Tatarigoroshi is the third chapter of this mystery/horror visual novel that once more sees us observe the life of a young man named Keiichi Maebara. After the brutal endings of the previous two entries, the story picks off several days before the Watanagashi and sees us returning to a peaceful life in the rural town of Hinamizawa. From that previous sentence, it should be quite apparent that you will be incredibly lost plot-wise if you decide to start from this entry, for whatever reason. I’d highly suggest backing out of this review if that’s the case, as this is a VN heavily reliant on suspense, and any prior knowledge can diminish that.
The plot kicks off with a police team investigating a corpse found in the drainage pipe. As morbid as that event is, it soon gets back to focusing on the care-free, slice of life aspect we are all used to at the beginning of each chapter. It will once again take a good ten hours before the main narrative begins to shed some more light on this town’s mystery and possibly raise some new questions. Given that glacial pace of any form of story progress, I found it just as surprising as anybody that I still ended up massively enjoying it as someone not particularly fond of slice of life. You’ll find that this chapter is primarily focused on the character Satoko, a mischievous but ultimately well-meaning child. It introduces a new side of her and allows us to dig deeper into her interesting family history, which was brought up quite a bit in previous titles.
With the first entry focusing on horror and its sequel on sadness, I was curious what emotion will protrude this time around. Turns out it was pure distilled depression and a sense of helplessness for us to ‘enjoy’. I went into this series expecting a story about simple hauntings or something. What a fool I was, as this series is one all about defying one’s expectations. Tatarigoroshi delves into incredibly dark subjects that have jack all to do with the supernatural and are entirely based on happenings that do occur in the real world. I am not going to say much more than that to avoid spoilers, though this is a subject that may hit closer to home for many compared to the comparably low chance of having witnessed brutal murders.
This is, in my opinion, the darkest entry yet. At the same time, it is also the funniest. That sharp contrast serves to show just how strong the writing is. Far from feeling stale following the formula of having a peaceful first half, then an unsettling second half leading to an intense finale, this proves the most entertaining title yet despite being the third time they’ve done this. It is incredibly skilled at pulling us into the world they created and keeping us invested, whether what is occurring is mundane or a life & death situation. In this case, much of the threat isn’t directed at our protagonist, unlike the rest of the misfortunes he’s had before this third chapter. It takes a new path into exploring the price of trying to fix an unfixable problem by distorting your sense of justice.
A surprising addition was that they finally added a character sprite for the teacher of their class. With how much screen time she has gotten, it was far overdue. There are a few other characters introduced throughout, but only one of these receives a sprite of their own. His nickname is Coach, and as you may be able to gather from that, he is the one training the school’s baseball team. Much like the rest of the cast, he has a lot of peculiar quirks. Most defining of these is his passionate love of soft skin and maids. Like the rest of the characters, you can switch between their original early 2000’s art style or the newly upgraded character portraits. I feel they could have taken this just a bit further with the addition of just one more sprite for a rather significant new character of the Houjou family. With how large a role he plays, it is odd having no idea how he looks like or a face behind his words. At least in this chapter, having a sprite for him may have been more beneficial than giving one to Coach, in my opinion.
In total, Tatarigoroshi lasted around 20 hours, making it the lengthiest entry yet. Crazy to think that between all three titles until now, it would come in to over 50 hours of playtime, and we are still not much closer to any sort of clear answers. The thing with episodic mystery games is that I can’t get too detailed into the storyline lest I make playing a chapter a significantly worse experience for people reading this review. With the glacial pace of the narrative, knowing about what happens next beforehand is a major detractor to one’s immersion. If you’ve stuck around this long with the series, the chances are good that you are invested. The Higurashi franchise has proved its value, and Chapter 3 does not disappoint in the slightest. It is the best title yet and will once again have you itching to get your hands on the next chapter.
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