[Game] Umineko - Spoilers, Theories, Interpretations

[chronotrig]

Originally Posted by UsagiTenpura

Assuming a version of that theory is right, I'd be willing to say Beato's goal is more to convince Battler.
Alternatively, in arc 2's chapel, we're shown that every adults admits to Beato's existence (I believe Rosa remains silent I'll have to get there again). It's possible that those who dies are those who accepts the golden land.

Still I'm going to say it's more likely her main goal, at the very least, is to convince Battler of it. It was said over and over, that you need two people to create a world.

Yeah. Also, if there is a single episode which describes "Beatrice's success" the best, it's EP2. And the conclusion of EP2 is when Beatrice convinces Battler that magic exists. If anything, that seems to be her goal, whether she's behind most of the crimes or not. Battler seems to die shortly after that, so there'd hardly be any point in tricking him for some different reason. So, it's very likely that convincing him is an end in itself.

Edit: And for those who haven't noticed, I'm slowly starting to build up my theory in the link from my sig. 4-7 are the more Shkanon-related parts.

[Renall]

I'm not seeing any point in convincing someone of something when you're both just going to die anyway. You basically wind up in the crazy/delusional/psychopath motive mode there, unless the person isn't responsible for the explosion and has no idea it's coming. Then it's just silly.

[Pika_power]

That can't be her goal. She made the game for him to solve. When he resigned in EP2 and EP3, Beato let him get back up, and even motivated him. She doesn't want to beat him.

The entire purpose is for Shannon to get Battler to realise he loves her. We first see this in EP4, then it keeps getting backed up in EP6. Firstly she tries to get him to answer the question of who to sacrifice, but that was just a ploy to find out who he likes. When that failed, she moved onto the direct question. Then she just gave up, and died.

[Renall]

And uh... what if he doesn't love her? Why would he? Why does he even need to? What if he realizes it and figures they've both moved on? What then? And if they both acknowledge and agree to that and move on, what was the point of all that other stuff just for that?

It's been six damn years. You don't go to such elaborate lengths for something like that. This cannot all be a story about puppy love. It's ridiculous.

[Judoh]

Originally Posted by Pika_power

The entire purpose is for Shannon to get Battler to realise he loves her. We first see this in EP4, then it keeps getting backed up in EP6. Firstly she tries to get him to answer the question of who to sacrifice, but that was just a ploy to find out who he likes. When that failed, she moved onto the direct question. Then she just gave up, and died.

Battler already knows that he had a crush on her. Shannon doesn't need to get him to remember that. In fact I don't think we have any implications she ever knew he did. Quite the opposite actually.

[Marion]

Originally Posted by Renall

And uh... what if he doesn't love her? Why would he? Why does he even need to? What if he realizes it and figures they've both moved on? What then? And if they both acknowledge and agree to that and move on, what was the point of all that other stuff just for that?

It's been six damn years. You don't go to such elaborate lengths for something like that. This cannot all be a story about puppy love. It's ridiculous.

Agreed. Battler was only twelve. Do you know how many silly things people say when they're still kids that they regret? The 'promise' he made to her didn't even sound like a real promise - it sounded like something embarrassing that he regrets even saying to begin with. What kind of person really expects a twelve year old to get a white horse onto an island of all places. And when he found out Shannon was with George he didn't dwell on it. He just brushed off and said 'well that's that'.

Honestly I really hope Ryukishi isn't making the motive a cheesy line that sounds like a half-baked promise. It would be more unrealistic than all the fantasy scenes combined.

[Pika_power]

Wasn't there the whole "I'm pushing my love of Battler onto you" line?

A game entirely about Puppy Love would be ridiculous, but currently, that's what it appears to be.

[Judoh]

Well it's probably not that anyway.

I have no interest in things concerning your immediate family or your home. Where are we? Rokkenjima. The main residence of the Ushiromiya head family. ......Isn't there a sin you should remember fitting for this place......?

Well when he returns to the island we get the hint that everyone returns to what they were like when they were kids there is even a mention of that for the adults too. So there are a lot of possible statements that it could be about actually. But I think something on the island itself is supposed to remind him of it.

Originally Posted by Pika_power

Wasn't there the whole "I'm pushing my love of Battler onto you" line?

There was but we don't know who she is pushing it onto or who is doing the pushing, or if it's even relevant to anything, but we can guess. There is also the line that says "and take this personality that matches his". Whose personality matches his? Well that'd be Jessica.

[UsagiTenpura]

The problem is that even tho I do feel 12 years old love is nothing beyond a crush and not something to dwell on, it's still a fact by now that whoever is Beatrice felt so hurt about her love that she "pushed it" on the Beatrice persona within herself.

... and claiming something like Rosa loved 12 years old Battler makes it even scarier...

... That's hard to swallow no matter what it seems...

Which makes me hope that Beatrice is not the culprit.
Or that she might be the culprit "within the tales that the arcs are" because SOMEONE has to play the villain and the writer of the tale wouldn't be too fair if they threw that role around to someone else. That would imply that on "Rokkenjima Prime" there is never any murders or even plans to.

[Pika_power]

Originally Posted by Judoh

There was but we don't know who she is pushing it onto, or if it's even relevant to anything, but we can guess. There is also the line that says "and take this personality that matches his". Whose personality matches his? Well that'd be Jessica.

Battler wished for a blonde, busty, blue eyed girl he could mess about with and talk dirty to, when he was asked what type of girl was his type by Shannon.

We then see a scene where Shannon confesses her love and pushes Battler's personality onto someone.

Lo and behold, EP4, a girl meeting Battler's exact description appears in front of him. She then talks dirtily and rudely to him, messing about. Battler even comments about what a good time he's having.

That's a strong basis of Shannontrice, if nothing else.

[Judoh]

Originally Posted by Pika_power

Battler wished for a blonde, busty, blue eyed girl he could mess about with and talk dirty to, when he was asked what type of girl was his type by Shannon.

We then see a scene where Shannon confesses her love and pushes Battler's personality onto someone.

Lo and behold, EP4, a girl meeting Battler's exact description appears in front of him. She then talks dirtily and rudely to him, messing about. Battler even comments about what a good time he's having.

That's a strong basis of Shannontrice, if nothing else.

I'm aware of that.

Well what I want to know then is who the 'Beatrice' talking to Shannon is then? Because with the way it reads it sounds like the Beatrice before her wants to forget about Battler and places this will or whatever on someone else.

Battler wished for a blonde, busty, blue eyed girl he could mess about with and talk dirty to, when he was asked what type of girl was his type by Shannon.

Oh by the way this is an assumption. We have no confirmation that the person who asked Battler this is Shannon or anybody we know. I admit it's an assumption that makes a lot of sense, but it's in no way a fact that this person is Shannon and it could easily be anyone else too. No matter how much you think it's implied this scene was left intentionally vague. It's not like it's an unusual question either.

[k//eternal]

Originally Posted by Judoh

I'm aware of that.

Well what I want to know then is who the 'Beatrice' talking to Shannon is then? Because with the way it reads it sounds like the Beatrice before her wants to forget about Battler and places this will or whatever on someone else.

Internal monologue. Regardless of whether the person in question is Shannon, that's pretty much the only context in which the line makes sense.

EDIT: In the interest of talking about something else... short of "I wouldn't put it past Kinzo", how did the gold get to its current location and/or who knows about it? I don't mean why it's on Rokkenjima in the first place, I've seen that being discussed... but it's supposed to be in some kind of secret location, yeah? Either it was moved there or construction was done around the gold, and in both cases somebody in addition to Kinzo probably has to know about it... right?

[Oliver]

Originally Posted by k//eternal

In the interest of talking about something else... short of "I wouldn't put it past Kinzo", how did the gold get to its current location and/or who knows about it? I don't mean why it's on Rokkenjima in the first place, I've seen that being discussed... but it's supposed to be in some kind of secret location, yeah? Either it was moved there or construction was done around the gold, and in both cases somebody in addition to Kinzo probably has to know about it... right?

The best historical (or famously fictional, it depends on whom you talk to) source of gold I am currently aware of is Yamashita's gold. Kinzo has an opportunity to be in on it or chance on it by a random miracle. It is known that Ryukishi is aware of this legend as it is mentioned in Higurashi, which makes it the prime candidate.

Beatrice-1 is supposed to be responsible for Kinzo locating it, my current best guess is that Beatrice-1 is meant to be the 1947 Tropical Storm Beatrice, which is somehow responsible for Kinzo discovering either Rokkenjima itself with a vault already there, or a shipwreck from the few Golden Lily shipments of gold that were sent to mainland Japan. (some of them are reported to have been lost) It could also be that Kinzo participated in creating the vault in the first place as part of his duties (according to one of the TIPS, "A Certain Witch Hunter's Interview Tape", "The previous head-of-house [Kinzo] was only a junior-grade officer during the war who held no special power,...") and the tropical storm destroyed the ship which was transporting all other surviving witnesses to the location of a particular gold vault.

As a result my current position is that the initial Beatrice is a mental image of an ideal woman "responsible for giving him the gold", created purely by Kinzo's imagination. Subsequent real instance(s) of Beatrice are his attempts to incarnate this mental image in one way or another.

EDIT: As a side note, Genji can be one of those soldiers employed in creation of the vault. In certain reports of Yamashita's treasure vaults, both prisoners and enlisted men of the Imperial Army were sealed inside freshly created vaults. Genji could be the lone survivor of such an atrocity, and Kinzo saving him by opening the discovered vault from the outside would surely earn his undying loyalty that we see in the text.

[LaplaceNoMa]

Originally Posted by k//eternal

EDIT: In the interest of talking about something else... short of "I wouldn't put it past Kinzo", how did the gold get to its current location and/or who knows about it? I don't mean why it's on Rokkenjima in the first place, I've seen that being discussed... but it's supposed to be in some kind of secret location, yeah? Either it was moved there or construction was done around the gold, and in both cases somebody in addition to Kinzo probably has to know about it... right?

Yeah.

Look at the circuimstances:

Hideyoshi's company: someone is buying out his company.
Rudolf's company: someone is clearly providing information to the corporate giant in USA about him in order to make them pressure Rudolf's company.
Krauss's company: someone is making sure to leave him short on money. Kinzo's death could be also not really natural. Everything looks like someone could've been making preparations to set some certain conditions for them to make them all need A LOT OF MONEY MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE.

The same could be actually said about Rosa. This co-signed debt doesn't really look very natural to me.

Anyone who could've made all this possible, as well as storing enough money in vaults seen by Ange in 1998, surely has A LOT of power. Probably even more power and money than Kinzo had.

Could it be that the real owners of the gold, or some goverment people who know all about it and its relations to the Ushiromiya family, actually set this all up in order to retrieve it? The funny thing is, aside from ep3 where Eva survives, we don't know what actually happens to the gold. It's quite possible that the person (or the syndicate) responsible for everything just snatched it later.

And that's probably what R07 meant by 'something went wrong in ep3'. Eva wasn't supposed to survive.

[Jan-Poo]

World peace...

Is it connected to the gold? If the truth about that gold is found there would be a diplomatic incident? That isn't so far-fetched if the gold is the yamashita gold, or even the gold embezzled by the nazi germany.

What if the explosion was a way to put a cover on the whole story?

The question is: who could do that? The government?

[Oliver]

According to Sterling & Peggy Seagrave, "Gold Warriors: America's Secret Recovery of Yamashita's Gold" (I couldn't get the full book, but there's excerpts on Google Books) - Yamashita's gold is quite tightly connected to world peace.

If their words are to be given any credence, (sensational as the book is, it appears extensively researched -- now whether the sources are speaking the firsthand truth is another question) both Japanese government and the US government would be contenders to prevent proof of the Ushiromiya gold being connected to Yamashita gold in any way from being discovered, as well as anyone involved with the collection of Yamashita gold, which would be both the Imperial Family and yakuza clans.

[Jan-Poo]

Does that book ever mention the supposed amount of this yamashita gold?

[June 1983]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

Does that book ever mention the supposed amount of this yamashita gold?

Yamashita's gold isn't one concrete sum, it's many, many treasure dumps hidden around the Philippines by the Japanese army in WWII, looted from various spots in Asia.

But here's the story of one deposit which was found, including the amount estimated later:

In March 1988, a Filipino treasure hunter named Rogelio Roxas filed a lawsuit in the state of Hawaii against the former president of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos and his wife Imelda Marcos for theft and human rights abuses. Roxas claimed that in Baguio City in 1961 he met the son of a former member of the Japanese army who mapped for him the location of the legendary Yamashita Treasure. Roxas claimed a second man, who served as Yamashita's interpreter during the Second World War, told him of visiting an underground chamber there where stores of gold and silver were kept, and who told of a golden buddha kept at a convent located near the underground chambers. Roxas claimed that within the next few years he formed a group to search for the treasure, and obtained a permit for the purpose from a relative of Ferdinand, Judge Pio Marcos. In 1971, Roxas claimed, he and his group uncovered an enclosed chamber on state lands near Baguio City where he found bayonets, samurai swords, radios, and skeletal remains dressed in a Japanese military uniform. Also found in the chamber, Roxas claimed, were a three foot high golden colored buddha and numerous stacked crates which filled an area approximately 6 feet x 6 feet x 35 feet. He claimed he opened just one of the boxes, and found it packed with gold bullion. He said he took from the chamber the golden buddha, which he estimated to weigh 1,000 kilograms, and one box with twenty-four gold bars, and hid them in his home. He claimed he resealed the chamber for safekeeping until he could arrange the removal of the remaining boxes which he suspected were also filled with gold bars. Roxas said he sold seven of the gold bars from the opened box, and sought potential buyers for the golden buddha. Two individuals representing prospective buyers examined and tested the metal in the buddha, Roxas said, and reported it was made of solid, 20 carat gold. It was soon after this, Roxas claimed, that President Ferdinand Marcos learned of Roxas' discovery and ordered him arrested, beaten, and the buddha and remaining gold seized. Roxas alleged that in retaliation to his vocal campaign to reclaim the buddha and the remainder of the treasure taken from him, Ferdinand continued to have Roxas threatened, beaten and eventually incarcerated for over a year.[3]

Following his release, Roxas put his claims against Marcos on hold until Ferdinand lost the presidency in 1986. But in 1988, Roxas and the Golden Budha Corporation, which now held the ownership rights to the treasure Roxas claims was stolen from him, filed suit against Ferdinand and wife Imelda in a Hawaiian state court seeking damages for the theft and the surrounding human rights abuses committed against Roxas. Roxas died on the eve of trial,[11] but prior to his death he gave the deposition testimony that would be later used in evidence. In 1996, the Roxas estate and the Golden Budha Corporation received what was then largest judgment ever awarded in history, $22 billion which with interest increased to $40.5 billion.[12] In 1998, The Hawaii Supreme Court held that there was sufficient evidence to support the jury's finding that Roxas found the treasure and that Marcos converted it. However, the court reversed the damage award, holding that the $22 billion award of damages for the chamber full of gold was too speculative as there was no evidence of quantity or quality, and ordered a new hearing on the value of the golden buddha and 17 bars of gold only.[3] After several more years of legal proceedings, the Golden Budha Corporation obtained a final judgment against Imelda Marcos to the extent of her interest in the Marcos estate in the principal amount of $13,275,848.37 and Roxas’ estate obtained a $6 million judgment on the claim for human right abuse.[13]

So in other words, if Roxas' claims about the number of boxes of bouillion were true it would have been worth $22 billion, a lot more than the amount of the Ushiromiya gold (Imelda probably spent it all on shoes.)

[Oliver]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

Does that book ever mention the supposed amount of this yamashita gold?

It seems to say the total is on the scale of 1500 metric tons, probably quite a bit more, but there are supposed to be hundreds of individual vaults, most of them (but not all) in Philippines.

[Jan-Poo]

Well the main problem here is that the "yamashita gold" actually indicates a lot of various valuables, not gold alone.

Plus I haven't found any indication of 10kg gold ingots. So we need to think if this gold was ever part of the yamashita gold it was melted and then reshaped into the 1000 10kg ingots stored in the secret room of Rokkenjima.

But in that case how could you make a clear connection between that gold and the yamashita gold? it would be impossible to determine the origin of that gold.

So even if this gold was found it would be hard to make any claim on it, it's not like the yamashita gold is the only gold that "vanished" and it isn't even supposed to be near Tokyo. Pretty much everyone then could claim that "it's my gold" but no proof could ever be presented.

I can hardly see how the discovery of this gold could lead to a serious diplomatic incident.