Warning this review may contain spoilers.

First impressions, so we got this town with these mysterious deaths that happens once a year.
Seems interesting enough so let's see how this goes. Also this probably one of the first horror anime I have ever watched.

Story, 7/10

So the story of higurashi when they cry starts off with are main character who has moved into this peaceful village nothing really out of the order, except for the last 5 years a series of mysterious deaths have plagued the small town. Once a year at the annual cotton drifting festival one person dies and another person disappears with out a trace. Some say its the work of the town local deity that protect the village from harm and others say that's it's cold blood murder.
So after the 5th death the main character decides to find out the truth of what going on only to find that there is more than meets the eye and that the truth is a lot closer to him than he thinks.
( maahahahahaamahahaahaahah evil laugh).

So how the story plays out it quite interesting from a narvite standpoint.

Basically what happens is that the story is broken up into question arcs and answer arcs.

The question arcs are basically used to bring up a different character point of view about the overall mystery that plagues this town. The answer arcs the used to answer all the questions that where brought up in the question arcs.
Which is a pretty interesting why to tell a story

So basically what's happen is the every arc plays out very differently even though most start off mostly the same.
It will start with the Main character going about his though his day to day life and him learning about these mysterious murders from different characters and as he finds out more about this mystery and then Shit hits the fan pretty quickly which gets triggered or should I say kick started for a quite a few reasons,
like for example the main character who had a doll that he won and gave to one girl and not the other one that was with him. Which him not given the doll to the other girl pretty much help kickstart a killing spree where quite a few people died.

So pretty much what the story trying to show you is that every action has weight to it.

So every arc they have an event that basically kicks starts where things get intense and giving tye characters a reason to go on a massive freak out and then the killing sprees with different people getting killed and sometimes in different way or time and even some characters even mangeing to live past there ordeal.

Now I know that some of you are going to say how come one little event trigger such actions.
Well to those people it dose explain why but it only hints at it and you will only get the full story in the second season.

So pretty at much the end of each arc the story dose a time reset and things starts all over again. With the next arc.

So the first season of higurashi When they cry basically covers all the questions arcs.
Now I had no problem with this because it gave me more elements to the over all mystery and made me more intrigued because over all it quite subtle of how it dose things.

Now one negative I would have to say about this approach is that on its own it kind of makes no sense in context and I have herd quite a few people talk about this.
But I am pretty sure that most of them haven't watched the second season which would fix that problem because the second season expains what is actually going on and why these characters are tapped in this time lop that will go on pretty much for ever.

Other than that for a horror story it also has a good sense of atmosphere and pretty well paced. But there are few parts that do kind of drag out a bit like the slice of nothing ever happens parts but over than that it it pretty good story wise.

Even though at first it doesn't make much sense.
And even it ends very abruptly.

Characters, 6/10

The main character is pretty much a generic v.n protagonist.
You know who is the nice guy who is full of hopeful idealism.
So he pretty one note.
But he dose have a dark side to him which dose comes to light once or twice.
So it kind adds some depth to his character.
And shows that he has weakness to his characters and that there more to him that meets the eye.

The side characters are also pretty much one note

But like the main character they also have a dark side which is also brought to light as well when they start going on there quote on quote freak outs.
Which also show that there is more to them that meets the eye.
Than just being moe blobs.

I also found the characters quite endearing.

The character interaction was also quite nice as well.

Art, 6/10

The animation is pretty average.
But even though it kind of average it dose a good job show caseing the gore.
And it kind of adds some grit to it as well.

Now there are some times where the animation was kind of inconsistent at times.

But it didn't happen that often so it didn't really bother me that much.

The art style is very moe and everything looks cute and innocent.
And then when shit starts hitting the fan it starts looking demonic and gritty.

The character design they look like moe blobs and then when things get intense.
They start having fangs and cat slit eyes and make these creepy faces

Sound, 5/10

The opening song I quite liked.
It had this nice sense of creepness to it and the fact it was pretty catchy as well.
And it worth a quick listen.

But over than the nice op the ending song is pretty foregetale. Just like the rest of the ost for this show which is kind of a wasted. Because this is the kind of show that need a good Ost.

Enjoyment, 7/10

So what did i enjoy about this show.

Well a few things I enjoyed the about the show overall is the mystery that it has and how it doesn't tell you all the answer right away.
I also enjoyed the opening song which is quite nice to hear.
Also liked the characters even though they where quite one note at first.

And overall it was quite the nice ride.

Overall, 7/10

As a horror story it has the mystery it has the gore it has the tension.

So if you like horror than this is going to be your thing.

But if your not a gore fan than stay away because there a lot of fucked up shit that dose go on in it so watch at your own risk I guess