New fan: Just finished VN Onikakushi
Not sure if posts like these get removed, but screw it, I have to gush about this.
I rarely ever commit to new content these days, especially if the time commitment is significant, but something about Higurashi drew me back in this weekend, a whole 4 years after I tried and dropped the anime.
I played Onikakushi over the course of three days and I’m especially blown away by how well Keiichi’s paranoia/psychosis/train of thought was presented to me. The progression from approaching the town with an open mind, to becoming curious about its past, to spending time with his new friends, to suspecting their odd behaviors, to pressuring them further for answers, to discovering the history of murders and missing persons cases, to seeing his friends completely shift their identities out of nowhere, to pursuing self preservation and more answers from Ooishi, to the attacks from his “friends” (ie the Mochi needle), to wanting to give up his curiosity to go back to the way things were, to realizing he couldn’t go back after all, to pushing forwards with his self preservation and boundaries/walls, to second guessing his every single thought, up to murdering his friends (unknowingly?), to admitting that there really is a curse after all in his final moments. I know I just went over the chapter basically, but the level of depth in that progression is just absolutely insane to me atm. It feels weird to say that I feel sorry for Keiichi and that I side with him, but there’s something about the fact that his death at the end of this chapter did NOT occur on the night of the festival that makes me feel as though he triumphantly broke “the pattern”, brought the world closer to the truth, and accomplished his goal that I find uniquely bittersweet.
My understanding is that, Keiichi started experiencing something similar to the “that’s not Rena” experience for himself without realizing it, and I’m in left wondering if the reverse scenario of “that’s not Rena” was happening when Rena and co. weren’t in their “crazy states” and instead saw Keiichi in a “crazy state” without the reader being able to see from their POV. Not sure what the tipping point was for Keiichi going into “crazy state” began, or what he should have done to avoid the “bad ending” that resulted. Still, I’m amazed with how detailed and in depth this chapter got into Keiichi’s head. I don’t think I ever empathized with a character’s paranoia enough to find them murdering two people to have a silver lining of optimism to it, and I think that’s a testament to the writing here.
Definitely eager to read more in the near future! Hopefully the steam sale is still up! 👀