Going Back to Rokkenjima of October 5, 1986 - Journey to the Golden Land

More than ten years ago my journey with the When They Cry franchise began. I was in last years of high school when I decided to immerse myself into visual novel series. I can't remember how I got to know of this weird medium and how it all began for me exactly, but I've been a huge fan of mystery fiction all my life and my favourite series consists of detective fiction series - in fact I'm aiming to become a mystery author myself one day and I love to get inspiration from series like this. I'd like to create a long-running series every half a year for about ten volumes, but instead in a way that's much different from anything else, for example instead of the story looping I could create multiple individual cases in different settings.

 I recall watching the Higurashi and Umineko anime series and then just wanting to get my hands on the original source material. This was before the original Umineko series was even over. 07th Expansion uploaded new Episodes ever half a year. I also remember loving the Motion Graphics and getting hyped over the next one, but I recall a certain natural disaster - a tsunami - took the lives of some of the creators.

First of all, When They Cry franchise consists of horror/mystery-fantasy visual novel series such as Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, Umineko no Naku Koro ni as well as the newest series Ciconia no Naku Koro ni. The series written and created by Ryukishi07 and rest of 07th Expansion development group.

The series used to get flack for its art style (drawn by Ryukishi07) but I never had a problem with it personally. However when in 2013 they announced Umineko no Naku Koro ni Chiru: Nocturne of Truth and Illusions, I was incredibly excited to experience the journey again one day.


It's somehow been hella long since the original series ended but I still remember the story and its characters well. The main character,  Ushiromiya Battler, is an obvious Phoenix Wright 2.0 so now that I've played the Ace Attorney games I'll be making some heavy comparisons. I am now actually getting back to this story in its full PS3 glory. I'm waiting for the best time to start the game though as I want to immerse myself as best as I can.

Ahh, I remember following this series for a good few years. It was incredible in a way. Chilly days, fun days, summer days. Always back in Rokkenjima. I've read the first episode of Umineko so many times as I liked the generic Agatha Christie-styled manor case it set up. Anyone who is familiar with long-running detective fiction series from any medium is more than familiar with this type of setting. Even the side characters feel very similar to those from Poirot stories.
Now that I think about it, the feel I got from following this series must be similar experience I'm sure many are getting from following Final Fantasy 7 Remake until its finale for many years now.

What I really liked about this series were the immersive parts - characters of course brutally die and it leaves one to question about what's going on. The music is fantastic and helps to elevate the experience. I loved to just look at the menu with the blood splattered avatars everywhere and read the information on characters. Of course now that I'm more experienced with the genre I can see that this series has some ridiculous pacing issues as it barely progresses over 8 Episodes of visual novels, similar to Higurashi (which has far more extra parts though).

I'm not expecting the PS3 version to change anything about the story but presentation is actually a very key aspect about any story. Dialogue, background, framing, lighting, everything matters. The PS3 version is definitely going to be a new experience for me in a way.

In its core Umineko is basically a Zero Escape game with Phoenix Wright dealing with a generic manor case, which then develops into this overworld war against witches, dealing with dimensional layers and multiverse theories as visual novels often seem to do. Umineko however did pull it off very well. The Schrödinger's Cat theory is a fan favourite for any mystery series and visual novels often tend to find many ways to focus on it so I'm interested to see how many times it's referenced in this series again.