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Post by avidgamer77 on Mar 6, 2007 5:54:29 GMT -5
Despite Gregory's innocence, it appears that Wendy had exploited his weakness by making him believe she was his Joshua, and in the process, torturing and ordering him to kill innocent kids. A selfish act out of love and revenge, I would say.
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Post by PrincessJennifer on Mar 6, 2007 11:00:39 GMT -5
But we are not talking about the kids from the night at the orphanage, we are talking about the missing kids from the newspaper and his innocence or guilt in taking and killing them.
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Post by avidgamer77 on Mar 7, 2007 0:30:17 GMT -5
He was innocent in that he didn't kidnap the kids, but was manipulated to kill the orphans, which he had regretted.
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Post by PrincessJennifer on Mar 7, 2007 0:31:28 GMT -5
I'm just pointing out that we're not talking about the orphans in this topic, but the missing kids from the articles.
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Post by avidgamer77 on Mar 7, 2007 1:25:49 GMT -5
For those missing kids, he was simply being misunderstood. But I wonder why Gregory dug up those 3 holes at the back of his house following the article. Probably to let Joshua immerse in his stories?
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Post by PrincessJennifer on Mar 7, 2007 1:31:57 GMT -5
The holes don't really relate to the article at all. The removed cutscene explains them, as it shows Gregory apparently digging up blood clothes he had buried, or possibly burying them. This is what supports my theory that he was planned to be the kidnapper and villian, then changed to a more sympathetic character, but they just decided to leave the holes in, rather than removed everything that pointed to him as the kidnapper.
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Post by PrincessJennifer on Mar 16, 2007 23:49:38 GMT -5
To aid bucketsquire, this is the topic you want to post that in.
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Post by laura on Mar 17, 2007 8:18:01 GMT -5
The articles, poem and techniques used always seem to hint to Gregory's guilt. The poem is a little to dark- why would a normal pea try to run away? I think we all know that the pea symbolizes the kidnapped children. Coming from a normal person, a song like this would be a little odd but nothing to worry about. Coming from a man who is slowly losing his mind, binging on alcohol and carrying a weapon, it's effect is a little more sinister. I always thought he stopped writing when he got Jennifer because she was basically the first child to not try and escape so soon and so blatantly. She stayed with him for a good while and made a plan with someone from the outside to escape. Therefore he didn't have a chance to kill her. Also notice in the song he 'grinds' the peas up, and buries them. I don't think I want to elaborate of grinding children up, because I just don't want to think about how he'd do that. But there are graves in his backyard.
I can't remember the number of graves but I think it was over two. And they are shallow (note the mounds over the top. You don't get that with a 6 foot deep grave). If someone you cared about dearly died, would you bury them so shallow? The animals will get to them, so you bury them deep. He doesn't have a strong connection to whatever bodies are buried in his yard.
There was agood point made about the dates and Gregory still making storybooks. I don't think this proves anything, since if I go with the theory he did[/] kidnap children to keep his idea of Joshua, then he would still write books for the fake 'Joshua'. It's only when they try to escape that he kills them, by grinding them up.
But the subject really teeters either way. The developers put in hints of guilt, but nothing a jury would convict over. I personally believe he's guilty, though.
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Post by avidgamer77 on Mar 17, 2007 8:55:03 GMT -5
If I were to believe he is guilty, those are good points, but wouldn't that make him a cannibal? The deleted cutscene only fuels his guilt as a serial child killer. No wonder he's so remorseful (in failing to find a replacement Joshua and killing children in the process) that he intends to kill himself, but was "saved" by Jennifer who sympathised with him. Maybe there's something really grisly about the house that Jennifer wishes to or have forgotten, and it's all too distorted in her mind already.
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Post by PrincessJennifer on Mar 17, 2007 14:07:49 GMT -5
Since the other things in her dreams were pretty grisly, I somehow doubt anything got left out.
I still stand by my original theories. There is a lot of evidence to support that Gregory was originally intended to be a more villianous character who had kidnapped the children, but then the makers dropped that idea but never bothered to remove all the evidence, as it would just take too much time.
If we refer to the unused dialogue, we learn that Gregory's stories are loved by Joshua for being "scary and full of surprises", which fits the pea story he was mumbling, as it firsts seems to be a dog collecting peas and turns out to be a man collecting and murdering children. The holes in the garden were left in from the dropped cutscene, so they seem to be something that should have been removed, but the makers left it in and added the shovel to be acquired as a weapon, as if that would explain it. As for the article, it is likely either an inspiration for his story or another clue that was left in. Either way, it is not that odd for people to get newspapers. If anything, the article and poem might have been meant to show the beginnings of the Stray Dog Rumor, for those of us who never bothered to visit the official site. And I've already went into detail about the diary earlier in this thread, I believe. There seems no other explanation other than the Joshua in it is the real one.
Lastly, Gregory really does not have the air of a murderer about him. He is only factually known to have killed children after months of torture, torment, and manipulation by Wendy, and even during that time, he still appears sorrowful and kills himself directly afterwards. During her long stay with him, Jennifer states he's sad but he is very kind to her and clearly seems only to be a danger to himself. He does not seem to be a man who would be capable of kidnapping and killing little kids.
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Post by laura on Mar 17, 2007 21:53:08 GMT -5
Since the other things in her dreams were pretty grisly, I somehow doubt anything got left out. I still stand by my original theories. There is a lot of evidence to support that Gregory was originally intended to be a more villianous character who had kidnapped the children, but then the makers dropped that idea but never bothered to remove all the evidence, as it would just take too much time. If we refer to the unused dialogue, we learn that Gregory's stories areloved by Joshua for being "scary and full of surprises", which fits the pea story he was mumbling, as it firsts seems to be a dog collecting peas and turns out to be a man collecting and murdering children This is being hypocritical here. You're stating that Gregory could have been the villain, except they left out that cutscene so really it can't be used as evidence. That, I understand. But then you use the unused dialogue as evidence that his stories are just scary stories made for Joshua, along with his peas song. But that dialogue is unused- it can't be used as cannon evidence, the same way I don't use the unused 'Gregory attacks Jennifer' scene.
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Post by PrincessJennifer on Mar 17, 2007 22:04:52 GMT -5
An interesting piece of evidence that supports my theory, is in a few snippets of audio that-like the cutscene of Gregory outside of the Gingerbread House-were cut from the final project but left on the disk. This dialogue is between Gregory and Joshua, and unlike the cutscene and a lot of the other audio, it has Gregory very in-character and seems likely that it was just removed because the matching scene just did not fit in(why would Jennifer see the two of them together if she had never met Joshua?). In the dialogue, Joshua is asking his father what will happen next in the story he's being read. Gregory replies he will have to wait until tomorrow, because even he does not know yet. Joshua states that he loves his daddy's stories, and Gregory ask why he loves them so much. Joshua replies that it's because they are "scary and full of surprises". Gregory laughs and says that makes him happy. Joshua asks his father to sing to him, and that's where it ends. Though it being canon is questionable, it does have Joshua stating what I theoried about him loving scary stories with surprises, which fits the pea story Gregory recites. Interesting, huh?^^ I already posted that the audio being canon was questionable, though clearly different from the dropped scene. Gregory's stories being that way is further proven by the ones we receive in the game, all of which are scary and have a surprise ending.
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Post by bucketsquire on Mar 24, 2007 23:10:28 GMT -5
I still stand by my original theories. There is a lot of evidence to support that Gregory was originally intended to be a more villianous character who had kidnapped the children, but then the makers dropped that idea but never bothered to remove all the evidence, as it would just take too much time. Lastly, Gregory really does not have the air of a murderer about him. He does not seem to be a man who would be capable of kidnapping and killing little kids. What I like about your theory, PrincessJennifer, is that it acknowledges that the game authors wrote-in evidence that was meant to indicate Gregory's guilt. However... the suggestion that the authors changed their minds about Gregory's guilt but then didn't have enough time (or money, etc.) to remove all this evidence is a theory that I dislike a lot. I know you must love this game to make this forum and devote so much effort to thinking about the game, but this theory amounts to an accusation that the game authors and producers did a bad job and produced a seriously flawed game. And even if the theory doesn't keep you from loving the game, if you think about it, you will see that the theory really is an insult to the game. And it is totally unnecessary when everything can be explained just as well without accusing the game authors/producers of messing up over the evidence of Gregory's guilt. Assuming that the authors did indeed re-evaluate how they wanted to portray the Gregory character, one could explain the re-evaluation NOT as a decision to make Gregory innocent of the kidnappings, but rather as a decision NOT to portray him as a one-dimensional character who is just a "bad" man, but instead to provide complexity to the character by making him have sympathetic traits and not drowning out these sympathetic traits by bluntly showing his bad acts. Such a treatment would keep his character's treatment consistent with the treatment of other characters in Rule of Rose. We see the Aristocrat Club girls do terrible things, but there are still many fans who like them a lot. I'm sure if Wendy's guilt in the orphanage massacre hadn't been made so certain in the story, there would be many Wendy fans saying that they don't believe she could have done it, she is so sweet. Gregory's character has been made 3-dimensional like these other characters. But sympathetic or lovable traits should not be taken as evidence of innocence. That isn't how the real world works, and what brings the Rule of Rose story up to the level of "art" IMHO is the acknowledgement that people are not simply good or bad. There is a real life example that makes this last point really strongly to me: I've mentioned, in another thread, liking Anne Perry's Victorian mystery novel series. I've mentioned that Anne Perry is the pen-name of Juliet Hulme. A biographical incident from Juliet Hulme's life is told in the movie HEAVENLY CREATURES in which the Hulme character is portrayed by Kate Winslet. Only after the movie was made was it discovered that Hulme had changed her name and was now a popular mystery writer living in Britain, but previously had been convicted in a famous murder case in New Zealand. Having read Anne Perry's novels I can't help liking her for having created such wonderful characters that one can't help but love and respect. Even in HEAVENLY CREATURES she comes off as very sympathetic, despite the fact that she and her best friend planned in cold blood the murder of that friend's mother, which the two girls carried out in a very vicious way: beating the poor woman to death. Had Hulme been in Texas rather than in New Zealand, she would have been tried as an adult and executed, rather than released from juvenile prison after some years of incarceration. I must admit that I think the world is a richer place for her being alive and writing novels... but please don't argue that a person has to seem full of anger and malice, or not seem sympathetic, in order to have committed a heinous crime, because that isn't the real world. The real world is more complex and strange than that. I could tell you of other cases I know about besides Hulme's (for instance, I know someone who spent time in the home of an IRA bomber/terrorist and said that the guy came across as a very ordinary family man), but I hope you've gotten my point already.
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Post by PrincessJennifer on Mar 24, 2007 23:20:18 GMT -5
I have ALSO provided theories about the questionable things in that scenario, in case they were NOT left in by the makers. If they are not in this thread, check the Missing Kids thread in Theories.
I do mean it as a bit of an insult, or more accurately, constructive criticism. While it was a good game, the story had some poor execution and left many confused. If you look at the trailer and artwork released prior to the game being finished, you can see many things that were changed or taken out in the final version of the game. The trailer and artwork realsed before the game was finished and the cutscene dropped from the project all show a violent side of Gregory, very different from the one we see in the game. In the game, even when attacking his look remains sorroful. Also, the cutscene related to the holes. When it was dropped, the holes should have been removed, but that can take a lot of time to remove that and all the other evidence, and if they were on a deadline...It happens a lot in video games.
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Post by prinnydood on Mar 25, 2007 23:11:23 GMT -5
I joined these message boards for this specific reason, as I feel Gregory is the most complex character in the game and the GameFAQS discussion seems to have broken down.
Anyway, I've been meaning to play through again just to try and figure out his position. However, I do have a little something to offer on Gregory's diary.
Pea harvesting generally takes place in the summer (early summer, as it is a good crop to prepare the soil for other veggies). Peas are planted in early spring, typically in 2 week successions to allow harvesting at different times. This game got the harvesting part right, as he is "selling" his peas around June 8, which is normally when the peas would first be ready. The fact that he doesn't sell anymore means he either forgot to mention it (due to his declining mental state) or just didn't bother with the 2 week deal. Anyway...
On June 14 and the 21, his diary says he "planted peas." Now I know the debate that has been going on, but you do not plant peas that late in the growing seasons. It doesn't make any sense. You run the risk of the plants encountering the first frost, killing them all. Also, the pea pods (and mature plants) themselves are very hardy and can stand up to the blazing summer heat, but immature pea PLANTS would fry and not survive.
Also, maybe it is just because I haven't played in a while, but I don't seem to remember seeing any climbing structures in the garden for the pea plants. Pea plants are vines that need a structure to climb on to grow properly.
Anyway, I just wanted to throw those out there. A good farmer would NEVER plant peas that late in the season, especially alongside mature plants. Not to mention the comments the game makes on the field when you examine it.
Oh, and before anyone asks, yes, the growing season is the same in England as it is in the U.S.
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