Thus far, Chapter 3 has easily been my least favourite of the Higurashi series, and I was not looking forward to this one, assuming it would the “answers” chapter and I would have to endure far more Satoko than I was prepared to for a second time.

…alright, it wasn’t THAT bad.

I have to admit that overall I’m very impressed with Higurashi’s ability to keep me engaged for this long when a lot of the time the events are pretty much the same. The difference in perspective can really make the difference sometimes…both for better and worse.

Whilst I knew Chapter 6 probably wouldn’t measure up to the previous chapter’s quality, I was still somewhat impressed with it.

I’m always more interested in the perspective of the villain. Without the villain, there can be no story…after all, what is there to drive our hero forward, to overcome the odds? But the thing about the hero is that they’re reactionary: they’re only doing things to stop the villain. But why is the villain doing what they’re doing? What drives them? I’ve always found that infinitely more interesting, because the villain is always the character who shapes the story.

So yeah, you can probably guess how this is going to read.

The problem with having major events in the past sometimes is that a game can rely too heavily on them to tell the story, so it feels like you’re missing a key part of the plot. Or that part of the background can become more interesting than what is going on right now and you’re left wondering why they’re telling you this part when the previous part they refer to sounds so much more interesting.

Higurashi didn’t have that problem for the most part – those early chapters required a bit of patience to plow through – but it’s still good to read about how it all started.

As a victim of child abuse I have very strong feelings about it, and on those rare occasions when I find it in media it generally makes me uncomfortable for obvious reasons. Disregarding my personal circumstances, it’s a very delicate subject that should be handled in a mature and constructive fashion.

So, let’s talk about Sakoto, I guess.

You know a piece of media is doing something right when you can’t put it down without wanting to go right back to it again. I have so much else I want to do with my time right now, but I find myself spending a large amount of time on my laptop, reading these old horror visual novels.

Thus far, I haven’t regretted it.