What VN are you playing? What do you think about it?

1. The protagonist, for some reason totally forgotten the fact that his friends were discussing about the incident while he was 'asleep'. This alone should've told him very clearly that they are NOT the murderers, because if they are the topic of discussion would've been much more 'intimate'. At the very least, he should've known that there is no way Rena is Satoshi's murderer no matter how insane she had acted. The clear evidence to that is one, she considered herself one of the possible victims of the curse, and that means whoever that's killed Satoshi it could NOT be her. Two, she seemed to have experienced an incredible trauma before the protagonist had moved in, thus translates to her mad belief in the curse. I highly suspected that the one trip Rena took with her 3 previously very 'close' male friends is a rape crime. Rena and Mion had truly tried to protect and save the protagonist - Rena was a bit insane so you can't blame her for carrying a cleaver to 'guard' the protagonist, Mion had seen a similar tragedy happened from the sidelines but was helpless to do anything (this line is an assumption) and wanted to prevent it from happening again.

Btw, the protagonist's eeriely similar death to the reporter's could actually be explained - which is not really that scary. The boy first step to hell was when he heard in detail how the reporter had died - clawing his on throat to death, and it was literally the form of death for him and an unwavering fear constantly haunting behind his back. It is not surprising that at the very end, when the threshold of his mental sanity finally broke under pressure, that he would mimic in the same way how the reporter had died. His mind was telling him subconsciously that that way of death was how he should die.

The almost retired police officer himself, Ooshi. There are 2 ways this can go:

One, he was the murderer of almost all the deaths that happened every year after the first incident.

Two, all of the deaths prior to the photographer's (Sorry I dunno why I called him a reporter in the first place lol) are truly accidental. The police officer had tried to scare off the photographer - who was probably going to attempt something terribly dangerous - but accidentally caused his death instead.

He is also the only concrete connection to the protagonist and constantly feeding him terrifying stories that in one way or another, always implicate that his friends could not be trusted and that his life is in danger. He was also the only one who knows about the needle in the bun (entirely possible that the protagonist is hallucinating that though) and can clean up various evidences easily, could drive (again, I find it incredible how the pathetic protagonist still somehow manage to relate that car try to kill me = friend who cannot drive a car must be the ones trying to kill me shit, even though I suspect that drugs were involved), have many opportunities to spike the protagonist's food or drinks, etc. The drugs didn't need to be anything harmful, it just needs to excite the protagonist's mind excessively - something you might even find easily in energy drinks. Then words alone will be enough to corner a person and possibly kill him.

Also, it is very possible that the protagonist did-not-kill-his-friends. People have been known to invent false memories (in fact it is really easy and IS a proven fact) to suit their logic, and when the protagonist saw his friends dead with the bat in his hand, at the near maniac state of mind, he literally imagined himself beating his friends to death and believed it to be true. In fact most people would assume the same thing at first.

It is incredibly tragic that, I believe the villagers and his friends were doing everything they can to help him, and the annoying guy just mistrusted everything. The few villagers chasing him down the dam was very likely chasing him down for the right reason - the guy looks fucking insane and is swinging a metal bat around. Plus, Higurashi is a small village, and it's easy to put one and one together - see Rena's fingers injured, see drastic change in protagonist, see Rena no longer going to school together with protagonist - plus they have Satoshi as reference before. The syringe Rena and Mion was trying to inject him with is highly likely just a calming/sleeping (I forgot what it's called) drug, which is commonly used when treating a psychologically disturbed patient. And finally the white wagon with many burly looking guys... well, you know. What do you do with an insane patient? Send him to the hospital. And how would you transfer an aggressively insane patient who has already assaulted a few people with his bat and might do again the same thing?

Of course this is the speculation I came up after only reading the first chapter so I could be totally wrong. There are holes of course (Such as, it would be hard to come up with a good theory - given the current amount of info - to explain how he had killed the photographer. Also the motive is still rather murky), but he was the first I suspected immediately halfway through the story after repeated confirmation that Rena and Mion could not possibly plot to murder the protagonist.

The above speculation is a total lie. The true murderer in Higurashi I speculate is:

Dear dead photographer's girlfriend, or dear dead photographer himself + girlfriend. The only hint was revealed in one of the tips that the photographer's background were fake, and that they were looking to confirm the body's identity through dental records, if I remember correctly. At any rate, the tip had hinted faintly that these two were suspicious, and they indeed will be the ideal 'third' trap of the drama, with the writer counting on the readers' observation skills to spot the 'obvious' possibility of Ooshi being the murderer, and that they will miss out the fact that the dead may very well be alive still.

Oh yeah, this is my own Higurashi style 'trap' to waste your time reading through my first spoilered flawed speculations. FOOLED YA! :P

Yeah, I was fooled but I think that you lost more time to write all of it =P

The photographer was killed by his own girlfriend in all three scenarios. His girlfriend was crazy, and wanted to snatch the opportunity of realizing the fifth year's curse herself. In the first two scenarios, one could say that she was crazy enough to commit suicide to realize the curse. In the third scenario, she might've expected herself to survive because of her encounter with the protagonist. She died in the same way as before however, so it could be that she didn't know and the protagonist was overthinking things.

The protagonist was killed in the all three scenarios because he did something wrong. The first one would be that he listened to Ooishi's words and expressed mistrust and distance to his friends. This caused his group of friends to be hurt and no longer happy, and thus someone among the group decided that he could die and return to the peaceful times as before. Both Rena and Mion are involved in cornering (and possibly drugging) the protagonist mentally, with Ooishi's own words unwittingly add on the pressure until finally he killed himself.

In the second scenario, the protagonist did something wrong to spoil the group's happiness and was doomed to die, and he was not alone. The protagonist was guilty of unknowingly woke Mion's inner demon with his terrible insensitivity, and Shion for tempting him into the forbidden storage.

It is stated in the All Cast Review Session that Mion murdered to protect someone. The circumstances are complicated with the new addition of Shion. The possible 'someone' in this scenario are: Rena, Rika, and Satoka. It is hinted over and over again Rika is not a normal girl (and in the 3rd scenario she's apparently worshipped as the reincarnation of Oyashiro-sama herself), and Mion's 'accidental' fall to death right at the end smelled strongly of Satoka's work. However, if they are both dead, it is safe to say that by elimination, Rena is that 'someone.

In the third scenario, the protagonist took it upon himself to become a demon and tries to murder Satoka's uncle for her happiness. This time, the protagonist integrated perfectly with the group and Satoka's uncle is the cause of their unhappiness. In addition, Ooishi the police officer is acting extremely strange and erratic as compared to the previous scenarios. I'm going to speculate on Rika's murderer first as I have little idea on the dopplegangers and dead man walking. And... the two possibilities I've come up with is that Rika killed herself, or Rena did it.

Someone saved the protagonist when he fell from the bridge, and put him right back there. Otherwise he was just lucky.

Whereas to the protagonist's doppleganger.. He doesn't exist. They were made up by everyone on the group. Satoka's outbreak was just a bonus. She appears to be extremely confused and may very well be drugged. She may very well be the person to 'disappear' or murdered, contrary to the protagonist's belief that her uncle should die. Also, I think Rika died because Satoka wished her so.

Now, to the common points of all the scenarios.

Rena probably saw all of the protagonist's action. She is the 'servant' of Oyashiro-sama, or believes herself so.

The volcanic fumes are the main cause of the madness in the Himawari.

The syringe of clear liquid is related to the volcanic fumes. It could be something extracted from the swamps.

The Sonozaki family is the fake master placed to draw all of the attention from the true mastermind. Should something extraordinary happen they will take all the blame, just like the second scenario had proven.

For every murder case there is a different murderer. This is very simple: The victim who was killed will be shown to be murdered, whereas the murderer himself will be 'demoned' away and made to disappear. Therefore all the deaths prior to the protagonist's arrival cannot be solved, because the murderer and the victim themselves have disappeared. Just has the protagonist's mother has said, if there is never an 'Introduction' to the crime, then the crime itself becomes perfect. That was how Himawari keeps their peace.

I don't know if I could sit through a visual novel with a female protagonist if the story took a turn towards a situation where the heroine's rape is unavoidable, and the "Group Sex of One Female and Several Males" tag has me concerned it won't just be one dude, but many. I think that would disgust me enough to ruin the story for me.