1. Japanese send lots of bombs to Rokkenjima
2. Years pass while Kinzo and his engineers waste time digging tunnels
3. A sub arrives from Italy containing 10 tons of gold
4. A fight breaks out, resulting in the death of everyone but Kinzo and Beatrice
5. The nukes are dropped, the war ends, Rokkenjima is forgotten in the resulting chaos

Maybe I'm just dumb. You'll have to point out the obvious to me.

[Leafsnail]

Originally Posted by Chron

That's one of the points I'm making. All speculation is inherently pointless, and a complete waste of time. Nothing is reliable, therefore, nothing can be used as a justification for one's own interpretation. Umineko isn't a puzzle.

It's like someone got a bunch of blank jigsaw puzzles that were completely different, mixed them together, and then conned us into trying to correctly solve each puzzle from that big, jumbled up pile.

...Except it isn't. Sure, you can't be 100% certain of your theory, but you can definitely back it up strongly using the information provided.

Nothing's 100% reliable in series, but no real world sources are 100% reliable either. It's up to you to make the judgement on it.

[Chron]

The explosives werent there for #1. And they were not there when the italians arrived, either, they were constructing a base for kaitans, but had yet to get anything to that effect. The base wasnt even finished during kinzo's story.

Therefore, if the base were unfinished, understocked, and frankly forgotten, then we can explain why kinzo got away with everything.

That means that if 900 tons of explosives were transported there, it would take place after kinzo's narrative. Setting the gold aside, when making use of the cave, there is no way that the imperial forces would have missed the wreckage. Its there, its evidence, and kinzo would have been held up on treason for hiding that alone.

The explosives alone arent a big deal, its how kinzo got away scot-free thats the problem, which the explosives throws a light on.

As for the kakeras? Nothings answered, at all. Its not just Ange's, the fantasy scenes, the meta plotline all throw all perspectives into doubt.

If you dont see what questions are left to be answered, ive gotta question why you think anything is answered in the first place. All premises of all kakeras are dubious, thats the end result of the goose chase ryuukishi has lead us on.

[naikou]

Originally Posted by Chron

The explosives werent there for #1. And they were not there when the italians arrived, either, they were constructing a base for kaitans, but had yet to get anything to that effect. The base wasnt even finished during kinzo's story.

Where does it say that? I assumed the explosives were there since the beginning.

Originally Posted by Chron

As for the kakeras? Nothings answered, at all. Its not just Ange's, the fantasy scenes, the meta plotline all throw all perspectives into doubt.

If you dont see what questions are left to be answered, ive gotta question why you think anything is answered in the first place. All premises of all kakeras are dubious, thats the end result of the goose chase ryuukishi has lead us on.

So what you're saying is that we can't be sure whether these fictional events really happened or not.

?

[Chron]

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

...Except it isn't. Sure, you can't be 100% certain of your theory, but you can definitely back it up strongly using the information provided.

Nothing's 100% reliable in series, but no real world sources are 100% reliable either. It's up to you to make the judgement on it.

DNA's 100% reliable.

Seriously, that's a terrible premise to act upon. If you really want to see what I'm referring to, try conclusively explaining Erika and just who or what she is, aside from being the detective, that's a question ryuukishi posed to us, after all.

[Chron]

Originally Posted by naikou

Where does it say that? I assumed the explosives were there since the beginning.

Kinzo explained the base as being little more than a cave, made no mentions of it being used for stockpiles, and even went so far as to emphasize that the base wasn't even properly equipped for it's purpose of stocking and supplying kaitans.

There's no reason to assume they were always there.

So what you're saying is that we can't be sure whether these fictional events really happened or not.

?

Worse, we can't be sure that these fictional events happened in their own fictions.

Episode 3's magic battle, for example.

[naikou]

Originally Posted by Chron

DNA's 100% reliable.

No it isn't. Identical twins have the same genotype.

And there's a small chance two people could have exactly the same genotype, even if they weren't related. It's a matter of probability.

But I think you're assuming that we can't reason about something if we can't be certain about it. This is not the case.

Originally Posted by Chron

There's no reason to assume they were always there.

What do you think the base was for in the first place? Do you think they just sent a bunch of soldiers out there to guard nothing?

If the text doesn't specify either way (and I'm not sure that it does), it makes much more sense to assume that the explosives were there all along.

Either way, you're using circumstantial evidence to fabricate a minor plot hole.

Originally Posted by Chron

Worse, we can't be sure that these fictional events happened in their own fictions.

Episode 3's magic battle, for example

bolded for emphasis

[Leafsnail]

Originally Posted by Chron

DNA's 100% reliable.

I'm not sure what you mean. If you're talking about "as a method for creating a creature" then no, since they have random mutations. If you're talking about "as a method of finding a criminal" then no, since even if you had a test that can identify a person's DNA 100% of the time you can't be 100% sure that the person's DNA is there because they were the criminal.

Originally Posted by Chron

DNA's 100% reliable.

Seriously, that's a terrible premise to act upon. If you really want to see what I'm referring to, try conclusively explaining Erika and just who or what she is, aside from being the detective, that's a question ryuukishi posed to us, after all.[/QUOTE]
Didn't I just say it's impossible to conclusively explain stuff in this story? I'm not sure what you're asking or why.

[Chron]

Originally Posted by naikou

No it isn't. Identical twins have the same genotype.

And there's a small chance two people could have exactly the same genotype, even if they weren't related. It's a matter of probability.

You're thinking about why it's not conclusive, not why it isnt reliable.

But I think you're assuming that we can't reason about something if we can't be certain about it. This is not the case.

Quite mistaken. You can reason all you want, but your speculating based on unreliable fantasies rather than anything concrete. It's reasoning that relies purely on assumptions, and will never be conclusive.

What do you think the base was for in the first place? Do you think they just sent a bunch of soldiers out there to guard nothing?

Kaitan torpedoes. And they were understocked. See what I mean? All you're doing is making assumptions, thats not reasoning.

If the text doesn't specify either way (and I'm not sure that it does), it makes much more sense to assume that the explosives were there all along.

While absence of evidence isn't always evidence of absence, it's more reasonable to conclude that Kinzo knows more about the conditions of the base at the time than Yasu did at any point ever.

Either way, you're using circumstantial evidence to fabricate a minor plot hole.

And you're using an absence of evidence to justify wild speculation, further proving my point.

bolded for emphasis

Surely my point isnt going over your head?

[naikou]

Originally Posted by Chron

You're thinking about why it's not conclusive, not why it isnt reliable.

A test which is 100% reliable never fails. DNA tests sometimes fail. DNA tests are not 100% reliable.

Originally Posted by Chron

Quite mistaken. You can reason all you want, but your speculating based on unreliable fantasies rather than anything concrete. It's reasoning that relies purely on assumptions, and will never be conclusive.

All reasoning relies upon assumptions, no reasoning is ever conclusive. We cannot even prove logic itself correct. What would we use to prove it? Logic?

Originally Posted by Chron

Kaitan torpedoes. And they were understocked. See what I mean? All you're doing is making assumptions, thats not reasoning.

Quotes from the text, please. Where does the text say that?

[Chron]

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

I'm not sure what you mean. If you're talking about "as a method for creating a creature" then no, since they have random mutations. If you're talking about "as a method of finding a criminal" then no, since even if you had a test that can identify a person's DNA 100% of the time you can't be 100% sure that the person's DNA is there because they were the criminal.

It's 100% reliable at proving the who the genetic material belonged to. You only said it needed to be reliable.

Didn't I just say it's impossible to conclusively explain stuff in this story? I'm not sure what you're asking or why.

*sigh*

I noticed. Look. You can't conclusively prove anything because there is nothing to concretely base your reasoning on. And yet, Ryuukishi challenged us to explain Erika at the end of episode 6.

So. I'll grant your choose your own adventure. However, challenges like those are entirely wild goose chases. That does not sit well with me.

[Chron]

Originally Posted by naikou

A test which is 100% reliable never fails. DNA tests sometimes fail. DNA tests are not 100% reliable.

Name an example DNA failing, not a human error or an example where it was too damaged for proper use.

All reasoning relies upon assumptions, no reasoning is ever conclusive. We cannot even prove logic itself correct. What would we use to prove it? Logic?

That is honestly stupid. That's why you never base conclusions on reasoning alone. "Mon ami, when the evidence contradicts your theory, discard the theory!"

The problem is that there no evidence or anything to back up speculations. There is no right or wrong. Challenging us to find the answer to several questions which have no answer is a wild goose chase. It's a troll.

Quotes from the text, please. Where does the text say that?

Show me how to install umineko on a phone running on Android and ill happily do so. But that is a pretty lame counter, youre arguing your assumption on the basis that theres nothing contradicting it.

But even of there were no mention, it'd only result in a stalemate, further buttressing my argument. You're the one playing apologist, after all

[Judoh]

Originally Posted by naikou

Where does it say that? I assumed the explosives were there since the beginning.

In Kinzo's story. He talks about it.

Establishment? Certainly, if you can call digging out a cave 'establishment'. Not only that, the base was abandoned before its completion."

The base on Hachijo Island was outfitted with Kaiten torpedoes and became a base for direct attacks, but Rokkenjima was never supplied with any.`

Furthermore, the construction was eventually suspended, and the minimum number of men were stationed on the island, waiting for orders from above that never came.

[naikou]

Originally Posted by Chron

Name an example DNA failing, not a human error or an example where it was too damaged for proper use.

Irrelevant. Even if every DNA test had been correct, that says nothing about future DNA tests. We can only assume that DNA tests are reliable.

As a more extreme example, it is impossible to prove that "1+1=2" is correct. We have only the evidence that that has been the case so far. We are not certain. If tomorrow, someone demonstrated that you could take 1 apple, and add it to another apple, and get three apples, we would have to throw out mathematics.

Because we cannot be certain about math either.

Originally Posted by Chron

That is honestly stupid. That's why you never base conclusions on reasoning alone. "Mon ami, when the evidence contradicts your theory, discard the theory!"

Even theories with evidence use logic. And logic cannot be proven correct. Uncertainty is inevitable.

Originally Posted by Judoh

The base on Hachijo Island was outfitted with Kaiten torpedoes and became a base for direct attacks, but Rokkenjima was never supplied with any.`

Furthermore, the construction was eventually suspended, and the minimum number of men were stationed on the island, waiting for orders from above that never came.

Ah, so Rokkenjima had 900 tons of explosives, despite being understaffed.

I retract all previous statements, this one fact proves that Ryukishi is a terrible author.

[Leafsnail]

Originally Posted by Chron

It's 100% reliable at proving the who the genetic material belonged to. You only said it needed to be reliable.

No test is 100% accurate. But the point is you can never draw an 100% accurate conclusion from one/

Originally Posted by Chron

I noticed. Look. You can't conclusively prove anything because there is nothing to concretely base your reasoning on. And yet, Ryuukishi challenged us to explain Erika at the end of episode 6.

I put it to you that you do not need to be able to "conclusively prove" anything in order to reason. We can explain Erika easily. We just won't know which explanation is correct.

Originally Posted by Chron

So. I'll grant your choose your own adventure. However, challenges like those are entirely wild goose chases. That does not sit well with me.

Originally Posted by Introduction

The genre of this work is probably a serial murder mystery.

However, that does not guarantee that reasoning and guesswork are possible.


Those who enjoy stupid puzzles that are made to be solved can leave now.

Umineko no Naku Koro ni is the worst kind of tale, created without any intention of letting all of
you solve it.

[haguruma]

Originally Posted by naikou

Ah, so Rokkenjima had 900 tons of explosives, despite being understaffed.

I retract all previous statements, this one fact proves that Ryukishi is a terrible author.

Well, it doesn't have to be. It could be that they actually transferred the explosives to Rokkenjima, but the sudden turn of events in the war made it impossible to neither ship out any material for torpedo construction, nor to safely transport the explosives back to larger bases on Honshû.
I actually understood it that way, that Kinzô used his strong contacts within the GHQ to make it easier for him when buying Rokkenjima, without the island actually being checked, because he was being trusted.

And while of course those amounts of explosives seem rather silly, it's not impossible to imagine that the military groups that stocked those on Rokkenjima would keep it a secret from GHQ. There were many people who refused to accept the defeat of Japan and kept their loyalty to a defunct system, so I could imagine that 1 or 2 bases could have 'dissappeared' from observation in order to ensure a certain arsenal for a comeback ... even though that never happened.

It is highly fictional, but not any more than most stories involving surviving Nazi groups which became a popular trope in the west. There are enough stories dealing with secret facilities that were never discovered and those same modern legends exist in Japan.
Of course this is more or less a trope found in spy fiction, but that genre is not so far from mystery and detective fiction.

Explosives being hidden under Rokkenjima might be improbable but not implausible.

[Chron]

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

No test is 100% accurate. But the point is you can never draw an 100% accurate conclusion from it.

It doesnt need to be. It just needs to be accurate enough to be relied upon 100% of the time for a what it needs to do.

I put it to you that you do not need to be able to "conclusively prove" anything in order to reason. We can explain Erika easily. We just won't know which explanation is correct.

So what? I could reason that Erika is really Battler's ideal self, and the problem is that that conclusion is just as reasonable as any other theory, and easily just as supported in the text.

Moreover, that boast of ryuukishi's would be a lot more impressive if he had the chops to live up to it. Undermining any possibility of a conclusive answer rxisting is cowardice. His taunt is nothing more than an empty troll.

If it is impossible to determine a correct answer, than for the purpose of a competition it is the same as there not being one. Its a heads I win, tails you lose scenario. A wild goose chase, and a waste of time.

[Sherringford]

I personally think that nothing was answered and I hate that, but I can't exactly say it's worse than satan. I mean, it is worse than Hitler as a mystery and if Umineko was a person I'd wish it a very bad case of pneumonia, but as a story it's just...meh.

I was very angry once I realized that we'd never get an answer to the actual killer(even if it was "probably" Kyrie/Yasu) and the locked rooms. Yes the locked rooms are childish and easy, but to me the greatest pleasure in a mystery novel is once the detective is about to announce his solution.

Even if the locked rooms seem easy enough, I love that feeling, that thrill of wondering whether you are right or wrong. Even if it's an easy mystery, I still like the payoff of being completely right, just like the detective, as the characters stand in awe. The entire novel builds up to that payoff.

Umineko's build up was HUGE!

...Then the "payoff" if you can call it such came in episode 7, and I was left disappointed. There was no dash, no sense of finality.

In a duel between reader and writer, win or lose, you bow to your opponent once it's over. Umineko's ending didn't make me want to bow, because it didn't make me feel like it was over.

The mystery genre is a game that doesn't end until all loose ends are gone over, discussed, argued, and concluded in either a gunfight if the series is a hardboiled, or the classic "the killer is YOU SIR!" in the golden age.

My biggest problem with Umineko isn't even in its content, now that I stop to think about it. It's that it lacks that feeling. Episode 7's summation wasn't good. Ryu might argue that he doesn't want to "give away" answers to those who haven't solved it, but he has made the answers even more meaningless to those who have.

He focused so much on the mystery's heart that he forgot to build an appropriate body and soul.

He might have said that Umineko wasn't a mystery, but he treated it like one. He contradicted himself, then contradicted himself again at the end, twice. He said it wasn't one, then he said it was one.

But it lacked one very important element. That last strike, that last thrust that makes the genre what it is regardless of whether the novel is a hardboiled, a cozy or a good old golden age story. The moment the detective bursts the truth wide open.

I understand what his themes were, but I'd say that his execution was, in the end, pretty flawed. It didn't make me wonder whether wanting the whole truth was bad or not, it made me root for the damn villain.

That gigantic letdown annoyed me. But now that I look back, the content itself isn't that bad.

[naikou]

Originally Posted by Chron

So what? I could reason that Erika is really Battler's ideal self, and the problem is that that conclusion is just as reasonable as any other theory, and easily just as supported in the text.

It's called "Death of the Author", and it's the currently favored theory in literary criticism. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_the_Author

[Leafsnail]

Originally Posted by Chron

So what? I could reason that Erika is really Battler's ideal self, and the problem is that that conclusion is just as reasonable as any other theory, and easily just as supported in the text.

I'd say no it isn't. You're possibly confusing "proof" with "evidence".

There's plenty of evidence against Erika being Battler's perfect self (chiefly: Battler thinks Erika is a complete bitch).

Crucial point: a theory can be more valid than another theory even if it isn't proved to be true.