I'm mostly worried about where this is headed. Will it have a good ending like the original or will it have a more or less bad ending like Umineko?

About the spoiling of new viewers:

I think that many new viewers are unwilling to watch the old anime (poor quality animation/art 1st season) or even read the VN. But I think that this is more enjoyable to watch as someone who watched the old anime or read the VN as the developments are in a way, more suprising for old viewers. New viewers might even find some things 'predictable' when they came as total suprises for old fans.

EDIT: btw have you watched ep. 4 already? by this episode things have deviated quite a bit from Onikakushi

Originally posted by veliedrako:

btw have you watched ep. 4 already?

No, only 2 episodes so far. I watch things at my own pace. 😁

This is how the Japanese have started to do remakes. FF7, RE2/3. All of them are alternative universes. The art in the new anime looks great though.

My best guess is that they really wanted to attract new fans, but if they directly announced this as a sequel only old fans would watch it. So they're trying to make sure that it can be understood by newcomers, but it's a sequel no matter how you look at it.

Originally posted by velie:

I'm mostly worried about where this is headed. Will it have a good ending like the original or will it have a more or less bad ending like Umineko?

I'm wondering the same thing because to me, the ending of Higurashi was thematically perfect. I know many people don't like Matsuribayashi, but it's one of my three favorite arcs and all those themes of defeating fate, sin and forgiveness, learning from your mistakes and creating a world with no losers are amazing. Creating a sequel where characters still fall in the circle of mistrust and continue to make the same mistakes goes directly against that spirit. What was interesting about Saikorishi-hen was that the characters didn't sin, so it was a moment of inner confrontation for Rika. But here, all those lessons and things we learned from the whole Higurashi series seem to be lost.

I'm liking Gou so far, especially solving the new mystery, but they had better give it a great ending to excuse the fact that they're rendering Matsuribayashi meaningless.

Originally posted by velie:

I think that many new viewers are unwilling to watch the old anime (poor quality animation/art 1st season) or even read the VN. But I think that this is more enjoyable to watch as someone who watched the old anime or read the VN as the developments are in a way, more suprising for old viewers. New viewers might even find some things 'predictable' when they came as total suprises for old fans.

I totally agree, and I've said the same thing to people who ask if they should watch the original first or Gou. I saw some Youtube reactions for episode 4, and all new fans were like Keiichi is so stupid, it was obvious Rena was crazy, why did he let her in? While for us old fans it was a painful twist, for them it was very predictable.

Originally posted by velie:

EDIT: btw have you watched ep. 4 already? by this episode things have deviated quite a bit from Onikakushi

I know this was not for me, but I'm quite intrigued by those deviations, especially the ones related to the overarching mystery, and I can't wait to see what will happen at the end of Watadamashi-hen.

As a person who really loved the horror first half and was very disappointed with the super happy ending of the second half. I feel the show is targeted at me lol. Two arcs have come out now and I enjoy the somehow sillier and yet even darker tone of the new show. I know many people loves season 2 of the show and the second half of the visual novels but as the story pivoted from horror to action I lost interest. That’s not to say I don’t “get” the miracle arc it’s just golden ending conclusions feel better in an interactive format where you literally earn the ending through hard work while in a passive medium it comes off clunky. AI Somnium had a golden ending but you had to do a lot to get there.

I feel the new show is a pivot back to what made the story famous in the first place. Unpredictable motivations and violence. I assume there will be explanations for the deviations but I am hoping that with the freedom to tell a story separate from the games we can go darker

Originally posted by Gamefan:

As a person who really loved the horror first half and was very disappointed with the super happy ending of the second half. I feel the show is targeted at me lol. Two arcs have come out now and I enjoy the somehow sillier and yet even darker tone of the new show. I know many people loves season 2 of the show and the second half of the visual novels but as the story pivoted from horror to action I lost interest. That’s not to say I don’t “get” the miracle arc it’s just golden ending conclusions feel better in an interactive format where you literally earn the ending through hard work while in a passive medium it comes off clunky. AI Somnium had a golden ending but you had to do a lot to get there.

I feel the new show is a pivot back to what made the story famous in the first place. Unpredictable motivations and violence. I assume there will be explanations for the deviations but I am hoping that with the freedom to tell a story separate from the games we can go darker

And this really speaks to how much of a distortion the anime adaptation has caused among non-VN readers, leaving the impression that Higurashi is supposed to be all blood and gore and shock factor. As you said, "what made the story in the anime famous in the first place" were the horror violence elements.

However, having recently read the VN myself after being a fan of the anime for such a long time (not to mention playing the anime at the same time to compare the two), I have to say... yikes. It's like two completely different shows, a straight-up horror slasher anime, and a tragedy visual novel.

That's right, folks: Higurashi was supposed to be more of a tragedy, not full-blown horror. It's a tragedy with horror elements, and the VN really emphasized on that, whether it's the pacing of the backstory exposition or the choice of soundtrack. There are clearly two completely different executions to the story here (similar to how the Watchmen comic book and the Watchmen movie have two very different tone), and the anime adaptation kinda went off and did its own thing, ignoring the spirit of the VN, thus inevitably making the Higurashi Kai anime adaptation feel lackluster.

The tragedy vibe of the VN, however, means that after so much sadness that makes you cry almost every single chapter ("When They Cry"? More like When YOU Cry), Kai is such a refreshing breath of fresh air that finally gives those characters the happy resolution. The anime f***ed that up, period.

And now you have a horror anime remake that celebrated the original anime's catastrophic failure in adapting the tone of the VN in the first place. lol

You know those club activity scenes people kept whining about in the Steam forum? How they wished they would end and wouldn't appear in the next chapter? Yeaaah, they're kinda important. They're like the slice-of-life, mundane everyday scenes seen in Steins;Gate... right before, you know, the horrific tragedies showed up later on. They're important, but Studio Deen decided to focus more on the horror elements instead. In the VN, what Keiichi and his friends (especially Rena) want the most is to return to those happy, ordinary and peaceful club activity days, which is why the VN spent so much time on them, so that the reader could get a sense of what has been lost when tragedy strikes. So no, I don't think they're annoying or irritating in the VN; I think they're fairly important to establish the contrast between the characters' perception of happiness and the tragedy that's forced upon them, and the fact that the anime adaptation seems to shy away from those scenes is evident that Studio Deen has a grave misunderstanding of the visual novel's message.

Originally posted by Orius:

And this really speaks to how much of a distortion the anime adaptation has caused among non-VN readers, leaving the impression that Higurashi is supposed to be all blood and gore and shock factor. As you said, "what made the story in the anime famous in the first place" were the horror violence elements.

However, having recently read the VN myself after being a fan of the anime for such a long time (not to mention playing the anime at the same time to compare the two), I have to say... yikes. It's like two completely different shows, a straight-up horror slasher anime, and a tragedy visual novel.

That's right, folks: Higurashi was supposed to be more of a tragedy, not full-blown horror. It's a tragedy with horror elements, and the VN really emphasized on that, whether it's the pacing of the backstory exposition or the choice of soundtrack. There are clearly two completely different executions to the story here (similar to how the Watchmen comic book and the Watchmen movie have two very different tone), and the anime adaptation kinda went off and did its own thing, ignoring the spirit of the VN, thus inevitably making the Higurashi Kai anime adaptation feel lackluster.

The tragedy vibe of the VN, however, means that after so much sadness that makes you cry almost every single chapter ("When They Cry"? More like When YOU Cry), Kai is such a refreshing breath of fresh air that finally gives those characters the happy resolution. The anime f***ed that up, period.

And now you have a horror anime remake that celebrated the original anime's catastrophic failure in adapting the tone of the VN in the first place. lol

You know those club activity scenes people kept whining about in the Steam forum? How they wished they would end and wouldn't appear in the next chapter? Yeaaah, they're kinda important. They're like the slice-of-life, mundane everyday scenes seen in Steins;Gate... right before, you know, the horrific tragedies showed up later on. They're important, but Studio Deen decided to focus more on the horror elements instead. In the VN, what Keiichi and his friends (especially Rena) want the most is to return to those happy, ordinary and peaceful club activity days, which is why the VN spent so much time on them, so that the reader could get a sense of what has been lost when tragedy strikes. So no, I don't think they're annoying or irritating in the VN; I think they're fairly important to establish the contrast between the characters' perception of happiness and the tragedy that's forced upon them, and the fact that the anime adaptation seems to shy away from those scenes is evident that Studio Deen has a grave misunderstanding of the visual novel's message.

Well said. This is exactly my opinion of the VN vs. anime, and I doubt I could express it better than you just did.