[Game] Umineko - Spoilers, Theories, Interpretations

[Renall]

Absolutely no factors other than humans participate in this game board is kind of a useless red. Obviously, it isn't strictly true. The typhoon is a major factor in the game. The layout of the island and buildings are factors. The bacteria in people's bodies are factors.

I have to assume that what was meant was "actions which are undertaken through direct agency in this game board are only caused by human beings." In other words, if something was affirmatively made to happen, a human did it. That is to say, animals didn't do it and whatnot. Other things can be "factors," but they are merely things exploited by a human culprit, not direct causes unto themselves.

Originally Posted by NarkNarks

The natural disaster explaination seems odd if we remember the conspiracy theories banging around in 1998. The witch hunt would be much less appealing if their had been an landslide, explosion or other natural event could have explained it easily.

Actually, it makes a lot of sense when you think about conspiracy theorists. A simple "official explanation" contrasted to some "evidence" (such as the messages in bottles) would be enough to start conspiracy theorists going. Eva's sole survival would also be incredibly suspicious. The police and "reasonable" people would say "no, it was a landslide," Witch Hunters would point to the message bottles and Eva's survival and say "It must have been a murder conspiracy!"

[ijriims]

I don't think Ange in Ep4 needed a guardian as well (she was already 18 years old), but Sumadera family came to "take care" of Ange anyway. What I meant by becoming the "guardian" was that if Battler did survive in Ep4, probably Sumadera family would try to "take care" of him as well.

Besides, legally speaking, Kyrie was Battler's mother (step-mother counted) and had the same rights and responsibility as a biological mother, unless Rudolf and Kyrie had not married or had divorced before the incident, so in the end Sumadera family was still the closest relatives to Battler and Ange.

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What it is meant for ghost-Beatrice to be wearing suits?

Meta-Beatrice awakes and start trolling again?

[LyricalAura]

Originally Posted by NarkNarks

The natural disaster explaination seems odd if we remember the conspiracy theories banging around in 1998. The witch hunt would be much less appealing if their had been an landslide, explosion or other natural event could have explained it easily.

There are some contradictory clues about that... Maybe we're looking at a disaster that had both natural and human elements?

According to Ootsuki, when the Ushiromiya Library was auctioned off, it was explained that the books "survived the disaster of Rokkenjima." All of the surviving books were from Kuwadorian where Eva "escaped harm", but there were probably many more that were lost due to the "accident on Rokkenjima." There definitely seems to have been some event that destroyed the books in Kinzo's study, which was interpreted by everyone as a disaster or an accident.

On the other hand, according to Ange, the reason Eva was forced to auction the Ushiromiya Library in the first place was because she was in dire financial straits at the time. That's because "despite the extraordinary circumstances, it was not established that the others [besides Eva] had been missing long enough to be presumed dead," so Eva wasn't able to collect on the family's life insurance.

Since none of the bodies were recovered and the police didn't interpret it as a crime, it seems that they must have thought the bodies had all been destroyed by the accident/disaster. Together with the loss of the books in Kinzo's study, that probably indicates that at least the whole mansion was destroyed in a way that could plausibly make bodies unrecoverable, assuming everyone was together in that one place.

In light of that, I agree that a natural disaster isn't very plausible. A landslide or a tsunami isn't something you could plausibly blame on Eva even if you were being paranoid, and because of the typhoon there probably wouldn't be much for the Witch Hunters to latch onto as obviously occult in origin. Something like a massive fire would work out pretty well though, since you could freely explain it as deliberate arson, a horrible accident, or a natural disaster (say, caused by a lightning strike). I imagine it would be pretty hard to find severely charred corpses in the wreckage of the entire mansion, so in the absence of any evidence of a crime, the police might just give up after a while and say the bodies were totally destroyed. The heavy rainfall would even help explain why the fire didn't spread to the forest.

But if it's a fire, that doesn't totally explain what happened to the bodies outside. Natsuhi and Krauss were in the arbor, which as far as I can tell was made of stone and well-removed from the house, so that shouldn't have caught fire. And for Maria and Rosa, even if the whole garden went up in flames in spite of the rain, it should have been easy to locate their corpses since there wasn't a whole mansion of wreckage on top of them. You'd have to assume that someone moved those corpses into the mansion and they burned with the others, or that someone deliberately hid or disposed of them. We do know that Eva was alive at end though, and that she was pretty well flipped out by that point, so maybe she dragged the corpses inside for some reason? She had about five hours or so to do it before the endgame.

It's not really necessary for Eva herself to have started the fire. The island already has a history of lightning striking and destroying buildings, what with the shrine that vanished over the previous summer. A fire caused by a lightning strike would also explain the Episode 1 and 4 endgames pretty well. For Episode 4 you can just interpret "Beatrice" as the storm itself. For Episode 1, the police knew it was a crime scene because there were six mangled corpses stuffed in the garden shed, where they'd be protected from the fire, and there was a creepy magic circle on the shutter. Anyone would call a crime scene "unimaginably gruesome" after seeing those victims, and that would probably get the police to search the mansion more thoroughly and discover the other burnt corpses.

That just leaves the unidentifiable body parts, but why were they unidentifiable? If they were severed limbs or something, as the ending scroll implies but doesn't actually say outright, the police should have been able to identify Maria's from the size alone. But if they just found a bunch of charred and melted bones, it's entirely reasonable that a lot of them would be beyond recognition.

[ijriims]

From the description of Ep1, I would say that the police did not find the bodies of the children except part of the jawbone of Maria.

A regular fire would at least leave the shape of the body (like Kinzo's body, which was charred as best but not cremated into pieces) as long as the mansion had not become a cremater (870–980 °C consistently for 1.5 to 2 hours' time is needed to decompose the corpse (because the body itself contained a large amount of water), which is not what can be attained by regular arson and especially when it has just rained heavily and air and ground being moised). And really, even through cremation, the whole body does not become ashes but many of pieces bones, and what we usually see in the final form is because the bones are further pulverized and reduced to finer ashes. And I believe expect the stake of Mammon others were not found, unless they were blasted to the forest by explosion, then they must have melted. (I admit Tin or Zinc does melt in a low melting point though, around 2xx-4xx °C, but they were not strong enough. I think the stakes were at least made by iron or steel, cannot be gold or silver considering the price was just $30, and iron's melting point is 1538°C)

Someone has to clean up the pieces of bones to make the whole scene look like accident though if all bodies of the children cannot be found.

But do you believe that an arson killed Battler in the end? How to set the whole mansion into huge fire without resorting to devices. And you know, police is really good at distinguish natural fire or arson...

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By the way, I have checked that picric acid was used as the major explosive in warhead by Japanese force during WWII (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._II_explosives, look at the comment entry for piric acid) , and note this quote from wiki "Modern safety precautions recommend storing picric acid wet. Dry picric acid is relatively sensitive to shock and friction, so laboratories that use it store it in bottles under a layer of water, rendering it safe. Glass or plastic bottles are required, as picric acid can easily form metal picrate salts that are even more sensitive and hazardous than the acid itself. Industrially, picric acid is especially hazardous because it is volatile and slowly sublimes even at room temperature. Over time, the buildup of picrates on exposed metal surfaces can constitute a grave hazard."

So the police had reason to believe there could be accidental explosion if Rokkenjima was a military base before and contained munition.

[LyricalAura]

Originally Posted by ijriims

From the description of Ep1, I would say that the police did not find the bodies of the children except part of the jawbone of Maria.

A regular fire would at least leave the shape of the body as long as the mansion had not become a cremater (870–980 °C is needed to decompose the corpse, which is not what can be attained by regular arson especially when it has just rained heavily and air and ground is moised. You see, even the boiler inside the mansion could not reduce Kinzo's body into pieces but maintain a complete structure with six toes being identificable). And really, even through cremation, the whole body does not become ashes but many of pieces bones, and what we usually see in the final form is because the bones are further crushed and reduced to finer ashes.

Someone has to clean up the pieces of bones to make the whole scene look like accident though if all bodies of the children cannot be found.

Keep in mind that I'm not talking about the police walking inside and seeing some bones lying in a neat pile on the floor. A fire would have completely gutted the mansion, to the point where the whole thing would have collapsed into the basement level. That would break up any intact skeletons and scatter them around, and then crush them under three floors of building material. Finding anything identifiable might be nearly impossible in that situation.

In Episode 1, the police found a lot of pieces of bodies during their search, not just the jawbone. It's okay if these are bone fragments, because isolated bone fragments would be pretty hard to link to a specific person. They lucked out with the jawbone because they had Maria's dental records, but nothing says that they didn't find pieces of the other cousins -- they just weren't able to identify them.

Originally Posted by ijriims

But do you believe that an arson killed Battler in the end? How to set the whole mansion into huge fire without resorting to devices. And you know, police is really good at distinguish natural fire or arson...

No, I think that a lightning strike sometime after midnight set the mansion on fire, the same way the shrine was destroyed the previous summer. There's no need to bring any Device X into it.

[ijriims]

So Beatrice was "a bolt from the blue"



And to believe that the same bolt reached the mansion to cause fire to kill everyone just seemed to imply that the children (EP1) and Battler (EP4) were either dumb enough not to run away (you could say because of the burning smell of Kinzo's body, they were not able to detect the burning smell of the whole mansion) or they did not realize there was a fire at all (they were just standing next to the window and on ground floor, you know). Then how could Beatrice say she was going to kill him just NOW? (setting up the whole mansion into fire took time, you know) Maybe Battler died not because the fire but because he was crushed by the collasping ceiling then, but then the bodies could not have burnt into ash as fire at the bottom has the lowest temperature (even just warm if you have been using Bunsen burner)

Natural disaster should not be the case, the truth must be Beatrice acting behind the disaster and led the police to believe it was an accident or at least it could be interpreted as an accident.

[LyricalAura]

Originally Posted by ijriims

Natural disaster should not be the case, the truth must be Beatrice acting behind the disaster and led the police to believe it was an accident or at least it could be interpreted as an accident.

Why? It's a classical trick in mysteries to have some event attributed to the murderer that was actually a total coincidence. Situation A.1 in the Locked Room Lecture, if I remember correctly.

[ijriims]

Because if Beatrice said "I am a bolt", then how could she ensure that no one survived after the typhoon ended or to ensure everyone die if no one solved the epitaph. (Of course, if you believe she did not think about killing all people in the end, then a lightning bolt can be the case)

Hey, landslide would still be said to be somewhat foreseen, but a lightning bolt... unless you are a prophet.

Was't Beatrice betting too much to rely on a lightning bolt to kill everyone in the end if no one solved the epitaph, I think it is even more remotely possible than having all people solving the epitaph together.

And can you tell me how Rosa and Maria were killed in Ep2 then. They were shown running to the chapel to take the gold and did not return to the mansion. (You don't suggest they were hit by another lightning bolt, I guess....)
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I believed there were already some elements of coincidence in the game: like how Natsuhi avoided death in the 1st twilight in EP1, how the sixes were killed in EP2 and suddenly the siblings were really to solve the epitaph in EP3.

[imaginari]

Originally Posted by LyricalAura

No, I think that a lightning strike sometime after midnight set the mansion on fire, the same way the shrine was destroyed the previous summer. There's no need to bring any Device X into it.

I actually don't think that the shrine was hit by lightning. It's too much of a coincidence, and too prominent of a clue.

Something that occurred to me: there might be a weak spot that only the culprit would know about, something to do with the tunnel or the location of the gold or some other secret of the island, somewhere that an explosion (or something similar) would destroy a much larger area of the island and resemble a disaster or accident.

[LyricalAura]

Originally Posted by ijriims

Because if Beatrice said "I am a bolt", then how could she ensure that no one survived after the typhoon ended or to ensure everyone die if no one solved the epitaph. (Of course, if you believe she did not think about killing all people in the end, then a lightling bolt can be the case"

Since I don't even think getting people to solve the epitaph was the motive, or that there was only one murderer, let alone that one of them was trying to massacre everybody, I think you answered your own question.

Originally Posted by imaginari

I actually don't think that the shrine was hit by lightning. It's too much of a coincidence, and too prominent of a clue.

Something that occurred to me: there might be a weak spot that only the culprit would know about, something to do with the tunnel or the location of the gold or some other secret of the island, somewhere that an explosion (or something similar) would destroy a much larger area of the island and resemble a disaster or accident.

I don't know, I think having the very first clue hint at the solution to the very last mystery would be pretty elegant. And if a wide-scale disaster like you're suggesting happened, why were the police able to find any bodies at all in Episode 1?

[Jan-Poo]

Originally Posted by TsundereCake

Something possibly interesting that I noticed when I saw a larger version of Episode 6's cover, sorry if it's been pointed out before:

Spoiler for Ep.6:

Is it just me, or is ghost-troll Beato wearing her suit?



It kind of scares me that I was able to notice this Not sure what it could mean, though.

that's a very interesting finding. Ryukishi managed to cover the whole body except that particular, I think he didn't want for people to notice so soon but he left a window open for the more attentive. Good job tsunderecake!

Suit Beato has always been the one that can be seen inside the gameboard in those that are probably real scenes.

Whenever the scenes are getting too magical Beatrice is seen with her usual dress.

So suit Beato is the real world Beatrice and she's evil, while the witch Beatrice is an innocent magical scapegoat?

Bu why is that suit Beato is the one with the hairs down? So confusing...

[ijriims]

You have to provide the motive of Beato then, why murdering people according to the epitaph, why sending the bank card and throwing letters-in-the-bottle, who and how different murderer arose in different episode.

You successfully convinced me that lightning bolt could be the case if Beato did not want others to solve the epitaph or did not try to kill people at all, no mastermind. But you have to fill up many other holes, which can be more difficult than articulating what caused all people to die in the end.

@Jan-Poo: I think it could mean that the suit-Beatrice had taken control of the meta-Beatrice in coma, which explained one of the scenes where Lambda asked "who are you?" and Bern remained silent.

[Marion]

I thought that was weird too :v

[LyricalAura]

Originally Posted by ijriims

You have to provide the motive of Beato then, why murdering people according to the epitaph, why sending the bank card and throwing letters-in-the-bottle, who and how different murderer arose in different episode.

You successfully convinced me that lightning bolt could be the case if Beato did not want others to solve the epitaph or did not try to kill people at all, no mastermind. But you have to fill up many other holes, which can be more difficult than articulating what caused all people to die in the end.

I'm not suggesting that the culprit varies from one episode to the next. Based on the different causes of death, there seem to be two separate killers who both act in each episode. Right now I'm working on a theory where one is the real culprit behind the first twilight murders, and the other is someone (Kanon) trying to identify and kill that culprit.

The bank cards could be payoff or consolation money, so long as the "recipients" were intended victims or accomplices of one of the culprits. It's probably not a good idea to assume that the three letters we know about were the only ones sent though. For instance, maybe George, Jessica, and Maria were also sent letters, but since they were killed the letters were never discovered.

The letter bottles are a problem with or without the lightning bolt, since as Ange said, message bottles are a terribly uncertain delivery method, and having multiple bottles just reduces the credibility of the story. I don't really have a coherent theory for them yet, but I suspect that they weren't written by the culprit. Of course, that would mean that the bank cards weren't sent by the culprit either.

Originally Posted by ijriims

And can you tell me how Rosa and Maria were killed in Ep2 then. They were shown running to the chapel to take the gold and did not return to the mansion. (You don't suggest they were hit by another lightning bolt, I guess....)

Also, Maria loaded a rifle that apparently takes a lot of practice to load, and then Rosa used it to shoot goat demons. Don't tell me you think that scene actually happened? Why would Rosa and Maria leave the mansion in the middle of a raging storm with a murderer on the loose anyway?

Originally Posted by ijriims

And to believe that the same bolt reached the mansion to cause fire to kill everyone just seemed to imply that the children (EP1) and Battler (EP4) were either dumb enough not to run away (you could say because of the burning smell of Kinzo's body, they were not able to detect the burning smell of the whole mansion) or they did not realize there was a fire at all (they were just standing next to the window and on ground floor, you know). Then how could Beatrice say she was going to kill him just NOW? (setting up the whole mansion into fire took time, you know) Maybe Battler died not because the fire but because he was crushed by the collasping ceiling then, but then the bodies could not have burnt into ash as fire at the bottom has the lowest temperature (even just warm if you have been using Bunsen burner)

What Beato actually said in EP4 was: After this point in time, I will kill you. He didn't necessarily die at exactly midnight. After his investigation, he may have gone to bed and been killed in his sleep, for instance.

Same thing applies for EP1. We don't know when the cousins actually died, or where they were when it happened. They could have gone back to Kinzo's study and holed up there. Being anywhere except the first floor would allow a fire in the right place to trap them. Or, since there was at least one and possibly two murderers still running around, maybe they were all shot before the fire got them.

[Jan-Poo]

Originally Posted by LyricalAura

The bank cards could be payoff or consolation money, so long as the "recipients" were intended victims or accomplices of one of the culprits. It's probably not a good idea to assume that the three letters we know about were the only ones sent though. For instance, maybe George, Jessica, and Maria were also sent letters, but since they were killed the letters were never discovered.

Wait. all the three letters have something in common:

1) They have as a recipient someone that was caught in the Rokkenjima incident
2) They have as a sender close relatives of those people provided that they weren't on the island themselves
3) For the intended purpose of these letters, the recipient is meant to be the sender and the sender is meant to be the recipient.


We can be sure that no letter was sent to Battler, else Ange would have received that. We can also be sure that only close relatives are included, else Nanjo's son would have another letter for his daughter. Additionally the numbers of the letters is based on the true recipients and not on the people on Rokkenjima else Battler would have sent a letter to Ange as well. Not sure about Kyrie since she might have sent a letter to Kasumi.

Considering all this the probability that letters were sent to George Jessica and Maria are quite low, and Eva would have got them.

[ijriims]

Spoiler for To save space:

Originally Posted by LyricalAura

The letter bottles are a problem with or without the lightning bolt, since as Ange said, message bottles are a terribly uncertain delivery method, and having multiple bottles just reduces the credibility of the story. I don't really have a coherent theory for them yet, but I suspect that they weren't written by the culprit. Of course, that would mean that the bank cards weren't sent by the culprit either.



Also, Maria loaded a rifle that apparently takes a lot of practice to load, and then Rosa used it to shoot goat demons. Don't tell me you think that scene actually happened? Why would Rosa and Maria leave the mansion in the middle of a raging storm with a murderer on the loose anyway?



What Beato actually said in EP4 was: After this point in time, I will kill you. He didn't necessarily die at exactly midnight. After his investigation, he may have gone to bed and been killed in his sleep, for instance.

Same thing applies for EP1. We don't know when the cousins actually died, or where they were when it happened. They could have gone back to Kinzo's study and holed up there. Being anywhere except the first floor would allow a fire in the right place to trap them. Or, since there was at least one and possibly two murderers still running around, maybe they were all shot before the fire got them.

The lightning bolt is a problem for the letters-in-the-bottle since the letters stated that none of the 18 people survived. The writer presumed that it was going to be the case and hope someone could solve the case in the name of Ushiromiya Maria. That's why hoping a lightning bolt to cause fire was not a reliable method to kill all people in the end at all. If there was no lightning hitting the mansion, then in the end of EP1, how can the writer of the letters be certain that none of them would survive? Remember she or he was 1 versus 3 at that time (not counting Maria), and Battler held a gun with ammunition loaded. It is even assuming the writer of the letter did not perish before that time.

You just quoted the first of the three red texts. And the remaining two stated that And right now, there is no one other than you on this island.
The only one alive on this island is you.
Nothing outside the island can interfere.
You are all alone on this island.
And of course, I am not you.
Yet I am here, now, and will kill you. I think it is quite clear to say Beatrice is going to kill Battler NOW (as he was standing before the portrait before he got into this battle).

The original Japanese scripts are ………右代宮戦人。今から私が、あなたを殺します。
………そしてたった今。この島にはあなた以外誰もいません。この島で生きているのは、あなただけです。島の 外の存在は一切干渉できません。
………この島にあなたはたった一人。そしてもちろん、私はあなたではない。なのに私は今、ここにいて、これ からあなたを殺します。


I suppose you were not suggesting Beatrice would kill Battler a few minutes or a few hours later even though she said NOW three times.

And how could we see nothing afterwards from Battler's perspective if he did not die just now? Surely if he had a few hours' lives left, we shall see it. (unless Ryukishi07 intentionally hide his procratinated death even though it was an instant death from context)

By the way, do you remeber we change from piece Battler's perspective to meta-Battler's, the piece Battler saw Beatrice up the stairs when the clock rang. I hypotherize that at the moment Battler saw Beatrice standing up the stairs, he was already dead (killed). Similar for the case in EP1, they never got to the point of seeing Beatrice in person, they were dead right after the clock rang.

Why Rosa ran away from the mansion in EP2? It was because she knew there was no killer outside at all. She herself knew the identity of real Beatrice after 1st twilight from Genji and Shannon (because she had killed the sixes, including real Beatrice, unintentionally). And she knew she was safe since she knew Genji would not kill her and Maria (Genji had finished his job of fulfilling 1st-8th twilights) and Shannon was dead. Of course, she did not anticipate a final disaster.



The main premise is that piece Battler's perception is narratively reliable in EP1-4, so how could he see something supernatural or unusual like golden butterfly in the end of EP1 (anime), or Beato on the stairs in EP4's tea party. It can only mean either he died already, so the scene can enter fantasy scene, or he cease to become a detective, but could he recant his identity of detective? It may have been done in EP2 when he declared he believed in witch and Beatrice being the culprit, so he stop being a detective and fantasy scene can slip in.

[Workworkwork]

Originally Posted by TsundereCake

Something possibly interesting that I noticed when I saw a larger version of Episode 6's cover, sorry if it's been pointed out before:

Spoiler for Ep.6:

Is it just me, or is ghost-troll Beato wearing her suit?



It kind of scares me that I was able to notice this Not sure what it could mean, though.

It's possible that Battler will re-introduce her as his girlfriend in EP6, only to be absent when Erika isn't present. Alternatively, she's right there so I can laugh at all of you for saying she isn't real.

[ijriims]

Just that we don't know why she was being transparent and having a hair down like meta-Beatrice in Ep5.

Interesting. That Beato was a blend of suit-Beatrice from EP2, 4 and meta-Beatrice from EP5

[Jan-Poo]

Originally Posted by Workworkwork

It's possible that Battler will re-introduce her as his girlfriend in EP6, only to be absent when Erika isn't present. Alternatively, she's right there so I can laugh at all of you for saying she isn't real.

Who said she isn't real?

Rather can I laugh at you if it is demonstrated that Beatrice isn't disguising as Kumasawa?

[Workworkwork]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

Who said she isn't real?

Rather can I laugh at you if it is demonstrated that Beatrice isn't disguising as Kumasawa?

I could care less who she's disguised as. Hell, she could be Genji or just manages to dodge the limit by some other means(Like if she thinks she's a witch, that may make it so she isn't a person per-se, just a human being.).

Kumasawa's just my scapegoat/example for the time being.

But feel free to laugh if I was wrong;I'll be joining you in that.