convince me to keep playing

[ｚｏｍｂｉ★ｄｅｓｕ]

I've finished episode 1, and it's little extra stuff. I... was pretty bored through a lot of it. It reminds me of The Count of Monte Cristo in that there's large chunks of the text that I just don't care about and.. I struggled to get into that one because of these boring bits. Umineko is 4 Monte Cristos long.

I'm in the George/Shannon date and I'm just. I don't really feel much of a connection to most of these people. Kannon, Kinzo and Genji are probably the ones I find the most interesting..?

It seems a lot of people really like this thing but I just. have like no motivation to continue and am finding myself procrastinating on playing it. :< so. help? convince me to keep playing.

[*^SaoSin^*]

It's your choice tbh, if you think that this mystery in general is not worth your time then by all means. For me it was exceptionally well crafted even if indeed many of the characters are not very likeable. I liked most of the main cast, and I hated most of the family heads. It's not the main goal of this though. You think it is boring but exacly because they are showing their detailed daily routine you may feel after some time, a bit of sympathy for them. Because you get better picture of how they feel.

Lenght is crucial here because great mysteries need to be long to create dimensional tale and finally to shock people after all... At least that's my believe and so far the longer the games... the better they are for mystery VN genre.

Games like this demands patience, and a little bit of thinking outside of the text box viewing certain characters from their shoes even if they are not likeable at first.

[Sergent H]

Episode 1 is the most "boring"; it's just an introduction to understand the basics (number of people; location; name and relation etc...)
The true game of Umineko start at the beginning of the Chapter 2 with a unique way to solve the mistery. Just by playing 1h hour, you should get access to this new content

[ｚｏｍｂｉ★ｄｅｓｕ]

Originally posted by *^SaoSin^*:

Lenght is crucial here because great mysteries need to be long to create dimensional tale and finally to shock people after all... At least that's my believe and so far the longer the games... the better they are for mystery VN genre.

Games like this demands patience, and a little bit of thinking outside of the text box viewing certain characters from their shoes even if they are not likeable at first.

re:length .. most detective novels, like for example The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins are not anywhere near this long. And are still. Good. And immersive. The House Fata Morgana is a game I loved and I'd be halfway done if I was re-reading that.

As for patience. That's a virtue people usually say I actually. have. And as for thinking outside the text box? I've been fact checking it with the Greater Key of Solomon. That's been the most engaging part.

Originally posted by Sergent H:

The true game of Umineko start at the beginning of the Chapter 2 with a unique way to solve the mistery. Just by playing 1h hour, you should get access to this new content

They were on the beach talking when I last quit because

[Battler Ushiromiya]

Just let the SoL exist. You don't seem like you're giving the SoL much of a chance which could be why you don't care. But even people who really like Umi find Ep 2's start to be slow. But it is important. Every scene is important. Umineko is a rare series where you can't cut a single scene because all of them are important for something

[ｚｏｍｂｉ★ｄｅｓｕ]

Originally posted by Battler Ushiromiya:

Just let the SoL exist. You don't seem like you're giving the SoL much of a chance which could be why you don't care. But even people who really like Umi find Ep 2's start to be slow. But it is important. Every scene is important. Umineko is a rare series where you can't cut a single scene because all of them are important for something

SoL? (thanks v )

.... I read the stuff in episode 1, and I did indeed try and give it a chance..? but there's. so so much of it. at the best of times it reminded me of why at family gatherings I tend to be off by myself reading a book, listening to music or pestering any cats in the area. at the worst... I was checking to see how much longer this section was going to be and just. hoping. something. would. happen. when it picked up everyone seemed to still discuss things over much.

as for episode 2 so far, the highlight has been remembering aquariums exist and then being sad because Covid means I can't visit them.

[DeRockProject (jongyon7192p)]

Slice of Life

[Vitamin defincensy]

i've seen someone describe it as "the pistachio of visual novels, because you have to crack the shell to get to the good stuff", and i've also been told it's better to digest the 8 arcs each as individual stories instead of as one massive slog and take breaks between them if you need to.

i don't personally know from experience, because I'm in the same boat as you. There is so much fluff in this story. i've been stopped on the tail end of Turn of the Golden Witch for like 3 months now. I'm still going to finish it though.

[Vitamin defincensy]

have you read Higurashi? if not know that its question arcs are more engaging, it will ease you into Ryukishi's style of storytelling a lot better than Umineko does at first, and it gives a lot of traction to the concept of witches in Umineko. If you haven't it might be better to do that and then return to Umineko, it's a lot of reading but you'll know from just the first arc if it's all worthwhile

[ｚｏｍｂｉ★ｄｅｓｕ]

Originally posted by I HATE THE ANTICHRIST:

have you read Higurashi? if not know that its question arcs are more engaging, it will ease you into Ryukishi's style of storytelling a lot better than Umineko does at first, and it gives a lot of traction to the concept of witches in Umineko. If you haven't it might be better to do that and then return to Umineko, it's a lot of reading but you'll know from just the first arc if it's all worthwhile

So... no I haven't? but also my Umineko experience kinda makes me want to never touch his work again unless I can force myself to actually finish this, and then find it to be like. amazing. somewhere. Cause like committing to another longass story to finish this one does. not sound like the best plan lmao. It's been a week.. ish? since I could last make myself boot it up. so I guess I am spacing it. unintentionally.

Thanks for the post tho, and GL on your own Umineko journey.

[Devilfish]

I'm in the same both as you OP. Maybe it's because I do a lot of fiction editing but ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ I am ACHING to edit this monstrosity down. Maybe I'm wrong and there's a very good reason why we get several paragraphs of a description of dessert, several pages of detailed explanation of the stock market and the exact math behind the conversion rate of gold to yen, but if this was a manuscript on my desk I'll bet I could cut 20k from just the intro and lose nothing. I know visual novels are the domain of talented writers who are allergic to editing and generally I can live with that, but this one HURTS. You can't have an entire novel's worth of exposition before the inciting incident. It's against the law I believe.

[DeRockProject (jongyon7192p)]

huh im actually kinda interested in what an edited down version of umineko would look like.

[ｚｏｍｂｉ★ｄｅｓｕ]

Originally posted by Devilfish:

I'm in the same both as you OP. Maybe it's because I do a lot of fiction editing but ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ I am ACHING to edit this monstrosity down. Maybe I'm wrong and there's a very good reason why we get several paragraphs of a description of dessert, several pages of detailed explanation of the stock market and the exact math behind the conversion rate of gold to yen, but if this was a manuscript on my desk I'll bet I could cut 20k from just the intro and lose nothing. I know visual novels are the domain of talented writers who are allergic to editing and generally I can live with that, but this one HURTS. You can't have an entire novel's worth of exposition before the inciting incident. It's against the law I believe.

Yeah, this almost reads like an old penny dreadful where the reason for the filler was $$$. Except you'd need to do a little more to keep the reader's attention to publish this the same way. Glad I am not alone in thinking this could stand to be a lot shorter tho.

[Battler Ushiromiya]

Well everyone agrees that Umi's prose isn't the best and Ryukishi loves to.repeat himself. It's just that for most of us it doesn't hurt our enjoyment

[DeRockProject (jongyon7192p)]

I read the entire darn 8 VNs and liked it. I just wonder if these novels were made shorter, it'll give more people thought to try it out with less time commitment demanded from them. I think it'd make it not as good of a VN series, but I think it's worth it these days. People just don't have time.
(OTOH, i guess that's literally the mangas. And those are pretty darn good if not for the lack of BANGER af music! ...What if the manga in video form with music...)

[ｚｏｍｂｉ★ｄｅｓｕ]

In a last ditch effort to try and make myself. care. I decided to look up the ending. Spoilers don't always ruin things for me? I was thinking if I knew what would happen, maybe watching for clues would help keep my interest, since I just don't. care enough about anything else here honestly.

If the summary here is accurate, I no longer have any interest in bothering reading this. Especially considering that when combined with the answers arc this is longer than the King James Bible. I'm guessing the main draw for people is probably the journey? but arc 1 was not memorable or engaging for me. If this is the payoff I just. can't. I am currently skipping through the rest for achievements. I'll avoid this person's writing in the future.