[Game] Umineko no Naku Koro ni - Ep. 3 Banquet of the golden witch

[confused_kitsune]

Some things that have been bugging me for quite a while:

I know the game is between Beatrice and meta Battler, however, you can't entirely separate meta Battler from 'human' Battler.
Meta Battler can obviously see, hear and feel what human Battler does. On the other hand, human Battler doesn't seem to be aware of meta Battler's existence. Couldn't there be a way to change this? If human Battler had meta Battler's knowledge, he could prevent a lot of things from happening, like stopping Rosa and Maria to go into the garden before the second twilight.

Second: Who took care of the other mansion? Although it is confirmed that it is smaller than the main mansion, it obviously also needs a lot of maintaining. A gardener is mentioned, but he couldn't possibly be the only member of the staff. If so, some servants probably lived there too. However, there had to be a way to secretly bring them there without the inhabitants of the main mansion noticing. That means new boat, new accosting place. As far as I can remember, the only other boat (mentioned in episode 1) belongs to Krauss and is out for repair in 1986 (and anyway, I doubt Kinzo would take the risk of using a boat he isn't sure he could use 100% of the time). Meaning that there could still be a boat, even know.
Now, if we take into account the Kinzo is dead before the 4th of October theory, doesn't that mean that it could be fairly easy for a completely unknown person to come to Rokkenjima and take part in the murdering process, without changing the 18?

And also, on a more, irrelevant note, why did Eva's eyes change color from blue to black when she became an adult?

[Avisch]

Originally Posted by confused_kitsune

And also, on a more, irrelevant note, why did Eva's eyes change color from blue to black when she became an adult?

heh. Have you been noticing the eye colors of everyone.

Spoiler for Whats noticeable:

Blue eyes are found on (Beatrice, Ronove, Eva Beatrice, Virgilia)
While one could first remark that "Blue eyes are found on the supernatural people", this could be wrong, cause Bernkasterl and Lambadelta do not have the blue eyes. Also red eyes are found on all the witches "furniture".

I'm thinking
Blue = People who represent something.
Red = The weapons used (this one wasn't very hard to determine)

For the blue eyes. Think about this Young Eva represents Eva's inner-persona. When she becomes Eva-Beatrice it represents this persona becoming muderous.

Beatrice is representative of just murders, and possibly the culprit

Virgilia and Ronove. They sort of crush my theory. Cause it's hard to think about what they could represent.

Or maybe I'm overthinking it.


Some things that have been bugging me for quite a while:

I know the game is between Beatrice and meta Battler, however, you can't entirely separate meta Battler from 'human' Battler.
Meta Battler can obviously see, hear and feel what human Battler does. On the other hand, human Battler doesn't seem to be aware of meta Battler's existence. Couldn't there be a way to change this? If human Battler had meta Battler's knowledge, he could prevent a lot of things from happening, like stopping Rosa and Maria to go into the garden before the second twilight.

We hadn't known that the worlds crossed over so easilly until this episode actually.
It wouldn't be wrong to think that it will become a plot point later on.

Now, if we take into account the Kinzo is dead before the 4th of October theory, doesn't that mean that it could be fairly easy for a completely unknown person to come to Rokkenjima and take part in the murdering process, without changing the 18?

You've joined the group of me and MultiPigeon who have also formed this theory.

[Matrim]

Now, if we take into account the Kinzo is dead before the 4th of October theory

No way, in ep.1 Kinzo and Kanon discuss the siblings quarrel about the inheritance, the state of their respective companies, their need of money etc. No way this could have happened at some earlier point before the family gathering- unlike the first dialogue betweeen Nanjo and Kinzo for instance.

[MultiPigeon]

Originally Posted by Matrim

No way, in ep.1 Kinzo and Kanon discuss the siblings quarrel about the inheritance, the state of their respective companies, their need of money etc. No way this could have happened at some earlier point before the family gathering- unlike the first dialogue betweeen Nanjo and Kinzo for instance.

Well there are a lot of things in Umineko that play out differently from how we see it. Like Eva having a connection with Eva-Beatrice when she sleeps. That's total bull. But while I'm saying that that scene can be fake, I agree that it's a bit far fetched to deny that scene since it's not a scene connected to the existence of magic.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. I don't have a complete theory for what happened and I'm just aiming to give some different view points to those following this thread.

By the way. Eva-Beatrice claims in red that there are only 18 people on Rokkenjima in Episode 3 too. I think someone mentioned a theory in were the "only 18 people" statement was only restricted to episode 2.

[Proto]

People... hold back with the episode 4 spoilers already. There is a thread for discussing Ep 4 if that is what you want to do.

[Benny1]

After finishing Episode 3.

Spoiler for Virgilia:

I have a vague guess.... I think she is 34-tan's piece. 34-tan claims she gave Beato-chan powers, but Virgilia is her teacher. 34-tan's goals seem to line up with Virgilia's ridiculously shocking actions in the end. It's possible theory. Anything prove against this? I still think she is the "good witch" that she claims to be. There's just some weird stuff going on... Also, I think Beato-chan was forcing her "YES I WAS EVIL" in the end type expression. I find it hard to believe she woudl go through her heart being laced over and over again for Kanon just to trick Battler.

Spoiler for Maria and Rosa:

I am also still mad about the one scene with Maria and Rosa and Eva. It's not even becuase it was disgustingly graphic like the first twilights, but rather becuase the description of Rosa's mental state through the torture and her screams and such made me feel absolutely disgusted

[Sterling01]

Originally Posted by Benny1

Spoiler for Virgilia:

There's just some weird stuff going on... Also, I think Beato-chan was forcing her "YES I WAS EVIL" in the end type expression. I find it hard to believe she woudl go through her heart being laced over and over again for Kanon just to trick Battler.

Spoiler for Reply:

If she didn't do the evil face at the end, she would've won. There's also the fact of how sad she got when Battler didn't like her "fun".

[Benny1]

Spoiler for Beato-chan:

Well, what she was trying to get at at the end was all of that was just her acting, but our Beato-chan isn't good enough of an actor to fake it all.

[lovelysan]

....You know, now that I think of it, you guys are right 0_0 .

Spoiler for stuff:

The party at the end WAS weird all in all. Being SUPER-DUPER-CORNY happy and then being SUPER-DUPER evil. Now that I think of it, it was over the top in both ways 0_0 .

That, added with Lambda's comments to Beat about her "acting like she doesn't WANT to win." HMMM .

[Bern-chan]

Originally Posted by Benny1

Spoiler for Maria and Rosa:

I am also still mad about the one scene with Maria and Rosa and Eva. It's not even becuase it was disgustingly graphic like the first twilights, but rather becuase the description of Rosa's mental state through the torture and her screams and such made me feel absolutely disgusted

Yet you have Ilya as your avatar. D:

[Benny1]

Aren't I so sneaky~

TT_TT ending of HF, Ilya-chaaaaaaaan~ TT_TT

Anybody know when plans are for an Episode 3 manga? I wonder how it will do red text. Color pages galore is expensive, after all.

[lovelysan]

Maybe "text in pipe smoke" or something like that? Beato does carry that pipe around all the time after all.

That or, "Text with funny looking screen tone." *laugh*

[ClockWorkAngel]

I have a feeling that they might bold it that or do an epic two page spread with her using the red text to crush Battler's theory.

[Bern-chan]

Originally Posted by Benny1

Aren't I so sneaky~

TT_TT ending of HF, Ilya-chaaaaaaaan~ TT_TT

Anybody know when plans are for an Episode 3 manga? I wonder how it will do red text. Color pages galore is expensive, after all.

And in the anime too. I guess they'll just have the background turn red when a red word is used.

[Nadeor]

-Or they can just display the red text like in the game

[Matrim]

Okay, back to the speculation room! Leave reason and logic at the door, please, let your crazy theories shoot down Beato! Err, I mean, I finished my replay of ep.1, so I might as well post my rambling speculation and try to connect the events in ep.1 with the overall picture. Alas, there will be much more questions than answers...Or at least logical answers.

Spoiler for ep. 1, 2, 3, possibly Higurashi too:

Question 1: Why did Rosa bring up the issue of the mysterious person who gave Maria the umbrella during dinner? In every other case, she hates it when Maria mentions Beatrice and witches and let's face it, even if someone had said" I gave it to her", Maria would have made a fuss saying it was the witch anyway, embarrassing Rosa. The only explanation I can think of is Rosa deliberately trying to increase the impact of the first letter by making or deceiving Maria into saying Beato gave it to her.

Observation: Everyone eats dessert at dinner, so I guess no poison or antidote in it...this time.

Question 2: Rudolf says to Kylie and Battler that he will probably be killed tonight. Why doesn't he say that in the next episodes? He also states he wants to tell something to Battler and Kylie but in the end doesn't. At least not to Battler, that is.

I can't really think of good explanation for Rudolf's behavior. According to Battler Rudolf would be the last one to believe in witches, demons and so on. If he knows or suspect about Kinzo's devilish roulette plan then it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to not try to protect his son.

Observation: Krauss changes the servants' shift. Shannon was not supposed to be on duty in the main mansion. Does this shift change happen in ep.2? Anyway, it gives extra weight to the theory that Shannon's murder was not planned - what if she saw the culprit(s) trying to enter Natsuhi's room and forced the murderer to eliminate her instead.

Question 3: Why are Eva and Hideyoshi up so early (6 o'clock)? Are they up early in ep.3? They are supposed to be very tired from the siblings' discussion the previous night.

Observation: When Kinzo praises Natsuhi, he is with his back towards her all the time and also speak in a gently voice - "like it came from another person".

Tempting possibility but I think it would be too cheap of a trick from the author, if someone was pretending to be Kinzo. Natsuhi is not that stupid and this happened before the bodies were found, so she wasn't too freaked out yet. But it's possible that she imagined the whole scene.

Observation: If Rudolf and Kyrie faked their deaths, they must have been really good at make up (there was reference to make up in their last conversation with Battler) as apparently some of their front teeth are missing. Maybe they simply used someone else's body.

Observation: Eva insists on preserving the crime scene after the first twilight untouched. Assuming someone was faking their death and they were an acoomplice of her, it's easy to see why. A brand new paddock is installed and Natsuhi takes the key. If someone is indeed faking death, they woudl probably need help to get out - but then again the building is full of tools and no one is shown later checknig whether the padlock still hols, so this is probably a moot point.

Question 4: How did the culprit draw the circle in the darkness and rain and made it so perfect? Maybe Kanon drew it in the morning? Shouldn't it be smeared by the rain by the time they found it?

Then again, unless Genji and Kanon lie, the second magic circle was drawn in matter of minutes.

Observation: Maria says Beato is a thousand years old. Does Kinzo mention that? Is this a common knowledge?

Question 5: Why did Eva put a receipt on the door in the first place?

She could easily be lying. She desperately needs a way to deflect suspicion from herself. And suspecting Natsuhi is a good excuse for her and Hideyoshi to shut themselves in a room. They announce they will use the door chain, the murder happens quite a few hours later, so the culprit had plenty of time to plan a locked room mystery. Which leads to the question why the killer waits more than more than a half a day before striknig again.

Very far fetched wilg guessing - What if Hideyoshi was taking a shower to clean himself after burning Kinzo's body or walking in the rain to open the storehouse for some death faker accomplice (Gohda?)?

Second twlight murder reall made me think. I don't have a complete explanation for it but I think there are some things worth noting:
- Genji is shown to stop trying to open the door once the clanking sound of the chain was heard (of course, it's quite possible the culprit was inside at that time and the chain was put on in the normal way) and later Kanon cuts the chain "far more easily than he imagined". What if the culprit was relying on the spooky effect on the letter in order to prevent people to test the chain too much? Maybe it was already cut and then somehow loosely assembled together, ready to break again easily. Yes, I know metalurgy doesn't really work that way.
- Another interesting thing is that Kanon and Genji don't hear the shower sound from outside but can hear the TV. On the other hand Kanon doesn't hear the shower when he enters either, so this probably doesn't mean much.
Anyway, my impression for these murders is that the culprit was in a great hurry. In the cases when the culprit had time, the murders were more gruesome in ep.1 and if the bodies were cut to piece, it would exclude completely the possibility of suicide - which would have been great if the killer really intended to create an impression that this was a perfect locked room mystery only achievable by a witch. Too bad the clothes of Hideyoshi are not mentioned (IIRC), I'd really like to know if they are blood stained or not as it would hint us whether he was actually taking a shower or was simply dragged there post mortem.
Apart from death fakers and Beato only possible culprits are Genji and Kanon but it really would have required quite a bit of misleading PoVs (hiding their thoughts from the readers). But Eva and Hideyoshi's last shown conversation was way too relaxed for people stranded on an isalnd with a crazy murderer and they are extremely suspicious in ep.3, so I favour the "dead" accomplice turning on them theory.

The perfect timing of the last phone call, plus the killer always being one step ahead of everybody makes me suspect that maybe there are eavesropping devices in the house.

The final letter - there should be a reason why its contents weren't shown. But I doubt it's as simple as "*evil laugh*, I, (insert name) am the culprit, come face me one on one. It's also interesting that the cousins don't find the letter either, even though Natsuhi supposedly threw it somewhere along her path to the portrait hall. One possibility is that Eva wrote it and included certain details only eva is supposed to know, she certainly knows how to push Natsuhi's buttons - even assuming Eva died earlier, if this was planned after Natsuhi took over the gun, it might still be a possibility. Also, it's mentioned that it's very dark when the duel takes place - basically anyone could have pretended to be Beato and shot Natsuhi.

Observation: Maria claims bullets are useless against witches – in ep.3 we are told the opposite. Maria also claims Beato couldn't select her for a sacrifice in the end due to the scorpion charm - I thought she had all kinds of charms? You'd think she would boast how invulnerable she was, not mention just the charm Battler returned to her on a whim.


So, overall, I think the culprit was either Rosa or a combo Gohda, Eva, Hideyoshi. The big problem with Rosa is that her and Maria's PoVs in ep.2 show quite clearly that they have a very difficult relationship and Maria is indeed abused by her mother. But who would know most about Maria's notebook in order to impersonate Beato best - Rosa. Who needs to kill of of their siblings in order to claim the inheritance - Rosa. of course, no one actually claims it in the end but since we know that Beato exists at least in the meta world, maybe she is indeed revived in the end - maybe she murders the culprit in the end?
I have mentioned most of the reasons why Eva and Hideyoshi are suspicious. Also, Eva acceps too easily George's refusal to come with them and hide in one room. Why would she do that if she really suspected Natsuhi (or anyone else from the survivors at that point)?

At first, I was very much against trusting the characters' conclusions about the murders but I remembered that in Higurashi Rena for instance was right in Watanagashi about certain characters' disappearance. So maybe this hiding under the bed theory might turn out to be true.

Enough for now, if someone bites the hook, I might add more. Now to episode two.

[k//eternal]

I think those are very interesting points, and I need to replay the first game anyway (since we're gonna fix up all those typos, haha) so I'll let you know my thoughts on the matter once I'm through with it again.

Although regarding "1000 years", that's just "generic really long time unit", kind of like saying "My bag weighs a ton" except with less exaggeration involved. I wouldn't really call it knowledge on Maria's part per se, and it's one of Beato's "calling cards" so anyone introducing themselves as Beato would probably say they're a "1000 year witch".

[Exilon]

Originally Posted by Matrim

Spoiler for ep. 1, 2, 3, possibly Higurashi too:

Question 1: Why did Rosa bring up the issue of the mysterious person who gave Maria the umbrella during dinner?

Spoiler for answer:

Possibly because it's when all the family is reunited. I believe it's mentioned in the episode.

Originally Posted by Matrim

Spoiler:

Question 4: How did the culprit draw the circle in the darkness and rain and made it so perfect? Maybe Kanon drew it in the morning? Shouldn't it be smeared by the rain by the time they found it?

Spoiler for answer:

Good call. Most probably it was drawn in the morning not too long before it was found. Another possibilty I thought of was that maybe there's a device to draw these things quickly and nicely- like a big compass. If that's the case, then how the circle was drawn so fast in the second twilight gets explained quite easily. Anyway, the size of these magic circles are never really mentioned- we suppose that they're big since they cover alot of the screen, however, there are various clues that point against this, namely:
- There was a magic circle in Natsuhi's door (the scropion charm) that was very small according to the description, but had the same size in the screen as the others. Same for the drawings Maria usually shows us.
- Some magic circles (like the one in the first twilight of EP2) have something written below it, and usually the characters take a while to notice them. although it's said that this is because of the similarity of the cricle with the words, being small sized helps to support this.

Originally Posted by Matrim

Spoiler for question5:

Question 5: Why did Eva put a receipt on the door in the first place?

She could easily be lying. She desperately needs a way to deflect suspicion from herself. And suspecting Natsuhi is a good excuse for her and Hideyoshi to shut themselves in a room. They announce they will use the door chain, the murder happens quite a few hours later, so the culprit had plenty of time to plan a locked room mystery. Which leads to the question why the killer waits more than more than a half a day before striknig again.

Spoiler:

Indeed, I noticed that too, but I have a completely different question. ...If you take a look at the timeline, Eva says she put the receipt there BEFORE the 6 bodies were found (if memory doesn't fail me.). ... Notice the contradiction here? Why would she put a receipt on the door to prove someone is guilty if nothing had happened to make her suspicious? ...which means, obviously Eva knows something we do not know. No one seems to have noticed this loophole in the story, though, and it really bugs me.

[Avisch]

Heh. I had trouble paying attention to receipt part. I need to re-read it.

Spoiler for On episode 1 first twilight:

Matrim I'm happy someone else agrees on the bit about Shannon not being the intended victim.
The implications are too big if we take Natsuhi's room into a account. The fact that the killer did not get Natsuhi is something I see as a big hint.
Because of the charm on her door, and blood on it. We are given the implication that it is Beatrice. But I believe this is what the murderer wants us to think.
The description of the door we are given something along the lines of "it looks as if someone was frustrated in trying to enter the room"

Why would they be frustrated? Because they wanted Natsuhi to be part of the first twilight and the charm prevents them from killing Natsuhi unless s/he wants to stop
the "Beatrice = Killer" motif.

IF the Killer had gotten to Natsuhi the deaths would have been more symmetrical and would make more sense
it would have looked like this
-Krauss & Natsuhi dead
-Kyrie & Rudolf dead
-Rosa dead
-Gouda dead

If the 1st twilight had gone as we think it was planned. ALL parents except (Eva & Hideyoshi) would be dead. Gouda was planned to be killed just to complete the six so to leave Eva & Hideyoshi alive.

Spoiler for Matrim's theories:

Observation: Maria claims bullets are useless against witches – in ep.3 we are told the opposite. Maria also claims Beato couldn't select her for a sacrifice in the end due to the scorpion charm - I thought she had all kinds of charms? You'd think she would boast how invulnerable she was, not mention just the charm Battler returned to her on a whim.

YES! I noticed this aswell. And when you try to execute Beatrice in the TIPS it says that bullets bounce of her.

Kanon doesn't hear the shower when he enters either, so this probably doesn't mean much.

No it could important. We find Hideyoshi in the shower naked right? Shouldn't the shower be on?


too tired to type anymore

[k//eternal]

Originally Posted by Avisch

And when you try to execute Beatrice in the TIPS it says that bullets bounce of her.

(Not going to bother spoiler-tagging something that's part of Ep. 1 since this is the Ep. 3 thread, although that's still worthwhile for long chunks of text for space reasons.)

My impression is that the "I'm invulnerable to bullets" bit is a bluff on her part. Imagine you have one weak point and someone who wants to take you down is trying to find out, right? Well, obviously you want them to think that this isn't the way to do it.

Of course, you could take it to be something about the numerous Beatos that seem to exist, that the Beato seen here isn't a "witch" in the same sense as we see in the meta world.