There seem to be a significant number of crossover fics on this particular manga?/anime?/visual novel? - I'm especially interested in reading Dark-Syaoran's Fictional.

Which format should I be going by? Should I be playing the original visual novel/game, read the manga or watch the anime?

Thanks in advance.

 

Play the first visual novel, then you can watch the anime which mashes up the three routs of the game. You can also watch the movie Unlimited Blade Works. Later you can read Fat/Zero which describes the 4th Holy Grail War.

I don't know if the second visual novel Fate/Hollow Ataraxia is translated into English.

Oh, and read Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma Illya manga - just for the LULZ

 

Get the original visual novel if you have the time. It's quite long, after all. Still, it is, by far, the best source, being the original and all-encompassing. The rest - anime, movie, manga, are at best like small, mangled slices of the greater whole. The true awesomeness can be gained only by playing the visual novel.

 

Thanks for the answers. Should I be gunning for any particular ending/outcome/path on my first playthrough?

 

The game makes you play the Fate path first, then it opens up the Unlimited Blade Works path, and after that you get Heaven's Feel. To finish it, you play it 3 times.

On the subsequent play throughs, the game allows you to skip the shared introductory steps and get straight to the decisions where the story route's split up. There's a decision map floating around online with all of the routes and decision paths marked out too.