Fatal Frame 1
Released: 2002
Story: (September 1986)
A college student named Miku goes to the Himuro Mansion to find her brother that had recently went missing after he went to the mansion looking for his photogrophy friend and tutor. Mafuyu heard his friend went missing in the mansion and so sought after him. Miku goes in where she later finds the camera that mafuyu had brought with him. The camera obscure was passed down from their family and was used to kill ghosts/evil spirits by taking their pictures.
Wondering around withen the mansion she looks for her only family member. When she does run into him she only sees his image and never catches up to him. She also sees a young girl in a white kimono and an angry female spirit named kirie who was a shrine maiden (who desperately tries to kill her many times over).
Gameplay: Amaizng! It's wondering around a haunted mansion with only a camera and a flashlight with evil spirits trying to kill you. sweatdrop
It's more of a tense and suspense game with a interesting and sad story! The graphics are great and 'dark' fitting perfectly. Characters are interesting as well!
Audio: No comment. Not a game CD I would buy but for the game it fits perfectly fine.
Characters:
Miku- Sister of Mafuyu and daughter of Miyuki and her husband. She was born with a 6th sense like her mother just like her brother. For this she has no friends and can see and receive visions from ghosts. Her vision became even stronger after her father's death and mothers suicide. Mafuyu is her brother/friend/mother and father all in one and means a lot to her. She desperately seeks him out in the mansion armed only with a camera.
Mafuyu: A 23 year old man who is the brother of Miyu. He heads off to the mansion after a friend and dissappears shortly afterward as well. Because he 'dissappeared' Miyu chases after to find her missing brother. Mafuyu entered the mansion and meets the chaotic and evil kirei just like anyone else who came in. However, since he resembles her lover (her lovers reincarnation I think) she instead kept him alive in a time loop so he couldn't escape. He's a kind man and tries to save kirei.
Miyuki and Masato: (Parents of Miku and Mafuyu)
Masato dies because he was killed in a accident while on a research trip.
Miyuki died from suicide. She also had a 6th sense like her children and but it died after elementry school. However she came across the camera and continued photogrophy later noticeing ghosts and odd spirtis. Becoming troubled by it she commited suicide (hanging. I think she also saw them outside the camera).
Kirei: The last rope maidn choosen. Rope Maidens are choosen and then locked up in a prision like room for 10 years to keep them 'pure' until to be killed in a ritual. Having been choosen at the age of 9 or 10 she was cut off from the outside world. The only ones she would see were the priests who also wore masks to not grow an attachment to the choosen maiden. (This seperation was done also so that the maidn would also grow sick of living and want to die; making her willing in the ritual. If a maiden is unwilling the ritual would fail.) Only on certain days she was allowed outside and sometimes but rarely she saw the members of the himura household but not much so she couldn't get attached to them.
Shortly, before the stragling ritual, a visitor came to the himuro household. He saw kirei through a window looking at him and waved. Afterward they managed to spend a lot of time together. She became fond of him and the priests found out. Worried she might lose the ability to be the rope maiden they secretly killed him and threw his body into the abyss. They then told her he left and returned home. However she shortly found out the truth and felt sadden and depressed blaming herself for her lovers death. She even became unwilling to die. However they still performed the ritual but b/c her spirit was unwilling. Ever since 1837 the gates of hell opened up and took over the mansion and those in it. Kirei wonders as a angry and evil spirit. Afterward anyone who enters the mansion is torn limb from limb by her.
1986- Kirei went to atack mafuyu like all her other victums but stopped realizing he ressembled the man she loved. She instead spared his life and trapped him in a time loop hoping to keep her with him forever.
About Kirei's death:
Rope maidens died quite terribly. Here's a great description found on a website:
"For the ritual to succeed, a young girl with no attachments to the world must be torn apart by five ropes to provide the ropes with holy power to keep the Gate closed. It's gruesome, but being killed by the ropes seems to imbue the ropes with her soul. This girl is known as the Rope Shrine Maiden or Rope Miko (“ê‚̛ޗ). She is selected (with or without the permission of her family, judging from the existence of Long-Arms, the angry ghost of the father of a Rope Miko) and put into near-total seclusion for about ten years. She is kept in "The Room That Has Never Been Opened," which is a small jail cell hidden in the attic of the mansion.
On the night of December 13, she is taken to the Tsukuyomi Shrine in the courtyard, where the four priests and the family master use their seals to open up a hidden pathway to the Moon Well. The Miko descends into the well and purifies her body in the moonlight reflected in from outside by a giant mirror. The first Rope Miko is mummified and enshrined in this well, and all subsequent Mikos have a symbolic doll enshrined in the Doll Room.
After purifying herself, the Rope Miko takes a path from the well to join the rest of the family on the Hell Bridge (they came through the Demon Mouth and down the Banned Path). At the end of the Hell Bridge is the room with the Rope Altar, which has five wheels to pull the ropes and gutters cut into the ground to drain away the blood. (...o.o; wink The Truth Binder puts five holy shrine ropes around her arms, legs, and neck, and the four priests and the Himuro master turn the wheels until the Rope Miko is pulled to pieces. In Shinto shrines, holy ropes are used to mark off any sacred or holy place (such as the ropes around the doll of the Rope Miko in the Doll Room), and these ropes are also hung over the entranceways."
Rate: 10/10
Great story, characters, gameplay, everything! It's perfect in story and keeps you going!
Extra Facts:
1. Although the story is 1986 the developers made a dicision of giving Miku a casual and modern wear clothes. Although they were playing with the idea of giving her a kimono.
2. "Based on a real story". This was only on the US cover art. It's not but there is a mansion where a murder of a family had taken place.
3. Himura mansion: It's a common last name in japan and the creators said it was located in japans outskirts. So basically it can be anywhere and most likely not named Himura. Here at the mansion there are a few that were connected and said to have some kind of 'ritual' that takes place. Many people say they've experienced something there like bloody handprints, spirits, ect. There is also said to be a spirit sealed talisman in their where people have sought it but were found dead with a broken body and rope marks around their wrists.
4. There is a fatal frame (or was) ride in japan but thats for ff2.
5. Miku is related to Yae (who's in FF2).
