[Game] Umineko no Naku Koro ni Chiru - Ep. 7 Requiem of the golden witch

[Renall]

Well, say for a second the message bottles were pre-written by Yasu or "Beatrice" or whomever. She wasn't expecting Battler to remember, and wrote it as such. Future writers lifted the idea that "Battler doesn't remember a promise he made" and made it a basis motive. And it might have been, but in truth, he didn't forget (but by that time the message bottles were already written and/or released).

Then the incident happened. Now the message bottles are the main sources of the story, and in that story, he didn't remember. Perhaps he really did remember, but no one presently exists (as far as we've been led to believe) who can set that straight.

And yes, that would suggest that any crime is independent of "Beatrice" taking a specific action, at least a specific malevolent action.

[TehChron]

Originally Posted by Renall

Well, say for a second the message bottles were pre-written by Yasu or "Beatrice" or whomever. She wasn't expecting Battler to remember, and wrote it as such. Future writers lifted the idea that "Battler doesn't remember a promise he made" and made it a basis motive. And it might have been, but in truth, he didn't forget (but by that time the message bottles were already written and/or released).

Then the incident happened. Now the message bottles are the main sources of the story, and in that story, he didn't remember. Perhaps he really did remember, but no one presently exists (as far as we've been led to believe) who can set that straight.

And yes, that would suggest that any crime is independent of "Beatrice" taking a specific action, at least a specific malevolent action.

Regardless of Author theory, we are completely aware of the identity of the original author of the two message bottles. Logically, it's impossible for them to have been prepared on short notice and released during or shortly before the typhoon hit.

In conjunction with the fact that Yasu is apparently related to whether or not Battler returns that year, the only motivation we're given for that is his promise with Yasu. In addition with the fact that George is a manipulative asswipe, we can conclude he spent a good deal of time convincing her that Battler wasn't aware of her existence. Therefore, we agree on that, overall.

So, all that really leaves is the question of what exactly happened? It's said that the tragedy was made worse because of Battler's presence, not that there wouldnt have been one to begin with. So how does that work?

[Renall]

Plans are always made worse by unexpected eventualities. Battler returning is unexpected. If someone had a plan, it could have been screwed up in a way that led to increased tragedy by Battler's return, whether he was specifically the cause of that or not.

But we'd have to reconcile that with the message bottle stories suggesting Battler did in fact return. These would have to be written once it's known he actually will, or else it's wild speculation on the bottle writer's part (imagine the surprise if Battler was never there or something). There's not much time prior to the incident to write that.

• If the stories were written first, they could anticipate Battler not remembering his promise; BUT
• If the stories were written later, they'd be reporting that Battler in fact didn't; UNLESS
• The message bottle writer is lying about it. But in that case why?

[Smeckledorf]

Originally Posted by TehChron

Episode 1 is a fiction. Thats indicated by the bottle epilogue, and the fact that it's always referred to as "the first game" from there on out in Meta-context.

Author theory is a theory for a reason. Episode 1 has never been said to be a fiction, if anything it has the potential to be more realistic than ANY of the other episodes so far.

Anyways, Bernkastel said the tragedy ends the same way every time. The only person who survives is Eva, wouldn't that mean no tragedy happens in Leon's world?

[Renall]

Originally Posted by Smeckledorf

Author theory is a theory for a reason. Episode 1 has never been said to be a fiction, if anything it has the potential to be more realistic than ANY of the other episodes so far.

There is no basis for saying that short of the absence of meta or magic sequences, things we aren't even sure exist in the "real world" stories to begin with. It's possible the second bottle was just as non-magical as Legend. If that's our metric for "most realistic," then the ep7 Tea Party should win out over everything else because it's the "most realistic" sequence in the entire series.

And that aside, what basis does the message bottle serve in the endscroll if ep1 was "more realistic?" By your logic, the bottle either is just random crap or an incredibly and impossibly accurate accounting of the real events that just took place. Real events in which Eva died, of course.

[Smeckledorf]

Originally Posted by Renall

There is no basis for saying that short of the absence of meta or magic sequences, things we aren't even sure exist in the "real world" stories to begin with. It's possible the second bottle was just as non-magical as Legend. If that's our metric for "most realistic," then the ep7 Tea Party should win out over everything else because it's the "most realistic" sequence in the entire series.

And that aside, what basis does the message bottle serve in the endscroll if ep1 was "more realistic?" By your logic, the bottle either is just random crap or an incredibly and impossibly accurate accounting of the real events that just took place. Real events in which Eva died, of course.

Except episode 7's tea party happened on a stage? So that doesn't apply at all. The message in the bottle wasn't nearly all that detailed and might not accurate at all. I guess my logic is flawed though; I should start believing information from people who fraudulently pass themselves off as Maria.

[Renall]

Do we really have any idea why a person would want to do that? I wouldn't go so far as to call it fraud, especially if the person is asking readers to find the truth. That seems to be at odds with an intent to deceive. Isn't that exactly what Battler came around to? The games not being the truth not making them useless frauds?

Also you apparently are content to completely disregard the ep1 Tea Party wherein everyone is talking about the story that just happened. That should be equally as much an obstacle to your claim as the counter that the ep7 Tea Party has a framing story.

[TehChron]

Originally Posted by Smeckledorf

Author theory is a theory for a reason. Episode 1 has never been said to be a fiction, if anything it has the potential to be more realistic than ANY of the other episodes so far.

Anyways, Bernkastel said the tragedy ends the same way every time. The only person who survives is Eva, wouldn't that mean no tragedy happens in Leon's world?

If Eva is to survive in the true account of events. Then inherently, Legend is fiction because it contradicts that.

Moreover, I contend that Yasu heard about Battler's return from Jessica/Rudolph/Minion X within a long enough time frame to write Legend and Turn, there's no reason to accept point blank that the notice was that short on Battler returning.

If the stories were written first, they could anticipate Battler not remembering his promise; BUT

Probably the correct account.

If the stories were written later, they'd be reporting that Battler in fact didn't; UNLESS

That would be weird on way too many levels. And considering the ultimate fate of Yasutrice is itself still up in the air, we frankly can't even know. But it doesn't make sense for both her stories to claim Eva died when she knew she didn't, thus knowingly rendering them blatantly fictional accounts.

There'd be no credibility in that case. There's no logical reason to assume that there'd be such a cult following forming up around those message bottles beforehand, so there's no real reason to make them blatant fictions depicting past events. They'd be normally be dismissed out of hand. If the idea is to draw attention to the stories and give them credibility, they need to be convincing accounts of what could have happened.

There's no logical reason to depict having Eva die, and being confirmed to die in the story, when she didn't in reality. Therefore, they had to be written during a time period when it was simply not known that she'd survive.

The message bottle writer is lying about it. But in that case why?

Iunno, that option is a pretty huge stretch as it is.

[Renall]

Originally Posted by TehChron

That would be weird on way too many levels. And considering the ultimate fate of Yasutrice is itself still up in the air, we frankly can't even know. But it doesn't make sense for both her stories to claim Eva died when she knew she didn't, thus knowingly rendering them blatantly fictional accounts.

There'd be no credibility in that case. There's no logical reason to assume that there'd be such a cult following forming up around those message bottles beforehand, so there's no real reason to make them blatant fictions depicting past events. They'd be normally be dismissed out of hand. If the idea is to draw attention to the stories and give them credibility, they need to be convincing accounts of what could have happened.

There's no logical reason to depict having Eva die, and being confirmed to die in the story, when she didn't in reality. Therefore, they had to be written during a time period when it was simply not known that she'd survive.

Hold on, what makes you so sure of that? The objective of the message bottle writer may not be public credibility. The mere notion that he/she made an entreaty to "find the truth" doesn't necessarily mean it was intended that just anybody could find the truth (though it doesn't mean no one can).

Indeed, the very act of writing multiple accounts automatically places at least all but one of those accounts solidly in fictional territory (and, we suspect, probably all of them outright). That alone should destroy any hope of "credibility" in actually telling the true story of the incident. If the goal was to "explain what happened," then it would be necessary that the stories depict Eva's survival and I would then agree with you that they absolutely could not have been written later.

However, that objective cannot be accepted as axiomatic. The possibility that someone unanticipated survived (either as a writer or as a reader) opens the prospect that the messages were only intended for a very small group of people. In that case, the goal was not to curry credibility, but to develop just enough public presence that the stories would be accessible to the intended audience (or potential audience, if they were writing to someone like Battler whom they hoped survived but didn't know).

That said, "accurate accounts" could have risked the message bottles never surfacing. If the police believed them to be actual murder confessions, they might have sat on them as part of the investigation. Since Eva dies early in both ep1 and ep2, if those were the message bottle stories, the police would dismiss them as some kind of weird nonsense or at least release them at some point.

Perhaps the most credible thing in most of the episodes is that Battler generally ends the story in a theoretical position to survive (at least in the sense of not being actually dead; his survival odds in ep4 seem a bit low where he's standing). This, I think, more than anything speaks to the objective of most of the authors, which is to probe the unknown and see if Battler responds. Maybe he has, or as of ep8, maybe he is about to.

Basically, I don't think it's so easy to say it "makes no sense" for them to have been written later. In a way I think it makes very little sense for them to have been written before, though there are only a few small reasons why not.

[TehChron]

Originally Posted by Renall

Hold on, what makes you so sure of that? The objective of the message bottle writer may not be public credibility. The mere notion that he/she made an entreaty to "find the truth" doesn't necessarily mean it was intended that just anybody could find the truth (though it doesn't mean no one can).

That's true. But that's a stretch, hence my use of Occlam's razor and all that.

Indeed, the very act of writing multiple accounts automatically places at least all but one of those accounts solidly in fictional territory (and, we suspect, probably all of them outright). That alone should destroy any hope of "credibility" in actually telling the true story of the incident. If the goal was to "explain what happened," then it would be necessary that the stories depict Eva's survival and I would then agree with you that they absolutely could not have been written later.

Not necessarily, if there are two realistic accounts of what happened floating around, both claiming it was done by a witch, both written by someone claiming to have been a victim who was present, then that would raise quite the stir, given the undoubtedly high profile nature of the case. There's no way such a sensational thing wouldn't have wound up being leaked to the public if it were left for anyone to find. Not to mention the inherently unreliable nature of the delivery method, it had to be done in such a way as to be considered convincing, so as to not merely be tossed away out of hand.

There's too much risk of the effort being wasted if it was written intended as a blatant forgery.

However, that objective cannot be accepted as axiomatic. The possibility that someone unanticipated survived (either as a writer or as a reader) opens the prospect that the messages were only intended for a very small group of people. In that case, the goal was not to curry credibility, but to develop just enough public presence that the stories would be accessible to the intended audience (or potential audience, if they were writing to someone like Battler whom they hoped survived but didn't know).

That's a trail of assumptions leading into one another, "a house built upon sand..."

That said, "accurate accounts" could have risked the message bottles never surfacing. If the police believed them to be actual murder confessions, they might have sat on them as part of the investigation. Since Eva dies early in both ep1 and ep2, if those were the message bottle stories, the police would dismiss them as some kind of weird nonsense or at least release them at some point.

And blatant fluff would have risked them never being given to the police in the first place, and would likely have been simply treated as random pranks.

Thats the normal thing to happen.

Perhaps the most credible thing in most of the episodes is that Battler generally ends the story in a theoretical position to survive (at least in the sense of not being actually dead; his survival odds in ep4 seem a bit low where he's standing). This, I think, more than anything speaks to the objective of most of the authors, which is to probe the unknown and see if Battler responds. Maybe he has, or as of ep8, maybe he is about to.

Meh, may or may not be correct.

Basically, I don't think it's so easy to say it "makes no sense" for them to have been written later. In a way I think it makes very little sense for them to have been written before, though there are only a few small reasons why not.

It makes even less sense for them to be written after the fact. And I never said "it doesnt make sense", I said there's "no logical reason". That doesn't eliminate the possibility of irrational motive X.

[Renall]

Originally Posted by TehChron

There's too much risk of the effort being wasted if it was written intended as a blatant forgery.

Oh, but it makes perfect sense that they were actual messages in bottles set adrift and weren't all potentially destroyed, which would be exactly at odds with whatever objective such a writer would want.

That's a trail of assumptions leading into one another, "a house built upon sand..."

The assumptions are based on pretty obvious thematic elements.

And blatant fluff would have risked them never being given to the police in the first place, and would likely have been simply treated as random pranks.

Thats the normal thing to happen.

The "normal" thing to happen is that they would be completely forgotten or thrown away. The real miracle is that anyone paid enough attention to them to ensure their publication, but I still question their provenance because the most reliable source is Ootsuki and he is not a reliable source at all. Ootsuki would believe anything.

Meh, may or may not be correct.

I'll agree but only with respect to whether that was anyone's objective. I think we're getting Battler being alive hammered over our heads by now on a level even Shkanon wishes it'd gotten. Though as before, doesn't necessarily make it true...

It makes even less sense for them to be written after the fact. And I never said "it doesnt make sense", I said there's "no logical reason". That doesn't eliminate the possibility of irrational motive X.

You're dismissing it too readily. Ange never gets an ounce of proof that the police/fisherman actually found the message bottles, only that people like Ootsuki - unreliable people who want to believe in them - believe that is the case. Given the implausibility of the message bottles surviving to publication with the story provided, we should at least wonder.

[Judoh]

Originally Posted by Renall

The real miracle is that anyone paid enough attention to them to ensure their publication, but I still question their provenance because the most reliable source is Ootsuki and he is not a reliable source at all. Ootsuki would believe anything.

ya see... the thing about that is...

http://community.livejournal.com/witchhunters/7134.html

K: The only work that incorporates the reader's deduction into the story seems to be Umineko.

R: I want to use this more often. As a matter of fact, Professor Otsuki, who appeared in EP4, represents the player's POV. I've always wanted to, through a character like Professor Otsuki, interrogate the main characters with questions players typically ask. For instance, what do you think of the heart theory? (smile) It should be interesting to write it out as an interview with the characters in the story. If I just mention it here about how certain theory is such and such, it wouldn't be fair, since those who haven't read this interview would not know about this. So I feel that these ideas should be written directly into the story. As for the epitaph, I will reiterate that the epitaph can be solved. But it is highly probable that those people who don't have a certain common knowledge would not be able to solve it; to them it would be a difficult problem. A lot of people don't know where Kinzo originally lived, so they can only consider various possibilities. It's hard, but it's not impossible.

[Renall]

Well we're hardly reliable sources. Where did Ootsuki get his information? Pretty much the same place we did: Somebody claimed it happened that way whom we cannot source (in this case, the ep1 endscroll). The Professor more or less repeats the tale. The one thing we do know is the message bottles and diary share handwriting samples (I don't doubt Ootsuki on this at least since he claims to have seen all three).

[Used Can]

Yasu's motive is probably the same as 6x9=42. The most reasonable answer would be saying it's on Base-13, but no matter how much sense that makes, it's still wrong.

[Leafsnail]

Is it a possibility that Battler was never on Rokkenjima during 1986 at all? I mean, perhaps the first 2 message bottles were just fanciful nonsense about how Battler would suddenly decide to come back for no real reason, and she'd teach him a lesson. In actual fact, Battler never returns - he's through with the Ushiromiya family permanently. They die in the explosion, Battler keeps living his life as before.

The main problem here becomes "Why doesn't Battler go back to Ange?" again, but... that's the same for every theory. I suppose we can add the wild speculation "He thought Ange had died in the blast" (considering she was meant to be there).

Come to think of it, I can probably go further with this theory. The Battler we know is a semi-fictional creation - a kindof idealised version of the person Beatrice loved 6 years ago.

[TehChron]

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

Is it a possibility that Battler was never on Rokkenjima during 1986 at all? I mean, perhaps the first 2 message bottles were just fanciful nonsense about how Battler would suddenly decide to come back for no real reason, and she'd teach him a lesson. In actual fact, Battler never returns - he's through with the Ushiromiya family permanently. They die in the explosion, Battler keeps living his life as before.

The main problem here becomes "Why doesn't Battler go back to Ange?" again, but... that's the same for every theory. I suppose we can add the wild speculation "He thought Ange had died in the blast" (considering she was meant to be there).

Come to think of it, I can probably go further with this theory. The Battler we know is a semi-fictional creation - a kindof idealised version of the person Beatrice loved 6 years ago.

That makes Amakusa being an adult version of Battler-Prime more plausible, I will certainly admit, although it does leave a bad taste in my mouth to contemplate.

[Leafsnail]

Well, yeah. It demotes our protagonist to just another fictional entity. Under this theory, Battler is basically the same as Erika (exists, but not in the form seen in the story, and not actually on the island).

Hadn't considered this linking to Amakusa, but that does sortof seem to work.

[estdesoda]

Originally Posted by Leafsnail

Is it a possibility that Battler was never on Rokkenjima during 1986 at all? I mean, perhaps the first 2 message bottles were just fanciful nonsense about how Battler would suddenly decide to come back for no real reason, and she'd teach him a lesson. In actual fact, Battler never returns - he's through with the Ushiromiya family permanently. They die in the explosion, Battler keeps living his life as before.

The main problem here becomes "Why doesn't Battler go back to Ange?" again, but... that's the same for every theory. I suppose we can add the wild speculation "He thought Ange had died in the blast" (considering she was meant to be there).

Come to think of it, I can probably go further with this theory. The Battler we know is a semi-fictional creation - a kindof idealised version of the person Beatrice loved 6 years ago.

Ah. Yeah, I do like the idea that the Battler we know might be a creation, and that he may not have ever set a foot on the 1986 Rokkenjima. At least those elements are what I have used on my "Battler is dead" theory.

The theory does have problems of its own, many related to how you believe each characters would do, think, and know (as Renall and Teh had been pointing out); but if you are thinking on the lines of "Battler never went to 1986 Rokkenjima", take a look at the speculation thread.

(yes, this is an advertisement!)

[Renall]

In theory there's nothing wrong with the idea, but it would be quite odd in the "future" context as Battler not going ought to be fairly common knowledge. There are things that might support it (Beatrice's evasiveness on whether he could've prevented it if he hadn't returned, Bern's suggestion that the massacre would happen even in Lion's world). Still, not many things. It also feels sort of anticlimactic in the face of BATTLER's ep7 promise.

"You want to know the real story? Pssh, I dunno, I wasn't even there."

[Smeckledorf]

Originally Posted by TehChron

If Eva is to survive in the true account of events. Then inherently, Legend is fiction because it contradicts that.

Moreover, I contend that Yasu heard about Battler's return from Jessica/Rudolph/Minion X within a long enough time frame to write Legend and Turn, there's no reason to accept point blank that the notice was that short on Battler returning.
Probably the correct account.

I typed that wrong, Bernkastel said Eva is the only survivor of every game. She also says a whole bunch of other things for no reason other than malice. I was asking a question based on what she said.
Moving on, I also believe that any preparations for Battler's arrival had time. However, my problem comes with what happens on the island. I just don't believe a pre-written letter can be accurate because of the randomness of what can take place and what can go wrong.