No.1714[Reply]
Kinda contain spoilers about the end.
What if yume nikki is not about making theories of Madotsukis past?
Better said, its about how the player influence madotsuki and the other way around?
Imagine, you would be Madotsukis friend. you live in a building infront of madotsukis one (You can see it always from your balcony).
Since she never leaves her room, you visit her and listen to her dreams and stories. You seem to misunderstand madotsuki, but madotsuki is still trusting you and keep telling you every detail.
Also if Madotsuki is telling everything very weird, you make theories what happened, but you don't know the past exactly. You try to help Madotsuki with confronting her fears wich she is the most afraid of. At times you will feel Madotsukis fear, hopes and dreams and you will feel emotional about them. and every morning you go out on the balcony to see if everything is alright. That madotsuki, your beloved friend is there.
And then comes the day where you feel uncomfortable and have a nightmare as well with Madotsuki placing the effects (eggs) in the nexus. You feel uncomfortable and go out to the balcony to take some air and then you see how your best friend commits suicide. And I bet the ending was the most heartbreaking scene in the game, because you grow up with madotsuki, you know everything she told you and you really wanted to see her someday again outside, to be happy and to be your best friend.
I personally think, Yume nikki is not about making theories, more like how you can influence her and could try to help her.
To show how it would feel like to loose a beloved friend, a person who gave you their whole trust and gone from your side anyways.
well I don't know if kikiyama wanted to do that, but yes I believe that it should show how it feels like to loose a beloved person and that you can do more than you actually think.
(sorry for the horrible english hhh)
No.1715
That's a very nice theory! It ties with the idea that Madotsuki is less her own character and more or less a device for the player to view the world; a window, really.
No.1119[Reply]
Theory: Torinigen are not bird people. Rather,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baku_%28spirit%29They are dream eaters. Unfortunately I wasn't able to work in a theory about Mado being raped in this one, sorry fellas.
No.1131
>>1129Really? I didn't know about that. Assuming it's true though, it only strengthens my point of view
No.1137
>1131
How does that strengthen your argument? Kikiyama her/himself called them Toriningen. Toriningen is not a word in Japanese, and it's spelt with the characters for" bird and the pair for "human". The only thing it can mean is bird-person. Toriningen isn't a fan name.
Therefore, it's pretty much canon that they're bird like.
No.1138
>>1137It obviously does, because if it's the official name, then it's pretty much impossible for people to start using another name to refer to them. Colton was the one implying they had snouts instead of beaks, don't mix our posts up
No.1700
Uboa is God.
No.1716
Is Toriningen really their official name? I thought only Madotsuki, Monoe and Monoko had ones.
No.1713
Well, knowing that their dreams involve a lot of blood, bizarre imagery, penis-esque things, and some random NPCs are pursuing them, it's not hard to think they are not very social.
Hell, they all even have an ending in which they kill themselves. You can easily guess they three are depressed and in dispair, surrounded by sorrow and pain. Just look at those motherfucking dreams, for every nice place there is, you have, like, 4 or 6 areas full of grotesque scenarios.
And if that shit was not enough, look at how other people are reflected in those dreams. Mado sees them as faceless creatures that somehow don't even know how to speak; Uro sees them generally distorted and amorphous; And Sabi just sees fucking monsters and blood-covered people.
Even if we're not talking about rape here, you can easily see they are really afraid of the outer world. They don't even get out of their room!
As for personality-wise, Mado seems to like Paraca's thing, and reading.
Urotsuki seems fond of a lot of things, from video games to clothes, although her own fears appear to make hard to her to involve in such tastes.
And Sabi… well. You know. Sabi seems to live in a slum, but somehow she doesn't fit that place. I daresay she might have fallen really down but not because she was there in first place, but due to some external event. She seems to be a smart girl who sadly got a shit-ton of problems in her life and she sadly ended there.
No.1004
The cat sitting on the mall's roof also gets red eyes when Madotsuki pulls out her knife
Might be related, might be a coincidence
No.1006
>>1003No, officer. It's fucking, "High how are you?"
No.1697
http://yumenikki.wikia.com/wiki/Shield-Folk_World(name)NECOIN(猫に小判)
(to cast) gold coin before cat.;The metaphor with standing on no role, even if it gives a thing precious to those who do not understand value as casting pearls before swine.
(to cast) pearls before swine; really big waste of resources
A proverb (from Latin: proverbium) is a simple and concrete saying popularly known and repeated, which expresses a truth, based on common sense or the practical experience of humanity. They are often metaphorical. A proverb that describes a basic rule of conduct may also be known as a maxim.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proverb Effects#Cat(招き猫)
The maneki-neko (Japanese: 招き猫, literally 'beckoning cat') is a common Japanese figurine (lucky charm, talisman), usually made of ceramic in modern times, which is often believed to bring good luck to the owner. The figurine depicts a cat (traditionally a calico Japanese Bobtail) beckoning with an upright paw, and is usually displayed—many times at the entrance—in shops, restaurants, pachinko parlors, and other businesses. Some of the sculptures are electric or battery-powered and have a slow-moving paw beckoning. The maneki-neko is sometimes also called the welcoming cat, lucky cat, money cat, happy cat, or fortune cat in English.
Post too long. Click here to view the full text. No.1699
Poop Hair(Baal (demon))
Baal (/ˈbeɪl/ BAYL; sometimes spelled Bael, Baël (French), Baell) is in 17th Century goetic occult writings one of the seven princes of Hell. The name is drawn from the Canaanite deity Baal mentioned in the Hebrew Bible as the primary god of the Phoenicians.
While his Semitic predecessor was depicted as a man or a bull,[1] the demon Baal was in grimoire tradition said to appear in the forms of a man, cat, toad, or combinations thereof. An illustration in Collin de Plancy's 1818 book Dictionnaire Infernal rather curiously placed the heads of the three creatures onto a set of spider legs.[2]CatCat(Baal) BaelDictionnaire Infernal illustration of Bael
Mt.kiki
FrogFrog(Baal)
Post too long. Click here to view the full text.
No.1582
>>1581Maybe Masada died. Or otherwise had something happen to him that was sufficiently terrible to ensure that Mado and Masada would never play piano together again.
Remember that when it takes you to Mars, it crashes, and Masada is freaking out. Something obviously went wrong.
No.1583
>>1577>>1578>>1579I agree with your idea of what their relationship might have been like. In my mind, Masada was her kind, caring piano teacher that gave her a place she could feel safe at. With someone she knew she could trust.
I also believe Masada understands her on personal levels and they came together as two people badly hurt to lean on each other.
As for Mars-san, I believe he, plus the broken down train, represents something happening to Masada. Likely he was killed. The ship crashing symbolizing their world crumbling to disaster/sorrow.
That's my opinion anyway.
No.1584
If you talk to Masada during the crash he is frantic. Afterwards he sounds defeated or depressed. Maybe mars-san and his isolation / sadness represents Masada moving away, being bedridden, etc. Music can be therapeutic and help people express themselves in a way that words cannot. Poor Masada and madotsuki…
No.1685
Bump for new insights. I haven't played Yume Nikki in a while but thinking about this stuff makes me feel homesick, even at home. I feel like they were really happy, at least for a little bit.
No.1650[Reply]
Something occurred to me regarding the beaked antagonists of Yume Nikki; they may not be antagonists at all. In fact, they may be the closest thing Madotsuki has to friends in the dream world.
Now the common theory regarding the Toriningen is that they are representations of the older, more stylish girls that picked on Madotsuki in school. Whilst it does make sense, I have my own theory.
The Toriningen, to me, are representations of Madotsuki's teachers. However, they go beyond mere mental reflections. The Toriningen, out of all the creatures in the dream world, are possibly the only truly benevolent entities.
Now I'm sure we all know what happens when Madotsuki finds all the effects. Now look at the Toriningen. In the places where they are already lunatic, they are usually guarding access to effects (or areas containing effects). Perhaps they know what will happen if Madotsuki finds all the effects, and are desperately trying to save her by stopping her from reaching them. The "lunatic" state is actually the Toriningen becoming hysterical with worry and trying to detain Madotsuki somewhere before she hurts herself or the other denizens of the dream world (hence why they go berserk when you stab them-they're thinking "Oh crap, she's gone nuts again! Quick, seal her away before someone gets hurt!).
Likewise, the Toriningen party. Whilst the common belief is that it represents social exclusion, my belief is that the Toriningen in the party are actually waiting for Madotsuki-they have no idea that she can't join them, and they can't see her behind the bush, and so are waiting forever.
No.1657
Well, I think the theory was very briefly touched on on the wiki, but it literally got around 3 sentences on it. Also I hadn't seen the theory posted anywhere on Uboachan (you'll have to forgive me, I am new here)…
I dunno. It was just a thought.
No.1660
what if madotsuki is being kept prisoner by bird people and she was raped by bird people and they are doing experiments on her and what if they are the cia and they are experimenting on her and the cia is bird people and the dreams are mk-ultra
what if madotsuki wants to be a bird person and jumps off the balcony because she wants to fly
No.1625[Reply]
Came up with a theory that tries to include why the effects are what they are, as well as support for Mado's age, since those are two things that seem kind of up in the air. (Though, for the most part, it just expands on the whole hikkikomori thing.)
There's a show called Nurse Jackie, in which the main character, Jackie, has a daughter named Grace, who starts suffering from an apparent "anxiety disorder" as she grows up. She's ten years old when this dialogue happens between her and her husband Kevin:
Kevin - "I asked Grace what she wanted to watch, and instead of cartoons, she chose a documentary called "Viral Armageddon: Death for Mankind"
Jackie - "So? She's interested in science.
Kevin - "She's *constantly* stressed, it's not about *science*, it's about… I'm wondering if it's about something bigger than that."
Later on, while Grace anxiously watches television, Jackie tries to talk to her, and the first thing she says is "Mommy, could the bubonic plague ever happen again?", and even after her mother's reassurance, she continues on with "Could the flu kill forty million people like it did in 1918?" Throughout the series, Grace's anxiety manifests itself in a number of ways. She starts hiding in rooms from her parents and hair pulling; her school teachers find that all of her drawings are done in black and white; when she goes to school, she suffers a nervous breakdown and has trouble connecting with other kids.
Sound like anyone we know?
Ima spread my points out through a couple of posts so I don't get my text maxed out, but this is more or less the basis of my theory; Madotsuki is a hikkikomori because she suffers from an anxiety disorder, and due to being a young girl (Probably about ten, or younger.) her lack of knowledge of the real world gives her an intrinsic and irrational fear of the outside world. The Effects in the game reflect this, in that they're primarily paranoid superstition by Madotsuki, things that she's afraid of becoming/encountering in the outside world.
2 posts omitted. Click reply to view. No.1629
Finally, I'll run down some of the events and locations in the game as they could relate to a little girl with an anxiety disorder.
-Toriningen are girls that bully her, all much more stylish than her, taller than her, better proportioned, and wearing creepy, cartoonish grins as they laugh at her.
-Numbers world is her fear of school; loud bells chiming, halls that twist and are easy to get lost in, mathematical equations everywhere, and lots of people laughing at her, as well as Toriningen representing school bullies.
-Road in the woods with dead body; Mado's fear of "People can get hit by cars and die if they're not careful!"
-Snow world is a fear of getting lost in the snow and possibly freezing to death; the presence of a Yuki-Onna drives this home the most.
-Mars-San is a fear of alienation and loneliness, maybe even homelessness, that she'll end up like him, alone in a dark place, and crying.
-Sky Garden is a precursor to her suicide; she goes high up, and contemplates jumping from the cliff. Note that this is also how she gets to the realm of the dead and finds the ghost effect.
-Just note the general theme of things going wrong in her dreams. Poniko's room turns into a nightmare, Monoko mutates into a horrible monster, Masada's ship crashes, FACE, Falling during the witch even; there's an incredibly prevalent theme that goes with the mindset similar to someone with an anxiety disorder, of "Anything that could possibly go wrong *will* go wrong."
All in all, the main point I'm trying to make with the theory is that there isn't any kind of big event that made Mado take the turn of hiding in her room. She wasn't involved in a car accident, she didn't have Seccom Masada as a piano teacher, she wasn't even raped. The center of it all is an anxiety disorder, that makes her an introverted, scared little girl, and causes the horrible turn of events that we see in the game, as well as her severely disturbed subconscious.
Anyways. Share yer' thoughts, criticize it, or w/e.
No.1632
Not everything has to relate directly to anxiety disorder, I think. Mado can ride bike because it's the fastest mode of transport in her real life. Also maybe some of the anthromorphic stuff like lantern may be just because little children tend to imagine every object in the world to be the same as they, that is, sentient. I believed normal cars were the children of trucks and buses. Mado may at least in her dreams believe she can turn into a lamp or frog. Or that lamps and frogs can think and feel like she does. Frog can also stand for turning one's back to human society. It is actually useful, but no one could live in a city like that. It's also found in a forest.
Neon could be about alienation from one's self. At least it makes Mado's body look alien.
Btw your theory is good.
No.1651
>>1629I much prefer my theory that Numbers World is a fear of hospitals. It's probably a bunch of other similar places to hospitals - cold, clinical places that try to be friendly but come off as almost industrial and frightening.
The numbers help make it look impersonal.
If you read my trans theory thread(I think on Page 3) You'll see a fair amount of support for it being a hospital.
No.1653
I saw your post, and I have to admit, a hospital sounds more probable than a school. I always kind of left out the part about the beds, but that would make sense for them to represent hospital beds. I also really like the idea of the Stabbing Room representing surgery or flowing blood, that's creepy on a level I totally didn't see coming. >_>
Though, while my theory about it being a school has far more holes in it, I'm still not entirely sold on it being a hospital either, at least not in the ways you've mentioned. A lot of the things that you connect to being sexual organs and so on just seem too Freudian in nature. Like, if he wanted it to connotate a transgender conflict, I think there's much more direct images/shapes that he could have used rather than things like "Two circles = Testicles" or "Rod shaped object=Penis." I think the point of Numbers world is more of a fear of people in general, with how the walls are lined with smiling faces, rather than the entire body, because really the only imagery I see depicting any other parts of the body are the hands and arms on the walls and the legs that the NPCs have. The blue thing in the Stabbing Room… I'm not really sure. But I'm still more inclined to see it as a face than phalloplasty surgery. If it had more of a body-shape to it, then I'd go for it, but it just seems *really* vague to say that it looks like a torso with breasts and a semi-penis.
No.1654
Reconsidering my theory about the world, I'm thinking that maybe it really is just a fear about being in places with lots of people in general? Again, the world is very loud, the walls are oddly shaped and covered in faces that are looking at her in goofy ways, denoting crowds of people. You've also got the few NPCs that are walking around periodically with parts of faces on their "bodies", and of course, one extremely crowded room with eyes darting back and forth, which could represent a room that's absolutely stuffed with people. (Reminds me of a video I saw of a Japanese subway, where they literally had to push people into the doors to fit them all inside.) This could connect to claustrophobia, particularly with crowds. The Toriningen takes Mado to all sorts of closed off spaces, but when she takes her to the one in Numbers world? The one with faces looking at her? There's the letter A on the floor, that of course, turns into "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA" if you step on it, more commonly used to denote the sound of screaming. Most importantly, Mado feels like people are out to get her, as though they all feel malice towards her. So the presence of the Toriningen, girls who want to ignore/get back at Mado, seems to reinforce this; note that they appear alongside the guillotine, a device used for public execution.
I also didn't discuss my theory about FACE here, but the fact that you get to him by entering a door that looks like a door to your room made me think that it's a really intense kind of denial, that she knows that hiding in her room is bad for her, but the conflict of knowing that she has to leave and face the real world is just so frightening to her that she wakes up. Connecting with this idea, this could very easily also serve as an explanation for the beds lying around, returning to the whole theme of sleep that the game has.
No.1639[Reply]
Personally, I think he represents Madotsuki's r̶a̶p̶e̶ loneliness, which is kinda a major thing in her life, especially if she is indeed a hikikomori. Onsen-san is alone in his room (I guess it's his house if it's only one room but whatever), in the dark no less. The area around his house, the Wilderness is ENORMOUSLY empty. The only thing in the area that moves is the towel, which is more like a blanket, considering the way that Madotsuki looks when using the effect (she wraps it around herself and she sneezes as if she is ill). Children generally hold blankets when they're scared or cold, which is what Onsen-san probably is, seeing as he's alone, "crying", and sitting next to a hot spring. Plus, Onsen-san might be trapped in the house, despite the door being open; when you stab Onsen-san, his head turns blue and he stops sucking up the hot water. Looking at Onsen-san, his head/head-tube are a bright red. Then his body is a dark red/green. Then, his legs are blue. Maybe the reason he's sitting down next to the hot spring is because he needs the warmth to live, and the only way to keep warm is to keep supplying his brain with the warm water of the spring. He can't move because he couldn't supply his legs with the warmth they need and thus died, hence the blue color. His body and his heart are on the verge of dying, as he can barely keep it warm with the water from the spring. He might represent Madotsuki's need for "warmth" to keep herself from dying; warmth often being another word for kindness/love/etc. The spring/hot water represents the "friends" that Madotsuki has made for herself in her dreams, which are her only source of "warmth" in her room. Onsen-san's dead legs represent Madotsuki's own inability to leave her room. Onsen-san's nearly-dying body represents Madotsuki's want to end her imprisonment. The tube connecting Onsen-san's head to the hot, sustaining water represents Madotsuki's dreams connecting her brain to the mentally sustaining "friends" she meets in her subconscious.
Once the hot springs run out of water, Onsen-san will have no more source of warmth and will die. Once Madotsuki meets everyone in her dreams, she has no more source of friendship/love and dies.
No.1640
I for one can't ever see Onsen-san the same way after seeing this picture in the archives.
I do think you're right, that he's supposed to be alone and isolated, and I also agree that there's some kind of temperature indication with him, in the way that his head that's sucking up the hot water is bright red, but his legs are a lifeless blue? So I can see the way you're thinking in that Onsen-san is a parallel to Mado staying in her room. I can also most definitely agree that the Wilderness is a representation of loneliness; the event with the Toriningen having a party seems like it has a very similar theme, in that while the Toriningen are having fun together, Mado can't join them. She can only watch them.
The thing that I disagree about is the idea that Mado wants to end her imprisonment. Onsen-san might be sad, but is he really sad about where he is now? The Hot Springs area seems very kind and peaceful, to me. The music is pleasant, the surroundings aren't nearly as threatening as in other areas, the darkness in the room almost seems like it's conducive to sleep. I see Onsen-san as someone who's upset about something, and is hiding away in here to comfort himself and stay safe, like Mado is by staying in her room to hide from the big, scary world. If he left, then yes, he would die, but it's not so much because he can't live without the water, as he can't bring himself to gather the strength necessary to live in the outside world. It's his own damn fault that he can't leave his room, not his legs/the water/the outside world's!
This kind of "I can't go out because <x>" rationalization is basically what I see as being the cause for all of Mado's suffering. Like, these factors certainly aren't helping them go out and face their problems, but it's their own fault that the problems are there in the first place. So I guess all the facts about our theories are the same, it's just the morals behind them that are different. :s
No.1641
Well, theories are theories, so who knows. I don't feel like Onsen-san is content because of the black streams on his face, but on the other hand I didn't make him so I don't know if they are tears, or veins, or whatever.
In hindsight, however, it makes more sense that Onsen-san is happy to be in his room, alone, considering how horrific the outside world can be. Hell, that makes him even more relatable to Madotsuki, hiding in his room in fear of what's outside.
The point is, though, that I feel Onsen-san deserves to be examined and looked at just as often as the other strange, random characters, like Monoe and Monoko, KyuKyu, Mars-san, etc.
(plus he seriously deserves to be more well-known than that zombie kid in the road is)
No.1647
I just played for a bit to take a closer look at him, and I didn't notice before that his mouth moves slightly. I'd actually say it appears to be slightly switching between a frown and a smile, or perhaps denoting that he's muttering something to himself? Either way, I'd say that it denotes him feeling some kind of conflict.
If you're right, and the lines on his face are tears after all (And I'd say they are.) then maybe there's some kind of connection between his tears and the tube going to his head; namely that he's siphoning off water to become his tears? If this is the case, then I think I might be able to vaguely connect these two facts:
Onsen-San is a pitiful, conflicted thing/person who is responsible for his current state of being, with his limbs atrophied and incapable of moving, leaving him alone in his dark room. At some point, he started siphoning off water to allow himself to cry. (Or rather, to make it so he can feel bad about himself.) This addiction to self indulgent misery is what led him to where he is today after he continued doing it for so long that he could no longer muster the strength to go back out into the world, so now, he sits, still crying and suffering through the mental conflict of wanting to leave and go back out into the world, but not being able to stop feeling sorry for himself long enough to do so. He's a manifestation of a never ending hesitation, and pure indecision.
This represents Madotsuki in that she's staying inside *her* room, scared of the outside world and feeling sorry for herself. Unfortunately, the longer she does this, the less prepared she is to return to the outside world and confront her problems.
No.1648
Derp. And I forgot to connect it to some other points about the area, some of which are similar to what you said:
-The Wilderness Area is focussed on Mado's loneliness and depression. It seems rather desolate, in that the plants that grow are short, simple, and more like vines than trees, like the area can't support much life. Like you said, there's very few NPCs around, other than a towel, which seems like its purpose is to comfort Mado and make her feel better. Still. It's not much of a companion.
-You have the Toriningen Party in the area, which I've speculated before is about Mado's loneliness, since she's not able to join them.
-Lots of sad frowny face blocks everywhere. :(
-The Barracks exist on the outskirts of the area, but are generally fenced off from Madotsuki and not particularly welcoming. The NPCs here seem human-like, but are very unrelatable to Madotsuki; they're identity-less, with holes for faces, and show no apparent emotions. (As opposed to NPCs like Monoko, Monoe, and so forth, who appear much more human, at least for a time.)
-Trying to think of the symbolism of the curled plants with red eyes that appear around the stairs to the Sky Garden, I think they might just represent the general paranoid "I'm being watched" theme that's prevalent throughout the game.
So yeah. I think this interpretation of Onsen-San could connect quite nicely.
