First Impressions: Ookamikakushi and Sora No Woto

And here’s the still rather delayed round 2, in which I’ll look briefly at Ookamikakushi and Sora no Woto.

Ookamikakushi

This was the show I believe I was most anticipating from the Winter/Spring 2010 lineup.

Ookamikakushi obviously has its claws in the mystery genre. Hiroshi, his author father and wheelchair-bound younger sister Kana have recently moved to a new town known for its age old religion involving a wolf deity and a special kind of citrus fruit (that resembles a mandarin, but apparently isn’t). Shortly after arriving, Hiroshi is instantly glomped by a hyper-energic girl called Isuzu.

Hmm, that’s a pretty obscene first greeting.

The little sister is not impressed.

Similarily, during his first school day as a new transfer student, he is FAR more popular (with guys & girls) than his fairly average personality and looks would suggest, apparently for no reason.

That is, except for one girl, Nemuru, whom it seems is well known for her less than social nature; and makes it quite clear that she despises his very existance. Despite this, her presence is highly commanding, and she manages to scare others away.

Nemuru does not do polite.

He was so buddy-buddy before, but now he’s terrified?

Whilst Hiroshi is walking around town with Isuzu, we also learn that this town is split into an old and new area. Apparently, some did not like the idea of expansion, and so moved to the old town,  the area across the river. These old town people hate new town people. We also learn that no shop is open after 7 and people are rarely on the streets after 8: the towns nightlife is apparently absent.

Finally, we see the guy who got strangely scared of Nemuru before being chased among alleyways. He is a werewolf (?) perhaps as he reacts to seeing the blood moon. But before anything happens, he is cut down by a masked white haired girl. With her mask off, she strongly resembles Nemuru gone albino. The next day, Hiroshi asks why that guys desk has gone. Nemuru curtly arrives and informs Hiroshi that he has moved town.

Apparently he’s also a lycanthrope? (not a very good one, mind you…)

As Albino-Nemuru cuts him in two with her stupidly large scythe.

Naturally, it seems almost a given that Nemuru is actually the wolf-goddess described in the legends; and it is possible that the construction of the new town has also come hand in hand with some kind of curse? We also see some slightly crazy Isuzu in the intro (that is…slightly more crazy than usual, so that is obvious forshadowing).

I’m not 100% sold on it with just the first episode, but I have got the second and third to digest yet, and I am noticeably interested.

Sora no Woto

This follows a girl called Kanata, whom, in her childhood (as a war orphan?),  saw a woman whom was a military herald. This apparently inspired her to join the army so that she could be taught to play an instrument.

When she arrives at her new assignment, the town is in preparation for a grand festival to celebrate fire maidens whom apparently doused themselves in water and continually embraced a vicious fire demon in order to protect the town. Since she is early, she wanders around town and gets herself doused in wine.

After this, another girl, Rio (whom we eventually learn is her superior and sempai) lets her use the bath and clean her uniform. During this time we notice that Kanata has really good hearing and discerns different tones really well, as demonstated in her listening to her sempai’s rining bell. Unfortunately, a thieving owl steals the bell. Kanata goes after it as she still has time before having to report in.

Eventually, she succeeds, but gets hopelessly lost in a nearby valley in the process. She decides to call for help by blowing her trumpet.

The older girl from before, Rio, is actually dressed up to be the fire maiden in festival, and hears Kanata blaring on her trumpet in the valley. Some of the people think this is surprisingly like another prophecy related to the festival.

Anyway, Kanata is rescued, waking up the next morning after passing out in the valley. Rio reprimands her but isn’t too mad since her bell was recovered in the process. We learn that the garrison is called the Time-Telling Fortress because it has a really nice view of the sunrise and it apparently their duty there to play various morning calls. Rio promises to teach Kanata how to be a good trumpeteer. Unfortunately, at the moment, she is total crap, as the townspeople laugh to themselves at her blaring from the fortess.

Could be interesting, this one. Has a relaxing pace and concept to it. I imagine Kanata will eventually become amazing, or something. Again, it’s not entirely caught my attention yet (depends on where they take it), but its got potential.

Thats all for now.

Ah yeah, I’ve decided after watching the next few Baka no Test episodes that I’m almost certainly not going to bother with it anymore. Lack of sense/plot, a rampant abundance of gratuitous homosexuality, and characters that are too cookie-cutter generic have made me facepalm one too many times, I think. The whole summoned creatures part actually seems surprisingly tacked on, which is a bit of a shame since I reckon it could have been the show’s saving grace if had been done well…

Next up will be Durarara! and Ladies vs. Butlers, when I get around to watching them. As you might imagine, crushing schedule and backlog do not a good update situation make. But stay tuned anyway, yeah?

First Impressions: Baka no Test and Dance in the Vampire Bund

Yikes. I have to start with an apology for starting this stuff so late, but I’ve been doing an seemingly exhausting amount of work recently which has obviously had the means to drain away all of my time. Though it’s immensely belated (most shows are about to get to their 3rd episode by now!), its time for the usual evaluations of the anime this season. That said, I guess that there isn’t a huge amount to cover, so though I have alot to catch up,  I still imagine I’ll be able to do it in three or four posts (he says…yet again).

Anyway, I’ll start with Baka no Test and Dance in the Vampire Bund.

Baka no Test (aka. the Idiots, the Tests, and the Summoned Creatures)

The random prediction I made about this in the previews turned out correct: the chibi versions are indeed the summoned creatures (facepalm). Anyway, this is another one of those highly discriminating tiered school systems that manga and light novel writers seem to love the idea of. Special A of course being the other notable one, where the ultimate students get the ultimate facilities. Of course, that focuses on the top, this on the bottom. We hear about Yoshii, who is a complete idiot, so gets assigned to class F. We also hear about Himeji, the token lovely awesome girl who also happens to be sickly and in ultimate discrimation, she gets assigned to F because of her illness preventing her from taking the exam. I’m sure I’d smell a lawsuit there if this were based on the assumption of any other country.

Anyway, Class F naturally has cardboard coffee tables, smelly tatami floors and an unmotivated teacher. Where most schools try their dardest to give the ‘intellectually challenged’ extra special help to make up for their problems, this school does all it can to remind them of just how awful and idiotic they are.

Naturally, Class F immediately starts a revolution, which is apparently allowed in the school charter, by challenging Class E to a virtual reality summoned creature battle with the stakes being Class E’s classroom and facilities (which are at least slightly less drafty with hardwood desks). Basically, students summon a creature which has hitpoints equal to their current total exam score. If their creature gets KO’ed they have to immediately take remedial lessons to get their score up, and can also leave and take more exams to increase health and attack power.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to go very well. Even though the battle goes evenly for a time (as it real idiots vs. slight idiots), the eventual difference in grades slowly becomes clear. Yoshii, the protagonist, has a slight secret weapon: he’s such an idiot he has to help teachers with chores so his chibi has the special ability to affect real-world objects. Unfortunately it also passes on its pain to its user, and in fact becomes totally useless.

So, of course, everyone in class F ends up relying on Himeji, who is of course a super genius only relegated to the class due to sickness. She completes 5 exams in the space of 30 minutes and pumps her creatures score up to 412, turning it into a greatsword wielding warrior girl chibi:

Which, of course, goes onto pwning all of class E simultaneously with a giant super-robot wars style FMV attack.

Which was apparently the class presidents plan all along. Strangely though, he forfeits the prize for some reason, and then a ludicrous challenge letter arrives for class F from… Class A? Oh dear…

Though the concept is fairly dumb, it is at least pretty. I imagine this will be one of the shows that will be fighting over my last couple of remaining slots rather than being guaranteed one. Nevertheless, its good chances as a backup show, especially on those days you want to watch mindless entertainment.

Dance in the Vampire Bund

Again, this one turned out fairly similar to my initial estimations in some respects: Vampires reveal themselves to the world because they buy a entire slice of Japan in order to form themselves a new country due to the efforts of Mina Tepes. However, I didn’t expect HOW they would do this: though the medium of TV show (within a TV show… whee go narrative framing).

It’s played straight, as they bring in various “experts” (ironically, the actual manga-ka guest star is THIS show’s original manga-ka) to determine the validity of vampires, whom of course throw out the concept.

Only to have the proof shoved in their face, first normally as Mina Tepes appears as a girl in the audience and evidence is provided from a recent murder scene.

Of course, still no 0ne take the bait when they they play it straight, so it comes down to the stupid actions the vain special guest star, an actor playing the vampire in a recent live action adaptation of a vampire manga, whom turns out to actually be one (ableit one with the true form of a ‘frog’ which is weird) and also the one resposible for the recent murders.

This idiot is promptly destroyed on live television by Mina, who promptly makes her announcement to the world.

Of course, they’ve turned the literary tradition on its head, not that I didn’t expect it. Since this Mina is apparently the descendant (?) of Vlad, rather than one of his wives as is the case in Dracula.

I have also actually watched the second and third episodes of this. Werewolves appear…and there’s a mighty amount of dubious loli fanservice provided by Mina herself (notably, the scene with the application of super suncream…OH DEAR).  The fact that all of this (the blood and the nudity) is also provided without censoring (fairly rare in an anime) suggests this is shown REALLY late at night. But hey, it makes a refreshing change.

I’m rather interested to see where they take this, so I’ll probably continue to follow this.

7th Dragon (and happy new years)

Happy belated new year and new decade.

Well, I was absent for a couple of weeks as initially anticipated without net access and ability to update. And of course, its been straight back to work after that! Anyways, the new Anime season has been pretty slow with picking up, so I’m actually not as far behind as I might have imagined, with only Sora no Woto, Baka no Test and Ladies vs. Butlers to actually review at the moment. I’ll probably throw them into a post together shortly when I can around to doing them.

With no net, I ended using my DS far more than usual over the christmas holiday when I was not engaging in the usual celebratory measures with the family. This led me into playing 7th Dragon in Japanese, which I had already started puzzling my way through back in the start of December.

I’ve been very eager to play this for quite a long time. It is, in essence, Etrian Odyssey III. Not in name, but certainly it is a spiritual successor with some of the same creators involved (and Yuzo Koshiro did the soundtrack!) . However, it takes that core formula, and adds a huge Dragon Quest type RPG onto Etrian’s amazing party customization. It also, of course, keeps the FOE’s and pretty high difficulty level. Classes are completed changed around, though, probably for the better, as they are very synergistic with one another, probably more so than ever: creating a party that works well and has a variety of strategies is a key to the game.

Unfortunately, Sega recently announced absolutely no plans to localise it, causing me to <headdesk> repeatedly. I suppose there is still a dim chance that Atlus, ever the savior for obscure games, might still pick it up, but I decided I couldn’t wait and plunged in playing the Japanese version (which, actually I was a little reluctant to do since I knew I’d be missing some of finer plot points). I’m mainly able to do this with help of the rather decent English Wiki that exists to provide a chunk of facts about the gameplay.

I also spent some time doing this Sketch of the Rushe Princess from the game:

Click the above to get a larger image, as usual.

She’s the one who always looks ill in the game. I decided this was due to insomnia, LOL. Her original, in game design, which I based this off, can be seen on the Wiki Princess Page. Yes, she’s the one with the blue hair and folded down cat ears.

She’s normally in my lead party providing a mixture of voice skills and occassional whipping support (I called her Felli, but this is customisable).

Oddly enough, though I often seem to draw girls on beds (ROFL), this is first sleepy girl I’ve drawn. I quite liked adding the details; like the bizarre corkscrew rabbit she carries, her twitching ear, disheveled hair and the whip under the pillow (!). Isn’t always amazing how crowns seem to stay on your head when you sleep with any animated royalty?

Anyway, it is, as I anticipated, a very, very great game (though I’m aware I’m very biased about this), and I’ve already clocked 40 hours (and have not quite reached the mid-game yet!).

So much so, that I decided I would attempt to help introduce others a bit by starting a FAQ and Walkthrough! Though not complete, I’ll update this post as it becomes updated.

The Current Version is 0.59

Get it by clicking the above link.

It is a Microsoft Word document. Eventually, a plain text version will be sent in to GameFAQs.

Hopefully this will help you if you decided to try the game out.

Anyway, as noted, I should return soon with my run of initial impressions over the next week or so, so stay tuned.

Winter / Spring 2010 Anime Season Early Thoughts

Again, I’m doing this shockingly early…much like I did last season. The new season is still about 2 weeks off, but in this case I have an excuse since I may not be able to post as well over the xmas period.

Anyway, as usual for a new year season, there’s much fewer shows actually starting up this time. Excluding stuff like random sequels, kiddie shows, remakes and stuff like that, I only actually count 10 new things. Of course, things also tend to suddenly appear under the radar from time to time as well, but as usual, if that happens, a supplementary will usually pop up closer to the time.

Anyways, on with the Winter / Spring 2010 Anime Season Early Summary.

Haruka Naru Toki no Naka de 3: Owari Naki Unmei

Well, that’s a wonderful mouthful to start with, eh? Anyway, this is the hardcore Shoujo Fantasy anime of the season (you know, one of those ones where a single girl is surrounded by pretty guys. In this case, you should be able to guess which one in the above picture is a girl. If you can’t then go back and brush up on your trap detection capabilities!). Not that this is neccesarily a bad thing. Anyway, its the usual situation: high school girl, Kasuga Nozomi, sees strange guy, and against better genre savvy instincts, follows him, and ends up sucked in a portal across time and space to emerge in an alternate history Japan of the past (specifically, Kyoto during the Heian period). Of course, said guy turns out to be a dragon, and girl, being from another world, gets picked as a chosen one (facepalm).

Can’t say I’d approach with vast enthusiasm, but then again I quite liked Fushigi Yugi, which this seems to resemble a fair bit (except replace historical china with historical japan), so if it can match that and pour in some decent action, I’d imagine it could be worth a watch.

Anticipation: Six harems of pretty boys, only four girls to go around?

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Seikon No Qwaser (aka. The Quasar of Stigmata)

Seems to draw on some strange mix of Russian Orthodoxy Christianity with some Chemistry and Psuedo Science thrown in there. Set in St. Mihailov Academy, it follows two students there (I’d imagine, the two girls in the back, including the one who is totally going to have spinal problems in later life) who encounter a mysterious silver haired Russian kid called Sasha. Apparently, becoming involved with this guy (come on girls, have sense, if he’s got heterochromia, a scythe and silver hair, you just don’t mess with him! Jeez…) embroils them in a war between the church and alchemists.

I think the manga-ka of the original version of this probably just really felt the need to use ‘Quasar’ in the title. Of course, he went and made a scientific term into Engrish, somehow (I applaud him!). Anyhow, this looks like an atypical Shounen thing at heart, so I’d be dubious of it myself, but I suppose I may try it, just for the lulz. We shall see.

Anticipation: Chronic Acute Engrish disorder occurs in 7 out of 10 subjects

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Ladies vs. Butlers

Basically, a guy down on luck because he looks like a stereotypical delinquant decides for some reason to apply to an institution that was once for high class ladies. However, it seems at some point this place changed into a school for maids and butlers, so he is accepted and placed into the servant training department. Since everyone here is attempting to become an exemplarary maid or butler, he is then caught in the various wars and highjinks involved between the two.

Shouldn’t it really be called maids vs. butlers? Well, that aside, this is based on a light novel of the same name, which is usually good news, but we shall have to see. Has the potential to be very silly in a good way or just plain dumb. At the very least I have to say I am very impressed with the right hand girls drill hair. LOL.

Anticipation: Three sexy maids, two surly butlers.

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Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu (aka. The Idiots, The Test, and The Summoned Creatures)

Its about another school that strictly stratifies students based upon their grades (in a fashion similar to Special A, by the sounds of it). The main protagonist is stuck in a low ranked class of dummies. But then, the class comes up with a great idea: lets increase our grades by challenging the superiors to fantasy monster battles! (for which the experimental technology has just become available, apparently). How this is considered a great idea is anyones guess, but there you have it…

I sure hope the fantasy creatures in this case aren’t the chibi’s… although I suppose if they are then you’ve got a show that vaguely resembles Angelic Layer, rather than Pokemon in its content. No doubt the plot happens to be that, although dumb, this class probably has it sorted when it comes to being Creature Trainers. Good for them. (or, I suppose, they can go slapstick and say they ALSO suck at being Creature Trainers)

Anticipation: 75% chance of stupid creature trainers ruining your day.

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Dance in the Vampire Bund

Has its roots in literary Dracula, in a what happened ‘if Vlad was killed by Van Helsing but this didn’t save Mina, whom instead becomes lord of the vampires in his place’. She spends a millenia in hiding, and now uses the vast fortune of the Tepes to pay off the entire gross national debt of Japan in return for being given a small part of the island to make a special vampire district. Now, with the eve of the announcement of this fact (and hence, the proclaimation to the world that vampires exist), she has to deal with terrorists and rivals attempting to assassinate her before the deal can go through.

I have to say that’s a pretty strange title. Oh well. It also probably completely discards the actual Dracula lore, making my prior analysis incorrect, but we shall see. No doubt it will, at the very least, be involving much violence and bloodshed.

Anticipation: Four Mina Tepe’s, One Van Hellsing

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Omamori Himari

Its Nyan Koi meets a Shounen Series. Oh ye gads. It follows an orphan, Yuuto, who’s parents died seven years prior to the start and only left him an omamori in the shape of a red ball. An Omamori is one of those kind of charms that protects the child from spiritual intervention until they come of age. Of course, the time is up, and a katana wielding Cat spirit called Himari walks into his life, obviously (sigh) wanting to wildly make babies with him. Naturally, he has severe fur allergies (facepalm), and also has a doormat of a childhood friend undoubtably clinging needlessly to him.

So, all the cliches are there. I’m hence very suspicious of it, and it currently seems the show least likely to attract my attention from the season.

Anticipation: Allergic to nine out of ten species of kemonomini girls, odds not looking well.

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Ookami Kakushi

Apparently based upon a PSP mystery novel. A boy, Hiroshi, moves to a new town in the mountains (in 1983?). This place is split into two obvious districts, old and new, by the central river (sounding a little like the town in FSN). He seems to be enjoying his new life, but is puzzled by the antics of a girl on his class commitee, Nemura, who stays remarkably aloof to him and distinctly warns him not to venture into the older section of the town. Of course, who follows advice like that, eh? Hiroshi gets drawn into the strange affair of the wolf god and the mysteries of people trapped in a neverending nightmare.

To me, perhaps one of the more intreguing offerings this season. I’d imagine the advertisement heroine is both Nemura AND the aformentioned Wolf God, but you never know, eh? (Also, what is it with ridiculously big scythes this season…!?)

Anticipation: Five Wolf goddesses out of five

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Durarara!!

Based on the Light novel of the same strange, bizarre name, written by the author of Baccano! (That guys publisher likes exclaimation marks, so I’m told.) Its basically ‘lets take a set of bizarre and ecletic characters and throw them into a “love” story’. One based in Ikebukuro, Tokyo: a youth who yearns for an un-mundane life, a hoodlum, a stalker denpa-girl, a young man who deals in information ‘for fun’, a black-market doctor, a high-schooler obsessed with magic, as well as a ‘headless rider’ riding a bike painted black. Hilarity ensues.

Baka Tsuki started translating the Light novels for this, but they never got too far with Durarara!! Since it sort of seems to take cues from a Love Actually type scenario of lets see what these weirdos do when we throw them together, it might interest me. We shall see.

Anticipation: Three relationships, two unrequieted loves.

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Katanagatari

An amazing swordsmith made 1000 swords in his entire career, which were so well made that they seemed to swing battles in their favour when wielded by certain armies. At the pinnacle of these are 12 amazing pieces of work with powers so extraordinary, one man could defeat small armies. The Shogun has won the war now, and possesses all 988 of the normal blades, but also wants the super set of 12 in his collection, so assigns his chief strategist, a woman called Togame, to the task. She doesn’t have much luck to begin with, as ninjas and swordsmen betray her for the sake of the swords time and again. Her last chance appears to be a guy who fights without weapons and has no need for money. Of course, what does this quest have to offer him? Why should he help?

“Because you will fall in love with me.”, she says.

Based on a historical fantasy light novel, such things of which always appear to grab my attention. I’m actually bemused by the concept and impressed by how damn colourful the promotional material is (even if the guy in the above picture LITERALLY has a leaf for hair). So its interesting to me. I’ll certainly give it a shot.

Anticipation: I’d certainly get all 12 out of 12 legendary blades for you, my dear.

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Sora no Woto

In a post apocalyptic world that has seen a huge number of conflicts during its time, the land has finally settled down into a gradual cycle of quiet, at last. Kumika nevertheless has a dream to join the army and play music there (military band, huh?). She is enlisted and joins a unit with another five girls as its members, and they are responsible for a fortress overlooking a small village.

Not actually sure what it involves, mind you. I guess I shall research it more closer to the time.

Anticipation: Three horn’s a blowin, but five gold rings?

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That appears to be all at the moment. I’d imagine Letter Bee, Kimi no Todoke, Fairy Tail and Railgun will still be on my lineup, allowing me to probably only pick three from the above selection.

At this early stage, I’m most anticipating Ookami Kakushi and Katanagatari. But of course, things can change drastically between here and then.

Anyway, I hope this post was informative for you in selecting your choices and initial interests for the January 2010 anime season. Stay tuned.

Oho, Sparklies!

Just a short post again today. I’ve been rather distracted with various games, which have all been eating away at my spare time. As noted before, I’ve been playing Syarin no Kuji and will eventually get around to doing a VN diary for it, though it took me longer than anticipated to complete it. Rather interesting game, though, with a world that replaces prison time with ‘obligations’ like losing some hours of your day, not being able to disobey parents or not being able to speak with the opposite gender.

I also picked up the new Heroes of Might and Magic game for the DS. I haven’t actually played a Heroes game properly since HoMM 4, since I had to return HoMM 5 since it never worked on my laptop, apparently due to some bugs, since I met the system specs and Oblivion used to work fine, which I’m sure was more graphically intense. Nevertheless, I’m told it returned more to the HoMM 3 type system, which I thought was inferior to 4, so it probably wasn’t much of a loss.

Back on topic, however, I’m very impressed with this game. It takes the classic, if tired HoMM like formulae, and forces a puzzle game down its throat, revitalising it in the process. Lining up columns of troops to attack and rows to defend, along with chain linking, merging, spells, artifacts, and both elite and champion class troops each with their own rules of engagement, and you have a very deep and fascinating strategy blend.

This is tagged onto a standard HoMM like map for exploration, recruiting, resource gathering and quests. Most of the standard sides return, with Haven, Academy, Necropolis, Sylvan and Inferno, creating a pentagon of wholly different sides that in some ways feel similar to the five colours from Magic the Gathering.

I’m currently on Godric’s campaign, which is a step up in difficulty from Anwen’s, I have to say, as his requires a much more defensive playstyle with his slower charging troops and damage prevention spell. Fortunately, you can get XP for solving puzzles too in this game, which helps in the more difficult battles. It’ll be interesting to play the more ‘evil’ sides after completing this, I should imagine.

To finish, I also created a new wallpaper again for you to use.
Its Ruri Matsuri, a new God girl and student council president from the latest Shuffle! game, Shuffle Essence+:

As always, click the above to see it full sized

Unfortunately, I’m told that Ruri doesn’t actually get a route in the game, which is kinda odd since they’re using her for the advertisment in Dengeki Hime. Whatever. In case you were wondering, this game is basically a revised version of the original shuffle, with a stack of extra girls thrown in and some slight amendments to the routes of the original girls. Most of the new ladies are God girls, actually. But then again, they already did a side game featuring the Demon world (Shuffle! Tick! Tack!) so I suppose its just. Or something.

And yes, you can actually romance Kareha-sempai now (hopefully complete with her ‘brrrinng, brrrinng, brrrinng!’ noise and her sparklies):

“Mai! Mai! MAI!” <brrrinng, brrrinng, brrrinng!> etc.

Which is perhaps the best development, since she was the most amusing character, IMHO.

Anyway, thats all for today. Cya again soon.

The Late Late Midseason post

Urk, well its actually episode 9 territory right now, so my usual midseason post is…uh…two weeks late. Dang!

Oh well, you can put it down to either laziness or negligence if you want. Both are probably applicable, LOL.

Regardless, I’ll put one up anyways. Perhaps it’ll help you in picking up something you may have missed, perhaps?

The current inhabitants of my slots are:

Nyan Koi!

Kotone is actually pretty disturbing…LOL

Well, its definately a Harem Comedy. However, it has continued to impress me and make me laugh, and evidently takes a cue from things such as Akane Iro Somaru Saka since it manages to cover all of the cliches in a refreshing way. And,  it does have a unique distinction: the main protagonist, Junpei, is definately 100% focused on Kaede, despite all the other girls pining for his attention, which is a rare and positive quality in the hero of an anime like this. I know I’ve said it a thousand times, but good, strong male leads REALLY make a good Harem Anime. They are the foundation on which the love polygon is built, after all, so if they’re an idiotic pervert/loser, the whole concept collapses unless you assume each girl is retarded. This even manages to have a good underlying subplot with the cats, too, though, adding to its quality.

Anyway, its going well, and assuming they don’t go for a undecided finish, it’ll probably be quite satifying.

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A Certain Scientific Railgun

Kuroko finally got to show off a bit in this last episode, by telefragging a building using its OWN panes of glass. No really. ROFL.

Hmm, this floundered around a little bit to begin with (that is to say, around episode 2 and 3 was…odd), but pulled itself out of the mire and eventually got its act together with some plot. Unlike alot of people, I actually enjoyed Touma and his righteousness in Index (but then I see an ideal of myself in such characters, since I’m also a stubborn optimist).

Nevertheless, its surprising to hear how many people suddenly like his character now in this compared to before based on his interactions (i.e. fights) with Mikoto. The highlight of these was her creation of a frickin’ Chain Sword by magnetising iron filings in the sand around her. LOL. Nevertheless, the Imagine Breaker always beats her best efforts.

On other topics, Uiharu and Saten, the new girls still haven’t really shown their colours, leaving most of the smackdown to Mikoto and Kuroko whilst offering a primarily support role. Not that this is neccessarily bad, but I’m itching to see what their actual ESPer abilities are. We can assume Uiharu does something with growth or flowers, but Saten is pretty mysterious as another proper level zero. (However, the level upper plotline is building to a climax which may well show us something, I’d assume, even if I want to slap Saten for her stupidity in accepting the bait).

Kuroko… well I’d don’t know what to say about her. Her perversion regarding Mikoto just crosses so far over the line it goes right through disturbing and returns to being funny, I guess. Especially the whole headdesk incident at the resturant.

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Letter Bee

Niche’s Sword Hair is awesome! Don’t mess with the MakaLoli!

I had some reservations about this to begin with since Lag’s incessant crying can and will grate even the most patient of observers. However, I guess, at some point, I just stopped noticing the tears and realised that actually, the plot on this is pretty meaty. I guess Niche’s introduction as inevitable inaugation as Lag’s ‘Dingo’ also helped tremendously, since she is such a simple minded but fascinating character.

I now get the feeling that Lag is actually a very strong character too. It may not fit the pre-concieved notion of being ‘manly’, but his ability to cry about stuff and move on without much hesitation in his stride is actually very admirable. He’s also demonstated that he can be a prodigy in the Tegami Bachi world too, able to shoot Shindan from his arms (not needing a gun like others) and realise what others need to attain closure.

This is also definately set up for the long haul (i.e. 26 episodes), which is nice. I hope it’ll continue to entertain me.

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Kimi No Todoke

When Sawako forces a smile…something just doesn’t quite work, eh?

As noted before, I decided to drop 11 eyes in favour of this. And…I’m very glad I did.

Its just…well… I can’t find fault at all in it. Perfect comedic timing, just enough angst, an adorable (if dense) female lead, a strong (if selfish) male lead, excellent use of chibification to enhance scenes, and an amusing supporting cast. Its got everything one needs in a proper romantic comedy and since I’m a sucker for such things, I’m literally hoovering up every second of it.

I realise such things are hardly everyone’s cup of tea, but if you’d like a fine example of romance, look no further.

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Fairy Tail

Scary Natsu is scary. Or something.

Interesting and exciting. Two terms that perfectly encapsulate what Fairy Tail is. In the same way that Kimi no Todoke can get me all swooning and fuzzy every time, I can barely watch ten minutes of this and NOT be grinning inanely from ear to ear like a hyper little boy. It may not dig deep, but it hits hard and you feel every punch.

One thing that is interesting to note is that you can almost ’see’ the manga chapters behind this. There are very obvious mini-arcs and they don’t attempt to illustrate parts that the manga didn’t (with the whole ‘and then…’ moments), presumably to keep the show moving and action thick and fast. It works quite well, it has to be said, though it would be nice if they let you pause to catch you breath more often!

My only concern is Natsu’s propensity for overusing his small handful of FMV attacks. He really needs a bigger repotoire or more moments like the one from the most recent episode where he grabs onto a railbridge with a flaming hand.

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Seiken no Blacksmith

Yes, at last, you realised your obvious character flaw, Cecily!

Somewhat like Letter Bee, this started with very little momentum. I was considering dropping it, in fact, because it was getting pretty retarded. Then, in a similar fashion to the aformentioned, it all started to click into place around episode 4. Aria appears, Cecily shouts her title less and stops getting beaten up as much, Luke being a jerk takes up less of an episode, Lisa gets some marginal development, etc.

Its never really gotten over some of its comical flaws, but I appreciate its courage in not even attempting to lampshade or handwave them away. And the above screenshot made me far more satisfied on whole with Cecily, too. Now, if only Luke will do something similar. He’s just an eyesore in my opinion at the moment, unfortunately, and we don’t even know why.

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Book of Bantorra

Enlike brings new meanings to ‘Thunder Palm’. Or something.

I can’t actually ascertain why I’m still not pissed off with Bantorra. I somehow get the feeling that…well…its out of control whilst knowing exactly where its going, if that makes any sense.

I watch each episode in a vague sense of confusion, after all. Its like the anime version of the movie Memento…fragmented all over the place with only the viewer able to properly pick up the pieces. Something which is difficult given that it has no real appreciation for the 4th dimension, and from my perspective it felt a little like the first arc concluded too much in a rush only for it to crash headlong into the second.

So…I don’t know. I feel like I enjoy it, but it confuses me. It may well be that at the end, some amazing revelation will occur and everything will suddenly make sense and this will be the anime of season, or it may well be that it just ends up being a confusing pile of junk. Until we find out, I’m strangely interested, and at the very least its pretty. Yeah.

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And there you go, midseason special over. Thats all for now, hope you had an enjoyable read and all that. I might be doing another Visual Novel Diary soon of Syarin no Kuji: Himiwari no Shoujo, which I just started playing on the side, so stay tuned, eh?

 

The White Devil of Fafnir

Hey guys, I’m back with yet another artsy post today (you may have noticed that the Unsorted Page was updated again a few days back with all the updates of recent times).

As per usual with my sketching arm, it seems to be most inspired shortly after I’ve completed a spree with reading novels. In this case, I recently finished Brandon Sanderson’s The Final Empire, which I thought was most intreguing. And I decided to sketch the other important NPC from my long running 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons campaign: Zakura Fafnir, the so called ‘White Devil’ of Renais, heir to the trade union great house of Fafnir, and Dark Warlock superior. Check her out:

As always, click it to get a bigger version.

As you might guess, she is done in a very similar style to the similar sketch I did of Alicia Silverscale (whom is also in the party)

As explained in an age old post, my setting, Retoria, has no elves, but instead has a few non-traditional races of my own devising: Auricans, Drakahn and Necrists.

Zakura is an Aurican, which is a race of half-Human, half-Yinn (spirit) borne from a magical cataclysm that occured in the final days of the Spirit Wars. They appear human, but are slim like Eladrin and yet also tall like Drakahn. All Auricans have shock-white hair but their eyes can be practically any colour of the spectrum. Their other distinguishing features are their star-shaped pupils and pale white skin which glows luminescently in moonlight and the presence of high magic. You can READ the race article I created for the campaign HERE, if you like. It goes into more detail about the biology and stats.

She showed up in the campaign somewhat later than Alicia did. Shortly after returning from the Western isles of Golgotha, the party re-entered the service of Gordon Rosalind, and after some diplomatic process found themselves in charge of the re-development of the island of Hassan, which is a natural fortress (and which they had cleared a necromancer out of previously…literally blowing the top off of one of the castle towers in the process -_-;)

Of course, to prevent dissent, this reconstruction had to be approved by each of the three great Houses of the mercantile islands of Renais: Rosalind, Veruna and Fafnir. Naturally, Gordon Rosalind was not an issue (an early part of the campaign involved them rescuing his young daughter whom was going to be used as a sacrifice and then also basically becoming privateers for Rosalind in his employ).

Christopher Veruna also wasn’t too hard since they had already gained the trust of his lover, Liliana Lunlun LuGunther.

Souten Fafnir, however was a much tougher nut to crack. It was only through some expert diplomacy he even conceded. Then, Zakura, his daughter and heir, was sent to find issues with the project. Amazingly, however, she gained grudging respect for the party after the Fighter managed to out-intimidate her (!) and then she was defeated in one-on-one combat by the Swordmage.

After this, she decided it would be amusing to follow the party, much to their chagrim. However, since she is perpetually surrounded by reverent flunkies and minions, at least they didn’t need any new crew for the ship for awhile. LOL. She seems to continually be chasing the Fighter of the party and either beating the crap out of him or showering him in arcane worms ever since the incident when he walked in on her in the hotsprings (LOL). She also seems to have a strange friend/foe/rival/enemy relationship with Alicia. Nevertheless, she also became rather useful when the party needed to get into Hell, being a Warlock and knowledgable about such things.

Her manner is haughty, arrogant and ill-tolerant of idiots; but quite willing and able to use all the tools at her disposal to achieve maximum impact in her own agenda. That obviously includes her natural beauty~ the 40 odd minions she has that get used as basically cannon fodder and footstools obviously have some reason for being that way, eh?

I guess it should also be noted that Warlocks of all varieties in my setting gain a ‘Fzvir’ (pronounced Veer), which is a large tattoo along their right arm as an expression of their contract (usually with an angel of a certain deity~ Infernal Contracts with Saulm, Star with Kinah, Fey with Corticarte and Dark contracts with Dahlia). It seems to be a pseudo-living thing, which writhes, snake-like, along the skin, when a Warlock casts a spell.

And, to match Alicia, I also made Zakura into a Wallpaper version:

Just in case you want an Arousing Aurican for you desktop (makes a set with the Desirable Drakahn, LOL).

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In other news, this article on the Wall Street Journal paints an interesting picture of how the Anime Industry has also been feeling the smackdown from the current recession, with an 18% drop in the industry sales between 2006 and 2008. Most anime veterans like myself are aware of the fact that being a key frame animator for an animation studio is like slave labour (I certainly wouldn’t want to do it…its like 45 hours a week for £9,000 a year [thats, what... $12,000 for you Americans?]), but by the sounds of it, things are getting worse in the current climate thanks to wonders of outsourcing. Nevertheless, I don’t really agree with this articles opinion that Anime is going more dark and brutal. If anything, Naughties Anime has been MORE bright and cheerful than Nineties Anime on the whole.

Anyways, thats all for today. Stay tuned.

Fire and Ice Wallpaper Special

Hmm, its been awhile since I’ve posted any artworks or wallpapers.

And actually, theres little reason for that, since I’ve had a few in the cabinet gathering dust for a little while now, just waiting for them to be posted with a sufficient reason to do so… However, today, I completed a new one which allows me to do a special post, whee.

And yeah, its the Fire and Ice cliche. Do I love stereotypes too  much? Probably. Oh well.

Anyways, enough needless twitter from me. Here’s the actual stuff. As per usual, they’re 1440 x 900 widescreen.

Don’t forget to click the image to see it full size!

First of all, have a flaming hot shax-able Shana wallpaper:

Since Shana used to grace Detarame’s main banner for over a year, you’d be correct in thinking she’s one of my favourite anime characters of all time. After all, she sort of started the recent loli tsundere trend that carried on with Louise, Nagi, Taiga etc. (most of these with the same voice actress, for extra immersion factor, LOL). She is of course famous for her obsession with Melon-pan and her penchant for saying ‘Urusai! Urusai! Urusai!’ (aka. ‘Shut Up! Shut Up! Shut Up!’).

Anyway, as for the wallpaper, I just had the idea to actually place her in a ring of fire after seeing that above picture of her sitting in the coat with Alastor. Adding Nietono no Shana (her sword) stuck in the ground in front slightly off camera also seemed to come naturally. After that, various masking effects were added, and eventually, the other image of her in flame haze form from the first artbook was added. Finally, this is a picture almost made for the ‘Blazed’ font. LOL.

Secondly, its the icy expression of the pair, a Blanc Neige Wallpaper:

Blanc Neige is from Shining Tears (and Shining Wind, in an older, longer haired form) and is one of Tony Taka’s more famous character designs. She is the big blaster mage in that, obviously using a huge amount of ice against everything. Though I can’t actually comment on her effectiveness, since I’ve not actually played the game.

I guess this image has done plenty of rounds. I’m quite sure its been in several other wallpapers not made by me, which is why, I guess, it took such a while for me to get around to implementing it. That said, I did alot more touch-up on it than some may have done from the original. Most notably, her skin tone was made paler, the edges were slightly re-drawn and softened, and her cape was re-colourised slightly. The background ended up alot simpler than the Shana paper, but I thought that just the production art and snowflakes were sufficient. Again, this was a good chance to use my favourite icy font as well.

Anyway, thats about all for today. I’ll probably update the Unsorted page with this stuff in the next couple of days too. And maybe they’ll be some more sketch related goodness in due course. So, see ya then.