TL;DR: start with the original here then move on to the rest, if you don’t like visual novels then you can read the manga which has been translated on mangadex but that doesn’t adapt anything from the far side routes. DO NOT START WITH SOME MYTHICAL TSUKIHIME ANIME, if you were to find it across timelines you can discuss how bad it is with our other fellow steiners (do people still get Steins; Gate references?)


Tsukihime is a work with a few adaptations and such, and knowing where to start may be a daunting task, this thread should help you get started. There are a few ways to get started and I’ll be summarizing the main ones here.

Original Visual Novel

Pros:

  • You get to enjoy the full story

Cons:

  • Really old
  • Very Long (~40h on vndb)

This is the general recommendation if you’re in it for the long run, the VN has quite a few rough edges; but if you can look past those it is the best way to enjoy the story, just know that it is basically a book with some PNGs and music. It runs perfectly fine on Windows and will run natively on Mac/Linux when using a native onscripter-en, additionally a web version has also been made for platforms where onscripter-en is not a sane option.

Remake

Pros:

  • Better art, music and story
  • Officially available

Cons:

  • Only on switch/PS4 (PS4 does not have an english translation)
  • Requires patch for english translation (switch only)
  • New timeline
  • Only the first 2 routes

I don’t recommend starting here as there are many cons and the remake changes the story quite a bit and currently only the first 2 routes are available which is a small fraction of the game.

Update: An official English release for the first part is slated for 2024.

Manga

Pros:

  • Great art

Cons:

  • Only first route

The manga is a good starting point for if you are on the edge or unwilling to read either VN, it only covers the first route of the game and pull some elements from the second route later on.

Notes

  • For many Tsukihime goes from great to masterpiece in it’s far side routes, these routes have not been adapted outside of the original VN
  • The far side routes will be in the remake as a separate game for which no release date has been provided yet
  • you can find more info on readtsukihi.me