[Wanderer]

Originally Posted by AC-Phoenix

Don't forget that at least one character in this story has a multiple personality disorder, so even if you allow Erika to exist as a living entity she won't necessarily increase the number of persons on the island.

Furudo Erika only increases it by one person.

Originally Posted by AC-Phoenix

I'm not really arguing for any culprit atm. While my first guess on Umineko was 'Shanon' for some weird reason as soon as I understood that it was supposed to be a mystery, Yasu/Shanon is seemingly not the right answer. Though I remember a Uraneko episode with a letter saying 'Yasu is the killer'.

"The culprit is Yasu" is actually a meme that long pre-dates Umineko.

Spoiler for TV Tropes says:

One that's really only known in Japan is the culprit in the old mystery game The Portopia Serial Murder Case... ...The culprit is quite literally the one you'd least suspect, since not only is he your assistant, he's also (since the main character is an unseen Heroic Mime) the guy executing the player's commands and speaking for the main character. The revelation was so out of left field that the phrase "Yasu is the culprit" is something of a minor Japanese meme for this sort of trope.

Actually it's interesting that the 'Yasu' of this old game is the person through which you interact with the world. It's very similar to Umineko in that way (and probably intentionally so).

Ryukishi says repeatedly in his interviews that he didn't want to make the answer to his story something that could just be copied and pasted on the internet, and I'm sure that when he says this he's got the "The culprit is Yasu" spoiler-meme in mind.

Anyway, a common point of view in this community is that Yasu presents herself as the culprit through the stories, but isn't really the culprit.

Originally Posted by qno2

Staking doesn't work, you can't actually get a good enough grip on them. "Our Confession" implies that the victims are shot and then the stake is inserted in the wound.

Yes. Also in Alliance, when Battler is investigating all the corpses he finds the idea that the stakes themselves could have been effective weapons to be pretty ridiculous.