Let's Read Higurashi When They Cry! - Ch.1 Onikakushi

Off-Topic
#33

I finally got the time to read chapter 1 and I’m glad that I managed to not get spoiled about it at all. Okay, I knew that it’s written by Ryukishi07 who also wrote Lucias route in rewrite. So the only thing I knew was that its probably going to be some mystery story.

The beginnig was quite amusing, I got to like the 4 girls pretty fast. Tomitake was a nice guy, everything was fine.
So the day after the festival where shit starts to happen I was waiting for some new characters to appear who could play the bad guys. I didn’t even think about Rena and co. But as you know, thats not what I got, I got a scary as hell rena… The first moment where she gets those crazy eyes it scared the hell out of me T_T But then it was clear that theres something really suspicious going on and it didn’t surprise me that Mion was involved too.

For Rena, my thoughts are that she maybe did go through the same thing als Keiichi in her old school. She got some friends and someday they started acting suspicious. Or she imagined that they act suspicious, to the point where she was so frightened that she beat them up and went crazy. Maybe the people behind the incidents made her do so and ‘safed’ her afterwards, so she would come back to Hinamizawa. But at this point I can’t think of a reason why they would do that so it’s just wild speculation.
But because of that she understands what Keiichi is going through and she wants to help him, but she doesn’t know how. And she’s frightened of Mion and the other people.
But as much as I want her to be a good person, as hard is it to find excuses for her behavior. The scene where she stands in front of Keiichis door for an hour, her chasing him with the axe, her standing in front of his house in the rain and so on. Thats some crazy stuff.

I found it interesting that she was apologizing over and over while standing in the rain. Keiichi did the same thing in the phone booth at the end… But I don’t know what to think of that.

For Mion, I think its clear that she is deeply involved in all of this and maybe she and her parents even are the heads of the organisation behind everything. I think that because of her statement that she had the chance to kill Ooishi but didn’t do it.

For satoko and rika, I hope they don’t belong to the bad people in Hinamizawa. Maybe their parents got killed because they tried to do something against Mion and her people. They could just be victims and act normal beacuse they’re scared as hell of the ‘curse’.
That would be the case for the majority of Hinamizawa. It’s clear that the whole village is somehow involved in this. For example, at the end when Rena is chasing Keiichi with an axe, why aren’t there any people on the streets? This points to the tale where everyone has to look away when the ‘demons’ (this time rena) are on their hunt. Everybody is scared and looks away.

I have a problem to believe supernatural stuff without hard evidence, so I say that there’s some shady organisation behind the ‘curse’.

For the things that happen to Keiichi. The presence he feels behind him sometimes could just be paranoia. The end where he goes crazy could be explained with the unknown drug that drove Tomitake insane as well. They injected him but he didn’t react how they expected and so they got killed. He stayed ‘sane’ and tried to escape but in the end the drug kicks in and he ended up killing himself.

All in all it’s really hard to guess whats going on. Many things and people that make no sense. I won’t watch the anime until I finish the whole VN, so I will have to wait for the next chapter to get some answers!
Does somebody know when that would be? :stuck_out_tongue:

2 Likes
#34

See, that’s the beauty of this series; this is actually a very plausible way of looking at it. Maybe she really was trying to help, despite her 360 turn in personality whenever Keiichi lies. Perhaps Keiichi was just being waaaay too paranoid! And maybe that’s what got him into this whole mess to begin with!

That’s at least one thing that I can find believable by the end of the series; Mion and her family are hiding some secret. Whether it has to do with humans performing the killings, or if it is simply in regards to safety against onikakushi, we don’t know quite yet…

+1 humans, then :smiley:

I just wish it would be soon T_T

#35

The TL on Watanagashi-hen is moving along surprisingly well these past few days.

#36

Man, reading the comments here… You guys are gonna love the rest of what the series has to offer.

I still haven’t found time to sit down and play it yet, but I will definitely get it done before the second chapter comes out.

1 Like
#37

chapter 2 hype

Read this some time ago, loved it. At first, I thought Keiichi had gone insane, but when part of his letter was removed, he definitely was not imagining it.

I too trust Satoko the most. She’s probably the person who’s in constant fear of being “spirited away” like her family. My question is: Did she know Rena and Mion were like this? And what does Rika have to do with anything anyway?

1 Like
#38

Watanagashi-hen just hit MangaGamer’s store and will be available for reading on Friday the 13th of November! You can already buy it and redeem your Steam key at a slightly reduced price if you want to.

5 Likes
#39

Good choice of release date there, and that’ll be another afternoon of rereading… if the PS-sprites mod gets released right away^^

#40

I could if Mangagamer wasn’t shitty and blocked Japanese IP addresses from accessing their website >_>

#41

Feel the hype! Time to re-read onikakushi. This time with ps sprites. I like them more than the brand new sprites for some reason

#42

Better backgrounds and sprites with the patch tbh. Here’s hoping they get the new patch out in time.

#43

Am I the only person who genuinely prefers the steam sprites over the PS2 ones??? I would like voices tho

#44

The steam sprites are good too but why don’t they have CG’s? The ps version has some and that’s why I prefer this one. And yeah, voices would be nice

#45

I don’t even know why I don’t like the steam sprites, I just look at them and think “…nah”, maybe it’s because I had the PS sprites when I first read it and now those are ‘normal’ for me? Didn’t have CGs back then though
And I’ll probably still leave voices disabled, I’m too used to reading it without voices^^

#46

Wait… There’s no CGs?

#47

The original release doesn’t have CGs, being a doujin production where all the art was done by Ryukishi himself. The console releases add some in addition to creating new spritework specifically for those releases. Personally, I don’t see why Higurashi needs CGs; it’s not like the story already does an excellent job of describing what’s happening. :confused:

#48

I don’t think I would ever be able to get used to a Ryukishi07 work that has CGs. I kinda like those textured photos as it adds to the feel of the novel.

I don’t like the potato sprites tho xP

#49

Now that you mention it, that was a silly question, lol. The original didn’t have CGs after all.

1 Like
#50

You’re right, it doesn’t really need CG’s. I didn’t even notice that there are none until I finished reading and someone here mentioned it. But I think they’re a nice extra. I’m a CG fan in general, everytime I get one I do a little dance of joy in my mind. :stuck_out_tongue:

1 Like
#51

So, Watanagashi is out, and the sprite mod is being made, keep an eye on https://github.com/higurashi-mod/watanagashi

I’ll get Watanagashi for rereading in a week or so, or later if the mod isn’t out by then

#52

I wanna keep the steam sprites but… Looking forward to the voice patch! :smiley: Muh Nakahara Mai