Thursday, December 30, 2010

Death Note blunt analysis

Death Note is good. Saying it's the "best anime I've ever seen" doesn't really mean shit. Maybe if it was "I've been watching anime for years, and out of the hundreds of seasons I've followed, I found Death Note to be one of the best I've ever seen" it would be okay.

If it didn't have such a bullshit ending, I might actually call it one of the best shows I've seen, anime or otherwise. Honestly, the exact replica was bullshit. Also, the ending made no sense. He didn't trust kira #4 to take out kira #3 when she was kidnapped, why would he trust him to take out his enemies then?

The moment he learned of another person with a death note he contemplated killing them. Giving out his secret to people willy nilly dilutes his character. He was trapped, unable to do anything. "Too bad I got someone else to do my dirty work" is no good. He was able to track down the company kira by analysing patterns. L was able to see he was a student by looking at the times of death. Letting someone else do this has HUGE consequences.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

My thoughts on Vocaloid


Vocaloid is definitely an acquired taste, and I personally enjoy covers over the original songs. Regardless, they help in allowing new composers/producers to create full songs with vocals, even if they have no singing abilities themselves. From there, the songs can take on human vocals, with the many amateur singers there are on nicovideo. If you like a song but dislike the vocaloid singing it, there's almost always an abundance of covers to look at.

Heck, I know several people who are perfectly competent in singing, yet have composed several songs using Miku for the sound of her voice rather than theirs. Luschka is a perfect example. She's covered several of Treow's songs among others, she was the lead vocalist in his album, Reversus, and she's even released her own album, Birth and Foster.
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm11419786
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm11280964
Regardless, she has actually recently started composing songs using Miku rather than her own voice.
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm12623948
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm13125524

Though I can't think of a way to fully explain this myself, I believe it's simply because it's an enjoyable community to be in. Many of the big producers on nicovideo know each other very well, and the community as a whole is incredibly tight-knit. People can experiment with vocaloids, tuning them in different ways to see what sorts of sounds they can make, and they have the experience of watching as the vocaloids themselves begin to grow better and better, approaching the level that human vocals are at. But anyway, that's just my two cents.

Monday, December 27, 2010

I still play Yu Gi Oh, normal?

So I was at the local trading card game store, playing yugioh with my TCG friends ( they are like 10-12 years old) but it doesn't matter because we are just playing a card game when one of those stupid "normals" happened to tell me that Yugioh was a kids game, HA! I began to "aspie rage" as they call it when I explained to them that, yu-gi-oh isn't a kids game anymore, a lot of the cards from the more recent series have a lot of writing and complex conditions for effects to be carried out, do you think a kid is going to understand "Activate only during the Battle Phase. Select 1 Equip Card equipped to a face-up Attack Position monster you control, and select 1 face-up Attack Position monster your opponent controls. Equip that monster with the selected Equip Card. Then, conduct battle between your previously equipped monster and the selected monster (other effects cannot be activated during this battle)."??!!!??!! And that's not even a joke, that's the instruction on a real trap card, on ONE FRICKIN CARD!! seriously WTF did they make cards like this, even i get confused when they load 5000 instructions onto one card!!!

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Haruhi analysis

Haruhi should be deeper.There's some pretty good character development there, it's certainly pretty human. I don't hate her because she's a teenager and most of them are confused, frustrated, self-centered, and believe the world lives and dies by random daily events. Most people struggle to find something that makes them feel like their life is special, valuable, or meaningful, and that they have some degree of importance to the world. I was like this, most people are like this, many don't really find that feeling. So I don't blame her for being obnoxious, just because she has a lot of growing up to do. She has numerous moments of sweetness and consideration that make you realize it's not all bad, and that she's got potential to grow. Your picture is a good example of that :3
How can you blame her for being a bitch? For her entire existence everything that she has wanted has happened in one way or another. She has no experience with conflict. Therefore, whenever something doesn't go her way she bitches and moans until it does, because that's the way the universe works.


Haruhi is much like us in that she has far too much imagination to function correctly, and the world is nothing but disappointment. Unlike us, Haruhi decides "Fuck that, I'm finding an adventure." and attempts to do so, using all force and resources at her disposal. She gathers up the most interesting people she can find and she DOES things. Haruhi is a bitch, but she is also what many of us can aspire to be. And even more so, she is the person many we could only hope to meet, someone who would drag them around, towards interesting things, without any effort required on our part. I think the character appeals to passive otakus as it takes the initiative, even if its forcefull it takes kyon (in which the viewer identifies) into a world of adventures, all far from the dull life the character and probably the viewer fells they are set into. In the end it apeals to what i think is the most recurring theme in anime for teenagers, a strange girl enters the life of a teenage boy and changes his life of dullness into thrill.On the inside, Haruhi is like any other girl of her age, with her own worries and fears. But instead of letting them get to her, she manages to firmly believe in a better tomorrow.
Fun and happiness won't come to your basement hideout to drag you outside and make you live your life. Haruhi knows that, so she does her best to make everyday fun with her own strenght.

Saturday, December 25, 2010

Christmas the depressed and aspergers way

My mom cut off my internet and weekly allowance, because shes tired of my Hikikomori and NEET lifestyle. Its not my fault I cant get a job because I have crippling social anxiety, and if you don't believe me  tell that to the disability check I get, and I dont know maybe my clinically diagnosed aspergers? I hate christmas luckily I spent this Christmas with my waifu~ I sometimes think about how hard it is not having friends outside of the duelist league and at the local manga cafe, but then I remember that all people just stab you in the back any chance you get.
So merry Christmas Bloggers I hope you are having a better time then I am.

Friday, December 24, 2010

Reading between the Touhou's

I can't completely blame people for doing this since Touhou is unique in the fact that character development isn't concentrated in any one place. You have to read EVERYTHING to get a good feel for the characters, and that is a rather tall order considering that some of it isn't even translated yet. But most people just push this way past the limit of common sense. The "Reimu is a bitch" thing is by far the worst offender though, considering she's actually probably one of the nicer (if occasionally temperamental, but hey who isn't?) people we've been shown. Marisa is also a lot more even headed than fans give her credit for, especially in the print works.

Hell, there are so many things in the endings that people just plain don't know because they never beat the games. I remember getting the Reimu and Marisa endings in EoSD and being like "Wait, wtf? Sakuya just lets Marisa in and tries to hide her from Remilia?! Why the hell do they make Sakuya out to be murderous bitch to Marisa then? God dammit, this is WAY more interesting than that bullshit they told me". After that I never listened to a god damned thing fans have ever said and decided to form my own opinions.

I sometimes think that we should put together a good introduction to the series and descriptive character profiles based ENTIRELY on canon (instead of conjecture), just to help mitigate the deluge of people that are relatively new and flood the boards with misinformation and stupid questions. I would say we already have the wiki for that, but I think that might be a bit too much for some people to wrap their heads around. Maybe a "Top 100 things fans think about Touhou that are complete bullshit", along with proof.

Damn, I think I rambled on a bit there. Sorry 'bout that.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Role Models

Im gonna be honest for one second.
I grew up without a dad, and i realized by 10th grade that I "learned how to be a man" through tv mostly...and kuwabara is probably the biggest male role model i ever had. He taught me respect, honor, honesty, and hardwork. he was never the best at anything but he always found happiness through the above values. This is all coming from me blowing my whole disability check on yugioh cards because I got kind of sad that I didnt have anyone but my mom to buy presents for this Christmas. Now I dont really celebrate christmas as the christian holiday but it really makes me think about Kuwabara and watching him defend the world from evil on YuYuHakusho

what do you guys think? i just want thoughts...

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Mikoooooo~

I don't get her.

Now she's arguably the character people loathe the most in the Western Fandom with the reason of plot armour blah blah lazy miko, etc. But in every 1 or 2 games she changes her attitude, in PC-98 she's young so I understand. Starting from EoSD her attitude is cool-ish and more carefree. Then in PCB is still like that except with the more skip-dialogue -> achieve-tea ideal. In IN she doesn't give two shits about anything that's going on (except the human village in stage 3) and is mad at Yukari for dragging her into it even though she later settles it and the only smile she does in the game is at Kaguya.

In PoFV well, nothing much, just the multi games' usually ridiculous reasons for every character having to fight the other (suspicion, funny-looking, the weather, etc). In MoF she's understandably angry about someone trying to take over her shrine. In SA she's mad at being obliged (?) to leave the hot springs, which later turns out to be a world-saving choice.

Then, in UFO, she, well, snaps. I've read the official mangas including SSiB (God forbid) and read more-so every dialogue she's done in the games and she's usually cool-headed with the occasional rage about X reason that her enemy feels the need to fight her or vice versa. But reading UFO she goes completely psycho after stage 2, being massively dissful towards anything that blocks her way towards the apparent ''gold'' that is in the floating ship. And after learning that there's no gold, her spirit goes down and all she has thoughts for is that this turned out to be yet another gohei-final-boss-in-the-buttocks-and-have-tea-ASAP routine.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Glorious Nippon

It seems like of all the countries to have fantasies about, Japan is the one that will let you down the most.

I'm from the Australia. I'd say any thoughts or beliefs people have about this country are pretty true. Most of the people I know are pretty laid back, we all like surfing and barbecues. Heck, it's not at all uncommon to see kangaroos in the paddocks next to my house. And it's hot here a lot of the time.

Japanese people who build up an idea of what Australia is like in their heads, I feel, will not be dissapointed or let down. But, from what I've read on alot of blogs and a lot of other places, any image of Japan I might build up in my head will quickly be dashed the moment I set foot in glorious Nippon.

Monday, December 20, 2010

Suzumiya Haruhi no shoushitsu : VIDEO REVIEW


 So I got the pleasure to watch this last night after all the anime communities were RAVING about how awesome it was so I found some time in my hikikomori lifestyle and well I'm simply appalled. First and foremost, Christmas Eve has to be one of the most predictable and overused settings of all time.
The SOS brigade wasn't created for the "strangest and most extraordinary students".
You can't wake up in a "weird, alternate dimension". An alternate dimension, in hard SF would refer to an additional axis on a Cartesian plane (perpendicular to the Z axis), rather than an Alternate Reality/Parallel Universe in which history is altered. Even using the theory that you are put into a parallel universe when you time travel (or conversely, create a new one when you change something), this is still incorrect
Last time I checked, Mikuru is an idiot.
SOS brigade exists in the alternate universe still.
Heading back in time doesn't fix being put into a parallel universe. You would need to travel pan-dimensionally (specifically, between parallel worlds), not across time.
Haruhi is predictable as fuck.

Let's just ignore how fucking bad the film is, considering the source material itself is fucking stupid. Not to mention the paradox thrown in when Kyon saves himself (Overused and unexplained because the author doesn't understand ontological paradoxes - we're only given the final-timeline sequence) is just fucking retarded.

Worst film ever. Not pleased.

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Why I love Gensokyo

I’m not saying here that anime cannot create good ‘settings’. Haibane Renmei, the Aria series, and now Sora no Woto have shown us that anime can create an amazing setting, but you’ll notice that all of those series take place almost entirely in one city. That, I’m afraid, I cannot consider a ‘world’ (even a continent might be fine for that consideration, but not a city.) I want to see a ‘world’ like a JRPG has – I can fully visualize the world map of Tales of Symphonia 5 years after playing it because it was such a fully realized, fully explorable, and immersive world. But then wait – why the hell can I see Gensokyo more clearly than any other world?!
I’m not basing that on non-canonical Gensokyo , either. If you’ve ever played any Touhou, a ‘bullet hell’ shooter game series, then you know that the background art is quite generic, and you can only even get a semblance of where you are at any time by the game’s vague dialog. However, there is something magical about what ZUN has created in the Touhou franchise, and I feel this applies to the characters as well as the world they live in – it’s built entirely on implications.
Having a look at, for example, the story of Embodiement of Scarlet Devil. From the past games in the series, we have established that the lead character, Reimu, lives in a shrine in the world of Gensokyo , which is largely populated by all sorts of classical Japanese monsters, some humans, and a lot of eccentric people. In EoSD, we learn that there is a mansion somewhere that Remilia Scarlet and her family lives in, and it’s where the main character goes to beat the game. The first stage has the character flying through a long forest, the second over a massive lake, and the third at the strange-looking entrance to the mansion. Therefor, we can create an image in our head that if you leave the forest surrounding Reimu’s house, fly for quite a while, and pass over a huge lake, you will eventually get to the Scarlet Devil Mansion. We learn that the mansion has a massive library, as well as that it is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside, and that it is populated by many, many maids.
We are given only a couple of lines of dialog from each character we meet with only the tiniest implications of their personalities. ZUN has written some background information on them, but it is mostly ‘telling.’ He tells us a lot of things about the characters, but even when he does, he is sketchy about it, claiming a lot of things to be ‘rumors’ or stating that sources may be more or less correct than they seem. The only time he gives us any scenarios involving the characters, it has a strong bias on the part of the narrators in question, skewing information further.
Point being, there isn’t a whole lot that is given to the player as ‘facts about Touhou’, but a lot of things that are given as ‘inspiration.’ With Touhou, it is possible to completely create the world and the characters inside of your head, all your own, and yet be correct about it.

My thoughts on anime

I like anime, although I wouldn't say I'm obsessed. (My current obsession is pet rats and X-entertainment.com). I do like the exaggerated facial expressions, maybe because I can understand them better but also because I like the art behind them. I enjoy the types of characters in anime better than the ones in American sitcoms. I feel like I can relate to anime characters better, such as Osaka and Sakaki from Azumanga Daioh.

I do agree  that anime has become a somewhat acceptable obsession. (More acceptable than obsessing over a specific animal, which I often get weird looks for). However, I also notice that non-anime fans tend to scoff at anime fans, as if the anime fans are a ridiculous excuse for humans. The ridicule is usually playful, however, rather than the type of ridicule that completely rejects someone. I've noticed that most people either love or hate anime, and there's seldom anyone who just thinks anime's okay.


My sister is really into anime, and I do believe she is an aspie as well. Other anime fans are about the only other people she can socialize with (though that’s not the only reason I think she’s an aspie).

I don’t think aspies are predisposed to enjoying anime in particular, but I can see why some aspies would. It’s a perfect medium for feeding an obsession, since there is just soooo much of it out there, plus it offers a fantastic avenue to socialize. Extreme anime fans tend to eat, breathe, and sleep nothing but anime – a dream come true for the aspie-anime-fan – it’s actually acceptable to talk to about their obsession nonstop!

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Anime TENCHOU

I’m pretty sure you know who is Anime Tenchou, right? I mean, after appearing on Lucky Star and all, he practically burst into popularity! As part of the 10th Anniversary for Anime Tenchou, producer Kondo Hikaru had recently tweeted the announced a crossover anime of epic proportions: an Anime Tenchou x Touhou anime project!
The one-time only special crossover will be shown during “Animate Ichoishi Bishoujo Anime Matsuri” held at Nissho Hall on the 20th November. ZUN, creator of the Touhou series, had expressed that he is not part of the project and that this particular crossover could be regarded as secondary work.
Plot? What plot, never heard of anything called plot when it comes to the hands of Anime Tenchou!

This show looks like a delicious combination of FLCL, Dead Leaves and the Power Puff Girls.

Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt is the newest show from Hiroyuki Imaishi, the man behind Dead Leaves, Gurren Lagann, FLCL episode 5 and many other brilliantly kinetic, high-octane pieces of animation. The artwork is highly inspired by Genndy Tartakovsky-styled Western cartoons like Dexter's Lab, Powerpuff Girls, Samurai Jack and others as a result of lead animator and concept artist Yoh Yoshinari (one of the best living key animators in Japan who did tons of great work on Evangelion, FLCL, Dead Leaves, Gurren Lagann, Diebuster and many others) being a huge fan of that sort of thing. Each episode will be made up of two self-contained twelve-minute 'mini-episodes' in true nostalgic Cartoon Network fashion. The series promises creative and well done fight scenes, lots of immature sexual humor and pretty much everything else you'd normally expect from this staff.

The story (what little of it there is) focuses on two fallen angels, promiscuous Panty and generally rude and cake-obsessed Stocking, who were kicked out of Heaven and sent to take out evil demon-like "ghosts" on Daten City under the watchful eye of Father Garterbelt.

Friday, December 17, 2010

Noel's Fantastic Trip LOVE is ALIVE and WELL

The film is centered around Noel, a young girl and her dog, Pup, who both live on the Planet Noel. While relaxing, Noel comes up with the idea to deliver ice cream to the sun. The two fly off and make their way toward the sun.
On their way, the two of them make a stop at the Planet Gaudy. Upon their arrival, the President steps out to welcome the two. The President invites them to a special party, in which the Emcees show off the planet's most beautiful designs. This does not impress Noel, who states that it doesn't matter what clothes one is wearing, they will still be beautiful and loved. This coaxes the President and the citizens of the planet to take their clothes off, as does Noel. Pup gently reminds Noel of their trip to the sun, and the two take off to find him.
When they find him, the sun warns of foul smog emminating from some unknown planet. The two leave the sun to find the source of the smog, but it quickly surrounds them. They escape underwater on another nearby planet. They appreciate the fine scenery underwater, but as they traverse further they notice the fish are ill.