Fair enough. Although I wish if Ryukishi felt the need to add these retcons in Umineko that he would’ve expanded on them a little more. Oh well…
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Can’t really word it better than that. It would be cool to know more about the game that was centered around Hinamizawa but I don’t know if Ryukishi will ever go back to that.
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I never said it was something in that game, it probably happened beforehand, or it was something that happened in the level above the game.
As for the logic error, it’s my understanding from Umineko that the Featherine abandoned the game and Bern as a piece to solve it on her own. Whether or not there was an explicit error or the GM abandoning the game was itself the error is unclear.
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About logic error:
I think I remember Lambda saying something like “you shouldn’t have let the dead bodies roam” to Featherine, Higurashi spoilers: one of which in my opinion is Hōjō Teppei in Tatarigoroshi(since there is no explanation to how his body disappered. And this is the only arc not explained in Kai. Well the arc itself is there, but the mystery is never explained, as Keiichi takes different approach to Satoko’s problem). But then it bothers me how was the error ‘resolved’ ?
Or maybe it’s just me, since I couldn’t google it anywehere :S
Another possibilty is the addition of Hanyuu to the gameboard, since it’s forbidden to have supernatural being involved.
Yet another possibility is that the ending of Higurashi is not the canon, and has been made up by Ikuko (Featherine, if you’d like) out of boredom (which would explain Hanyuu’s physical appearence and introduce logic error (like Hanyuu stopping time in human mod or her existence, per se)). Bernkastel did somehow manage to resolve it (which is never shown to the player. There’s still about 900 years between Higurashi and Umineko, according to Bernkastel’s age) and spoiled the right answer to Lambdadelta.
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Well, I think that’s a result of (Higurashi spoilers) the other club members figuring out what Keiichi did, and Mion using her connections to hide/relocate the body. Keiichi of course, doesn’t notice this and freaks out. He also mistakes passers-by as Teppei, just like how Satoshi mistook passers-by as his aunt, who should be dead. It’s a case of unreliable narration and a symptom of Hinamizawa syndrome. Although I suppose her quote could be a reference to this anyway. But keep in mind that letting “dead bodies roam” is exactly what [spoiler]Takano did in the original arcs - her faked death actually occurred a day earlier than possible, leading to an “impossible” scenario! [/Spoiler]So I don’t think that’s the error, but you raised some great points.
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(Higurashi spoilers) Well, in that case the question is how did they know where the body was? Also, I don’t remember Keiichi mistaking passers-by as Teppei. But in any case, I don’t think this was the error, so this isn’t really the right thread for us to discuss it.
All in all, I find the references to the Higurashi ‘game board’ in Umineko illogical at best (ironically) and potentially Higurashi-ruining at worst.
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Takano did in the original arcs - her faked death actually occurred a day earlier than possible, leading to an “impossible” scenario!
Major Higurashi spoilers:
Which isn’t really a logic error, since real Takano is alive and to some extend well. It’s just a slip up, which can be fully and logically explained.
But as has been noted, we should discuss this somewhere else. This doesn’t really do Bernkastel justice 
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I can understand why people want to discuss the Higurashi game board here, but the fact of the matter is no one can provide even the most basic info on the game, such as:
–Who the GM was
–What the logic error was
–What the miracle was
–Why the game didn’t freeze if there was a logic error
…etc., etc.
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The highlight of Bernkastel for me was at the end of ch.3 when I finally realized she was voiced by Yukari Tamura but other than that I don’t like her much.
The same goes for Lambda and Featherine, I dislike that these characters are overpowered and have nothing to lose. Even if they are just personifications of the concepts they represent, IMO they should’ve acted entirely from the sidelines and let their pieces take the antagonist role. Battler hitting Bern didn’t mean anything to me, it didn’t make sense but hey being badass is expected from the main character.
I like cruel characters. I like stoic and depressed characters. I should’ve liked Bern but every time she declared she was bored (and that’s way too often) she killed my immersion. Those moments I paused and thought “Am I bored aswell? Do I really care about these characters as much as I think I do?” And I realized I was exactly like these voyager witches with no actual connection to these events, only following the story for my own amusement and capable of throwing the VN into oblivion never to be seen again. I hated Bern for that.
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I don’t think it was thought out well, and there’s the additional wrinkle that the Logic Error may have been engineered and Logic Errors aren’t even technically possible, so one possibility is that Bern is only metaphorically comparing her situation to the Logic Error in Umineko as essentially “an eternal, seemingly unwinnable situation.” As a non-player piece, Rika couldn’t possibly have been the target or cause of any Logic Error; it’s only by accident or miracle that she gained awareness of what was happening, and that’s what began to change her and eventually lead to Bernkastel’s ascension as a witch.
I’d liken it to if someone else was in the room with Battler during the Logic Error, and this person was just a piece. The piece probably won’t notice all the snapbacks and room resets and will have their memory altered constantly. If they somehow became aware of the Logic Error and their memory persisted through it, they’d be in a situation like Rika: Not the originator of the Logic Error, and not the person it’s entrapping, but entrapped as a consequence of that scenario as a piece who happened to be contained within the parameters of the Logic Error itself. If that piece then went on to SOLVE the Logic Error, they would presumably become a witch not unlike Bern herself.
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[spoiler] I like your Logic Error room analogy, but what you’re describing actually sounds more like what happened to Keiichi than Rika, because Rika’s memory was never altered (that we know of). She was aware of the “logic error” from the beginning.
(In regards to Keiichi, Ryukishi recently confirmed that Keiichi was subconsciously aware of the “time loop.” Keiichi never became a witch, though, obviously.) [/spoiler]
It’s just an example. The piece whose memory is altered is just a piece, and no matter how many iterations pass nothing will change. In theory anyway. If the piece possess some sort of awareness, the level of awareness the piece possesses is relevant to what may or may not happen to that piece. We know that Rika was special, therefore giving rise to Bernkastel makes sense; we aren’t sure what happens to other pieces in other circumstances. Given what we see with her and with Battler, a piece can definitely be elevated to the level of a witch, but it seems to take extraordinary circumstances and awareness of the meta-level to some extent in order for that to happen. Battler had the advantage of being deliberately elevated to that level, though.
I agree wholly with you. It also doesn’t help that like Featherine, Bern is also an Author Avatar, and thus, she’s far too over-praised in the narrative because she can’t be too evil or that says a lot about the writer, but because he made her the villain, he has to make up Freudian excuses for why she’s such an awful person (when I would have accepted “Just because she enjoys torturing people”.) She reminds me of the Ballad of Edgardo story where people let a self-righteous smug character lord over everyone with the little people suffering and trying to stay alive against this God Moder.
It also doesn’t help that so many people in the fandom excuse her actions and yet criticize characters who have done less worse things than her (I’ve seen people say that they excuse Bern because she’s not human but criticized Erika). So, I cannot stand Bernkastel (except with some fan interpretations), for most of the reasons you’ve said, and more.
To be fair, she is a villain. Other people’s interpretations or appreciation notwithstanding, she does bad things for bad reasons and is a jerk about it and is ultimately an obstacle for better people to overcome. To that extent, it’s fine if she’s hateable. I suppose my issue on that front is it’s not terribly clear why she cares so much, since it doesn’t benefit her in any way other than curing her boredom. Beatrice and Erika also serve as antagonists, but they have appreciable objectives; even though Erika’s is “make Bern happy enough to consider me useful,” that’s kind of pitiable in a way “torture things so I’m less bored” is not.
It seems like the ep8 manga tried to salvage her a little bit by giving her an actual argument for doing the things she was doing, but while it was a valid argument it didn’t in any way excuse any of her methods, and it came far too late. A character developed from the start as an antagonist trying to teach you a lesson for your own good who doesn’t understand that their methods are harming the chance of you learning and growing can be well-done, but that isn’t what she ever was.
What part of the manga is that from? It’s not that I don’t believe you; it’s just that I’m not that familiar with the manga version.
I can’t recall the actual portion of the manga but there’s a bit where Battler relates his logic about why he’s presenting things to Ange in a certain way instead of just telling her the truth and Bern has an aside at one point about her belief that the truth can strengthen someone even if it’s difficult to accept, and that it is better for Ange in the long term to experience a hard truth than to discard it for something more palatable, which while probably disingenuous on her part is at least a reason of some sort which ties back to her origins and explains why she would have an additional reason beyond “I’m bored” to become personally involved in the way Chiru progresses.
The problem is it’s only barely better-established than the VN and I’m not sure the other episode mangas developed the same idea. There’s also a bit more dialogue in the manga critical of Battler and Beatrice, including an expansion of some of Beatrice’s self-criticism of what they did and what they’re doing. Basically everyone’s motivations make slightly more sense and Battler feels more obviously bad about what he’s doing even as he justifies it.
Well I also think Bern and Lamda are cruel monster (Higurashi spoiler)
but it also make me think what would happen if the cruel Bern end up facing Keiichi in some way or another in a game how would she act. Well beside saying his luck suck for him to end up in another endless hell. We know that Keiichi was a key part to Rika freedom. We can also say that the miracle could of bet Keiichi getting his memory back from another world which would be the starting point to Rika overcoming her cruel fate.
I would love to ask Ryukishi07 what the logic error was and what the miracle was and what I said about Keiichi facing Bern.
How do you cover spoilers?
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Yeah, but I personally think the parts in Umineko about Higurashi being just a story might just be there for fun, and not meant to be taken as gospel.
For example, I think we can all agree that it’s ridiculous that Lambda wouldn’t know what the ending of Higurashi was.
And if Higurashi really was a story in Umineko, then shouldn’t Battler have made the connection between Rika and Bern? The name ‘Frederica Bernkastel’ appears outright in Higurashi.
…That is pretty funny about Tohya and Ikuko making their cat the villain, though.
@someoneunknown I’ve actually wondered the same thing myself. (Higurashi spoilers) All in all, Keiichi is so absent in Umineko that it’s almost glaring. Not that I would expect him to be mentioned by name, but given that he was so instrumental in Rika’s escape from fate, you’d think he’d at least be mentioned in a vague way, especially when the topic of Bern’s past comes up.
Bern also takes credit for coming up with the “demons eating popcorn” thing, but that was only said by one character in Higurashi, and it sure wasn’t Rika.
By the way, Lambda compares Bern’s experiences in the logic error to the infinite monkey theorem, but if Bern’s experiences were comparable to that, then (Higurashi spoiler) doesn’t that mean it should have taken a lot longer than 100 years for her to get free?
Edit: (Higurashi spoilers) [spoiler] So I was watching the video of Ryukishi’s third panel at ACen last year, and it looks like he does consider Higurashi’s Frederica and Umineko’s Bernkastel to be the same entity. Because the questioner asks about Frederica specifically, but Ryukishi talks about her splitting off from Rika in Saikoroshi-hen and becoming Umineko’s Bernkastel. (Although I can’t hear how the interpreter translated it to him, so I can’t be sure she was completely accurate in conveying it.)
It’s true that Frederica didn’t really come across as evil in Higurashi…but Ryukishi says he made her evil in Umineko to mess with his friend BT (whose favorite character was Rika), so maybe he hadn’t decided she was evil yet. [/spoiler]
By the way, a silhouette of a Bernkastel image from Ougon Musou Kyoku is used in Higurashi Sui to represent Frederica.
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I actually covered all of this in another post. I’m bad at forums, can I link it here? Or I can summarize.
[spoiler]1. Featherine was unquestionably Bernkastel’s master. Featherine subjected her piece to an infinite monkey conundrum. Bernkastel’s former self was absolutely Rika, based on tons of evidence from author testimony to straight out saying it in the manga. Bernkastel’s former piece self was definitely locked in a game with Lambdadelta, based on character bios for both. Rika necessarily began in Hinamizawa, given statements in both series.
Therefore Lambdadelta was the game master who Rika struggled against, though the game started off as Featherine’s. Which brings us to 2.[/spoiler]
2. The unanticipated actions of Lambadadelta created the logic error, an entire game without solution. She fundamentally ruined the game board in a way similar to what Bernkastel and Erika attempted in Episode 6. Her actions “created” Oyashiro, a corrupted version of Featherine.
3. The miracle in this case isn’t a straightforward “what” as much as it is the chance of a little girl defeating the highly trained and specialized forces of Tokyo and the willpower of Miyo Takano. It was an infinitesimally low chance, but an inevitable given an eternity of trying.
4. Punishment for a logic logic error is served in a separate timespace, or at least not in linear step with the events connected to it. See Battler’s logic error which took place concurrent to, before, and after his role as game master. In this case, Lambdadelta served her time in hell along side Bernkastel, as Satoko. The two have a strong dichotomy, Satoko and Rika were tortured by their metaworld incarnations of Bernkastel and Lambdadelta. Forward and backwards. This created the twisted and perverted sense of love they have for each other. Why mutual sadomasochism is their strongest bond.
The reason they run is that Higurashi, as played in the first 8 Episodes, is only fixable by pegging the logic error the “sin” (the greatest sin a game master can commit), on a piece or player.
That’s why now that Umineko is over, we see more and more “alternative” Higurashi settings. To find a way to play the game board so that Miyo Takano, Lambdadelta, Rika, and Bernkastel can all exist without having everyone they love die. I think that’s what Dice Killing was about, in large part. Showing that even saving Miyoko kills off the characters as we know them.
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